GP1

Thanks for the credit where credit is due. The Great GP1 didn't just come up with something similar, the Great GP1 came up with an idea for superior to what this hack at SI offers. The only thing worth quoting in his article is:"The NCAA began with the noblest intentions, but it has grown into a bloated beast of an organization that routinely does harm even when it tries to do good."The NCAA is a complete fraud. The answer is not for a certain number of schools to leave the NCAA. The answer is for those schools is to have their own division. And why does this hack think 64 is the right number? First of all, it is too many. Secondly, what else does the number 64 remind everyone of? SI should stick with photographing half naked girls. At least what they would be printing would be interesting.

Yes, yes and yes. They aren't going to build a fan base by starting out the season 1-3 every year.Our basketball team just got smashed by a mid level mid major and they are a much better program than our football program. That game should have been an awakening for football fans as well. UofA does not have the players to compete against BCS level schools at this stage in college football. BCS schools have gotten better and MAC schools have gotten worse.Let's put the program in a position to succeed in lieu of ongoing failure in the hopes that once every five years, some BCS school in horrible circumstances will fall apart against the Zips. When you start out the year 1-3, casual fans think you are a 4-8 team so why bother?

It was similar, but Faust had an additional problem. Faust had a problem with the number of scholarships he had to offer and the number of partial scholarships being used. Keep in mind Faust took over a I-AA team with I-AA talent. I wasn't quite in school yet, but I believe Dennison had 65 scholarship players and not all of them were full scholarships.The first step Faust took was to dare to have an honest discussion with each player from the Dennison era and tell most of them they were not D-I talent and they would never see the field. A lot of these players were on partials and weren't D-I talent. This pissed off a lot of players and caused it's own problem, but Faust did the right thing. Combining enough partials freed up enough money to start to offer more full scholarships. If anyone can remember, I would like to know the answer to this. When did UofA finally have enough money to field the NCAA limit of scholarship players? If my memory is correct, it was about half way through the Owens era. Reason 287 why this program has done little in the last 20 years.You are correct. The NCAA didn't let the Zips automatically jump from 65 scholarships to 85. We could only offer 25 scholarships per year, working our way up to 85. If 8 kids quit the team...to bad...you got your 25 per season, maximum. It took us forever to get up to 85. It might not have happened until the Owens-era.Nothing like playing against schools like Auburn and Florida with 70 only scholarship players.But when did we finally have 85 endowed scholarships? I know we could have offered them, but I think it took some time before we could actually pay for that many so we in fact did not have 85 scholarship players on the team.Several years ago -- maybe around 2003/2004 era, someone (I think it was the Michiganlive website -- is that the FreePress?), published the actual number of Am. football scholarships provided by MAC schools. Remember, this was a period when the league was more successful than more recently -- the BigBen era. Only one or two schools came close to providing the full number available under NCAA max's, and I recall that EMU then was only giving between 45-50 total, several were around 60-65. I would guess than Akron was in the mid-upper 60s, maybe 70ish. These numbers -- or the lack of NCAA maximums isn't primarily due to players dropping out (although that accounts for a secondary loss), but rather to budgetary restrictions. Based on that I would be surprised if MAC schools are today very close to the 85 scholarships limit. Someone do some research -- Mike Razor, where are you?My understanding is UofA now has 85 endowed scholarships. Could be wrong though.Everyone complains we did not have the facilities to win....Hell, we didn't have the people to win.

Terrible schedule. At no point do the Zips play two home MAC games in a row until the end of the year. Twice they play two MAC road games in a row.The Zips will start the season 1-3. Let's hope someone shows up for the NIU game.Until we know whether or not Coach I can turn talented kids into players, I'm goin with a five win season.

It was similar, but Faust had an additional problem. Faust had a problem with the number of scholarships he had to offer and the number of partial scholarships being used. Keep in mind Faust took over a I-AA team with I-AA talent. I wasn't quite in school yet, but I believe Dennison had 65 scholarship players and not all of them were full scholarships.The first step Faust took was to dare to have an honest discussion with each player from the Dennison era and tell most of them they were not D-I talent and they would never see the field. A lot of these players were on partials and weren't D-I talent. This pissed off a lot of players and caused it's own problem, but Faust did the right thing. Combining enough partials freed up enough money to start to offer more full scholarships. If anyone can remember, I would like to know the answer to this. When did UofA finally have enough money to field the NCAA limit of scholarship players? If my memory is correct, it was about half way through the Owens era. Reason 287 why this program has done little in the last 20 years.You are correct. The NCAA didn't let the Zips automatically jump from 65 scholarships to 85. We could only offer 25 scholarships per year, working our way up to 85. If 8 kids quit the team...to bad...you got your 25 per season, maximum. It took us forever to get up to 85. It might not have happened until the Owens-era.Nothing like playing against schools like Auburn and Florida with 70 only scholarship players.But when did we finally have 85 endowed scholarships? I know we could have offered them, but I think it took some time before we could actually pay for that many so we in fact did not have 85 scholarship players on the team.

