Lamarcus Joyner is thankful and honored to be recognized on Friday night as one of the newest members of Florida State’s athletics hall of fame. Joyner played a number of defensive back spots from 2009-13 at FSU, committing to his dream school in the days after the coaching transition from Bobby Bowden to Jimbo Fisher and staying in school to help the Seminoles claim a third national title.
Now retired after nine years in the NFL with the Rams, Raiders and Jets from 2014-22, Joyner is back home in South Florida. He’s the father of five, with a sixth on the way, and is a coach and mentor to football players at all levels. He has a packed schedule on Friday, in part meeting current Seminoles as well as familiar faces like Jerry Latimer, FSU’s longtime director of athletic rehabilitation, and Bruce Warwick, who he knew going back to their days with the Rams, among others who work in and around the Moore Athletic Center.
Florida State’s 2024 class includes Joyner and receiver Anquan Boldin, baseball All-American Ryan Barthelemy, All-American softball pitcher Casey Hunter, NCAA hurdles champion Phillip Riley, tennis great Katie Rybakova and former FSU track athlete and long-time Florida State athletics administrator Bernie Waxman. They will be honored in a ceremony this evening at the University Center Club.
“I don't do well with accolades because that's not really even really why I played the game,” Joyner told the Osceola on Thursday night. “I'm thankful when I do receive it, but I'm more so just there to watch the game (Saturday) and just feel the majesty of being on campus again, being around that atmosphere, that environment. I'm there to just see the younger guys and see what they got, up close and personal.”
Below is Joyner's interview with the Osceola on his FSU career and what his message would be to current Seminoles.
What are you doing now? Tell us about your family.
Joyner: I guess you could say I'm coaching underground. Got a lot of ex-teammates, lot of guys that's still younger than me in the league playing, have a couple of college young friends call, ask for advice. I coach life. And then, most importantly, my day to day is my kids. Me and my wife have five kids (ages 8, 7, 6, 4 and 2) with one on the way. So being a full-time dad and mentoring and I'm pouring into them. … I'm so used to this lifestyle, and I love being around my family.
What was your reaction when you heard about your induction?
Joyner: If I had to be honest about the emotion I had, I was honored. I wouldn't say I was surprised, nor would I say that I was expecting it. Just coming off retirement and just getting football out of my system, and to be reminded of the great body of work that I put together as a Seminole, it just hit me. I'm sitting at the dinner table with my family. They know me as dad, my wife knows me as Marcus. And I don't see myself as just, I don't walk around wearing a badge of honor from being an ex-football player. And to be reminded, hey, ‘You're a part of the FSU Hall of Fame now such a prestigious college and university.’ It was very emotional and it was unbelievable.
You signed with FSU at a dark time. The football program was struggling, coach Bowden had been forced into retirement and coach Fisher was taking over and recruiting. Why did you pick FSU?
Joyner: Florida State was kind of like a hometown favorite for my neighborhood specifically in my household. Because my older brothers, they enjoyed players like Deion Sanders, Terrell Buckley, Peter Warrick, all the greats. And that was kind of like what I grew up seeing and seeing people root and cheer for. And when I became more established as a high school football player, it just would have made life that much more special to be able to go to a university that, you know, I didn't have cable TV growing up. And I wasn't a sports fan. Football for me was Florida State. And the Dolphins sucked. That was my football introduction. So to be able to live out a dream for other friends and relatives of like, if they had the opportunity, I was being one of the first from my neighborhood to be able to be honored with a scholarship to Florida State. There were other schools in the mix, just because at that point in my life I thought it was cool. I thought going to another state like Ohio would have been great, USC. It was just the entertainment of the recruiting process. But in my heart, I knew that I wanted to be a part of Florida State. And at that point in my life, I always had just a huge chip on my shoulder. I always felt like wherever my presence was, I was going to make a difference. That was my mentality. FSU, I was used to them being great, and then seeing them go through the dark days, and I just wanted to be a part of that resurgence of FSU. And that's what I put in my mind. That's what I put in my heart during recruiting process, and that was my goal for that part of my life.
Looking back, we can see the resurgence that you were a part of and helped build. But in the moment could you and your teammates tell that you were building something special?
