GP1

I have to respectfully disagree. The last thing the Zips need to do when the basketball team plays Malone or St. Francis or whatever cupcake the parade into the JAR is get a lot of people to the game. If a person's first experience with Zips basketball is watching them roll over a pile of crap, they will believe that is the way Zips games are. Most people don't understand it is part of the "building process" . If my choice was to watch the basketball team play Malone for $1 or pay the amount of a full price ticket to not have to go watch the game, I would probably pay full price to sit at home and do something interesting. When fans don't go to games, they are making a rationale choice to not spend not only their money, but also their time on a bad product. Nobody is talking about the giant elephant in the room and this isn't just a problem isolated to UofA. The elephant is the quality of play in the MAC in recent years has been terrible. A fan doesn't have to go to a game in person to see the MAC is terrible. MAC schools are on TV a lot and fans get exposure to the league much more than in the past. Fans are not stupid....they know crap when they see it and that's why MAC games are so poorly attended. You can have dollar hotdogs all day long, you can have counter productive discounted tickets all day long, you can have Zippy going around making farting sounds with his armpits all day long, but as long as the quality of product remains low, people will not turn out. The question shouldn't be...How do you market the Zips? It should be....How do you market a bad product and get repeat customers while generating enough income to support an entire athletic department? There are bad products marketed and sold every day that support companies. It can be done, so how do we do it is the real question.

I agree with some of what you said, but below is my disagreement. Why does everything have to be about "the children"? Either we are a big time program or we are not. Stops in play should be filled with awards to student athletes, winter and spring sport athletes being introduced on the field, recognition to large donors, recognition of alumni success, etc. I understand a funny skit with Zippy every once in a while, but college football is adult entertainment. I don't need to go to a football game to be entertained by cartoons during timeouts. Advertise football, not a "family event". We have been giving away tickets for years and it doesn't expand the ticket base. In fact, if I still bought tickets, I would be pissed as Hell that they gave away tickets. Promoting local talent has also not worked....they my as well go back to "band day".

If you are on the side of the coach who turned this girl in, then you are part of the problem. The guy who turned her in (see, Billy Martin, George Brett) you should be fired tomorrow.

If we have a defense with a pulse, everything else will take care of itself. PN7 needs to be more accurate and everything on offense will be fine.

I have no idea what this means. Is it equal to, "the coach has lost the team"? I have a better idea. Play hard and win some freaking games.

One other thing. A better quality of play would help. People are not stupid and they know a bad sports product when they see it. Not just from the Zips, but from the MAC in general. Unless I'm watching NC State, my laugh-o-meter does not go off during ACC games. It never goes off during SEC, Big 12 or PAC 10 games. It goes off frequently during MAC games.

Agree. The problem is, we hire people with "Sports Management" degrees. The problem is two fold. First, the people we hire only get ideas from other inexperienced people in college athletics when they go to seminars together to network for their next job. The people they listen to are from schools with supposedly good marketing programs like the large BCS schools who have to just offer tickets and they are sold because there is an over demand for the tickets. Second, we have turned over a lot of marketing responsibility to ISP. I think ISP is great, but they are paid on revenue so they use their creativity for big ticket items to maximize their revenue. As long as revenue increases, the AD and ISP can show results. Revenue does not always equal increased attendance.

1. Too many teams. 2. No mention of no poaching into lower conferences for ooc games. 3. No mention on how they will keep competition balanced in the league. For example, fewer spring practices for playoff teams.

