untjim1995

Can we make your kingdom include UNT??

Its why I am just amazed that anyone believes anything different will happen here under RV and this BOR. As far as RV goes, though, he has everything perfectly set--the BOR loves him, the big donors love him, the large majority of the fanbase loves tailgating, which he started, and 99% of the fanbase thinks that getting SMU for a home-and-home series is just a coup. He's going to be here for a long time--as in until he wants to retire.

Well, you won't have to hear anything about again until 2017...

There is no way we are firing Mac before the end of 2016, more probable is after 2017. Its just a waste of breath to even think that will happen after 2015--Chico will get kicked out because his contract is up, but definitely not the head coach. Mac has it made, as he cruise controls into retirement. He did what he needed to do for himself--earn a good extension. If he gets another--great, but if not, sobeit... Even then, we aren't buying out another head coaches' contract at another school, either. I don't care if its Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Goergia tech, or freaking Georgia...we ain't buying out anyone's contract--that runs 180 degrees from the UNT Value Way. Follow the costs, folks...that's how you will find when the replacement will occur and then who might be an option. After 2017, Mac has one year left to be bought out. That's a known cost--those are all we deal with here, all that matters. Then, we will replace that him with either an assistant coach or a FCS/D-2 head coach. It just amazes me that there are people on here that think we are going to hire to pay a coach over a million dollars to coach here anytime soon. That's not how its done in Denton. Sure, in Jonesboro, Arkansas and Lafayette, Louisiana and some other G5 outposts, that's how its done--not here. Enrollment, location, history, new facilities, better conference, etc...none of the trumps known costs here. It is what it is--you accept it or you leave...the BOR doesn't care which one you choose, either. RV being here 14+ years and an 80% empty Super Pit and what will probably be a 75% empty Apogee at the end of the year has never made a bit of a difference to them. And for those of you that say, well then just drop the thing down to FCS--beware of what you ask for...its happened here before, and it basically killed the program.

The thing about the Iowa games is that Iowa was specifically mentioned as a team we could potentially host now that we were building this sweet new stadium--that was the reason we couldn't ever get a known team here was that Fouts was an oversized dumpster, which was true. Then, before Apogee gets built, we announce that we are going to play at Iowa twice, with no return game. That told me that we were looking at Iowa for $$$, not to move the program up. Then, after Apogee's first year, where we got UH and Indiana here, we have played the following teams in OOC: Texas Southern (2012), Idaho and Ball State (2013), SMU and Nicholls State (2014), and Portland State (2015). Almost amazingly, Fouts was more than capable, even in its most decrepit state, to host crowds for those opponents--in part, because WE ALREADY HAD HOSTED THEM OR TEAMS FROM THEIR CONFERENCES AT FOUTS!! It just amazes me that nobody has screamed from the highest building in town that we spent $78 million dollars for what we have gotten. Our program is 23-29 since we built Apogee--and will probably be 24-39 by the end of this season. Of the 23 wins we have enjoyed since Mac has been here, the home fans have been rewarded with wins at Apogee over Indiana, Florida Atlantic (twice), Louisiana-Monroe, Middle Tennessee (twice), Texas Southern, Louisiana-Lafayette, South Alabama, Idaho, Ball State, Rice, UTEP, SMU, Nicholls State, and Florida International. Its very probable that the only win we will see this year at home is Portland State. In other words, our best opponent to come to Apogee was the first game ever, featuring Houston, which we lost. After this, SMU and UTEP brought in big crowds to Apogee, so they have been the most popular draw since we opened the new stadium, but both featured epically bad teams when they played here. And Ball State was the best team we beat at home--in front of about 10k. I'm thrilled to death every time I see Apogee and realize that is where we play football--but the teams we have put together, the teams we have brought here to play us, and the future schedules just make me wonder how we ever pulled this off. It really is amazing when you think about it.

