Bernie Kosar Talks Career & Leading Miami to a National Title

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00:00The big game, New Orleans, right here on Media Row. It's the Sports Grid Network. It's 90 right

00:04side. I've got a special guest today. It's Bernie Kosar. Legend Bernie Kosar. How about that?

00:08All right. Thank you so much. Slowing my cranium with this beautiful entrance here. Thank you.

00:14Love it. Cleveland Browns, Miami Hurricanes. We're going to go through it all, but I always

00:18like to start with the background with you, Bernie, because I'm enthralled by how you went

00:21to Ohio and how you got sold on the University of Miami and how you ended up there.

00:26Well, I have my You Matter shirt on, but it's not just for the University of Miami. I'd talk

00:31about big self-confidence and self-awareness. And as a little boy growing up in Youngstown,

00:36Ohio in the late 70s, early 80s, and running a 5'5", 40, and always being tall, slow, and skinny,

00:44the Midwest wasn't recruiting me. And being a mommy's boy, that was a little disappointing.

00:49So really, the only schools that would recruit me back then was the Florida schools. So Coach

00:54Snellenberger with the Pro Style Offense came to Northeast Ohio and said that he thought I could be

01:01a quarterback. And I was impressed. Impressed enough with Coach Snellenberger and his pipe

01:07from the old days showing my age. We've seen, obviously, the U30 for 30s. You're in all of

01:12those. But this is one of the interesting things where a legendary program, and I felt like you

01:17were on the foundation floor of building that. A lot of young kids growing up, hey, Miami was

01:22fantastic in the 80s and 90s. Iconic program. But it had to start somewhere. How were you sold

01:27on going to Miami and the belief that Snellenberger told you, you're going to win a national championship,

01:32and you did? Yeah, thank you. To bring that up and to focus on that. And one of my core beliefs,

01:37the life lessons that you learn in football at the University of Miami is really on the football

01:42field, carried forward into my life lessons now. And Coach Snellenberger has such an unwavering

01:49belief in himself and the system. He says, to believe is to be strong. And he believed

01:55so much in himself, in the program, and he got you to believe in yourself. And that belief

02:02in yourself and his vision of wanting to win a national championship in five years and being

02:09able to play the best guys. And I actually was a little intimidated by that. Wasn't sure

02:14about coming from Youngstown down to Miami after the Mario boatlift and some of the things that

02:20were going on, the riots in Miami. Miami back then wasn't the Miami that we see today. But he

02:27had said to me, he goes, you know, everything in life that's great, everybody wants. And he goes,

02:32if you don't take this challenge, we play everybody tough. He goes, you know, the big 10 schools

02:36didn't want you. Notre Dame didn't want you. I play all them. He goes, if you want to be the best

02:42and be a national championship, don't run from a challenge. And he goes, everyone who runs from

02:49a challenge at 18 years old will run their whole life. So to stand up for it now, and that's just

02:54core confidence and homily that he went on with that belief in himself was so contagious that

03:01made me want to go. And now as I get into the heck, the late third quarter, early fourth quarter of my

03:06life, and some of the diagnoses I've been getting, it may be fourth quarter to overtime,

03:12but I almost feel a responsibility to kind of pass down, pass it forward, some of those beliefs

03:19and some of those characteristics that Coach Snowenberg and Coach Johnson implemented on me.

03:24Absolutely. Because when you were there, and I specifically remember, again, I was just a young

03:28toddler, but just learning about the years in the 87, 89, the multiple national champions. But I

03:32always remember you bringing up saying like, oh my goodness, like the public's like Nebraska's

03:36coming to the Orange Bowl, the unbeatable Tom Osborne's coming to town. And I remember you

03:40saying specifically, they're going to have a tough time defending us because we have a pro-style

03:44passing game, something they've never seen before. Talk about your confidence heading into the Orange

03:48Bowl that night. Yeah. So like it's well documented, maybe a little dated today, but talking

03:54about the bravado, the confidence of the Canes of the mid 80s, the late 80s and stuff. But bluntly,

04:00we hadn't established ourselves in 1983. And we were massively the underdog to even debated if we

04:08were worthy to be considered a national championship team. So to be playing kind of the team that was

04:13documented as the best, the best team ever. And maybe it's because you didn't have cell phones

04:20and technology and social media and all that. And maybe we're just young and dumb, but we a hundred

04:25percent just solely believed that we were the better team and they were coming to our house.

