Spin

So after being born and raised on the Browns, Indians, Cavaliers, and 44 years of living and dying with them, I'm suppose to just turn my back on them for some selfish, attention hound, prima donna like we've never seen before who turns his back on NE Ohio fans who have kissed his butt for years? He can play that "I'm from Akron" card all he wants, I personally don't care. He turned me off with this three year circus, building up to a one hour special to crap on Cleveland fans on national TV. Just because you're from Akron doesn't mean I have to like you...

I agree with every word he said. I don't care where he's from. If you're a tool bag, you're a tool bag. I'm done with him. I'm ashamed to say he's from Akron. Don't come back. He quit in the playoffs, changed his whole attitude, he'll never take a team to the championship. He needs to jump on DWade's coat tails to win. Just another player who couldn't get it done in the playoffs. No better than CC or Jose or anyone else who chokes on the big one.

Screw this. I aint even watching. I'm watching the Tribe, they'll tell me what the jerk decides. LeBron who?

He's tainted his legacy with this whole media whore circus. I'm changing my mind listening to the national media and local fans. If he leaves, don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out. Jersey burning party on campus?

I'll follow him wherever he goes. If he leaves I'll still watch the Cavs team, but LBJ will still be my player.

Not many homes down there have phone service, and the ones that do, these forums take a long time to load with dialup through AOL...

The church my son attends has a bunch of Akron Aeros tickets for 7/5 7:05 against Trenton. They're a buck, and it's also Dollar Dog night. If interested let me know and I'll get you his info.

In my defense I've heard a LOT of soccer haters this past month (and more than a few last fall during the Zip's run), and sometimes you can't determine who is the "Soccer is boring. They're all gay" and the "I could really get into this if..." If I offended anyone I apologize. So besides the shootout, how can you change the game without completely changing it, and making it completely different from what the rest of the world plays? Without alienating the hard core soccer fan? Basketball can use a shorter shot clock and encourage an aerial game without changing the basics. 5 players, 10' rim height, 15' foul lines. Baseball can lower the mound, toss pitchers who throw inside, build stadiums with shorter outfields, without changing the basics. The NHL's changes didn't screw with the game so much that the players couldn't go to the olympics and adjust. Do we even need to change the rules? What about a minimum width field? IIRC the NASL had to do that in many stadiums. Especially Fenway Park (I remember when one player disappeared. The corner of the field was right at the outfield wall. He opened a door as went inside to get a run for a corner kick. The door closed behind him and he couldn't open it from the inside. It was several minutes before anyone figured out where he was. The good old days of American soccer!!!!) Would that give more scoring chances?

I was being sarcastic about another thread. If you scroll back a few months I was the biggest advocate of the soccer program getting a new stadium. I won't go into the whole schpeal again about not being able to get a ticket on Tuesday afternoon for a Saturday game, well-to-do soccer fans sitting in the mud, the port-a-jon, as it's all moot now, those problems are being addressed. I applaud the U. It's fun to be on campus watching the progress of the construction. I can't wait for the season to start!!!

Why are they doing all this work? Spending all this money? If they don't completely change the sport, nobody's going to come to the games...

OK so talking about why you hate the sport (things that can't be fixed) is fine, but trying to stay on topic isn't.

At least those people care enough to discuss with you as to why they are not in love with the sport that you are. If you are confused as to why soccer is not popular in the US, those might be the people to listen to. Well I do, and it's usually that soccer is boring, there isn't enough scoring, players dive. Adults bouncing balls off their heads. Nobody brings up the shootout, at least among non-fans. That is something that desperately needs changed, everyone agrees. But that's not what I've been hearing from soccer haters as the sole reason they don't watch. In order to make soccer "exciting" for the "typical American" fan, it would take so many changes that the sport would be very different than what it was. You can change NBA basketball, but it would still be similar enough to the international game that the players can adapt. Five players to a side. The rim is 10' off the floor. The floor is wood or some composite that's like wood. Same with baseball and hockey. But with soccer, they're talking about a smaller field, less defenders, bigger goals. I have an image in my mind of what that would look like... Been there, done that. Got the T-shirt. Nobody bought it. Except in Cleveland where they latch onto a winner no matter what it is. Even if it's a college 150 miles away... Don't forget when NASCAR made all of those changes to make things more exciting, they lost a TON of long time fans. Now they're backpedaling trying to bring those people back. Anyway, what was the topic about? Heck it doesn't matter. Every soccer discussion degrades into this...