We will beat Portland State and then maybe one more--most likely against UTEP in that last game of the season at Apogee. 2-10 at best. We aren't beating USM on the road. And I'll only believe we beat UTSA when I see the scoreboard show it at 0:00. They absolutely own us... All of the other teams are G5 teams that are just way better than us right now or are P5 giants that are gonna pay for our non-revenue sports. 2016 is when you hope you can get back to winning 3-4 games, that the power running game will be behind a OL that will get more experienced and stronger after this year, even while breaking in a new busdriver. 2017 is the year to really see where things go. We either fire Mac like we did Dodge in 2010, when a winning year is officially out of the realm of possibility, or he turns in a 2013 year and we get bowl eligible again. At that point, if the latter occurs, with one year left on Mac's contract--a decision will have to be made: he either get an extension or he gets replaced, assuming of course that Mac doesn't announce that 2018 would be his last year, to retire at the end of his last year of his contract.

First of all, even if Leach took a 50% pay cut to $1.3 million, he would still make double what Mac makes as a salary here. IOW, we aren't going to double (again) what we pay a head coach. Mac has the highest salary in school history--and its $650k. That was over double what we paid Todd Dodge--and we wouldn't fire him after three seasons because that was deemed to expensive. What the hell do you think the leadership is going to think about buying out more than a year of Mac's contract that is double annually of Todd Dodge's contract? And then turn around and pay double Mac's salary to a guy like Mike Leach, who is currently making double this amount? I'll take a swig of whatever Kool-Aid you are drinking. We don't operate like this in Denton--never have, never will. Even after McNatt donated $1.5 million to UNT Athletics, the posts on facebook from alumni and students were about 75% negative about even having a football team, much less donating to it. That mindset is the majority--by a loooonnnnnggggg ways. When Mac gets replaced, after 2017, he will get replaced by an assistant coach, one who will be thrilled to make $400k-$500k annually. We sure as hell aren't gonna go up higher than what we pay Mac. Hell, that's why the BOR approved his 5-year extension from RV--he wasn't going to get a huge raise in salary, so the known costs of the next 5 years was perfect for the budget.

No matter what, a losing season gets Chico kicked out--so he will be gone shortly. 0-12 doesn't get Mac fired. It doesn't get RV fired, either. Benford gets fired as soon as it becomes clear that a .500 season is out of the question or when we finish up the season without a bid to the NCAAs or the NIT. Now, its possible that Smatresk may be the one who picks the next coach in basketball--knowing full well that he is going to replace RV when the buyout drops down, but before we can fire Mac if he cannot turn it around. That scenario is plausible...but so is the very real possibility (or probability) that RV is still here as the AD until he retires.

Nobody said it was--just expressing my view (sarcastic as it may be) that Mac will replace Chico with someone he knows very well to run his Wing-T 1970 offense, but can be sold to the general public as a wide-open OC...

It makes perfect sense, too. Someone who knows Mac well and has had success in a wide-open offensive system with Mac's blessing...its the guy we have been trying to find for five years now to lead our team... SENECA WALLACE!! maybe just a smidge of sarcasm here in this post...

Reality is tougher to like than fantasy, young BG...another life lesson that following the Mean Green is teaching you...

He would cost way more than we will ever pay for a coach. Plus, he hates glad-handing alumni and playing nice with the AD, which is why Tech turned on him, among other things. As you have seen here, the 12 big money donors DEMAND that you be super nice to RV and enjoy their company. They like guys like Dan McCarney and Tony Benford, who are the polar opposite of Mike Leach.

Then goes over to McNulty's Dad and tells him how proud he is of his son and that he will do everything in his power to get his jersey retired...then they both laugh at how stupid it is that UNT gets to pay him through 2018.

