eldonabe wrote: ↑Thu Oct 10, 2024 12:10 pm
Floyd wrote: ↑Thu Oct 10, 2024 11:22 am
The only thing that makes any sense is the team has to get better first. Spend the money on coaches, increase the talent, and win games. Then money starts flowing in. No sense adding seats when the place is rarely close to full, or adding nice bathrooms. People aren't coming because the team has been bad, not because the bathrooms suck. All the infrastructure is nice but if they aren't good, what's the point? Start with building the program leadership on the field to be top notch and if that doesn't work, it probably never will.
Cal did it with hoop, he had a high school gym and no support, but could sell ice to an Eskimo. That's what we need, a recruiting master
Cal was a looong time ago and the landscape looks nothing like it is now - and it will look that much more different in the next 12 - 24 months.
This is just a different version of kicking the can down the road. Even if you could get some players decent enough to win enough, that takes 3-4 years minimum, and THEN you think about the stadium? It will be in the 30's before a Stadium is opened.
I don't even know if Nick Saban could come here today and fix this in 3-4 years without proper infrastructure (stadium).
I am not disagreeing with you Floyd, you are right. The problem is all of the above and the biggest hurdle - MONEY.
Money on Coaches
Money on Players
Money on Facilities
Umass has a rich history of being Cheap.... the concept of spending the kind of money they need to spend is quite foreign.
They have spent a boat load on Frank. The jury is till out, but I would not call that a success yet, and I am not overly confident that they will be much better than they were last year going forward either.
I'm not a big fan of the " build it all, then we'll be good" philosophy. Everything starts with the product on the field. Make the commitment to build the best staff ( I have to say I am a Don Brown fan, but I think that his best years are in the rearview). Spending money on the best staff would still be less than a new stadium. Winning teams create the excitement, excitement brings in the fans, the fans bring in money. I don't care if my Cal comparison was 30 yrs ago or 3 yrs ago, the philosophy is still the same. Now, people don't go except mostly diehard football people. Start winning, it becomes an event, and people go to games that don't know what a 1st down is because it's exciting and the place to be. Get noticed, get on the news, and people from Boston start coming out, the money flows. Now you got momentum for the stadium, upgrades etc. And if it does fail, at least you didn't spend all that money first on stadium etc only to become an empty relic on campus.
The people making the decisions on the leadership of the program need to be a serious group of knowledgeable people with experience in building winning programs, not gamble hires like Molnar & Bell.
People just want to see good, competitive football teams and they'll come out. It's a great way to spend fall afternoons outside enjoying the day. No reason a large university like UMass can't build a good product to put on the field. It's a shame how long this program has been down