Billy Donovan, Er, Urban Meyer Was Just Kidding

Seriously, is there something in the water down in Gainesville? Two high-profile coaches, two successful coaches, two relatively young coaches, two “never mind, I take it back” decisions.

And they just so happen to both be coaches at the University of Florida.

When men’s basketball coach Billy Donovan decided to go to the Orlando Magic, I was, admittedly, a little surprised. He seemed to have everything going for him at Florida and his program had just racked up two national titles in a row. His decision to return to Florida about 17 minutes later was a bit more surprising because I hadn’t really heard of such an about-face in the coaching profession. I agreed with it and thought it was the correct thing to do, but the circumstances were just odd.

In recent years, coaches like Dana Altman at Creighton and Gregg Marshall at Winthrop spurned gigs at Arkansas and College of Charleston, respectively, to stay where they were (Marshall has since moved to Wichita State). So I guess it’s not all too uncommon, but it certainly doesn’t make it any more sensible. I realize the “leaving was harder than I thought” angle is certainly in play with decisions like these, but didn’t they think about that prior to taking the other job?

But I digress. Back to Pope Urban.

Meyer’s situation is a bit more confusing than all of the aforementioned situations (and even Bill Belichick’s decision to resign from the New York Jets after a few days in order to take the Patriots job) because it’s health-related. No one can deny that he has a few issues to deal with; he has a cyst on his brain and a heart muscle defect. After the details of his apparent resignation surfaced, the decision made sense to me, and I actually admired (admeyered?) Urban’s call. The wherewithal to make such a choice in the midst of such a successful run really took some courage. It’s easier to walk away from an uncertain situation than a prosperous one, but Meyer was doing the opposite.

For a few hours, at least.

Now that he’s back at Florida (and make no mistake, by saying he hopes to be on the sideline for the 2010 opener, he’s essentially saying that he’ll be there without a doubt), I’m concerned for him. His health problems aren’t going to get better, his family is still going to miss him immensely, and the high-stress atmosphere of coaching in the SEC won’t get any easier. What happens to Meyer now if winning all sorts of titles with one of the best runs in college football history made him feel terrible? I’m scared that one day we’ll be looking back on this decision as the one that ultimately backfired on Meyer. Instead of riding off into the sunset with a handful of accomplishments and all of his health, he’ll instead be given a much less happy ending.

Ironic, right? Especially since everyone thought LEAVING Florida was the wrong move.

~~ Lank