Paterno Him Is To Love Him

i don't follow sports, but i know paterno. i'm a northeast gal.

I have been following this abuse thing for a couple days and had not noticed the name Joe Paterno until this morning, when an elderly female coworker who has otherwise never mentioned sports was just like "Holy shit about Paterno, huh?"

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I don't follow college sports closely, but I knew who he was/records/etc.. Kind of shocked there are people who don't.

I'd never heard of him before this whole thing.

'follow college football' tho I'm drifting away from it cause of the incessant stream of shit like this.

how many nfl, nba, whatever coaches could your average non-sports fan name? coaches aren't really part of the mainstream media narrative, not in tv ads etc. etc.

Current college football coaches I can name:

1. Joe Paterno
2. Is Bobby Bowden still coaching? (Probably not, since didn't Paterno break Bowden's record? I mean, I know that some of Bowden's victories were declared invalid as well, but I still have to think that the dude hung it up a few years back.)
3. What about Lou Holtz?
4. Tom Osborne?

you just named 0 current head coaches

i probably couldn't name more than a few either

when's Mike Leach coming back?

Yeah, I have to think that the last time I actually watched a college football game was close to 20 years ago.

All I Ever Needed to Know About Coaching I Learned from the Coaches Caught in Mid-Coach Thread.

I have heard of Bear Bryant because he was in a Drive-By Truckers song!

i think this question becomes way different if you actually live in pennsylvania.

or have family from Ohio

from Michigan, went to Michigan, regularly watch Big-10 football, so yeah

If you live in a big ten state, it seems like you pick up a lot of this information whether you're really interested in football or not. Or least that's the case with me.

how many nfl, nba, whatever coaches could your average non-sports fan name? coaches aren't really part of the mainstream media narrative, not in tv ads etc. etc.

NBA - Phil Jackson (no longer coaching, of course)
NCAA Basketball - Coach K
NCAA Football - I thought Paterno would have been one of the two or three easily named ones)
Baseball - none
NFL - Tom Landry (dead), Vince Lombardi (dead), maaaaaybe Bill Walsh?

I guess this a lesson on how even though I'm not a rabid sports fan by any means it's a bigger part of my knowledge/life than it is for a whole lot of people. (also I'm a nerd who has three fantasy football teams and runs four rotisserie baseball leagues for money)

Bill Belichick after 2007 was a pretty hot topic

Baseball - none

Maybe Joe Torre. Or Tommy Lasorda at the height of his fame.

I have heard of the Gipper

Broader question could be which head coaches have passed over into major pop culture figures.

Pat Riley in the '80s, Phil Jackson, Tom Landry might really be it, tbh

The Gipper wasn't a coach.

Landry over Lombardi, according to that criterion? xp

I think head coaches are even bigger in college ball cause they're the only constants. That said I'm pretty much blanking out on famous college coaches in any sport right now. Bobby Knight, Jimmy Valvano (neither of whom are current coaches, iirc -- in fact isn't Jimmy V. dead?), Schiano but only because he's my alma mater's coach.

Tom Landry was a running joke on King of the Hill and with the iconic fedora, being dominant during the '70s NFL Films era, I think he's probably more known than Lombardi by non-fans?

John Madden was a coach, he definitely passed over the threshold.

Jimmy Johnson, especially for being in those awesome Extense commercials

I think there was one guy who did the skins and the chargers. was his name schottenheimer? also, i hope someone has sb'd me for this horrible thread title.

I'd never heard of him before this whole thing.

in fact isn't Jimmy V. dead?

only gonna give you shit for this because you're an ilh regular

I really don't watch college hoops though, in fact I find it pretty boring nowadays.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

gotta say, I'm pretty impressed with the turnout for this one-day poll!