GP1

Four thousand people AND LeBron show up. "Akron is my home, it's my life. Everything I do is for this city. I'm going to continue to do great things. I love every last one of you all. Akron is home." --LBJ Good job ignoring the entire story. They expected 10,000 and got 4,000 to a FREE event to listen to the Mayor, Jim Tressel and sniff jock for a couple of hours. Most had left by the time LBJ arrived. This event was a silly disaster. I wish I could have been there to see it in person....I love a good trainwreck. A good poster on this board used to say about Zips football games, "It is Bush League all the way." This ass kissing fest was Bush League. The really stupid thing about all of this is LBJ stands a good chance of resigning with Cleveland without all of this nonsense. The ass kissing is just too much for me. I don't even think LBJ likes all of the ass kissing and probably wishes it would all just stop once and for all. A part of me feels bad that LBJ has to put up with this nonsense. LBJ needs to make a professional decision about what is best for his brand. My belief is his brand works anywhere and Cleveland is just as good of a city as the next. I hope he stays. I hope that when he does stay, nobody believes LBJ Appreciation Day had anything to do with it. LBJ is a business and will make a business decision. Everyone knows LBJ loves Akron. Is everyone around Akron so insecure they need a professional basketball player to tell them he loves their city for them to feel good about it? It is all so small time.

Other than Temple, there is not a single team in the MAC a BCS level conference would want. In all the talk about realignment, there has not been a single peep about a MAC school going anywhere. The Big East may not want to take Temple back in a couple of years, but they may have to take them back out of necessity. Everyone, please listen to me and listen good. The MAC is a I-AA league. Any move the league makes should be with both eyes on I-AA and forgetting the fantasy that somehow we are going to "grow" into something different. The MAC is being crushed under the weight of the BCS conferences and we need to move and move quickly so we can do it on our terms and not in a panic. The league has one year to figure out what to do and they had better think fast. We could still be D-I in every other sport, we just need to free ourselves from the clutches of the BCS.

I think it is a crying shame that an assistant basketball coach has to put this together. It makes us look small time. Other schools have a clinic for ladies as well. It isn't on their press page, but I have gotten invitations the past three years for their golf outing as well. Like I said, it isn't either/or. They should be doing things like this. Does anyone think for one second that an assistant coach at even a little school like Wake Forest has to organize golf outings? It's insane. There are plenty of people in the Athletic Department to do this. Gary Bogue used to do it and it was a great event when he did. He wasn't a coach, just a guy working in Athletics. He could have easily done both because he was organized. I could go on about what a poor job UofA does with alumni relations. Miami has an alumni events 2-3 per year in the Charlotte area...my wife makes me go. There is a young woman who organizes them and she lives locally. Miami gives her mailing lists/e-mail lists and give away items. She does the rest. She even has the phone numbers of Carolina Panthers who went to Miami and they show up. It isn't hard to send an e-mail, reserve a room at a local bar and have an outing with 40 people. I know people who graduated from UofA who would love to have socials, but there is no way of organizing them. I brought this up to someone at UofA one time and they looked at me like I was speaking another language. I would do it myself with a little support. It is not the job of coaches to organize golf outings. That is small time if they do. The University needs to take charge and people in the bloated Athletic Department's staff need to put this together.

To me there is a big difference between "fixing" a game and setting a tone that would influence certain styles of play. For example, the NFL cracked down on touching WRs past 5 yards which changed the game. That isn't fixing games, it is just changing the tone. At no point did this guy fix games. All he knew was certain refs like certain players and focused on certain calls. Knowing that allowed him to very closely predict games. His crime was getting involved with organized crime and letting them know what he knew went on around the NBA.

Was it the football staff or the athletic department? I hope it wasn't the staff. The Athletic Department has had nothing to do with the outing recently. It's all organized by the football office, and Ianello said the hell with it. If this is true, I have different thoughts. First, on some level I don't blame the coach. Look at GoZips.com and look at the amount of staff sitting around the Athletic Department. Surely a couple of them would have time to do something like this. The coaching staff shouldn't have to do it. This is the kind of support an AD should give to one of his new employees. CoachI is new at the school and his staff is new (six months). Give these guys some help getting to know the alumni/donors and organize an outing for them for crying out loud. I've said it before and I'll say it again. We have a very lazy AD on our hands and I am worried about that.

What if he is right? Does the messenger matter at that point? There is a big difference between Jeffrey Dahmer and a guy with a gambling problem. Try some perspective.

