GP1

Thanks for the link. As much as I think LBJ has been an a-hole during this process, I think the billboard is a bit of a cheap shot. Strikes me as sort of childish and phony. I don't think it is reasonable to believe that someone out there is so enraged with him going to Miami that they felt the need to buy this. I think he is a jerk, but I'm not made angry by the thought. It is the kind of thing we see a lot these days. Everyone is trying to out fan the next guy. The billboard says more about the person who bought it than it does LBJ.

I could care less about his feelings when he looks at a map. How is LBJ going to put Akron on the map and why does Akron need LBJ to put them on the map? Akron and NE Ohio in general have been in a steady state of decline since LBJ went pro how many years ago now. How has he helped Akron again? How has he helped UofA in a way that we could not have done so ourselves? Between playing basketball, endorsements and lap dances in Las Vegas (not that there's anything wrong with that), how is he going to have time to put Akron on the map? It would seem to me that a guy looking to put Akron on the map and has a pile of cash would at least fly some strippers in from Vegas and have his party in Akron. Personally, I don't see how a guy with limited intelligence is going to save a region. The guy is a Hell of a basketball players, but not exactly ready to split the atom. It absolutely amazes me that there are still people out there who think LBJ is some savior that is going to save an entire region through his basketball playing skills. When LBJ retires, he will be gone and his influence diminished. Jordan's contributions to Charlotte basically consist of running a bad basketball team, keeping cigar shops in business and eating once a day at a different fine restaurant.

I'd like to see him play a whole game instead of the YouTube videos they put up. From what I see he looks like a good player. I'd like to see how he plays against a good team and a really fast running back. One thing about these videos is how unorganized many high school teams are. He is clearly the best player on that defense and the number of times he is unaccounted for is amazing.

Doug is looking to inspire the team after losing three games by a total of 12 points. "12 More Points" could be the inspiration they are looking for, but the way Doug coaches, they will lose three games by 13 points. There is nothing this loser can do to make his team a winner.

Here in the Carolinas, we know tourists by the way they tuck their golf shirts into their jorts.

The 3-3-5 defense had nothing to do with the off the field turmoil. You can't let teams march up and down the field at will. College football has become high scoring, but at times, you still have to stop people or at least hold them to a fg try.

ND would sell out. The cost would be too high. There are plenty of non-BCS level teams that would produce a great crowd if the Zips were good enough for people to spend their money on.

Call me crazy, but I have an idea for getting more PD coverage. If the Zips win more games and put a better team on the field, the PD will be forced to cover them. Let's win more games. When the Zips are 4-8, there is little more interest in Cleveland for the Zips vs. MAC Team than there is for BW vs. Case. The local media did a really good job of covering the Zips when we went to the MCB. It can happen again if the Zips would start winning. The local media is not the enemy. They are mostly stupid, but they are not the enemy. We have met the enemy and we are us. If we keep losing, there will be no coverage. If we win, there will be coverage. It's very simple. We really need to start winning.

Once again....nobody is excited to go watch Marshall. These home and homes need to be against fairly significant teams in order to gain the local interest. If we cant get it from Syracuse and Indiana, we surely wont get it from Marshall. What if the Zips put such a good product on the field, that it doesn't matter who they play? It seems to me that the "savior complex" of people in NE Ohio shows itself when talking about future OOC home games. Instead of bringing in a team to save the match-up and produce a good crowd, how about if we make the Zips the team people want to go see? If the Zips suck, nobody is going to the games regardless of who they play. I see it like this. Indiana and Syracuse are bottom feeder teams that never play in bowl games and have little interest in their own fan base. On the other hand, Marshall has become kind of good again and made a bowl game last year. People know Marshall as a good team really worth going to see if the Zips are good as well. They see them on TV playing in bowl games. People know Syracuse and Indiana suck and will find something else to do with their time and money other than going to watch them play.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that moderates are more subtle than extremists. I think you confuse being a moderate with being open minded. An extremist can be open minded as well. William F. Buckley was a solid conservative, but was open minded enough to discuss his ideas with those he didn't agree with. Byron York is a modern day Buckley. By definition, a political moderate is generally open to a wider range of ideas from both the left and the right than a political extremist, who typically follows primarily far left or far right beliefs. William F. Buckley Jr. was an intellectual conservative who evolved away from his early extremism (support of segregation and McCarthyism, for example). He was more moderate and less extreme in his later years, becoming an eloquent spokesman for mainstream conservative principles that are accepted by many moderates. By whose definition?

