Nebraskan here too. He ruined so many of my Thanksgivings only because he was such a great coach. What a terrific recruiter and he meant so much to the Nebraska-Oklahoma rivalry. Thanks for everything coach Switzer!
Son of a Bootlegger, BEST recruiter, savvy coach. He’ll always be the center of my OU love! People don’t appreciate how he kept the Dallas Cowboys together while Jerry Jones used him. Love ol’ Barry!
I am originally from northern California , my dad was from Oklahoma so I grew up a Pac 10 and Oklahoma fan. I loved coach switzer and the wishbone. Thomas Lott and Billy Sims were some of my early memories of college football. GO SOONERS.
Coach Barry Switzer is a Sooner Legend! I personally want to Thank him from the very bottom of my heart for all the wonderful years he coached at OU. He was always looked down upon by the National Media simply because he coached and won games against the "old school" NCAA teams that a midwest team wasn't suppose to do! Switzer put the Swagger in Sooner Football! I consider the years between Coach Switzer's reign and Coach Stoops as the "Regent Years"! Those Jerks RUINED Sooner football for 10 yrs! Coach Switzer had many more years of Coaching in him. I Thank YOU Coach Switzer for the best football memories, best memories except for my family, for me. BOOMER SOONER!
When I was 4 my father was a GM of a Ford dealership in Joplin Mo. He had 2 options to open his own dealership, a Cadillac dealership in Manhattan Kansas, or a Chrysler dealership in Oklahoma City, Thank God dad chose Oklahoma and thank God Oklahoma had you Barry. Dad opened Sooner Chrysler Plymouth in downtown OKC..for the years that it was open, he hired players to help out. It was wrong what they did, For us Barry was has much Oklahoma as were Will Rogers or Gene Autry or Garth Brooks. When your hand was forced in the end, we were two of a handfull of folks that took out a full page add in the Daily Oklahoman in support of you. Oklahoma football has stayed a part of our lives year after year. But there is only one Barry Switzer,, what a ride!!!! eternally greatful ...BOOMER!!!!
Yeah, it's real interesting how he got framed by a corrupt governor's vindictive coup against the university and it's doubly interesting how the national news media deceived the entire country into believing a bunch of fiction and the worst moral hysteria since Salem, Mass.
Switzer for me is all college football. For us 70’s & 80’s kids in North Jersey we wore Oklahoma and Nebraska gear. We played our games on Thanksgiving and then watched their game on Saturday eating leftovers. Great memories🏈
As a TEXAS fan, this man was the anti-Christ to me....until about a month ago and he saved a pitbull puppy from a locked van and found it a home.... now, even after all these years, Barry's OK with me..... all of us in our lives would have gone back and done a little different if we could....you do the best you know how at the time....that if LIFE.... Thanks, Barry....the rivalry that was TEXAS/ou was never better than when you were walking the sidelines....God, BLESS and KEEP you!
I remember when I was 16 year old. To ME Barry Switzer was like "God" I had a poor relationship with my Dad. I had few friends. Barry Switzer was my hero, my idol, I have a German family background, You don't show outward emotions if you're German, I had a big emotional lump in my throat when Barry Switzer retired, I almost cried when I watched Barry Switzer leave OU on TV, it ripped my heart out when Barry Switzer left OU. But you know what?? Barry Switzer could have put out a "public statement"...... letter, or a "note" but Switzer didn't. Switzer held a PUBLIC press conference/ Switzer *took it like A MAN* It made me cry, but I will never forget it
Ou was never the same , you will always be my favorite Head Coach....you started sooner magic ! Ou invented championships .....thanks for all the great memories Coach !
The King. Switzer was a players coach. He was one of the greatest recruiters of all time. Saban is a modern day Switzer, who can stockpile talent even with all-Americans in front of them. Growing up in Oklahoma in the 70’s was a great time to be a Sooner. The games with Texas and Nebraska will always be etched into my memory. I miss the rivalry with Nebraska and the game was always on the day after Thanksgiving.
I have "Barry Switzer: Bootlegger's Boy & have read it several times. As a lifelong OU fan, I have to say that I enjoyed it every time I read it & will continue to do so. Yes, Barry was human, as we all are. You can't babysit 80someodd young men. That's what college football has turned into. I also like how he talks about Jerry Anderson and that he saved the lives of people he didn't even know. Unfortunately, the media doesn't care about people that risk their lives to save others and put themselves second. They want to write about rapists, dopeheads, crackheads, etc. Kudos to Barry for being honest & not "playing politics" w/the media.
Barry was a fantastic coach his players loved him, he was a darn good and very resourceful and a cunning recruiter, he used a lot of initiative in his recruiting methods. I think he loved his players the game and winning. God bless Barry Switzer, he meant so much, and still does to Oklahoma football.
I'm the one who voted this down NOT but because of coach Switzer story here but cause all the damn November heart ache you cause me with that damn Sooner Magic .Good luck coach.
Biggest mistake the program ever made was running coach Switzer off because his 88 team went 9-3. We love you Barry. Miss your TV show as it was the best thing on TV, never a dull moment.
barry has always been demonized by the press and his rivals, and sooner fans loved him for it i loved things about barry that people hated, how he gave kids second and third chances, how he recruited kids considered "high risk", how he went into junior colleges and grabbed athletes universities considered poison. did he/they skirt some rules? sure they did, did he ignore uppity university protocol, yep. it was a win-win-win policy... win for oklahoma university, win for kids who needed a break, and a win for the man who took those chances. if a kid gets in trouble does the family throw him to the wolves? of course not, you take him in, protect him, defend him, get him a good lawyer, feed him, help him get back on his feet, you help him become a productive citizen. why is america so blood thirsty that kids in trouble need to be ruined for life? that a professional athlete who makes a bad choice should be financially ruined? how in the fuck does that make sense? all you're doing is punishing the people he needs to taken care of, but no one thinks of that... what asshole decided we should throw away the key and not try to rehabilitate young people? that punishing people and hardening them is better than helping and rehabilitating them? what kind of society are you building with this insane approach? america is the incarceration capital of the world, and coincidently the gun violence capital of the world, it's just an insane cycle of violence, incarceration, and destroyed families and communities. all this b.s. about pulling yourself up by your bootstraps but at the same time making it impossible to do so, someone comes out of jail and can't get a job, can't afford an apartment, can't pay the bills, how in the fuck do you expect them to contribute? help their family? help their community? barry had a hard life growing up and understood these things. and he passed that compassion on to others. the man is a saint.
Switzer turned up his game against all of his best rivals and I give him credit for being a great motivator, but his hands off approach caused him a lot of grief and some blame must fall on him. Paterno was basically senile at the end of his career and look what happened to him, basically the same thing only worse.
Barry isfar more than the coach to the players that played for him, 2 most he is a dear dear friend that is much bigger in life then the title of coach and it is far more than can be said about bear
Barry Switzer is a bad person because his Oklahoma teams had a nasty habit of beating Nebraska on a consistent basis and that makes him a bad person. I guess.
tremendous recruiter at OU and a winner. was a joke at Dallas Cowboys he was fired by Jerry.Inherited a super bowl team and stood out of the way. less than 2 yrs from 1995 super bowl was canned.Dallas hasn't won it since and it's now 2017.Not acceptable Jerry. Dallas has been wildly inconsistent for 20yrs
I never seen a bigger fake as a coach, even his pigeon toes are crossed more than any other I have ever seen. I'm surprised he don't end it, and surprised he don't trip over his big toes!
