Beyond the Game: Mental Health, Pressure, and Purpose with Jay Paterno

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0:30Mick:What an amazing episode. This is about to be with Jay Paterno. We talk about a lot of things, but here's some things. His new book, Blitz, it's a sports story that has a ton of parallels to leadership. And we're going to talk about that book. We're going to talk about his because it's amazing when you hear it. He admits to me at the end who his favorite Penn State player of all time is. I won't spoil it. You're going to go listen to it. And then we get the truth behind the 86th Fiesta Bowl, Penn State, Miami. If you don't know, there's an infamous story out there that Jerome Brown told us about.

1:03Mick:It's in our 30 to 30. Jay tells us the Penn State perspective. It's at the very end. I can't wait for you to listen or watch this episode. So ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to stop. Here's my good friend, Mr. Jay Paterno. You're listening to Mick Unplugged, hosted by the one and only Mick Hunt. This is where purpose meets power and stories spark transformation. Mick takes you beyond the motivation and into meaning, helping you discover your because and becoming unstoppable. I'm Rudy Rush, and trust me, you're in the right place. Let's get unplugged.

1:43Mick:Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another exciting episode of Mick Unplugged. And today I have someone who I've looked up to for a very long time. He's a leadership coach, a changemaker, an author who's redefining what legacy really means. From the sidelines of Penn State to the front lines of public service, he's inspiring leaders to lead with courage, character, and conviction. And his new book, which we're going to get into today, is sparking conversations nationwide and several with my VIP clients. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome the bold, the principled, the visionary, my guy, Mr. Jay Paterno.

2:18Mick:Jay, how are you doing today, brother?

2:19Jay Paterno:I'm doing great. How about you?

2:21Mick:Man, I am honored to be here with you. You know, I'll tell you offline about the book and how a lot of my clients are looking at it and reading it, and there's a lot of parallels there. So I'm just honored, one, to have you on the show, and two, I want to dive into this book. This is about to be a master class that you're going to give out today, so I hope everybody's ready, man. But how are you doing, Jay?

2:41Jay Paterno:I'm doing great. It's that time of year where football season ends. Like, I feel as a guy that loves college football, I feel lost. Oh, my God, we don't have games for like eight more months. And it was an exciting and unexpected year, obviously. So, yeah, other than that, I'm doing great.

2:54Mick:I love it. And I have to pick your brain. We're going to have a conversation on football, too. Before I get there, though, I love asking my guests about their because. That true purpose that they have, the mission in life that they have. You know, if I were to ask you what's your why, you're going to tell me, your family, your kids, or something like that. But then when I say why, why is that important? That sentence usually starts with, well, because. And I care about that. So, Jay Paterno, today, man, what is your because?

3:22Jay Paterno:Well, it depends on what role I'm involved in. Like, as a trustee at Penn State, my because is I look at Penn State as something that's been here before us and something that will go on after us. So even though it's a difficult job role, it's not a job, although it feels like it sometimes. I want to leave Penn State a better place and continue to protect the things that made Penn State unique in that regard. In terms of writing books, I want to put things down that people can pick up and learn something from and get something out of it and speak to things, especially with Blitz. I look at college football right now and I say, if people really knew what was going on, there would absolutely be a movement to try and get this thing under control.

4:07Jay Paterno:I know people are frustrated. There are other things I'm involved and I'm starting to work with some other trustees of the school to talk about what comes next in college football. As somebody who wants to help other people lead, I look at leadership in this country and I look at it at the highest levels of what is supposed to look like leadership in this country. What it is, what we think it is, and what it really is are vastly different. So I want to keep speaking to that because, you know, being a leader is not simply lying and never admitting you're wrong. Some of the greatest leaders are people who listen, who admit false, and then correct them.

4:41Jay Paterno:And those things have all been lost. So there's a lot of becauses and whys because of the fact that, you know, I just have all these things going on and different roles.

