The unofficial online home for fans of the UAB Blazers. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

(03-17-2015 09:08 PM)58-56 Wrote:  

(03-17-2015 08:32 PM)CajunBlazer Wrote:  We all have been assuming that Watts is still paying Direct Communication to run his PR campaign even after that disastrous leak John Archibald exposed. Given their exorbitant rates combined with their p*ss poor performance, Watts should have fired them long ago. Just about everyone of Watts' clumsy attempts to "move forward" and clean up his reputation has resulted in total disaster.

We have all been calling for Watts' removal even though we all know that the BOT will replace him with another (probably more politically savvy) puppet. Since Watts' incompetence is one of best assets of the FreeUAB movement, perhaps we should be happy he is still around. Maybe we should hope that the BOT doesn't figure that out.

There is a procedure to follow, which means they have to invoke a search committee. Last time they did not pick that committee's top recommendation, which is going to be harder this time. But the biggest source of interference was from East Side types whining that UAB had to, just had to, "replace the nurse with a doctor."

Unfortunately, we're not making this stuff up: Watts really is destroying UAB. The longer he sticks around, the harder the damage is to repair. He has to go.

Direct Communications has been a valuable asset to #FreeUAB. They were obviously picked for their personal connections to Trustees, which is going to make them harder to fire.

All true, but I guess I am looking at the bigger picture. I see Watts as the symptom rather than the disease. The disease is most certainly the BOT which is pulling Watts' puppet strings. Ridding the body of the symptoms without with affecting the disease often makes the malady more insidious and harder to identify and conquer.

All I know is that Watts' stunts and the fact that the BOT has done nothing but support him makes it infinitely easier for our team to convince legislators that something must be done legislatively about the BOT.

I too have often called for Watts to be fired, but since he doesn't appear to be going anywhere soon, I intend to put him to the best use possible and the man is a seemingly endless source of pro FreeUAB ammunition.

(03-17-2015 09:39 PM)CajunBlazer Wrote:  

(03-17-2015 09:08 PM)58-56 Wrote:  

(03-17-2015 08:32 PM)CajunBlazer Wrote:  We all have been assuming that Watts is still paying Direct Communication to run his PR campaign even after that disastrous leak John Archibald exposed. Given their exorbitant rates combined with their p*ss poor performance, Watts should have fired them long ago. Just about everyone of Watts' clumsy attempts to "move forward" and clean up his reputation has resulted in total disaster.

We have all been calling for Watts' removal even though we all know that the BOT will replace him with another (probably more politically savvy) puppet. Since Watts' incompetence is one of best assets of the FreeUAB movement, perhaps we should be happy he is still around. Maybe we should hope that the BOT doesn't figure that out.

There is a procedure to follow, which means they have to invoke a search committee. Last time they did not pick that committee's top recommendation, which is going to be harder this time. But the biggest source of interference was from East Side types whining that UAB had to, just had to, "replace the nurse with a doctor."

Unfortunately, we're not making this stuff up: Watts really is destroying UAB. The longer he sticks around, the harder the damage is to repair. He has to go.

Direct Communications has been a valuable asset to #FreeUAB. They were obviously picked for their personal connections to Trustees, which is going to make them harder to fire.

All true, but I guess I am looking at the bigger picture. I see Watts as the symptom rather than the disease. The disease is most certainly the BOT which is pulling Watts' puppet strings. Ridding the body of the symptoms without with affecting the disease often makes the malady more insidious and harder to identify and conquer.

All I know is that Watts' stunts and the fact that the BOT has done nothing but support him makes it infinitely easier for our team to convince legislators that something must be done legislatively about the BOT.

I too have often called for Watts to be fired, but since he doesn't appear to be going anywhere soon, I intend to put him to the best use possible and the man is a seemingly endless source of pro FreeUAB ammunition.

The fact that he's handled this so incompetently makes me wonder.

I've heard from a number of people who worked with him before he was UAB president. Very very smart man they said. But even they said he completely bumbled this football situation.

We all know Watts is the puppet. What if the BOT sold him on the job by saying we want to increase UAB's research prestige and medical school prestige-- something he would support. Then when he steps into the job word comes down that these are going to be at the price of football and eventually the undergrad. The BOT sends people who show him numbers-- he knows nothing about the business of football, so he believes them. He thinks that it must be done.

But then he does the deed and then the backlash starts. He's made a huge mistake. So what does he do when he realizes he was given the new job to be a hatchetman, not a leader for the new century?

If he truly worked to become a better president, he could still not bring football back with the BOT's blessing. He'd be kicked out and replaced with another puppet extremely quickly. Remember that even as pro-UAB as Garrison was she could not fight the BOT, nor come out publicly about their interference. So he bides his time. He doesn't try to repair his image-- this will only help the BOT. He plays the part of a hatchetman. He tries to make it as obvious as possible. He does everything how the BOT wants, but also exactly wrong. He becomes the symbol of the BOT, rather than the scapegoat of the BOT.

The endgame is the death of the BOT. He'll go down too, but he was going down anyways. This way he can take them with him.

