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Student Attendance & Marketing


ZachTheZip

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7 hours ago, NWAkron said:

However, he's a nasty curmudgeon who only looks for the negative when it comes to U of A.  He did a vicious hit piece on Groce a few years ago which will prove to be wrong.  I got into an email back and forth with him, and he's arrogant and hateful.  I've been happy with the ABJs recent coverage of UA, but I knew this was coming.  I don't know why he has to continue to rip on the stadium.  Nothing can be done about it now.

I had to deal with him years ago.  He's mean spirited, arrogant and has no interest in the truth.  Once he gets the angle he wants nothing will change his mind or his writing.  I don't know how the Beacon hasn't folded yet or become the Akron branch office for the PD.  

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Interesting how many of you find fault with the messenger while ignoring the cause of the message which is being delivered.

 

The Athletics Program is being mismanaged. This too is nothing new. It has been for the better part of a decade.  The same people, save for the AD position, have been in place for 30 years.  There have been 6 ADs since 1994: Bobinski, Helsel, Thomas, Rhodes, Wistricil, Williams. NONE of these people made much of an impact, though one could argue that Thomas' hire of Dambrot got basketball back on the map and Wistricil's move with Bowden achieved that in part with football ,regardless of how it ended.  Two bowl games is pretty strong for Akron.

 

The following things are ones that  you would think people would be asking for answers on...

 

1. What is the new President's vision for athletics... not the 50,000 foot stuff he's mentioned - real goals and metrics

 

2. What is the contract status for Larry Williams? When that is answered, why does the AD change 6 times in 25 years but the senior positions are the AD just keep hanging on with no change.  With all due respect, when the team around the leader is weak, the results will be the same. If these people are so great why have they never had a chance to move up in their profession? If you do the same thing again and again and expect different results... 

 

3. What are the detailed benefits of playing these football games on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights in November? 

 

4. Why did Dyer, who is absolutely a joke of a reporter, talk to middle management in the Athletics Department instead of the AD?  Seems pretty weak that Williams would push his sports media person out front on the attendance issue. Seems to be the AD should be leading from the front, not the back, but then again, he is a Phantom. Did Dyer ask to speak with LW?

 

5. What are the real season ticket numbers for football, men's basketball, women's basketball and men's soccer? Not the BS announced numbers, the real numbers?  If there was a recent annual report like there used to be perhaps some of this would be widely known.

 

6. In the face of financial distress at the University, Athletics has added two new sports and is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on fields, facilities, coaches, uniforms, travel, etc... for baseball and women's lacrosse when the main publicity and revenue sports are all falling off: Men's Soccer, Football, and Men's Basketball. Why were these sports added? 

 

7. What is the 2019-20 expectation of the AD and President for John Groce?  He has had two lackluster seasons at Akron after running the Illinois program into the ground... when should we expect to be back in the running for the MAC Championship?  

 

8. What is the basic goal of the Akron Athletics program?  Is it to sponsor a large number of sports and be mediocre, but drive heads in beds in terms of added number of students (D3 mentality) or is it to have winning programs?  Big broad based programs cost a lot of money.  Logic would lend the leverage to having a lean program with priority resources where they will pay off?

 

Ok, now attack me for asking the questions... 3-2-1...

 

Edited by DannyHoke
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@DannyHoke I'm not trying to cherry pick as a lot of what you're saying I agree with. I still wanted to clear up a few things.

 

2) I went and looked at articles for this previously. I think his contract expires in spring of 2022 unless he got another extension that I'm not aware of.

 

3) Each MAC school gets something in the neighborhood of a million dollars from ESPN. I'm sure you will hear exposure and other things tossed out, but it's 100% because of money that they do it. Akron doesn't pick the days it plays the games. That's pushed down from the MAC who makes the schedule. 

 

5) I'd say men's soccer, women's basketball, and men's basketball really aren't inflated. Some people may not use their season tickets on certain nights, but those numbers do reflect legitimate ticket sales. Normally sometime in the spring the ABJ publishes an article on how many tickets the University buys to meet quotas. Not much of a surprise, but it's a large sum.

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Good feedback.

 

TV runs the show I guess.  It's not about the kids who are missing more class with travel to midweek games and not about the fans who buy season tickets and see 40% of their investment shifted away from times where working people can attend games.

 

 

Screen Shot 2019-11-25 at 10.28.25 AM.png

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  • 2 months later...

I think the YSU game Marketing theme should be "Rubber Bowl Revisited!"

 

We haven't played YSU since the early 90's at the Bowl. The venue was well know those in Mahoning County.

 

Get $10 tickets using the promo Code "Rubber Bowl".

 

I think painting the grass area in the Info endzone to match the old Rubber Bowl cement lettering would look cool.

image.png

 

Players wear the Moving A helmets.

 

image.png

 

Let people tailgate in the grass inside the Jackson Field track.

 

Lots of fun stuff you could do with the idea. I predict Joe Akron would show if it were done right. Paul Penguin too.?

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  • 2 months later...

Funny how the AAC pretends to be a "P6" school until crap hits the fan.

 

Cinci cut soccer. My hunch is that was done to help prevent the momentum the football program has right now isn't stunted. I wonder what we are considering..as the quote in the article says...never waste a good crisis.

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The article states that Cincy has been considering dropping soccer for years. I found this below quote from the article to be pretty spot on. This seems like the opportune time for AD and university presidents to slash sports without public backlash.

 

Quote

One collegiate sports source noted that many schools that will end up cutting sports had long been thinking about it. COVID-19 becomes the cover to do so, as one official brought up the old Winston Churchill quote: “Never waste a good crisis.”

 

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  • 2 years later...

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