Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

I admit to not knowing much about him or his coaching style while he was at Bowling Green, Utah, Florida, and Ohio State other than the fact that he was successful. His first season in all four of those programs were improvements over the previous season. He'd won three National Championships and amassed an incredible .853 winning %, good for 8th all time among college coaches.

There were some troublesome hints that would surface at times during his collegiate career. In 2010 there was a Sporting News investigative report regarding a supposed toxic culture that developed under Meyer in Florida. In 2018 he was suspended for three games for "failing to take sufficient management action" when they found out an assistant coach may have been abusive towards his wife. So there were little signs that despite the winning, Meyer perhaps didn't run the most respectable and ethical of ships. Still the wins kept piling up

But what transpired in Jacksonville was an absolute three ring circus. I don't think anyone anticipated such an embarrassing failure so soon, and Meyers own behavior exposed him as an immature phony. His outright incompetence and lack of awareness is what really shocked me and you saw it right from the get-go. Calling NFL scouts lazy in that article (while his scouts were in the room) Somehow not being familiar with players like Aaron Donald (how is that humanly possible?!), signing TIM TEBOW. Hiring a strength and conditioning coach who was forced to resign a day later when former players came forward with accounts of him being a racist and bully. Forbidding his players from speaking to the opponent on the field before the game and ordering them to dunk the ball over the crossbar if they scored. Not flying home with the team after a loss and then being caught partying at a bar with a woman that's not his wife, kicking Josh Lambo

I see behavior like this and I just can't reconcile in my head how he was ever able to have such long, lasting success at the collegiate level. It's hard to explain...and honestly I believe it might be due to some sort of cognitive decline he may have suffered due to the brain cyst (or whatever that is) that was discovered years ago. Not sure if anything has happened health wise since that perhaps wasn't disclosed to the media...but something may be going on there that needs to be looked at. His behavior was just outrageous.

Maybe it's the Michigan guy in me showing through, but I always thought Meyers was an egotistical asshole. He got his comeuppance trying to treat grown-ass men like they're 19-yr-old sophomores on the bus to Ann Arbor. I'm always happy to see phonies and bullies get a kick in the nuts.

And how on God's green earth does an NFL coach not know who Aaron Donald is!!! That was maybe the most shocking thing I read about Meyers. It'd be like an incoming HC in 1967 talking about the Colts, "Say, I hear number 19, this Johnny Vitalis guy, is pretty good throwing the ball."

Yeah, I just read the article and that's exactly what I thought -- who doesn't know about Aaron Donald? A nine-year-old kid knows about Aaron Donald.

I'm not an Urban Meyer fan at all but I don't know how that's possible because Donald had one of the greatest defensive college seasons of all time while Meyer was coaching Ohio State. He also won virtually every defensive POY award. You'd think he heard of him then. But maybe he didn't know what he'd done in pro ball.

sheajets wrote:
I see behavior like this and I just can't reconcile in my head how he was ever able to have such long, lasting success at the collegiate level. It's hard to explain...and honestly I believe it might be due to some sort of cognitive decline he may have suffered due to the brain cyst (or whatever that is) that was discovered years ago. Not sure if anything has happened health wise since that perhaps wasn't disclosed to the media...but something may be going on there that needs to be looked at. His behavior was just outrageous.

Because if a college coach is successful he is basically a demi-god. No one will challenge him and he will be protected. The collage athletes aren't going to speak out they have scholarships and potential NFL careers to consider. Administration won't say anything because if they do boosters will call for their heads. Only way it does happen is if someone like a police officer or asst. coach is not cowed into not saying anything ( Paterno & Petrino). Once you go pro the curtain is pulled back and guys like Lou Holtz, Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer are exposed for what they are. Although Holtz and Spurrier are not even close to being in Meyers league when it comes to abject stupidity.

JKelly wrote:.
Because if a college coach is successful he is basically a demi-god. No one will challenge him and he will be protected. The collage athletes aren't going to speak out they have scholarships and potential NFL careers to consider. Administration won't say anything because if they do boosters will call for their heads. Only way it does happen is if someone like a police officer or asst. coach is not cowed into not saying anything ( Paterno & Petrino). Once you go pro the curtain is pulled back and guys like Lou Holtz, Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer are exposed for what they are. Although Holtz and Spurrier are not even close to being in Meyers league when it comes to abject stupidity.

And, the sad thing about the Paterno situation wasn't just Sandusky. There was a crazy player on his team in the late-70's that was raping women:

https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story ... ng-justice

7DnBrnc53 wrote:

JKelly wrote:.
Because if a college coach is successful he is basically a demi-god. No one will challenge him and he will be protected. The collage athletes aren't going to speak out they have scholarships and potential NFL careers to consider. Administration won't say anything because if they do boosters will call for their heads. Only way it does happen is if someone like a police officer or asst. coach is not cowed into not saying anything ( Paterno & Petrino). Once you go pro the curtain is pulled back and guys like Lou Holtz, Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer are exposed for what they are. Although Holtz and Spurrier are not even close to being in Meyers league when it comes to abject stupidity.

And, the sad thing about the Paterno situation wasn't just Sandusky. There was a crazy player on his team in the late-70's that was raping women:

https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story ... ng-justice

Ouch! Just read the whole thing, 7Dn! And, coincidentally, I just read this very SI article weeks ago...

https://vault.si.com/vault/1980/03/17/t ... penn-state

Never really knew of this guy and upon reading this, here, '79 SI piece again, he's hardly mentioned! A while back I watched that 1978 '60 Minutes' piece on Paterno and Penn St which aired the night (New Year's Eve) before their National Championship game vs Bryant's Crimson Tide! He was made out to be a Saint, for sure.

Never was an apologist for Paterno in the Sandusky scandal though never blaming just him. My rationale for continual PSU football fandom was that there was Penn St football before he arrived, and Penn St football afterwards. It's not James Franklin's fault nor Bill O'Brien's. But I almost stopped being a fan at the time (2011) and this ESPN article, here, serves as quite the double-dip!

It took a child sex-abuse scandal for the hammer to finally fall (and even that took too long to reach the surface)!