Top to bottom, RI has better players awaiting him. JD had Frye...IMNHO he was a joke. Frye is a long line of piss poor QBs who masquerade as NFL qbs these days. Had a career losing record at a MAC school. Blackburn...solid player. Much better pro than college player. Hixon....was on defense and JD turned him into an NFL player. Brookhart should get the credit for Hixon. I don't remember number four. Corner? BG transfer. Without the guys JD brought with him (Biggs, Getsy, AA), the team is a joke his second year. Besides these four players, there was garbage left behind by Owens. Owens pissed all over the program on the way out.....JD didn't.

Can the Zips beat all three? No. Can the Zips beat two? No. Can the Zips beat one? Maybe, but I'll lean to no. If they lose all three, it is not the end of the season or even something to be concerned about. The Zips have enough talent to compete well in the MAC. I don't know what the final record will be, but I am pretty certain we will not be run off the field against any MAC team.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that moderates are more subtle than extremists. I think you confuse being a moderate with being open minded. An extremist can be open minded as well. William F. Buckley was a solid conservative, but was open minded enough to discuss his ideas with those he didn't agree with. Byron York is a modern day Buckley.

But, he didn't score a point in a high school playoff game. Not to get off the Zips, but DA took a team that Charlie Frye shipwrecked in the first game of the season and went 10-5 the remainder of the season and had the Browns within a hair of making the playoffs. DA wasn't great, but he was a decent qb on a really bad team. Back to the Zips.....

What if ND fans, Illinois fans and Rasor are all morons? Let's face it, time passed ND by years ago. I'm not sure what their fans expect. At this point, neither do they. Illinois? Well, they are used to watching Illinois, which is a mid to low level Big Ten team. Zook is a bigger problem than their dc. Rasor? Nice guy, but kind of caught up in the neo-conservative politics of the Republican Party. Most are mentally unstable. Only in towns like Stow could he get elected. Probably made a good intramural volleyball player, but that is about it. I don't take his opinions on football too seriously. He is a liberal waiting to happen. However, since he is a UofA graduate, I wish him luck as he progresses towards being a liberal like all neo-conservatives become. Actually, neo-conservatives are in fact former liberals....sort of comes full circle. Be careful of what you read on the internet.

I'm sorry, but this is not the direction the University is going. Nor should it go this direction. UofA can look like UofA and still be a good research institution. We don't need to do what they do in California or anywhere else. The direction is good. A branch in Stark Co makes no sense when you are trying to attract students to live on your campus. If they want to do refining technology and chemicals research, fine. Send graduate students to the companies to collect samples and bring them back. Better yet, have the students/professors do the research and then use this thing called "e-mail" to send the results to Akron for study. UofA does not need another "building" 20 miles from campus to pay for and maintain. They have plenty of room in Akron and if they need more, they can take over another vacated building downtown.

Like most of your posts, I'm not sure what you are getting at here. Moderates have no opinions, that's why they are moderates. Let's see. Like so many, kid has sex in high school. Sperm finds it way to egg and fertilizes the egg. Nine months later, girl has child. How many of us could that have happened to? How many on this board looking down their nose at this kid could that have happend to in high school? That's my point. It has nothing to do with the kid in question. I'm not sure about the gray area in science or the probability/outcome factor.

What makes Rasor's opinion or the players valid? The players are college kids who aren't exactly experts at the big picture. Rasor is a law student who writes a blog and has limited access to the program these days. I could get posts from the AD and Coach I saying they expect to win next year. That doesn't sound like "writing off this season as a rebuilding year" to me. I'm sure that in this age of the internet, there is a certain desire to start searching for any quote by anyone in the program that may have used the word "rebuild". Save yourself the time. High school debate club does not interest me. None of us really know what they are thinking because they have been so closed mouthed. I have no problem with that. Patience. Let's see how they do on the field.

