Recent Comments
Very well said!!
If there is one thing I trust less than the coaching staff, it is the collective wisdom of any university student body. I don't begrudge anyone making choices on how to spend their disposable income, and I know that the thought of having to pay the salaries of employees who do not perform up to the standards associated with those salaries must be frustrating. At the same time, student body protests, boycotts, and other forms of showing displeasure are the act of self important kids who somehow think they have move the needle. Newsflash, you don't.
If the program has a good season next year, Lane will be full. If you don't use or buy your tickets, someone else will. The money you don't spend on a turkey leg means one more for me. Don't kid yourself, unless you are a top level donor, your voice means squat, and any fiscal damage you do to the program will mean less money for capital improvements, travel for recruiting, etc. etc. The coaches will get paid regardless.
This is what will drive change:
1) Frank Beamer decides that this season is unacceptable, and puts performance ahead of loyalty.
2) A majority of the 100K+ donors refuse to donate. I am talking the Mike Vick's, Bruce Smith's, the Byrds etc.
Remember where the program was in 1993. 40,000 people in the stands was a huge deal. There was no merchandising revenue. Even if John Q. Hokie fan spends less, it doesn't put any pressure on Beamer because he brought the program out of the wilderness.
If you really want to make change, use your tickets, support the team in the stadium, and then take the time to understand why they succeed and why they fail, and articulate those issues in every public forum possible. The movers and shakers will move and shake soon enough.
Conference affiliation today is all about financial positioning; nothing less. An SEC paycheck (and what VT can bring to the table) will absorb easily any burdens that would potentially displace all other athletics for the university, and no doubt pad other department coffers.
With all the silliness going on, no doubt another round of realignment rhetoric, shift and prognosticating this spring, then the rumors of Clemson, FSU, UVA and BC surfacing, acting in the best interests of the university, it behooves VT to consider SEC courtship.
Jump. Now, before the ability to explain away a "fiduciary responsibility to the school" -Dr. Steger" is lost with a lame duck conference and a more attractive and long-term financially beneficial offer (the SEC) has moved on.
I have 3 friends from high school that go to uva and after talking to them over break, not a single one of them is even going to watch the game Saturday...
I will be driving back to Tech Friday night.
Wake up at 7:30 ready to rage.
Jump my ass off at 11:56 when Sandman comes on.
Lastly, I will cheer on my Hokies till the last minute expires.
Tech > Uva
Hell, I get BTN in the ass-end of Texas. Makes my Mich alum friend happy ^_^
Here we have another uva fan falling back on "I'd rather be a softy from uva than a redneck from Tech"... If uva is so smart, how come they still can't tell the difference between Tech and Radford.
Knitting while angry is a bad idea... ask me how I know <.<
They've already taken one toxic asset, might as well take another.
I grew up in Maryland and was almost always able to watch the VT games. I'm not saying that the SEC wants us right now, but of all the schools that would fit into their conference, we're definitely up there. Clemson, FSU and VT have to be their top 3 right now. Our fan base doesn't travel anymore because we're getting bored with having the same thing every year, an Orange Bowl appearance gets old after a while. At least that's what I think. If we were in the SEC and playing top 10 teams every week then I could see our fan base traveling a lot more again.
And I just want to be on the record as anti-SEC. I don't think it would be a smart move for us because our fan base is on par with South Carolina, a good football team that the rest of the SEC schools don't care about.
Is there a cable network in DC that doesn't already get the BTN? I've gotten it for years now as part of my standard cable package. Or is there anyone outside of Maryland on the eastern seaboard that will care more about the Big Ten now and get cable companies to pony up for the BTN?
I get the talk of footprints and markets, but I don't see how adding a mediocre football school with below average fanbase will add more eyeballs in this area beyond what they already got with their big name teams. I already watched the BTN at times because I like football and the Big Ten has some good, big name football teams that it's fun to root against. And the BTN was already in this area because there are a fuckton of Big Ten alumni all over the place. They graduate like fifty thousand people a year from Ohio State and they spread like locusts.
I dunno about the BTN's reach in NYC, so that may make some sense, but the idea that Maryland will bring more than they'll take away seems mind-boggling to me.