4:50Mick:Yeah, you are definitely one of, if not the, I don't like the term busiest, the most involved person that I know. I mean, when you look at the tentacles that you have and where you reach, man, like you're involved in making impact in a lot of different areas. And I think that's the true definition of you. It's not just being involved. I don't think Jay Paterno does anything where he can't make an impact. Is that true?

5:16Jay Paterno:Well, I try. I mean, sometimes people don't want you to make an impact and they have ways to freeze you out. And, you know, but I think the thing is this. It's I am not a perfectionist by the stretch of the imagination, but I would like us to strive towards that as people and help other people. So when I see things that I there are things I can see around the corner that sometimes other people can't see because of experience or because of people I learn from. I mean, I've been very fortunate in my life to be around incredible people with great lessons that I've picked up and write. I make notes all the time.

5:51Jay Paterno:So if I have the advantage of some information and I can help people or use that to lead people to get to the right thing, I can't sit still and not do it. So that's kind of it's a curse in some ways, but it's also a blessing in some ways.

6:04Mick:Not totally agree. Totally agree. And so let's talk about college football. You've been around it your entire life, and it's at a different dynamic than it's ever been, regardless of what people thought back in the day when you assumed or thought players were getting paid. Well, now it's a real thing, and there's not enough, I don't want to say governance. There's just not enough of something that's there to really wrap our hands around it. I'd love to get your perspective of where college football is today, in particular with the NIL structure.

6:35Jay Paterno:Well, it's not that there's not enough governance. There is no governance. And part of that is the NCAA, and look, I'm the last guy that wants to make excuses for the NCAA, but they keep losing lawsuits. So they're gun shy in taking a stand on anything. And right, you know, and I understand why. Every time they try and stand up for something. And so what is passing for governance in college football right now is simply a reaction to the last ruling by a judge somewhere. The House settlement versus the House versus NCAA settlement is kind of the law of the land right now in terms of revenue sharing, NIL, things like that.

7:12Jay Paterno:But it's all it's going to take is another lawsuit to upset that cart. So we're at a point now where the game is kind of lawless. You know, players can sign a contract with a school and then go in the transport and say, I'm not going to sign with somebody else because they give me more money. And now the school's forced to sue the player. And that's not a place we want to be. so there needs to be in the next year or two and i'm having conversations as i mentioned with a lot of the people trying to figure out where can we get that kind of governance i tell my kids all the time and they get hired to hear me say it there's two types of people in the world there's problem people and the solution people problem people anybody can point out problems it's not hard to find problems and say here it is and that's what we got right now in college football we've got everybody saying it's broken it's not working it's not this it's not that okay well what's your solution?

7:58Jay Paterno:Well, maybe we should have a commissioner. Nobody's really coming forward. I think we're at a point now where we essentially need a constitutional convention that will involve everybody and just say, you know, these are the rules we've had and they're all patchwork and we keep slapping things on it. We got to reimagine this thing and the players should be in the room. That's the one thing no one's talking about. You know, we're talking about we've got a 12 team playoff. Do we want a 16 or 24? Well, does anybody think to ask the players, do you want 16? because I look at a guy like Mendoza the other night took a beating and under a 16-team playoff, he's got another game to play.

8:33Jay Paterno:Right. Like, that's not the end of it. He would have a 17th game to play. Right. And do the players really want to play 17 games? You know, I don't know. I mean, no one knows. So, I mean, there's a lot of things that have to happen. But college football definitely needs some massive reform right now.

8:47Mick:If Jay Paterno were in charge, this is a huge hypothetical, what would it look like? Like, could you paint an overview of what could simplify this mess for people?

8:57Jay Paterno:Well, we have to be honest about what we are now. And look, I'm an old school guy who loved the amateur model and playing for dear old state or whatever it may be. But the reality is, is now the Big Ten last year took in$1.1 billion. Just the Big Ten. This is not, and this is not including March Madness. This is not including all the other stuff. This is$1.1 billion for television rights and media rights for those schools. So it's not an extracurricular activity anymore for kids that students. So we got to be honest about that. You know, when COVID happened, OK, we kept our players on campus. We quarantined them when all the other students weren't here.

