(09-04-2017 01:45 PM)Purplehazed Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 12:10 PM)DoubleDDuke Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 11:17 AM)Purplehazed Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 08:54 AM)Potomac Wrote:  It'll be brought up in every thread every year until he leaves. I can guarantee you. It's the new "FBS or Bust" infection on our message board.

It will be brought up every week one way or another. It's relevant.

If Houston leaves after this season for average or below G5 gig, a la Withers, or a non HC job at a P5, we've got our answer about JMU's conference future.

He may stay a few years if he is waiting on a mid-atlantic ACC gig if JMU treats him well but don't forget we are dealing with JMU, JMU will not pay top dollar for a sports coach.

Dude, unless you're a million dollar donor, what do you expect? It's not that JMU "will not" pay top dollar, it's that they can't. Simple as that. However you want to break it down, we're a stepping stone program and if somebody gives the guy $3 million a year or something, I'll wish him the best and root for him. It is what it is. Hopefully he has an ambition to finally take us up to the next level and we can retain him and pay him.

I should not have used the term top dollar...I meant JMU already stretched for Withers and Houston at $300K. JMU won't widen the pay gap between football and the other sports.

Look at history, wrong or right, JMU won't pay up for a coach.

What do you think will happen, assume JMU runs the table which is tough but could happen.

Well, I think they bumped his base $30k after last year. I don't know how far they can go. The burden is really on us in this discussion. JMU can't print money. Also, it's not just the head coach. I believe they stepped it up quite a bit for his staff. Unless WE all contribute, there's only so much that can be done. Houston has said he wants to raise his family in one place so we'll see. Also, he has incentives and at the least, $330k in Harrisonburg isn't bad.

JMU deserves all credit and we Pirate fans are laying in the bed we made. Payback for the 1993 CAA mens basketball championship game? Will be pulling for the Dukes the rest of the way. I knew we had our hands full with you guys. I actually posted before the game that you guys would be a top 50 team if in the FBS right now. You guys looked more like a top 25 team Saturday. I'm not sure if you guys are that good or we just suck that bad. Likely a bit of both. Either way it's a good time to be a JMU fan and we ECU fans will just have to take our lumps for a while. Good luck the rest of the way!

(09-04-2017 02:07 PM)B easy Wrote:  JMU deserves all credit and we Pirate fans are laying in the bed we made. Payback for the 1993 CAA mens basketball championship game? Will be pulling for the Dukes the rest of the way. I knew we had our hands full with you guys. I actually posted before the game that you guys would be a top 50 team if in the FBS right now. You guys looked more like a top 25 team Saturday. I'm not sure if you guys are that good or we just suck that bad. Likely a bit of both. Either way it's a good time to be a JMU fan and we ECU fans will just have to take our lumps for a while. Good luck the rest of the way!

JMU is that good. I told one of my pirate friends that JMU would be at least mid pack in the AAC if we joined this year... he of course balked at it. Now, he agrees.

They raised him from 300k to 375k. He also received 87k in bonuses. If he duplicates last years success, he'll make over 460k. Not quite low level FBS money, but close enough depending on cost of living. I would hope he wouldn't leave unless it was AAC or higher though. We really couldn't come close to that money-wise anyway.
https://pilotonline.com/sports/college/e...0d389.html

(09-04-2017 02:09 PM)HolyCityDuke Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 02:07 PM)B easy Wrote:  JMU deserves all credit and we Pirate fans are laying in the bed we made. Payback for the 1993 CAA mens basketball championship game? Will be pulling for the Dukes the rest of the way. I knew we had our hands full with you guys. I actually posted before the game that you guys would be a top 50 team if in the FBS right now. You guys looked more like a top 25 team Saturday. I'm not sure if you guys are that good or we just suck that bad. Likely a bit of both. Either way it's a good time to be a JMU fan and we ECU fans will just have to take our lumps for a while. Good luck the rest of the way!

JMU is that good. I told one of my pirate friends that JMU would be at least mid pack in the AAC if we joined this year... he of course balked at it. Now, he agrees.

I hope that you guys would be good enough to contend for the AAC title because that would mean that we still have a chance to be a middle of the pack AAC team. Wishful thinking I know.

(09-04-2017 02:13 PM)olddawg Wrote:  They raised him from 300k to 375k. He also received 87k in bonuses. If he duplicates last years success, he'll make over 460k. Not quite low level FBS money, but close enough depending on cost of living. I would hope he wouldn't leave unless it was AAC or higher though. We really couldn't come close to that money-wise anyway.
https://pilotonline.com/sports/college/e...0d389.html

Thank you for clarifying that. I obviously got it wrong. I think we'd be a fine institution in the AAC but we'll see what happens. Every time we play them, we beat them. If They don't like that comment, let's schedule more games.

