WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.459 I was looking at the staff directory for a major 00:00:03.459 --> 00:00:05.360 college football program the other day, just 00:00:05.360 --> 00:00:08.019 scrolling and scrolling. You have the head coach, 00:00:08.199 --> 00:00:11.160 obviously, but then you have the offensive coordinator, 00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:13.359 the passing game coordinator, the quarterback's 00:00:13.359 --> 00:00:15.759 coach, the assistant quarterback's coach. I think 00:00:15.759 --> 00:00:18.480 I even saw a sleep and recovery coach. It's the 00:00:18.480 --> 00:00:21.519 army of specialization. We live in an era where 00:00:21.519 --> 00:00:24.519 we... Well, we slice expertise into thinner and 00:00:24.519 --> 00:00:26.660 thinner layers. Oh, truly. If you aren't hyper 00:00:26.660 --> 00:00:29.059 -specialized by the time you're 20, the world 00:00:29.059 --> 00:00:31.199 tells you you're falling behind. Exactly. We 00:00:31.199 --> 00:00:34.200 optimize everything to the nth degree. But today, 00:00:34.320 --> 00:00:36.439 we are going to look at a stack of sources that 00:00:36.439 --> 00:00:38.759 tell a completely different story. We're going 00:00:38.759 --> 00:00:41.719 back to a time, and specifically to a man who 00:00:41.719 --> 00:00:44.460 didn't just switch lanes. He drove the entire 00:00:44.460 --> 00:00:47.399 highway. It really is a fascinating counter -narrative 00:00:47.399 --> 00:00:49.840 to how we operate today. We're looking at the 00:00:49.840 --> 00:00:54.920 life and career of Morris Glenn. And I want to 00:00:54.920 --> 00:00:57.179 be clear right up front. This isn't just a story 00:00:57.179 --> 00:00:59.020 about a guy who coached a little peewee football 00:00:59.020 --> 00:01:02.780 on the weekends. We're talking about a legendary 00:01:02.780 --> 00:01:06.280 figure at Southern Illinois University Carbondale 00:01:06.280 --> 00:01:08.879 SIU who somehow managed to be the head coach 00:01:08.879 --> 00:01:13.060 for football, basketball, and baseball. And if 00:01:13.060 --> 00:01:15.140 you look closely at the timeline in these records, 00:01:15.319 --> 00:01:18.019 often at the exact same time. Right. Plus, he 00:01:18.019 --> 00:01:19.980 was the athletic director on top of it all. It 00:01:19.980 --> 00:01:22.079 sounds impossible. It sounds like a clerical 00:01:22.079 --> 00:01:24.200 error. If you tried to do that today at a division 00:01:24.200 --> 00:01:26.060 high school, you'd be hospitalized for exhaustion 00:01:26.060 --> 00:01:29.420 within a month. No question. So our mission for 00:01:29.420 --> 00:01:32.599 this deep dive is to unpack this stat sheet that 00:01:32.599 --> 00:01:35.280 honestly looks like a typo and figure out how 00:01:35.280 --> 00:01:38.000 one man became the ultimate generalist in a world 00:01:38.000 --> 00:01:40.519 that hadn't yet learned to specialize. It's a 00:01:40.519 --> 00:01:43.129 great case study in human capacity. And it starts 00:01:43.129 --> 00:01:45.909 in a place that sounds exactly like where a rugged 00:01:45.909 --> 00:01:48.469 do -it -all coach should be from. Burnt Prairie, 00:01:48.510 --> 00:01:50.310 Illinois. I mean, come on. That sounds like the 00:01:50.310 --> 00:01:52.109 setting of a Western movie. It sets the tone 00:01:52.109 --> 00:01:55.090 perfectly. He was born there on January 19th, 00:01:55.090 --> 00:01:59.790 1906. Now pause and think about that date. 1906. 