9:33Jay Paterno:Why? Because we needed that television check. And the players and their families started to say, well, wait a minute. So rightfully so. So I've essentially gone from an old school guy to guys been, you know, I have other trustees and the board say, man, you've been radicalized. Yeah, I have, because this is reality. So what we need to do is, A, admit what we are, B, come up with some solutions. And some of those things would include collective bargaining with players. Because let's be honest. I mean, we can say they're not employees. They are. I mean, no one likes to hear that. But how you classify that, what that looks like.

10:05Jay Paterno:Give kids an opportunity to come in. And if they want to commit to your school for four years and get a degree, let them go down that path. If a guy wants to come in and say, I want to play college football, but I want the ability to transfer after a year. Say, okay, we'll sign that contract with you. But at the end of that year, guess what? If we don't think you're good enough, we can let you go.

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11:35Jay Paterno:us then we ought to be able to leave you and i think you'll see more parents funnel their kids toward the four-year program model, you would still have some mechanisms for transfers and things like that in that model. So I think those are some of the things that have to happen. And I think we've got to redo the calendar. You know, for example, when the Dolphins had fired their coach, I forget what week it was, maybe in week 14, Mike Tomlin and the Steelers are on a playoff hunt to try and make the playoffs. If the Dolphins had contacted Mike Tomlin before his season was over, there would be hell to pay.

12:06Jay Paterno:They would lose draft picks. They would lose money. And we need to bring that same kind of idea to college football in terms of the calendar has to be remade so that coaches don't have to jump during the season. But we don't need to fire a coach in October because we got to get somebody signed before sign day. So all this, it's going to take an overarching reorganization of literally everything soup to nuts.

12:27Mick:I totally agree. Another thing that I think we need to look at is what we call bowl season, right? I, you know, again, I'm a huge sports nut. And the bowls used to matter, even, you know, before the BCS, right? Like back in Jay's day, the bowl mattered. And you guys were in the Fiesta Bowl all the time, right? The Fiesta Bowl or Orange Bowl, right? But they mattered, even if you were not in the Fiesta or Orange Bowl. It truly mattered. It mattered for the seniors as like their last game. And then you had the redshirt freshmen that might get some play. Like it mattered. Bowls haven't mattered in a very long time.

13:02Mick:I mean, you have players that opt out. I feel bad for bowl sponsors. I feel bad for folks that attend. How do we fix the bowl game scenario as well?

13:11Jay Paterno:Well, I don't know that we can at this point because of the playoff. And so many fan bases have made it all about, you know, playoff or bust. The bowl games you're seeing that have good crowds are ones that are within driving distance. Houston is in the Texas Bowl or whatever it was in Houston. And LSU can drive. And, you know, and like the Pinstripe Bowl, Penn State fans. We have a ton of Penn State fans in New York City. So there was a ton of them there and they showed up. And even though the weather wasn't great, but I think those are the things that matter. But I think your point is a great one.

13:43Jay Paterno:The bowl games used to be, there weren't 50 of them. Six and six teams weren't going to bowl games. My last year at UVA was 1992. We went seven and four, beat Virginia Tech pretty soundly and didn't get a bowl game because there weren't that many bowls. Now that team would be playing on New Year's Day. But I mean, so that's kind of where we're at. So, you know, these things used to be chamber of commerce events. The Orange Bowl was like, hey, how do we get like a ridiculous number of people to come down here in that week, those days between Christmas and New Year's? well let's put a bowl game and the team would come down they'd be there for a week and the fans would come down for four or five now it's you know teams are getting there three days before the game it's not really a bowl trip anymore to them so i think you know there's going to be some bowls that survive but i think it's got to shake itself out and probably thin the call the herd a little bit but on the flip side for the networks it's they don't care how many people understand they're getting three hours of of and they don't care who opts out they've got three hours of programming to put on and the spread of gambling is such that there are always people going to bet on these things and the fans are more invested so I don't think the bowls will go anywhere like you said they're not as you know it's not as exciting as it used to be no definitely not you know I personally think you figure out how to incorporate bowls into the regular season I mean maybe not all

