Four days before the Pitt Panthers opened their season by defeating Southern Mississippi 14-10, Johnny Majors was at a table in a plush hotel, bidding on items at an auction.
The sale was to help an athletic department that needs scholarship funds to stay afloat.
“We’re close to Chapter 11 here,” Majors said.
The Pitt budget for men’s and women’s sports is about $14 million. At Tennessee, where Majors used to coach, the budget was some $11 million more.
Dinner for six at Majors’ university-provided house netted $9,000 in the auction. Majors’ bid won the original painting of the 1976 Pitt media guide, the year he coached the Panthers to a national championship. He bid $650 for a year’s supply of gasoline.
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Someone seated nearby asked, “Coach, don’t you get your gas free?”
“Oh, yeah,” Majors said.
Too late. His bid won.
When you’re into a massive rebuilding job, when you’ve got money to raise, players to coach, meetings to attend and speeches to make, it’s easy to overlook a detail or two.
Majors, bought out last season at Tennessee with two years left on his contract, is back for a second tour at a school that has been on a freefall in football.
From 1973-82, Pitt was 92-25-1 with five Top 10 finishes and nine bowl trips. From 1983-92, Pitt was 55-53-6 and never Top 10. It went to three bowls but won just 12 games the last three years. Facilities, finances and fan interest have declined.
Players say Majors has brought together a team divided by dissension.
“Coach Majors puts more emphasis on discipline,” receiver Dietrich Jells said. “That’s what this team needed. Last year, it seemed like discipline was lost.”
It showed. Pitt was 3-9, worst record since 1972, the year before Majors arrived the first time. Last year, the Panthers lost by an average of almost 22 points. They surrendered a school-record 429. Paul Hackett was fired. Majors, looking for a place to go, came marching back.
“He knows the tradition,” linebacker Gerald Simpson said. “He helped build the tradition. He’ll bring it back.”
“No one second-guesses him,” defensive tackle Tom Barndt said. “Last year, there were a lot of bad apples that did a lot of talking in the locker room, `We shouldn’t do this or that.’ Some of the guys stopped believing. A lot of those guys are gone.”
Majors said five players were not invited back and several others transferred, leaving Pitt with 88-“people, not players,” Majors said.
Sixty-nine are on scholarship.
The team lost a four-year starter at quarterback and replaced him with a guy who has exercise-induced asthma. The top offensive lineman has twice run afoul of the law. Eight sophomores are projected starters on defense.
Majors said he has never inherited less talent. Sports Illustrated picked Pitt 101 out of 106 Division 1-A programs.
“Goal No. 1 is to get out of the 100s,” Majors said.
Sounds easy enough, but Pitt scheduled five teams that played in New Year’s Day bowls. Three other foes had winning records, including Southern Miss, which returned 16 starters from a 7-4 team.
“We’ve got a champagne schedule on a beer budget,” Majors said.
Facilities are dated. Pitt Stadium is 68 years old. The weight room is small. The urban campus is cramped.
Majors rebuilt Iowa State when he was 32, Pitt when he was 37, Tennessee when he was 41. Now, he is 58, coming back from five-bypass heart surgery last August. Can his health hold up for the rigorous road ahead?
Majors gives an incredulous look. His eyes bulge.
“Hell yes,” he says. “I have a lot of energy. I play golf, tennis. I do anything I did before. I just have new veins.”
And a new team.
“The cupboard’s pretty bare,” Majors says. “Right now, we’re in the embryonic stage. We’ve got to crawl-and I hope crawl decently-before we can do some walking and running.”
Majors was thrilled to report the auction generated $105,000. The ESPN appearance against Southern Miss will bring Pitt $350,000 to $400,000.
“I wasn’t all that excited about being on national TV,” Majors said. “But we couldn’t afford to turn it down financially.”
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At an afternoon picnic at Pitt Stadium, 94 degrees, Majors introduced his staff and addressed several hundred fans: “I’ve had no greater desire in my life than to bring Pitt back to the top again-and we can.”