00:02:00.069 --> 00:02:02.670 If you're coming of age in the 1920s in rural 00:02:02.670 --> 00:02:05.120 Illinois. You aren't growing up with a lot of 00:02:05.120 --> 00:02:07.420 safety nets. Right, you're growing up fast, and 00:02:07.420 --> 00:02:09.800 you're probably learning to do a little bit of 00:02:09.800 --> 00:02:12.360 everything just to get by. The sources show he 00:02:12.360 --> 00:02:14.120 went to college at Southern Illinois, playing 00:02:14.120 --> 00:02:18.479 football there from 1929 to 1931. But here's 00:02:18.479 --> 00:02:20.400 the first little nugget that caught my eye, and 00:02:20.400 --> 00:02:22.759 I think we need to scrutinize this a bit. The 00:02:22.759 --> 00:02:25.400 notes say he played professionally for the Chicago 00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:28.659 Cardinals in the NFL in 1932. Yes, that's on 00:02:28.659 --> 00:02:31.159 the resume. But let's be real for a second. The 00:02:31.159 --> 00:02:34.199 NFL in 1932 isn't the NFL of today, with the 00:02:34.199 --> 00:02:36.400 private jets and the billion -dollar TV deals. 00:02:36.979 --> 00:02:40.259 What does playing in the NFL in 1932 actually 00:02:40.259 --> 00:02:43.360 mean? That is a crucial distinction. The NFL 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:46.000 in 1932 was, well, it was brutal. It was barely 00:02:46.000 --> 00:02:47.979 a decade old. We're talking leather helmets, 00:02:48.199 --> 00:02:50.620 virtually no padding, and playing on fields that 00:02:50.620 --> 00:02:54.000 were often just dirt patches. The pay was negligible. 00:02:54.560 --> 00:02:57.280 Many guys had day jobs in factories. So it wasn't 00:02:57.280 --> 00:02:59.930 a full -time career. Not at all. So when we say 00:02:59.930 --> 00:03:02.169 he played for the Chicago Cardinals, it establishes 00:03:02.169 --> 00:03:04.949 two things. First, he was an elite athlete, obviously. 00:03:05.169 --> 00:03:08.509 But second, he was tough. You didn't play in 00:03:08.509 --> 00:03:10.770 that league unless you could handle serious physical 00:03:10.770 --> 00:03:13.870 punishment. So he's got this tough guy credibility. 00:03:14.150 --> 00:03:17.389 He's a pro athlete. But he doesn't spay in the 00:03:17.389 --> 00:03:20.430 pros long. He pivots almost immediately into 00:03:20.430 --> 00:03:23.189 coaching. Right. And looking at this early resume, 00:03:23.449 --> 00:03:26.090 he didn't exactly start at the top. No, he entered 00:03:26.090 --> 00:03:28.150 what you might call the high school grinder. 00:03:28.560 --> 00:03:31.699 He starts at Fairfield High School in 1933. And 00:03:31.699 --> 00:03:33.879 I noticed something here. At Fairfield, he's 00:03:33.879 --> 00:03:35.740 already doing the double duty. He's coaching 00:03:35.740 --> 00:03:38.419 football and basketball. Was that common back 00:03:38.419 --> 00:03:41.159 then? It was almost a necessity. High schools 00:03:41.159 --> 00:03:43.560 didn't have the budget for separate staffs. If 00:03:43.560 --> 00:03:45.360 you were the coach, you coached whatever season 00:03:45.360 --> 00:03:48.039 it was. It forced you to be adaptable. You couldn't 00:03:48.039 --> 00:03:50.020 just know the gridiron. You had to understand 00:03:50.020 --> 00:03:53.340 the hardwood. So he does Fairfield, then moves 00:03:53.340 --> 00:03:55.900 to Pontiac High School in 36, then Princeton 00:03:55.900 --> 00:03:58.719 High School in 37. He's bouncing around a lot. 00:03:58.759 --> 00:04:01.819 Is this a red flag? Was he getting fired or was 00:04:01.819 --> 00:04:04.879 he climbing? He was climbing. In that era, the 00:04:04.879 --> 00:04:07.000 only way to get a pay bump or a better facility 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:09.759 was to move. He was proving himself in different 00:04:09.759 --> 00:04:13.159 systems, paying his dues. And clearly it worked 00:04:13.159 --> 00:04:16.259 because in 1938, he gets the call to come back 00:04:16.259 --> 00:04:19.310 home. To his alma mater. He gets hired as an 00:04:19.310 --> 00:04:21.529 assistant football coach at Southern Illinois 00:04:21.529 --> 00:04:24.370 Normal University, which is what SIU was called 00:04:24.370 --> 00:04:26.370 back then. And he wasn't an assistant for long. 00:04:26.569 --> 00:04:30.389 No. In 1939, he takes over the big chair. He 00:04:30.389 --> 00:04:33.069 succeeds William McAndrew as the head football 00:04:33.069 --> 00:04:35.689 coach. And this begins the first major chapter 00:04:35.689 --> 00:04:37.990 of the Abe Martin era. Okay, so let's look at 00:04:37.990 --> 00:04:39.550 the football chapter because I'm looking at the 00:04:39.550 --> 00:04:41.410 numbers here and I have to play devil's advocate. 