Joe Paterno
Joe Paterno
Joseph Vincent "Joe" Paterno, sometimes referred to as "JoePa", was an American college football player, and later athletic director and coach. He was the head coach of the Penn State Nittany Lions from 1966 to 2011. With 409 victories, Paterno was the most successful coach in NCAA FBS history. His career ended with his dismissal from the team in November, 2011 as a result of the Penn State child sex abuse scandal...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth21 December 1924
CountryUnited States of America
Coaches have got to be given rank within the university so that you can't fire a coach unless you go through an academic committee, just as you would with a professor. If coaches are to have any stability and security, they need to be treated like an English professor.
I'm not as concerned about me. What's happened to me has been great. I got five great kids. Seventeen grandchildren.
I don't think it's fair to 12-, 13- and 14-year-olds to say 'Show us you're a winner right now!' Winning isn't everything. I'll never buy that thing that if a boy loses a football game, he's a loser in life.
The name on the front of the jersey is what really matters, not the name on the back.
Mostly I want to talk positive; I wanna talk about a bunch of great kids that I coached and made me look good and the university that I've seen grow from a cow college, which it was, only 12,000 people, and when I came here, we weren't at Pennsylvania State University, we were at Penn State College.
My thing was play as hard as you can, don't be stupid, pay attention to details, and have enough guts in the clutch that you're not afraid to make a play. Some things I thought were important for a young man to know.
In every life, there have to be some shadows. Look at me. My life has been filled with sunshine. A beautiful and caring wife. Five healthy children. I got to do what I loved. How many people are that lucky?
I've had a wonderful experience here at Penn State.
It doesn't matter what people think of me. I've lived my life.
I don't think I deviated from what I'm all about and what I thought was important. Whether you want to call that a legacy, or whatever you want to call it.
We shall act with good intentions, but at times we will be wrong. When we are, let us admit it and try to right the situation.
When a kid plays football games before he attends a class, something is wrong.