EDITOR’S NOTE: Florida football coach Urban Meyer will step down after the Jan. 1, 2011, Outback Bowl game against Penn State. “…I appreciate the sacrifices my 24/7 profession has demanded of me,” he said. “I know it is time to put my focus on family and my life away from the field. The decision to step down was a difficult one.”
This column originally ran on Dec. 27, 2009, when Meyer — a three-time national coach of the year — originally said he was planning on leaving coaching. Note that statistics are as of that date. Meyer’s current overall record is 103-23 and 64-15 at Florida.
At first blush, the first quarter century of their college football coaching careers look eerily similar for Joe Paterno and Urban Meyer.
Paterno was an assistant coach for 16 years (all of them at Penn State). Meyer was an assistant coach for 15 years (at Ohio State, Illinois State, Colorado State and Notre Dame, with five years at each of the last two stops).
As assistants, they spent their time with the passing game, Paterno coaching the quarterbacks while Meyer worked primarily with the receivers.
In their first 23 games as a head coach, Paterno was 15-7-1 at Penn State; at that stage Meyer was 17-6 and out the door from Bowling Green to a new head coaching job at Utah.
After their first 47 games as a head coach, Paterno was 37-9-1 at Penn State; Meyer was 39-8 at two universities and out the door from Utah (22-2) to a new head coaching job at Florida.
Early in his career, Paterno thought about leaving for another job, in the pros — especially to New England – but after a sleepless night, he turned down the Patriots. “At least you slept with a millionaire for one night,” said Joe to wife Sue the next morning. That was in 1973, after seven seasons as a head coach at Penn State.
After five years at Bowling Green and Utah, Meyer left in 2005 for Gainesville, Fla. His seven-year contract with the Gators was for a reported $14 million that eventually grew to $3.25 million a year. (Paterno’s base salary in 2008 was a reported $1.037 million — after 59 years with one employer and 43 years as head coach at that point.)
After serving as head coach for 113 games — the 1966 through the 1975 seasons, all at Penn State — Paterno had a record of 94-18-1. That’s a winning percentage of .836.
In his 113 games and three stops as a head coach, Meyer has a 95-18 record heading into his last game — a Sugar Bowl contest against Cincinnati. That’s a winning percentage of .840.
In his first 113 games, Paterno had three undefeated seasons, a pair of No. 2 rankings and a one-loss campaign. (Many say those 2’s should have been 1’s.)
In his first 113 games, Meyer had one undefeated season, a pair of No. 1 rankings and three one-loss campaigns.
The announcement by Meyer, 45, that he was taking a leave of absence from coaching due to health issues stunned the sports world. He was born in 1964.
Paterno, 83, continues to amaze the sports world as he continues to coach. He was born in 1926 and became head coach in 1966, when Meyer was 2.
This may seem like a Lincoln and Kennedy type of thing. You know: Lincoln had a secretary named Kennedy who told him not to go to the theater. Kennedy had a secretary named Lincoln who told him not to go to Dallas. (Both, by the way, are urban legends.)
There’s a catch: Urban may be a very good — nay, nearly great — coach. But Paterno is a legend.
And not just for accumulating a record that includes two national championships, a record 23 bowl game victories and a major college record 393 wins.
I don’t need to tell you what Paterno has done off the field, albeit with much more time and accrued income than Meyer. The dollars he’s donated. The causes he’s espoused. The stances he’s taken. The people he’s inspired. For 44 years, Paterno’s won like an Urban and led like a Kennedy.
The thing with Joe, he’s done it and he’s done it often. And then he’s done it again. And again.
By Paterno’s sixth season, a book called “Football My Way” was written about the Penn State coach. In it, the Grand Experiment received its first national audience; it was the assumption, put into practice by Paterno, that football players could also be legitimate students, excelling in such outlets like the arts, ala poster boy Mike Reid. It also said that the coach, while a firm leader, could also be a regular Joe called by his first name by his players.
In 1973, entering Paterno’s eighth season as a head coach, Sports Illustrated’s William Johnson had this to say about the Nittany Lion coach:
“Most of the worship around Paterno the football coach does not arise from the fact that he has the best winning percentage of any major college football coach in America (73-13-1). Nor does it arise from the 12 All-Americas he has produced in the past seven years nor from the 12 Penn State alumni now starting on NFL teams. Nor does it arise entirely from his kinetic personality nor from his quick intelligence. The admiration for Joe Paterno springs mostly from the fact that he is a man who seems to speak truthfully and with candor and who does not believe that money is the root of all the fruits of life.”
Three years later, entering his 10th season in 1976, Sports Illustrated featured the coach again. This time, D. Keith Mano followed Paterno on the recruiting trail and got so close to the coach that Mano slept in Joe’s hotel room on a cot. The writer delivered this report:
“A winner can talk out, he can be a gadfly. (But) Paterno has influenced recruiting. He advocated — loudly, stubbornly, long before others — a number of changes that have been adopted in recent years: A limit on football grants-in-aid. …A limit on campus visits. …A limit (three) on player-coach, player-alumnus contacts off campus…”
In its Dec. 7, 2009, issue, Sports Illustrated profiled Meyer. It was a balanced piece, moreso than the aforementioned pieces about Paterno. It detailed Meyer’s tirades that produced excruciating headaches. It also chronicled “the 28 Florida football arrests on Meyer’s watch.”
In the story, there was nothing close to the 1970s sonnets to Paterno. That’s because there’s been no one close to Paterno.
Granted, Paterno had his own on-the-field struggles with wayward players. In the past tense. Overall, they were a blip in his 60-year screen. Paterno, too, has had his health issues: broken leg, injured hip, rehab as an octogenarian.
And to be fair, Meyer has been an active philanthropist, co-chairing a Florida Opportunity Scholars Program and funding an endowed scholarship to benefit the Utah football program.
So, this is not meant to kick Meyer while he’s a difficult crossroads. He has been an extraordinary coach, taking the Gators to the national championship in 2006 and 2008. His winning percentage (.841) is the highest among all active coaches with a minimum of five years at a FBS program.
But to paraphrase Joe’s son’s favorite politician: No need to be against Urban Meyer; this is really about being for Joe Paterno.
Paterno has his health. And he has hundreds of career victories, a winning percentage of .751 and a 50-13 record since the start of the 2005 season. It is all so impressive.
But lest we forget: When Paterno was at Meyer’s stage of his career, Joe was just warming up.