One can hope.

I just received and invitation from the NAS inviting me to their Watch Party Thursday. I thought I would share my emailed reply:

I saw Dr. Watts also invited me to your Watch Party. I am sure that you will understand that there is no way on God's green earth that I would now set foot in the NAS building that day.

You need to understand that in the eyes of most alumni advertizing your relationship with Dr. Watts is not healthy for your organization..

(03-17-2015 11:21 PM)CajunBlazer Wrote:  I just received and invitation from the NAS inviting me to their Watch Party Thursday. I thought I would share my emailed reply:

I saw Dr. Watts also invited me to your Watch Party. I am sure that you will understand that there is no way on God's green earth that I would now set foot in the NAS building that day.

You need to understand that in the eyes of most alumni advertizing your relationship with Dr. Watts is not healthy for your organization..

Advertising, not advertizing.

The True Alumni Building is Iron City. NAS Bldg didn't hold the Coach Clark celebration or NCAA Viewing Party.

(03-17-2015 10:04 PM)sadolakced Wrote:  The fact that he's handled this so incompetently makes me wonder.

I've heard from a number of people who worked with him before he was UAB president. Very very smart man they said. But even they said he completely bumbled this football situation.

We all know Watts is the puppet. What if the BOT sold him on the job by saying we want to increase UAB's research prestige and medical school prestige-- something he would support. Then when he steps into the job word comes down that these are going to be at the price of football and eventually the undergrad. The BOT sends people who show him numbers-- he knows nothing about the business of football, so he believes them. He thinks that it must be done.

But then he does the deed and then the backlash starts. He's made a huge mistake. So what does he do when he realizes he was given the new job to be a hatchetman, not a leader for the new century?

If he truly worked to become a better president, he could still not bring football back with the BOT's blessing. He'd be kicked out and replaced with another puppet extremely quickly. Remember that even as pro-UAB as Garrison was she could not fight the BOT, nor come out publicly about their interference. So he bides his time. He doesn't try to repair his image-- this will only help the BOT. He plays the part of a hatchetman. He tries to make it as obvious as possible. He does everything how the BOT wants, but also exactly wrong. He becomes the symbol of the BOT, rather than the scapegoat of the BOT.

The endgame is the death of the BOT. He'll go down too, but he was going down anyways. This way he can take them with him.

One can hope.

That is by far the most absurd theory I have ever seen put forth on this board. Let me boil it down for you: 1) Watts did what he did and the way he did it because he is a puppet. 2) Though he may be smart as a whip, Watts continues to do what he does, the way he does it, because he is clueless on how to deal with people.

I thought it was possible that it was something like that at first, that his hand was being forced and that he acted accordingly because he really didn't have a choice one way or another.

Then it was readily apparent that he didn't give a damn and was all about that salary. A man that is merely following orders doesn't get angry when there's push back against the nonsense he's trying to accomplish. If he cared about the school at all, he wouldn't be wasting money and trying so hard to put knives in the backs of people trying to make things better. As far as I'm concerned, the only thing Dr. Watts cares about UAB wise is that paycheck.

I can only wish he'd pull some kind of reverse Mackin and start sharing everything to drag the board down with him someday.

(03-17-2015 11:50 PM)Hopeful Wrote:  Then it was readily apparent that he didn't give a damn and was all about that salary. A man that is merely following orders doesn't get angry when there's push back against the nonsense he's trying to accomplish. If he cared about the school at all, he wouldn't be wasting money and trying so hard to put knives in the backs of people trying to make things better. As far as I'm concerned, the only thing Dr. Watts cares about UAB wise is that paycheck.

Fully agree. Just look at the extended 11-minute version of the Football Meeting (BlazerTV has it). That is one twisted bastard at that podium, enjoying every minute of it. When he sneers at Ty Long fairly early in the clip, it's really evident. He's a cartoon villain in that video and absolutely unperturbed. A man following orders does not act that way.

Also, football was not Target One. That was the GASP clean air program, one that Watts helped found, that he killed as soon as he became president to satisfy the coal barons on the Board. Then he attacked the "elitists" of the Honors College.

The only thing that could possibly mitigate his moral guilt would be some kind of brain tumor/injury or senile dementia that's turned him into Dick Dastardly without the mustache. I know such a thing is possible but don't know a lot more than that.

(03-17-2015 04:22 PM)58-56 Wrote:  

(03-17-2015 04:03 PM)Memphis Blazer Wrote:  To be objective, show me the part where he took credit.

Our strategic plan moving forward is to continue to provide the financial and other support needed to make UAB basketball a perennial powerhouse.

"Strategic plan" has been his code phrase for "destroying football" since December 2nd, when he used it in front of the players and multiple times in his press conference. This moral and physical coward is claiming that he made this championship possible by removing football.

Watts is once again attempting to steal others' glory. My fury has been stoked into white-hot rage. This cancerous pumpkin must be removed from our beloved university.

Anyone who writes "moving forward" in any context other than directional reference can blow me.

& anyone that doesn't believe that Watts knew what he was hired to do needs to get examined.