GP1

I was just on GoZips.com looking to see if the Zips were on television tonight. A lot of the remaining games are on Sports Time Ohio with at least one on ESPNU. I'm glad to see that. The MAC is a regional conference that should be on a regional television network. I'd like to know the ratings (number of viewers) STO produces for the MAC in comparison to when the games are on an ESPN network. Specifically, what is the viewer count in Ohio. My guess it is very similar. Naturally, ESPN provides more potential viewers, but I think it doesn't matter for the Zips if some guy in New Mexico watches them on TV or not. There is a guy in South Carolina who wouldn't mind watching the game at a sports bar while taking in the NFL playoffs. Is STO available nationally in any manner?

If not Texas Colt, then who? There isn't a good free agent anywhere who would want to go to Cleveland and they run every young QB they get out of town as soon as they can. That's the problem the Browns have. They need to spend at least the next 2-3 years developing the little guy and getting some better players around him. It was fun watching the destruction of the Browns last weekend and a fantastic way to finish up a holiday weekend. They were finished after the interception in the first quarter. God knows I wouldn't want to have to stand in the pocket down that much against the Steelers defense.

I've been pretty hard on the MAC the past few years, and rightly so. It was a horrible conference and in almost every way that counts is still a horrible conference. It was a much better conference this season and, with the exception of OU, did not make fools of themselves in bowl games. A word of caution to the "builders". There is a better chance that this season was abnormally good and not normal. Miamioh looked good last night. MTSU did look horrible though, but that's the way it goes. Haywood really changed the complection of the program at Miamioh and it paid off in a short period. They are going to continue to be good. The next coach is going to walk into a good situation. We are better than Miamioh in all things that are secondary to having a winning attitude and kids who want to win/willing to pay whatever price necessary to win. We have a great stadium and all the facilities to go along with it. They had a winning attitude and a desire to win. They won...go figure.

By reading the article it appears as if JD did have a long term plan that involved doing anything until a job in Colorado opened. JD doesn't want to run a foundation. JD doesn't need money because his family has tons of it already. That's the difference between JD and most others in coaching. Most would take a job in a crappy situation just to have a job. JD had the ability to sit back and wait for the right position.

I do. As little as the ABJ pays attention to UofA sports, it would never get uncovered. Interesting thought. What if we were SMU? Would you take 10 great years for a pile of crap to follow knowing you could get good again? I'd welcome the 10 great years. Would the 20 years of sucking to follow be worth the 10 great years? Some on this board love the sucking and 20 more years of it wouldn't hurt them...they would just throw their hairshirts on and attend every game like they always do. They don't mind the losing to BCS teams...it gives them something to go with their hairshirt.

Good post. Just a couple of things. In terms of political scandal, the SMU case had all of that as well. At the time, the sitting Governor of Texas was involved in the SMU scandal. In terms of casinos, people getting killed, etc., it is interesting this is going on in the south. If this went on in the north, nothing would happen and people wouldn't pay attention. But why GP1? In the south, the mafia is a new thing. Southerners belive the "good old boy network" is the mafia. It isn't. The good old boy network is when 5 or 6 guys get together and decide to do business with only one another and then they spend the rest of their lives trying to screw one another over. Nobody gets killed by the good old boy network. The mafia is organized crime that is frequently violent. As the mafia moves south, southerners don't know what to do and don't even recognize it. I've had to have talks with a couple of customers about some of the new general contractors around the Carolinas who are owned by Russians. I'm not saying all Russians are in the mob, but there sure are more of them and crime follows where they go. I'm just saying. Ever notice the Russian strippers came over to visit their Uncle Vladimir before going to graduate school? I'm just saying, there sure are a lot of Uncle Vladimirs out there? Uncle Vladimir must have 500 siblings because every one of them has an Uncle Vladimir who is taking care of them. I'm sure those nice Russian girls dancing in Myrtle Beach are only strippers and not hookers....girls in graduate school just dance to make money to pay tuition....ya, that's it...they aren't hookers. I'd be very careful when linking Newton to gaming crime. Just because Newton took money from a guy who bribed a politician doesn't make him involved in bribery because the guy was bribing a politician.

Even though I didn't see these games in person, here is what I learned. 1. He is much faster than future D-III players. 2. He is really good at throwing the ball to wide open players on a bubble screen. 3. The one thing that I like to see he did. A couple of time he throws the ball towards his receivers and has confidence they will catch the ball. Doesn't try to win the game on his own evern though he probably could.

A&M bought Dickerson the car thinking it would be enough to get him to sign with A&M. It wasn't. He signed with SMU and took the car A&M bough him to Dallas.

That's kind of the attitude Modell took to the whole city of Cleveland. (Not that Mr Cox Esquire didn't deserve it) Modell produced the only winner in Cleveland for generations and the City built the two biggest losers in the City stadiums before him. Modell didn't just deserve a new stadium, he earned it. The City got what it deserved.

