Will Muschamp is telling the world not to worry about his sideline behavior. Florida’s football coach says he can and needs to curtail the f-bombs when confronting officials, but that he has no intention of pulling back on his fiery demeanor. Coach, this shouldn’t come as breaking news: If you’re going to survive long-term in the pressure cooker of being the Gators coach, you might want to do more than just lose the colorful language. Nobody is naive enough to think that football coaches don’t curse, though some like Tony Dungy have the capacity to hold their tongue. But when Muschamp’s potty-mouth was captured on national television against Auburn, he felt compelled to minimize the public relations damage by apologizing for his choice of words. But if Muschamp is smart, he better have a filter for more than just his mouth. It’s fine to go crazy on the sidelines in celebration of a good play. Everybody loves to see fire and passion, but as a head coach, there’s a fine line to walk when that comes out a different way as things go awry. Head coaches are supposed to be leaders. Nobody expects them to be perfect, but the early read on Muschamp is his temperature runs too hot in certain game situations. It doesn’t send a good message to players when they see the head coach becoming enraged in the heat of battle. How can a coach expect his players to be disciplined on the field if he’s acting like a crazy man every time he questions an official’s call? Remember, this isn’t the first time a Florida football coach failed to exercise proper restraint in a tense situation. Under different circumstances in 2004, Ron Zook did a poor job of self-control when athletic director Jeremy Foley asked him to intervene in a fight between some of his players and members of the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity. Zook went there to be a peacemaker but let his emotions get the better of him by becoming confrontational with some of the frat brothers, according to eyewitnesses. When the incident later became public record, Foley admitted some of Zook’s behavior was “unacceptable.” Two weeks after that, Zook was fired following a 38-31 loss at Mississippi State. Now you can argue that Zook’s fate was sealed anyway, but his self-control issues in handling the fraternity incident didn’t help his cause. Does this mean Muschamp, also a first-time head coach, is another Zook? Who knows, but Muschamp is not creating the best impression by acting like a wild man as his young team scored a combined 27 points in losing to Alabama, LSU and Auburn. Muschamp still has time to get his program going in the right direction. But the last thing he needs is this image of coach who can’t control himself on the sideline. It’s not just the language, coach. It’s the whole appearance of lack of composure. Gene Frenette: (904) 359-4540
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