(01-21-2021 11:54 AM)Statefan Wrote: Wahoo - I don't know how old you are. Based on your knowledge base you sound like you are less than 40. I mean you no slight but I am nearly 60 and get part of my "inside" information from people like Bill Friday and Bill Cobey. I am a NC State because me father took me to basketball games where I met David Thompson, Tommy Burleson, Monte Towe, Norm Sloan, etc. I met them at the locker room after the game. Then I was a student at NC State where I was lucky to know Jim Valvano, I attended UNC, and Duke as well. My wife has worked or does now work at UNC, State, and Duke. I have taught at VT. I have paid ******* tuition at WF for one of my children. In this strange, compact world, I don't have to press people like Debbie Yow for info. I don't have to press Chancellors or Presidents. I have had the unique pleasurer of attending classes with both Carolina's and NC State's dumbest basketball player.
Swofford is a pimp. Nothing more, nothing less. He pimps what he has to sell. He "hates" NC State for three reasons - 1. Our Chancellor embarrassed him in 2003 and made him out as a liar to Syracuse. (He can forgive Duke and UNC) 2. He is a UNC/UVa man. 3. Most of all NC State gutted it's sports programs in 1990 and they have never fully recovered. He can't pimp us. Pimping value is what he values. As far as Raycom goes, the ptb at UNC, Duke, WF, UVa, NC State, and MD were wedded to Raycom as was their *** **** right. Was it an incestous family thing - yes, but the family is/was wider than you realize.
Duke University cut ACC football throat in 1962. It took 15 years for the ACC to claw its way back. As soon as Clemson won the National Title, they were caught making cash payments. They kind of cash payments that you have to make if you wanted to win back in the early 80's. The same payments that Georgia, Auburn, Alabama, and TN made. They drew an NCAA and an ACC probation. The ACC probation last longer because no one at Clemson appealed the action by the ACC committee who handled the league side of things. No sooner than Ford was run off Len Bias died of a coccain overdose and UM gutted it's programs. Sweaty Gary's on NCAA title does not compare to Lefty's program. No football coach matched Ross and the downward socioeconomic/sports spiral started at MD that has not abated. At the same time MD was politically beholden and ego beholden to continue funding non revenue programs also carried by UVa and UNC and Duke. Sweaty Gary quit recruiting and started hanging out a student parties allowing suggestive photos of him to be be taken. Fridge reneged on his retirement causing them to loose James Franklin. I won't attempt to get into the deep racial and political issues at UM, but they have been there since the graduate programs were moved to Baltimore in 1970.
Swofford was not a genius or a ninja. But he did work with what he had. The big mistake was not going to market for bids before Bobby Bowden got too old at FSU and before it was figured out that Miami was past it's superstar status. He could not do anything about MD because the MD System Chancellor and former Ohio State President had already decided to move MD and use the cover of the Big 10 to also attempt take over all other UM units and put them under UMCP. By quirk of timing I got to hear part of VT's President take on being lied to by Kirwan although the one most undercut just retired from Wake Forest.
Blaming Swofford for things that the Presidents and Chancellors did is foolish. The Big 10 AD did not bring PSU to the Big 10. Illinois' President did that.
If you pick a convenient scapegoat, you learn nothing. You understand nothing. You are apt to repeat the same mistake.
State fan - If it makes any difference, I’m 58 years old (graduated from UVA in 1984)...about your age.
Obviously Swofford “work[ed] with what he had”, everyone does. My contention is that he has not been a good commissioner for the ACC. For example, Delaney was an excellent commissioner because he had foresight to advocate for his own TV network that created a first-mover financial bonanza; Slive was a very good commissioner because he convinced SEC members to collaborate and drive for the common conference well-being. At best, Swofford has been a care-taker who way over-stayed his usefulness by about 15 years.
Conference commissioners are hired to generate revenue. Football and media are the two disciplines that he needed to master, but he’s further behind today than he was 25 years ago. In business school marketing terminology, Swofford can be classified somewhere between a late-adopter or laggard...while the ACC needed an innovator or early-adopter to keep pace in revenue generation. You whine about athletic self-destruction at NC State and Maryland...but where were the commissioner’s best practices efforts from the well-healed programs.
To be specific about my second guessing of Swafford’s actions...
1) He should have more forcefully promoted a football conference championship game much earlier than 2005 (although Miami was the key school)
2) He should have focused on football culture, rather than TV markets, in the first expansion (although Mark Warner saved him from himself & ESPN)
3) He should have battled the NCAA for a greater share of revenue from Tournament wins (for goodness sakes...he could have better leveraged the hoops success of UNC, Duke, Maryland, Syracuse, Louisville and Virginia)
4) He should have made the conference more appealing to genuine football brands (e.g., Notre Dame, PSU, Florida and UGA)
5) He should not have bundled all TV rights in one contract (the financial advantages of diversification are well understood in all businesses; and by all other P5 conferences)
6) He should not have signed such a long-term media rights contract in 2012 (the ACC’s value & leverage were at a historic low)
We could continue, but it would get too depressing. Swofford is hardly a victim...he has a competent army helping him generate revenue. He started his tenure with a strong hand and played the game for 24 years...being well compensated for his work.