DRC: UNT football needs a salesman with a big personality, will that be Eric Morris?

[Brett Vito]

 

[MeanGreen_MBA]

I can be that guy 

[KingDL1]

I like a Salesman!

 

I wish I had thought of that. 

[BillySee58]

When we’re talking about hiring a coach, we’ll often say “we need our version of this other coach.” Our football version of Grant Mccasland, our version of Jeff Traylor, etc.

One type of hire that I liked the idea of modeling ours after is PJ Fleck at Western Michigan. He got hired there back in 2014 and he really did a tremendous job of selling that program to recruits, fans, and media. The biggest key was that there was substance behind it. They went 13-1 in 2016 with their only loss being to Wisconsin at the Cotton Bowl.

He has been solid at Minnesota too.

[Dannymacfan]

31 minutes ago, BillySee58 said:

When we’re talking about hiring a coach, we’ll often say “we need our version of this other coach.” Our football version of Grant Mccasland, our version of Jeff Traylor, etc.

One type of hire that I liked the idea of modeling ours after is PJ Fleck at Western Michigan. He got hired there back in 2014 and he really did a tremendous job of selling that program to recruits, fans, and media. The biggest key was that there was substance behind it. They went 13-1 in 2016 with their only loss being to Wisconsin at the Cotton Bowl.

He has been solid at Minnesota too.

Yes I agree.  I would like for once to not feel the need to copy what has worked for someone else.  This Morris hire has the feel of being unique.

[emmitt01]

“Eric Morris officially took over after UNT fired Littrell following a run that can only be described as successful by Mean Green standards.”

No @Brett Vito, getting blown out in bowl games (two of which you backed into with a losing record) and failing to win ANY hardware isn’t successful by anyone’s standards. 

We’re not some junior college with hopes of one day being a real 4-year institution.   Let’s stop pretending that wanting excellence is beyond the scope of what we deserve.  

Edited December 15, 2022 by emmitt01

[greenminer]

Our standards should be defined by our current budget/spending, not our past.

[meangreen11]

We should not be judged on what happened in the past anymore.  That type of thinking is embraced by our enemies and is meant to keep us down.

[NorthTexasWeLove]

52 minutes ago, emmitt01 said:

“Eric Morris officially took over after UNT fired Littrell following a run that can only be described as successful by Mean Green standards.”

No @Brett Vito, getting blown out in bowl games (two of which you backed into with a losing record) and failing to win ANY hardware isn’t successful by anyone’s standards. 

We’re not some junior college with hopes of one day being a real 4-year institution.   Let’s stop pretending that wanting excellence is beyond the scope of what we deserve.  

He's trolling at this point. But he's very forgettable, so it's easy to ignore his takes. Actually, outside of his headlines here, I never click on any links of his. He likes to be disparaging towards our university. Not sure where he attended (and don't care), but he's always free to go cover that. 

[NTPoonKing]

Agree.  Just my opinion as a very proud alum, but it sure seems that Vito never misses a chance to passive aggressively belittle the university, but mostly the football program.

I do think that Coach Morris actively engaging the student body as much as possible and generating some enthusiasm, will hopefully get more butts in the seats.

I'm optimistic about the hire and hope we can get some great assistant coaches and some game changing transfers.

[BillySee58]

I don’t know why everyone has such a hard time grasping the relationship aspect to this. Vito’s going to be charitable to the people who maintained a good and respectful relationship with him. McCarney did, Littrell did, Derek Thompson did and he pays them all back with putting their names in a positive light. Thompson used to always do post practice interviews for Vito and Vito would always be charitable to him and call him a future Hall of Famer.

[NT80]

3 hours ago, KingDL1 said:

a Salesman!

So Morris needs to be the opposite of Seth.  

As for Vito....he needs to go into the transfer portal!

[GrayEagle]

I used to feel the same way about Vito.  But, he largely followed what was actually happening with our football team.  We had a lot of naysayers here who were more realists than being hypercritical about how good we really were.   The only exception that I can recall was the five game winning streak at the end of last year.  Then what happens?  We had what should have been as much of a sure thing as any bowl opponent we've had.  We all know what happened.

Outwardly, Morris is the opposite of Seth.  Inwardly, I'm hopeful that he'll improve on Seth's good qualities and throw in some wrinkles of his own.   I keep getting more excited about this hire as I hear something new about his past.  Also, you'll never hear me referring to him as Elf.  If he's as successful as I think that he'll be, I don't believe much bad from Vito.  Maybe we'll all start calling him Santa.

Edited December 16, 2022 by GrayEagle

[NorthTexasWeLove]

1 hour ago, BillySee58 said:

I don’t know why everyone has such a hard time grasping the relationship aspect to this. Vito’s going to be charitable to the people who maintained a good and respectful relationship with him. McCarney did, Littrell did, Derek Thompson did and he pays them all back with putting their names in a positive light. Thompson used to always do post practice interviews for Vito and Vito would always be charitable to him and call him a future Hall of Famer.

That's great. And he can keep maintaining all of those relationships without shitting on the football program and athletics. Seth Littrell wasn't good enough. He's not here any longer because of it. That's the headline. 

[Big Z]

4 hours ago, KingDL1 said:

I like a Salesman!

 

I wish I had thought of that. 

 

[MeanGreenTexan]

15 hours ago, emmitt01 said:

“Eric Morris officially took over after UNT fired Littrell following a run that can only be described as successful by Mean Green standards.”

No @Brett Vito, getting blown out in bowl games (two of which you backed into with a losing record) and failing to win ANY hardware isn’t successful by anyone’s standards. 

We’re not some junior college with hopes of one day being a real 4-year institution.   Let’s stop pretending that wanting excellence is beyond the scope of what we deserve.  

If you replace the word "standards" with the word "history", it would be correct.   

But yeah, Mean Green Standards have been raised.   People as plugged into Mean Green Football like Brett Vito should be able to see that.   This, thanks in part, to Littrell.    .500 football is not meeting "Mean Green Standards" anymore... as evidenced by his firing.

[2020 Sucks]

About 45 days ago, I posted this and nearly got tarred and feathered!  Now its almost consensus on this thread!  Glad y'all are coming around!😍

[SilverEagle]

Coach Morris has to be more of a motivational speaker than a salesman. When he is in selling mode, mainly he will be selling himself and how he can push a program "over the hump".  Selling the program is not as much work as when Hayden Fry took over. He had to do a LOT of selling. 

Currently his message to the NT faithful (and used-to-be-faithful) should be "hang in there guys, we're going to get this thing into four-wheel drive and get it out of the ditch".

But he can't be the only one doing the motivating. Jared Mosley needs to get with all the spirit groups and make sure they are pushing the same message as Coach Morris. For too long everyone associated with game day has been showing up and doing their own thing. That will never work.

[greenminer]

50 minutes ago, 2020 Sucks said:

About 45 days ago, I posted this and nearly got tarred and feathered!  Now its almost consensus on this thread!  Glad y'all are coming around!😍

I think you might be playing sarcasm here, but the anti-Vito sentiment has been floating around for several years now.