15:02Mick:of them right but you can probably get 15 to 20 bowls that you could do weeks one through four of the regular season. That way you still get that competitive juice. The bowl itself actually matters. I'm not Jay Paterno, so I don't know how to figure that out. But to me, that would almost be a good thing. You're going to guarantee players are going to be there. Coaches are going to be there. Those are the things that are hit or miss after December 15th, right? December 15th happens, and now you've got the Holiday Bowl or the Myrtle Beach Bowl, and it's like we really don't know if anybody's going to be able to show up.

15:35Jay Paterno:Yeah, and I think if you sit down and redo the whole calendar, I think some of that will help take care of itself. Because, you know, you don't have guys that are in such a rush to get in the portal. And if the transfer portal was in February, not January, you wouldn't have so much pressure to get coaches jumping. But we'll see. I mean, that's all going to sort itself out.

15:54Mick:Now I want to take some time and talk about Blitz. But before we get into the book, I want to get into the why behind the why of the book. So what made you say this book and now?

16:04Jay Paterno:Well, a couple of things. When my dad died, about two or three years later, I wrote a book about him. And then it did really well. And people said, what are you going to write about next? And I was like, okay, well, that's a good sign that people want me to keep writing stuff. at that point you know i would sit around people and ask what college footballs were like and i would tell them stories about recruiting or in the course of a game and what's like in headsets you know you ought to write a book about that so i started to write it and then i realized you know some of these recruiting stories we gotta change names to protect the innocent and the not so innocent because there's a lot of things that go on so i said you know what there was a book called primary colors which was ostensibly about the clinton presidential campaign and it was written and that's fiction.

16:49Jay Paterno:I said, you know what? That's what I'll do. I'll use that kind of vehicle where I'll take these real stories and I'll create a nonfiction fiction and I'll set it at Ohio State because I had recruited that state for 17, 18 years and knew a bunch of coaches there over the years and got to know them really well. So I was very familiar with that program and I wanted to get away from writing about Penn State so that I, you know, kind of write it and challenge myself to write about something that wasn't as familiar. So I wrote a book, basically started, it's called hot seat. It started with the coach losing the bowl game.

17:18Jay Paterno:And the president of the university shows up at his hotel suite the morning after the game and says, look, the trustees are all over me on this. You've got one year. I mean, I can hold them off for one more year, but you've got to win or else. It takes you through all the ethical dilemmas that he faced. Well, at the end of that, about two, three, two years later, I kept hearing, well, what comes next? What comes next? What comes next for this guy? And then NIL started to happen. I was consulting on NIL with things and all these other things were happening. And I said, you know what, what I wrote about before to where the game is now are so dramatically different.

17:52Jay Paterno:I think it's time to write a different, you know, what's happening now and essentially a sequel to that book. So that was kind of the why. And I felt like a couple of things. Number one, I could highlight things like mental health, because when you talk about everybody thinks, oh, well, everybody's making money. It's great. More pressure on coaches, more pressure on players. So that was part of it. And I thought it would be good to kind of peel back the curtain as to what's going on in college football without naming names and let people, fans understand what this thing has become. And so that was really the why.

18:21Mick:Amazing. And, you know, one of the things that I have on my question list for you was the mental health component. And, you know, when I talk about, you know, my clients and VIPs that we discuss your book and that they have copies, I start there because mental health is real. You know, when you talk about from a CEO, CRO, VP of cell, when you talk about that level of people, it is almost like you're being the head coach, the offensive coordinator, the defensive coordinator, because usually with these major corporations, you've got a board of directors and they're looking at reports and they're looking at outcomes, which is just like the president of a university or the athletic director, right?