Autograph seekers streamed past Majors’ table. Old and new friends greeted him. Majors soaked it in.
“When I walked in here the first day, I felt like I’d never left,” Majors said. “The people all over the state are open, friendly, warm. There’s not much game-playing, innuendo. They don’t have hidden agendas.
“I tell them, `I’m happy to be here, but you might not be glad I’m back after the season.’ I’m afraid I may disappoint some people who expect miracles. I’ve never seen a miracle in my life.”
Enthusiasm runs high. On the first two days coaches could contact prospects, 25 committed to visits.
Majors raves about his coaching staff. When he did background checks, the first question he asked: “Are they loyal?”
He insinuated not all of his staff at Tennessee was loyal.
Pitt has made Majors the star of an advertising blitz. The slogan is “Back to the Future.” His picture is on billboards, the media guide, schedule cards and T-shirts. There are “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again” television ads. “Panther Pride,” a weekly TV show, has been renamed “The Johnny Majors Show.”
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The school hired a public relations firm to promote the show and Pitt football. That is needed in Pittsburgh, a pro sports town. A cab driver, asked about Pitt football, says, “Nobody cares.”
Attendance averaged 32,687 last year. Tennessee averaged 95,924. Pitt’s home finale against Louisville drew 14,065.
Tennessee football is the No. 1 game in that state. Pitt football is the No. 5 game in town, behind the Steelers, Penguins, Pirates and Pitt basketball.
“You play with the cards you’re dealt, wherever you go,” Majors said. “You’d be dumb to fight it, stupid to fight it. We’re not going to fight the competition. You don’t cry about being in a pro town . . . not a pro town, a town of varied interests.”
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If you visit his home or office, you won’t find a clue that John Majors ever coached at Tennessee. No pictures. No plaques. No trophies.
“What’s important to me, I have in safe keeping at the proper place. Things not important to me, I put them out of my life.”
He laughed.
“I had two, three people say they heard I took all my orange and white stuff and threw it in the Tennessee River.”
He laughed again.
“That wasn’t the case. I have no reason to display a lot of stuff because my colors have changed. They’re blue and gold.”
Does he ever wear orange?
“Huh? For what? You got a good sense of humor. You notice I’ve got mine, too.”
Majors loses his sense of humor when talk turns to Tennessee. Make no mistake, he is still bitter about his ouster, so bitter he won’t say University of Tennessee. He refers to the school as “my alma mater” or “my former employer.”
“I don’t have any trouble saying the state of Tennessee. I’ve got too many things to look forward to to be bitter. Other than a handful of people, I’ve got nothing to be angry about.”
He won’t call them by name, but they are university President Joe Johnson, trustees Bill Johnson and Jim Haslam, Athletic Director Doug Dickey and coach Phil Fulmer.
“The state deserves better,” Majors said.
Majors said he left Tennessee its “greatest program” since the Vols won the national championship in 1951. He said he left Tennessee with national championship talent. Is he trying to put heat on Fulmer?
“I’m telling the truth. We were knocking on the (national) door.”
Asked if his biggest regret was not winning a national crown, Majors said: “A handful of administrators and officials at Tennessee, they made the determination for me not to be able to win a national championship at the best time of my career. Therefore, I cannot regret not winning a national championship at my alma mater. They took away my best chance.”
Majors was offered a chance to remain at Tennessee as associate athletic director. He said he’s better off rebuilding a gutted program than “being associated with a handful of people you can’t trust.”
Majors mentioned the two contract-extension offers from Dickey that were withdrawn last fall. Majors isn’t sure if Dickey or Joe Johnson or someone else made that call.
“I don’t know who pulled the trigger.”
There are still times when the whole bizarre incident festers.
“Any time I do that (get angry), I try to completely turn my switch and don’t give the satisfaction to deceptive forces of the world. I think about the hundreds of good things that have happened to me compared to the few negative things.
“I’ve had an exciting life. To let a period of deception at the height of your career . . . yeah, it you think about it, sure it makes you angry. But hey, man, you’re healthy, you’re lucky, count your blessings. I’m doing the thing I like to do.”