RamWire Exclusive: Ties to Thomasville remain strong for Mike Bobo

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Remember your name.

The phrase came out of George Bobo's mouth every time his son Mike left the house growing up in Thomasville, Georgia. It was a reminder to the young man that whatever he said, however he behaved, he was representing the Bobo name. In Thomasville, it was a one which carried weight.

George was the head football coach at Thomasville High School, a highly respected one. His was a career which culminated in him being elected to the Thomasville Hall of Fame, a membership his son would later join as a player. Those years, the memories, are what Mike carries closest to this very day, and in the end, formed what was his true desire.

He wanted to be his dad.

He never imagined being the quarterback at Georgia, or coach in college, in the SEC, be a coordinator at his alma mater, move up the ranks to running a program of his own. No, his plans were all firmly rooted in Thomasville lessons.

"It was a special thing at Thomasville High. Your role models were your coaches," Mike said. "Not just my dad, but the other coaches on the staff. My biggest goal was to play at Thomasville High, then to coach. I wanted to coach and have an influence on young people like my dad. Not like just what he did for me, but for other people on the team."

It didn't work out that way. He was a record-setting quarterback for Georgia. He quickly joined the collegiate coaching ranks, spending 16 years back on the sidelines with a headset replacing his helmet. It led him to Fort Collins and the chance to mold the Colorado State program, and most every decision he makes -- the morale fiber and structure -- are rooted back home in Georgia.

For George, it's been a blessing to coach and watch his son develop in the ranks. He wasn't exactly pleased about the first head job, saying "he's taking my grandchildren away," but he hasn't missed much. When Mike went to play in college, he stepped down as the head coach to become an assistant so he could be in the stands.

"Coaching was special. Being able to work with kids, but coaching my son was very special," George said. "Watching him grow and watch him mature, it was hard when he left, because you spent all of your life watching him grow up and play football. Then when he graduates, then it's a different thing. It's a different part of his life, but I was staying where I was. But it was wonderful."

Growing up, the football program was as much of Mike's family as blood relatives were. George's staff was part of his upbringing, molding the way he thinks, acts and carries himself. It would be impossible for him to remove it from his being.

And unthinkable.

How his Rams' teams act, how they work, how they function is deeply rooted in the lessons he watched and absorbed as a youth. Those were special, formidable times, and no matter the level, they work. They breed structure and family, which every program requires.

"It takes me back to being around high school football. I was in Thomasville growing up since fourth grade, a south Georgia town where it was all about Friday night, the community supporting the football team and the school," Mike said. "That's' all I ever wanted to do. It kinda shaped me. My dad was the coach, the other coaches, just how it worked, how we trained, the work ethic my dad and the other coaches had. The countless hours of watching film and the relationships they had with the players and still to this day."

It's a community which supported Mike as a player in high school and later in college. They remained true to him in all of his years at Georgia and have now added Colorado State to the short list of their favorite teams.

George and his wife, Barbara, are constant fixtures during the season. They come out in a camper, even buying a bigger one this year. When he's in town for games, he's on the sidelines. And when Mike won his first game with the Rams, he had more than enough people to celebrate with at his house.

"To be able to have that first win and play well, it was an exciting moment," Mike said. "We probably had 45-50 family member here at the house after the game. I tell my players all the time, you think it's all about you. You got here, or you made the play, but there's a lot of people who helped you get where you're at. The same with me. When you have success, you want to enjoy that success with the people who love and support you, and I was able to do that our first win. That was a proud moment for them as well. Me, I was thinking about the next game."

When Mike was afflicted with a peripheral neuropathy prior to the start of the 2018 season, his parents were there to help. It allowed father and son to bond in a different way, making George no less proud.

"I got to watch him grow up from a different perspective," George said. "When you're denied things, like his ability to coach, his ability to really get around, you have to adjust. I've always said this, you have to endeavor to persevere, and he learned to persevere. He learned through all this stuff, this journey he's been through, it really developed him more as a man. I'm really proud of the way he did his family and the way he handled his football players."

Mike's teams know George personally, but if they didn't, they'd know his lessons. The words which shaped Mike's upbringing as a child and a player now fill their ears in meetings and the sidelines. Heck, even Mike's coaches borrow the timeless phrases.

Don't depend on the undependable.

Things not written are soon forgotten. This is something wide receivers coach Joe Cox – who played quarterback for Mike at Georgia -- makes his players write on their books when he starts every meeting at the start of every semester.

Repetition is the mother of all skills.

If you misbehave, Fort Collins won't be big enough to hide in. It was Thomasville in his high school days, but the point is still clear.

Coaching enters the bloodstream, and it never leaves. Not in retirement, not when on the sidelines watching your son's teams play.

"He's got on to me saying, dad, I heard you were down there saying throw it," George said. "Well, I might be telling somebody, because football is really … It can make a preacher a nut, a fool, because they get involved with thing that you have an opinion and you need to do this. Most of the time, to the coaches, I keep my mouth closed."

At the conclusion of the comeback against Arkansas last year, the two of them shared a special moment on the field, a picture of which is now on George's phone. He looks at it every day, one that is worth more than a thousand words to him.

It represented more than a win, but a culmination of trying times extending well beyond four hours for each of them. Much of what brought them to that point was rooted deeply in the Georgia soil.

In many ways, it still has a magnetic pull for Mike. Even for his college roommate, Kirby Smart. Smart, who is now Georgia's head coach, was also raised by a high school coach just up the road from the Bobos.

If the two friends ever tire of the life of a college football coach, they shouldn't be hard to find.

"Me and Kirby talk about it all the time, us going back and coaching high school football," Mike said. "We argue about who's going to be the head coach. Neither one of us wants to be the head coach, we just want to be the assistant. You just have a lot of fond memories of growing up and playing in a community that supported the school."

For more RamWire content, click here.

Calendar

Upcoming Events

Recent Results