Well, that didn’t take long.
Urban Meyer has been head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars for just one month and he already has a controversy on his hands.
Meyer recently hired former strength coach at the University of Iowa Chris Doyle as the Jags director of sports performance. Over the last year, Doyle has been accused of uttering racist remarks, belittling and bullying players during his time with the school, per ESPN.
But Meyer is standing by his decision to hire Doyle, who he’s known for nearly two decades. In fact, he thinks the team did “a very good job” of vetting Doyle despite the allegations.
“I vet everyone on our staff and, like I said, the relationship goes back close to 20 years and a lot of hard questions asked, a lot of vetting involved with all our staff,” Meyer said.
“… I met with our staff and I’m going to be very transparent with all the players like I am with everything. I’ll listen closely and learn and also there’s going to have to be some trust in their head coach that we’re going to give them the very best of the best, and time will tell. … The allegations that took place, I will say (to the players) I vetted him. I know the person for close to 20 years and I can assure them there will be nothing of any sort in the Jaguar facility.”
Meyer, of course, is no stranger to controversy. His college football coaching career hit a major snag in 2018 after he was accused of ignoring allegations of spousal abuse involving one of his assistant coaches. (And that’s just one of many controversies he’s faced throughout his career.)
And clearly, he wasted no time bringing that same vibe to Jacksonville.