Joyner: I felt that personally, individually and for the team and the university in itself. Because my first year in that recruiting class was a great recruiting class. And I see the pros and cons, what that revealed to me. I remember just being on recruiting visits, and guys who were top prospects like myself were kind of like, ‘FSU, they suck.’ I'm like, saying to myself, ‘But if you're a big-time player, I would think that you would want to come to a university and bring it back. That's what alphas do.’ But guys want to go where everything was going good. So when I got there, and we had somewhat of success that first year with Coach Fisher, it became easier to recruit guys, easier to recruit talent. Guys wanted to come. ‘Man, y'all doing some good stuff. FSU is back.’ You could see just from that standpoint, that we were getting better, and every year the results were better. And every year my mentality was, ‘I want more, because I know we can be better.’ So every year we got all the talent, compiled the talent. And I feel like every year we produced a better result. But I just knew the ultimate goal was a championship for me. And every year the guys believed, as a group, believed that we can do better. I definitely experienced and knew that we were getting better and heading towards something great, like we all planned to.
We had heard after the bowl game in your junior season that you had conflicted emotions about returning for 2013 and debated the decision. Is that fair and why did you want to return?
Joyner: That's fair to say. Think about it. You are a successful collegiate athlete. You did some good things at Florida State, and you saw some results. You didn't finish what you wanted, you didn't get everything that you wanted, but you saw some good things. And we all know that the ultimate goal, I would hope so, as an athlete, when you're in that kind of competitive sport, the ultimate goal is the National Football League. You do all those things in Little League, high school in college, for the most part, to get to that league. So the conflicting part for me was waging the war between selfishness and what's best for the university and the guys that depend on you. And so that was the thing, between selfishness and leadership. Being responsible and accountable to a greater force, something greater than you. And I think the determining factor, after talking to coach Jeremy Pruitt and coach Jimbo Fisher was that the force that was greater than myself was more important than me just like saying, ‘Hey, I came to FSU, I did some good things. I helped the program turn around, and hey, I'm gone.’ I felt like the university did so much more for me, and did so much for me that it was worth considering to come back and finish what we started. The reward was great.
We could spend an hour discussing the 2013 season. But what do you remember the most about that year, the friendships, the memories?
Joyner: I say this all the time. If you look at or listen to any interview that I've made in the past two years about speaking on that team was the brotherhood and the selflessness. I never have been from, from Little League to pros, including that 2013 season, I've never been a part of a team where the next man respected his teammates so much that he did everything in his ability to make sure his teammate has success. Literally, I never heard guys talking in college like, ‘Hey, the D line said, If we eat, the secondary eats. And the secondary is like, if we cover.’ I never have heard that kind of language, other than in 2013 being a part of that. Even taking it back, fast forward it to my fifth year in the league, when I went to the Super Bowl with the Rams. We were very dysfunctional. Everyone had an individual goal of their own, and in respects to the team. It was never about the team, it was always about me and what I can gain from this. I felt like that 2013 season, it was the brotherhood, the love for one another, to see your teammate do the best he can. And get an opportunity to be drafted or whatever it is, All-American. Give your all for your teammate to win a championship. We were all about each other. And that's what I remember that made that team so special because other years we had just as much talent, if not more.
If Mike Norvell asks you to speak to the team, what’s your message about maximizing your life and your football career?
Joyner: It would be the same message that I had last year. And it would be football, especially when you're playing for a university like FSU that has so much expectation, and there can be so many great things brought about from being successful, I think the way you go about having this scholarship and having this position on this team, it has to be a way of life about how you go about doing things. It can't be, ‘Last year we were successful, so this year we got to be successful. That's different from, you know, it being a way of life. It’s being a standard. How you go about your business has to be a way of life. A way of life is when that's just what a person does. That's what's in their heart, that's what's in their soul, that's what's in their mind, and they don't have to talk about it or they don't have to write about it, because it's their way of life. And I feel like when you look at all of the great things, the great teams and the great players that came through Florida State in successful years, they wanted to be successful. They didn't feel like they had to be because Mike Norvell wanted them to be, or because 2013 we won the national championship, or because Jalen Ramsey was great, they want to be great because it's a way of life, and that's what they want to be. That's how you go to class, that's how you lift weights. It doesn’t feel like you have to do it, or it doesn’t feel like a practice. You actually get upset when practice is over. So those are some of the things I would tell this team. Just how you go about this year, your business, it has to be a way of life. It just can't be something. It can't be a practice. It can't be football. It's from 3 o'clock to 5, and I have to go to practice. It can't be I have to go to class. All those things have to coincide and work together. And you have to want to do it. It has to be a passion, because you want to do it. And when you got enough guys that want to do that, you're going to have success. And to be quite frank, when you don't have enough guys that want to do that, then you see the opposite of success. That's my humble opinion.
FSU fans seeking improvements to gameday experience will see it Saturday
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