Urban Meyer was one of the greatest College Football Coaches to ever wear a whistle. He won big wherever he was. Lifting the National Championship trophy, at Florida twice, and once at Ohio State. Meyer was also the Sporting News Coach of the decade for the 2000’s. His success made his name one that always floated around the NFL ranks for years. Shad Khan took the bait and made Meyer the head coach of his struggling Jacksonville Jaguars franchise.
The Jags had a what looked like an attractive situation. With the number one overall pick in the 2021 draft with Trevor Lawrence the Clemson Tigers star sitting out there. He went on to become the team’s first legitimate franchise quarterback since Mark Brunell.
The Jags also had a ton of salary cap space to go and make moves to improve the team and remake the roster in one off season. The Jags also had an additional first round pick to go with their number one overall pick.
Most would view the Jags off season was a waste with over 70 million dollars in salary cap space with-out landing any major free agents, and not getting any impact players out of the draft to help Trevor Lawrence. This lands on the shoulders of Meyer as he is seen as being the football operations CEO despite Trent Baalke serving as the team’s General Manager.
Before Urban Meyer could even Coach one regular season game as the Jags leader he hired a strength and conditioning Coach named Chris Doyle who was forced into a buyout by Iowa because of racist behavior towards black players. The Fritz Pollard Alliance, which exists to champion diversity in the NFL, denounced the hiring of Chris Doyle.
The NFL is made up of 70% African Americans, hiring a coach with a racist past is about tone deaf as it gets.
The troubles for Urban Meyer did not stop there. Once training camp began the controversy continued as Meyer brought in Tim Tebow his college quarterback at Florida in to try out for the team at tight end, which is a position that Tebow never played.
It was spun as Tebow being in tremendous shape and that he could bring leadership into the locker room, but around the league the decision was panned and Tebow ended up cut during training camp.
Going into week 15 the Jags sit at 2-11, and the team is in turmoil with Trevor Lawrence struggling and having to answer questions about his Coach. There have been reports that Meyer made negative comments about his assistant coaches calling them “losers”, and that he had a shouting match with one of his players, wide receiver Marvin Jones.
At a press conference when asked about the playing time of a Jacksonville’s third round draft pick, Meyer apparently did not know how much time Andre Cisco actually got to see on the field.
Let us not forget the time Meyer stayed behind and did not make the team plane so he could go to his own hometown bar in Cleveland where he was caught on camera flirting with a young woman that was not his wife.
Head Coaches are supposed to have trust, credibility, a concept of who is on the field and how much playing time they are receiving, and they must also be able to construct a roster that is capable of putting a winning team on the field. Meyer has failed on every front, his quarterback is not developing, and with all of the gaffes and personal failings of Coach the 2021 season has been an unmitigated disaster.
After getting the dreaded vote of confidence from the Jags ownership, more stories of dysfunction came out and the Khan family changed their minds and fired Coach Urban Meyer after only 11 games.
