It’s tough to admit it, but we have our preconceived notions about drug addicts. We often picture the destitute, the down and out, or the ones who can’t function in society. Then again, we can also imagine addicts like Hunter Biden, who has a cadre of enablers propping him up.
But the reality is that many addicts manage to carry on with their lives while suffering in silence. Scott Cochran, the current head football coach at the University of West Alabama, fell into the latter category. He developed an addiction to opioids that was severe enough that he snorted 50 pills a day, all while coaching college football players to national championships.
Cochran worked for years with Nick Saban on his strength and conditioning staff and helped coach six national championship teams at LSU and Alabama. His booming voice and frequent use of the word “yeah” earned him the nickname “Coach Yeah,” but it also led to debilitating migraines. In 2012, his doctor told him to stop screaming at practice and on the field; Cochran snapped back, “You try not breathing, Doc.”
Blood thinners didn’t work. Vicodin wasn’t effective enough, either, so Cochran’s doctor prescribed extended-release OxyContin. Cochran determined that he wouldn’t become an addict.
“I'm not gonna get addicted to something,” he told ESPN’s Marty Smith about his initial mindset. “Come on. I'm winning. I'm winning everything. I'm financially successful. Life is too good for something like that. So I'll be fine. But sure enough, I had to get more and more and more.”
“By the time 2020 comes, I'm like, ‘Okay, I gotta put this down. I gotta stop,’” he added.
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In February of that year, Cochran joined Kirby Smart’s staff at Georgia, taking on the role of special teams coordinator. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Cochran spiraled and increased his intake drastically. On April 10, 2020, his wife Cissy found him passed out from an overdose.
“He was doing video work upstairs, and I found him, and he was kind of like slumped over, just not really responsive,” she told Smith. “And so I tried to kind of, like, rouse him up, and I couldn't get him. But yeah, then I called 911.”
After he got out of the hospital, Cochran quietly went to a 28-day rehab program. He didn’t tell anybody at the University of Georgia. He thought he had kicked his addiction.
Cochran no longer had access to OxyContin, so when he felt the temptation to take something to feed his addiction, he turned to drug dealers, who supplied him with fentanyl. Another incident led him to seek treatment in the summer of 2021, this time for 100 days. He had no choice but to tell Smart.
“So I called Kirby, and he was blown away,” Cochran said. “He's like, ‘What are you... What?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I've been having this problem and I need real help this time.’ I said, ‘You hired a drug addict.’”
Smart was supportive of Cochran and even visited him at the rehab facility. Things seemed to be going Cochran’s way, and the Bulldogs won back-to-back national championships with him on staff. Then Cissy noticed his demeanor at the Capital One Orange Bowl game on Dec. 30, 2023.
“My wife grabbed me at the bowl game, literally grabbed my face and said, ‘I know you are struggling. This can be our last football game,’” he said.
Six weeks later, Cochran resigned from Georgia to concentrate on his recovery. He spoke to college athletic programs about the danger of substance abuse and helped found the American Addiction Recovery Association, which he wants to be the Susan G. Komen Foundation of recovery efforts. Cochran got back into coaching again — this time as a head coach at West Alabama.
“My story's about redemption,” Cochran said. “Oh, yeah. You just gotta keep taking one step, one little inch. Over 18 months in recovery and having a purpose-driven life, now I get to do what I believe God put me on this earth to do, which is coach young men.”
What’s not to root for in a story like this one?
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