ctmjbowes@sbcglobal.net

I absolutely agree about the reason for optimism JZ84, and I too LOVE it that NZF has brought so much positivity to the boards. However, I felt a strong generalized negative vibe when we lived in Akron the last few years. Look at the economy, read the stories about the local economy in the papers, read the comments on ABJ stories online, talk to guys at work and it's hard (for me at least) to miss the negativism. Look at the time on market for homes and talk with real estate agents about the local market. I do believe that the area can and should shine again and hope that the economy will come storming back in the next decade. There is no doubt that Akron and surrounding areas have done better than many similar cities in the region and for that I thank UA, Summa and the corporate anchors that are still going strong. I do believe that some of the apathy that Joe Akron feels for the Zips is related to the local economy and negative associations made with it.

It would be interesting to see if Ray Lewis would still be interested in delivering punishing blows if the equipment he wore allowed him to take more punishment himself. These fools delivering blows with their multi-layer shoulder pads and spearing with their helmets might not be quite as brave if their own Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) were thinner and less protective. The concussions that are a result of the constant head slapping and mashing on the lines will be very hard to minimize, but I bet we could certainly lessen the "human missile" injuries by just making these gigantic steroid monsters wear less equipment. I don't recall seeing the head-low missile strikes from secondary guys in old NFL film, probably because those guys were engaged in at least some level of self preservation. "Hey Ray, I just removed your face mask. Get out there and good luck with that big fella."

NZF you will soon see and experience, if you haven't already, the self-loathing and defeatist negativism that is endemic in the area, really the entire NE Ohio region. The economy has been in a slow motion downward spiral literally since the late 1960s. No exaggeration. NE Ohioans tend to focus on the pro sports teams in Cleveland and consider themselves fans of "major", "big time" teams. I have never understood the OSU thing, as it applies to NE Ohio, but assume that fans who tend to consider themselves fans of the NBA, MLB and NFL teams in Cleveland want to be fans of what is, to them, "big time" college football, hence OSU. Having grown up in Akron I have always hated the OSU thing and OSU as a result, and have the same chip on my shoulder as most Akron fans. Screw OSU and their fans, for sucking at least some of what could be positive energy directed toward our teams, away from us. Still though, part of the apathy of Joe Akron has, I think, something to do with the sense of decline that exists in the area. I lived away from NE Ohio for many years and moved back in 2005. I moved back away a few months ago and can say without a doubt that there exists a constant low level hum, as part of the background noise day in and day out, a negativism and defeatist tone to almost everything that happens in the region. I thank goodness for the university and the the anchor institutions that are still thriving in the Akron area, because without them Akron would have by now gone the way of Flint or Youngstown (take that eguins). Akron is holding its own and I believe that it will eventually transform itself fully into a nice, but small-ish, glorified university town. There are worse things to be for sure, but it could be said that the region is still in a kind of collective mourning over the death of the region as an industrial powerhouse, coupled with a longing for the days when "we" were more relevant and vibrant. You will see and feel all of this the more you are here, the more people you talk with. Keeping these things in mind will help you understand a little bit why things are the way they are.

+1,000, and I would bet a paycheck that LeQuit has never given a dime of his own money to UA, nor to the charities he "sponsors". Cannondale and others donate all of the equipment that has ever been given away by his bikes for kids thing. He is a man-child jerk off who happened to grow up in Akron. Hey people from Akron, when your city is best known as being the place where LeDouche is from, your city ain't much to write home about. Even when he was with the Cavs and things were going well, I was always uncomfortable with the big deal that was made about him being from Akron, including those idiotic city signs that said "Akron, home of LeBron James". We'll see if the man-child ever gets back to Akron to do anything worthy of all of the attention, but he's not a positive factor for the city or the university at this point in time and should be ignored until he grows up a little. While I'm venting, the whole "I hate Cleveland" thing is idiotic. Akron benefits from being so close to Cleveland in a thousand ways. Clevelanders may think of Akron as the smaller town to the south, and it is the smaller town to the south. Infrastructurally and culturally both are unbreakably intertwined and they are the major anchors that make up "Northeast Ohio." Also, both are down economically and if the NE Ohio region is to survive and prosper at some point, it will be at least in part because of synergy between all of communities that it comprises. Akron is not a stand alone entity and it would be moribund if it were.

To what does this thread perTAIN?

Here's the world's answer to the question "What was the MAC's bowl record this year again?" 1) WHO CARES? or 2) THE WHAT? WHAT'S A MAC? or 3) THE MAC IS STILL A JOKE or 4) IS THE MAC REALLY FBS? HUH... or 5) WOW, I DIDN'T KNOW DIV II TEAMS PLAYED IN BOWL GAMES

In fact, from now on, when someone says "how are you feeling today?" and your response might have been "pretty grey, pretty dadgum grey" the new and most logical response ought to be "Man, I'm just really feeling MAC today. It's just a MAC of a day brother." If the MAC had a trademark odor, it would be oily kerosene, the smells of which normally one would associate with a wet oily bilge in an old Navy vessel. THAT'S THE MAC. MAC team colors ought to normally be variations on the color of the residue that you wipe from the lower quarter panels on your car in early March, if you had not washed the car all winter.