Not this year, we aren't. The QB is mediocre on his very best day. But the OL blocking for him is very inexperienced, the defensive front seven is still very undersized, and the special teams are not good. 2013 proved, just as 2002-2004 proved, that the only ways you win with the McDickney Offense is to have a killer defense and great special teams that complement the run-run-draw or throw bubble screen-punt offense. We don't have that even if Damarcus Smith became 100% of what you hoped he would be when he signed and showed up to fall camp. The overall developed talent on this team is just woeful, still. It very well could get much better in the years to come, hopefully, since that is the ONLY chance that this style of play has to succeed. If Damarcus Smith doesn't get to start and keep the #1 QB job at some point this season, I expect him to transfer. He will then know that his talents do not align at all with what the busdriver QB needs to do to succeed here, especially since Mac's offense is likely to get MORE CONSERVATIVE with the next OC he hires than what we currently have in Chico. That's why I believe that your next busdriver in 2016 is either Greer or Means, somebody who is going to run the offense the way Mac wants it run. And you can take a maximum of 3 or 4 wins to the bank with that style of offense next year if the defense isn't back to its 2013 level again. How fun will it be to see a program going into 2017 with a coach who can finally get replaced because he is deemed affordable to replace, coming off of three years that we probably won't combine for 10 wins? It will be just our luck that Mac will have another 2013 type season in 2017 and RV will extend him again...

Berglund and Dajon were head cases--either mental midgets or just too self-centered to lead a FBS program. That's why things fell the way they did for both of them. I don't know anything about Damarcus Smith, but it is very telling that he had to go the JUCO route, ended up agreeing to come here and play QB at a school that passes about 1/3rd of the time, of which most are within 5 yards of the LOS, and then couldn't qualify academically to get here until the fall camp. There is no way that a coach like Woody Hayes McCarney is going to turn over the reigns to a QB like that until he has earned his trust. And that trust is going to be even harder to earn when his style of play is like Dajon's, which epically failed in the Wing-T offense of 1970 that Mac demands to be run here. Unless we get an OC in here that is allowed to run an offense that is wide open, which should happen sometime around the 2018 season, we won't have one decent throwing QB on the roster. There hasn't been, nor will there be one decent QB from a Texas High School that will come here to play in this offense. Not one... Basically, all you can do is wait this out over this year and probably the two that follow...or walk away. That's what RV and the BOR have given to us as choices, since we extended Mac thru 2018 at $650k per year. Its just so perfectly North Texas for us to be in this spot right now.

I grew up in Ft. Worth, so I watched a TCU-North Texas State game at Amon Carter one day in 1984. TCU killed us, but next year we got our revenge and beat them. UNT never even registered with me until I went to the Homecoming Game in 1990 as an invited guest of the athletic department. I got a scholarship offer to be a student manager starting in 1991, just as Dennis Parker got hired. I worked my tail off for 5 football seasons at that place--seriously, the hours you spend up there getting everything ready for practices and games during the season easily tops 60 hours, probably more. I graduated in December of 1995, as we moved up to Division 1-A again, feeling like we would be a rising up-and-comer, especially after beating tech in 1997 in Lubbock and giving a game to the Aggies at Texas Stadium the next week. Then the wheels fell off from October of 1997 until October of 2001. Almost miraculously, Dickey pulled the team out of a gigantic funk and started pounding the SBC schools for the next 4 years. But after 2004, the wheels fell off and the entire chassis just blew up. I thought that with 2013s momentum, that we had restored the car, but it looks like the engine died again and we won't try and buy a new car, just keep hoping the oil leaks and transmission issues won't keep us from having to buy that new car until 2017. Since 1990, I've only known North Texas to treat athletics one way--whether you call it cheap, value-oriented, broke, or frugal, its all been the same. But its never been committed to winning. 25 years is a long time to watch your alma mater, no matter if they've been I-aa in the Southland, an independent in I-A, in the Big West, in the Sun Belt, or in CUSA, enjoy all of 5 winning seasons, 2 of which ended with bowl victories. I am not sure how much more energy I've got left--which just amazes me about the few fans who have stuck with us since the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. Talk about not following the crowd--especially if you graduated in the 70s or 80s and watched the university basically crush the program into I-aa oblivion for a dozen years. We gripe about having about 2% of the fanbase coming from alumni since RV has been AD--imagine how few are fans from the alumni that graduated between 1979 -1995? It cannot exceed 1%, maybe not even .5%.