Likewise I don't see how the ACC really loses out unless others try to jump ship. Maryland does nothing to help the conference in TV contract negotiations that isn't already done by VT and UVA. A half a million Maryland fans doesn't move the needle at all, and they're just another pathetic #goacc football team at this point. Push Notre Dame for full membership or add Louisville or Connecticut. All would be a plus in markets, fans, football quality and basketball quality.
But not new viewers. Just like the B1G, it's about number of TVs that will have the network. If the SEC is truly getting their own network like the rumors say, Having more people watch in Florida isn't worth as much as having the game shown across the state of Virginia for even just 1 person to watch.
There's something to be said for having one of the biggest national brands in college football. Miami is extremely popular, and they get TV ratings. They will be a huge asset in contract negotiations, especially if SEC money revitalizes the program.
fans are restive, a showing of solidarity if you will. I admit that not showing up for a game could be interpreted as punishing the players because fans wouldn't be there to cheer them on, but's its only one game. I concur the fans are somewhat "spoiled", but Beamer does have a habit of dismissing criticism by denigrating the person calling him out.
They want untapped markets. UF has Florida, UGA has Georgia, and USC has South Carolina. That leaves Virginia and North Carolina as the two locations closest to it that the people counting the $$$ care about. While schools like Alabama and Ole Miss have a similar mentality to UVA, why would the SEC want the Hoos for any reason other than to add a W to most teams' record annually? That leaves us as the Virginia option. In NC, I don't think UNC and Duke would go to the SEC just because they pride themselves in academics (irony at its finest with UNC) too much to make that sacrifice. That leaves NC State. The SEC could also tap into Oklahoma with either OU or OkSt, but I think the Big12 will revive itself so they won't get them. If SEC wants money, NC State and us give it the best chance.
This move for Maryland not only solidifies them, but improves them as an athletic department and as a university. I give them props for doing what is best for their university, regardless of what some people think. There were seven sports teams cut because they could not be afforded. Those teams will now be reinstated per the university president. Between now and 2020, Maryland stands to make nearly 100 million more in the Big than the ACC. And that's before all of the research money they will now have access to. The big ten is better at basketball than the acc and worse in football. Maybe equal. That's a great fit for maryland.
When it comes to VT and the ACC... Yea sure we wanted to be in the ACC for a really long time. But the ACC we always wanted to be in is far from the ACC that we have now. It is an unstable conference, that does not pay well, does not reward us for our success, has a bias towards a sport we put in an extremely distant second, and puts a sport that built or university on the back burner. Idk if we have an offer from the SEC, but I do know this... Two things took our school from some random, redneck, regional school to a name that everyone in America knows. Football and football money. And that's in athletics and academics. If we stray from that because of some profound loyalty to a conference that never really wanted us, and has done anything but look out for us since joining, and others will pay us a lot more money than what the ACC is giving us, why on earth would we ever stay here? It would be a great and tragic disservice to what we were built upon. This is our time. We came from football independence and national irrelevance to the doorstep of the pinnacle. We can't let this opportunity slip through our fingers. It will secure our upward mobility throughout the ranks of academic reputation, as well as the opportunity for all sports to flourish. The ACC was a good pass-through. Lets make the jump to the SEC and never look back.
I didn't say anything about the sports being better, I was speaking purely of location, to which the administration has referenced a bunch. Travel for the non-revenue sports is easier in this footprint since you can bus to UVA, UNC, Duke, NC State, etc as opposed to the Big East days when you couldn't. Moving to the SEC prevents this as well. I don't share your opinion that the ACC is dead in the water yet, but needs to have something up its sleeve in order to stay relevant. I do agree that this is move from the B1G is purely a power play and a big FUCK YOU to the ACC for the ND move.
What other sports are better in the ACC? Maybe soccer or baseball, but even those are be close. We don't play lacrosse. The SEC doesn't have wrestling, but we would probably be able to join the EIWA, which is an even better conference than the ACC. Everything else is probably on par or better.
I think the Big 10 is deliberately targeting the ACC to force Notre Dame to join their conference as a full member. I expect the Big 10's next new member will be Boston College. It makes sense from a TV market perspective, it's a traditional rivalry game for Notre Dame (that is typically televised nationally on NBC and therefore worth millions to them), and it's in the ACC. That move puts the ACC's postseason future in jeopardy. If they do this, I think ND will have no alternative but to join the Big 10 as team #16.
