I’m bumfuzzled
It’s bumfuzzling, dad gum it.
It’s the only way to describe Bobby Bowden stepping down the way he is.
When you think of Florida State University – you think of Bobby Bowden. He put the school’s football team on the map around the nation. Fourteen straight times his Seminoles would finish in the top 5 in the nation.
He’s a legend – period.
I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing Coach Bowden during my sportswriting hey day. He was always a pleasure to interview. The first time I met him was at the 1989 State Championship game when Bradenton Manatee played Miami Carol City and I was a young pup reporter for the Bradenton Herald.
The conversation started on the field like this:
“Hello Coach Bowden.”
“Hey Boy”
I was a little taken back. I mean I was 26, of course to him I guess I was a boy.
As the years went on, culminating with myself as president of the Florida Sports Writers Association in 2006, he would call me Mike. But I’ll always remember that first conversation we talked about why he was at the game, (He was eyeing offensive lineman Pat McNeil of Manatee to play at FSU) and what his Seminoles would be looking forward to in the 1990 season.
I never was a “beat writer” for the Seminoles but, as sports editor for The Daily Commercial, I would have links to the FSU program and Coach Bowden mostly through former Eustis High players Billy and Bobby Rhodes and Justin Amman. I would also talk to him during the Florida College Media Day, which was held before the start of the season in Daytona Beach or Cypress Gardens. The event, held each year, was put on by the Florida Sports Writers Association, took place all in day.
On one day August 1, 1999, the event was held on a paddlewheel steamer in which Cypress Gardens had bought and they shuttled in the coaches back and forth on a boat, leaving us “hacks” on the steamer for seven hours – with no air-conditioning.
Coach Bowden needed about three people to help him off the boat and it was about 3:30 in the afternoon, but he was his usual self, full of quips ”Boy howdy, how did you guys ever survive this boat ride?” That was his first words when he got to the podium. “It’s dad gum hot up here I’ll tell ya,” was his next line.
The next year, the media day was inside. A month after the 2000 media day I was hired by The Tampa Tribune and became an officer of the FSWA. In 2005 and 2006 I was president of the organization and was in charge of arranging what grew into a two-day function at a posh hotel in Orlando in 2005 and in Tampa in 2006.
While arranging 12 coaches to attend the two-day event, each were given a half hour in which to speak. Urban Meyer got a half hour. Lamont Massie at Ed Waters got a half hour. And most would eat up that half hour, except one – Coach Bowden. Coach would “hold court” with the sports writers just chatting football and one-liners. All that was needed was a change in the setting from a hotel ballroom to a bunch of wooden chairs, a cracker barrel and some checkers.
In 2006, FSU Sports Information Director Rob Wilson asked me if it ”would be all right” if we had Coach Bowden go on last, which was Sunday, and if we could block out an hour because as Rob put it then “Coach likes to talk.” I had no trouble honoring his request.
Of course, those media days were always great – it was like who cares about August baseball, the heat, the afternoon storms whatever – football season was just around the corner. Time talk football. And Coach Bowden was the best.
In the annals of college football history, Bowden will always go down as one of the best, but what made him more legendary – I believe – was when his status was boosted by another coach just down the state – the head ball coach Steve Spurrier at Florida. At those media days, fellow state sports writers would salivate over what Bowden and Spurrier would say.
Those two coaches made this state legendary when it comes to college football and now, neither one is here. The St. Petersburg Times, at the turn of 1999 to 2000 had a special commemorative section on the 25 most influential people in the history of Florida. In it were people like Walt Disney, Majory Stoneman Douglas and former Governor Ruben Askew. But also in it were Steve Spurrier and Coach Bowden with the line “They have consumed our Saturdays.”
LAKE Magazine’s Jake Vest was right a couple months back in his column – Bowden and Spurrier ARE a part of Florida’s history.
I remember during that 1999 Florida-FSU game in Gainesville, when FSU won 30-23 Bowden was saying afterward that when FSU would look to be in trouble offensively, he would grab the headset and start calling the plays instead of then-offensive coordinator Mark Richt. “I wanted to start working out of the I-formation. That’s the best formation for when we get in a bit of trouble. We can either throw it to or run (Travis) Minor and that’s safe.” The Seminoles would go on to win the National Championship.
Don’t tell me he couldn’t coach. Yeah, maybe he made the wrong decision when Richt left for Georgia and he hired Jeff Bowden as coordinator and FSU’s dominance diminished, but it really hasn’t gotten THAT much better with Jimbo Fisher has it?
Its all over.
It’s a dad gum shame the way they (FSU) are forcing Coach Bowden out the door, oh maybe he should have left a couple years ago and we would be writing this two or three years ago.
I’m not a FSU fan, but if Coach Bowden is coaching the last bowl game, no matter who the opponent is. Let them win. Let the players raise Coach Bowden on his shoulders for one more ride. FSU owes him that much – at least.
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