I used to think the ACC would be a good fit for Temple, but with the resurgence of Florida State, VA Tech still being good and UNC coming along, I don't see why they would want to bring down the quality of their league while it is on the upswing. The Big East needs to decide what to do and soon. Temple might fall back there by accident. At the end of the day, Temple has a pretty good set up in the MAC. They have everything they need to be a top program in the league and they are in a solid basketball conference. There doesn't seem to be a reason for them to change right now.

Not sure I get this thread... I'm not sure either. One point may be that after 12 games, both teams have the same record (unless I counted wrong). I've been interested in the WBB program since Kest took over. I think she was and still is the right person for the job. We'll know a lot more about the program, obviously, after the season, but when is the last time the WBB program had a winning record after 12 games going into the conference schedule.

I tend to get the credit for calling the MAC the Dollar General of conferences, but it is actually the luckiest woman in the world, Mrs. GP1 who said, "Being commissioner of the MAC would be like being VP of Marketing for Dollar General. You could convince people to come to your store once to shop, but once they see the crap you are selling they won't come back." She said that a couple of years ago after the UofA vs. Miami football game that ended in something like a 3-0 score on national tv so all of America could see it. In the current economic situation, it appears Dollar General is doing well....at least better than the MAC. When things turn around though, straight to Target. In pure economic terms, there has always been a market for bad stores like Dollar General. In my home town 30+ years ago, we had a store call Ben Franklin that was the Dollar General of the day. I'm not sure there ever has been or will there be a market for bad D-1A football. In fact, when Mrs. GP1 compared the MAC to Dollar General, it was probably an insult to Dollar General.

Before our society went insane, letters like this could be sent from NFL teams to idiots.

You should have flushed the money you gave to Can't down the toilet. I cannot think of a single program Can't has that is as good as what UofA offers. I cannot think of a single program at Can't that comes close to our Polymer Science School. UofA has a much better engineering school. UofA has a much better business school. My brother is a doctor and he says the best nurses around are UofA graduates. UofA has the nationally known Ray C. Bliss Institute. UofA yearly produces the highest percentage of first time bar sitters that pass the exam on the first try. I will give it to Can't that they have a first rate fashion museum . Let me say again. The only thing Can't is known for is the unfortunate matter that happened in the 1970s. That's pathetic. I have no respect for the president of Can't. I have no respect for the students at Can't. I have no respect for the sports programs at Can't. I have no respect for the faculty at Can't. I have no respect for the janitors who clean the buildings at Can't. They could bulldoze the whole place as far as I'm concerned. If Portage County went back to being a swamp, nobody would miss it.

Because he is the majority shareholder in a company, in an industry, he is not familiar with and needs help from someone who has been around the block at extremely large building products companies. He also needs an HONEST opinion. I think we all know on this board I'm an honest opinion type of a guy. At this point, he needs to decide whether his investment is toy or a business. If it is a toy, he should dump the company and sell it to someone who wants to turn it into a business. If it is a business, he needs to put more of the $35 million he got on the way out the door at his company to really get it going. My guess is it is a toy for him and he wants to protect his fortune. He owns a large part of an oil exploration company in Houston and that is really his passion. No matter how old you get, always do something you are passionate about. He loves the oil business. If you find oil 10% of the time, you are considered great at what you do....his record was 13% over 35 years....He was in Dubai years ago when there were no roads and they had to land equipment on the beach and then make the roads to the oil fields....Very interesting guy.

I see the same thing. The last time gas prices got real high was right before the recession. You can't take that much money out of the economy and expect anything good to happen. 2011 is going to be a tough year for this country. The price of gas is nothing more than a tax...the more you pay, the less money there is for the real economy. Oil companies will do well....how many of you work for oil comanies? I do some consulting work for a guy who ran a major oil company. He worked in the oil industry for 35 years and has a Masters Degree from MIT in Geophysics (BS from Texas A&M). He is convinced the world is quickly running out of cheap oil. There is plenty of oil out there...if you want to pay $6.00/gal. for it. Everything has a cost and just saying drill baby drill is a childish way of avoiding a real problem. The solution isn't urban rail systems either. We need electric cars and quickly. In order to keep them running, we need a lot of nuclear power plants built asap. Americans like to drive and the electric cars do that with little polution. Right now, we just need the power plants.

I always heard Meyer's dream job was Notre Dame. Actually, I think Meyer just left his dream job in Florida. He isn't going to win two national championships at tOSU or ND.