00:04:41.670 --> 00:04:44.250 You called him a legend earlier. I did. But I'm 00:04:44.250 --> 00:04:46.269 looking at his head coaching record for football 00:04:46.269 --> 00:04:49.730 from 1939 to 1949. Okay, walk me through what 00:04:49.730 --> 00:04:52.209 you see. I see an overall record of 31 wins, 00:04:52.389 --> 00:04:55.310 42 losses, and 5 ties. That is, well, that's 00:04:55.310 --> 00:04:58.209 below .500. That is. In modern college football, 00:04:58.509 --> 00:05:01.649 if you go below .500 for a decade, you don't 00:05:01.649 --> 00:05:04.899 get a statue. You get fired. How do we reconcile 00:05:04.899 --> 00:05:07.759 this legend status with a losing record? This 00:05:07.759 --> 00:05:10.899 is where context is absolutely everything. You 00:05:10.899 --> 00:05:13.800 cannot look at a spreadsheet from the 1940s and 00:05:13.800 --> 00:05:16.279 treat it like a spreadsheet from the 2020s. Think 00:05:16.279 --> 00:05:19.939 about the years. He takes over in 1939. What 00:05:19.939 --> 00:05:22.339 happens on the global stage shortly after? World 00:05:22.339 --> 00:05:26.279 War II breaks out. Exactly. By 1941 and 1942... 00:05:26.480 --> 00:05:29.339 The United States is fully mobilizing. The draft 00:05:29.339 --> 00:05:32.000 is stripping universities of every able -bodied 00:05:32.000 --> 00:05:34.100 male over the age of 18. I actually see a note 00:05:34.100 --> 00:05:36.519 here for the 1943 season. It just says, no team. 00:05:37.000 --> 00:05:39.899 That's not a typo. There was literally no team 00:05:39.899 --> 00:05:41.939 fielded because there were no men left to play. 00:05:42.100 --> 00:05:44.259 Wow. So for the first half of his tenure, Abe 00:05:44.259 --> 00:05:46.480 Martin isn't just coaching. He's trying to hold 00:05:46.480 --> 00:05:49.000 a program together with duct tape while the entire 00:05:49.000 --> 00:05:51.100 demographic of his roster is fighting overseas. 00:05:51.600 --> 00:05:53.759 It's impossible to build consistency in that 00:05:53.759 --> 00:05:55.699 environment. That's a fair point. You can't recruit 00:05:55.699 --> 00:05:58.180 players who are in basic training. But the war 00:05:58.180 --> 00:06:00.100 eventually ends. The guys come home. Does the 00:06:00.100 --> 00:06:02.240 record get better? It does. And this is the proof 00:06:02.240 --> 00:06:04.439 of concept. Look at 1947. This is often called 00:06:04.439 --> 00:06:06.180 the glory year in the source material. Okay, 00:06:06.220 --> 00:06:09.899 1947. The war is over. The roster is back. And 00:06:09.899 --> 00:06:12.500 the stats jump off the page. They go 7 -2 -1. 00:06:12.720 --> 00:06:15.699 A massive turnaround. And they win the Illinois 00:06:15.699 --> 00:06:18.019 Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Championship. 00:06:18.399 --> 00:06:20.579 So he proved he could win when the playing field 00:06:20.579 --> 00:06:22.740 was level. He did. It was a massive validation. 00:06:23.360 --> 00:06:26.389 But. As sports often go, the decline was quick. 00:06:26.509 --> 00:06:28.850 The records show back -to -back struggling seasons 00:06:28.850 --> 00:06:33.149 in 48 and 49, with records of 2 -6 and 2 -7. 