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It’s throwback week here, so we naturally pounced all over this walk down memory lane from USA Today chronicling that time Bear Bryant led Kentucky to its football pinnacle and then took the Texas A&M job. Give it a read: come for the ridiculous salaries ($15,000) and stay for the stark reminders of how different this planet was 65 years ago. Let’s kick over the traces.
“Paul is a comparatively young man in the game. He is a genius as a football strategist and as a leader of boys. He has tremendous enthusiasm and ambition. It has been his hope to remain in Kentucky the rest of his life. He would make his name, and a name for Kentucky right here in Lexington.
Keeping it humble. Very classy.
“But every time he hurdled one backwash from the scandals, he encountered another. Most of the publicity has been undeserved. Much of it has been grossly unfair. But deserved or not it has caused innumerable boys to turn elsewhere for athletics. In addition to this deplorable state of affairs, Paul has come to realize that the University of Kentucky is governed by basketball, at the expense of football. This and the scandal brought him to the decision that he never could achieve here the success he wants and feels will be his in football.”
Well...he was right, wasn’t he?
Bryant himself declined to elaborate on why he had changed his mind just three weeks after saying he wanted to finish his career at Kentucky amid interest from LSU. He did say the environment Kentucky faced at Texas A&M in a 1952 game when Aggies students carried victorious UK players off the field had impressed him.
SEE?!?! BEING CLASSY REAPS HUGE BENEFITS
“I have nothing but praise for anybody and everybody in Kentucky,” Bryant told Ruby. “We have been wonderfully happy. When Texas A&M first asked me if I would be interested — that was in Cincinnati at the NCAA meeting — I laughed. … But now … well, I’ve just decided the change would be better for me and my family.”
Good grief...could you imagine the backlash from Aggie Internet if such a thing happened now? WE DON’T NEED THIS CLOWN HE DOESN’T TAKE THIS UNIVERSITY SERIOUSLY FUCK BEAR BRYANT THAT CLASSLESS PIECE OF SHIT, STAY AT KENTUCKY IF YOU THINK A&M IS SUCH A JOKE YOU POTATO CHIP HAWKING HABERDASHER.
Bryant’s wife, Mary Harmon Bryant, who quipped “speak for yourself” after the coach’s description as the moving being best for his family, told the Courier Journal she first heard the news when a woman phoned and asked to buy their house upon learning Bryant was headed to Texas A&M.
Bear Bryant managed to stay married to this woman until he passed away 30 years later. That’s some quality backpedaling and damage control.
Enjoy your nostalgic Thursdays and beat the hell outta modern-day Kentucky.