When the Jaguars decided to fire head coach Urban Meyer 13 games into his NFL tenure, there weren’t many voices around the NFL who expressed surprise that such an outcome came to fruition. Count former coach Rex Ryan among those who saw this coming.
During a segment on Sunday NFL Countdown on ESPN, Ryan eviscerated Meyer’s attempt to coach in the NFL, saying he knew the three-time national champion would not be successful in the professional ranks and telling the 57-year-old to go back to coaching in college.
“This is the best of the best. It’s not just the best players, it’s the best coaches in the country,” Ryan said. “There’s only 32 of these jobs right here … that’s what happens to these college guys.”
The Jaguars went 2–11 under Meyer, including losses in his last five games. His brief tenure was mired by off-the-field drama and division within the team and coaching staff, which led to the team reportedly terminating Meyer for cause.
Ryan said he had a conversation with Meyer before the season in which he tried to explain to him the added challenges of coaching in the NFL compared to college, but thought Meyer did not take his advice to heart.
“It’s not that you’re just playing Alabama every week, which is the case. He didn’t listen, I knew he wasn’t listening,” Ryan said. “He told me about recruiting, I go, ‘Recruiting? That’s a picnic.’ You’re going to go talk to a kid and talk about football and talk to their parents and have a meal and all that stuff, great. I’m talking about the grind. Your job as an NFL coach is to put your players in the best position possible to be successful. That’s your job…(players) respect that, they respect your work ethic.”
Ryan, who was a head coach in the NFL for eight seasons with the Jets and Bills, offered one more piece of advice for Meyer should he want to continue his coaching career.
“I knew he’d get out-coached, he did. Go back to college where you belong,” Ryan said. “And I’m sorry, I respect him as a college football coach, but I knew this was going to happen.”
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