00:06:33.290 --> 00:06:35.589 And that marked the end of his tenure as the 00:06:35.589 --> 00:06:38.250 head football coach. So if we stop the story 00:06:38.250 --> 00:06:41.370 right here, Abe Martin is a decent football coach 00:06:41.370 --> 00:06:44.389 who had one great year after the war. Good, but 00:06:44.389 --> 00:06:47.689 maybe not deep dive worthy. Right. If he was 00:06:47.689 --> 00:06:49.689 just a football coach, we probably wouldn't be 00:06:49.689 --> 00:06:51.629 talking about him. But here's where the story 00:06:51.629 --> 00:06:53.750 goes off the rails in the best possible way. 00:06:53.870 --> 00:06:56.529 Oh. Because while he is dealing with the football 00:06:56.529 --> 00:07:00.689 team, remember those lean war years, he decides 00:07:00.689 --> 00:07:02.889 he doesn't have enough to do. This is the part 00:07:02.889 --> 00:07:05.750 I struggle to wrap my head around. In 1943, the 00:07:05.750 --> 00:07:07.610 same year they couldn't even field a football 00:07:07.610 --> 00:07:10.269 team? Martin takes over the basketball team. 00:07:10.329 --> 00:07:12.230 He steps in as the head basketball coach from 00:07:12.230 --> 00:07:16.069 1943 to 1946. So the football coach is now running 00:07:16.069 --> 00:07:18.230 the basketball practice, and here is the kicker. 00:07:18.670 --> 00:07:21.209 Statistically speaking, he was a better basketball 00:07:21.209 --> 00:07:23.629 coach than a football coach. The numbers don't 00:07:23.629 --> 00:07:26.850 lie. He went 43 and 20 on the court. That's a 00:07:26.850 --> 00:07:29.709 winning percentage of nearly 70%. But wait, we 00:07:29.709 --> 00:07:32.310 need to talk about 1946 because this isn't just 00:07:32.310 --> 00:07:35.509 about winning a few regional games. The source 00:07:35.509 --> 00:07:39.129 says he won the NAIA National Championship. Yes. 00:07:39.269 --> 00:07:41.370 Okay. For you listening who might not be sports 00:07:41.370 --> 00:07:44.470 historians today, the NAIA is sort of seen as 00:07:44.470 --> 00:07:47.050 a smaller division, separate from the big NCAA 00:07:47.050 --> 00:07:50.250 tournament. Was it a big deal in 1946, or was 00:07:50.250 --> 00:07:52.569 this like winning a consolation bracket? No, 00:07:52.589 --> 00:07:55.509 no, this was a huge deal. In 1946, the landscape 00:07:55.509 --> 00:07:58.389 of college athletics was much flatter. The NAIA 00:07:58.389 --> 00:08:00.610 tournament was a prestigious national showcase. 00:08:00.790 --> 00:08:02.930 It was a legitimate national title. Legitimate 00:08:02.930 --> 00:08:04.589 national title. So let me get this straight. 00:08:04.730 --> 00:08:06.810 You have Abe Martin, a guy who played in the 00:08:06.810 --> 00:08:09.279 rugged NFL, a football guy by trade. walking 00:08:09.279 --> 00:08:11.899 into the gym and outcoaching basketball specialists 00:08:11.899 --> 00:08:14.920 to win a national title. That's exactly what 00:08:14.920 --> 00:08:17.879 happened. And it raises a fascinating point about 00:08:17.879 --> 00:08:20.920 coaching. We tend to think that to be a great 00:08:20.920 --> 00:08:23.459 basketball coach, you need to know the specific 00:08:23.459 --> 00:08:26.060 mechanics of a jump shot better than anyone else. 00:08:26.199 --> 00:08:28.420 Sure. But Martin suggests that coaching is really 00:08:28.420 --> 00:08:30.220 about competitors. What do you mean by that? 00:08:30.459 --> 00:08:33.000 Well, think about it. He took the same intensity, 00:08:33.179 --> 00:08:35.519 the same leadership, and the same strategic mind 00:08:35.519 --> 00:08:37.820 from the football field and applied it to the 00:08:37.820 --> 00:08:40.360 court. He wasn't teaching them to dribble better. 00:08:40.500 --> 00:08:43.299 He was teaching them how to win. The mechanics 00:08:43.299 --> 00:08:45.940 are different, but the pressure of a tie game 00:08:45.940 --> 00:08:48.879 with two minutes left, that's universal. That's 00:08:48.879 --> 00:08:51.320 a great insight. He was a master of competitive 00:08:51.320 --> 00:08:54.220 psychology regardless of the ball they were using. 