Former KU football assistant Ed Warinner on the rise at Ohio State
By Tom Keegan
January 6, 2013
Photo by Nick Krug. Enlarge photo.
Former Kansas offensive coordinator Ed Warinner gives opening comments during a press conference Monday, Dec. 31, 2007 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Columbus, Ohio ? Step inside the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. All the way at the end of the hall is the legendary coach?s final chalkboard with words and numbers chalked by the legend the day he threw a punch that ended his career. Out of the speaker in this alcove, Hayes? voice forever loops.
Well before reaching the end of that hall, a left turn brings a visitor into the weight room, where excuses come to die. On the wall is a ?loaf chart? with a number listed next to names. Every time a player is caught putting less than maximum effort into a lift, a graduate assistant hollers, ?Loaf, (player?s name).?
What amounts to a public wall of shame for athletes arms assistant coaches with ammunition to draw better effort from their pupils.
One of those assistants is Ed Warinner, former Kansas University offensive coordinator and current co-offensive coordinator/offensive line coach on Urban Meyer?s staff at Ohio State.
Keeping in mind that the word ?Michigan? is prohibited from ever being uttered by coach or athlete on the premises, here?s how a conversation between Warinner and one of his offensive lineman is liable to go when the player?s name appears next to a scarlet number on the loaf chart:
Warinner: ?What?s this all about??
Player: ?I was sick that day, throwing up.?
Warinner: ?Oh, really? Why don?t you tell that to the guy from that team up north when he?s slamming your quarterback to the ground. Maybe he?ll go easy on you if you tell him you?re sick.?
That?s what coaching football sounds like at the elite level. Coaches constantly drag players out of their comfort zones and challenge them in ways designed to make them a little tougher every day, mentally and physically.
Warinner would know. His football coaching life is as star-crossed as the movie life of Forrest Gump. Warinner has ties, direct and indirect, to the biggest names in college football, past and present.
Warinner?s family roots reach to as big a name as there is in the college game?s history. Warinner?s father, Edgar, was part of Bear Bryant?s first recruiting class at Kentucky.
Indirectly, Warinner?s coaching roots stretch to the most celebrated defense in football history. He worked as a defensive graduate assistant at Michigan State when the head coach was George Perles, coordinator of the Pittsburgh Steelers? Steel Curtain defense that won four Super Bowls.
A search for Warinner?s direct ties to active coaching giants does not require looking past the top three teams ranked in the Associated Press poll.
After Kansas and before Ohio State, Warinner worked for No. 1 Notre Dame?s head coach Brian Kelly as offensive line coach. As a GA at Michigan State, Warinner coached under then-position coach Nick Saban, head coach of No. 2 Alabama.
Ohio State, ineligible for a bowl game because of NCAA rules violations under former head coach Jim Tressel, went 12-0 in its first year under Meyer and is ranked No. 3 in the nation.
?I really wanted to hire a coach with coordinator experience,? Meyer said in explaining the hiring of Warinner. ?That was very important to me. Ed has that experience. His offenses at Kansas were not only impressive, but they were some of the top offenses in the country.?
A native of Strasburg, Ohio, and 1984 graduate of Mount Union University, Warinner said he would have left Notre Dame for ?probably only one? assistant coaching job ? the one he has.
?It was a dream place for me to coach here in my home state,? said Warinner, whose two daughters are students at KU. ?Woody Hayes was a (high school) coach in the county I grew up in. I have family close by. I moved away 25 years ago and have been away from my family and friends. This was a chance to come home.?
Professionally, it fit for Warinner as well.
?To work with another high-level coach like Urban, to be able to work with Brian Kelly and Urban Meyer over a two-year period for me is very lucky,? Warinner said. ?I?ve learned a lot from both of them. I?ve learned a lot of football. I?ve learned a lot about leadership. I?ve learned a lot about being a head coach and how to manage a program. Obviously, they are two people who are as good at it as anybody in the country.?
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