DRC: Report -- McCasland's buyout has been paid

[Brett Vito]

DRC:

http://beta.dentonrc.com/sports/mean-green/2017/04/11/report-unt-paid-mccaslands-buyout

[TheReal_jayD]

Way to report @untsportsfan

[TheTastyGreek]

I've found that when I have an important deadline or event I need to remember, it helps to set a Google calendar reminder. 

You can have it send a reminder to you by phone or email the day before, the morning of, 15 minutes ahead of time... Whatever you need to make sure you have enough time to take care of all the little details necessary to complete your task. 

Not every important action can wait 7 months. Some of them have legally binding deadlines. So, if we ever find ourselves with a deadline to pay a huge buyout (or a gas bill, or to take important prescription medication, or to apply for openings at Big 12 programs) in the future, maybe setting a Google calendar reminder can help us avoid this sort of amateur shitshow embarrassment again!

[MeanGreenTexan]

8 hours ago, TheTastyGreek said:

I've found that when I have an important deadline or event I need to remember, it helps to set a Google calendar reminder. 

You can have it send a reminder to you by phone or email the day before, the morning of, 15 minutes ahead of time... Whatever you need to make sure you have enough time to take care of all the little details necessary to complete your task. 

Not every important action can wait 7 months. Some of them have legally binding deadlines. So, if we ever find ourselves with a deadline to pay a huge buyout (or a gas bill, or to take important prescription medication, or to apply for openings at Big 12 programs) in the future, maybe setting a Google calendar reminder can help us avoid this sort of amateur shitshow embarrassment again!

I thought it was odd that his initial contact to ARSt regarding the buyout was "last week" (probably when his calendar reminder was set to).
McCasland has been here since March 13.  Why wait until April 3-7 to get the ball rolling on the buyout?

Odd move.

[TreeFiddy]

Maybe this was an oversight, maybe we were still trying to pass the hat.  

However, I hope this was a calculated move by WB to provide a subtle reminder to Mohajir of who's his daddy.  

[Harry]

This could have been handled better on our end.  We have not had many of these types of buyouts in our history.  So lets admit we could have done better and try to learn from it going forward.  GMG

[GrandGreen]

Much ado over nothing.

[MeanGreenHoops]

I like the fact that we were late, which caused someone to report it, which got UNT mentioned again and that we were buying out a contract. Free Publicity.

[Mean Green 93-98]

[MeanGreen13]

This seems like a weird thing for Arky State to mention in a radio show or to reporters at all... I think it was an oversight on our end or they had a little trouble getting the money together in time, but there is no reason it should have ever been public. I don't think it is that big of a deal and I am already not a fan of AState's AD based on how he has talked in the media since we took his star coach away. Whack!

[Cerebus]

11 minutes ago, MeanGreen13 said:

 I think it was an oversight on our end or they had a little trouble getting the money together in time

[MeanGreenTexan]

24 minutes ago, MeanGreen13 said:

This seems like a weird thing for Arky State to mention in a radio show or to reporters at all... I think it was an oversight on our end or they had a little trouble getting the money together in time, but there is no reason it should have ever been public. I don't think it is that big of a deal and I am already not a fan of AState's AD based on how he has talked in the media since we took his star coach away. Whack!

[UNT Five&Dime]

4 hours ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

I thought it was odd that his initial contact to ARSt regarding the buyout was "last week" (probably when his calendar reminder was set to).
McCasland has been here since March 13.  Why wait until April 3-7 to get the ball rolling on the buyout?

Odd move.

Wire transfers cost money. Holding on to $500K in an interest-bearing savings account at my Credit Union will collect around $500 interest in the 29 days between March 13 and April 11. Plenty to cover the cost of the wire and probably the administrative costs associated in handling the buyout on our end as well. Smart move!

[MeanGreenTexan]

15 minutes ago, UNT Five&Dime said:

Wire transfers cost money. Holding on to $500K in an interest-bearing savings account at my Credit Union will collect around $500 interest in the 29 days between March 13 and April 11. Plenty to cover the cost of the wire and probably the administrative costs associated in handling the buyout on our end as well. Smart move!

Sure!  Although, I'm betting you'd be an upstanding citizen and hold onto it for 28 days instead, and pay the buyout when it's due.

[MeanGreen_MBA]

isn't there a 30 days grace period???

[MeanGreenTeeth]

$500k is like $5 billion in Arkansas.   

Edited April 12, 2017 by MeanGreenTeeth

[meangreenlax]

17 hours ago, Brett Vito said:

DRC:

http://beta.dentonrc.com/sports/mean-green/2017/04/11/report-unt-paid-mccaslands-buyout

But what will the A State people complain about now?!?! 

[cdizzle86]

Did they use Venmo or Paypal?

[MCMLXXX]

1 hour ago, cdizzle86 said:

Did they use Venmo or Paypal?

They do not have those sophisticated forms of payment in Arkansas. It was an Armored Car filled with pennies.

[TheTastyGreek]

I don't want to belabor the point, but nobody else seems to much notice or care that this is a pretty troubling and significant screw-up that reflects very poorly on us and program leadership. So, one contrarian post, and I'll try to walk away from the topic and not beat people down with my opinion. 

With all due respect to guys like @GrandGreen and @Mean Green 93-98, who are people I can frequently disagree with on UNT stuff but always still like and appreciate because it tends to be in a limited, respectful, non-personal (I hope?) manner... This is not much ado about nothing, and it's not something to yawn about. 

This is embarrassing, concerning, and completely unnecessary. We had an entire month to get this figured out, and a clear deadline to get it done. So, the Mandy McKinley approach to contractual fulfillment ("If you haven't gotten your buyout yet, it's because you haven't called us, or we haven't called you!") doesn't fly. We should not be screwing stuff like this up. 

