As Meyer-watch 2011 hits its peak -- rumors of an announcement of Meyer’s hiring have pointed to sometime early next week despite denials by the coach -- another report indicates that Ohio State could be conducting a total athletic makeover.
ESPN Cleveland reports that three members of the school’s board of trustees have been behind the courtship of Urban Meyer to Ohio State, not athletic director Gene Smith. In fact, multiple sources have informed ESPN that Smith’s job security is shaky and that he could “relinquish his position” winkwinknudgenudge in the next six-to-nine months.
Word around the campfire is that Meyer isn’t particularly high on Smith and his track record of NCAA troubles, and that perhaps his hiring could be contingent upon Smith being shown the proverbial door. But, even Ohio State president E. Gordon Gee’s attitude toward his AD has taken a turn for worse in the past few weeks.
“I am disappointed that this is where we find ourselves. You know I find this unacceptable,” Gee said in a letter to Smith following a new failure to monitor charge because of the school’s insufficient action to monitor booster Robert DiGeronimo
Paul Krebs, current athletic director at New Mexico and former athletic administrator at tOSU, is thought to be a leading candidate to replace Smith if he steps aside. Krebs was the AD who hired Meyer at Bowling Green in 2001. Could there be a possible reunion at OSU?
The connection is certainly there, but Meyer has skirted around the issue.
“I’m in a good place right now mentally and physically,”Meyer told Pat Dooley of the Gainesville Sun. “So if something happens with Ohio State, I’ll have a decision to make. But there has been no interview. There has been no offer to make a decision about”