04:31And there's nothing like the old Orange Bowl. And I'm glad you brought that up because I finally

04:37made it to the Orange Bowl in 2001. And I said to myself, as soon as I saw it, I saw so many big

04:42games here, obviously Miami fan or Miami Dolphins fan or Superbowl has played there. What was it

04:47like at the Orange Bowl when that place was rocking on a Saturday night? Okay, nothing is like the

04:52Orange Bowl on a Saturday night for sure. But Coach Schnellenberger back then, we believed in

05:00the heat. So we practiced every day at 12 o'clock. He wanted the games. He wanted the games at 12

05:07o'clock. But when we started really playing good and we started getting kicked up to the national

05:12games. And I know today it's kind of cool to see we're doing an awesome show right now on screen

05:17and stuff. But TV wasn't big back then. So to be kicked up to a primetime game, when that really

05:22happened, that was magical in terms of the electricity. And you still see me getting

05:28elevated as an old man here. But the metal bleachers and the raucousness of it and the banging

05:36and the way it would literally shake. It was massively intimidating and still really

05:42inspiring to think about. I used to get a kick out of it, Bernie, because when I would go to games

05:46there, even into the 2000s, there was no video play board. It was very old school. It was rickety

05:50at that point, but it was your Orange Bowl at that point, which is certainly a big legacy for

05:54University of Miami. Now, you were a national champion. You move on to the NFL, but I do want

05:57to talk about this as well. The way you got to the NFL, a lot different than people used to get to

06:02the NFL. How did you make it to the Cleveland Browns? So if you go back into the late 70s,

06:09I love where I'm from in Northeastern Ohio, but it's almost like today. The manufacturing jobs

06:16of the 1950s and 1960s was spectacular. We've had some really good periods sometimes in the early

06:232000s here, but now manufacturing really dissipated in the early, late 70s there.

06:32So being able to provide for your family, the uncertainty and issues within your house

06:40really resonated as a young kid. So bluntly, I didn't want to leave University of Miami. The

06:47team was loaded, rocking and loaded, and talent was incredible back then. With the guys that,

06:54Michael Irvin and stuff, who I got awesome, got the Super Bowl with in 1993. When we won the

06:59national championship in 1983, he didn't even get on the field. We were that good with Eddie Brown

07:04and stuff like that. So I really wanted to come back there, but now we're three or four years

07:10into the mills being closed. I'd love to sit here today and tell you how intelligent and affluent

07:16and successful me and my family has been through generations, but really we're lower demographic

07:22steelworkers. We're hourly workers. And if the mills are open, we're okay. And if the mills aren't,

07:27we're not okay. So now the mills have been closed for three or four years. School came easy to me.

07:34So I was able to do math, the finance economics major in my head. And I was really trying to get

07:39into my master's, but it was a way to get into the NFL and really come up with an excuse to really

07:46supplement my family. My younger brother and sister needed to go to college, my parents and

07:52the house and that. So it was kind of wanting to go home and kind of have like our dad's safe face.

07:58Absolutely.

07:59Because it's still, your dad's want to take care of you.

08:02Now I could talk to you, Bernie, for an hour, Miami Cleveland legend, but I know you're here

08:06for bigger reasons as well. Tell us a little about what you're doing right now with your life and how

08:09you're going on.

08:10Well, thanks. You know, I really, as a man, you know, 61 years old, you want to sit here and be

08:16cool and talk about how everything's perfect. I have no anxiety. I have no, no issues. I,

08:23the top best point physically, cognitively of my life. That completely would be my Pinocchio nose.

08:31We keep growing even more than possible. So, you know, as a guy who's here, I'm talking about

08:36mental health and mental awareness. You know, I've had 60 surgeries, 80 broken bones, a hundred

08:42concussions, 14 seizures. The last couple of seizures in a coma for 72 and 96 hours. So to

08:49have been retired in 97 and start those surgeries and to really bluntly be medicated on North of

08:5580 to a hundred pills a day and to have had a seizure and to come out of it in 2017 and for

09:02the doctors to say, you're a tough guy. You're doing great. Keep up with your prescriptions and

09:06protocols. I'm like, that's going to kill me. So I haven't done a pill or drank in seven years.

09:11And for a guy that was told seven years ago that you have five years left to cognitive brain

09:16function. I couldn't say cognitive. I couldn't enunciate, articulate, communicate multiple

09:21syllable words. So now it's not sitting here to brag, but so many of my friends now, I love my

09:28number 19. Yeah. Love my number 20 in college, but 19 people a day will commit suicide in the state

09:34of Ohio. We had a bad seven out of 10 pills now are laced with fentanyl in the state of Ohio. We

09:42have epidemic issues with the fentanyl overdose issues. I could have, should have been either one

09:49of those two statistics. I've lost so many of my friends, the great Junior Seau, Dave Durris, and

09:56just this past year, Bob Dahl, one of my old offensive linemen committed suicide. So it's a

10:03taboo subjects. Don't none of us really want to bring that up. Men, we want to suppress a lot of

10:09our feelings. I wrestle. I try to pretend like I'm cool and extroverted. I'm deep down introverted on

10:14the spectrum. So how do you manage anxiety? How do you get out and cope and be in environments

10:20like this? So without having to be medicated, without having and wanting to be doing it. So now

10:27I kind of work with people and try to help them find healthy habits for some of the healthy things

10:33that unhealthy things that could be around us. Well, Bernie, you look great. You've had a great

10:38career. You're doing big things now. I appreciate you stopping by the set. Big game here in New

10:42Orleans, Super Bowl 59. Donnie Wright's out. Bernie Kosar, legend Bernie Kosar. Thanks for joining us.

10:47Thank you. You matter.

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