Joe Greene Statue "Update"

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

@GrandGreen, your post (and Harry's mention of it in the last podcast) prompted me to give a little update on this, for anyone who would be interested.

Some of you may recall that some time ago, there was discussion of a fan-led effort to fund the construction of a Joe Greene statue near Apogee. At that time, I began reaching out to university staff and was put in contact with RV. RV, George Dunham and I met several times about the project which, evidently, had been in the works (at least as an idea on paper) for some time already. I learned a lot from these meetings about where exactly the red-tape is in trying to make a project like this happen. We met right before I left for a two week vacation out of country and on the day I returned I learned that he had announced that he was stepping down the day before. I tried to call for an update but couldn't get a hold of him, so i sent a text that he replied to a couple days later saying something along the lines of "UNT is in a better place now than it was when I got here and that makes me happy; I hope the future brings more good things for North Texas." However, he did not directly address what would come of the Joe Greene statue project. (A quick aside - working with RV was a largely pleasant experience. I've been brainwashed, I know. I was frustrated by some things that are epidemic in the Athletic Department including a forgotten meeting, communication miscues, and missed deadlines, but RV always did what he said he would do. Well...other than finish this project before he left. But who knows how much control he ended up having over his date of departure.) While we were working on this, it was a big concern to keep things under wrap so Mr. Greene did not learn of the project. As I no longer have any idea of what the plan will be moving forward (and if the project is picked up at all by a new staff, I doubt that I will be involved), I will return to freely sharing what little I know with y'all.

If you are curious, this is where the project stood at the time of our last meeting:

A sculptor (the guy who did the Shaq sculpture at LSU) had given us a quote and some mock-ups, estimating the cost to be somewhere between $80K-$120K, depending on a few remaining variables and fundraising results.
Supposedly, Coca-Cola, the Steelers, and some large donors had already announced their intention to provide significant funding for the project. I personally never viewed any documentation to confirm this.
The university has a campus artwork committee which, apparently, is usually in charge of selecting artists, choosing locations and stuff like that. They were upset that someone else was doing their job, I guess, and figuring out how to reconcile the situation was a big to-do.
The artistic concept had a ~7' Joe Greene in bronze on a 12-24" pedestal and a 6' tall wall behind it that would wrap semi-circularly around the statue, approximately 10-12' long. This wall would be covered in pictures and engravings of historic UNT moments, including the likes of Abner Haynes and Leon King.
We were preparing to move into the public fundraising period and had a few decisions left to make about how we would approach it and what precautions we might take to maximize the time it would take for Mr. Greene to learn about the project.

I think that covers most of the key details that I thought y'all might be interested to know. If you're curious about anything else, feel free to message me. Again, who knows what will happen with this project now. Maybe a new AD will come in and knock this out of the park right away. It's low-hanging fruit, really. If, however, the plans have been lost by the time the new AD arrives or the position is filled from someone incompetent or uninterested in the project (potentially from within the department), maybe nothing will come of it. The most frustrating thing for me is recognizing that I probably won't know until A) it happens or B) it's two years from now and nothing has happened. So there you go! Do with that information what you will. Props if you made it to the end.

EDIT: Also, we never came up with a really good name for this area. Georgie and RV liked "Greene Plaza" but I think that is bland as shiz and (like other areas of our campus like "the library mall") is about as inspired of a name as calling your golden retriever "Buddy".
"Because his last name is Greene but we're also the Mean Green. Get it!?!" Yes, I get it.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Tyler Maryak

MeanGreen_MBA · July 1, 2016

This is the kind of things we need to promote our past successes, and tie people to the school. Please let us know what we can do to help...

DeepGreen · July 1, 2016

Honoring Joe Greene like this is certainly a worthwhile project and is doable.

drex · July 1, 2016

The university is a complex web or fiefdoms. It is extremely hard to go in a single unimpeded direction. My hat is off to you for your progress, thus far. I'll keep watching for movement on this project and will donate once it is a concrete (or should I say bronze) project.

