From The Wham Articles:
It was pretty well-known that the complexities of football preparation and gameplay had passed Bobby Bowden a long time ago.
The current head coach of the Florida State Seminoles is allegedly planning to announce his resignation tomorrow, according to sources from ESPN. He has many coaches on his staff, and although as figure he is one of the most powerful and influential people in college sports, it has been questioned how much influence he has on his football team’s day-to-day operations.
If you don’t believe, here is a quote from Mr. Bowden in 2005 after a loss to the Gators:
“I don’t feel like I need to be as hands-on as I used to be. In the old days everything started and stopped with me, but now I have a good staff of assistants. Real dependable guys. Hell, I don’t need to wear no headsets or crazy microphones during games. I don’t have to do jack shit. I can just stand there and read the paper if I want. Or better yet, have one of my assistants read it for me.”
Also remember the infamous transcript where he forgot the score to a game against Clemson earlier this year ( re-printing transcript ):
Bowden: “Both of us made errors. We probably scored on some of their errors — I didn’t keep up with it. But we’d turn the ball over and they’d go down and score. Then we’d turn it over and they didn’t score. They’d turn it over back. And the game kind of went that way. We felt very comfortable. We knew it was a battle.
“How late was it 24-21 in our favor? How late did it get? Did that get into the fourth quarter?”
Reporter: “Nine and a half minutes left.”
Bowden: “Left in the game?”
Reporter: “Yes.”
Bowden: “So you’re feeling comfortable, but you know that it ain’t won yet. Then of course the dam broke.”
A few minutes later, Bowden was asked this question by another reporter.
Reporter: “In the second half, when it seemed like momentum started to switch, how hard was it to try to reverse that?”
Bowden: “You mean when they got it (momentum)? Well, actually … you know, they had to kick off to us. We had a what? A three-point ….? Did we have the lead at the half?”
(Reporter nods).
Bowden: “We had a three-point lead at the half, I think. Then they had to kick off to us. We needed to take it down and win the darn game right there. We didn’t do it. They stopped us. Then we kicked it to them and then they probably scored.”
Reporter: “They went ahead and then you guys came back.”
Bowden: “Huh?”
Reporter: “They went ahead and then you guys came back again.”
Bowden: “Did we get ahead of them again after that?”
Reporter: “Yeah.”
Bowden: “Then we got back ahead, huh? Umm, it was going that way, you know it? I felt very comfortable that if they could score, we could score. That’s the way I felt, you know it? We’ve done it all year. But then we started turning the ball over.”
Transcript from Deadspin.com
Would you want Bobby to have an extension to coach your team if he isn’t really coaching? Do you think he still means something to the program, considering he built the thing from scratch?