You list 31 examples (and Barry Alvarez twice). 26 of those (Miles, Saban, Peterson, Walker, Alvarez, Smith, Petrino, Tiller, Leach, Mangino, Bob Stoops, Friedgen, Pinckel, Pelini, Tuberville, Jones, Schiano, Dantonio, Golden, Mike Stoops, Erickson, Tedford, Richt, Hill, Davis, Edsall) were at least offensive or defensive coordinators before becoming a HC. Something Ianello has never done. 9 of them (Miles, Saban, Petrino, Friedgen, Pelini, Schiano, Hill, Davis, Edsall) coached something in the NFL along with having coordinator experience. 2 of them (Barnett at Fort Lewis College, Davis at Tulsa Rodgers High School) coached as a HC at a lower level first. Out of your list, only Shembechler, Fry, and Neuheisel started off going from a college position coach to a FBS head coach. If you go back and look at the threads that were around during the coaching search, you would find that I was not opposed to hiring someone with coordinator experience but believed that head coaching experience would be the preferred option. At least coordinators deal with half of roster (40 or more players) and call plays in game situations instead of just coaching 8 or 9 guys as a position coach. Ianello has never been more than a position coach. He can recruit for easy-to-recruit schools and he can sort of coach WRs. What he can't do is call plays or recruit for a school that doesn't sell itself. I agree with you. This has to at least concern people that, not only has he not been a head coach, but also has not been a coordinator. But the thing that really bothers me is that Akron, one of only 120 or so D-1A schools, SHOULD be able to get a guy with HC experience, if they wanted one. And someone else tried to make the "well...everyone needs to start somewhere" point. And that's fine, IF they are "starting somewhere" much earlier in their career. With the length of time he has been in coaching, you have to at least wonder why he has not at least been a OC or DC by this point. If he's been offered such jobs, and just has not taken them, then that would explain it for me. But, it just seems odd that he has not reached at least coordinator level with his lengthy tenure in coaching. Time will tell. He's coaching football at a MAC school, not running General Electric. I'm sure that for every success story you could point to where a guy with HC experiece did well, you could find 10 where he failed. Failure and getting fired is the nature of coaching. Coach I has done nothing wrong (with the exception of the texting mishap, but that seems to be working out and was really a small thing). Most of what he has done seems to be good. He ran a difficult and spirited spring program and he seems to be working hard at getting ready for fall camp. His players, especially PN, seem to be buying into his program. You guys may not like not having a golf outing, but he put on a program to support breast cancer research...that's a good thing. He had a good recruiting class for his limited time and staffing at UofA. With all "coachers", there is a search for points of reaffirmation about their idea. If a player fumbles, then we hear, "See, if the coach had HC experience, he wouldn't fumble." If an INT is thrown, same thing. And so on. It is the nature of being a "coacher". I say the PLAYERS need to get their asses in gear this season. There are enough returning starters (70%) to make a huge difference. They need to start playing. At the end of this year we will know more. I expect some bumps with any new coach, but as long as we don't fly off of the tracks, we should be OK. I expect the team to win 4-6 games this season. Anything above six and below four would be shocking to me.

You'd be surprised how many student-athletes have kids. Not if you think it is still the 1950s. ??????? Since you ask........ I sometimes get the feeling that we have a group of Puritans posting on this board who believe that any sign of what they see as immoral behavior should be cause for stoning. They live in a world where if a kid gets a girl pregnant in high school, then that is a sign of bad character. I'm sure that if the sex odds had turned out different for a lot of us, we might have been in the same position as Mr. Howard in high school.

Maybe they weren't being reported. I find it hard to believe that a guy with his money and fame wasn't doing these things years ago. Personally, I would be doing the same thing if I was in his position so I'm not looking down on his behavior. There is a big difference between what people want to believe about professional athletes and what they actually do.

You'd be surprised how many student-athletes have kids. Not if you think it is still the 1950s.

You'd be surprised how many student-athletes have kids. I'm sure your right about that. I just don't understand why this kid is making things difficult for himself. A baby is just one more obstacle and distraction. He has talent, but I question his work ethic and priorities. If he backs up the girl and kid the way he needs to, and never sees a D1 FB game, seems to me his priorities are fine. Isn't backing up the girl what got him into this trouble in the first place?.?.......

The only undies worth savoring belong to libertarian politicians, right? It depends on what she looks like......

Dear LeBron, Step 1: Fire the clowns you have around you. Step 2: Talk with Nike about replacing the clowns around you. Please call with questions....you know the number. Sincerely, The Great GP1