This isn't going to be the last move. The Big 12 is going back to 12 and will probably settle even higher than that. The SEC and Big 10 are probably going to 16. The ACC is dead in the water as far as football is concerned. VT needs to get out while it can. Alumni need to make themselves heard on this because the administration and staff treat the athletic department like their personal playground, and they are biased toward the ACC. They have already cost VT nearly a hundred million dollars by waiting this long to go to the SEC. The end game of all this is ownership of a playoff. If we end up on the outside of a football playoff controlled by four superconferences, the losses will be incalculable.
I don't want to wait for FSU to leave the conference. I want to do it now on our terms. If we are stuck in a crumbling conference, we lose all bargaining power and we could end up accepting something less than full, equal membership in a major conference. Or worse, we could end up languishing in a minor conference. It's easy to take our position in big time college football for granted but it is not guaranteed.
Personally I hope the SEC picks up Miami and VT. I hate Miami, but of the viable options it is probably financially the most valuable. I assume FSU is going to the Big 12.
I think it is much more realistic to say the fans have been taking the team's success for granted. How does skipping the Thursday night game make me more devoted to my school or my team? It does not.
Better yet, how do I procure coke to mix my bourbon with? I'm not going to waste smuggling space on something with 0% alcohol.
Also... #turkeylegs
Tech will stay with the ACC as long as it can. The administration always wanted to be here. When you think about geography and the types of schools in the ACC is makes sense. I wonder what the impact will really end up being to UMD. Sure they get more money, but now they also will have to spend more money trucking their non money making sports out to Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin, etc. They've already cut 7 sports and I doubt they bring them back either.
Personally I think the SEC gives us the best chance from a football perspective, but what's the impact to our sports other than FB or BB? While people on here won't necessarily care, I think the admin takes the strongly into consideration.
... out of Boardwalk Empire.
I have been thinking along similar lines as you articulated in your bullet points.
I think a more Noticeable method of sending a consistent message to the university community would be for fans to boycott all of the stadium concessions during the season. That would include the seat back rental chairs, sodas, food, programs, and even refusing to buy Tech gear at the University Bookstores.
I would even go one step further and urge the SGA to not even sell "Orange/Maroon/White-Out Effect" shirts. Another idea would be for the fans to boycott the Thursday night game, but still conduct tailgating activities.
I especially agree with point #5 - Hokie Nation belongs to all of us, its a partnership among the alumni, the players and the administration/coaches. Lately the coaches have been taking the fan support for granted. We need to start asserting ourselves, make our voices heard, and collectively push back.
I happen to agree for the most part, but we shouldn't jump the gun with the recent reports that O'Cain and Newsome are on the way out. Obviously, we all want Stiney gone (or at least demoted) and some want Sherman gone, but at this point any change is good change.
If they make the changes (and it seems that they are, thank god), then they're doing the right thing and we, the fans, should continue business as usual. If they don't, then you're plan is a good one.
I'll take the Chicken Bacon Ranch from Flip's if we are all sharing....
This argument is inadequate. Lane will likely remain full regardless (next year at least), but if the average hokie club donation of season ticket holders declines even slightly, that will be significant to the income of the athletic department. The majority of annual donations do not come from extremely large gifts.
"The money you don't spend on a turkey leg means one more for me"
This obviously isn't a serious economic argument, unless you think you can personally eat enough turkey legs to replace every single lost sale.
And then you go on to say that a decline in revenue won't get their attention, but careful study and public airing of greivances will? I appreciate the sentiment, I've been doing that for years, but it's not working. The administration cares more about the bottom line than the feelings of any of its employees, including those of legendary coaches.
The problem is apparently Beamer is unwilling/unable to accept that real changes need to be made. If he does clean house this year without any prompting, great, but he hasn't after any of the previous years so I'm not willing to take it on faith that it will happen now.
As for the wisdom of crowds, there is mixed evidence, but it's pretty hard to argue that the crowd is wrong in its negative assessment of certain members of the coaching staff.