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How Do You View John Cooper As A Coach?

  • He was here 13 years. He accumulated a 111-43-4 record or 71.5% winning percentage. He was inducted into the College Football Hall Of Fame in 2008. His signature win was in the 1996 Rose Bowl over Arizona State 20-17. He won three B10 Championships while in Columbus (93,96, @ 98). He developed one Heisman Trophy winner in Eddie George in 1995, Outland trophy (1995) and Lombardi trophy winner Orlando Pace in 1995, @ 1996, Biletinkoff award winner-Terry Glenn in 1995, Butkus Award winner -Andy Katzenmoyer in 1997, and Thorpe winner Antoine Winfield in 1998. He helped produce All American status for the Buckeyes for Jeff Ulenhake,Steve Tovar,Korey Stringer,Dan Wilkinson,Eddie George,Terry Glenn,Orlando Pace,Mike Varbel,Andy Katzenmoyer,Rob Murphy Antoine Winfield,Na'ill Diggs and Mike Doss.

    His low points were a devastating loss to AirForce in 1990 in a Bowl game 23-11, his overall 3W-8L bowl record, and his 2-10-1 overall record aganist arch rival Michigan.

    John Cooper's accomplishments, and overall winning record at OSU seem solid on paper.

    QUESTION:
    Was John Cooper a successfull coach here at Ohio State? Why, do you feel he is looked down on my many for his time as a Buckeye coach? Does he deserve more praise or is his Michigan record the entire killer in your appraisal of him? What do you think?

    This post was edited by Bigjimmie on 7/6/2012 at 9:38 AM

    Bigjimmie

  • I named my pit bull Cooper because he passes the looks test but is really quite a scaredy cat when the going gets tough. That should sufficiently express my opinion of Cooper. Good coach - great recruiter - bad big game coach.

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    tembuck2

  • He was a mystery to me tembuck2. I can;t help but think if he had just beaten Michigan 50% of the time, he would probably be looked on NOW, by Buckeyes fans as a decent coach. While going thru those 10 losses it was very frusturating as a Buckeye fan and really hard to take. I just never felt he "got it" about that Rivalry! The 3-8 Bowl record, too is very bad....that just does not fly wiht Buckeye fans...

    Bigjimmie

  • tembuck2 said...

    I named my pit bull Cooper because he passes the looks test but is really quite a scaredy cat when the going gets tough. That should sufficiently express my opinion of Cooper. Good coach - great recruiter - bad big game coach.

    I'm thankful for the quote function because I couldn't express my opinion any better than it has already been expressed above.

    brutusandwoody ●

  • Like tembuck said.. Great recruiter, good coach, bad big game coach. He knew talent and brought talent to OSU, just coaching them up for big games was a problem for Coop!

    joe1776p

  • joe1776p said...

    Like tembuck said.. Great recruiter, good coach, bad big game coach. He knew talent and brought talent to OSU, just coaching them up for big games was a problem for Coop!

    Great recruiter, great at player development, but he ran his team like a business which allowed players to lose focus. You saw the same thing with Pete Carroll. USC had amazing teams but would always lose focus for a game here or there that prob cost them at least two NC. Cooper's players were more worried about their draft stock by the time the scUM game and the bowl game came around.

    fritz_jones

  • I will always look at Coop as the coach at tOSU that had at least 2 of the most talented teams ever and came away with nothing. Not winning a single national championship with the '95,'96 or '98 teams is ridiculous. I will remember him much more for the loss to sparty, and the crushing defeats to scUm than a single one of his victories. Just bringing up his name pisses me off. Not in a I hate him kind of way, just in a sad disappointing way. So I guess sad and disappointing would best describe my memories and thoughts on Coop. There is also no way he should be in the hall of fame. There has to be some sort of provision that precludes induction for someone who loses a home game to a Mediocre sparty team that was a 24 pt dog.

    sally1226 ●

  • Overall a good coach, excellent recruiter (until his final couple of years it tailed off) and unfortunately the debacles against Mich...he never embraced the rivalry like Tress did and I'm sure Urban will. He downplayed it and tried to treat it like just another game....but I give credit for the unbelievable talent he brought in, so many 1st rd draft picks and he did well vs Penn st and hammered ND two years in a row.

    theville

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    olref129665

  • Coop while lasting more than many coaches of the past, just did not make it in the "graveyard" of Coaches, as Ohio State was referred to in the past days. If you did not beat Michigan...basically fans in Columbus did not care what else you did..."you had to go".The olde saying of "nice guys finish last", unfortunately fit John when it came to winning that big one.....One thing he did do, through while painfull to us...he paved the way for the "Tressell years", which soothed over the 10 difficult losses somewhat to die hard football fans in Columbus!

    Bigjimmie

  • Great recruiter decent coach terrible big game coach.

    davebucknut ●

  • He did so little with so much, I consider him one of the biggest coaching failures of the 20th century. He was awful.

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    LegalAlien

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    Go Bucks!

    flbuckeyebob

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    TenorBuck

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    TenorBuck

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    "Whatever doesn't kill you...is gonna leave a scar." - MM

    MiseryMachine ●

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    GBHawk9

  • At times I thought John Cooper was the best coach Michigan has ever had... But all his flaws aside, Buckeye football is better off for Coop having been a part of it- even if he won almost every game but the games he had to win. Perhaps history shouldn't exactly beam upon his legacy. But a smile is more than warranted. Along with a Hall of Fame induction that was well-deserved.

    This post was edited by gessig on 7/6/2012 at 11:47 AM

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    gessig ●

  • Great recruiter, great coach, sucked in rivalry/big games.

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    www.miamiproject.miami.edu/

    Buckeye Warrior ●

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    NJJ0711

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    Bigjimmie

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    JohnKaplan

  • How do I view Cooper? Perpetually between 8-3 and 9-2, which is pretty decent but not great. Good recruiter, lax disciplinarian, did not understand the importance of THE GAME and failed miserably in big games.

    Overall, a decent CFB coach. However, an unacceptable OSU head coach. Frankly, he is unworthy of the CFB HoF and absolutely not worthy of being considered a great OSU HC..

    JarheadBuck ●

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    Go Bucks!

    flbuckeyebob

  • JarheadBuck said...

    How do I view Cooper? Perpetually between 8-3 and 9-2, which is pretty decent but not great. Good recruiter, lax disciplinarian, did not understand the importance of THE GAME and failed miserably in big games.

    Overall, a decent CFB coach. However, an unacceptable OSU head coach. Frankly, he is unworthy of the CFB HoF and absolutely not worthy of being considered a great OSU HC..

    It's funny. Overall, both Cooper and Bruce probably averaged out to a 9-3 record. But, you have to like Bruce a lot more as a Coach of the Ohio State University. The difference to me was that Cooper was a far better recruiter and 9-3 was underachieving with the talent he brought in to the program over the 1990s. Bruce was a passionate, hard nosed coach that probably overachieved with some of those teams in the 1980s to get to 9-3. It's too bad you couldn't combine the best of both of them.

    NetBuck

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