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

I should clarify - while I initially played a large role in steering this project early on, when it was still fan-driven - this project was being spearheaded by the Athletic Department during the major phases of plan development. A lot of credit is due to them (and after my wife suffered under them for two years, it pains me to say that).

Sadly, my only tie to the Athletic Department, and thus the pulse of this project's progress, has been severed.

13 minutes ago, drex said:

The university is a complex web or fiefdoms. It is extremely hard to go in a single unimpeded direction. My hat is off to you for your progress, thus far. I'll keep watching for movement on this project and will donate once it is a concrete (or should I say bronze) project.

Also, lolz.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Tyler Maryak

Wag Tag · July 1, 2016

15 minutes ago, drex said:

The university is a complex web or fiefdoms. It is extremely hard to go in a single unimpeded direction. My hat is off to you for your progress, thus far. I'll keep watching for movement on this project and will donate once it is a concrete (or should I say bronze) project.

Agree and I think it is a project many alums will get behind! GMG

Aldo · July 1, 2016

9 minutes ago, Tyler Maryak said:

Sadly, my only tie to the Athletic Department, and thus the pulse of this project's progress, has been severed.

Dunham ain't dead (well, maybe to some). Once the new regime is in place, come back at them along with Dunham.

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

2 minutes ago, Aldo said:

Dunham ain't dead (well, maybe to some). Once the new regime is in place, come back at them along with Dunham.

True...True...

MeanGreenTexan · July 1, 2016

2 minutes ago, Aldo said:

Dunham ain't dead (well, maybe to some). Once the new regime is in place, come back at them along with Dunham.

Right. I can't imagine a new Athletic Director would want to punt this. They may have other more-pressing issues to deal with first, but I can't imagine anyone with any sports sense at all would not want to get a statue up of one of the greatest football players of all time.

Aldo · July 1, 2016

3 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

Right. I can't imagine a new Athletic Director would want to punt this. They may have other more-pressing issues to deal with first, but I can't imagine anyone with any sports sense at all would not want to get a statue up of one of the greatest football players of all time.

It would be a news-worthy early accomplishment, and probably an easier/a more concrete (nope no pun there) problem to, uh, tackle (there it is).

DeepGreen · July 1, 2016

27 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

Right. I can't imagine a new Athletic Director would want to punt this. They may have other more-pressing issues to deal with first, but I can't imagine anyone with any sports sense at all would not want to get a statue up of one of the greatest football players of all time.

The new AD will certainly have many issues on is plate, but going full speed on honoring Joe Greene like this will sure start the AD off on the correct path. The Alums will certainly look at it in a positive way.

trud1966 · July 1, 2016

Honoring Joe Greene is a No-Brainer, his name alone practically promotes itself. ....Should've been done this 25 years ago, so people will GLADLY dig in their pockets for this. Hell, you could probably spearhead a GoFundMe account for this and have the money in a month. This kind of feature will, believe it or not, will actually be a reason for people to come to the games to see it, pose with it for pictures. The actual "unveiling" of the statue/wall event with Joe Greene present would get a ton of media attention.

Like the idea of the wall behind him with engravings of other images/players. Another idea would be to incorporate some of the motifs that were up on Fouts that were removed...

baberuthbomber8 · July 1, 2016

Did they say how long it would take for the it to be created once everything was approved???

Edited July 1, 2016 by baberuthbomber8

UNT90 · July 1, 2016

1 hour ago, Tyler Maryak said:

@GrandGreen, your post (and Harry's mention of it in the last podcast) prompted me to give a little update on this, for anyone who would be interested.