(09-04-2017 02:13 PM)olddawg Wrote:  They raised him from 300k to 375k. He also received 87k in bonuses. If he duplicates last years success, he'll make over 460k. Not quite low level FBS money, but close enough depending on cost of living. I would hope he wouldn't leave unless it was AAC or higher though. We really couldn't come close to that money-wise anyway.
https://pilotonline.com/sports/college/e...0d389.html

The only way schools come to dominate the mid/lower tiers by retaining top coaches is to exponentially outspend their peers (Witchita State, etc). NDSU was successful promoting from within but if JMU wants to rule the top of FCS we'd need to become the clear leader in compensation.

Same goes for MBB. The "CAA average" isn't going to cut it, let alone the low end of CAA. If you do luck out with a low cost "find" he/she is most likely going to leave sooner rather than later. The churn of changing staff every 3 to 5 year creates inconsistency in success.

I would pose a larger investment in the HC for revenue sports more than pays for itself by reducing the potential donor and fanbase tailspins suffered by years of bottoming out and having to work your way back. Just look at our Men's BB program. ECU FB may end up being another example of this. Cost of opportunity.

JMU is 10-4 all-time vs. the current teams in the AAC. 6-3 FCS vs. FCS. 4-1 FCS vs. FBS.

South Florida 1-1
Connecticut 4-1
UCF 1-1
East Carolina 1-0
Navy 2-1
SMU 1-0

(09-04-2017 03:50 PM)DooX Wrote:  JMU is 10-4 all-time vs. the current teams in the AAC. 6-3 FCS vs. FCS. 4-1 FCS vs. FBS.

South Florida 1-1
Connecticut 4-1
UCF 1-1
East Carolina 1-0
Navy 2-1
SMU 1-0

That is a powerful post. I knew it was good, but didn't realize it was that good.

Someone on Boneyard Banter named Piratesoul seems to think we couldn't beat anyone else of ECU's schedule. It's a ridiculous assumption to think we'd play their entire schedule with a 22 less scholarship player disadvantage ( and those that we have, were recruited to play FCS ball, not the big boy ball of the almighty P6).

However, it's not unrealistic to wonder how we'd do for one game against other schools on ECU's schedule. Let's look a little closer. Current Massey ratings matchups:

UConn- 90% chance of winning. UConn beat unranked FCS Holy Cross 27-20 in week 1. Had to score 13 points in the 4th to win. Holy Cross was 4-7 last year.

Cincinnati- 84% of winning. Cincinnati beat unranked Austin Peay 26-14 from the mighty Ohio Valley Conference. Austin Peay was 0-11 last year. Cincinnati led only 20-14 w/ 5 minutes left and were outgained by 50 yards.

Tulane- 78%...It's Tulane, enough said.
UCF- 70%.
Memphis- 59%. Beat bottom 10 FBS Louisiana Monroe by 8 points.
Houston- 52%
Temple-50%
BYU- 49%
USF- 46%. Beat unranked FCS Stony Brook 31-17. Game was tied till the 11 minute mark in the 4th quarter. Stony Brook was 5-6 last year and a .500 CAA team
WVU-35%
VT-25%

Put us in the AAC and give us a complete 5 year recruiting cycle at the FBS level and I see no reason why we wouldn't compete for titles in the AAC east. As for "Piratesoul"'s assertion that we couldn't beat anyone else on their schedule, I believe the above says otherwise. Admittedly, not sure I buy the Houston, BYU and UCF predictions, but the others I could see.

*Note- Massey ratings had us by 9 against ECU.

We'd win 4 or 5 of those aac games at minimum. A ridiculous thing to say otherwise. JMU may be better than at least 2-4 of the teams remaining on their schedule.

(09-04-2017 04:23 PM)olddawg Wrote:  Someone on Boneyard Banter named Piratesoul seems to think we couldn't beat anyone else of ECU's schedule. It's a ridiculous assumption to think we'd play their entire schedule with a 22 less scholarship player disadvantage ( and those that we have, were recruited to play FCS ball, not the big boy ball of the almighty P6).

However, it's not unrealistic to wonder how we'd do for one game against other schools on ECU's schedule. Let's look a little closer. Current Massey ratings matchups:

UConn- 90% chance of winning. UConn beat unranked FCS Holy Cross 27-20 in week 1. Had to score 13 points in the 4th to win. Holy Cross was 4-7 last year.

