Balsy

Am I the only one who doesn't mind the A-Roo gold-matte helmets? I always liked them... Wish we had these three Helmets next year: Gold A-Roo with the stripe, Chrome Black Z and White Z.

I can feel the winds of change.

I'm sorry folks, but I'm tired of hearing the "LeBron is the bigger man" non-sense. The mature response (the one he said in the essay) was that everyone made a mistake, and lets leave it in the past and move on. LeBron isn't the bigger man here. We're all "bigger me" because cooler minds prevail. LeBron shouldn't have led Gilbert on, shouldn't have made a media episode on in, shouldn't had rubbed it in CLE's face by producing a NIKE commercial; "What would you have me do" that led to Michael Jordan backing CLE fans' feelings. You can call it dumb. You can call it stupid. You can call it inexperience. It was something that hurt a lot of people who've already been hurt for along time by their sports team. Especially someone who grew up from NE Ohio, should a known better. EVERYONE is a bigger person from this, LeBron is not Bigger than those fans who are "forgiving" him for coming back, or is he "bigger" than Gilbert. It just irritates me hearing "LBJ is a bigger man" cause he's not. He's just being an adult. He wanted to come back here. CLE didn't go begging for him to come back. I'm glad everyone can be adults and do what's best for everyone to be happy, but LBJ is NOT "the bigger man" we all are.

I'm not sure how much I like them. I think I would have rather had the matte blue design. But I like these much more if it means we have 3 helmets that we'll use throughout the season, blended with different combo jerseys...I'm a fan of this!

You can call it backtracking...but I now have some respect for LBJ that I never had before. Between 2003-2010, I never cared much for him. When "The Decision" came down, I didn't like him even more. But after the letter in SI, I finally have respect for him. He finally said the things I've been wanting to hear him say. I'm NE Ohio born and raised, and I'm so tired of people who aren't from here down trotting us. I'm even more tired of hearing people from hear downtrot it. It's nice having support from a big-time celebrity, who chooses to come back to this place. I've always felt that NE Ohio is a special place, and it's in need of a lot of love and a lot of work. LBJ reflected that same opinion in SI, hence the reason I respect the guy now. As for support of the Zips, I still want to see a more vocal, more public support of the Zips, before I start swooning a "Thanks LeBron for supporting the Zips" song.

We seem to have an impressive crop of Junior LBs this year....looking at 247sports there's a WR who signed David Francis? Any info on him?

Agreed. It'll be fun to follow him over the next two years. Hopefully he sticks to his guns, and his family supports him. However I will note; maybe he is who cannot be influenced by friends etc. Some people don't like the Big-Big schools. I didn't, which is why I chose Akron. But of course, I'm not a 4-star QB recruit. By his quote, he sounds like a guy we really want to keep here. We could use more fire like that

:gun: :gun: :gun: Question is...will he stay committed....

The only Akron Zips jersey that Alex Abreu will wear again is the cheaply made ones that they give out to fans in the stands. Now that's not a dig at Alex, because everyone makes mistakes...hopefully he has learned from his, and hopefully he will complete his degree and make something positive for himself.

Zipmeister...

Part I like the most: "Bowden is a guy I feel is going to be there for awhile..."

When was the last time Akron got any coverage on NFL.com...or for anything remotely related to it's uniforms... Now it's time to beat Penn State.

@GP1 didn't CJ Mizell have a questionable past too? Stealing things from teammates if I remember correctly? He's worked out well with his second chance. Everyone deserves a second chance.

I'm in the camp of having Kincade as the QB of the future post Pohl...however, I'm also in the camp of bring as many quality players to the team as possible (granted they are deemed worthy of a second chance etc...). Nothing but could can come from having quality players competing with other quality players for the starting roles.

Clearly he was better than D2 quality if he was recruited by Pitt...one of the teams we're playing this year...hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Another 4-star recruit swept up from the breadcrumbs of State Ohio University. If I'm not mistaken both he and Pittman were both recruiting class of 2012. If he had to sit out a year, would that mean he only has 1 year of eligibility left? Or (since he hasn't used the redshirt) is it possible that he could have 2-years left starting next season?

I'm okay with having as much QB competition as possible. Bring on the fire for Kincade to prove himself.

GP1 it's not that easy. Players have OU, State Ohio, Toledo and BGSU to look at (for starters) and Akron. All marketing relatively the same thing. Excluding State Ohio University, OU has a "tradition of success"...Toledo ad BGSU ARE up and coming programs THAT make cool changes to their uniform. And then you have Akron...which doesn't do anything new. It is possible to be a player who wants to win, and win big, but also have other interests. Winning can still be that "number one factor" and you still have three schools to choose from.

After reading the article it says he was sentenced to 90-days in jail, but had 87 waived by the judge. Reading between the lines here, but if the judge didn't see a full sentence of 90-days as necessary for the offense, and that 3-days and 90 hours of community service were appropriate, it seems that they really believe he should learn from this experience. If coach Nemec believes, and Bowden, that he is worthy of a second chance with Akron, than we shouldn't hate on the guy.

Here's his ESPN profile just in case anyone's interested.

@Taxpayer, great point. I didn't think of that, even though hat was directed at Zippyrulz. Perhaps one of the upgrades can be better camera equipment/streaming tech, that can be either moved to the new facility once it is built, or to Infocision. We need better filming equipment because what they've got now is TERRIBLE.

News is a tricky business. The only paper versions to really not be affected by the great recession are student newspapers on university campuses. They usually are the most direct, and cheapest method for advertisers to reach college students. The ABJ IMO is the best news source is NE Ohio. I'd rather see them sell their product to people than to go begging for large advertisers that may compromise the integrity of the reporting.

And we get Penn State with two extra days to prepare/and they're coming off a week in Dublin.

We absolutely can beat Penn State. To take after my friends over there at ESPN Cleveland: #AkronGoodKarma

I'm not middle-aged nor complaining. I like the new uniforms, and I agree with you GP1 about the misguided mentality at the administrative level (as well as the marketing people that to a good job of marketing this non-sense). In this particular situation, we have an Alumni giving a gift to the football program for new uniforms. Kudos to him, and if that's what he wants to donate money for than go for it. I don't think the administration at this university would have gone in that direction had the money not been given explicitly for that purpose. It's sad that college athletics has gotten to this state where it is. But rabble of sheeple who have no actual affinity to the vast majority of these programs, are a powerful economic force.