Q&A: President Thrasher supports Fisher

John Thrasher stood up from his chair, extending his arms outward and pointing with his two index fingers.

For a few animated minutes, the president of Florida State University looked, acted and sounded like a coach.

Speaking with the Tallahassee Democrat editorial board on Thursday afternoon, Thrasher recounted his 20-minute meeting with the FSU football team on Monday.

The 71-year-old Thrasher repeated the standards expected of it at the school. He posed a question – no, make that a challenge – to the athletes as they sat in FSU’s athletic facility.

“The final thing I did was I stood up in front of them and I said, ‘Are there any leaders in here? Are there any leaders in here?’ ” Thrasher said.

Maybe 10 players initially stood, including redshirt junior kicker Roberto Aguayo.

Thrasher took another step toward the team and raised his voice.

“I said, ‘Are there any leaders in here?’ I shouted it,” Thrasher said.

“And every one of them stood up. And I said, ‘Are you with me? Do you understand the consequences, the concerns? Are you going to help us get through this?’ And every one of them said, ‘Yes sir.’ ”

Public scrutiny of FSU’s football program has intensified after two players were charged with misdemeanor battery in separate incidents a few days apart last week. Freshman quarterback De’Andre Johnson was dismissed, sophomore running back Dalvin Cook suspended indefinitely.

“When you have two things like this happen and you get national attention, you have to pay attention to it,” Thrasher said.

He is hopeful the football team received his message loud and clear.

“I am convinced, having raised kids myself - a son and two daughters, two of whom graduated from FSU – they know right from wrong, that they know where they ought to be and where they ought not to be,” Thrasher said.

“And when they make a serious mistake like striking a woman, that has to be dealt with in a pretty significant fashion.

In Thursday’s 60-minute meeting at the Democrat, Thrasher shared plans the university and athletic department want to implement to help educate student-athletes when it comes to their behavior. They include:

*A required course in social responsibilities.

*Creating an additional position in the compliance department to focus on student-athlete development.

*Scheduling additional speakers and former players to meet with the team.

Over the next three days, the Democrat will highlight the Q&A session with Thrasher.

During the meeting, he voiced his support of football coach Jimbo Fisher and believes they have a good relationship.

“His motor is running 100 percent, all the time,” Thrasher said. “It’s always on go. And it’s always focused on being successful, and he wants his athletes to be successful. ... When we visit and talk about how he feels about how he runs the program, I respect that. I respect that. But I am not short on making sure he understands where I’m coming from.”

Thrasher wants to make sure that coaches have studied all aspects of a player’s background during the recruitment process. His focus also remains on academics. He emphasized a lengthy list of achievements that students and student-athletes have celebrated.

“I don’t think there a lot of bad things going on at FSU,” Thrasher said. “I think there are, by and large, very powerfully good things going on.”

Opening Q&A Installment

President Thrasher on meeting with coach Fisher

“I met with Coach Fisher personally one-on-one (and) with Stan (Wilcox) on Monday. We had a great conversation. Coach Fisher came in with an outline of some ideas that he had. I think the first one, he has three or four more in the que that are going to come. We’ve had offers from our friends (and former players) Charlie Ward, Derrick Brooks, all over the country, want to come in and help mentor the kids. I think that’s part of it, I don’t think it’s the whole thing. Stan and I have talked about a course in character, ethics, that would be a required course the kids can take, young people can take, that would give them some additional background in consequences of actions, social types of responsibilities. Understanding that we live in a social media world; everything you do is scrutinized just about. All those things. He’s working on some ideas, I’ve got some ideas. I’ve gotten a lot of input from a lot of different people as you could imagine. I’ve got a lot of friends out there who think they know how to solve all the problems. ... (we) were talking about that if (snapping finger) we just added a couple of these ideas it would all go away. It isn’t going to go away. And I am not going to be here to tell you that we are never going to have another incident at FSU. I hope we don’t.”

Q: To what extent is Coach Fisher’s performance going to be judged and evaluated based on wins and losses versus to the behavior of his student-athletes?