Cincinnati- 84% of winning. Cincinnati beat unranked Austin Peay 26-14 from the mighty Ohio Valley Conference. Austin Peay was 0-11 last year. Cincinnati led only 20-14 w/ 5 minutes left and were outgained by 50 yards.

Tulane- 78%...It's Tulane, enough said.
UCF- 70%.
Memphis- 59%. Beat bottom 10 FBS Louisiana Monroe by 8 points.
Houston- 52%
Temple-50%
BYU- 49%
USF- 46%. Beat unranked FCS Stony Brook 31-17. Game was tied till the 11 minute mark in the 4th quarter. Stony Brook was 5-6 last year and a .500 CAA team
WVU-35%
VT-25%

Put us in the AAC and give us a complete 5 year recruiting cycle at the FBS level and I see no reason why we wouldn't compete for titles in the AAC east. As for "Piratesoul"'s assertion that we couldn't beat anyone else on their schedule, I believe the above says otherwise. Admittedly, not sure I buy the Houston, BYU and UCF predictions, but the others I could see.

*Note- Massey ratings had us by 9 against ECU.

Solid post

Olddawg. I don't think JMU would have any problem beating at least 4 other ACC conference members this year. UConn, Cinc and Tulane and pretty much locked. Another win or two from UCF, Memphis, USF depending on who was home. I have no idea how Temple kept/lost but they were like 9-1 last year so I'll take that L.

I will caution on the recruiting though. We get some guys now cause they want to play as freshman or redshirt freshman and don't want to wait on the depth chart at an FBS. We also get a FBS dropout or two that becomes a solid contributor every year. Then there are the recruits that want to play for an FCS national championship vs a bowl game in middle of kansas. We lose those 3 (and probably more) recruiting advantageous by being in the AAC. Obviously other recruiting paths open up as being part of the P6. But I'm saying we COULD be less successful (as in turning recruits to commits to players) in the AAC than we are in FCS (when looking at our recruiting class compared to conference/division peers).

Back to the ECU experience.

All the ECU fans we ran into (top of Sec 19 and at Sup Dogs) were very cool. Enjoyed the back and forth until it wasn't really funny and I felt kind of sad for them. They are not looking forward to this year.
Enjoyed the ride, the stadium, and the gals official uniform of cut-off jean shorts . I did think Sup Dawgs (?) was a little overrated. Great atmosphere but it was just a basic dog. Pretty wimpy at that. I see why they give you an extra dog for only $1 more.

(09-04-2017 04:46 PM)DoubleDogDare Wrote:  Olddawg. I don't think JMU would have any problem beating at least 4 other ACC conference members this year. UConn, Cinc and Tulane and pretty much locked. Another win or two from UCF, Memphis, USF depending on who was home. I have no idea how Temple kept/lost but they were like 9-1 last year so I'll take that L.

I will caution on the recruiting though. We get some guys now cause they want to play as freshman or redshirt freshman and don't want to wait on the depth chart at an FBS. We also get a FBS dropout or two that becomes a solid contributor every year. Then there are the recruits that want to play for an FCS national championship vs a bowl game in middle of kansas. We lose those 3 (and probably more) recruiting advantageous by being in the AAC. Obviously other recruiting paths open up as being part of the P6. But I'm saying we COULD be less successful (as in turning recruits to commits to players) in the AAC than we are in FCS (when looking at our recruiting class compared to conference/division peers).

Some valid concerns for certain, especially the first two. Just have to hope the new advantages outweigh what we have now. It definitely would make it hard to instantly reload a specific position like we can do now w/ an FBS transfer.

(09-04-2017 08:30 PM)olddawg Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 04:46 PM)DoubleDogDare Wrote:  Olddawg. I don't think JMU would have any problem beating at least 4 other ACC conference members this year. UConn, Cinc and Tulane and pretty much locked. Another win or two from UCF, Memphis, USF depending on who was home. I have no idea how Temple kept/lost but they were like 9-1 last year so I'll take that L.

I will caution on the recruiting though. We get some guys now cause they want to play as freshman or redshirt freshman and don't want to wait on the depth chart at an FBS. We also get a FBS dropout or two that becomes a solid contributor every year. Then there are the recruits that want to play for an FCS national championship vs a bowl game in middle of kansas. We lose those 3 (and probably more) recruiting advantageous by being in the AAC. Obviously other recruiting paths open up as being part of the P6. But I'm saying we COULD be less successful (as in turning recruits to commits to players) in the AAC than we are in FCS (when looking at our recruiting class compared to conference/division peers).

Some valid concerns for certain, especially the first two. Just have to hope the new advantages outweigh what we have now. It definitely would make it hard to instantly reload a specific position like we can do now w/ an FBS transfer.

