Yahoo - Barry Switzer said he used connections with local authorities to keep players

[Jenni Carlson]

Longtime Oklahoma head coach Barry Switzer has never been bashful when it comes to telling stories about his time with the Sooners. Switzer told USA Today Thursday that during his time as a coach he used his relationship with a local sheriff to keep minor incidents about his players out of the limelight. “I’d have local county people call me and say, ‘One of your guys is drunk and got in a fight and is jail down here.’ And I’d go down and get him out. Or I’d send an assistant coach down to get his (butt) out,” Switzer said Thursday. “The sheriff was a friend of the program. He didn’t want the publicity. He himself knew this was something we didn’t need to deal with in the media or anything with publicity.” Switzer coached as an assistant and head coach at OU from 1966 to 1988, long before the 24-hour news cycle and the constant presence of social media. Switzer said things could be handled in a different manner back then. “This is back before social media and the internet and all that,” he said. “And most colleges ran it that way. Most coaches ran it that way. We all did.” Switzer said that he and his assistants were in control of the discipline for players. An example of Switzer’s punishment would be forcing a player to run the stadium steps in the early morning. “We could handle things internally in an era 30 years ago that you can’t today,” Switzer said. “You get a traffic ticket today, it’s everywhere. No one escapes what we have today, the attention and technology we have today. It was a different era, a different time.” - - - - - - - Sam Cooper is a contributor for the Yahoo Sports blogs. Have a tip? Email him or follow him on Twitter! Follow @SamDCooper

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