Appearance wise, Penn State’s Joe Paterno and Florida’s Urban Meyer couldn’t be more different. It was more than manifest at their joint press conference the week of the Outback Bowl game.
Paterno is 84 and craggy. Also Ivy League educated. Wanted to be a lawyer back in the day.
He arrived rumpled in baggy khakis, a sweatshirt-like sweater and sneaks. His Brooklyn-accented speech is peppered with gesticulating “Ahhh, I dunno’s”–usually prefacing what he does know. When he’s not referenced as “legendary” or “iconic,” the winningest (major) college football coach of all time (401wins) is often called “curmudgeonly.” But he can wax insightful and even funny. Plus, audiences, including those comprised of sports writers, make allowances for 84-year-old,–ok, iconic–football coaches.
Meyer is 46 and cut Midwestern clean. Degrees from the University of Cincinnati and Ohio State. Always wanted to be a football coach.
Urbane Meyer came impeccably pressed out in a coat and tie. He could be a news anchor or a podium-savvy executive or an ESPN-analyst-in-waiting, which is the rumor. The Ashtabula, Ohio native is crisp, well modulated and concise in presentation. Likely would be as at ease going PowerPoint as using a blackboard. He was also professionally deferential to Paterno, who–besides just being Paterno–is given to more expansive responses with transition-challenged sidebars.
While Paterno’s humor is a mix of self deprecation, faux exasperation and friendly ethnic stereotypes, Meyer’s is more wry. In lauding Paterno for his longevity, Meyer noted that he “has known Coach Paterno longer than he has known me.”
Indeed, Meyer became a head coach when George W. Bush was president. When Paterno became a head coach, Lyndon B. Johnson was president. And Meyer was two years old.
And in a pattern-defying dynamic, the younger coach has had enough and is calling it quits for all those well-chronicled, health-and-family reasons. Meanwhile, college football’s village elder plans to coach on.
“I haven’t even thought of it; I honestly don’t know,” said Paterno of purported plans to step down after 61 years of coaching at Penn State. You’d think he’d been asked if he planned to take in a hockey game while in town.
And yet.
While not exactly the mod couple, these two uber successful coaches are very much in sync where it counts. There’s mutual respect. They’re winners. But it’s more than the four national championships they equally divide. There’s an aura of class that is part of their presence, that transcends their winning ways. Lane Kiffin would never understand.
Despite a chronological difference of almost four decades, both, for example, are “old school” when it comes to the game they love. Both reflect almost nostalgically back to a time when the game was more team oriented. When a lot of high school players didn’t have a case of the look-at-me’s before arriving on campus. “Good guys doing it the right way,” as Meyer put it.
“I’m worried about the game,” Paterno acknowledged. He meant that “sacrificing for the team,” for example, is no longer the given it used to be. And there are vested interests, he bemoaned, who are “only in it for the entertainment of TV.” He cited the Insight Bowl game (Dec. 28) in Tempe, Ariz., between Iowa and Missouri. “It comes on at 10:00,” pointed out Paterno. “I’ll be asleep.”
They both are pleased that the game now includes instant replay review. “I’m in favor of it. It’s worked out great,” assessed Meyer.
“The game has changed,” said Paterno, who was a factor in lobbying for instant replay. In fact, the Big Ten was the first conference to implement it in 2004. “It’s more spread out today; there’s more motion,” explained Paterno. “It’s a very difficult job for officials to see everything.”
But back to basics.
Given his swan-song setting, Meyer went out on his own, set-the-record-straight-forever-more terms. After extolling the virtues of “fantastic hire” Will Muschamp, his successor, he made his point. “Our players our fine now,” he underscored. “I’ve really enjoyed these last two weeks. …This is OUR team till 8 p.m. Jan. 1.” Moreover: “I’ll always be a Gator.”
Before shuffling off to Jesuit High to preside over yet another practice before the 692nd game he’s coached at PSU, Paterno also lobbed in a final, vintage musing: “Hey, next time let me know if Beau Brummell’s going to be here.”