Smartest and dumbest thing the athletic department has done

[Techbert]

Yeah. That was a real bummer to have an awesome recruiting class and something to look forward to this February.

yea real bummer to not look forward to any ACC titles or BCS game victories am I right?

clown

You do realize we have been mired with a 500 record overall and in conference for the last 4 years, and had a particular deficit in talent when he walked away from the program, don't you?

The other big schools figured out the defense against the 3O. The spikes of glory, of which half had Geoff Collins' players, were gone and were not coming back.

 

[OptionJacket]

Leaving the SEC was dumb. Hiring Rice was outstanding. Hiring Cremins was awesome. Extending Hewitt was dumb. GT’s marketing ability until Collins came along was borderline criminal. It’s almost as if those who run GT purposefully have tried to sabotage any positive marketing strategy. Russell was laughable. Adidas is outstanding. Keeping Hall around is horrible. Way too much talent in the metro area for GT to continue to be mid tier year after year. Hiring Ramsey was awesome. And the Penn State game was indeed just a stupid decision that took all our luster.

 

[00Burdell]

Letting Bill Curry get away to Bama.

One of these days, I'm gonna have a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong talk with you.

 

[Tampa Jacket]

Leaving the SEC was dumb. Hiring Rice was outstanding. Hiring Cremins was awesome. Extending Hewitt was dumb. GT’s marketing ability until Collins came along was borderline criminal. It’s almost as if those who run GT purposefully have tried to sabotage any positive marketing strategy. Russell was laughable. Adidas is outstanding. Keeping Hall around is horrible. Way too much talent in the metro area for GT to continue to be mid tier year after year. Hiring Ramsey was awesome. And the Penn State game was indeed just a stupid decision that took all our luster.

Why does everyone think leaving the SEC was such a big mistake? The only SEC school we have anything remotely in common with in modern day football as far as academic standards, funding and attendance is Vanderbilt. I love GT through and through, and I know we’ve beaten some good SEC teams over the years. But realistically, Tennessee hasn’t been relevant in that conference for almost 2 decades and they have a much bigger fan base, more money and don’t have nearly the recruiting challenges GT has.
Winning football games has never been the top priority at GT. The same is not true at Georgia, Alabama, Auburn and Florida. Winning comes first at those factories, academics second or even third in the list of priorities.

 

[ee8384]

Upper North expansion was a good idea up until about 2010-2011. Hard to predict we would have completely lost momentum with the Gailey mediocrity tour after O'Leary built the fan base up. In retrospect, sure... Would have been done completely differently and capped at about 50K with lots of premium suite seating to go with the Letterman's Club. Hindsight.

LOL at knowing in 93 that Cremins' best days were behind him. I call total bullshit on that.

Hard to disagree with Homer Rice to repair the decay under Dodd as AD.

Biggest mistake was definitely leaving the SEC. Hewitt's contract has to be up there too.

As an alum sitting behind the basket yelling "Go Bobby, Go" while his buddy yelled "Stay Bobby, Stay" after watching Tech lose to Southern in the first round of the 93 NCAAs in Tucson, I call bullshit on your bullshit call.

 

[texstinger]

Carson was not a GTAA or even a Dodd hire. Dodd's choice was Dickey, had even offered & been accepted, and Pres Ed Harrison over-ruled Dodd...... Just another reason no one cried when Harrison handed the reins over to Art Hansen about 1969.

That is what i am saying. The old farts with the power had to hire a GT man (and Many of the unthinking thought Bud as such due to being CBD last DC.)

As compared to Dickey anyway.

Not me - them.

 

[texstinger]

We have had several poor presidents who hired poor AD's who then hired poor coaches. Hopefully, our current president and AD have ended this trend. Why did Harrison want Carson enough to oppose Dodd?

As said, because may of the old money guys (especially Mr Robert) considered (if not a true Tech man) Carson as part of the elitist family by simply having worked here. They had Harrison's ear.

That mattered more than making the best hire. Truly stupid and when this wad done the GT job was probably the best job opening in the country at the time.

 

[texstinger]

Letting Bill Curry get away to Bama.

Always good to be able to laugh in times like these.

 

[DeepSnap]

As said, because may of the old money guys (especially Mr Robert) considered (if not a true Tech man) Carson as part of the elitist family by simply having worked here. They had Harrison's ear.

That mattered more than making the best hire. Truly stupid and when this wad done the GT job was probably the best job opening in the country at the time.

First, I am in full agreement with you.

Second, the one name that never comes up, not with Carson, Fulcher or Pepper, is Jim Carlen, a proven HFC at WVa & Texas Tech, and later at USCe. Great guy, liked everywhere he went, and yet he never got a sniff as a GT alumnus at NATS. Or perhaps he knew better than to follow Dodd or he didn't want to step into the mess Fulcher did.

 

[texstinger]

Why does everyone think leaving the SEC was such a big mistake? The only SEC school we have anything remotely in common with in modern day football as far as academic standards, funding and attendance is Vanderbilt. I love GT through and through, and I know we’ve beaten some good SEC teams over the years. But realistically, Tennessee hasn’t been relevant in that conference for almost 2 decades and they have a much bigger fan base, more money and don’t have nearly the recruiting challenges GT has.
Winning football games has never been the top priority at GT. The same is not true at Georgia, Alabama, Auburn and Florida. Winning comes first at those factories, academics second or even third in the list of priorities.

Why?

Because programs need money.

To make money you need fans.

