GP1

I understand what you are saying, but James is with Nike and UofA is with Addidas. Contracts are contracts, and there is only so much UofA can do to promote James under these circumstances. The current Athletic Department staff did not sign the Addidas contract and when it runs out, UofA should run to become a Nike school if they will have us. There is a guy with the initials of KD who may have some influence with a guy with the initials of LJ who could help. I agree with ZipsWin! in that I don't think promoting James is the answer either.This marketing staff does nothing more or less than what we have seen around here for the past 20 years. Billboards, newspaper advertisements, etc....it's the definition of insanity. There is actually an argument for them doing more as they increased football season tickets drastically after years of decline prior to them. I would credit ISP partnering with us for that increase, but it was Mack's decision. BB is not done yet so we can not make a judgement. I think many on this board need to get over the knee jerk reaction to blame the marketing staff for everything. We all know why this is and it is really starting to look silly. If anyone would like me to get into why it is and who is to blame for the Addidas contract and decline in football season tickets, I would be more than happy to debate that.

When I think of KD, I think he could be the Bill Cowher of the MAC. He could be the guy who wins a ton of games for a long time with talent less than other teams around him. As a fan, it is fun to watch, but there is a heartbreak element to it also. He'll come close a lot of the time to winning the MAC championship and fall short because of talent. He will win a MAC championship at some point because he will field good enough teams that at some point all the cards will fall his way and he will win in Cleveland. The question is not whether KD will win the MAC, but when he will win the MAC.The talent level in the MAC can only get better in the next few years so KD is going to need to improve the talent level on the team. This year may be the year all the cards are falling in place. The league is horrible, Akron has a veteran team that plays hard, the players are coachable, they are winning a lot (they need to keep the momentum up going into Cleveland) and on any night a win against one of the better teams in the league is not wishful thinking.Bill Cowher had to win 140 games before winning the Super Bowl and 149 games total in 15 years (more than any other team in that 15 year period). Let's hope KD doesn't take that long.I don't want to anger the Farking Gods, but this really should be the Zips year.

Double A will obviously get drafted 3-4. I think he is one of those players who will not be impacted by his performance at the Combine regardless of how it turns out.Getsy will not be drafted. The only question with him is what team needs a #3 willing to work for peanuts compared to other NFL players.

Akron shouldn't worry about anyone else on their schedule, cautious maybe, but not worried. They need to play like to they are a good team, which they are.

As of now it will.

Good point.Wood and Travis 12-18 (67%)Rest of team 13-32 (41%)

74ZIP makes one of my favorite points that people always fail to make when watching sports. It's the point that good athletes go a long way in covering up any problems a team may have. In general, athletic players can go a long way to cover up officiating problems and bad coaching decisions.When a good athlete is having a bad night, he can still be good enough to beat an inferior athlete. The inferior athlete must always be better than the superior athlete. The players are human beings and not robots; therefore, some will have off nights. Guarding against the off nights is the key.I didn't see the game last night, but it sounds as if the Zips played hard. As long as the Zips continue to play hard, good things will happen for them.

There is really no Zips Win! road jinx. It's just a story of a dedicated fan who honorably follows his team through many, many, many years of bad programs. It's not you, it's them.

BGSU is a "dog." They suck unless they're playing a Division III school, which is how they got their deceivingly decent record. BG is drawing about 1,200 at home, so there's no way they're bringing many on the road.Austin Peay is a HUGE game. We shouldn't need to discount tickets. It will be for either our 20th or 21st win, and it's on ESPN "something." People should pay for that game.If the Zips discount tickets the rest of the way out, they're being stupid and lazy. There's a good bandwagon rolling. Zips men's basketball is now proven to be a great product, and all remaining games have a good value.It's time people besides me started paying for their tickets. Good point. I'd still go with the 2.5 for 3 though. We bundle truckloads of products by discounting the cheapest product minimally and forcing customers to bundle that with a more proftiable product all the time where I work and it works out very well. The only game they would be discounting is the AP game and it could actually increase ticket sales for the other two games at regular price because people couldn't back out of the purchase once they did it. Casual fans have no idea that BGSU is bad, but they have heard of them. Most have no idea who or where AP is so I can't believe there would be any more interest than BGSU.The bandwagon fans are going to be there regardless, but maybe not to all three. They should force the bandwagon fans to purchase tickets for all three games just in case Akron slips in a game or they are considering plans for another event. Let's eliminate the excuse not to come and focus on a positive reason for them to come and guarantee the sale up front. The key is to give something up with out having to pull your pants down. If Akron slips in a game, the bandwagon will explode and fans could easily be reduced from 4,000 average for these three games to 3,200 (difference of 800 per game). That's the nature of bandwagon fans.If this would work, some of the walk up crowd expecting to purchase GA tickets would be forced into upper reserved. Few are going to walk away because of an extra $5 per ticket. Let's assume there are 2,000 GA seats, the discount is only about 16% on those seats and the ga seats sell out. A 16% increase in sales is only 320 people taking advantage of the promotion to break even for the AP game. Half of that is 160 which is the extra upper reserved tickets they would need to sell to those locked out of the promotion or casual walk up fan in order to break even if ga was sold out. Anything over that is gravy. If the game is sold out, standing room only tickets could be used as GA tickets if the purchasers do not show up for any reason.