Some of you may recall that some time ago, there was discussion of a fan-led effort to fund the construction of a Joe Greene statue near Apogee. At that time, I began reaching out to university staff and was put in contact with RV. RV, George Dunham and I met several times about the project which, evidently, had been in the works (at least as an idea on paper) for some time already. I learned a lot from these meetings about where exactly the red-tape is in trying to make a project like this happen. We met right before I left for a two week vacation out of country and on the day I returned I learned that he had announced that he was stepping down the day before. I tried to call for an update but couldn't get a hold of him, so i sent a text that he replied to a couple days later saying something along the lines of "UNT is in a better place now than it was when I got here and that makes me happy; I hope the future brings more good things for North Texas." However, he did not directly address what would come of the Joe Greene statue project. (A quick aside - working with RV was a largely pleasant experience. I've been brainwashed, I know. I was frustrated by some things that are epidemic in the Athletic Department including a forgotten meeting, communication miscues, and missed deadlines, but RV always did what he said he would do. Well...other than finish this project before he left. But who knows how much control he ended up having over his date of departure.) While we were working on this, it was a big concern to keep things under wrap so Mr. Greene did not learn of the project. As I no longer have any idea of what the plan will be moving forward (and if the project is picked up at all by a new staff, I doubt that I will be involved), I will return to freely sharing what little I know with y'all.

If you are curious, this is where the project stood at the time of our last meeting:

A sculptor (the guy who did the Shaq sculpture at LSU) had given us a quote and some mock-ups, estimating the cost to be somewhere between $80K-$120K, depending on a few remaining variables and fundraising results.

Supposedly, Coca-Cola, the Steelers, and some large donors had already announced their intention to provide significant funding for the project. I personally never viewed any documentation to confirm this.

The university has a campus artwork committee which, apparently, is usually in charge of selecting artists, choosing locations and stuff like that. They were upset that someone else was doing their job, I guess, and figuring out how to reconcile the situation was a big to-do.

The artistic concept had a ~7' Joe Greene in bronze on a 12-24" pedestal and a 6' tall wall behind it that would wrap semi-circularly around the statue, approximately 10-12' long. This wall would be covered in pictures and engravings of historic UNT moments, including the likes of Abner Haynes and Leon King.

We were preparing to move into the public fundraising period and had a few decisions left to make about how we would approach it and what precautions we might take to maximize the time it would take for Mr. Greene to learn about the project.

I think that covers most of the key details that I thought y'all might be interested to know. If you're curious about anything else, feel free to message me. Again, who knows what will happen with this project now. Maybe a new AD will come in and knock this out of the park right away. It's low-hanging fruit, really. If, however, the plans have been lost by the time the new AD arrives or the position is filled from someone incompetent or uninterested in the project (potentially from within the department), maybe nothing will come of it. The most frustrating thing for me is recognizing that I probably won't know until A) it happens or B) it's two years from now and nothing has happened. So there you go! Do with that information what you will. Props if you made it to the end.

EDIT: Also, we never came up with a really good name for this area. Georgie and RV liked "Greene Plaza" but I think that is bland as shiz and (like other areas of our campus like "the library mall") is about as inspired of a name as calling your golden retriever "Buddy".
"Because his last name is Greene but we're also the Mean Green. Get it!?!" Yes, I get it.

So George was working side by side with RV a mere 3 weeks before throwing RV under the bus by saying Hank "made excuses for the last guy for 15 years?"

How North Texas of George.

As to the project, bravo for trying to get something done that should have happened years ago. Hopefully the next AD gets this going again.

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

13 minutes ago, trud1966 said:

Honoring Joe Greene is a No-Brainer, his name alone practically promotes itself. ....Should've been done this 25 years ago, so people will GLADLY dig in their pockets for this. Hell, you could probably spearhead a GoFundMe account for this and have the money in a month. This kind of feature will, believe it or not, will actually be a reason for people to come to the games to see it, pose with it for pictures. The actual "unveiling" of the statue/wall event with Joe Greene present would get a ton of media attention.

Like the idea of the wall behind him with engravings of other images/players. Another idea would be to incorporate some of the motifs that were up on Fouts that were removed...