The previous leadership here came under a lot of scrutiny, much of it justified, because of a number of much less significant screwups. Mislabeled Christmas cards, typos in press releases and game recaps, delayed emails and news updates... Well, this is 1000 times worse. This isn't some intern or low-level employee forgetting to spellcheck something. This is the guy at the head of our entire program not bothering to execute a half million dollar payment in a timely fashion, when we had a full month to figure it out. And when we've brought in 3 other high salary upper-level support team members that ought to help make this sort of big picture, high dollar stuff run easier and better. 

If you ever got upset because your Heart of Dallas bowl tickets didn't get shipped in time for you to get them, if you've ever been pissed off over your seatbacks not being in place, or your email inbox getting an invitation to a game or event that already happened... How can you blow this off? We owed another school HALF A MILLION DOLLARS, and we couldn't even handle the simple process of transferring them the money by the legally required deadline. 

I'm not saying Wren Baker is incompetent, or calling for anyone to be fired, or claiming the sky is falling. But this is very bad, very dumb, and absolutely unnecessary and avoidable. Contrary to frequent opinion, it IS possible to be pissed off, frustrated, and embarrassed without carrying that out to an absurd extended hypothetical. I'm not calling for pitchforks and torches, but people ought to recognize that this matters, and we damn sure ought to care enough to demand accountability to make sure huge, stupid, public errors like this don't happen again. 

Hopefully, this is an isolated incident. I don't intend to say anything else on the matter unless someone replies in a way that wants to continue the conversation. You are free to disagree. Go Mean Green. 

[oldguystudent]

5 hours ago, TheTastyGreek said:

If you ever got upset because your Heart of Dallas bowl tickets didn't get shipped in time for you to get them, if you've ever been pissed off over your seatbacks not being in place, or your email inbox getting an invitation to a game or event that already happened... How can you blow this off?

This is a very fair and valid point.  When my Heart of Dallas bowl ticket didn't arrive until two days after the game, and the fine young man in the ticket office essentially told me I was lying to him and trying to rip the ticket office off for two tickets (for the same seat for the same game???), and I raised bloody hell over it, the response was, "It's still staff from the old regime.  We're working to make things better." 

It's been a minute or two since then.  Will we still get the same response?  Blame it on the old, long departed guy and his lingering staff?  Who still apparently linger nearly a year after the fact? 

While I've absolutely no love in my heart for a certain football "coach" (term used vu-herrry loosely), I've never much felt the need to criticize the athletic department for its hit and miss (and miss and miss and miss and miss) coaching hires.  But holy hell its operations have been utter shit.  I want to see this improve, and like right the f*ck quick. 

Dropping the ball on a $500K check, while kinda funny to an extent (because it doesn't hurt us personally), is a pretty big operations blunder.  This does not bode well.

I was thinking unrelated to any of this last night that I still don't have faith that I'll receive my 2017 season tickets in time for the first (or the second, or the third) game, and that if I want to go to the SMU game, I'll probably have to buy tickets from John Williams again (who in 2015 bought them from the SMU ticket office because, well, take a couple guesses).  

I'm at the end of my rope with this operational gaffe blame it on the customer nonsense.  (Did they blame Arkie St. for not calling?  I truly wonder). F*ck up my tickets for 2017, and I'll finish out my capital gift, but likely won't continue throwing good money after bad. 

And thus concludes the early morning maniacal rantings of a tax account mere days before the deadline. 

[TreeFiddy]

Since I have no idea if this was a mistake or planned, it's hard for me to get too worked up.  Especially, after the way I felt Mohajir handled the original announcement of the hiring, I have very little issue with the fact he had to ask for the money again.  I prefer to think that this was a calculated move as a dig at Mohajir.  

For all we know, the person/entity that promised the funds to WB for the buyout may have been dragging their feet, which in turn caused the payment to be delayed.  I have no supporting information, but it seems a lot less likely that WB simply forgot the payment was due.  However, if that level of incompetence exists it will surely surface in other areas soon.

 

[MCMLXXX]

7 hours ago, TheTastyGreek said:

 

The previous leadership here came under a lot of scrutiny, much of it justified, because of a number of much less significant screwups. Mislabeled Christmas cards, typos in press releases and game recaps, delayed emails and news updates... Well, this is 1000 times worse. 

For all his faults RV did manage to get a timely $400,000 payout to Idaho.

[MeanGreenTexan]

1 hour ago, TreeFiddy said:

Since I have no idea if this was a mistake or planned, it's hard for me to get too worked up.  Especially, after the way I felt Mohajir handled the original announcement of the hiring, I have very little issue with the fact he had to ask for the money again.  I prefer to think that this was a calculated move as a dig at Mohajir.  

For all we know, the person/entity that promised the funds to WB for the buyout may have been dragging their feet, which in turn caused the payment to be delayed.  I have no supporting information, but it seems a lot less likely that WB simply forgot the payment was due.  However, if that level of incompetence exists it will surely surface in other areas soon.

 

very valid point...  and this is the kind of thing you and I usually would take into account as being a possibility when we owe $500k on a certain date, right? 
Would you (or anyone else here) wait until the week prior before reaching out to the person owed for information?

I like WB, and like a lot of the things he's doing here, but it is somewhat concerning.

And yes, Mohaijir was a doofus about the hiring, but that doesn't mean we should be late for anything... and I HIGHLY DOUBT it was a calculated move.  If it was, I'll go ahead and say WB needs to be gone because that is reckless, petty, and stupid.

[MeanGreenTexan]

20 hours ago, MeanGreenHoops said:

I like the fact that we were late, which caused someone to report it, which got UNT mentioned again and that we were buying out a contract. Free Publicity.

Not the right kind...