00:08:54.340 --> 00:08:57.700 So he wins the national title in 46. He steps 00:08:57.700 --> 00:09:00.100 down from basketball. Probably time to take a 00:09:00.100 --> 00:09:02.000 vacation, right? You would think. Maybe focus 00:09:02.000 --> 00:09:03.659 on that football team that's starting to get 00:09:03.659 --> 00:09:06.519 its players back. You would think. But Abe Martin 00:09:06.519 --> 00:09:09.879 apparently hated free time. because as he puts 00:09:09.879 --> 00:09:12.740 down the clipboard for basketball, he immediately 00:09:12.740 --> 00:09:15.539 picks up a fungo bat. This is just getting ridiculous. 00:09:15.899 --> 00:09:18.860 In 1947, the same year he's coaching that championship 00:09:18.860 --> 00:09:21.639 football team, he becomes the head baseball coach. 00:09:21.879 --> 00:09:23.580 And this wasn't like taking over the New York 00:09:23.580 --> 00:09:26.659 Yankees. The sources indicate that SIU hadn't 00:09:26.659 --> 00:09:29.980 fielded a baseball team since 1924. Wait, hold 00:09:29.980 --> 00:09:33.419 on. The program was dead? Dormant for 23 years. 00:09:33.759 --> 00:09:36.539 There were no uniforms, no equipment, probably 00:09:36.539 --> 00:09:39.399 barely a field. Martin didn't just coach the 00:09:39.399 --> 00:09:42.100 team. He resurrected it from the grave. Wow. 00:09:42.320 --> 00:09:45.460 He built the entire program from scratch starting 00:09:45.460 --> 00:09:49.039 in the spring of 1947. And spoiler alert, this 00:09:49.039 --> 00:09:51.120 actually turned out to be his longest gig. By 00:09:51.120 --> 00:09:54.220 far. He coached the baseball team from 1947 all 00:09:54.220 --> 00:09:57.519 the way until 1965. And if you look at the win 00:09:57.519 --> 00:09:59.759 totals, baseball was technically his most successful 00:09:59.759 --> 00:10:03.940 sport. 281 wins, 156 losses. That is a dynasty, 00:10:04.080 --> 00:10:06.200 especially for a zombie program that didn't exist 00:10:06.200 --> 00:10:09.080 when he took the job. It is. But I want to pause 00:10:09.080 --> 00:10:11.259 here. We've listed the sports. Football, basketball, 00:10:11.500 --> 00:10:14.039 baseball. But to really understand the absurdity 00:10:14.039 --> 00:10:16.340 of this man's life, we need to look at the calendar 00:10:16.340 --> 00:10:19.159 year of 1947. Okay, let's freeze frame 1947. 00:10:19.480 --> 00:10:21.620 Let's walk through Abe Martin's year. All right. 00:10:21.840 --> 00:10:24.659 It starts in the winter. He's just coming off 00:10:24.659 --> 00:10:27.340 a national championship in basketball. He's likely 00:10:27.340 --> 00:10:29.580 transitioning the athletes because remember back 00:10:29.580 --> 00:10:32.360 then the athletes were generalists too. Right. 00:10:32.419 --> 00:10:34.019 The quarterback was probably the point guard. 00:10:34.080 --> 00:10:38.000 Exactly. Then spring hits. He is launching a 00:10:38.000 --> 00:10:40.960 brand new baseball program. He's ordering bats, 00:10:41.179 --> 00:10:44.279 finding a field. organizing tryouts and coaching 00:10:44.279 --> 00:10:47.019 the games. Then summer rolls into fall. And he 00:10:47.019 --> 00:10:49.399 puts on his football hat. He leads the football 00:10:49.399 --> 00:10:52.820 team to a 7 -2 -1 record and a conference championship. 00:10:53.389 --> 00:10:55.289 But there is one more hat he's wearing, isn't 00:10:55.289 --> 00:10:57.970 there? The one that makes this a total HR nightmare 00:10:57.970 --> 00:11:00.590 by modern standards. The administrative hat. 00:11:00.750 --> 00:11:04.029 Since 1945, Abe Martin had been serving as the 00:11:04.029 --> 00:11:06.309 athletic director. Okay, stop. Think about that 00:11:06.309 --> 00:11:08.549 for a second. He is the athletic director. He 00:11:08.549 --> 00:11:11.110 is also the head football coach and the head 00:11:11.110 --> 00:11:13.909 baseball coach. He's his own boss. It's the ultimate 00:11:13.909 --> 00:11:16.279 conflict of interest, isn't it? It's wild. If 00:11:16.279 --> 00:11:18.659 the football coach has a bad game, does the athletic 00:11:18.659 --> 00:11:20.759 director call him into the office and yell at 00:11:20.759 --> 00:11:22.480 him? He'd have to yell at himself in the mirror. 