Let's force people to buy tickets for the last three games early, but let's make them feel like they are getting a deal. This idea applies to General Admission tickets only.The last three games are against OU, BGSU and Austin Peay. OU and BGSU are interesting and will draw a decent crowd but not sell outs. AP is, let's just say, not interesting and I would be worried about a small crowd if I was the University.Anyone who buys OU and BGSU tickets (GA only) at full price can buy AP tickets at half price. The ticket must be purchased prior to the first of these three games. This could help sell out GA for all three games and force people to buy upper reserved which will make more money because of the higher cost in ticket. The real goal is to get people to show up for the AP game which is not very interesting to many.Also, one of my favorite statements is, "A bird in the hand is better than two in the bush". Selling the tickets early gets the money early. It's all about cash flow guys!

I only have 2.5 games of watching the Zips under my belt this year, but from what I have seen, Middleton brings more to the table. However, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The team is winning, the players have accepted their roles and everyone is happy. KD seems to have this team dialed in (no pun intended) and he should keep doing what he is doing until a change is needed.

If the Browns are smart (which the aren't), they will bring in a veteran QB to start next year. Make Frye and Anderson compete for the #2 spot. Sign a scrub to be #3. Cut the loser of the #2 competition. Beef up the OL to protect the veteranMore than anything, the Browns need a QB who can throw the ball down field and can complete passes under pressure. It's the chicken or the egg argument. The Browns don't have an OL so teams pressure the QB. If the QBs would complete passes under pressure, teams would have to stop attacking. If teams stop attacking, it opens up the running game. The NFL is a QB oriented league and the QBs the Browns have now are woefully inadequate.I've never thought much of Frye's abilities and I think he played his way out of a starting position with the Browns last year. In fact, I think he played his way out of being the next Kelly Holcomb and his career is coming to a close in the next 2 years (This opinion was confirmed when I heard Terry Pluto say this year Frye would be in the NFL 10 years). He doesn't throw down field, if it wasn't for that little 5 yard pass to Winslow he would complete very few passes, he loses too many yards when he gets sacked, he fumbles every other time he gets sacked and he is slow mentally. Losing yards and fumbling destroy any chances of winning and he does too much of both.Browns fans are not going to be patient waiting for a third year QB to develop into an average QB over the next 2-3 years and at this point they shouldn't be patient. Remember how we all sat around for four years waiting for him to develop into a championship QB? We're still waiting. Average QBs are a dime a dozen, the Browns could pick up an average veteran and have a better QB than what they have with Frye and Anderson who are both well below average. The NFL is not kind to players, especially QBs. I think Frye is in trouble.

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?amme...D(COLLID+fsac))A friend sent me the link to this web page. Just thought I would share since it isn't football season. It contains color photographs from WWII of various places. This happens to be the link to Akron. As you may know, color photos were few and far between back then so it is a bit of a treat to see.....especially the Air Dock with all of the old cars outside of it.

Here is why I don't agree.The people sitting in the lower level pay top dollar to sit there. I would guess that most don't want a continuous parade of people coming and going when someone arrives late to the game and there is the constant getting up and down to allow the ticket holder to sit down. Imagine sitting there and people coming up to you continually and saying, "Is someone sitting there?" while you arer trying to watch a game that you dished out $500 to sit in so you could have a good seat and not be bothered by late arrivers who didn't pay what you do. The people sitting there have bought the right not to be bothered with nonsense. Those people should be treated with respect.Secondly, I watched the entire game and the lower level looked full on TV. Unless a person was really paying attention to the tops of the ends, the entire stadium looked full.One of the things I know for sure is that when you give someone something for nothing, they expect something for nothing. UofA has spent decades conditioning the people of the area to expect something for nothing and it needs to stop. If someone doesn't pay to sit down low, they should not get to sit down low.

