Friday, November 17, 2006

Couldn't let another minute pass with a thought on the passing of Bo Schembechler. I'm a huge MAC guy and Bo, of course, played his college football at Miami. His head coach was Woody Hayes. And later, Bo would be an assistant on Woody's staff at Ohio State. Then, of course, they had their classic battles when Bo moved onto coach at Michigan.

I was in Bo's presence several times, when I was the play-by-play broadcaster for the Cincinnati Bengals. We always saw the Lions in the pre-season and Bo was involved with their broadcasts. I found the man 'larger than life'.

It occured to me today, as I heard about his passing that there are no 'larger than life' coaches anymore. Bob Knight, for a lot of reasons, Bill Parcells and Joe Paterno come close. Maybe it's because we live in the 300 channel universe and all things sports seem to on TV. Television, particularly live television, has a way of de-mystifying people. In most instances, that's a good thing. In a sports sense, it's probably a good thing too.

But today, I miss that. Bo against Woody. Did it ever get any better than that?