Bobby Bowden Is Selling His New Book, Selling Out Florida State

[HT: Associated Press, Orlando Sentinel]

Bobby Bowden is going public about how he was treated by Florida State. Here's the interview the Associated Press did with the Seminole legend. (Thanks AP/youtube.com)



Oh by the way, he's trying to sell his new book "Called To Coach, Reflections on Life, Football and Faith." Bowden co-authored with Mark Schlabach.

First of all I thought Florida State was about as creative you could get with head coaching titles. Last year Mickey Andrews was the associate head coach, Rick Trickett was the assistant head coach, Chuck Amato was the executive head coach and Jimbo Fisher was the head coach in waiting. Ambassador coach? That's just a little extreme.

Bowden also talked to The Sporting News which will be in the magazines August 30th issue. In his interview with Matt Hayes of TSN Bowden describes his meeting with then FSU President T.K. Wetherell and how it went down.

“First thing he says is, ‘This ain’t gonna be pretty.’ It went downhill from there,” Bowden said. “Those were his first words; I couldn’t believe it. He said, ‘You have two options: One is to stay on as an ambassador coach for one more year. You can still be the coach, but we don’t want you to go on the field.’ I’d get paid for doing nothing. That’s stealing from FSU. I said, ‘That’s out, forget it. What’s the other option?’ He said, ‘We don’t renew your contract.’ ”

Read a preview of the Bowden interview and watch TSN's Matt Haynes talk about that interview by clicking the link below.

http://link.cinesport.com/services/player/bcpid260821017001?bctid=593381546001

Former FSU president T.K. Wetherell responded in an e-mail to the Orlando Sentinel. In his response Wetherell agrees with Bowden's side of the story but it's clear his sacrificed their friendship for the good of Florida State University.

"I haven’t seen anything that is new in his book or the papers, There were basically two options and neither were going to come out good. The whole idea of an Ambassador Coach made no sense to me or him when we talked through it but I told some of the Board of Trustees and Boosters I would present it—but was not committed to it and didn’t think Bowden would want it either. To his credit, he dismissed all variations of it right off the bat.

“That left option 2 — not renewing his contract. It is not all that complex—just that simple. Option 3 of one more year or 400 wins (which probably would mean 2 more years) would not have moved the program forward and hindered the Presidential search that I knew was coming so Bobby chose to announce his retirement. End of story — end of friendship."

Those of us at the OSG HQ knew this would get ugly once the facts came out in regards to Bobby Bowden stepping down as head coach. We do agree that it was time to make the change but just wished that didn't go down the way it did.