You don't keep / make fans by telling them beating WFU is equal to beating auburn.

And Vandy, in any realm, had never been close to GT.

Too many make the mistake of making comparisons now - after we made the most stupid athletic mistake we ever could - not in judging it when the decision was made. And we knew pro sports was coming.

People who can't / refuse to see that this mistake literally almost kilked our program will never understand.

 

[texstinger]

First, I am in full agreement with you.

Second, the one name that never comes up, not with Carson, Fulcher or Pepper, is Jim Carlen, a proven HFC at WVa & Texas Tech, and later at USCe. Great guy, liked everywhere he went, and yet he never got a sniff as a GT alumnus at NATS. Or perhaps he knew better than to follow Dodd or he didn't want to step into the mess Fulcher did.

Jim, indeed, had some impressive coaching accomplishments.

Only reference i ever heard about him was from a man that once work in our family business.

He had 2 neighbors that were both A-A at GT for CBD. One played in the early 50's. The other in the 61-63 years.

They both related that, somehow, Jim Carlen burned some very big bridges at GT.

IDK

 

[77GTFan]

Building the Upper North was not a good call. The enlarged student section seats in the Lower North was nice. Should have created a plaza on top of that seating with a really nice room for Lower West big contributors to enjoy pre-game and halftime that could be used for other events with a nice view of the stadium. Have a patio outside that folks can stand on overlooking the field.

Hiring Dr. Rice was amazing. He made us relevant again. Just a few of his hires - Bobby Cremins, Bobby Ross, Jim Morris, Puggy Blackmon. A national champion, a Final Four, multiple ACC titles, nationally ranked basketball, football, baseball and golf. Total Person Concept made Tech SA’s as respected as any in the country.

 

[JJacket]

This is clearly the dumbest...

A home and home with Georgia State is a close second.

Wasn't that a "support the Falcon's" day?

 

[Dhatura]

Wasn't that a "support the Falcon's" day?

Originally, the picture was for the Falcons. Unfortunately, the gtadmissions instagram actually posted that very picture for the mutts.

 

[Dhatura]

I'll just stick with more recent ideas, so I think the best thing they did was to hire CPJ. I think he was really the right coach for the right time. It may not have ended well, but we got the jolt we needed to let us know we can compete in this day and time.

As far as the worst - I still think we are horrendous in marketing and exposure. I think we are beginning to do a little better, but I believe, as an Institute of technology, we ought to be on the cutting edge in game day experiences. Why do we have ööööty sound systems and cheesy things on the digital boards and is just completely underwhelming? Can we not get assistance from any of the students to lend a hand like they used to do? Seems like a good resume builder to assist in developing things like this. If it is a money thing, could the school not also help with this since students will be taking actual part in making the campus better? Maybe it's all a pipe dream...

 

[JJacket]

Best and worst thing they did was grant me season tix years ago. Good for me. Bad for me. Glorious. Heartbreaking.

 

[GEETEELEE]

The worst? Installing first generation AstroTurf in Grant field. I played intramural football on it and it was like playing on concrete. Nobody wanted to play on that crap, our injuries skyrocketed and made recruiting even more difficult.

Hiring Homer Rice and subsequently Bobby Cremins hands down the best move.

 

[GT flunkout]

I'll just stick with more recent ideas, so I think the best thing they did was to hire CPJ. I think he was really the right coach for the right time. It may not have ended well, but we got the jolt we needed to let us know we can compete in this day and time.

As far as the worst - I still think we are horrendous in marketing and exposure. I think we are beginning to do a little better, but I believe, as an Institute of technology, we ought to be on the cutting edge in game day experiences. Why do we have ööööty sound systems and cheesy things on the digital boards and is just completely underwhelming? Can we not get assistance from any of the students to lend a hand like they used to do? Seems like a good resume builder to assist in developing things like this. If it is a money thing, could the school not also help with this since students will be taking actual part in making the campus better? Maybe it's all a pipe dream...

Meh, I think in retrospect CPJ is definitely debatable. We already knew we were capable of doing much more, otherwise we wouldn't have hired a coach that never had a losing season after what now seems like a very short 6 years (Gailey). That's not a slam on Johnson at all but I'm sure others will take it as such.

The window dressing on marketing looks semi-ok after one year, but that's still 100% CGC and and what they're doing on the social media front. I mean I guess Stansbury & the AA get some credit for letting him run with the vision and allowing our media partners to copy it. Gameday experience is still completely amateur hour under a regime that is well-established.

 

[18in32]

Why does everyone think leaving the SEC was such a big mistake? The only SEC school we have anything remotely in common with in modern day football as far as academic standards, funding and attendance is Vanderbilt. I love GT through and through, and I know we’ve beaten some good SEC teams over the years. But realistically, Tennessee hasn’t been relevant in that conference for almost 2 decades and they have a much bigger fan base, more money and don’t have nearly the recruiting challenges GT has.
Winning football games has never been the top priority at GT. The same is not true at Georgia, Alabama, Auburn and Florida. Winning comes first at those factories, academics second or even third in the list of priorities.

I think the question is "What way does the causation run?" Staying in the SEC might've turned us into Vandy, but perhaps not. And certainly we'd be richer now than we are, for whatever that's worth.

But in general, I think you are right that we complain about the SEC departure when really that's serving as a proxy for our complaint that the school gradually decided football shouldn't be that important.

Cuz, yes, it should be that important

 

[Techbert]

We'll never know how the SEC thing would look like today. That's one reason the topic bores me.