New coach Jube Joseph, Central’s ‘crazy uncle’, has a plan to keep Rockets’ dynasty going

It’s the third day of training camp in the Jube Joseph era and there’s a buzz around Miami Central. There are former players, and parents and older siblings all hanging around, and most all of them fall into a couple of those categories. This how things tend to go with inner-city Miami football.

Practice is getting near its end and there’s a slip-up in the secondary. Central’s defense is getting a little too lackadaisical for Joseph’s liking. He blows his whistle and everyone freezes. They know what’s coming. For three years before he succeeded Roland Smith as coach in March, Joseph was the defensive coordinator, so his defense knows the drill. Everyone on the defensive side of the field runs in place until the whistle blows again and then they drop for up-downs.

On its face, there’s nothing too unusual about this, but it’s hard not to notice the glee Joseph gets out of it. He spreads his legs wide and takes on a power stance; he barks out a quick message — usually, it features a word or two not fit for print — and raises his whistle up to his mouth; he points his finger, flicks his wrist a little bit like Dave Chappelle doing an impression of Howard Dean and lets it rip.

Off to the side, those former players, and siblings and parents snicker among each other because they know — maybe because they played for him or next to him, or at least have watched him coach before — this is the classic Joseph experience and it’s going to work.

‘If it ain’t broke...’

It really wasn’t so long ago when Joseph was in their shoes. He was a Rocket from 2001-2004, during the days when Central was still the team that couldn’t get over the hump. He went to William H. Turner Technical Arts School — the magnet school located directly next to Miami Central Senior High School — and caught the 17-Norwood bus every morning on 17th Avenue to get to class. For as long as he has been coaching, Joseph has dreamed of coming back to the Rockets.

His long road home included stops in Citra at North Marion, in Tallahassee at Lincoln and Godby, and eventually back in Miami-Dade County, where he coached at both Miami Springs and Carol City before Smith gave him a shot in 2019.

At the time, Joseph was just supposed to be Central’s defensive backs coach, but some last-minute departures meant he became the defensive coordinator for one of the best teams in the country.

In Joseph’s first year, the Rockets won their sixth state title. In his second, they won another and then a third straight last season. When the Miami Hurricanes hired Mario Cristobal in the winter and the new coach wanted to build out his coaching staff, he pried Smith away from Central to be his director of high school relations and Joseph ascended to the head job.

Ultimately, it was an easy choice. In Joseph’s three seasons as their DC, the Rockets went 32-6 and finished in the top 25 of MaxPreps’ national rankings each year.

Now, Central opens Joseph’s first season at No. 15.

“As they say, If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” Joseph said. “Clearly we have a system here, clearly we have a culture here, clearly we have a standard and a brand to represent, and we’re not going to miss a beat with it because we know what it takes to get there and stand on top of that mountain.”

The foundation largely starts with Smith, who was the coach for Central’s last six state championships and a mentor to Telly Lockette, who was the coach for the first two. By the end of his run in Miami, Smith was almost more of an all-seeing supervisor at practices, content to let his assistant coaches coach, and instead take a big-picture view of the program.

It was something he learned from Hall of Fame coach Jimmy Johnson and it created space for Joseph to be Joseph.

Rueben Bain, a star defensive lineman and fixture of the last three title-winning defenses, calls him, “the best crazy person ever.” Really, it’s more accurate to think of him as something like the crazy uncle.

“I’m the uncle who—I’ll get on you, but people see that. They don’t see the fact that we’re inside cracking jokes,” Joseph said. “I wanted to coach kids who I can relate to and I can tell them, I’ve seen what you’ve seen, I’ve gone through what you’ve gone through because that way the connection and the bond is more authentic. It’s more genuine because I’ve walked these halls. A lot of the kids that play for me — I went to school with their parents. It’s more of, I’ll come to church with you.”

Take those up-downs from Day 3 of practice, for example.

In the new transfer-filled world of high school football, the first few practices of a powerhouse program’s preseason are as much about installing a culture as they are an offense and defense, and the Rockets’ culture is about discipline, with a “punishment period” kicking off every practice to discipline players who were late to school or violated team rules.

“He’s not just doing it because we’re doing something dumb,” said Bain, who set the Rockets’ single-season sacks record last year. “Everything he’s doing translates to the field. It’s going to make us a better player and better young man, and man for the future.”

‘No free rings’

One of those onlookers wears a shirt Joseph hopes sums up the whole Central ethos.

Above a picture of three championship rings to symbolized the Rockets’ ongoing three-peat, the shirt carries a disclaimer: “No free rings.” Beneath, it notes, “This ain’t for everybody.”

“You don’t just come here and think you’re going to wear a uniform, and you get a ring. You have to work,” Joseph said. “You’ve got to do something. You’re either a liability or an asset. You’ve got to contribute in some way, shape or form. Ask yourself today, What did I do for the Rockets?”

His coaches aren’t off the hook, either. In the offseason, Joseph encouraged all his assistant coaches to get in better shape.

“If we’re going to demand this with the kids,” he said, “we have to show them that we’re willing to uphold the standard, as well.”

The results speak for themselves. After it won an eighth state title last year, Central has more state championships than anyone else in Miami-Dade and its most recent rosters were littered with college-ready players.

On offense, he can point to running back Amari Daniels and wide receiver Yulkeith Brown, who contributed for the Texas A&M Aggies last year as freshmen. On defense, he can point right down to Coral Gables, where linebacker Wesley Bissainthe is now set to play a role for the Hurricanes as a freshman.

Newcomers like linebacker Stanquan Clark and safety Mark-Allen Gay, both of whom transferred from Killian, have every reason to buy into what Joseph’s selling.

“I always try to tell them that we’re going to try to turn this into the ‘University of Miami Central.’ This is the launching pad for a reason. I joke with them, but I’m dead serious when I say, I’m not in the business of redshirt freshmen.”

The byproduct is rings and lots of them, although they’ve maybe never been harder to earn.

This year is the first with the Florida High School Association’s new Metro-Suburban split and Class 2M, with the Rockets as the favorites, is easily the deepest classification in the state. For Central to win a fourth straight championship, it’ll have to get past Plantation American Heritage, Cardinal Gibbons, Gulliver Prep, Northwestern, Jackson, Norland and Edison.

It’s just the way Joseph likes things. It isn’t supposed to be easy.

“We just see state championships as an expectation, not something we wish for,” Bain said. “We feel like getting a state championship is the standard, something we have to do. It’s not like something we want to do and something we want to accomplish, it’s something that’s guaranteed that has to happen.”