I think FBS schools can do something similiar with "grad transfers" to fill in holes - seem to recall ECU fans saying they picked up a couple of these from P5 schools this year. It probably all balances out, and I don't think the G5 schools are at a real disadvantage compared to us.

(09-04-2017 04:23 PM)olddawg Wrote:  Someone on Boneyard Banter named Piratesoul seems to think we couldn't beat anyone else of ECU's schedule. It's a ridiculous assumption

I read that guy's posts too and laughed. He's butt-hurt and borderline nuts. Hope the "L" burns bright and deep for him, however, there's no reasoning with myopic fans like that. He's seeing the world thru thick pirate glasses that are distorting his view of reality.

(09-04-2017 08:40 PM)Longhorn Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 04:23 PM)olddawg Wrote:  Someone on Boneyard Banter named Piratesoul seems to think we couldn't beat anyone else of ECU's schedule. It's a ridiculous assumption

I read that guy's posts too and laughed. He's butt-hurt and borderline nuts. Hope the "L" burns bright and deep for him, however, there's no reasoning with myopic fans like that. He's seeing the world thru thick pirate glasses that are distorting his view of reality.

Well.. It is kinda hard to see the reality with an eye patch on...lol

I think the whole FCS vs FBS total scholarships and depth is a little overplayed. Maybe on special teams but you aren't playing 80 guys or even 60 so the last 20-30 really don't matter on the day of the game. Why FCS teams have struggled against FBS teams in the past has more to do with the relative number of playmakers and relative size on the lines. In both cases JMU fares well against FBS schools/programs from the G5. JMU is not the typical FCS program.

(09-04-2017 11:51 AM)91Alum Wrote:  

(09-04-2017 07:32 AM)NJDuke97 Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 06:43 PM)91Alum Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 05:58 PM)Wear Purple Wrote:  

(09-03-2017 05:37 PM)91Alum Wrote:  and the hosts were openly hoping for 0-12 so they could justify making a coaching change.

I wonder if they were looking across the field for who that might be.

Yeah. That seemed to be the feeling. Heard a lot of chatter in the stadium in the second half and after the game to the effect of "why the **** isn't THAT guy our coach?" We need to enjoy this ride while it lasts.

Are we going to post about Houston leaving JMU all season? Just enjoy the job that he and his staff is doing and the performance of the team. It's like the media- you squawk about it enough it may actually happen. Truth is none of us know what Mike Houston is thinking and how long he will be JMU coach. He could be the coach to stay at JMU for 20 years keep getting raises and take us FBS- you never know.

If every thread about the team and Houston is going to devolve into - he could be the next ECU or whomever coach- it's going to get tiresome to get through all season.

Yes sir. Sorry sir. Anything else you don't want us mentioning?

ECU's current coach makes a million dollars a year. ECU fans at the game (were you there?) were openly discussing the fact that they loved the way we played and wished they had MH. Let's ignore it though.

CAA to AAC might be a bit too much of a jump for the ECU muckety mucks to swallow (NDSU's three-peater Craig Bohl left for a $750K job at Wyoming, after all). But ignoring the possibility makes it more likely (not less) that he leaves. I'm thinking specifically of Kenny Brooks as I say that.

Scottie Montgomery is under contract for 3 more seasons after this one. Is ECU so flush with cash that they can pay two coaches $1M per year? It's all very far fetched but not surprising from our fan base. We are always waiting for the other shoe to drop instead of enjoying our success.

Just because Withers left so quickly doesn't mean that Houston will- Withers didn't have the success Houston has been having. Withers has a different personality than Houston and there are a ton of other variables including: age of children, how much the coaches family likes living in Harrisonburg, age of the coach, where they came from, etc. It's pure speculation and ill informed.

I've mentioned this before- keep winning and I think Houston stays- start to lose early in the FBS playoffs and inevitably he will be rumored to fill FBS openings. If JMU keeps getting to the championship game the timing of the game is such that a lot of the FBS openings are either far along or filled. Would a team wait to speak with Houston?

Houston is a smart guy- I'm sure he's seen that Withers despite the bigger paycheck is barely able to beat Houston Baptist. It's fools gold because Withers will be gone from Texas State in a few years and he'll have trouble landing somewhere good. I also think if Houston keeps having success at JMU he will continue to get raises. Sure there will be a ceiling but I don't think the other coaches salaries have anything to do with it. If he's winning championships and they aren't he will get paid and the alumni will put pressure on the admin to do so. Women's basketball isn't Men's Football in terms of revenue or exposure.

Enjoy the team and don't worry about things that are out of your control. The level of success that our athletics program as a whole and our football team is achieving is not something a lot of alumni at other schools can enjoy.