5-7 and no off-field side shows. A nice improvement from last year.

Nobody is saying anyone's opinions are wrong, I'm just saying if you don't like soccer, I really don't care. And the people I talk to feel the same way. It's not right or wrong, we just don't want to be told over and over again that so and so doesn't like soccer. BIG DEAL. We're trying to talk soccer here. Go away. If I went to a tennis or golf forum and argued over and over that those sports were boring and I couldn't watch them, I'd get pretty much the same reaction from them. Or much worse. If watching the game doesn't make them fans, then we're not going to talk them into it. I've never become a fan of golf or tennis from reading a forum or listening to a talk show about those sports. And changing the sport is not an option. The NASL tried that and it backfired. We had "Americanized soccer" for 20 years and it didn't catch on. It didn't bring in the soccer haters and it didn't become as big as the NFL like it promised. The reasons some people don't like soccer are still there. If you can figure out how to get more than 3.89 points per minute to convert NBA Fan, then it won't be soccer. Why does every soccer discussion have to turn into a love vs. hate debate? Why can't we just discuss the sport? And if you want to talk about hating soccer and changing soccer, why does it have to be in a thread about UA marketing? You know, the original topic?

You guys are missing the point. You don't like soccer. We get it. Newsflush: WE COULDN'T CARE LESS!!!! Really. We couldn't. You're wasting your time here. Do you think after 30 years of watching soccer, and hearing it all before, ad nauseum, that I'm going to read someone's post (or hear some stick-and-ball host in a radio show) and say "You know what, he's right. This is boring." Save your time. Now, the thread is about whether Akron U should capitalize on the World Cup. Absolutely. The World Cup has captured the attention of the soccer fan, and there are new fans. Not billions, not everyone here, but there are new fans. Converts, whatever you want to call them. And they don't know about Akron soccer. Northeast Ohio had the only profitable soccer franchises in their time. It could have the only self sustaining college program if they'd get off their butts and promoted it. With no NEOhio soccer franchise this season and the swell of interest from the World Cup, there may never be a better time...

If the final score equals excitement, why isn't arena football more popular than the NFL? How is a 200 point NBA game that takes a half hour to play the last two minutes more exciting? If all we need is rules changes to make you a fan, why aren't you and everybody else watching indoor soccer? The Force would still be here and the MLS would still be some purist's dream. I've sat in bars and watched hockey and soccer while others were watching NBA basketball. Our whole side of the bar erupted when someone scored, we lit the place up. The basketball fans thought we were nuts. They just sat there. When the game was over they picked up their tab and just walked out. Sorry, that's not why I watch sports. But to each his own. Back on topic. Yes I think the U should have an aggressive marketing program going right now. Capitalize on the World Cup, and on what the program accomplished last year. Raise awareness to the teams and the school. Buy air time on a local TV channel against a high profile opponent. Like I said last fall, this area is hungry for a good soccer team. The Force was the only profitable franchise in indoor soccer, maybe in the sport's history. The Cleveland Caps set attendance records then the City Stars set them higher. Too bad the USL put them both out of business with stupid decisions. Akron could fill that need. They just gotta "put it out there."

After sleeping on this whole thing for a night, what did we really accomplish? We lucked into a point against a beatable England on their own goal. We needed last second heroics to beat a team from a country of New Mexico's population. (Not counting illegals). And we needed an extra time goal to beat a third world country with the population of California. We make Stage 2, and don't show up against another third world country with the population of Texas. OK, I get our best athletes are drawn (pressured?) into football and basketball when they get too old for youth leagues. I get that we had a couple bad calls in the four games. What's new? It would be different if we were simply beat because we didn't have the skills they do. But that's bullcrap. We have much better training and nutrition technology and facilities than the last 3 teams we played. We have players who play in First Division leagues around the world. Aston Villa. AC Milan. Rangers. Borussia Mönchengladbach. West Ham United. They had no heart. Unless they were about to get throttled by "World Powers" like Slovenia. Many times they advanced deep and looked like they didn't even know each other. Bob Bradley has to go. And that's NOT the best we've ever done, we made the quarterfinals in 2002 with Bruce Arena coaching. We were ranked 4th in the world. But the US needed a "fresh approach". How did that work out for ya? I'm disappointed. Almost embarrassed.

