Jim Tressel (official thread)

[scarletngray]

I've loved how Greise just continued to give his support to Tress throughout the game today.

[Buckskin86]

Should Jim Tressel run for office or pass on it?
By Doug Lesmerises
October 30, 2009


Marvin Fong, The Plain Dealer
Former Nebraska head football coach and former U.S Congressman Tom Osborne thinks Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel could handle the transition from football to politics just fine. Tom Osborne knows better than most what choices Jim Tressel faces as he approaches the rest of his career as a football coach, and beyond.

With a personally conservative style, a connection to the offensive side of the game, national championships (three at Nebraska for Osborne, four at Youngstown State and one at Ohio State for Tressel), lots of wins (255 for Osborne, 224 for Tressel) and a career linked with a troubled star running back (Lawrence Phillips for Osborne, Maurice Clarett for Tressel), the former Nebraska coach and current Ohio State coach share past experiences. Maybe the future could share some similarities as well.

This time of year, with Election Day four days off, outsiders like to wonder about a potential political future for Tressel, who has always said he's more interested in teaching whenever he stops coaching. Sixteen years older than Tressel, Osborne, 72, took the political path.

Osborne served six years in the U.S. House of Representatives, ran unsuccessfully for Nebraska governor, and returned to Nebraska in 2007 as the school's athletic director. He also had a book published recently, "Beyond the Final Score: There's More to Life than the Game." In an interview earlier this season, he spoke about his choices and whether Tressel might fit a similar mold.

# On his decision to retire as Nebraska's coach in 1997 at age 60. (Tressel is 56.)

"I didn't have a definitive game plan, but I made a promise, it must have been about 1992 or so, that I would leave within five years, and five years came and went and I thought I'd better keep that promise. So I did and I had to figure out what I was going to do with myself, because I had quite a bit of energy. So I decided to run for Congress, and I learned a lot. I didn't ever anticipate being athletic director.

"The other thing about it was I was serving as offensive coordinator, and I really enjoyed that, I enjoyed calling the plays. I wanted to be heavily involved. And you can become a CEO head coach, where you do the press conference and you make decisions on whether to accept a penalty or refuse it, but you aren't involved in the day-to-day coaching, and when Saturday afternoon comes, if things go south, you're really at the mercy of your coordinators. (Tressel has expressed similar reservations about stepping away from play-calling and becoming a CEO type.) I wasn't anxious to coach as a CEO type, but I realized as I hit 60, I probably wasn't going to be able to maintain the pace, working 80 or 90 hours a week. If I was calling the plays, I had to spend an extra 30 hours a week watching film and getting a feel for what the other team was doing, and then with the other things a head coach does, it gets pretty wild."

Should Jim Tressel run for office or pass on it? | Ohio State Buckeyes - cleveland.com - - cleveland.com

[CalvinistBuck]

Loved this comment by JT in the presser:

"Joe... you know him, he's the perfect gentleman. His comment was, "Hey, Jimmy, your kids played really well." And that's the way he is. He's great for the game. He's a legend. Sometimes I pinch myself to think that I've had a chance to coach against him," Tressel said.

Buckeye fans are blessed. Having a coach with class never gets old.

[MililaniBuckeye]

Originally Posted by CalvinistBuck

"Joe... you know him, he's the perfect gentleman. His comment was, "Hey, Jimmy, your kids played really well."

Betcha there ain't too many folks that get to call him "Jimmy".

By the way, there are three teams in the Big Ten that have over 800 all-time wins: Michigan, Ohio State, and Penn State. Against Michigan and Penn State, Tressel is 13-4.

[Jake]

Ohio State 24
Penn State 7

Thank you, Coach Tressel.

[SanClementeBuck]

A nice, predictable touch by JT. Contrast this with some of the tacky utterances made by one or two of our rival coaches.

Originally Posted by CalvinistBuck

Loved this comment by JT in the presser

"Joe... you know him, he's the perfect gentleman. His comment was, "Hey, Jimmy, your kids played really well." And that's the way he is. He's great for the game. He's a legend. Sometimes I pinch myself to think that I've had a chance to coach against him," Tressel said.

Buckeye fans are blessed. Having a coach with class never gets old.

[Buckskin86]

Ohio State notebook: Tressel remembers Rose Bowl with his dad.
By Todd Porter
CantonRep.com staff writer
Posted Nov 10, 2009

COLUMBUS ? .When Jim Tressel was growing up and his late father, Baldwin-Wallace Head Coach Lee Tressel, finally had a break, the Tressel family made Jan. 1 a football holiday.

Tressel, whose Buckeyes could play in the Rose Bowl if they beat Iowa on Saturday, remembered watching the Rose Bowl with his father every year when the Big Ten and PAC-10 always sent a team there.