Who cares? Is the Big East more maligned than the crappy MAC? The MAC is THE WORST man, THE WORST. It's worse than just bad. It's dirty grey, it's the former Soviet "stans", it's the worst kind of athletic badness, which is to say that it's small-time and terribly bland. The MAC is lentil soup with no spice and no taste, it's trying to keep a buddy from laughing when trying to distinguish one directional school from another, it's explaining to people that there are those who actually give a s__t about beating Can't, even as they look at you like you're a kook. The MAC is the lay-down-to-be-murdered-by-Wisconsin for cash league, the "is that really D-1 football?" league, where every school is so close to each other in the same region that it all looks and feels the same. The MAC is the kid who never gets chosen for pick up teams, it's the Debby Downer of sports leagues. It's Pleasantville in black and white, except the film never shifts to color. The MAC is the Siberia of sports leagues, it's where teams are exiled for being too shabby, too boring, for lacking any vitality. When someone wants to snidely make fun of something crappy they call it MACtastic. I would be happy to see UA join ANY other league of substance. If it's the MWC/C-USA, let's go! If it's the Big East, minus the Pitts and Syracuses, so be it. The MAC is where you're left when the music stops and THERE ARE NO CHAIRS LEFT. If North Korea were building some horrible old version of a Soviet version of a crappy old Fiat, the designs for which they stole in 1956, and the North Koreans were still throwing these buckets of 1956-technology crap together, they would be called THE MAC. "Hey Comrade, can I help you push start your grey, 1973 MAC so you can struggle to the coal mine, belching black smoke in -3C temperatures this morning?" Now that we have KD pushing the BB team, Porter maintaining a top-flight Soccer program, perennially competitive track teams and Terry Bowden, who sure as hell better do good things with this football program (please God!) I can see the crowds gathering at the wall. Soon there will be brave ones who climb the wall to cut the barb wire and then the crowds with sledge hammers will show up. We're in East Germany right now, and it's cold and it's dark and it's grey. I want West German goodness. I want some color. I want freedom from the MAC and all it represents.

I may be in the minority but I would welcome the joining of ANY FBS league other than the MAC. The MAC is the most boring, bland league out there. If for no other reason than to give fans some good places to visit on road trips UA needs to find its way out of the MAC. It's the worst. Nobody, including in the midwest, even thinks of it as a real D-1/FBS conference.

Thanks, JZ84, for bringing it back aGAIN. I read the article during a day of heavy RAIN while riding on the TRAIN.

Dude you're effing high. Whitney's was without a doubt the greatest National Anthem ever sung, assisted by the recording or not. It was later released as a single and became the #1 song in the country. Faith Hill? Seriously? Either you are a hillbilly country western dude or, like I said, high, probably on crack, which was of course one of Whitney's favorite drugs.

Actually, it's that you (and most of us) are getting old, so you don't sleep as well as you used to, and as your prostate grows you have to pee more at night. It's easier to just get up and moving than not at your advanced age.

Call me crazy, but if I had to choose between staying in the MAC or joining that list of teams in a conference I'd take the latter in a second. The MAC is just dead flat boring in every way. That league would at least bring a few strong programs into the mix. At the very least there would be some great road trips every year to really interesting places. The MAC is just the worst there is. I would LOVE to see Akron get out of it as soon as possible.

OK, I'm going to engage in some cognitive dissonance. I believe that JT engaged in dirty business at OSU and at YSU. I'm also happy that UA has hired him to engage in growth projects for the university. His name, experience and charisma will hopefully do good things for UA. For those of you who somehow try to distinguish OSU from schools in the SEC when it comes to big time dirty business, and who also attempt to tar SEC programs and coaches while implying that Tressel is clean, you are completely and utterly full of shit. The implication that Auburn is beyond the pale, tarring TB at least tangentially, while OSU and it's B10 brethren are clean, makes me want to vomit. While I'm happy that tressel is here, OSU is the absolute definition of the gigantic, dirty college football program. Don't think for a second that there is ANYTHING that makes that god damned football factory in Columbus any better, in any way, than any of the schools in the SEC. Tressel is not clean; it's just that this is his chance at redemption, and hopefully UA will benefit along the way.

Which prostitute is the biggest whore?

