The Collected Wisdom of J.C. Watts The Collected Wisdom of J.C. Watts
Interviewed by Darnell Mayberry
Published: July 1, 2007
J.C. Watts doesn't like to look back on his football career and wonder, ‘What if?' But the former OU quarterback can't help but think about what kind of career he would have had if he was only born a few years later.
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Watts, the former Oklahoma Representative in the U.S. Congress, remembers his playing days, talks about whether America is ready for an African-American president and whether or not OU coach Bob Stoops will leave for the NFL.
Today, you've got Steve Young, Donovan McNabb, Randall Cunningham, Michael Vick, Steve McNair, Vince Young. But I think there's a difference between a mobile quarterback and a running quarterback. I'd like to think I was a mobile quarterback. Michael Vick is a running quarterback. Running quarterbacks won't make it in the National Football League. So I think maybe I was six or seven years ahead of my time.
But that part of my life is over and I can't imagine the National Football League experience being any better than the experience I had at Eufaula High School or the University of Oklahoma.
For me personally, it probably isn't one it's two (memorable moments at OU) and they both happened in about a 40 day span. My senior year we played Nebraska in Lincoln. Our defense stops us on fourth-and-1 on our 22-yard line and we've got 78 yards to go with less than 2 ½ minutes to go in the game. And we won it in Lincoln. I guess 40 days later we're in the Orange Bowl against Bobby Bowden and we had beaten them pretty handedly the year before. They understood our option concept a little better. Again we're down 17-10, 80 yards to go, less than 2 ½ minutes left to go in the ball game. We march the length of the field, score and go for two and we won it.
Thinking about the wonderful feeling of those two games back to back, I've also thought about what if Forrest Valora missed that 2-point conversion, or if I would have overthrown it? I probably couldn't have been elected to dog catcher. My political career probably would have started and ended that night.
The camaraderie and fellowship that's created through those experiences, those things are ties that bind the University of Oklahoma football family. They'll bind us forever.
I think Barack (Obama) is the one African-American candidate who has hit the scene or announced that he's running for president that from the outset was taken seriously. And I think in politics, if you don't see me as a serious candidate I'm going to have a tough time getting over the hurdle. But I think the fact that he's raised the money that he's raised legitimizes his candidacy.
He is obviously an American of African descent, but there will be subliminal expectations of him that no other candidate will have on them. John McCain or Hillary Clinton will not be seen as white candidates. Barack is seen as a black candidate. And I think the black community or the black leadership has got to give him the latitude to be a presidential candidate, not necessarily a black presidential candidate.
I don't know (if America is ready for a black president.) It's about the same as when I came out of the University of Oklahoma, asking whether the National Football League was ready for a black quarterback. It's cross my mind that race played a role that there were not black quarterbacks. With Barack, those that might not vote for him have some legitimate concerns. Is he ready to lead a nation in time of war? I think that's a legitimate concern. But that remains to be seen. I think he's handled himself well at this point.
I don't know (if Bob Stoops will leave for the NFL). If you're the head coach of a top Division I school, one of the top five programs in the country, if you need a middle linebacker you've got the nation to go and find him. But if you're the head coach of the St. Louis Rams and you need a middle linebacker, you've got three rounds to try to find him. If you can make $2 million plus at the University of Oklahoma, Florida or Florida State, I just don't know if the appeal is there or if it's just the challenge alone.
I never would have thought pro basketball would have taken off the way it did (in Oklahoma) the last couple of years. I've seen in the last couple of years that Oklahoma could be a big-league state. I don't know if we're ready for the National Football League, because of Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Tulsa. I would wonder about the entertainment dollar being stretched too thin.
But I talked to some friends in Dallaswho did a survey, and from everything they saw they said Oklahoma City is a big-league city for basketball. Football, I don't know. It's a different animal. But I think Oklahoma City has arrived as a major league city in some venues.
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Former Oklahoma Rep. J. C. Watts is running J.C. Watts Companies, a multi-industry business headquartered in Washington, D.C. with operations in Oklahoma, Texas, Massachusetts and Korea. ASSOCIATED PRESS
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