COLLEGE FOTTBALL ’86 : Switzer Believes Success Always Comes Sooner or Later

It wasn’t until Oklahoma went 7-4-1 one season, then 8-4 the next two that Barry Switzer’s life style got really famous. Suddenly it was as if a Robin Leach gone bad had burst into the coach’s life.

“The football coach, son of a bootlegger, parties the balmy Oklahoma nights away in the fashionable splendor of a 4,000-square-foot mansion, which is warmed by a 43-foot fireplace. There he entertains the corporate kings and oil moguls, men whose tips in the stock market soon become part of his fabled fortune, a cool million dollars. A man about town. . . . “

And so it went. Maybe it would have happened anyway, this being Oklahoma, but when a highway patrolman stopped Switzer with whiskey on his breath, it was not just front page news in the Sunday paper, it was the banner headline.

That was after those 8-4 seasons, keep in mind. Nothing like a couple of 8-4 seasons to put a man’s life style into focus.

Suddenly these things mattered: Switzer’s divorce, his far-flung and widely questioned financial empire, even his team’s graduation rate. It was all fair game. Since when was any of this interesting? Oh, since about 1983, when the Sooners last had an 8-4 season.

Switzer couldn’t have been prepared for what happened. Oklahoma was used to winning its football games. Switzer was used to winning his. His first three seasons, for instance, he lost just one game. So how could he know what a four-loss season--what ultimately three of them in a row--would do to the public perception of his character.

Well, Oklahoma wasn’t going to have it. The NCAA had once sniffed around Switzer; now, amazingly, the SEC, and that’s not the SEC that plays football, was looking into things. What letters next? The IRS, the FBI, the ASPCA? No, the university would not have it.

Reportedly, the school regents had Switzer in tears over a supposed one-year probation. This would not do, this party-animal image, this money-grubbing attitude. Insider trading? Get it together, Barry. Or else.

Whatever happened in any meeting, this much is certain. His five-year contract, automatically rolled over in previous years, began ticking down that year. That’s pretty severe.

The Daily Oklahoman called for his ouster. After his team lost to USC in 1982, the paper declared: “As a winner, Switzer was tolerable to many. As a loser, perhaps it is time for him to move on.” Suddenly there were the occasional reports that Dick Vermeil or some coach of similar stature had sneaked into town.

The university had to have a coach with a better life style, somebody who didn’t booze, who graduated his athletes and who didn’t get called in by the Securities Exchange Commission over a $97,900 stock profit. In short, they needed a coach who didn’t lose four games a season.

Well, it’s all history because Switzer hasn’t lost four games in a season since. In fact, in the last two seasons since he was put on notice, his Sooners have won all but three games and a national championship. And, even as they prepare to entertain UCLA Saturday, many are predicting they will win another.

And hometown newspapers report with some pride on the rehabilitation of Switzer that has made this possible. He saw the light. Now papers that had begun to sneer at the life style of this rich and famous person are chronicling the born-again Switzer, down home, disciplined, with an aura of saintliness about him.

The man, humbled by the regents, the fans and the media, has rediscovered character. Why, just the other day, so it was reported, he sent off a check for $1,000 to help some single parent who faced eviction. True story.

Barry Switzer sits in his office under the stadium stands, agitated by the above scenario. “There might be some people who’d like to take credit for what has happened here,” he says, tersely.

For the turnaround?

“You might call it a turnaround. I mean, 8-4, wasn’t that an awful season? Yeah, we’ve come a long way back, haven’t we?”

Of course, 8-4 is an awful season, at least here. Back in 1975, when Switzer had a 25-game winning streak, he was being booed for not winning by large enough margins. Switzer can be sarcastic, but he cannot be unmindful of the tradition of Oklahoma, or even Switzer football. It’s a monster. His job, like it or not, is to feed the monster.

Most years, he has kept the monster more than filled. His record of 126-24-4, along with three national titles, gives him the best record of any coach still in the game. It even ranks him with Bud Wilkinson, the man who created the monster. Their winning percentages are nearly identical. But 8-4 seasons leave the monster hungry.

The thing that seems to bother Switzer the most about it all is the aforementioned credit some folks are taking for turning him around. “We’re practicing longer?” he repeats, incredulous. “That’s why I don’t read what they write. More disciplined? More hands-on coaching?” He fairly snorts in disgust.

Perhaps Switzer was chastened by the regents and the press and the boosters during the final 8-4 season, but he is not changed because of them. They didn’t turn the Sooners into last season’s national champions.

“Do you know why you win?” he asks. “Because you have better players. We’re doing the same thing we did in 1982. We have the same playbook. We’re coaching exactly the same. There is only one reason we turned it around. Great players.”

