Urban Meyer isn't the same man who walked away from the Ohio State Buckeyes in 2018 on top of the college football world. The sport itself is also dramatically different, most notably the fact that there is now pay-to-play NIL. Kind of like the NFL, a league Meyer crashed and burned in as the Jacksonville Jaguars' headman.
So if the Penn State Nittany Lions were to hire him as their next head football coach, Victory Bell Rings' Josh Yourish doesn't believe the union would go as smoothly as some in State College, PA, would hope.
"The most unlikely name on this list is Urban Meyer, but he’ll inevitably be mentioned with his three national championships and his few years of youth compared to Indiana’s Curt Cignetti, the dream candidate for the job," Yourish wrote.
"However, Meyer’s brief foray into the NFL was a disaster, wrought with scandal like the end of his tenure at Ohio State. Meyer is from another era, and there are plenty of reasons that he hasn’t been coached in the college ranks since 2018. It won’t happen, but if Penn State hired Meyer, there’s a much better chance of it going up in flames than resulting in a national title."
The Sporting News' Bill Bender previously linked Meyer to the Florida Gators opening, claiming at the very least it's worth a conversation for the former two-time national champion in Gainesville, albeit a two-time champ back in the aughts.
"Meyer, 61, won two national championships at Florida in 2006 and 2008. He was 83-9 from 2005-10, a run that was dominant with Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow but was also marred by 31 player arrests. Meyer won a third national championship at Ohio State in 2014," Bender wrote.
"A reunion would be complicated, but there is no question Meyer was an elite college football coach with Florida and Ohio State before a rough NFL stint with the Jacksonville Jaguars that incredibly lasted less than one season. Meyer is an analyst on the Big Noon Kickoff – and a good one at that. This is a long-shot at best and we don’t see it happening. But the fact Meyer and Leipold are the same age is a reminder that at least a conversation might be worth a try."
Would Meyer translate to the NIL era well? It's fair to wonder, considering he has enough personality to be doing podcasts and analyst work for FOX Sports. Being able to hold your own in long-form recordings is a good sign of someone being able to pitch top recruits to a school like UF or Penn State, especially with three championship rings on his fingers and a hefty check joining the negotiations.
Clearly, there's more confidence for that to work in a place Meyer has worked before.