I'll tell you guys what. I attended my first Lake Erie Crushers game the other night, and I changed my mind completely about minor league baseball and what UA should do with it's baseball facilities. The first half of the game was social hour for the women in attendance. Across rows, across sections. I don't think they knew what event they were at. Then they all left. We were then left with wild kids and drunk men, both falling all over us. What they need is drunk wild women, but I'll stay on topic here. I really missed sitting in the "stands" at UA with a few other people, you can talk baseball with someone else or just sit and watch. Pull up a folding chair on the bank. Very few kids, no drunks, no Pop Tart races or whatever those costumes were. No trying to leave and kids running you over trying to get to the "Run The Bases" gimmick (sadly that's the first time some of those kids have run in months). Just keep the ballpark the loveable dinky retaining basin for the soccer field it is. A place for BASEBALL FANS!!!

Dump Temple, and move Toledo to the East. Then Ohio schools face each other (almost) every year, and home-and-home in basketball.

CSU football is dead. The outgoing president wanted to start it as a legacy, nobody else thought it was a good idea, and it fell apart. Right now they're focused on losing the "community college" stigma they will probably always have.

No shootin', I promise. The NCAA is not behind this, it's the individual schools and conferences chasing the lucrative network TV dollars that are behind this whole thing. That's what it's all about. The schools want the network money from the conferences, the conferences involved want to spread their new networks into more markets, the schools want to be on those networks. Meanwhile Notre Dame is sitting pretty by itself, how that would change if their opponents were all restricted from playing them (as a power move by the Big Ten), nobody knows. And then there's Texas, wanting to start their own cable network, but the wouldn't be able to in the PAC-10, so they're not joining. And they have the Texas legislature behind them to "persuade" other the Texas schools to stay with UT. It's all big business, and the NCAA can't do anything about it. If they tried, the big conferences would pull out and start a new league. Anyone else remember the CFA? Anyway if this all takes shape, there's nothing Akron can do. They can build a college football power, against the odds, but it'll probably be too late as this is taking shape now. Maybe it doesn't come to that, hopefully not.

Sagarin had us at 137 at the end of last season...

Not really. Being in a top 20 market is one thing. Taking the big step to being a BCS program is another. I see it going to four 64 team conferences, each with a title game in football, then a two week BCS. Anyone outside the 64 loses it's bowl bids, for what they're worth, and most likely their big payday whoopin' against top teams. Outside the four mega-conferences, does it really matter what conference you're in? Take the top teams out of MWC and CUSA, and you have the MAC. With a lot more travel. And the hoopsters have a much harder road to the Dance... If the program was in a better way right now, the big conferences might look at the market size of C-A-C. But our program is just "not ready for prime time", and I don't think they want to be.

The University, from everything I read, took the money it would have cost to refurbish the Rubber Bowl (in essence putting lipstick on a pig), plus the sponsorships that came along with the new house, and spent that much. It was all paid for the day it was built. I haven't heard anybody say they were building a top notch college program here, and everything they've done leads me to believe they're not trying to. To me, spending the money on a NICE stadium even for an FCS team, makes perfect sense. Reference Canal Park, All Pro Freight Stadium, Classic Park, Huntington Stadium. I don't see how this school can go "big time" with the budget they have, the recruiting they do, and the seven other FBS schools in our backyard. Not to mention the 800 lb gorilla in Columbus. Even with the talent we have right now, we're outside the Top 25 in FCS. Personally, I have a LOT more fun watching the Akron Aeros play for championships than watching the Cleveland Indians try to play major league ball with a AAA roster.

Thanks for saving me $40+ this year. I'll stick with last year's version.