?Jan. 1 in our house, two black-and-white TVs set up side by side, that old 30-cup coffee machine ? that little silver thing ? my dad never got off the couch, man. We were taking him coffee and switching the stations. I mean, that was ? shoot you were living on Jan. 1.? Tressel paused for a second. ?That was it for the year, by the way.?

The last time Tressel coached Ohio State in the Rose Bowl it was an odd game. The Buckeyes played UCLA in the first game after the Sept. 11 attacks. ?It wasn?t a normal away trip, and I also remember we didn?t win,? Tressel said. It also was noted by Bruce Hooley, a talk show host in Columbus, that it was the only time Tressel did not wear a sweatervest during a game as the Buckeyes? head coach.

Ohio State notebook: Tressel remembers Rose Bowl with his dad - Canton, OH - CantonRep.com

[Buckskin86]

Rob Oller commentary: There's no time like the present for Tressel
Saturday, November 14, 2009
By Rob Oller
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Time is not on the side of Jim Tressel. And the feeling is mutual. The Ohio State coach is no fan of living in the past or ruminating on the future. He sees calendars as a waste of, well, time, because every day is today.

The present is all that matters to Tress, who lives by the Einsteinian theory that the only reason for time is so that everything does not happen at once.

Operating in the here and now has proved mostly successful for Tressel and the Buckeyes, who by defeating Iowa today would secure their fifth consecutive Big Ten championship. It would be a rare five-peat. Only the 1972 to '77 Buckeyes have won more consecutive conference titles (six). Michigan (1988 to '92) is the only other school to win five straight.

Just don't ask Tress why it's so hard to repeat as conference champion and expect to receive a descriptive answer. That would require him to ponder the past, and he is not big on personal reflection.

"We don't look at things in groups like that," he said. "We look at things today, and it will be highly difficult today (vs. Iowa), and the only way to be Big Ten champions is to be good today, which is irrelevant to the four before that, or the 30-some prior that have been won at Ohio State."

Rob Oller commentary: There's no time like the present for Tressel | BuckeyeXtra

Virtues of Tressel Ball on display last week
Saturday, November 14, 2009
By Ken Gordon
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Laws are like sausages, the saying goes -- it is better not to see them being made.

Add "Tressel Ball" to that list. The process is hardly pretty, but the results can be effective.

Ohio State's victory last week at Penn State perhaps was the perfect example of how coach Jim Tressel wants to play.

Virtues of Tressel Ball on display last week | BuckeyeXtra

[OregonBuckeye]

Tressel didn't coach a good game but dammit am I happy with the W and roses!

[CookyPuss]

Originally Posted by OregonBuckeye

Tressel didn't coach a good game but dammit am I happy with the W and roses!

+1

[Merih]

Originally Posted by OregonBuckeye

Tressel didn't coach a good game but dammit am I happy with the W and roses!

?

I think he called a pretty good game. Conservative all around, but all in all he did a good job. I really think the KR TD changed everything. Up 24-10 with momentum clearly on our side. If we got a stop there I know that Tressel would have tried to pound it out and get some sort of score and take more time off of the clock. I think that then the game would have turned out something like 34-17.

[OregonBuckeye]

Originally Posted by Merih

?

I think he called a pretty good game. Conservative all around, but all in all he did a good job. I really think the KR TD changed everything. Up 24-10 with momentum clearly on our side. If we got a stop there I know that Tressel would have tried to pound it out and get some sort of score and take more time off of the clock. I think that then the game would have turned out something like 34-17.

I think he almost blew the game by going too conservative. It was part Iowa luck, part poor execution, and part questionable playcalling. W is all that matters though.

[GrizzlyBuck]

Very conservative, but I agree, take away the KO return, and even the miss on the FG after the KO return and the game may have looked like a nice comfortable Tressel type 10-14 point win. I may not always like that it seems like he coaches not to lose sometimes, but [censored] the results are usually awfully nice.

[Merih]

Originally Posted by OregonBuckeye

I think he almost blew the game by going too conservative. It was part Iowa luck, part poor execution, and part questionable playcalling. W is all that matters though.

Iowa luck had a big part in it as well. Nate Williams doesn't jump and we are up 31-17. Chekwa and Rolle don't tackle each other (or at least just bat the ball down rather than up to Moecki) and we take over and take the air out of the ball and grind it out.

This was just one of those games destined to go the distance it seemed, Heacock called some great plays in overtime.

W is a W is a W...[censored] Michigan!

[CookyPuss]

Originally Posted by GrizzlyBuck

Very conservative, but I agree, take away the KO return, and even the miss on the FG after the KO return and the game may have looked like a nice comfortable Tressel type 10-14 point win. I may not always like that it seems like he coaches not to lose sometimes, but [censored] the results are usually awfully nice.

You take the good, you take the bad, and there you have... Tresselball, Tresselball.

Frustrating at times, but as you said.. results.