Catching Up: Ex-UC Quarterback Glenn Farkas

By JOHN P. WISE
One Great Season

CLEVELAND -- I talked to an old bud this week named Glenn Farkas. My Cleveland friends might remember him for tormenting our proud Richmond Heights Spartans on the football field many years ago. And the basketball court. And the baseball diamond. Hell, I bet he drank our beer and stole our girlfriends, too.

Farkas was a three-sport standout at nearby Kirtland High School, and although he was two years ahead of me, I was once asked to guard the long-range bomber when I was a sophomore. I would imagine my basketball coach had been drinking before making that decision. I believe I held Farkas to 30 points that night.

And my Cincinnati friends might remember him for quarterbacking the Bearcats for several years.

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Glenn has been a generous supporter in recent years of my photography projects and One Great Season. We caught up this week, and he had a few interesting thoughts to share about UC football.

Farkas' Kirtland teams were successful in all sports, and the Bearcats actually weren't too bad when he accepted a scholarship to play in Clifton. A born winner, you might call him.

But after he'd been at UC for a couple of years and the program found itself in some NCAA trouble, the Bearcats became pretty good at losing, a trend with which Farkas wasn't too familiar.

So understandably, he doesn't recall his last two years at UC, the first two of the Tim Murphy era, as being all that enjoyable.

"(Former UC coach Dave) Currey used a West Coast offense, which is why I came," Farkas said. "Murphy wanted to implement a little of everything -- dropback, rollout, option -- and we did none of them well."

Farkas said Murphy took a Bobby Knight approach to motivating players, a technique to which Farkas and other veterans didn't respond kindly. In Farkas' junior and senior seasons of 1989-90, the Bearcats had a combined record of 2-19-1.

"My final two years were the worst two years I can remember in any sport I ever played," Farkas said.

Farkas, now a big-shot money manager in Chicago, said he's followed UC football much more closely since the Bearcats joined the Big East Conference. And while he likes what Brian Kelly has done to push the program toward the unfamiliar territory of the nation's elite, he thinks a setback is on the horizon for Cincinnati fans.

"I am proud to see where UC has gone in the last five years and especially under Kelly," he said. "He will likely take another job after this year and I cannot blame him. The money will speak loudly."

Farkas said he tries to make time to watch the top college matchups each weekend, and is yet another believer that the sport needs a playoff system. He proposes a format that awards a playoff invite to each of the champions of the six BCS conferences, as well as four other wild-card teams, as determined by the polls. Those four teams will play each other for the two remaining spots in what would be a seeded, eight-team playoff.

"They'll never do it," said Farkas, who tries to get back to Nippert Stadium for one game each season. "It's an objective way to determine a winner and makes too much sense."

Comments

[Dave Marcon]

Mr. Farkas needs to keep closer tabs on his old team. To think the program is positioned for a nosedive is an outsiders perspective. Many believe that upon entering the Big East Mark Dantonio was recruiting a much higher quality of player and some of those players have been the cornerstone of Brian Kelly's success. BK has done a great job of selling the program and if he chooses to leave the next coach will have a much easier time recruiting and selling out Nippert. The UC job is becoming more and more attractive with the addition of practice fields and indoor bubble. I remember those years under Murphy and it was far from Div. I quality. The program is on the verge of something special for BK or who ever the next coach is.

[John P. Wise]

@Dave: Perhaps some of my own opinion influenced how I worded things, but I don't think Farkas really said he thought the UC program was going to tank if Kelly bolts. But I agree with your many good points.

[max]

It's always great to hear from old Bearcats I am glad he is doing well.
Too bad he had to play under Currey who had to be the worst coach
in UC history. The fact that they then went and named Currey the
AD gives us a clue to why we were so bad for so long.

[mark]

I played with Farkas. He was a good guy. A little slow footed. :)

Currey was doomed because of the schedule and soft spoken nature. And I would agree with Glenn about Murphy. I left the UC team because the guy was a jerk and it was beyond NOT fun. He won his last year after UC was finally in a conference but he played no one that year. And then he leaves because UC was going to actually play someone the following year.

I give Rick Minter a lot of credit. He brought at least a little stability to the head coach position at UC.

BTW currey was NEVER the AD at uc. I think the guy's name was Rick Thomas who hired huggins and Murphy.

[John P. Wise]

Rick Taylor was the athletic director at the time and left UC for Northwestern. Don't know what he did after NW, but I believe it was on his watch there that that one basketball coach had that bizarre, in-game meltdown.