34 seasons Bobby Bowden has owned the city of Tallahassee, and has built the Florida State program into one of the best in college football. He owns 2 National Championships, and is second only to Joe Paterno in all-time wins. However recently FSU has fallen on some hard times and hasn't been among the best of college football for quite some time. In fact you have to go back to 2000 the last time FSU won ten or more games. Yes, things are starting to get dire in Tallahassee and unfortunately Bowden is a victim of his own success.
It's not enough anymore to just win 8 games and go to a bowl in Florida State. This is a school that is now 3rd in the big three behind Florida and Miami. That doesn't sit well with the higher ups at the school or the board of trustees. There's a statue of Bowden outside the stadium in which the Noles play at. He's been the football program since 1976 and has built it into what it is now. But regardless of what is happening with Bowden the team just isn't playing well. They're playing sloppy and not capitalizing on their opportunities as they should be.
I just still have a hard time with this school forcing out a man who has done so much. I understand things aren't going great anymore but he's ready to leave and at the age of 80, Bowden knows it may be time to step aside for Jimbo Fisher after this year or maybe even after the next. But don't force him out. Hasn't he earned the right to leave on his own terms? Gracefully, and in a way that will depict him as a legend? Not as a man who didn't know when it was time to leave and overstaying his welcome?
In a world of sports where it's a what have you done for me lately, we were able to overlook what Bowden did or didn't do when his players got in trouble when he was winning. However, now that he's not, every little thing he does is gong to be ripped apart and shredded and that's not fair to a man who gave everything to a university and formed it into the program it is now.
