Success without honor is an unseasoned dish; it will satisfy your hunger, but it won't taste good.

The line contrasts outward achievement (“success”) with the moral quality that should accompany it (“honor”). By likening dishonorable success to an “unseasoned dish,” it suggests that results can meet immediate appetites—status, money, wins—yet remain fundamentally unsatisfying because they lack integrity and self-respect. The metaphor implies that honor is not an optional garnish but the element that makes accomplishment genuinely worth having. In a sporting context often associated with Paterno, the idea also critiques win-at-all-costs thinking: victories obtained through cheating, exploitation, or compromised principles may still “count,” but they leave a bad aftertaste for the individual and the community.