Don't forget Northwestern.... Normally, I don't like to put much into wins or loses in bowl games, but the destruction of the Big Ten today was pretty complete. Michigan got killed and is a joke. MSU must not have known there was a game today. PSU lost to a very average Florida team (I was really pulling for Paterno to get a win in this game). Wisconsin lost to a non-BCS team that runs a modern offense and not one from 20 years ago. Northwestern actually played well and their game was fun to watch, but they don't have enough good players. Put some better players on Northwestern, with that offense, and they win a lot of games. The darling of the Big Ten plays in a few days. We'll see if they put the cherry on top of this crap cake the Big Ten served up today.

Actually, both Arkansas and tOSU are overrated. With that said, tOSU is a better team than Arkansas and should win. Big day on the ground for tOSU. Like I said, be careful using bowl results as evidence for how good your conference/team is. It makes for fun discussion on ESPN in pre-game hype shows, but bowls aren't a good place to prove it. I went to the Car Care Bowl yesterday. Talk about a couple of teams who could have cared less about the outcome of the game... If any of us listens to guys who have coached in bowl games, they tend to say the same thing (I was at the USF party Thursday night at Whis. River and Skip Holtz gave these exact goals on his radio show). The two primary goals of the team are to: 1. Get practice in for next season. 2. Support the seniors in their last game. If you notice, both of those goals do not involve winning as their top goal. USF and Clemson both looked like two teams going into a spring game. The players were not emotional when they ran out for the game and the sidelines throughout the game were not emotional. The fans were more hungover than excited. Coaches call a bunch of trick plays they would never call during the regular season. I know fans like to think that the players are "ready to play every down and defend their conference" in bowl games, but most are beat down by their coaches for a month before the game and are ready for a break. USF and Clemson looked like they were looking forward to the game being over and not the game. I see this every year when I go to the Car Care Bowl. There is a different vibe and it isn't very exciting. The only fun thing about the game yesterday was watching the stupid hicks that are Clemson fans get upset at the results. The only bowl game that teams come out ready to play is the BCS Championship.

Yep. I don't see how Pitt can keep him or why they would want to keep him. This is a stupid, stupid, stupid man. Two things....First, don't get jailed the Friday before a holiday weekend. There are no judges around to hear your case so you sit in jail all weekend in the drunk tank. Second, when you come into around $1.0 million, let your lawyers talk to your baby momma/baby momma's lawyers. You can afford the lawyers now. He had to know this woman was going to try to shake him down when his salary went from $175,000 to whatever it is a Pitt. Actually, this is a good demonstration case for how insane some college football coaches are. They live in a strange world where it is encouraged that you be a prick. They also live in a world where it is encouraged to work 24/7. That is not natural or even good for the people doing it. This guy is a prick and it worked at Miami on the football field. Being a prick didn't work off the field in this case. Some of these guys can't turn it off...see the coach of the Raiders.

This is just too funny. Buckzips is such a loser I don't even know where to begin....He is as mentally unstable as Notre Dame fan was ten years ago.....At least he is an expert on penis size....maybe that counts for something on tOSU boards.....I don't know and I don't care. Have a Happy New Year everyone.

Trips down Memory Lane are always fun. The Browns 2.0 get their one victory every five years against the Steelers and the fans gloat. Then they bring up the past when the Baltimore Ravens blew out the Steelers. That was before Cowher coached Pittsburgh and he was the coach for 15 years. I'd go as far as to say we wouldn't even be having this discussion if the NFL had done the right thing and not given Cleveland back a team after they moved to Baltimore.

Yes, literally.

This is not a tough one for me. Beating Can't is the answer not just intellectually, but also emotionally. I hate Can't and I honestly think the school is a joke. They are best know for the kids being killed in the 1970s...that is just pathetic. Intellectually, I also want to win our division. Beating Can't is one step closer in that race. In reality, even if God willed Can't to beat us five straight years, gravity of Can't's sucking would somehow allow us to win 4 of 5.

I saw the same thing on TV. All of that took place and I'm sure your written evaluation of the Browns QB situation will be appreciated by the front office. I'm sure they get thousands a week from Fantasy Footballers and they take them very seriously. You also mention Troy Aikman in your post. I'm old enough to remember this Hall of Fame QB in his first season at Dallas. You could have said the same thing about him. By no means do I think McCoy is a Hall of Famer, but he can be a good player. He has to get better, but everyone has to get better in the NFL or the league catches up with you. If they could get some better players around him (attention Browns fans, Touchdown Tommy Hilis is not the answer), they could win more than they lose or at least go .500 within 2-3 years. Who are we kidding?........By then, Browns fan will have run him out of Cleveland for the next hot prospect. The last time I went to a Browns game in Cleveland that close to Christmas was the Christmas Eve Massacre vs the Steelers. My wife and I were laughing at that game this morning while driving home from Hilton Head. We had club level seats behind the Browns bench. Literally, we had an entire section to ourselves half way through the fourth quarter.