A response to "Time to move on"
There are a handful of members on this forum who on an almost monthly basis express their desires for an end to the division between the life-long supporters of ETSU athletics and those who run it. The most trumpeted charge found, in their in all too familiar emphasis on unity for the sake of unity, is that of their overwhelmingly tiresome reaction of disgust to the whining from those yet to be converts still clinging on with dear life for the return of ETSU Football. Well, I don't see whining...I see outrage from a body of people whose common link is an unwavering devotion to a strong athletic program for a university which they support with devout dedication. Make no mistake... Football will return to ETSU. I can't tell you if it will be ten, twenty, thirty, or even forty years from now but it will return. Upon it's return I for one would feel chagrined if at any point I had taken up the passive cause of those who seek to hold hands with an administration who selfishly humbled our beloved athletic program for the purpose of advancing their own country club agenda. No one should bow their heads in a lazy effort to get along with the current administration until they have asked...Are ETSU athletics as respected now, in the community or across the region, as they were five years ago? Are we okay with being pitied by Chattanooga fans as a once great institution who stumbled into our twilight years with crippling impotence while they surge ahead with an effort to breathe new life into their football program? Are we satisfied with being in a conference made up of schools whose fans have less spirit than elderly bingo games? Are we okay with having a twenty win basketball season and still receiving a sixteenth seed in the NCAA tournament? If your answer is no then it is time for you to get behind and actively seek a new beginning at East Tennessee State University.
The passive fan will accuse those of us who are openly dissatisfied with the administration and the overall direction of the sports program to be living in the past and therefor out of touch with the realities of the day. A few of them take on a twisted delight in declaring our best days are behind us. One of them in particular even dared to impugn the accomplishments of Jennings. They eagerly dismiss our great successes and large crowds as merely flukes. I utterly reject this view. It took an uncompromising belief in the program to reach those tall and mighty towers of success and it will take a similar determined spirit to achieve them again.
We on this side of the aisle are sometimes incorrectly viewed as anti-ETSU. Nothing could be further from the truth. Let me tell you who we are. We want the absolute best for ETSU. We want a basketball team that is athletic, well coached, hard-working, with a strong fan base, worthy adversaries, and a chance to win games in the NCAA tournament as often as humanly possible. In order for this wish to become a reality we require a football team, which leads me to our next wish. We want football. We believe that it is essential to the overall success of ETSU that the blue and gold suit up every Saturday during the fall and those who don't believe in this have no business leading our athletic program. Other universities of our size, such as Austin Peay, have flirted with an existence without football, saw the folly of their failed policies, and quickly sought to reinstate the biggest sport in America. In fact this is a trend going on in college athletics today and it is a trend that we so badly want to be a part of. We are not against the existence of minor college sports but we are adamantly against the obscene amount of money the university spends on Tennis and Golf while the great American pigskin is nowhere to be found. We are not against the recruitment of foreign athletes but it infuriates us to helplessly look on as the university cancels a sport that offered a great number of American students academic and athletic opportunities in order to fund foreign-filled sports at the level of SEC schools or better. And while we are constantly focused on the future we strongly reject the administration's constant attempt to distance ETSU from it's past.
It is true that we sometimes differ on how to reach our stated goal but rest assured that we do not differ on the stated goal. Although it is unlikely football can be reinstated under this current administration we would be doing a disservice to not keep this issue on the forefront so that when it comes time for new leadership the powers that be will be less likely to sneak in an anti-football mindset to continue in the self-destructive policies of this current administration. It is our responsibility to be mobilized and ready to be heard on that glorious day when new leadership is sought after.
We support the athletes on the court in spite of the current paralyzing policies of the administration and we trumpet the coaches who have gone out and recruited well despite the limitations of the Atlantic Sun. And do not deceive yourselves for we are not as big and physical as we were five short years ago. We seek to win the Atlantic Sun every year that we are forced to be in it and we are utterly embarrassed when we don't.
We are not shills and therefor are not deceived by the administrations disingenuous claims that it was unfair to keep football because the sport took too much money from the pockets of other sports therefor rendering it impossible for those minor sports to be competitive. Well, all one has to do is look up box scores and you will quickly learn that five years later we still have several little sports that are not competitive. And if winning were truly a high priority concerning the country club sports then we would see changes at the coaching ranks. Head coaches would be fired and either their assistants would take over or someone from the outside brought in. It begs the question...how many losing seasons could Bartow survive?
As the administration sits idly by and allows these sports to fail it very haughtily denies it's own football alumni to host their annual meeting on campus. Indeed, this is an administration that sets out to quieten fans at championship basketball games when the right of an NCAA Birth is on the line. It is an administration that apologizes for the behavior of it's fans such as chanting "Air ball". An administration that refuses to honor three of it's all time greatest players by properly retiring their Jerseys to the rafters to remind fans and players what it means to be a buccaneer.
Our problems are both acute and chronic. Yet all we hear from those in a position of power are the same tired excuses of winning the right way which is exactly the sorry state of mind that got us here in the first place. In an age where Gardner Webb and Campbell pass us by as they make a break for the big south and Saturday afternoon football can anyone look at the record of this administration and say, well done? Can anyone compare the state of our athletic department from the day Mullins took over to where we are today and say, Keep up the good work? Can anyone look at our reduced standing and the quality of conference play and say, let's continue in this direction? Can anyone sit inside the dome and look on as fellow spectators show up wearing Appalachian State paraphernalia to our A-sun games without being deeply embarrassed and shamed? I believe if Rasmussen came to Johnson City and took a public opinion poll the approval rating of this administration would unequivocally be, NO we've had enough!
I can't quote it exactly...but Les Robinson said something in Chip Kessler's book that I think it would do us all well to be reminded of. Les was hired on right after Barry Dowd disintegrated our program into the ground with several NCAA violations and in that first year the bucs were lucky if they could get a thousand people to show up for a home game. Les commented that this area is a basketball spirited town just waiting to be unleashed. As it turned out he and two of his successors tapped into that spirit. A spirit which burned with zeal in the hearts of thousands. Some say that spirit is no longer there but I've seen it...it's still there. It can be found on this board and throughout this town. It is like a smoldering ember left over from a great fire. Not anything that is openly impressive in it's present form but if properly utilized it has the power to blaze into life when the conditions are right. Thanks to the efforts of a certain board member one only has to access youtube to see for himself just what is possible here. Two great dynasties are currently represented there. The Mister years as well as the Wadood era. Upon viewing these videos can you have any doubt of the potential at ETSU? And after one concludes the great potential that is lying dormant at ETSU the following truths become self-evident. It requires a spark. That spark is a better conference. A better conference requires football. Football is not the historic disaster that they would have you believe. The opportunity is here just waiting to be unleashed again. What kind of program is it that you seek for ETSU?
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