RE: The Day Tiger Football died
I saw nothing wrong with the Original Post. If I may:
With respect to Memphis football: The administration is NOT behind football or the donors simply prefer to support Memphis basketball, period. Most of them probably are Vols football fans, as sad as that is. See Rick N. (UCLA) departure speech as to how not putting the funds behind the program will cost you. If you've lived in Memphis your whole life, I can see where you might not be the most objective about the situation. The Liberty Bowl is horrible, horrible. It's old, not on campus, low seating capacity and in a horrible neighbor hood. The main reason we are passed on: The Memphis Media market.
With respect to the BigEast: Even with the additions they are still the worst BCS conference by far. Obviously the BigEast looked past geographics this time, mainly because they had no choice, but, also, because they picked up some MAJOR TV markets. Memphis isn't even in the top 35 metropolitan markets, whereas SanDiego, Houston and Orlando are in the Top 15, if not Top 10. They are also in heavily recruited areas for talent - Southern California, Texas and Florida. Boise St. was a no-brainer for football, although they don't fit with the whole "BigEast" name brand. I imagine the BigEast was hoping to keep BYU, add BoiseSt, San Diego St, Houston, SMU for a "western" division. I believe we were passed over for Houston, just like we were passed over in the past for Louisville and Cincinnati. Memphis is not Houston. They have 3 Professional Sports teams, we have 0. We couldn't even hold onto the Titans when the opportunity presented itself. The BigEast now has the opportunity to have football on their networks from 11amCST to 11pmcst, all day Saturday, that has to be attractive.
The city itself, Memphis, and it's leaders are just as much to blame as the University. We are doing NOTHING to make business attractive for the city, and that's why all the new build and money is in the suburbs, not going downtown or anywhere near the Liberty Bowl.
Conference USA should have been more proactive instead of letting itself get raped and pillaged. We should have gone after BYU and Boise St and TCU, perhaps San Diego ST, Fresno ST., broke into divisions, and diligently tried to secure an AQ bid for the BCS (which is on the verge of crumbling). We even have the name "CUSA" to support such moves.
We need basketball to stay REAL strong. We need the administration and city to get behind a new stadium. Football, Liberty Bowl bowl game, outside concerts, neutral site games for other football games, etc. Hire an Athletic Director that appears to have stepped outside of the midsouth for a period of time, it's a national landscape, by the time RC gets finished with a sentence, the boys in the North and West have finished business, ate dinner and put the kids to bed.
That's my late night humble opinion rant anyway.....
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The Day Tiger Football died