It would be nice if donations could be funneled through athletics so the donation can be tax deductible and cut out the processing fee associated with GoFundMe. At least, that was the reasoning.

12 minutes ago, baberuthbomber8 said:

Did they say how long it would take for the it to be created once everything was approved???

The original timeline was to unveil the idea at the Spring Scrimmage and start the public fundraising phase right then and there. That was the most disappointing busted timeline. But the hope was, at that point, that if we started fundraising that day, we would unveil the statue by Homecoming.

baberuthbomber8 · July 1, 2016

Once everything is completed, the location, the funding, etc.. and we have ordered it.. Is this something that will take a year to build? or something less.. Wasn't sure if this something that could completed during SL's first year? But I'm figuring with the entire process this is something that will be most likely completed and dedicated during the 2017 season, if everything goes as planned?

But another side note, If we could deciate it during the Spring Game next year, and we had a bunch of possible recruits.. this maybe a nice little attention grabber for them as well..

Mean Green 93-98 · July 1, 2016

2 hours ago, Tyler Maryak said:

While we were working on this, it was a big concern to keep things under wrap so Mr. Greene did not learn of the project.

I'm not exactly clear on this . . . why is this former "big concern" a concern no longer?

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

7 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

I'm not exactly clear on this . . . why is this former "big concern" a concern no longer?

It was a concern to the Athletic Department. I personally thought making sure we got enough money to make it happen was more important (and would require more advertising, which would increase the odds of Mr. Greene finding out).

11 minutes ago, baberuthbomber8 said:

Once everything is completed, the location, the funding, etc.. and we have ordered it.. Is this something that will take a year to build? or something less.. Wasn't sure if this something that could completed during SL's first year? But I'm figuring with the entire process this is something that will be most likely completed and dedicated during the 2017 season, if everything goes as planned?

But another side note, If we could deciate it during the Spring Game next year, and we had a bunch of possible recruits.. this maybe a nice little attention grabber for them as well..

It would be cool to have a ribbon cutting or something at next year's Spring Game and that timeline may be more realistic at this point. Theoretically, if everything were in place to get started today, it would only take a couple months to create.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Tyler Maryak

Mean Green 93-98 · July 1, 2016

1 minute ago, Tyler Maryak said:

It was a concern to the Athletic Department. I personally thought making sure we got enough money to make it happen was more important (and would require more advertising, which would increase the odds of Mr. Greene finding out).

Okay. I guess it's a lot more your call than it is mine, but I would have at least discussed it with the others involved before taking it public.

UNT Five&Dime · July 1, 2016

1 minute ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

Okay. I guess it's a lot more your call than it is mine, but I would have at least discussed it with the others involved before taking it public.

Yep. How are we going to keep @greenjoe out of this thread?

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

13 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

Okay. I guess it's a lot more your call than it is mine, but I would have at least discussed it with the others involved before taking it public.

Sure, makes sense. But the facts, as I see them, are:

I asked RV what would happen with this project now that he's leaving and got a non-answer. The only other person involved is George Dunham, who has only directly responded to my phone calls, emails, or texts (about this project) one time. Not upset about it, he's a busy guy, it's just unlikely that he would respond to me if I brought it up again.
It's likely that no progress will be made on this for several months more and it's entirely possible that nothing will come of it at all (barring UNT fan intervention). After all, we were supposed to unveil this plan at the Spring Scrimmage and we see how well we stuck to that timeline. So I'm not outing something that is happening so much as saying what might have been.
Just since I first joined the circle (triangle?) four months ago, how many times have people brought up on here the need for such a project? Maybe this project would be better led by fans and alumni than the AD and maybe what I know now could provide some help/direction in making it happen.

I can see what you mean, but I didn't decide this morning to blab about this to be a cool kid, I brought it to our fan base after several attempts to communicate with RV (and Mr. Dunham once as well), waiting several weeks, and seeing numerous posts about making a project like this happen. I didn't make a call on a whim. I considered the implications and deemed the possibility of making the project a reality greater than the importance of keeping it a secret from Mr. Greene for two more months instead of him maybe finding out now from a (sorry, Harry) largely non-credible source.