...which is ridiculous. There is tremendous potential for growth and positive change, the kind of change that has been generally been lacking in the region for 30+ years. I find it incredible that the egos of a handful of people could keep the city and the university from more effectively joining forces to forge something truly beneficial for both. I'll give you an example. Once, in speaking with the UA Police Chief, I asked whether the city/APD had made any efforts to assist in adding patrols in the neighborhood south of exchange (aka the student slum) when that area went downhill. I was told that the city and APD had done absolutely nothing to assist in that neighborhood and that the crime problem there had become a serious issue for the university. That is a simple thing that the city can, and should do to make it clear that it is a joint priority that the neighborhoods around the university be reasonably safe. There really needs to be a beneficially symbiotic relationship between the two entities if both are going to thrive going forward. If Tressel needs to focus on anything, this is an area where his notoriety could effect positive change. The city of Akron, and especially the Don, need to understand once and for all, that without a thriving UA this city is a dying two-bit rust belt town. Maybe Tressel can be the yoke that finally brings the two together, aggressively and publicly.

I just read the Q&A article in the Beacon, with Marla Ridenour asking questions of Tressel. The thing that popped into my mind as I read it was whether the city will more aggressively engage with UA going forward. How can the Don go forward without fully and very publicly engaging with the university and marrying the city's interests with UA's interests? My impression over the last several years has been that even though UA has become the absolute anchor institution within the city of Akron, there has been less than full engagement between the city and university. I'm not sure that I can define what that engagement should look like, but it just has seemed as though there's the city, and then there's UA. Perhaps the recruitment of Tressel will provide the impetus for the two leaders to match their visions to maximum advantage. I just moved away from Akron recently, but in the 6+ years that we were back there I can't remember even one time that the mayor and LP were in the press together, not one joint press conference, joint appearance, never saw stories in the paper about joint planning initiatives. There has occasionally been press about the University Park partnership, but these are the two most powerful people, by far, in the Akron metro area. They should be joined at the hip mapping out a joint strategy, very publicly.

I didn't watch the press conference but used to do liaison work with the University and remember meeting a guy named (I think) Ted Curtis, who had a title very similar to Vice Prez of Development or some such. It was explained to me that he was one of the primary forces behind the building of Infocision. Didn't he retire fairly recently? And if so, is Tressel sort of a grander potential force doing some of the same "development" work? He would certainly be a helluva heavyweight in such a capacity.

We settled a few miles further west in Thousand Oaks, but I'd happily travel that extra 2,000 miles to enjoy some shave ice and some brew while watching some Zips FB, BB, Futbol, you name it.

I applaud UA if a way is found to sell brew to fans at the games, either through food vendors inside the stadium or at beer stands/tents/gardens outside the stadium, the way Can't does. I also applaud the lot niners turning the volume up to 11 on the tailgating, including adult beverages consumed with discretion, as was always the case when I was there with them. No way in hell will Akron PD nor UAPD come after the tailgaters unless things get wildly out of hand. GO ZIPS! GO TAILGATERS! GO BEER! Of course, I've discovered two places that I wish would have existed in NE Ohio while we were there: Total Wine and Beverages and More (BEVMO!). Superstores for adult beverages. They are awe inspiring the first time you walk into them. The beer selection at both is insane. if only there were a way to build a connection straight from these places to lot nine, some sort of time/space doorway....

So happy to see Bowden pushing aggressively on the local recruiting trail. How very refreshing! Hopefully we'll start to see some solid local talent choosing UA, and soon. It really is amazing to hear that many local recruits were simply ignored, along with their HS coaches, by the last regime. What incredible fools they were. Bowden seems to couple high energy with solid common sense. Again, it's just so nice to see this turn of events for UA, along with some meaningful coverage from the local paper. I had abandoned our season tix last year as we were preparing to move to the west coast, but frankly I might have abandoned them anyway because following this program had become so un-fun, so demoralizing. Now I sit in SoCal and am a little envious of you there who will have the chance to be there as this program finally becomes worthy of our consideration. Go Zips!

I do believe that both of the officer's hands are about to be on Sammy's shoulders.

Were those 1st 2 paragraphs about the SEC or OSU? Exactly! The Big 10 just isn't as good at the cheating as the SEC is. Let's not ever assume that the Big 10 teams don't engage in ugliness and cheating much less than SEC schools. Hell, MAC schools probably frequently engage in cheating too but on a smaller scale.

+1+ I felt very much the same way when PW declined UA. I'm also very excited about Bowden now. We'll see if he can turn the team around but my oh my what a refreshing change from Ianello! How idiots like Ianello get, and keep, jobs is beyond me. I defy anyone to convince me that Ianello is a recruiter. No way in hell did kids join any program because of Ianello, anywhere, ever. They joined programs in spite of him. Anyway, yeah to TB and GO ZIPS.

I'm tired of the Wagner ass kissing here. If he leaves UA for his final year of eligibility he's nuts. This thing is going to turn around and he can be the big fish in the little-ish pond as things turn for the better, or he can go join another program and hope and pray that things work out. If he's got NFL talent he'll end up in the NFL, regardless of which program he comes from. Especially when the new coach is basically begging him to stay in public, I will think much less of Wagner if he leaves at this point. I respect him keeping his options open until now but it's time to sign up for year one of the big turn around. It ain't going to be any better, and you ain't going to be noticed any more, anywhere else, BWags. Have a few beers for the new year and get into the gym to prepare for the new Zips dude.