Reality Check

[chrisfisher]

The women's facilities and the athletic center were not luxuries or even a chioce versus the stadium. The women's facilities were necessary to meet the plan that Mr. Helwig had laid out for both the NCAA in the certification process and for an OCR report. They were required per a review of our situation by an independent expert in the field. In addition we need to provide our young ladies with the facilities they deserve as Division I athletes. The Athletic Center was the priority I was assigned when I arrived because we had no facilities to recruit to or provide proper strength and medical spaces for our current kids. What we all "want" many times has to be tempered with what we need and the needs have been met. I guess someone may view that as an inability to make a decision. If so it doesn't bother me.

We all want a stadium and not many people can be more frustrated than me and my staff that we had to build basically every facility an athletic department needs (now in place) before we could even address the stadium project. We have to deal with the complaints about sight lines and bathrooms and everything else that is Fouts' Field. But Fouts is not the the only challenge for us. If it was then Tulsa has just as big a challenge and UAB and Akron have worse situations. Southern Miss, Boise State and many others play in substandard facilities but seem to rise to the occassion. Hell TCU plays in a 60 year old stadium that's been painted to look better, but has no luxury boxes or suites and concessions are sold out of auxilary units for the most part like we do. They're in the TOP 15.

It is not my intention in responding to rant and rave and defend myself. I have made and will make the decisions that need to be made about facilities or any other area of the program. Because they don't conincide with the individual wants of everyone doesn't make them wrong. Nobody demanded a new stadium or athletic center or as far as I know any other facility before 2001. In fact nobody donated significnat money for any phase of the athletic program before 2001. Now we expect facility in 6 years. It doesn't happen that way on any campus (sorry, except OK ST).

As we now crank up the stadium process, I hope everyone that is demanding its' construction is just as excited about it going up and willing to depart with the dollars needed to make it happen. Don't expect others to pay for what we want. This is an everybody project and it "will be" completed just like the other facilities have. It will change the way people look at us for sure as the other facilities already have. But it will not fix all of our problems and deficiencies. Attendance didn't generate significant additional revenue even during a four year bowl run and Mean Green Club membership while significantly higher than four years ago still lags far behind where it needs to be. That won't build a stadium and definitely won't generate the necessary revenue to fund other projects. And this doesn't address the other problems that prevent competitive programs.  I know that. You know that. And those deficiencies must and will also be remedied.

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I never knew Glad to Be Green was RV until tonight, and I did a search on GMG to read several of his posts. I am relieved to hear his comments and responses to numerous topics posted in this forum. Kudos to RV for facing head-on a somewhat unfriendly environment… that is total class. I was soooo excited to attend a school with D1A athletics when I accepted here, but I’ll be damn if I wasn’t starting to lose sleep over concerns that our athletics was heading down the drain. I had visions of RV sitting back with DD with umbrellas in their drinks, laughing it up and collecting check$. However, I firmly believe that RV is dedicated to moving this program forward. In fact, he seems to have the same or similar goals as we do, albeit expresses them a little more rationally. No doubt we are a dedicated seething hotbed of unbridled, yet well intentioned, verbal and emotional support (sounds like more financial support needs to be added to this list according to RV's posts).

Does this mean that I’ll sit back and except anything that comes along? Of course not. I’ll still have the same expectations that I have posted again and again. I’ll probably temper my tone knowing that we have an athletic director who is not only aware of these concerns, but is also working hard to overcome them. RV, I hope to hear from you soon in this forum.