(10-03-2021 02:08 PM)Buc2002 Wrote: Without the Mullins era, you never get the current success. Athletics needed to reset. Building new facilities and putting the program back on better financial/Title IX footing would not have happened otherwise. This HOF weekend was a classy move by the institution. And Mullins being honored on the field (without boos) was also a great reflection on our university. Just a fantastic weekend. The reviews of the tailgate and game day experience is spot on. As lifelong Buc fans, this was another dream come true. It’s what we always wanted and never had in football’s previous incarnation. This reincarnation is certainly special.
I think we get what you're saying, but one could also say that without WWII, the Marshall Plan wouldn't have been possible. I.e., you present a false (imo) dichotomy. There could have been another pathway. Imagine, just as a thought experiment, if we had had Dr. Noland as prez back at that time. Do you really think things would have gone down the same way? How ironic it was that when paulie first tried to bring back football he (in)famously said: "sometimes you don't know how much you miss something until it's gone" (maybe *very* slightly paraphrased). Which (obviously) showed he was clueless on most things athletic all along.
Another way to think about it is this: Just how far back did killing football set ETSU? I think at the time most of us speculated from 10-15 years, minimum,
on up to "a generation". Well, somewhere in there is the truth. Did Europe get a huge leap forward because of the Marshall Plan? Of course. But was the price worth it? We'll never know where we'd have been now, if there had been honesty in that *mythical* "football fundraising" back at that time. Or if the Pirate Club, Jo Ann Paty, et al, had stood up and said "no", or resigned en masse. We can't know that. Just sayin'. Was surviving paulie really worth it to get to Noland? Answers may vary there, somewhat depending on the respondents' age. I would say not, but realize that others may feel differently.
And I don't want to detract from the joy of what's going on now, but we *must* remember how we got here. Some of us may not have all that many years left, and that wasteland was a big chunk of "what could have been".