Blackistone actually writes a good article

[MrMustang1965]

C'mon, people...haven't you figured it out yet? The Dallas Morning News is run by people who don't give a tinker's damn about SMU. Why SMU continues to allow the DMN to have its name plastered on scoreboards, souvenir programs and sponsoring events on The Hilltop is beyond me.

[SoCal_Pony]

Hey Frog,

Let me try to provide you something you never got at TCU, an education...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58965-2005Feb2.html

[SoCal_Pony]

KnuckleStang,

What planet do you live on?????

Have you ever BEEN to San Jose State???

When I attended SMU, we won more games than any school in the nation. SJS will NEVER EVER have the success SMU had or can have in the future....regardless of payola.

Your analogy is the equivalent of asking...'if I have the same shoes as MJ...can I jump as high as he can???'

[McClown27]

C'mon, people...haven't you figured it out yet? The Dallas Morning News is run by people who don't give a tinker's damn about SMU. Why SMU continues to allow the DMN to have its name plastered on scoreboards, souvenir programs and sponsoring events on The Hilltop is beyond me.

Amen! We need to start demanding equal coverage with UT!

[MrMustang1965]

C'mon, people...haven't you figured it out yet? The Dallas Morning News is run by people who don't give a tinker's damn about SMU. Why SMU continues to allow the DMN to have its name plastered on scoreboards, souvenir programs and sponsoring events on The Hilltop is beyond me.

Amen! We need to start demanding equal coverage with UT!

McClown: I'm not sure if your post is meant in jest or not.

SMU will never get equal coverage with UT. It just ain't gonna happen. The DMN is run by folks who don't care about SMU and they know where their $$$ comes from. It comes from readers & advertisers who don't care about SMU because 1) they didn't go to school there or 2) sports isn't important to them.

Pick up a copy of the DMN and look at which section is thicker than the rest. It ain't the sports section.

[LawSchoolPony]

I have said it before, and I'll say it again...

In reference to the article correctly calling student support at SMU "embarassing": from what I have seen on campus at law school, the administration does basically NOTHING to get students excited about sports, even football.

There are no signs, banners, etc. on Fridays to get students pumped about Saturdays at Ford Stadium. In the law quad, home to 1,000 law students (1/10) of the entire student body at SMU, there is NO mention of the games at all. Most students have no idea where the football stadium, is, let alone that we get free tickets! There are NO advertisements, no posters, no banners, etc. The ONLY mention of the games are the invitations in August to come to the law school tent on the Boulevard for home games. A staff member told me on Homecoming week that it was "their homecoming" weekend...not "ours" - that seems to be their approach.

I mean, I know law students study alot, but when it was suggested that Law School Orientation should include at least 1 segment on "SMU" and the benefits we get as students (free tickets to sports events, rec center, health center, etc.) the administration shot it down. Grad students make up 40% of the 10,000 students at SMU, but I bet there were less than 100 grad students who attended home games this year - total!

All I'm saying is that the school could do A LOT MORE to get students, graduate and undergrad, excited about game days...

[WildBillPony]

There is a game tonight at Moody. SMU vs. S. Miss. at 7:00 p.m. Show up early, be loud and let's get a win tonight. I still think Kevin BS is full of it!

[Hoop Fan]

after more reflection, Blackistone hit us hard today. Very hard. Basically you can see what happened here. Turner called the DMN out with a quip during the press conference. Blackistone didn't appreciate it, and took it as whining and placing blame elsewhere, namely him. So what he did was he went back to the office yesterday evening and wrote an article about as derogatory as possible on SMU. The "whining" theme is at the forefront and you can directly attribute it to the exchange with Turner yesterday afternoon I'm sure. Blackistone was offended by Turner and it oozes out of that column.

Hey, Turner shouldn't have done that yesterday, he should plead our case more professionally to the media. He was out of line with Blackistone. And Blackistone was unprofessional about it and turned around and slapped us hard. Set recruiting back significantly. He hurt Tubbs and he hurt Bennett. Never was there a more negative article written about a college and its fans and supporters. Never, no place no where. Even if it has truth, things like that dont get written by newspapers. What needs to happen now is Turner needs to apologize to Blackistone and company. But our heavy hitters MUST NOW go to the DMN and make it known that articles like that are ridiculously opinionated and hurt SMU badly. Whatever pressure we have to bear must be used to fight the damage done by that article.

