Urban Renewal

For those folks that follow football in the college and professional arenas I’m sure that you heard about the firing of Jacksonville Jaguar head coach Urban Meyer. His less than one year at the helm was problematic. Note to yourself, if you plan to do any trips to your own bar late at night realize that if you are famous and the owner of the bar keep your hands to yourself because someone has a camera phone and they will use it. Just sayin’. Also don’t kick the kicker.

Meyer was a college football coach at Utah, Florida and Ohio State. Meyer had two highly successful seasons at Utah and would become the head guy at Florida. After six seasons at Florida which included two National Championships he resigned or retired due to health issues according to him. But there were accusations about Meyer and favoritism for certain players making the locker room a bit caustic.

Meyer sat out for a couple of seasons working for ESPN as a football commentator and analyst. Meyer found his way back into the college game for the 2012 season becoming the head coach at Ohio State with a locker room full of talent.

His first Buckeye team went undefeated but because of NCAA sanctions OSU wasn’t eligible to play in the post season. Two seasons later the Buckeyes would win the first four team playoff and become National Champions. Prior to the beginning of his 7th season as Buckeye head coach Meyer was placed on administrative leave by OSU after reports of his knowledge of spousal abuse by one of his assistant coaches. The board of trustees voted to suspend Meyer for the first three games of the 2018 season. That team went 12-1 winning the Big Ten Conference championship and a Rose Bowl victory. The team was not one of the four teams selected to play for the National Championship. Meyer resigned as head coach for the Buckeyes effective following the Rose Bowl game in 2019.

I’m not sure if the spousal abuse story was a factor in the final selection of teams or not.

Meyer became a college football analyst for Fox Sports for the 2019 and 2020 college football seasons. Meyer knows football that is for certain. Guys like Urban Meyer will always have the itch to be on the sideline coaching in a big game. Pro football owners are looking for that guy to come in and save a losing franchise. The Jacksonville Jaguars were the worst team in the league last year and had the number 1 pick in the NFL draft and Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence was going to be their pick. Naturally the Jags ownership thought that Urban Meyer with all of the success that he had grooming QBs would be a natural fit. Now they didn’t hire him to be the QB coach but they did hire him to be the Head Coach.

I often wonder what these owners are thinking when they go to the colleges to get head coaches. The success rate is not very good. Remember that Nick Saban and Dennis Erickson have had a ton of success at the college level but they had only average success at the pro level. The most likely reason is that they have more control as a head college coach than as a professional. The same can be said for Meyer. He didn’t become a bad coach but less than average talent can make anyone look bad and when the guys you are coaching are sometimes making more than the head coach…well so much for the motivating factor.

Coaching the Jacksonville Jaguars was something entirely new for Urban Meyer. He has been able to takeover programs that already had some good players. He was able to recruit, motivate and win at each of the places that he was head coach. His name popped up at several other schools that also had winning traditions. But like a lot of college head coaches with a winning record there will always be that challenge of wondering if they can make it in the NFL.

I would just say that no matter how much money they want to throw at you it’s not worth it. Even if they name a street after you it doesn’t mean you can fix the neighborhood.