CHICAGO — Ohio State head football coach Urban Meyer spoke on day two of the Big Ten Football Media Days. He addressed several topics of interest, specifically Monday’s firing of wide receivers coach Zach Smith. Meyer also touched on some personnel issues as well. You can catch all of the highlights of his 15-minute press conference below. We will have much more coverage today’s event throughout the day.
+ “Obviously I had to make a change on our coaching staff yesterday. It was in the best interest of our team.”
+ In 2009, Zach Smith was an intern for Meyer at Florida. He and his wife were a young couple at the time. Meyer and his wife Shelley were both involved in trying to help Zach and his wife at the time. Counseling was advised.
+ Regarding the 2015 situation that has been reported or rumored, Meyer has found nothing to that report.
+ The decision about Zach Smith’s replacement will be announced later in the week. He hasn’t even addressed it with his entire staff yet.
+ “The decision was made and it’s time to move forward.”
+ The violation of the team’s core values about treating women with respect was a “big part” of the decision to fire Smith even with the unfounded 2015 reports at this point. Meyer said what he was told about the situation in 2009 is different than what is being reported now, with the news now being worse than what he was led to believe.
+ The expectations for Dwayne Haskins is to be the best quarterback in the Big Ten. That’s the expectation of every Ohio State quarterback.
+ “I’ll forever be indebted to J.T. Barrett.”
+ Haskins is the quarterback right now, but 30 days from now anything can happen. Meyer wishes he had one more quarterback, but he likes the three he has.
+ Tuf Borland is doing great. He has the same pain threshold as J.T. Barrett. Borland is smiling and winking at Meyer. “He’s on course to play this fall.”
+ Haskins has earned the trust of his teams and emerged as a leader.
+ This is the best group of young coaches Meyer has ever had on his staff, which makes this transition easier to handle.
+ Meyer thinks the OSU-MSU rivalry has always been there. He still remembers losses to George Perles back in the day. He knows there is a focus on the Michigan rivalry “and that will never change,” but there is incredible history with Ohio State and Michigan State. There is never a need for manufactured motivation.
+ It was a very tough conversation with Joe Burrow at the end of spring ball. The last two weeks, he did about everything he could to win the job. It was close. They had conversations throughout. “Ryan Day did a phenomenal job.” Meyer wishes Burrow was still a Buckeye, but he understands the decision.
+ The competitive level of the Big Ten right now is as strong as any conference Meyer has ever been in. The East is the most competitive division he’s ever been in. The level from 2012 to now has risen dramatically.
+ The redshirt rule has brought conversations with Meyer’s staff, but they do not have a template yet. It remains to be seen how they’ll use it, but it’s a good rule and he’s excited about it.
+ It’s “very concerning” that the Big Ten champ hasn’t made the playoffs in the last two years. “That should not happen.” But Meyer said he doesn’t know enough about the committee and the requirements. He’s not sure the committee lives by what the coaches have been told.
UF and co. vetted ’09 and it wasn’t as bad as portrayed via the reports, which likely included the victim’s statement and smith was allowed to continue with the grad program at uf. Counseling advised. Then urb saw or heard nothing in the ’15 report that would indicate smith needed appropriate action or any action for that matter. Yet in ’18 with a “trespassing and an order for protection that has yet to be vetted, smith is fired? I take it smith is fired so osu and the program don’t have to face any adversity in regards to these incidents. The court of public opinion must hold sway at osu, please no questions on how smith was vetted twice and nothing was found but now, where there’s smoke there is fire and smith is fired. Ok sounds fair enough.
Good to know that Myer upholds his stance on respect for women. You never want to hear of anyone abusing women in any form or fashion and as a coach in a position of leadership you must set the example. Hopefully Smith will finally get the help he needs!
I’m looking forward to the upcomig season. I am not a Haskins fan….he reminds me of Cardale (one hit wonder) Jones. Will he play like Jones did after Jones was handed the job over the better QB J.T. Barrett? My personal belief was that Burrow really never had a chance. The coaches went into spring training with their minds preset much like what happened between Jones and Barrett.
Haskins backup Martell reminds me of Johnny Manziel….his appearance, mannerisms, etc….hopefully he does not go the same route as Manziel and I am wrong on my feelings.
The committee does not and WILL not abide by the same rules when it comes to the SEC. Last year was a clincher in proving that bias and “pets” is what every other conference and every other program has to revolve around. There’s even more stupidity involved in their “behind closed door” BS than there was with the BCS. We’ll never know what would have happened between PSU and Clemson a couple years ago, and we’ll never know what would have happened between UCF and Georgia last year. My money would have been on UCF to drive the Dawgs teeth through the back of their collective heads, which would have driven a dagger through a corrupt committee’s SEC biased heart.
The BCS was BS, and this playoff is an even bigger trainwreck.
James…I agree my friend…why all the secrets…why not place before the public your process. I became a fan of UCF after the season they had and felt like they deserved an opportuniity. Not sure what it will take to right the wrong but somewhere along the line things need to change.
Yep, this whole nonsensical playoff was to reward “the best teams” REGARDLESS of conference or size of the school. UCF is FBS and they deserve the same amount of consideration as any other FBS program. At least the BCS was honest about their bias.
This is College ball, not pro ball, so is there really any purpose in crowning and “outright” champion of all of FBS, especially when the actions of the committee include bias, which effectively renders the so called National Title game just as mythical as it has always been.
I remember back when I played in Pop Warner. 2 straight years we went unbeaten and nobody came close to beating us. There was another unsanctioned group of teams who were excluded for the League because they were too small, but they had 2 teams that were either unbeaten or have just 1 loss (they would take turns losing to each other). They always crowned their champ the real champ, just like we did. In my last year in Pop Warner our coaches agreed with their coaches and put together a pair of their teams and a pair of ours to play a playoff. We beat our elimination opponent by 22 point. Our second place team had their doors blown off in their game. We faced that team 2 weeks later and they beat us like a dust filled rug in the wild west. 45 – 0. We didn’t belong on the field with that group of kids comprised of 18 players, most of who were younger than us. The only real thing that accomplished by that was our sanctioned league drew a tighter web of protection around the league. The result was that our so called outright championships were merely mythical because the system stood on bias. I see that exact same thing going in in the FBS. They will always exclude the “little guys” because it will only serve to expose their underhanded agenda.
All of the FBS Big 5 Conferences have a majority of teams UCF would have clubbed like a shark bitten beaches seal. Chances are high that they could have competed if not beaten most of the Power 5 Conference winners.