It was similar, but Faust had an additional problem. Faust had a problem with the number of scholarships he had to offer and the number of partial scholarships being used. Keep in mind Faust took over a I-AA team with I-AA talent. I wasn't quite in school yet, but I believe Dennison had 65 scholarship players and not all of them were full scholarships.The first step Faust took was to dare to have an honest discussion with each player from the Dennison era and tell most of them they were not D-I talent and they would never see the field. A lot of these players were on partials and weren't D-I talent. This pissed off a lot of players and caused it's own problem, but Faust did the right thing. Combining enough partials freed up enough money to start to offer more full scholarships. If anyone can remember, I would like to know the answer to this. When did UofA finally have enough money to field the NCAA limit of scholarship players? If my memory is correct, it was about half way through the Owens era. Reason 287 why this program has done little in the last 20 years.

My point always is other than winning one MAC Championship in 20 years, there really isn't much glory here. Hell, Bundy's four touchdowns in a single game at Polk HS is probably more impressive than our last 20 year history.Faust, Owens and JD are like the losers in Al's No Ma'am Club hanging out in his garage.

There will be a group of UofA alumni watching and drinking at McHale's in Tega Cay, SC.Go Zips!

As long as the field is one color with a logo in the middle, I think schools should be able to do whatever they want.Quite frankly, college football is becoming borring. Different fields might be interesting. Basketball courts are very different depending on the school. The Nazis at the NCAA need to loosen up on the rules a little.

Wow, you guys were so important.

It's not as much of a debate or conversation as some of us taking one of our fellow alumns (you), lovingly putting our arms around you and saying, "It's ok that you guys sucked. You don't have to make up fiction about what really happed during the Owens years. We still love you anyhow."This coming from a Faust guy??? The entire era you were involved in was nothing but a black mark and embarrassment to this University on all accords. My coach went out on a 7-5 record, in the upper echelon of the MAC at its height, and with enough talent left on the team for his successor to go win a championship. Your coach went out with one win, a bunch of disgraceful thugs populating the team, and a gigantic mess for his successor to clean up. Faust and his teams are an embarrassment that most involved in UA athletics would like to forget ever happened.In the 4 years that I played, we won 17 MAC games. All that impressive? No. Best in school history? Yes. So don't come at me talking about how "you guys sucked" when my teams won more MAC games than any class in your embarrassment of an era even thought about.7-5 with two I-AA teams. How impressive.... You guys sucked. I could sit here and cry and bitch and moan about how bad we had it with our facilities, weight room in the jar, zero academic support, etc., but it would just make me look like a whining bitch....like, well, you know.

It all starts with talent. Miami had a ton of talent around the campus, they picked up the talent and put it to good use. Bernis Kosar had a lot to do with it as well. Bernie was a smart guy who could spread the field out and run a pro style offense. The story of the Cotton Bowl win against Texas was funny as well. They hated the city of Dallas, they hated the people of Texas and they set out to humiliate them on national TV....and they did. One Miami player told his teammates before the opening kickoff he was going to knock out the return man....and he did. Miami had 195 yards of penalties and still destroyed Texas.The interviews with Coach Johnson were great as well. He grew up dirt poor like a lot of the kids at Miami and they all related to each other. One guy said he coached with his middle finger in the air. College football seems so phony today compared to what it was then. The players hate each other, but they have to pretend they don't. The players are wildly excited when they do something good, but they can't celebrate.

The Zips put up a solid win last night. They need to keep that momentum going for not just the Tournament, but they badly need to beat Can't for more than just pride. Losing twice to them create a recruiting advantage for Can't that I don't want to give up.The best thing they can do now is go on a winning streak going into the Tournament. KD will play to win.

It's not as much of a debate or conversation as some of us taking one of our fellow alumns (you), lovingly putting our arms around you and saying, "It's ok that you guys sucked. You don't have to make up fiction about what really happed during the Owens years. We still love you anyhow."