Was it as pathetic as the AP story makes it seem? Who among you puckered up today?

Sounds like a well organized event.

Was it the football staff or the athletic department? I hope it wasn't the staff.

I don't think it is a land mine. It really isn't an either/or proposition. They should have both. After 10 years, I can't imagine putting together a golf outing would be all that difficult. At this point, it should fall into place easily. The ladies day is something completely different. Other than getting people there, the rest shouldn't be that difficult. The coaches probably have presentation material from other events so it would take them no time to put together. They could get some players with a little free time on their hands to do some demonstrations. I could be wrong, but it all seems pretty easy to me. Community outreach is important. Golf outings, clinics for the ladies, public speaking stops for Coach I, JK and KD should all be a must do. It's not either/or. Last question. Is there a bigger camera whore on the face of the Earth than Zippy?

Answer 1: Never. In fact, we could add up the wins from the past two seasons and not get there. Answer 2: Long enough to get good, which doesn't take very long if you really want to. Answer 3: Long enough to have given me permanent damage in my esophagus from the acid reflux. Temple did pass up the MAC in a short period of time. Marshall was the on ly team to do it faster because the MAC gave the farm away to get them in the league. It takes more than a new stadium to be good. It takes the will to win. We have never had the will to win. Look at Temple's schedule if you have time to search. Three home games to start out the season and all three can be won (they will lose to UCONN however). They will lose at PSU, but so what...they got a sold out home game against PSU last year. It takes us three home games to draw as many people as they can to one game. Worst case, they will be 3-2 going into the meat of the MAC schedule. Only one time do they play two or more road games in a row (we play three). Temple is focused on winning football games and competing well in a basketball conference that is much better than the MAC. We are focused on "building" things. They are smart, we are stupid. Let's see how next year goes. I'm not even demanding we dominate the league. How about a minimum seven wins a season in a down year? I don't think that is asking too much.

Interesting you bring this up. I have a friend who lives in the Philadelphia area. Temple is selling a "family pack" type deal UofA sells. Four tickets for $100 for the season. He didn't go to Temple but bought them because the team was good and $100 isn't much money. He said that even if he goes to one game it was worth the purchase. Temple could be the next Marshall if they stick around. After they leave the MAC, the could still be the next Marshall....a team that dominates the MAC but flounders outside of the MAC.

This is a link to a final in a series Deadspin has been running with Tim Donaghy, a former ref who went to jail for gambling problems. Read his book. It is an excellent review of what goes on behind closed doors with refs in the NBA and the interpersonal relationships between refs, players and coaches. I find it very believable. One doesn't have to fix calls to do well gambling on sports. All you have to have is knowledge of how refs feel about certain key players and you can accurately predict game outcomes.

I disagree on both counts. The MAC needs to dump Temple at whatever cost (there is no cost, they don't bring in anything that improves the MAC's finances or reputation). They are not worth the money spent feeding another mouth or travelling to and from Philly. They don't help attendance when MAC schools play them at home, they don't get us a better TV contract, and they screw up our scheduling so we can't play rivals that people actually care about seeing us play. And how can they be our best program? They haven't even won their own division, let alone the conference, since joining. They don't even have enough support to have their own football stadium, instead they have to rent one from the NFL. There is so little support for football that their fans are willing to go independant or drop down to 1-AA, or drop football altogether, instead of bringing their hoops program to the MAC. If football was important to them, they would bring hoops instead of risking getting kicked out. Why should the MAC allow them to continue to leech off us with nothing in return but a few token basketball games? Temple football was 9-4 overall last season. They beat Navy. They were 6-1 in the MAC, losing only @ Athens. They were up 21-7 vs UCLA in the 3rd quarter of their bowl game. They ran out of gas, but they had a good showing. The cost to travel to/from Philly vs. any other place the Zips would travel is negligible. No opponent helps the attendance of any MAC program. MAC attendance blows regardless of the opponent. No opponent helps us get a better TV contract... and who the hell wants to watch MAC football on the TV anyhow? The support for Temple football grows at the program experiences success. That's not unique to Temple. You'd see the Zips attendance rise if we'd go 9-4 for a few seasons. What "rivals" do you want to see play in lieu of Temple? Would you have rather watched a crappy Miami OH team play the Zips in 2009 than a quality Temple program? I liked watching Temple kick our ass last year (56-17). They thoroughly out-classed us at every position. It gives me hope that we can do the same (in the MAC) one day soon. Temple was no better than us a couple years ago. It doesn't matter what Temple has done, overall, in MAC football since they became a member. What matters is the direction they are headed. And since they have joined the MAC, they have headed one direction -- up. Playing in an NFL stadium is a plus, not a negative. That stadium is awesome. Didn't they schedule a home game with Penn State? That beats the hell out of Gardner Webb. People on the MACbbs board are, for the most part, idiots. You will figure that out one day. Temple is a top MAC football program. They are talented and fun to watch. They are one of only a thimble full of MAC football programs who can not only escape embarrassment when stepping up in competition, but actually have a shot at winning. And the fact that they give the MAC 5 basketball games per year is a gift from the Gods. It allows MAC fans to see Top 25 programs in their own venue. That would never happen otherwise. I told you guys two years ago Temple was a top MAC team. Everyone laughed. They ARE a top MAC team.

