Urban Meyer leaving Florida

[dolfan]

First, and this is the dead dog truth, I couldn't be HAPPIER that the attention is somewhere else. Anywhere else. I wish every single newspaper, TV network and journalist in America would vacate Tuscaloosa and then not bother to show up to Pasadena. I am just a little more glad than UF folks that the media is swarming around Texas Tech today.

I expect players to love their coaches. I haven't said one word to suggest they shouldn't. Again, my beef is the very public display of it. This is football. Football is football, and it is many things, but it is not a new age love-in, which is what Sunday's press conference looked like. The news story on Addazio this morning made it a point to note that he is, and this is their word, "emotive". It is the key word in the whole UF narrative, and it is --- and there's no other way to say it --- girly. It is the kind of display, and the kind of coverage, that belongs on ABC News Now (which, if you haven't watched that network, is all chicky-type news 24/7).

I prefer bursts of anger, testosterone filled rage and collisions that sound all the way to the press box and through the TV even. In other words, all I want them to do is play the game. Now, Tebow is a college player's player, and I've never said he wasn't. Meyer gets results --- you can't question the guy's coaching ability with 2 NCs inside 5 years. But, that's all the football stuff. I respect that in them.

It is the non-football stuff about which all this attention has been sought (and, Meyer sought attention about it or he would not have made a resignation announcement before the Sugar Bowl, and UF wouldn't have brought Tebow out for a conference on his change-of-mind seeing as he only has one game left and if Meyer is to return, he'll be there after Tebow is gone) that gets me.

Once upon a time, we never saw any backstories of the players and coaches in college ball, at least none to speak of. Now, (sigh), it is almost all we see. I just want them to practice and play and do their best to win. That's it. Where someone's story is particularly special, like Michael Oher for example, let them make movies about it. Brian Piccolo. John Cappaletti's little brother (remember 'Something for Joey'?). All that's great. But, it isn't football, and it wasn't covered and treated as if it is part of football itself. The constant man-love from Verne Lundquist and Gary Danielson over Tebow is over, thankfully. But, they'll find someone else (it was Phillip Fulmer before Tebow -- they always spoke in hushed tones and practically genuflected for him). I think it'd be an honor and a hoot to meet Tim Tebow. What he did with the young lady, Kelly something, at the awards a few weeks ago was special and heart-warming. And, it was promptly and correctly put in context of a red-carpet occasion. I don't want them to go on and on about it in a game or in the coverage of an upcoming game. Why? It isn't football. The Meyer resignation and un-resignation belongs in that special category of odd facts and bloopers, not in serious news and not in game coverage. It took on almost comedic tones Sunday with the love train.

I don't even like ---- and got mad enough to call my local affiliate on a Saturday afternoon during a Bama game ---- when they talk about Mark Ingram, Sr. being in jail. I know it is either an attempt at being poignant or a left-handed compliment to Mark, Jr. about success in the face of adversity, etc., to bring that up. I don't care which one, neither belongs in the game coverage. Just give me down and distance, sideline updates, replays, and x's and o's. Leave the special interest stuff up to someone else to play in a season ending retrospective that I can turn away from without having to miss some part of an actual game.

Just my .02.

[Rob]

It is the non-football stuff about which all this attention has been sought (and, Meyer sought attention about it or he would not have made a resignation announcement before the Sugar Bowl, and UF wouldn't have brought Tebow out for a conference on his change-of-mind seeing as he only has one game left and if Meyer is to return, he'll be there after Tebow is gone) that gets me.

Dolfan,

What facts do you have that Meyer sought attention?

For me, this story is a lot better than the one coming out of Lubbock right now. It's certainly better than the eye gouging story that came of out Gainsville earlier and better than the story of Dunlap that happened earlier this month.

[dolfan]

"I have given my heart and soul to coaching college football and mentoring young men for the last 24-plus years and I have dedicated most of my waking moments the last five years to the Gator football program," Meyer said in a statement. "I have ignored my health for years, but recent developments have forced me to re-evaluate my priorities of faith and family."

He upstaged his own BCS bowl game, for one. He then backtracked on that one day later, and also before the Sugar Bowl, but instead of simply making a statement or just manning up and coming out to handle the matter on his own with his superiors, he brought Tebow -- a departing player who really has nothing to do with the future of Urban Meyer -- out with him. Tebow is the ultimate fashion accessory (and, as kind as he may be, he is still a commodity and Meyer used him on Sunday for that reason).

Meyer could've handled the u-turn with a press release. Would it have caused all sorts of questions? Sure. But, he could've avoided all that in the first place by postponing his resignation announcement until after the Sugar Bowl. He's the chum in the water and he knows exactly where the sharks are.

Let's look at a timeline:

Dec. 25 – Meyer has a pretty much watershed chat with his family, with whom he decides he needs to quit football for “health reasons".

Dec. 26 – UF releases a statement early Saturday evening that Meyer is calling it quits. The now-infamous statement about priorities, health, family, etc. is released. He tells the New York Times, “I saw it as a sign from God that this was the right thing to do”. Pretty big statement to make.

Dec. 27 – Meyer meets with the team before flying to New Orleans, and after seeing them take the practice field, he decides he isn’t quitting. He’s going to simply take a “leave of absence.” Ironically, he doesn't even consult his wife in making the decision. Earlier in the very same day, the Orlando Sentinel runs a story quoting Mrs. Meyer as saying there was "no chance" he would reconsider.

Dec. 27 - Late afternoon: At presser in New Orleans, Meyer tells reporters, when asked if he'll be on the Gator sideline in 2010, "I do believe that'll happen". He emphasized that by saying he believes it "in my gut." He brings Tebow out with him --- for some unknowable reason. Tebow drones on and on about how Meyer is like a father to him and the team, love, love, love (even SI's Pat Forde called it the "We Love Us press conference"), and how Tebow thinks the LOA is the right decision --- evidently reversing God's earlier decision that resignation was the way to go??? (I can't answer that, but Meyer has made it a question; Tebow isn't to blame on that because he's a just a young guy given to great emotional statements anyway.)


I read a funny joke. What's the difference between Brett Favre and Urban Meyer? Everyone's allowed to make fun of Brett Favre. Evidently, you can't do that with Meyer or even Tebow.

More seriously, though, when asked, "Have the doctors specifically told you to get away from football?", Meyer refused to answer. Personally, I think he was told exactly that. If he was, then he's just made his own row a lot harder to hoe, seems to me. If he wasn't, then he did the right thing in refusing to answer because of all the negative attention that would bring on him; and, his critics would probably be right in large measure.

Bottom line: He could've waited to announce anything. He could've taken the time he said he took to make the resignation decision in making the leave of absence decision, and wouldn't have let his wife look like a dupe and not let her be the last one in the loop of his newly suddenly all-important family to know what he was doing. He could've avoided all of the fodder he's created for those recruiting against him. He could've handled it without dragging Tim Tebow into the middle of it before his last game as a Gator.

But, he didn't. He created this commotion around himself. People do what they want. I'd have a hard time believing Meyer is being driven by anybody but himself.

[Rob]

Okay.