This is a tired old excuse that carries very little merit. The fact is, Mark Shapiro is incompetent. The team can't draft, overpays for washed up has-beens (the latest, Russell Branyon), and pays big money to sign free agents to platoon (ie Dave Dellucci in 07). The coaching at the major league and AAA level is horrible, year in and year out the Aeros are a threat to win the title. Yet by the time these guys make it to Cleveland, they act like the simplest fundamentals are beyond them. I don't hear anyone in Tampa Bay whining about the salary disparity. Florida has two rings. Arizona has one, St Louis has one. Colorado went. It's all just an excuse for an owner who doesn't want to invest in a real management and a real roster who can win, even though this market has proven over and over it will support a winner. I do support the pro and college teams teams who at least try. Once the football team melted down last season, I was done. I put all of my support on a program that deserved it so much more, the soccer team. I refuse to waste time and money on a circus run by clowns. Now this year, I'll start supporting the "new" football program (and the "new" Browns) unless they prove they don't deserve it. But the Indians? They're dead to me. It's much more fun right here in Akron at Canal Park. So you are a fair weather fan? I wouldn't say Spin is a fair weather fan as much as he is a rationale buyer. At some point, every consumer must look at their purchases and ask about the value they are getting for the money they are spending. Spin has made a decsion the Indians are not worth spending the type of money it takes to go to a MLB game. Fair weather fans are actually the best type of fans. They expect to see a good product and if they don't see a good product they don't buy. It tells the owner of the company that if they don't improve their product, they will not make money. Spending your money to support a loser encourages the owner to continue with his losing ways. Let's say you always used one brand of toilet paper. One day, the manufacturer of that tp decided it would be good to include 50% sand into their mix. Would you continue to buy the tp or would you find another way to spend your money? The Indians and Pirates are selling sand laced tp to their fans.

This is a dead serious question. Why do you spend money going to Zips games? The NCAA is designed for the BCS teams to win. I support them because I am a fan and I like college football.

True. It does take a sane man to express his frustration in such a clear and thought out manner. MBL won't change a thing about what they are doing. Their attendance and ratings are up over the past few years. People go to games regardless of how bad their team is. For example, the Pirates are near sell-outs for every fireworks night this year and they are a Class AAA team poised add another year to the consecutive losing season record they now hold. The key to marketing bad sports teams is pre-season sales. If you are waiting for in season sales and your team sucks, you are in big trouble. Until people stop going to games, this won't change. Want to make MLB better? Reduce the number of teams by about 6 and the league will be better.

See for yourself.....

Unless "food" means a bag of chips or a case of beer, that's just gross. BTW, does Zip Mart still exist?

What makes this Howard situation so unique is the public statement that Tressel never stopped recruiting. Locker room talk is one thing, public statements are another. There is also a pattern that has always been around the Zips program in the past 20 years. There are a lot of guys playing for the Zips who came to UofA because nobody else wanted them. I don't care what the recruiting services say about who was getting recruited by whom, that's what really goes on. One reason MAC schools suck is it is hard to get a team where half of the guys believe they are settling for something less than what they should have to be successful. It's hard to win with that mentality. In reality, Howard is so stupid that he publically admitted what a lot of guys at UofA think behind closed doors.

17-18 year olds hardly qualify as "Adults". Half of the 25 year olds I know still haven't grown up enough to be responsible adults. All this talk about tOSU is proof of his immaturity. As a matter of fact, 18 qualifys as an adult. I'm sure Mr. Howard's stellar academic performance set him back at least a year. The kid is probably near or at 19.

This conversation is going to go nowhere. We obviously have a different set of morals. I wonder how Tom Brady's life would be different if he got his high school girlfriend pregnant in high school instead of a super model after an established NFL career? ONE supermodel? Try he got two different supermodels pregnant in an 18 month period. One he married. Brady left the bastard child with the other. Since I actually know almost none of the people on the board, I can only assume some things. One is a lot of people on this board are really old or have double standards or at one time were the world's oldest virgins or got married at 18 so they could finally have sex. How many of you who think a kid having sex in high school is a sign of bad character and the kid should not be able to play college football think we could actually field a DIII team if that was the case?

I knew this wasn't about anyone from the Faust years, or it would have read, "Former Zip Breaks Into Zip Mart".

I don't think anyone is taking issue. He can do whatever he wants.