Was he wearing a pink suit?

If there were banners and now there aren't, shame on the University. I've never taken inventory. We can't hide from who we are. We are a school that started out Division III, then II, then I-AA and then what we are now. Instead of hiding from it, we should embrace it. It's our history.On Tuesday, I went to the UCONN vs. PITT game and I noticed their banners. Their team didn't always win something to be noted on a banner. Basically, they had one for every year in the NCAA Tournament and yes, they had another for years in the NIT (one for each category with the year only). They have some championship banners. They also have individual banners for Sweet 16 appearances and various other accomplishments.Banners are not only good reminders of accomplishments, but they can remind players every day, who may have not won anything (present players included), that they have something to prove and can leave their mark on the ceiling. You can get angry about various things in the past, but never hide from the past. We are who we are.

A couple of weeks ago I said that the bb team needed to string a few wins in a row together for the bandwagon to start. KD and his kids have done their part. Now it is up the people in Summit and Stark Counties to start to support this program. Too bad we scheduled a game on the same day and the same time as the NFC and AFC Championships. Couldn't they move the game up to noon?

Agreed!This nonsense has gone back to one of the greatest myths about UofA sports and that is Huggins would have stayed at Akron of Faust was not hired.There are actually a few good myths about UofA sports. Perhaps a topic is in order...even a poll.

Disagreed and here's why. I think a big problem JD has run into with recruiting SO MANY kids from Florida is that they come from a different world and many times (not all the time) have discipline and attitude problems. From players I've talked to the unity that used to exist on this team is just not there anymore. Good points, but if the kids want more unity, they should join a fraternity. If they want to hold hands and sing "We Are The World", they should join a commune in California. This is a major college football team and not a love fest.There is not enough Division 1-A talent in Ohio for OSU, Akron, OU, BGSU, Can't State, Toledo, Miami and Cincinnati to field top notch teams year in and year out. How did all of that team unity and discipline work out for Ohio State when they were getting their asses kicked by Florida last Monday?We went throught the "bring in local kids" nonsense with Lee Owens and it was a disaster.

The answer to the question of "JD should..." is, get the best players possible on the field regardless of where they are from.

If you allow people to sit wherever they want, then they will feel entitled to sit wherever they want. When the new stadium is built, they will feel entitled to sit in the reserved sectiion even if they didn't pay for it because like a child they will say, "but we did it at the Rubber Bowl". If people want to sit in reserved seats, they should pay to sit in them. It's not much more money to sit in reserved than GA. The Univeristy needs to break the culture of entitlement.

http://www.dispatch.com/prep/preps.php?sto...0111-E7-00.htmlJust got back to my hotel and found this article in the local paper.

They probably could not afford to do so. A really good marketing executive probably makes much more than either JD or KD.

No it isn't. They were nice people, but just more of the same billboard buyers and newspaper add buyers we saw here for the past 20 years. They also had more than their share of give away programs as well. There was actually a decline in season ticket holders for football during their time. If the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.....well, we would still be in the same boat we are now.....someone who cut his teeth at Virginia buying billboards and newspaper adds resulting in half empty stadiums or full of people who didn't pay to get in and us bitching about it. It goes on, and on, and on, and on.........One thing they were really good at though was self promotion. And we can continue this discussion further if anyone wishes.

This is so unbelievable it must be true.Why wouldn't the athletic department just offer 10% of any NEW season ticket order sold or Z-Fund contribution raised by an Athletic Department employee to that employee? Hell, open it up to anyone working at the University and get everyone involved. Employee sells 10 Family Packs for football @ $100 ea., employee gets $100 bonus, etc. The incentive must be there to produce similar to my company only paying independent sales agents commission. If they sell a lot, they make a lot, but so do we. If they don't sell a lot, they don't make a lot, but the cost of sale was kept low. I wonder if anyone at an athletic department convention has ever offered up this idea. The pay for some of these people is so low, they would bust their ass just to make a few extra dollars.Give 20% commission to any NEW reserved seat sold for football. I think my tickets were only $15 each, so the net after commission would still be $12 which was more than the general admission seating (normal or Family Pack) and they have a new customer buying high end tickets at face value. Even if tickets remain the same price next year, there would be an increase value of the ticket 20% if the person renews.UofA will never know if they can change the culture around Akron and sell more tickets unless they get away from buying billboards and newspaper adds. Try the other way.