orangeandbrown wrote:
Well, OK, though if we had two teams in the Top 25, I wager that Chryst would be getting credit for that.
This is true. I would be here assigning that success to the great television exposure he is getting our league -- which leads to your question, that I failed to answer previously: What are weeknight ESPN games getting us?
My view is weeknight ESPN games are a end unto themselves.
One would hope they are also a means to something else -- better recruiting, more visibility and respect among national opinion leaders. I must concede this doesn't appear to be happening right now.
But, even if they aren't a means to any of these things, they are an end.
The glory of Falcon football, for me, when one gets beyond the wins and losses, is to step onto a field with a Wisconsin or a Northwestern and enjoy -- if only for three hours -- the sensation that we belong there.
Even if our team gets blown out, the very act of being on that field shows we belong. It pushes some buttons within me about what I want for our university long term and how I hope my degree is valued by others decades hence.
So, the weeknight games are an end in that sense. To play Miami or Toledo on national television is to suggest these games belong on national television, that we are nationally relevant, and it's an damned important message to send about ourselves as an institution.
And what's the cost?
We have fewer people at some of our games -- but this isn't a fatal flaw to me.
I look back at the last home game with Toledo. We had, what, 17,000 people there? If you figure we could have had 24,000 people there on a Saturday, there's your cost -- and I don't think that's too steep a cost to be on national television.
It's annoying and frustrating -- I missed a chance to be at the last Miami game, a game I had tickets for, because I couldn't be up there on a weeknight because some personal challenges came up. And I still think this was a worthy trade off, in my view. The exposure was worth more than the cash the department went without for that game, in my view.
In fact, I suspect some of these TV windows may gradually start to close as other leagues warm up to the opportunity to play on weeknights. We already see the Big East playing some of these games. Will the Big 12 or the Pac-10 eventually take the plunge?
I do wonder if we will look back, 20 years hence, with a sense of wonder at just how much exposure we were getting now -- just as I look back to the 1970s and marvel at the fact that CBS did occasional MAC games.
Shifting gears slightly: O&B, you suggest "MAC football was lots stronger when we didn't have as much TV exposure."
While I could quibble (2003 was our league's home run year, and it was a fairly well televised year), let's accept that proposition, because there is probably some merit to it (you can point to Marshall's 1999 season, Toledo's 1995 season and several other Miami seasons along the way).
Are you suggesting a casual link? I don't see how any one could argue that TV exposure has made us worse.
I don't think you are, either, but it is the implication.
I guess I would close with this: The challenges facing individual MAC programs are so great that I wonder if anyone has the answer, and I'm not sure these challenges are necessarily the responsibility of the league commissioner.
We rely so much on the student fee to make ends meet in an environment where:
1. Much better financed programs are also relying to some extent on the student fee (e.g., West Viriginia)
2. Expenses seem to be outpacing inflation in a sort of arms-race environment.
3. Pressure is growing to get control of the price of a college education.
It's such a difficult situation that I wonder anyone has the answers. I certainly don't think Chryst can be blamed for this stuff.
My primary hopes and aspirations for our athletic department are these:
1. Continue playing Division I-A football and build the program, much as the folks at East Carolina, Boise State and Southern Mississippi have built their programs.
2. Continue playing men's ice hockey and rebuild the program into significance.
Neither of these things are Chryst's responsibility, and I don't think his actions have held us back at all. We need to look at ourselves.
(I apologize for putting this in the hoops forum. But the conversation drifted here, it's a good conversation and I don't know that it necessarily fits in any particular forum).
