Charlie Frye receives praise from LO

[Kangaroo Craig]

Lee Owens talks about Superman at recent Pro Football HOF luncheon. The only part of this speach I disagree with is where LO says he was born to be a football coach. LOL. Former coach Owens talks of FryeSteve King, Staff Writer 04.03.2007Lee Owens has been a football coach for 30 years, so he knows what tough is."I was born to be a football coach," he said Monday without hesitation.Also, his son is just finishing up a tour serving with the Army in Iraq during which he was awarded the Bronze Star."You watch CNN every night and see what's going on over there, and you just hold your breath," he said.That's not just tough. Rather, that's Tough with a capital T.So it comes as no surprise, then, that when Owens is asked about Browns quarterback Charlie Frye, he just shakes his head and smiles."Charlie is the most inspirational football player I've run across," Owens said after serving as the guest speaker at the weekly meeting of the Pro Football Hall of Fame Luncheon Club in suburban Canton's Canton Township. "He is such a tough young man."Owens should know. He recruited Frye to the University of Akron and served as his head coach for his first three years there. Those seasons brought Frye national attention and eventually led to him being a third-round pick of the Browns in the 2005 NFL Draft."Some guys play football to position themselves for the draft, or they do it to attain individual goals, or they simply just for the money," said Owens, who has been head coach at Division II Ashland (Ohio) University the past three seasons. "But not Charlie. Jason Taylor (another Akron product who is now with the Miami Dolphins) is the same way."Those guys play for the love for the game. They play for pride. Money doesn't matter to them. That may sound corny or unrealistic, but it's really true."And then Owens proved it."When I was at Akron with Charlie, we had a game at Iowa," he recalled. "It was halftime, and Charlie was all dinged up and in no condition to continue. We're down by five touchdowns, but he wanted to come out and play in the second half. He insisted on playing. It got to the point where we actually had to hide his helmet from him."More proof, Owens said, was when Frye, despite having missed the previous 3½ games with a badly-bruised wrist on his (right) throwing hand, willed himself into playing the season finale at Houston."If I'm going to be the quarterback of this team, I felt like I had to be out there," Frye explained at the time.Again, Owens just smiled."That's Charlie," he said. "He told me how much the wrist was hurting, but he said he wanted to play."Neither the Browns nor the Texans were going to the playoffs, so the game didn't mean anything from that standpoint. But Charlie doesn't look at it that way. That's not the way he's built. Whether it's the last game of the season with nothing at stake or just a pickup game, there's always value in playing for Charlie. It's a chance to win a football game and for him to get better.Owens also spoke about Frye learning a new scheme under new offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski."Charlie's not going to let that bother him. No matter where he's played in his career (he started at Willard, Ohio High School), he believes every year is the one where he's going to be the quarterback the other players will rally around, and that he's going to lead his team to the championship.'It's all about winning with Charlie. I remember one of those Mid-American Conference preview luncheons. Ben Roethlisberger was playing for Miami, Josh Cribbs was at Can't State, Josh Harris was at Bowling Green and Byron Leftwich was at Marshall. Somebody asked Charlie who the best quarterback in the conference was, and he said, 'The one whose team wins the championship.' "Owens then recalled another story where Frye, after having set 11 Akron records, wanted to take his medals and make them into ribbons to give to every other starter on the offense."Charlie's a team guy," Owens said.And a tough guy.Which means more when it comes from a 30-year football coach and, more importantly, the father of an award-winner in Iraq. Related Players Charlie Frye

[GP1]

Owens was born to be a football coach indeed.........a bad football coach.How does someone like Owens even get to come within a five iron of a place called Hall of Fame?

[Captain Kangaroo]

"When I was at Akron with Charlie, we had a game at Iowa," he recalled. "It was halftime, and Charlie was all dinged up and in no condition to continue. We're down by five touchdowns, but he wanted to come out and play in the second half.

I think confused "second half" with "second quarter!"That first quarter of the Iowa game goes down in the anals of college history as the worst 15 minutes of football ever (and I did mean anals).

[skip-zip]

When he says, "We were down by 5 touchdowns".....those are the kinds of things I remember about the Owens ara. Ahhh...such fond memories

[timmyboy]

charlie was tough as nails. I remember the game at Can't( his SR year) when he hit his hand on the helmet of a player, and it got popped out of place, and he poppped it back in an kept playing.

[Captain Kangaroo]

charlie was tough as nails. I remember the game at Can't( his SR year) when he hit his hand on the helmet of a player, and it got popped out of place, and he poppped it back in an kept playing.

My fondest memory of that moment was the following day. I'm driving to work and Steve French is giving the game wrap up on WNIR and mentions Frye's finger popping out of the socket. Maggie (co-host) instantly quips, "I thought it was the K.e.n.t. quarterback that was having 'joint' problems?"

[Buckzip]

He didn't say he was born to be a head coach, just a coach.I think he was born to be an o-line coach. That's about it.

[timmyboy]

charlie was tough as nails. I remember the game at Can't( his SR year) when he hit his hand on the helmet of a player, and it got popped out of place, and he poppped it back in an kept playing.

My fondest memory of that moment was the following day. I'm driving to work and Steve French is giving the game wrap up on WNIR and mentions Frye's finger popping out of the socket. Maggie (co-host) instantly quips, "I thought it was the K.e.n.t. quarterback that was having 'joint' problems?"

ha ha ha ha thats hilarious

[zipseuph]

My fondest memory of that moment was the following day. I'm driving to work and Steve French is giving the game wrap up on WNIR and mentions Frye's finger popping out of the socket. Maggie (co-host) instantly quips, "I thought it was the K.e.n.t. quarterback that was having 'joint' problems?"

I LOVE IT