You don't have to sacrifice your family to be a great coach.
As I've said many times, it's one thing to dream about something; it's another thing to experience it. It's one thing to think you're good enough; it's another thing to know you're good enough.
You may not have any interest in Clemson whatsoever, but if Clemson calls, and they want to pay for you to come, and feed you and put you in a hotel, well, who doesn't want to go do that? Sign me up. Let's go, man.
When a guy comes unofficially, then he, to me, is sending you a message that, 'You know what? Hey, I'm interested in Clemson.' Now, he may hate it when he gets here. But at least he came on his own. That's just my personal philosophy.
It's hard for me to come up with a plan and hold my players accountable until I self-evaluate and hold myself accountable.
I'm kind of a bottom-of-the-barrel guy.
All I know is, there's nothing we can't do at Clemson. I don't have to go somewhere else to win at the highest level, to recruit great players, to have great support - I really don't. I'm just really fortunate.
I love that about college football. I love all the funky matchups. I love the Funky Cold Medina Poulan Weed Eater Bowl. I love all of that. I like the crazy games. There's obviously a market for it because them TVs love to put it on there.
I'm not trying to be like everybody else. I want to be Clemson, and Clemson's not for everybody.
A football team is really just a reflection of society. You've got 118, 120 guys on the team, you got a little bit of everything.
I've never really hired anybody that people thought I should hire.
I'm not a sympathetic guy when I see people throwing their lives away and using their life's obstacles as excuses to fail. I just don't buy into that.
Let's not be miserable when we win. There's definitely people in places that, even when they win, they're not happy. That's sad.
There's some criminals that wear badges. Guess what? There's some criminals that work in the media. There's some criminals that are football coaches. There's some criminals that are politicians. There are criminals that work in churches.
I thought, 'If I ever get a new football building, I want a slide.' Now I go down it every day.
When you win by three touchdowns in a state championship and you've got people who can't appreciate that? That's really sad.
I hate the fact that, all of a sudden now, it's not cool to go to the Gator Bowl. Are you kidding me? I don't like that mindset.
A win is a win, and I've just always felt that way, and I've always been passionate about that.
No, we don't control who our parents are. We don't control what color we are. We don't control what home we are born into. But we control our attitude. We control our work ethic. We control our drive and our commitment.
Everybody sees me now, and I'm the head coach at Clemson and this and that, but my life hasn't always been this way.
