I know there are not a lot of FSU fans here, but this might be of interest anyway. FSU's Problems Myriad causes for Florida State’s demise By Tom Dienhart - SportingNews Mar 11, 9:35 am EDT Tom Dienhart SportingNews.com There isn’t just one source of blame for Florida State’s fall from greatness. A closer look reveals widespread problems, both on and off the field, have plagued the program. Scrapes and scandals hit FSU When it comes to infamy, Florida State is famous. The lowlights: • An agent sponsored a shopping spree at a Foot Locker for several players in 1993, prompting then-Florida coach Steve Spurrier to dub FSU “Free Shoes University.” • Kicker Sebastian Janikowski was known for barroom brawls and other off-field escapades in the late-1990s. • Wideout Peter Warrick went on a deep-discount shopping binge in 1999 that prompted Bobby Bowden to say he was “praying for a misdemeanor.” • In 2002, quarterback Adrian McPherson, who was being investigated on gambling and theft charges, was dismissed from the team. But the academic scandal that surfaced before last year’s Music City Bowl is the mother of all misdeeds under Bowden. Stupid off-field behavior is one thing. The soiling of a school’s academic integrity is another. And the timing couldn’t have been worse. FSU wrapped up its second consecutive 7-6 season by playing in the bowl without 36 of its players—some of whom were suspended as the school investigated improprieties in online testing for a music history course. The scandal involved athletes from multiple sports and brought unprecedented shame on the university. “That online class stuff scares me to death,” says one ACC head coach. “There doesn’t seem to be a lot of security and guidelines to it. If you get an overzealous tutor and a lot of people involved, I could see where you could have problems.” Florida State concluded the investigation in February with the help of a consulting firm. The result: a self-imposed probation of two years, a cut in scholarships, more suspensions (several football players will sit out the first three games next season) and a reshuffled athletic department. And the NCAA still is sniffing around, which means more penalties could be coming. How FSU missed the Mark December 26, 2000. That was the day Georgia hired Florida State offensive coordinator Mark Richt as its head coach. That’s also the day the Seminoles’ vaunted football program began to decay. The Seminoles capped that 2000 season by playing in the BCS championship game against Oklahoma, FSU’s third straight shot at a national title. Florida State hasn’t been back to the big game since. Coincidence? No. “Losing Richt hurt,” says former FSU running back Lorenzo Booker. “We may have been running the same plays, but the offense wasn’t called the same. When and why you call a play matters.” Bobby Bowden hasn’t been actively involved in the offense since turning it over to Richt in 1994. In seven years running the offense, Richt molded two Heisman winners (Charlie Ward and Chris Weinke) and a high-powered attack that five times ranked among the top five scoring offenses in the nation. Now? Florida State’s offense ranked 80th last season with 369.4 yards per game, and it scored just 32 touchdowns. During Bowden’s tenure at FSU, only two Seminoles teams have scored fewer—the 1981 (31) and 1976 (26) teams. And the 1976 team played just 11 games. “They have two problems,” says an ACC head coach. “They can’t control the ball, and they lack big-play ability.” The son also rises Ÿ and falls It was a disaster. There’s no other way to describe Florida State coach Bobby Bowden’s decision to make son Jeff his offensive coordinator in 2001 after Mark Richt departed for Georgia. “You’re losing and coming into meetings hearing how it’s your fault,” says former FSU running back Lorenzo Booker. “But I always wondered, ‘What are the coaches doing to get better?’ It’s a two-way street. We felt it was us losing the games, not the coaches. “It was like they had no part in any of it. It was like they had no accountability. It was like Jeff Bowden was untouchable. It was like no one on the staff could criticize him. The defense always did its job. The guys on defense would get mad at us. But after a while, they understood.” Once the losses started to mount (four in 2001, five in 2002), the Seminoles lost their swagger. And, even worse: Opponents stopped fearing Florida State. “I always thought it was an awkward situation to have Jeff coach receivers and be the coordinator,” says current FSU quarterback Drew Weatherford. “When we were off meeting with our position coach, Jeff was with the receivers. He then had to get information from our quarterbacks coach after the offense got back together.” As the offense floundered, the pressure mounted on Bobby Bowden to do something about his son—like get rid of him. It finally happened after the 2006 season, when Jeff quelled the storm by resigning—with a $500,000 buyout in hand. Florida State grabbed highly regarded LSU coordinator Jimbo Fisher to run the offense, but his fast and furious scheming yielded minimal results in his first season at Florida State. “I’ll tell you what we need,” says Bobby Bowden. “We need a star. We need a Warrick Dunn, a Chris Weinke, a Derrick Brooks. We have started evaluating players better and like our chances.” Instability under center For so long, Florida State had a solid system with its quarterbacks: Sign the guy, sit him for a few seasons and make him the starter after he learns the position. The system began to thrive with Peter Tom Willis and continued with the likes of Casey Weldon, Charlie Ward, Danny Kanell, Thad Busby and Chris Weinke. Then came freshman Chris Rix in 2001—Bobby Bowden’s son Jeff’s first year as offensive coordinator. Rix was not ready to start physically, and he wasn’t ready mentally. But he started anyway. And then he became the face of the Seminoles’ struggles. After that, Florida State’s tidy quarterbacking system was thrown into disarray because it misjudged some recruits and didn’t land others. Quarterback hopefuls like Adrian McPherson, Wyatt Sexton and Xavier Lee couldn’t make the grade. Drew Weatherford, the 2007 starter, is back this season, but the Seminoles are still searching for stability at a position that will be wide-open again this spring. “They haven’t had a quarterback,” says an ACC head coach. “I think that has been their biggest problem.”
My favorite was Janikowski's defense in an attempted bribery case. His defense was that there was miscommunication between him and a police officer because he didn't understand English very well. Pretty impressive getting through FSU for 3 or 4 years when you can't understand English.
Yeah, it's going to break my heart if they get nailed even more than they have proposed! For all of Bobby Bowdens reputation as a good guy his program has gotten away with a lot for years. In my opinion they well deserve to get hammered.