| Biographical details | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1931-10-08)October 8, 1931 Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. |
| Died | May 14, 2020(2020-05-14) (aged 88) Reston, Virginia, U.S. |
| Playing career | |
| 1951–1953 | Georgia Tech |
| Position(s) | Quarterback,kicker |
| Coaching career (HC unless noted) | |
| 1958–1959 | Air Force (backfield) |
| 1960–1964 | Florida (OC) |
| 1965–1966 | UCLA (backfield) |
| 1967–1970 | Kansas |
| 1971–1973 | UCLA |
| 1974–1979 | Georgia Tech |
| 1984–1985 | Memphis Showboats |
| 1995 | Memphis Mad Dogs |
| Administrative career (AD unless noted) | |
| 2001–2004 | Washington Redskins (VP of football operations) |
| Head coaching record | |
| Overall | 73–65–3 (college) 19–19 (USFL) 9–9 (CFL) |
| Bowls | 0–2 |
| Accomplishments and honors | |
| Championships | |
| 1Big Eight (1968) | |
| Awards | |
| Big Eight Coach of the Year (1968) | |
Franklin Cullen "Pepper"Rodgers (October 8, 1931 – May 14, 2020) was an Americanfootball player and coach. As acollege football player, he led theGeorgia Tech Yellow Jackets to an undefeated season in 1952 and later became their head coach. He also coached collegiately for theKansas Jayhawks andUCLA Bruins before leading professional teams inMemphis, Tennessee, in theUnited States Football League (USFL) andCanadian Football League (CFL).
Rodgers was aquarterback andplacekicker for Georgia Tech. After the Yellow Jackets won theSugar Bowl and earned a share of thenational championship in 1952, they again won thebowl game the following year, when he was named the contest'smost valuable player (MVP). Rodgers began coaching as an assistant for theAir Force Falcons and later theFlorida Gators and UCLA. He became a head coach with Kansas in 1967, and later returned to UCLA and then Georgia Tech as their leader. He compiled a career college coaching record of73–65–3.[1]
Moving to the professional ranks, Rodgers coached two seasons in the 1980s with theMemphis Showboats in the USFL and one season for the CFL'sMemphis Mad Dogs. In the 2000s, he served as vice president of football operations for theWashington Redskins in theNational Football League (NFL) before retiring.
Rodgers was born inAtlanta,[2] where he became a three-sport star in football,basketball andbaseball at Brown High School. His football team won a state championship in 1949.[1]
Rodgers played college football atGeorgia Tech under head coachBobby Dodd, where he was a backupquarterback andplacekicker as a sophomore in1951.[3] As a junior in1952, he led theYellow Jackets to an undefeated 12–0 season and share of thenational championship after throwing for atouchdown and kicking afield goal in a 24–7 win in the1953 Sugar Bowl over Mississippi.[1] In thefollowing Sugar Bowl, Rodgers threw for three touchdowns against West Virginia and was named the game'sMVP.[1] In 2018, he was named to the inaugural class of the Sugar Bowl Hall of Fame.[4]
Rodgers was selected in the 12th round of the1954 NFL draft by theBaltimore Colts,[1] but remained at Georgia Tech for a year, earning aBS degree inindustrial management while also serving as a student assistant on Dodd's staff.[5] In 1955 he joined theU.S. Air Force,[5] where he was a pilot for five years.[1]
While with the Air Force, Rodgers was an assistant coach for theirFalcons football team. He was later an assistant forFlorida andUCLA before landing his first head coaching position withKansas in1967.[1] In his second year with the Jayhawks in1968, he led the team to a share of theBig Eight Conference title.[6][7]As of 2021[update], this is the program's most recent conference championship.[8] They played in theOrange Bowl inMiami, but lost 15–14 toPenn State.[9]
Rodgers returned to UCLA as its head coach in1971.[2] Competing in thePac-8 Conference, he installed thewishbone offense and with junior college transfer quarterbackMark Harmon in1972, the Bruins upset top-ranked and two-time defending championNebraska in the season opener, snapping the Huskers' 32-game unbeaten streak.[10][11] UCLA finished8–3 and ranked No. 15 inthe final AP rankings.[12] In1973 they were9–2 andended ranked No. 12.[13] After the season, he returned to Georgia Tech as its head coach, compiling a 34–31–2 record in his six seasons.[1]