You could very well be right about TCU--they basically have the metroplex to sell, as well as their recent winning in football. Actually, they are probably the only private school that the Pac-12 would consider, just because it really isn't that overtly religious anymore, certainly less than BYU or Baylor, neither of whom will ever get included out west. I figure the Pac-12 has 4 slots left, the SEC has 2 slots left, the B1G has 2 slots left, and the ACC has either 1 or 2, depending on how you look at Notre Dame. I still think that Texas, OU, OSU, and Tech will go west at some point. Tech just has more political sway within Austin and they have been UT's buddy for a long time. I think KU will go north to the B1G and I think they will get another ACC team to move over--my guess is UVa. Then the SEC will poach Va Tech and NC State. The ACC will replace them with the following teams UConn, Cincy, and WVU, plus a basketball only type member like St. John's to get to 16 hoops teams and 14 football teams + ND. The leftovers will have to find their place in the G5s or in the realm of going independent to get Power Leagues to continue to play you as a peer, just like BYU has done.

Yeah, she has never understood that what kills them is being in Houston--the SEC and Big XII already have those markets covered. And when the Big XII goes away, the other conferences are going to use the Texas and Oklahoma Big XII schools to gain their entrance into the DFW and Houston markets. If the Big XII does expand, it will be to Cincy, Memphis, BYU, Boise State, CSU, UCF, or USF--markets that they can gain a foothold in that they don't overlap already. Its not gonna be Houston. UH has one hope for P5 status--that the Pac-12 expands east and they take them because they cannot get Texas to drop the LHN. Its possible, but not probable. Otherwise, they have very little hope. I suppose the ACC could expand, but they will look at Cincy, UConn, and WVU, to add to their league to replace anyone who might leave to go to the SEC or B1G. I still believe that you will see UH, SMU, TCU, Baylor, and anyone else that gets left behind by the Power Conferences to just go the BYU route and declare independence in football--they will play each other, as well as BYU, Notre Dame, Army, and other G5s and FCS teams. That way, they can still cling to the idea of getting into a playoff and being able to play power teams in their OOC schedules.

Todd Dodge won 5 games in three seasons--and was given a 4th season to still lead the team, since that would have required us to buy out an extra year of his contract that was worth $300k annually. He rewarded us by going 1-6 in his 4th year before getting fired. Dan McCarney can go 0-12 this year and he won't get fired. And my guess is that as long as he wins 2 or more games next year, he will be back for 2017. We will buy out one year of a contract--but to pay over $1.3 million to buy out two years of Mac's contract and then hire someone just isn't something the BOR will ever get on board with--like ever. The exact same thing has happened with Tony Benford--he hasn't had a winning season yet in his three years over at the Super Pit, yet he gets a 4th year because we wouldn't buy out an extra $325k that it would cost to buy him out after last season instead of during or after this upcoming year. It would take us winning only one game over the next two years for Mac to get replaced--and we would probably hire the absolute cheapest options available (again) to take over as head coach.

Oh, I agree...but I do think that UConn and Cincy will get in...

I think that they probably realize both of those schools will be P5 very soon. I totally understand BYU and Notre Dame, but Army is the one that makes no sense to me.

They allowed them because they have already been scheduled...

Iowa 45 UNT 6

And next year at Florida, as well...

That QB probably isn't on the roster right now for this offense. Next year will be very interesting. You'll have a senior in Greer, who couldn't play FBS football in his first season up here. You'll have Damarcus Smith, who will be a senior, but plays a style that doesn't even come close to fitting the offense Mac runs (see Woody Wilson/Dickey offense in 2006). You have Connor Means, who hasn't made much progress in his time here yet, but fits the busdriver qualifications perfectly for Mac. And whoever else is on the roster that cannot seem to make a dent on the depth chart. I don't know who the JUCO QB will be that we will target for our next class, but most likely, he will be behind Greer or Means for next season. I actually expect D. Smith to transfer, just like Dajon did. His game would be perfect at a school that has a wide-open offensive attack--that style will NEVER be played here under Mac. I do know this--we aren't getting any Texas HS QB to come here that can throw the ball--they refuse to come here for obvious reasons. Maybe a QB from another state, ala Minimac again, but not one from Texas, unless they are in the 5% of the high schools that don't run a spread offense.