Spring Focus: Meet Mizzou's TE Coach Joe Jon Finley
3/9/2016 12:30:00 PM | Football
As the son of a football coach, Mizzou's new tight end coach, Joe Jon Finley, has been around the game for as long as he can remember. His father, Mickey, was a longtime successful coach at Arlington (Texas) High School, and Finley began his love affair with the sport as a four-year-old water boy.
Finley quickly moved up the ranks. "I graduated to tee boy, graduated to ball boy, then I was the clipboard guy," he said. A standout prep playing career would follow, which preceded a stellar run as a tight end at Oklahoma. That would lead to spending a couple of years on NFL rosters, and when his playing days ended in 2012, he started a new path in coaching.
Being around the game for so long gives the 31-year-old a special perspective, one that he fully appreciates.
"I feel like I have a master's degree in football," he joked.
It's that appreciation for the game which has shaped his life so much that spurs Finley to coach. He wants to pass along the life lessons and the character it can teach to young men from all different upbringings. It's a task he relishes, and one that he takes very seriously.
"At the end of the day, it's our job to teach these young men how to win in life, and we get to use football as a tool to do that," Finley said. "It all goes hand in hand, you teach them how to work, you teach them how to approach every day, you teach them how to be mentally tough. You teach them all these things through football, and then when they leave here, they have a foundation for how to be successful in life," he said.
Finley joined Head Coach Barry Odom's staff in January after spending one year at Baylor, learning under offensive guru Art Briles. He was part of a BU staff which has been on the cutting edge of the offensive game. In 2015, the Baylor offense was among the most potent in the nation, as the Bears led the country in both total offense (616 ypg) and scoring (48.1 ppg), while ranking in the top-25 nationally in numerous other categories, just a few of which included rushing (2nd – 327 ypg), passing efficiency (3rd – 171 rating), fewest sacks allowed (15th – 1.1 per game), 3rd down percentage (16th – 46.7%) and passing yardage (24th – 290 ypg).
He's also spent two years coaching alongside his older brother, Clint, at Los Fresnos (Texas) High School, sandwiched around a two-year stint as a graduate assistant coach at his alma mater, Oklahoma.
He laughs off when reminded that he and his Sooner teammates dealt Mizzou fans one of the more painful blows in program history – an OU 38-17 defeat of the #1-ranked Tigers in the 2007 Big 12 Championship Game in San Antonio, Texas. That loss dropped Mizzou out of contention for the BCS National Championship Game.
Finley caught a touchdown pass in the fourth quarter to seal that one, and it was one of his team-high five receptions (for 34 yards). "I'll probably have to live that one down for a while, but it's all in good fun," he said. "We had a lot of respect for Mizzou then, we knew they were really talented and we played a really good game that night," he said.
Finley had never met Barry Odom before, but it was his connection with another first-year Tiger coach that helped sway him to join the MU staff. Brand new offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Josh Heupel gave Finley a level of comfort that Mizzou was the place for him. Heupel, of course, was a Heisman runner-up quarterback at OU and coached there when Finley played, and later served as a GA coach.
"I know what he's about, I know what kind of offense he's going to run, what he wants to run, and it matches up with what I like to do as well," Finley said of Heupel.
But that wasn't the only draw to Mizzou for the Texas native, who brings with him the strongest beard game on the staff.
"(It) was a great opportunity for me to come be in the SEC, which is the premier league in America," he said. "Then, just the tradition at Missouri, I know them from playing at Oklahoma. Always a really good football team, a great tradition and something that I wanted to be a part of," he said.
Having known Odom for only a short time, Finley is impressed with the environment the first-year head coach has quickly created.
"(The) first thing that stands out from day one is that he's a worker," said Finley. "He's not afraid to get in there and grind away. You can see that through his team, they see that, just interacting with him, seeing him at team meetings, at workouts, how they respect him because they know anything he asks them to do, he's not afraid to go and do that, plus some," he said.
Finley fully recognizes that he is stepping into a great spot at Mizzou, with a very deep group of talented tight ends in his stable. "I'm very fortunate to walk into this situation where I have three really good tight ends (Sean Culkin, Jason Reese, Kendall Blanton), and I have two more coming in this recruiting class (Brendan Scales, Albert Okwuegbunam)," he said.
With spring camp having started on March 8th, just what is Finley looking for his pupils to achieve?
"I want to see who's going to have the mentality to do everything," he said. "It's easy to walk out and play receiver, that's the fun thing to do. I want to see those guys really take in the responsibility of being a full package tight end – put their hand on the ground and block, get in the backfield, block the linebacker, pass protect on the defensive end. Also, run routes, create mismatches on linebackers and small DBs. Really, I just want to see who's going to do all of those at a high level," he said.
As Finley wears black and gold for the first time this spring, he represents a football family who sees the best in not only the sport, but the young men playing it, and what it can do for their lives going forward. He wants very much for them to get out of it what he has for himself.
"I tell this story all the time, my dad coached for 36 years, and had a retirement party, and had guys from his first team ever," he said. "They would get up in front of the group and tell stories about the effect that he had on their lives, grown men with tears coming down their face. That's what really solidified that I wanted to be a coach," said Finley.