A: “Not only behavior…behavior is important, we are going to do that. Also the academic success of this team. I think if the athletes understand when they come here, there is going to be a demand made on them to be good students as well as good athletes. And that’s a demanding thing because they spend a lot of time on the football field or on the basketball court or wherever. And they also understand that not every one of them is going professional and they need to get that education. So we are going to emphasize that. Part of the partial of Jimbo’s evaluation will be not only how we do well on the football field – I am confident we are going to do well. The best I can tell, we have some pretty good athletes that are coming through the process, a bunch of good recruits. But I think Jimbo has to be evaluated on wins and losses certainly and the academic success and the number of kids we have graduate. Now, the graduation thing is a dilemma for a lot of universities, not just us. You look at Duke, you look at Kentucky in basketball, you know the kids are spending one or two years and they are going pro. That’s one of the downsides of recruiting the quality of athletes that we have. But I want them while they are here to get as much as a quality education as they can. And part of that is I think his is responsibility. And to ensure that, we are going to work with them to make sure that happens.”

Q: You mentioned recruiting.

A: “I want to look at recruiting. I do. And I have asked coach Fisher this, and he assures me they do that already. They look at the background of these folks who come in. But I want to doubly reassure myself that when we are recruiting someone, we are looking at all aspects of that young person’s background and making sure we are making the right decision. Just like we do when we bring in kids who come to this university. We look and make sure of their backgrounds. I think it’s important for us to do that. I think it’s particularly important now that we do that. Just to take a look at, to reassure ourselves we are looking at all aspects of the background of those young people.”

Q: What we are asking of these 18-, 19-year-olds realistic? They are at the intersection of fame, and of immaturity and the complexity of the world.

A: “I couldn’t agree with you more. I am a dinosaur compared to them now. I do have children and some grandchildren. It goes back to 20 years ago, or maybe not that long ago, if you played for Bobby Bowden you really didn’t play until you were a junior or a senior and you had a chance to grow. And the kind of money was not out there like it is today. All those things I think make it a lot more difficult situation. So it maybe something we need to reflect on.”

Q: How does this all affect your appreciation for the role that the football program plays in this community?

A: “I think we all have to pay attention to the things that we believe in. We have to communicate. We have to be open. And I think again that’s part of what we are trying to do. Sometimes there’s warts that will be out there, I recognize that. We have some great athletes. We have some wonderful athletes who are doing great things in the community. That are doing great things in the classroom and are doing great things on the athletic field. Sometimes I don’t think we get enough of that kind of publicity.”

Q: In terms of helping educate players, what are your plans?

A: “We talked about the course (in social responsibilities). I think we are going to work on that. We talked about perhaps another compliance type person to come in and oversee some things like that. That’s in the discussions stages. Jimbo’s plan of bringing in some quality people to talk about character, role models I think can be a good influence on some of these folks is positive. We had two big incidents and the spotlight refocused on us. So we have to refocus on the kind of things that tell our story how strong we are as a university and the positive things that we can accomplish and hopefully make some corrections to any of the inadequacies frankly that we may have had. You look back on everything. I don’t think there a lot of bad things going on at FSU. I think there are, by and large, very powerfully good things going on. When you have two things like this happen and you get national attention, you have to pay attention to it.”

Q: Talk about your conversation with coach Fisher.

A: “He came in ready to go, which I appreciated by the way. Jimbo’s an ‘A’ personality, that’s why he’s so successful. His motor is running 100 percent, all the time. It’s always on go. And it’s always focused on being successful and he wants his athletes to be successful. When we visit and talk about how he feels about how he runs the program, I respect that. I respect that. But I am not short on making sure he understands where I coming from.”

Q: He understood the gravity of the situation?

A: “Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. Before I ever got there to meet with him, he and I had a phone conversation and he clearly understood the gravity of the situation.”

Q: You released a strong statement last week, and coach Fisher also had a strong statement. Where does your athletic director fit in this process?

A: “Stan is a very, very competent athletic director. He is, I can assure you and tell you from just traveling around the few times, a couple of the NCAA meetings, I’ve been to a couple ACC president’s meetings, he is highly respected as an athletic director. He is well thought of from his time at Notre Dame and at Duke before he came here. I think he is a very competent guy. I rely on him a lot and I have confidence in him.”