The Jacksonville Jaguars recently got a win in court over Urban Meyer, the worst NFL coach in history. He sued the organization, claiming he was fired without cause in 2021 and was due over $30 million from the four years that were left on his contract. An arbiter sided with Jacksonville, so the College Football Hall of Famer will not be getting a dime from the franchise. The Jags got some closure with the Meyer era in the rearview mirror, a time that will not be remembered fondly by anyone involved.
What Makes Urban Meyer The Worst NFL Coach
The Meyer hire by the Jaguars always seemed strange. The former Ohio State coach was one of the best recruiters in the history of college football, a skill set he couldn’t really use in the NFL. In most cases, when a college coach makes the jump to the league, it’s usually someone who has a prolific offensive scheme and is good at teaching it (like Steve Spurrier or Chip Kelly).
On top of that, Meyer just wasn’t good at (or even cared about) developing pro-ready quarterbacks. Not to mention, the Fox Sports analyst had multiple high-profile scandals at Florida and Ohio State. The writing was on the wall for how this era for Jacksonville was going to go, and the franchise ignored all the warning signs to make a splashy hire.
The Jaguars’ 2021 season showed why Meyer was a terrible hire, and he caused tangible damage to multiple careers during his abbreviated run. The Jags went 2-11 before he was fired, and only three of those losses were within one score. Trevor Lawrence got thrown to the wolves as a rookie with an inept head coach, and he’s still not near his potential as an NFL QB despite five years of starting experience. The Meyer experiment cost Jacksonville years of rebuilding before they could realistically contend in the AFC South, and the fault lies with ownership.
What makes Meyer’s run especially notorious is all the scandals he got caught up in as an NFL head coach. It started with hiring Chris Doyle, who was let go by the Iowa Hawkeyes for racist language and behavior towards African American players. He allegedly kicked Josh Lambo, the Jaguars kicker, in the leg and told him, “I’m the head ball coach, I’ll kick you whenever the f*** I want” (Lambo has sued Meyer since, with a court date set for August 3).
After a Thursday night game with the Bengals, the coach stayed behind, and a video surfaced of him interacting inappropriately with a woman who was not his wife (which apparently is a common thing for football coaches now). The embarrassment of off-the-field behavior and on-field struggles forced the Jags to fire him in mid-December, bringing a shameful end to the worst run by a head coach in NFL history.
Both sides eventually got what they wanted after the split. The Jaguars are poised to take the next step under second-year coach Liam Coen, after winning the AFC South in 2025. Lawrence is finally living up to the hype of a number-one overall pick, and Travis Hunter is one of the more compelling athletes that the NFL has had in some time. Meyer seems content with his role as a TV analyst, with nothing left to prove in the college game and an NFL return extremely unlikely. 2021 was a dark year for everyone in Jacksonville, but things are finally looking up for the Jags.
