Apprenticeship makes perfect: Fisher benefiting from ultimate tutorial

By Charlie Barnes, Executive Director - Seminole Boosters

Amid the chaos of his brilliant victory at Chancellorsville, Robert E. Lee lost his greatest general. As the mortally wounded Lt. General Thomas Jackson was carried from the field, Lee had to name a replacement immediately.

Lee gave command to General J.E.B. Stuart, passing over more senior generals. Stuart would be required to assume command in a critical moment when the tide of battle might turn either way.

Florida State alumnus Jeff Shaara describes the effect of Lee’s decision in his best-selling novel Gods and Generals. Stuart embodied flamboyant selfconfidence and he was a superb commander of cavalry. But he had never led an army. When faced with having to coordinate infantry, artillery and cavalry all at once in the clamor and urgency of battle with victory or defeat on the line, Stuart experienced that single, awful shock of a leader who suddenly senses he may not be equal to the task at hand.

Which bring us roundabout to Coach Jimbo Fisher, the next-in-line of command at Florida State. Seminole fans who meet Fisher come away impressed. But like general Stuart who had never commanded an army, Jimbo Fisher has never been a Head Football Coach and that is the subject of some discussion.

“I was at LSU when they were a top program,” Fisher tells the crowds. “They sure missed me this year didn’t they?” The self-depreciating line always draws a laugh. But Seminole fans hungry for a return to glory see what LSU has accomplished and naturally expect Jimbo to bring that magic with him. Some ask, what’s so great about Jimbo Fisher since national champion LSU certainly seems to have not suffered in his absence?

Some fans fret that Fisher is an unproven talent, and others wonder if Fisher is really willing to wait the entire three years before his contract specifies that he must be named Head Coach. Don’t worry; the truth is Fisher is not only an exceptional talent — he’s also lucky and he knows it. Fisher is benefiting from a special tutorial that will help him assume his first Head Coaching job with confidence.

Fisher’s position is unique in all of college football. He has been described as our Head Coach “in waiting”; but it’s more accurate to say he is “in training.” When the time comes, Fisher must be prepared — and he will be — to assume the pressures and shocks and expectations of a title he has never held.

Head Coach Bobby Bowden

Head Coach In-Waiting Jimbo Fisher

My guess is that Bobby Bowden is encouraging Fisher to make Head Coaching decisions here and there without the pressure of public accountability. Bowden will cover for his protégé while he learns. If there’s an unwise player selection or if a bonehead play blows up, Bowden will shake his head and tell the press, “Dad-gum it, I should have listened to my assistants; they told me not to do that.”

Like you, I have seen great assistant coaches who by all measure should be terrific Head Coaches, but success eludes them and they usually pass quietly back into the lower ranks. Across the years I have marveled at the can’t-miss wunderkinds of coaching assistants and coordinators who failed after having been elevated to a Head Coaching position.

Coach Bowden thinks most of the problem stems from the fact that coaches do not have time to gain experience in their new Head Coaching role. In the constant spotlight of modern communications, Coaches can never make an unexamined decision.

Bowden was Head Coach at three other universities before he came to Tallahassee in 1976. “I got to make all my mistakes out of sight.” He says, “I was Head Coach at South Georgia College and at Samford, and then, even at West Virginia the media coverage was still pretty regional. Of course, there was no Internet.”

My grandfather started in the automobile business in the southern West Virginia coal fields in 1917. Fifty years later, reflecting back on the many changes and challenges of the car business, he said if he had his life to live all over again he would be like the old Island Creek Coal Company doctor who was his neighbor.

“The old doctor had made arrangements to have a new car delivered to his home in Holden,” he said. “The doctor’s friends were horrified the next day to see the new car coming down the road with the doctor standing on the running board and steering by reaching in through the car window.

“Fearing for his life, one of his friends ran as close to the car as he dared and shouted, ‘Get inside the car, Doc, get inside the car!’

“The car whipped by him in a cloud of dust and the doctor, his grey hair flying in the wind, half turned to shout a reply: ‘I’m not fool enough to get inside this damned thing until I learn to drive it!’”

Think now about Coach Jimbo Fisher and his role as coach-intraining. Jimbo is a very smart fellow, and certainly smart enough to want to learn how to drive this damned thing before he gets behind the wheel.