I've never liked Frye and this doesn't change my view. It is also a free country. If he wants to have a camp at Ashland, he is free to do so.

If Akron continues to have things like LBJ Day, everyone will consider it a small time city. In fact, it is a small time city. All the cities you mentioned are small time cities as well. It's OK to be a small city, just don't be pathetic in the process.

It's free entry into the stadium. If all you want to do is see the stadium, then you can see it for free this day. That person won't be buying a ticket to watch the Zips play.

I disagree on both counts. The MAC needs to dump Temple at whatever cost (there is no cost, they don't bring in anything that improves the MAC's finances or reputation). They are not worth the money spent feeding another mouth or travelling to and from Philly. They don't help attendance when MAC schools play them at home, they don't get us a better TV contract, and they screw up our scheduling so we can't play rivals that people actually care about seeing us play. And how can they be our best program? They haven't even won their own division, let alone the conference, since joining. They don't even have enough support to have their own football stadium, instead they have to rent one from the NFL. There is so little support for football that their fans are willing to go independant or drop down to 1-AA, or drop football altogether, instead of bringing their hoops program to the MAC. If football was important to them, they would bring hoops instead of risking getting kicked out. Why should the MAC allow them to continue to leech off us with nothing in return but a few token basketball games? I remember Temple was one of the few "bigger time" schools that would come to the Rubber Bowl as Akron was transitioning to Division I. I always appreciated that and, therefore, have no problem assisting them in keeping their football program going until they can get into a better conference. They helped us and we help them? I say, thanks for nothing. 20+ years and this program is still a disaster.

After watching...actually, trying to desperately trying to not watch it but having to suffer through it at some point, I can only say that anything soccer does, we should not do. It is the only sport that can be made worse by a plastic horn.

Who is paying for this nonsense?.....and nobody send a note back saying Captain Kangaroo owns the board....I'm not talking abotu that. Who is paying for LBJ day?

If your gonna post this crap, at least post it in the correct forum. http://zipsnation.org/forums//index.php?showforum=7 It's not IF, but WHEN. The truth is, I think LBJ is great. They way he gets treated makes me sick, but that isn't his fault.

Sort of sums it up well......

If you knew a trainwreck was going to happen later today, would you go watch? I would. I hope it is a huge failure and if I still lived in Ohio, I would go to watch....then I would go get drunk at BW3. What they should really do, since LBJ isn't going to be there, is have sort of a Mardi Gras parade across the field at The Big Dialer. The Grand Marshal could be the last living Cleveland fan who actually remembers the last time a Cleveland team won a championship. Floats of all sorts could be made. One could be of Mayor Don kissing LBJ's butt. One could be of the mayor of Cleveland kissing LBJ's butt. Another could be an economic impact calculator of LBJ leaving the Cavs. A missing entry would be the float of LBJ's NBA Championship ring. All the while, The Pretenders song Back to Ohio would be playing over the speakers.

It just depends on the guy. I played with guys who tore their ACL and were never the same, and I also saw guys come back from it as good as new. A lot of it depends on how hard the guy is willing to work in rehab. For a recent Zips example, Alex Allen blew out his knee and came back fine. He seems like the kind of guy who probably worked his tail off in rehab. Hix is the same kind of guy. His career isn't over, IMO. Hix is a five year veteran who played on a Super Bowl winning team. He has been a solid producer and will play again for someone.

The ABJ runs a story like this for LeAppreciation Day and you know nobody is going to show up. This is a joke and everyone involved should be ashamed. Bush League.