[KnuckleStang]

KnuckleStang,

What planet do you live on?????

Have you ever BEEN to San Jose State???

When I attended SMU, we won more games than any school in the nation. SJS will NEVER EVER have the success SMU had or can have in the future....regardless of payola.

Your analogy is the equivalent of asking...'if I have the same shoes as MJ...can I jump as high as he can???'

Easy there cowboy...okay, bad analogy. All I am saying is that those of you who think that the ONLY thing holding SMU back in terms of big time football and basketball is our Restrictive Model, prepare to be very disappointed when we finally do change the Model to a "level playing field" and big-time recruits STILL don't want anything to do with us. The reason is simple: No recruit who is worth a damn wants to come play at a school where it looks like nobody gives a crap. Which is what it looks like at SMU, because nobody does. Some people say our team doesn't deserve a large audience until it adopts a model on a par with our natural and traditional rivals. I say YES, we need to change the model, but that's the easy part, and it's not going to make as big an impact as some of you seem to think.

[ponyplayer]

What`s a tinkers damn? Is that different from other damns............

[MrMustang1965]

What`s a tinkers damn? Is that different from other damns............

Yes, it is. Like different forms of sh*t.

[ponyplayer]

What`s a tinkers damn? Is that different from other damns............

Yes, it is. Like different forms of sh*t.

I don`t think so, no matter where that stuff comes from it is all the same........

[couch 'em]

I'm not sure this is the proper place for such a disscussion, but you can classify by color, shape, constitution, aroma, etc etc.........

[mr. pony]

Here's my letter to Blackistone and the DMN sports department. Doubt they'll print it:

The tired, biased logic by Kevin Blackistone goes like this: Small, private schools must cheat to compete in football and big, state schools don't have to. Blackistone states the only way a small, private school can run with "the big dogs", like SMU did in the 80s, is to cheat.

Is TCU cheating right now, Mr. Blackistone? (Please keep us informed on how that investigation is progressing.) How about USC and Miami?

The fact is small, private schools can, and do, indeed compete legitimately.

Many news organizations share Blackistone's bias and have no interest in digging into winning, major programs. Success at big state schools is to be expected, not investigated. Besides, bringing down a big program would tick off a lot of readers.

Why doesn't Blackistone head down to College Station and get to the bottom of recent comments by a Midland Lee recruit concerning cash handouts? If cheating is in fact going on at A&M, does anybody care to wonder for a moment if UT, Tech, and OU aren't possibly doing the same?

There's this thing called a public information request. How about doing some research? After all, someone was fishing when SMU was landed and gutted in 1987.

Here's some reality for you, Mr. Blackistone. SMU was not the only school paying players in the 80s. But, SMU is the only school to have ever received the death penalty, even though over 20 schools have since been eligible.

As for SMU's fans, shut down a big, state school program for a couple of seasons and take away their conference affiliation, and see what it does to the fan base.

SMU got the death penalty precisely because they are a small, private school, (and we all know those guys cheat.)

[PonyTime]

"The truth is that the only reason a private school of a few thousand students was running with the big dogs in the biggest of sports, year in and year out back in the day, was because it cheated. "

This is one of the most inaccurate statements that KB puts in this article - and it irks me the most.

I realize what went on in the early 80s, but COME ON Kevin - SMU has been playing football since before you were born - and has been quite successful at it for many decades. Don't tell me KB thinks that the teams that played with the "big dogs" in the days of Doak or Don Meredith were only successful because they were cheating. Taking a look at this program using a 5 year view is a journalistic error that leads me to believe that Kevin will never play with the "Big Dogs" unless he, like Dale Hansen before him, uses slander and negativity to further his own career. Looks like that is the choice that Kevin has made - hey - it worked for Dale - Why Not?