00:11:22.639 --> 00:11:24.879 It sounds funny, but it actually might explain 00:11:24.879 --> 00:11:28.320 his success. How so? Because he was the AD, he 00:11:28.320 --> 00:11:30.759 understood the budget constraints. He understood 00:11:30.759 --> 00:11:32.799 the scheduling logistics because he was the one 00:11:32.799 --> 00:11:35.500 making the schedule. And because he was the coach, 00:11:35.679 --> 00:11:38.360 he knew exactly what the athletes needed. Ah, 00:11:38.620 --> 00:11:41.879 no bureaucracy. Zero. The decision maker and 00:11:41.879 --> 00:11:43.720 the executor were the same person. That's true. 00:11:43.820 --> 00:11:46.679 Today, a coach has to go through five layers 00:11:46.679 --> 00:11:48.919 of administration to get a new tackling dummy. 00:11:49.379 --> 00:11:51.940 Abe just had to decide to buy it. Precisely. 00:11:52.279 --> 00:11:55.360 But it also speaks to the sheer mental bandwidth 00:11:55.360 --> 00:11:58.919 the man must have had to shift gears from administrative 00:11:58.919 --> 00:12:02.320 budgets to baseball strategy to football recruiting 00:12:02.320 --> 00:12:06.509 all in the same day. It forces us to ask. Have 00:12:06.509 --> 00:12:08.590 we lost something by getting rid of this model? 00:12:08.710 --> 00:12:10.250 I mean, obviously, you can't do this at the University 00:12:10.250 --> 00:12:12.669 of Alabama today. The job is too big. But on 00:12:12.669 --> 00:12:14.929 a human level, Abe Martin seemed to have a holistic 00:12:14.929 --> 00:12:17.529 view of his athletes that a modern specialist 00:12:17.529 --> 00:12:20.230 just can't have. I think that's the tragedy of 00:12:20.230 --> 00:12:22.750 specialization. When you only focus on defensive 00:12:22.750 --> 00:12:25.509 line technique. you lose sight of the human being. 00:12:25.610 --> 00:12:28.370 Abe Martin saw these kids year round. He saw 00:12:28.370 --> 00:12:30.309 them struggle in the classroom. He saw them win 00:12:30.309 --> 00:12:32.429 on the court. He saw them lose on the field. 00:12:32.649 --> 00:12:35.250 He was a father figure in a way that's hard to 00:12:35.250 --> 00:12:37.210 replicate when you only see a kid for three months 00:12:37.210 --> 00:12:40.049 a year. So he rides the baseball wave for a long 00:12:40.049 --> 00:12:43.570 time. He retires from the dugout in 1965. But... 00:12:43.769 --> 00:12:46.049 He sticks around, right? He does. He stayed on 00:12:46.049 --> 00:12:48.830 as part of the athletic department until 1971, 00:12:49.090 --> 00:12:51.250 which was his final retirement from the university. 00:12:51.570 --> 00:12:55.110 So he gave roughly 33 years of his life to SIU. 00:12:55.230 --> 00:12:57.929 And the university recognized that. The sources 00:12:57.929 --> 00:13:00.610 mentioned a pretty significant honor just a year 00:13:00.610 --> 00:13:04.509 after he left. On April 30, 1972, they dedicated 00:13:04.509 --> 00:13:07.029 the baseball field as Abe Martin Field. Which 00:13:07.029 --> 00:13:09.230 is the ultimate honor. But I did notice a little 00:13:09.230 --> 00:13:11.610 bittersweet note in the records. If you go to 00:13:11.610 --> 00:13:13.809 SIU today, the field isn't called that anymore. 00:13:14.009 --> 00:13:16.850 That's true. In 2014, the fields was renamed 00:13:16.850 --> 00:13:19.570 to honor a different coach, Richard Itchy Jones, 00:13:19.990 --> 00:13:23.029 who was also a legend in his own right. But it 00:13:23.029 --> 00:13:25.389 is a reminder that institutional memory fades. 