Rodgers was also the head coach of the USFL'sMemphis Showboats from 1984 to 1985 and for the CFL'sMemphis Mad Dogs in 1995.[14] With the Showboats, he coached futurePro Football Hall of Fame playerReggie White.[15] While coaching for the Mad Dogs, Rodgers was noted about his dislike of the rules ofCanadian football.[16]
At 69, Rodgers was considered for theWashington Redskins' head coaching position beforeNorv Turner's eventual firing during the2000 season.[17][18] He was instead appointed the team's vice president of football operations, a position in which he served from 2001 to 2004.[18][19][20]
Rodgers wroteFourth and Long Gone, a novel published in 1985 that is a bawdyroman à clef of his experiences as a college football coach and recruiter.[1] He also wrotePepper!: The autobiography of an unconventional coach with Al Thomy.[21]
Rodgers later lived inReston, Virginia,[22] where he died on May 14, 2020, at the age of 88.[23]
| Year | Team | Overall | Conference | Standing | Bowl/playoffs | Coaches# | AP° | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kansas Jayhawks(Big Eight Conference)(1967–1970) | |||||||||
| 1967 | Kansas | 5–5 | 5–2 | T–2nd | |||||
| 1968 | Kansas | 9–2 | 6–1 | T–1st | LOrange | 6 | 7 | ||
| 1969 | Kansas | 1–9 | 0–7 | 8th | |||||
| 1970 | Kansas | 5–6 | 2–5 | T–6th | |||||
| Kansas: | 20–22 | 13–15 | |||||||
| UCLA Bruins(Pacific-8 Conference)(1971–1973) | |||||||||
| 1971 | UCLA | 2–7–1 | 1–4–1 | 8th | |||||
| 1972 | UCLA | 8–3 | 5–2 | 2nd | T–17 | 15 | |||
| 1973 | UCLA | 9–2 | 6–1 | 2nd | 9 | 12 | |||
| UCLA: | 19–12–1 | 12–7–1 | |||||||
| Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets(NCAA Division I / I-A independent)(1974–1979) | |||||||||
| 1974 | Georgia Tech | 6–5 | |||||||
| 1975 | Georgia Tech | 7–4 | |||||||
| 1976 | Georgia Tech | 4–6–1 | |||||||
| 1977 | Georgia Tech | 6–5 | |||||||
| 1978 | Georgia Tech | 7–5 | LPeach | ||||||
| 1979 | Georgia Tech | 4–6–1 | |||||||
| Georgia Tech: | 34–31–2 | ||||||||
| Total: | 73–65–3 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
Source:[24]
| Team | Year | Regular Season | Post Season | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Won | Lost | Ties | Win % | Finish | Won | Lost | Win % | Result | ||
| MEM | 1984 | 7 | 11 | 0 | .389 | 4th in Southern Div. | did not qualify | |||
| MEM | 1985 | 11 | 7 | 0 | .611 | 3rd in Eastern Conf. | 1 | 1 | .500 | Lost in Semifinals |
| Total | 18 | 18 | 0 | .500 | 1 | 1 | .500 | |||
Source:[25]
| Team | Year | Regular Season | Post Season | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Won | Lost | Ties | Win % | Finish | Won | Lost | Win % | Result | ||
| MEM | 1995 | 9 | 9 | 0 | .500 | 4th inSouth Division | did not qualify | |||
| Total | 9 | 9 | 0 | .500 | 0 | 0 | – | |||
Source:[25]
The year Kansas fans could finally quit referencing Pepper Rodgers, Bobby Douglass and John Zook while reminiscing about 1968, the last time a conference trophy in football was hoisted atop Oread. (Division ties, like the one KU achieved in 2007, don't really count if left out of the conference title game.)
They contemplated giving it to longtime college coach Pepper Rodgers, but were talked out of it and instead gave Rodgers a front-office position.
In an overall shake-up of the organization, the Redskins also named longtime college coach Pepper Rodgers their vice president of football operations and fired special teams coach LeCharls McDaniel, giving that job to tight ends coach Pat Flaherty.
Iconography with a twist is served up in PEPPER (Doubleday, $7.95) by Pepper Rodgers and Al Thorny an often comical autobiography of the shrewdly zany Georgia Tech football coach, and in JOE NAMATH AND THE OTHER GUYS (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, $7.95).
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