That 17% was for a single season.I thought the 17% number seemed strange. I know too many guys who graduated for it to be true.Once again, Faust reigns as the tallest midget. You guys have no idea how strange it is to type those words or even to take the thought serioiusly.Speaking of Faust, did anyone see the absolutely great 30-30 on ESPN about Miami FL football? It's amazing to me Faust actually coached on the same field against J. Johnson. That 30-30 was great in so many ways. Miami really changed college football in many good and bad ways.My favorite part was when the media complained about Miami destroying other teams and they never once complained when Oklahoma, Texas, Notre Dame were beating teams 50-0.

Understood... however, the question was brought up about how RP would have dealt with slavery, and that was to buy out slave contracts and then make slavery illegal. However, my (quite limited recollection and) assumption was that the civil war was really fought to keep the southern states from succeeding. The reason they wanted succession was to force their right to keep slaves. So, simply declaring slavery illegal would not necessarily have stopped the war (and all the lives and expenses incurred). That was my only point.I love Civil War history and could talk about it all day. Southerners saw slaves as property and not people. Most slaves served as farm hands. Property can be sold for the right price and most historians believe the price for purchase would have been much less than the war price. The purchase of the slaves in an agreement to end slavery would have eliminated the cause for succeeding.The really interesting thing about slavery is it still exists. Many countries have sex slaves. In fact, there have been stories in recent years about eastern European girls being brought to the US to serve as sex slaves right under our noses. Some countries around the world even today have slaves similar to what the US used them for in past centuries, as a source of farm labor. In WWII, the Germans used Jews as slaves and forced them to work in factories. It's all very strange.

Church gossip is something even the Great GP1 can not explain.

Whatever floats your boat dude.... We have a former football coach at our school who bought himself and his coaches MAC East Championship rings when they didn't even make the MAC Championship.

This afternoon I was speaking with my mother and she started a sentence with the following words, "I heard in church that..." There is usually some truth to whatever comes next.This kid is a freshman at my high school and is reported to be an excellent basketball player. Church gossip also has him being recruited by tOSU, Michigan and UofA.How much is true?

Another interesting statistic is the W-L records. Isn't it the case that LO loaded up on I-AA teams (3) late in his tenure and JD didn't do the same thing? I think JD only played one in his six years so let's redo the math with a more realistic view.As we all know, any ooc game played in the LO era was a loss so let's count the Liberty and Cal Poly wins as L's since we surely would have lost to I-A teams. That would take the LO record from 32-36 to 30-38 (.441).Give JD two guaranteed wins instead of L's in his time, he goes from 30-41 to 32-39 (.450).If winning percentage, adjusted for scheduling, is a consideration, JD wins this category. Maybe you aren't so right after all....If LO was still the coach of UofA, the program would be in shambles, worse than it is now. LO had nothing in the tank at the end and the "talent" he took with him from UofA to Ashland couldn't even win a D-2 league.NFL players are not the indication of great recruiting. Overall talent is. The overall talent on this team is as good as it has been since the Zips went 7-3-1 under Faust. The Zips had a coach who put that talent in impossble situations. If Coach I and his staff are any good at all at coaching players on the field, this team should have a winning record in the MAC next year and compete for the championship of the East.

I've never believed in the theory that fans were disgruntled by Dennison getting fired. In fact, there was a good bit of energy about Faust being hired. Faust's first year they had a great crowd at Acme-Zip and a good Thursday night crowd for the MSU game on ESPN. My freshman year we had the fourth largest crowd to see the Zips play in the Acme-Zip game. The evidence just isn't there. Crowds did get smaller, but that was more of a result of losing than disgruntled Dennison fans.When UofA hired Faust, they had no clue how to support a D-1A football program. The weight room was a double sized classroom in the basement of the JAR for the first two years. Regardless of what anyone thinks about Faust, he was at Notre Dame and knew what it took to succeed at a high level. Never once did he complain about the horrible circumstances he was in at UofA. Nor did his coaches or players. Faust never once complained about Dennison being his boss, which was a terrible situation in itself because of the circumstances of Dennison being let go and Dennison having no clue as to how to run a D-1A program. I good poster on this board always said it was "Bush Leage all the way". Believe me, it was and nobody complained.If you look at what Faust had to work with his first 5 years, it was absolutely horrible and the guy did a pretty good job given the circumstances. I'll take the Faust years and the men who coached and played for him any day over the boys from the other eras.