This is what he once said about coaching in the ‘70s at Oklahoma: “All I had to do then was pick up a schedule and I could tell you that we were gonna win 10 or 11 games. It was easy to coach in those days. . . . Do you think that when we had Leroy and Lucius Selmon, and Joe Washington and Billy Sims that we were gonna go out and scrimmage? Hit hard? We were just gonna keep a smile on their faces, keep them happy and go play Saturday.”

Then there were other years, when Nebraska had Irving Fryar or Mike Rozier. “We knew we were in trouble those years,” he says. “If we were gonna beat those teams, it would be an upset. When I’ve had the players, we won. But only coaches can tell that. The fan gives the coach too much credit when he wins, too much criticism when he loses. No coach wins without talent.”

Improvement in a coach’s character does not lead a team from 8-4 to 11-1. On the other hand, to judge from the talk in Norman, an 11-1 record can quickly improve a coach’s character.

In fact, Switzer probably hasn’t changed all that much. He’s as hard-driving as ever, although he does seem to have pared down his various business interests. He doesn’t manage a country-western singer anymore, for one thing. And he’s not quite the high-liver he used to be. He has settled down with a steady girlfriend, devotes more time than ever, it is said, to his children and no longer entertains the press lavishly, which is how he got his reputation in the first place, he says.

Mostly, he has better players.

For certain, the loosey-goosey atmosphere among players remains. During the so-called down seasons there was some talk about the players throwing Frisbees before practice or signing autographs along the sidelines before games. If anybody thinks Switzer has cracked down in the meantime, they are likely to be disappointed by the current crew, which seems to have the appearance, not to mention the work ethic, of a punk-rock group. This is not Parris Island.

Says All-American linebacker Brian Bosworth: “That kind of attitude is what allows us to win. A coach could crack down, but he wouldn’t get results. This way we get what we want, they get what they want. It’s a manipulation both ways. So I guess you could call Coach Switzer a master manipulator.”

About the only change Switzer will concede is in the graduation rate. “We’ve paid more attention to that,” he admits. “Last year, 20 of our 24 seniors got degrees. In the past, we might have got a few kids in recruitment who didn’t do the job academically. But we’ve devoted time and money to change that.”

Other than that, he means to insist, this is the same old Barry, for good or bad. He just has better players.

His real worry, right now, is that at 48, he might be swept into the Establishment. For goodness sake, he’s already made up with Penn State’s Joe Paterno, the man who once ripped him and Texas A&M;’s Jackie Sherrill in the same breath. What next? This rogue football coach could become part of the old guard if he hangs in there.

“Old guard?” he says, suddenly worried. “Oh, no. There are 9 or 10 guys ahead of me in longevity. There are guys (who have) been coaching 24 years. I’m nowhere near that.” And then Switzer ticks off each of the coaches ahead of him, ending with himself and Nebraska’s Tom Osborne at 14 years. For a guy who doesn’t want to be inducted into the Establishment, he is certainly highly familiar with the voting.

“I’m still young,” Switzer, 48, finally protests. Still young after all these years, although those regents sure can age a guy. WINNINGEST ACTIVE COACHES The top 15 active college football coaches, as rated by winning percentage, before the start of the 1986 season. Coaches must have a minimum of five years at a Division I-A school. Records are for games coached at four-year colleges only.

BOWLS Coach Crnt School Yr W L T Pct W L T 1 Barry Switzer Oklahoma 13 126 24 4 .831 7 3 0 2 Joe Paterno Penn State 20 187 44 2 .807 11 5 1 3 Tom Osborne Nebraska 13 127 30 2 .805 7 6 0 4 Bo Schembechler Michigan 23 196 55 7 .773 3 10 0 5 LaVell Edwards BYU 14 129 40 1 .762 4 6 0 6 Herb Deromedi Cent. Michigan 8 64 20 3 .753 0 0 0 7 Danny Ford Clemson 8 58 21 2 .728 2 2 0 8 Vince Dooley Georgia 22 175 67 10 .714 6 9 2 9 Terry Donahue UCLA 10 80 31 6 .709 4 2 1 10 Bobby Bowden Florida State 20 156 64 2 .707 5 3 1 11 Fred Akers Texas 11 91 38 2 .702 2 8 0 12 Pat Dye Auburn 12 96 41 1 .699 4 1 0 13 Dick Crum North Carolina 12 94 41 3 .692 6 1 0 14 Jackie Sherrill Texas A&M; 10 79 35 2 .690 5 1 0 15 Bobby Collins SMU 11 85 39 3 .681 2 2 0

NOTE: Ties computed as a half win and half loss. Bowl games included in records.