Jaguars’ Wingard Says Meyer Threatened to Cut Him for Calling Him ‘Rookie’ Coach

The Jaguars safety said that Meyer called him one night from another coach’s phone.

The days of Urban Meyer’s tenure as the Jaguars coach in 2021 were as embarrassing as it was short. During his time in Jacksonville and soon after, several stories and reports surfaced of how the former college coach created a toxic environment — and now there’s another one to add to the list.

Jaguars safety Andrew Wingard told Tyler Dunne of Go Long a story from Meyer’s tenure where his former coach showed some extremely childish behavior. 

After a 31–7 loss to the Seahawks, the team was 1–6 and they held a “Come to Jesus” meeting as their season began to spiral. Several players spoke up, including Wingard, who brought up the fact that they had a rookie quarterback in Trevor Lawrence and a rookie coach in Meyer and it was up to the defense to help them out. He wasn’t taking a shot, but he paid for it 

That Monday night, Wingard’s phone rang and Caller ID said it was safeties coach Chris Ash. When he picked up the phone, it was Meyer, who had heard what he said through the grapevine. 

“He says, ‘Dewey, why the hell did you call me a rookie head coach? Tell me why. If it was anybody else right now, you’d already be cut,’”Wingard recalled Meyer saying. “Explain yourself to me is essentially what he said. So I had to freaking save face and tell him how much I love him and how he’s the greatest coach ever. … You’re sitting there on your off-night chilling and you get a call from your head coach: ‘Hey, I’m going to cut you if you don’t apologize for calling me a rookie head coach.’”

Meyer, who was in fact a rookie NFL coach, was known to pull such tactics during his short time in Jacksonville. It was reported to be commonplace for Meyer to belittle both his players and assistant coaches. He would regularly threaten coaches and players that he would fire or cut them and was even reportedly unfamiliar with some of the biggest named in the NFL like Aaron Donald and Deebo Samuel. 

Among the first public issues that arose for him last year came when a video went viral of him dancing at a bar with a woman who was not his wife in Ohio after a Week 4 loss to the Bengals. He was fired in December ’21 shortly after it surfaced that he reportedly kicked Jacksonville kicker Josh Lambo. He finished with a 2–11 record.