Let's find out. If he did contact him from somewhere other than an office or University paid phone, where did he call from? A boosters phone? Was he contacting his HS coach to act as a middle man? Lots of questions. I think we're barking up the wrong tree so to speak. All this is spin (I think) to conceal the fact that he missed the 4 "B's" he needed, getting 3 "C's" and a "D", hense not qualifying. So he wouldn't have been coming anyway. This is probably a story to cover up that fact. If this is true (all rumor keep in mind) I hate the fact he's taken to trashing our program so he has a body to step on and make himself look good. As a side craziness, his HS girlfriend is preggies also...........rumor has it. Like I said before NLOID. The kid lacks character. Does he lack character or is he just stupid? Does getting a girlfriend knocked-up a sign of a lack of character?....If so, is Tom Brady a guy who should be run from the NFL because he has knocked-up two girlfriends and has no character? I also don't see where he is trashing the Zips. To answer your question, look at his grades to answer the stupid part. When he signed with Akron he made a comment that he was only signing with Akron until something better came along. To me that is scum. Also, I don't think comparing a pro athlete to a high school kid apples to apples. I get the point, but again, apples to oranges. Are you saying that kids having sex in high school have a lack of character? Or, are you saying kids in high school that are unlucky enough to fall onto the wrong side of the pregnancy odds while having sex in high school have a lack of character? Howard is an adult. Tom Brady is an adult. Both got at least one girl pregnant as an adult. Why are they different?

Let's find out. If he did contact him from somewhere other than an office or University paid phone, where did he call from? A boosters phone? Was he contacting his HS coach to act as a middle man? Lots of questions. I think we're barking up the wrong tree so to speak. All this is spin (I think) to conceal the fact that he missed the 4 "B's" he needed, getting 3 "C's" and a "D", hense not qualifying. So he wouldn't have been coming anyway. This is probably a story to cover up that fact. If this is true (all rumor keep in mind) I hate the fact he's taken to trashing our program so he has a body to step on and make himself look good. As a side craziness, his HS girlfriend is preggies also...........rumor has it. Like I said before NLOID. The kid lacks character. Does he lack character or is he just stupid? Does getting a girlfriend knocked-up a sign of a lack of character?....If so, is Tom Brady a guy who should be run from the NFL because he has knocked-up two girlfriends and has no character? I also don't see where he is trashing the Zips.

1) To show support for our star player 2) To show appreciation for him choosing The University of Akron - out of all of the places in the world - for his press conference. 3) To show appreciation for bringing every national media outlet to the JAR, which offers both Akron and UA incredible exposure. 4) To show appreciation for visually relating incredible success to Akron, The University of Akron, and Keith Dambrot. 5) Because in Cleveland and NE Ohio, it's very rare for us to have something/somebody so great in sports. We need to appreciate it while we have it, and look no further than the Cleveland Indians for a perfect example of that. Sorry, I'm just not buying LBJ is doing this for UofA. I'm also not buying it does anything for the BB program. If he really wanted to have a press conference going back to his roots, he would have it at St. V-M. He want's UofA because it provides a bigger arena for him to promote himself. I know a lot of you want to believe LBJ sits around thinking about this stuff all day long, but he actually has people think about these things for him. This is a marketing creation by the geniuses at Nike. A commercial won't be far behind.

Let's find out. If he did contact him from somewhere other than an office or University paid phone, where did he call from? A boosters phone? Was he contacting his HS coach to act as a middle man? Lots of questions. I think we're barking up the wrong tree so to speak. All this is spin (I think) to conceal the fact that he missed the 4 "B's" he needed, getting 3 "C's" and a "D", hense not qualifying. So he wouldn't have been coming anyway. This is probably a story to cover up that fact. If this is true (all rumor keep in mind) I hate the fact he's taken to trashing our program so he has a body to step on and make himself look good. As a side craziness, his HS girlfriend is preggies also...........rumor has it. Let's assume all of that is true. If there is an NCAA violation, it is bigger than the grades. As far as the girlfriend, before we look down our noses at this, we should all think about how something like that could have happend to A LOT of us in HS.

Let's find out. If he did contact him from somewhere other than an office or University paid phone, where did he call from? A boosters phone? Was he contacting his HS coach to act as a middle man? Lots of questions.

They should know. Between working at Hooters during the lunch rush and The Doll House from 7-1, those girls make a ton of money.