GTFLETCH
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Unpacking my Georgia Tech football angst, and looking to what could be. By Robert Binion @robert_binion
After a mysterious coaching search, up to the microphone stepped Geoff Collins. He talked about the glory days of GT football, although he never seemed to mention the 2 Orange Bowls and 3 UGA victories that his immediate predecessor had engineered. He made lofty promises about restored glory and owning the city that had once belonged to Dodd’s teams until the 1960s.
Now, it’s been 3 years. I’m 34, not 3 anymore. And last Saturday, I sat in my living room, watching the red-clad Bulldog Nation overrun Boddy Dodd Stadium. I saw some 10,000 GT fans endure a humiliating beatdown under the leadership of a coach who has not yet given any indication that he knows what he’s doing.
From the announcers, there was pity. For the GT fanbase, there was embarrassment. For the team, there was heartbreak and frustration. All we could see was the remnants of a football program that doesn’t seem to matter anymore. It makes me sad, and I wonder, will we ever matter again?
Two prominent Georgia Tech boosters went public to Ken Suguira with similar thoughts for a piece that has set off another round of uproar in the GT fanbase. Reading my mind, Steve Zelnak offered this: “We’ve gone from being relevant to who cares? And that’s sad. It’s sad for the players. It’s sad for the fans.”
It gets complicated. Zelnak was the head of the search committee that hired Mike Bobinkski. And Bobinkski was the leader most directly responsible for not giving Paul Johnson the resources he had earned and thought he needed to maintain the gains he had secured. That slowly drove Johnson towards his North Carolina cabin, even as Todd Stansbury entered the picture with a more clear direction on how to properly resource the program.
Now, Stansbury has staked himself to Geoff Collins. Clearly, from Suguira’s reporting, the pair has one more year at most to show significant progress. But if resourced supporters like Zelnak feel this way, things can change. There are almost certainly more wilderness days coming, but the fans who didn’t show up on the Saturday after Thanksgiving are still out there. Scores of people - from former players to coachers to alumni to boosters - who helped make this program what it was still care deeply. A leader is needed to mobilize us. A visionary is needed to capitalize on what GT still is. And then we just might matter again.
Link
www.fromtherumbleseat.com
After a mysterious coaching search, up to the microphone stepped Geoff Collins. He talked about the glory days of GT football, although he never seemed to mention the 2 Orange Bowls and 3 UGA victories that his immediate predecessor had engineered. He made lofty promises about restored glory and owning the city that had once belonged to Dodd’s teams until the 1960s.
Now, it’s been 3 years. I’m 34, not 3 anymore. And last Saturday, I sat in my living room, watching the red-clad Bulldog Nation overrun Boddy Dodd Stadium. I saw some 10,000 GT fans endure a humiliating beatdown under the leadership of a coach who has not yet given any indication that he knows what he’s doing.
From the announcers, there was pity. For the GT fanbase, there was embarrassment. For the team, there was heartbreak and frustration. All we could see was the remnants of a football program that doesn’t seem to matter anymore. It makes me sad, and I wonder, will we ever matter again?
Two prominent Georgia Tech boosters went public to Ken Suguira with similar thoughts for a piece that has set off another round of uproar in the GT fanbase. Reading my mind, Steve Zelnak offered this: “We’ve gone from being relevant to who cares? And that’s sad. It’s sad for the players. It’s sad for the fans.”
It gets complicated. Zelnak was the head of the search committee that hired Mike Bobinkski. And Bobinkski was the leader most directly responsible for not giving Paul Johnson the resources he had earned and thought he needed to maintain the gains he had secured. That slowly drove Johnson towards his North Carolina cabin, even as Todd Stansbury entered the picture with a more clear direction on how to properly resource the program.
Now, Stansbury has staked himself to Geoff Collins. Clearly, from Suguira’s reporting, the pair has one more year at most to show significant progress. But if resourced supporters like Zelnak feel this way, things can change. There are almost certainly more wilderness days coming, but the fans who didn’t show up on the Saturday after Thanksgiving are still out there. Scores of people - from former players to coachers to alumni to boosters - who helped make this program what it was still care deeply. A leader is needed to mobilize us. A visionary is needed to capitalize on what GT still is. And then we just might matter again.
Link
GT Used to Matter in the CFB World: What Happened?
Unpacking my Georgia Tech football angst, and looking to what could be
www.fromtherumbleseat.com