Nice story.In South Carolina, people don't care as much as you might think about football. Clemson has a loyal following as long as they are winning, but that following is somewhat isolated to the upstate. Clemson is not easy to get to and once you get there the stadium is even more difficult to get to. Not to mention it full of a bunch of a-holes. The part when the team runs down the hill is not that impressive also...it takes too long. The leg room in the stands makes the JAC seem like a luxury suite. The music they play over the PA is too loud and reminds me of going to a Cavs game. The only good thing they have going for them is...you guys aren't going to believe this....you can leave at halftime (you have to get a hand stamp), go to your tailgate, drink a couple of beers and then return to the stadium.The Gamecocks are an ACC school pretending to be an SEC school. They stink, but the expectations are not very high and the results are usually poor to average. Horrible position for any coach. They should beg the ACC to take them back...they would immediately be one of the best teams in the league. Going to a basketball game at USC is like watching paint dry.The point is, in a state where not many care about their D-1A football teams, it will be difficult for Hunter to get people to care about Coastal. He does have a really nice stadium being built next to a main highway, but can he convince the people pull themselves away from the beach or shrimping in the last few weeks of warm weather to go to many games? The other issue is many of the people there are transplants from somewhere else so they really don't care much about Coastal. He has a bit of a fight on his hands, but I think it is doable.

that sort of divisive interpretation is often not as unintentional as it might appear.... but alas, that's politics.Regardless, if that is his theory, I have to ask whether he would have allowed to the south to leave the Union as well, since fighting succession may have had more to do with the war than abolition.ZW, thanks for the information. Many have argued this point as well and it is more than theory. Great Britain ended slavery in exactly the same way. The government bought all slaves and freed them at a very low cost of money and lives.zen, the Civil War was about slavery. Many say it was about "states rights", but that is a dodge from reality. The question then becomes, the right to do what? The answer was the right to own slaves. One of the ugly spots on American history is the claim of states rights when people are committing horrible acts against their fellow man. States rights to have slavery. States rights to have segregation. I believe in states rights because it increases the amount of ideas to 50 instead of one, but not when it is used to hold your fellow man down.

Neither one of these guys recruited the quality of player Faust did in his first five years. While neither Lyons or Buddenberg were Faust recruits, each will say if it wasn't for the NFL quality coaches Faust brought in they would have never made the NFL (if NFL players are the measurement of success...I doubt that).Faust had it far worse in his first five years than Owens in terms of school reputation, conference, facilities, financial support, etc. You'll never hear anyone from that era cry about that.Since we are talking NFL, Faust brought in Vic Green and JT. Let's face it, every NFL guy Owens or JD brought in is/was easily replaceable on any NFL team they played on. How soon we all forget how much better the Browns were immediately after they cut Frye. Owens produced marginal NFL players and zero superstars.Green was one of the key players on the Jets. Green started in the NFL for almost his entire career and had a ten year career. This Faust recruit is the second best Zip in history behind the Faust recruit next.Do I need to get into the Hall of Fame career of Taylor? I'm sorry, the first ballot HOF career of Taylor. While he wasn't recruited in the first five years of Faust, he was the greatest Zip ever.I guess in some small thinking way, NFL players are a measurement of success, but what about the giant pile of crap Owens recruited around those giants of the NFL he brought in? If you put all of the Owens NFL players on one team, you would almost one half of a very average college team.I think Faust also had the best season winning percentage in his first five years as well 7-3-1. Pretty good if you ask me. Especially considering the state of ficilities, financial support, etc. the program had in his era.The one thing ITZ conveniently leaves out it is Brookhart was 1-0 in MAC Championship games. He was also 1-0 in a game that mattered to go to the MAC Championship. Owens can brag he never lost a MAC Championship with his 0-0 record in them.Owens was a choke artist and produced a bunch of crybaby choke artists around him. The more I hear them cry, the more disgusted I become by them. Guys who played for Faust never cried about facilities, reputation, lack of conference, zero academic help, financial support, etc. Everyone just played. While some wound up in jail (two who wound up on jail were certain NFL players in Frowner and Clark), there were players much better than what we saw in either the Owens or JD eras.In a measurement of the tallest midgets, I think Faust comes out on top...at least in the first five years. Amazing what history teaches us. In fact, what does this trend teach us? Maybe the trend is a declining quality of coach since the start of the D-1A era. We'll see how Coach I does.

Can you give us a public statement Paul has given on slavery. Exactly what do you mean by pro-death?