That ended up being longer than intended.

MeanGreenTexan · July 1, 2016

6 minutes ago, Tyler Maryak said:

Sure, makes sense. But the facts, as I see them, are:

I asked RV what would happen with this project now that he's leaving and got a non-answer. The only other person involved is George Dunham, who has only directly responded to my phone calls, emails, or texts (about this project) one time. Not upset about it, he's a busy guy, it's just unlikely that he would respond to me if I brought it up again.

It's likely that no progress will be made on this for several months more and it's entirely possible that nothing will come of it at all (barring UNT fan intervention). After all, we were supposed to unveil this plan at the Spring Scrimmage and we see how well we stuck to that timeline. So I'm not outing something that is happening so much as saying what might have been.

Just since I first joined the circle (triangle?) four months ago, how many times have people brought up on here the need for such a project? Maybe this project would be better led by fans and alumni than the AD and maybe what I know now could provide some help/direction in making it happen.

I can see what you mean, but I didn't decide this morning to blab about this to be a cool kid, I brought it to our fan base after several attempts to communicate with RV (and Mr. Dunham once as well), waiting several weeks, and seeing numerous posts about making a project like this happen. I didn't make a call on a whim. I considered the implications and deemed the possibility of making the project a reality greater than the importance of keeping it a secret from Mr. Greene for two more months instead of him maybe finding out now from a (sorry, Harry) largely non-credible source.

That ended up being longer than intended.

You know that RV is gone and we're transitioning, right? RV is not going to help you at all anymore. He is likely not too happy with UNT right now. Hank is not going to help you either as he has other things going on... namely campaigning.

Maybe try emailing the new AD (give him a month or so to learn where the bathroom is and other necessary on-boarding efforts) letting him know where you left off.

Withers940 · July 1, 2016

2 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

You know that RV is gone and we're transitioning, right? RV is not going to help you at all anymore. He is likely not too happy with UNT right now. Hank is not going to help you either as he has other things going on... namely campaigning.

Maybe try emailing the new AD (give him a month or so to learn where the bathroom is and other necessary on-boarding efforts) letting him know where you left off.

UNT was not too happy with him either but I totally get what you're saying

Tyler Maryak · July 1, 2016

18 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

You know that RV is gone and we're transitioning, right? RV is not going to help you at all anymore. He is likely not too happy with UNT right now. Hank is not going to help you either as he has other things going on... namely campaigning.

Maybe try emailing the new AD (give him a month or so to learn where the bathroom is and other necessary on-boarding efforts) letting him know where you left off.

Yes, I do think that I recall someone mentioning on here at some point that RV left. The suggestion was to check with "those involved." While RV was still here, I did make that effort.

Yeah, after my wife's limited experiences with Hank, I'm not keen on working with him anyway.

Certainly, once a new AD is in place, I will try to get in touch with them. Perhaps I shouldn't be the only one of us involved in the effort. It would appear that I lack the prowess to handle such an undertaking anyway. I would love to have other passionate UNT fans in on this project, especially those who may be better connected or have more experience than I.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Tyler Maryak

MeanGreenTexan · July 1, 2016

2 minutes ago, Tyler Maryak said:

Yes, I do think that I recall someone mentioning on here at some point that RV left. The suggestion was to check with "those involved." While RV was still here, I did make that effort. Certainly, once a new AD is in place, I will try to get in touch with them. Yeah, after my wife's limited experiences with Hank, I'm not keen on working with him anyway. Perhaps I shouldn't be the only one of us involved in the effort. It would appear that I lack the prowess to handle such an undertaking as it is. I would love to have other passionate UNT fans in on this project, especially those who may have more experience in related fields.

paging @Side Show Joe