00:13:25.690 --> 00:13:28.649 It is. Names come off buildings. But the story 00:13:28.649 --> 00:13:30.909 remains, Abe Martin lived a long time after that, 00:13:30.970 --> 00:13:33.710 didn't he? He did. He passed away on April 17, 00:13:34.110 --> 00:13:37.090 1997, at a retirement home in Springfield, Illinois. 00:13:37.330 --> 00:13:40.769 He was 91 years old. Born in 1906, died in 1997. 00:13:41.450 --> 00:13:43.610 Just think about the arc of sports he witnessed. 00:13:43.909 --> 00:13:46.409 He saw football go from leather helmets and, 00:13:46.529 --> 00:13:48.889 you know, no forward pass to the West Coast offense. 00:13:49.169 --> 00:13:51.809 Oh, yeah. He saw baseball integrate. He saw basketball 00:13:51.809 --> 00:13:54.210 go from a ground bound game to playing above 00:13:54.210 --> 00:13:56.710 the rim. And he didn't just watch it. He participated 00:13:56.710 --> 00:13:59.210 in almost every phase of it. So when we step 00:13:59.210 --> 00:14:01.490 back and look at the stack of records, the sub 00:14:01.490 --> 00:14:04.429 .500 football record that was actually a heroic 00:14:04.429 --> 00:14:06.809 effort during the war, the surprise basketball 00:14:06.809 --> 00:14:10.450 national title. the baseball dynasty. What is 00:14:10.450 --> 00:14:12.950 the big takeaway for you? Why does Abe Martin 00:14:12.950 --> 00:14:15.769 matter to someone listening in 2026? For me, 00:14:15.789 --> 00:14:17.909 it challenges the narrative that you have to 00:14:17.909 --> 00:14:20.570 stay in your lane to be successful. We are constantly 00:14:20.570 --> 00:14:23.190 told to niche down, find your niche, dominate 00:14:23.190 --> 00:14:26.059 your niche. Abe Martin didn't have a niche. His 00:14:26.059 --> 00:14:29.139 niche was sports. His niche was leadership. And 00:14:29.139 --> 00:14:31.340 because he refused to specialize, he was able 00:14:31.340 --> 00:14:33.559 to step in wherever he was needed, whether that 00:14:33.559 --> 00:14:36.399 was reviving a dead baseball program or saving 00:14:36.399 --> 00:14:39.240 a war -torn football team. He was the ultimate 00:14:39.240 --> 00:14:41.960 utility player. It's the sheer versatility of 00:14:41.960 --> 00:14:44.519 the contribution that gets me. Three major sports, 00:14:44.759 --> 00:14:47.139 an athletic director role, championships in two 00:14:47.139 --> 00:14:49.740 different sports. I mean, honestly, try to find 00:14:49.740 --> 00:14:52.580 a resume like that today. You won't. And maybe 00:14:52.580 --> 00:14:54.980 we shouldn't expect to. But we can certainly 00:14:54.980 --> 00:14:57.340 learn from the mindset. That brings us to the 00:14:57.340 --> 00:14:59.899 thought I want to leave you with today. We live 00:14:59.899 --> 00:15:01.879 in a world that forces athletes, and let's be 00:15:01.879 --> 00:15:04.799 honest, all of us, to specialize earlier and 00:15:04.799 --> 00:15:07.480 earlier. We ask 18 -year -olds to pick a major 00:15:07.480 --> 00:15:09.960 that defines the rest of their lives. We ask 00:15:09.960 --> 00:15:12.019 10 -year -olds to choose between travel soccer 00:15:12.019 --> 00:15:14.779 and baseball because they can't do both. But 00:15:14.779 --> 00:15:16.620 looking at Abe Martin, who did it all and won 00:15:16.620 --> 00:15:19.710 on the biggest stages. Have we lost the valuable 00:15:19.710 --> 00:15:21.950 perspective that comes from being a jack of all 00:15:21.950 --> 00:15:24.129 trades? It's a question worth asking. Sometimes 00:15:24.129 --> 00:15:26.149 the best way to understand the game is to play 00:15:26.149 --> 00:15:28.389 all of them. Couldn't have said it better. That's 00:15:28.389 --> 00:15:31.309 it for this deep dive into the life of the ultimate 00:15:31.309 --> 00:15:33.730 generalist, Abe Martin. Thanks for listening, 00:15:33.789 --> 00:15:35.250 and we'll catch you on the next one.