Jimbo Fisher Explains The Challenge Of Playing Young Athletes In Social Media Era

Jimbo Fisher has coached college football since 1988. He has been a head coach since 2010.

A lot of things have changed over the past 13 years, let alone the last three+ decades. The internet was only five years old when Fisher started as a grad assistant at Samford, and it only became a commonly used entity about a decade into his career when he was running the offense at Auburn, Cincinnati and LSU.

Jimbo Fisher in 1999(Image courtesy: University of Cincinnati)

Even then, it was mostly dial-up. Email was starting to become a viable means of communication. AIM became the first instant, live conversation application.

Wi-Fi really changed the entire landscape of the internet by 2005. The first iPhone dropped in 2007.

Around the same time, the first "Tweet" was sent in March of 2006. Evolution of internet practices and commonalities only continued from there.

The entire world is connected through the information superhighway known today as the cyberspace.

Everything is at our fingertips. Good, bad or otherwise.

Fisher has seen the impact of the internet on college football. More specifically, he has seen the way in which it impacts the athletes. Especially young athletes.

Criticism has always been a thing. The same can be said for negative press.

However, unlike the days of the morning newspaper, it is instantaneous. Anyone can say anything about anyone in real time. People can offer commentary on a certain situation as it happens.

That makes things tricky for coaches like Jimbo Fisher.

While speaking to the media over the weekend, Fisher explained why today's landscape is a challenge for people in his position when it comes to playing young athletes. If he, or any coach, rushes an athlete into the spotlight and it results in failure, that athlete will be the subject of critique.

It often comes in the form of hate, which can tear that young athlete down before he or she gets a chance to reach his full potential. As a result, Fisher is careful with his approach to that exact situation.

There are a lot of questions that surround Texas A&M football in 2023. A large portion of them stems from who is going to play where. The Aggies have a lot of young athletes who may be asked to step up and show out, but Fisher needs to be cautious with how he rolls them out in the social media era.