JJ: "I will coach 3-5 more years"

[PlanoStang]

We sold out our new stadium vs. Kansas

[PonySnob]

We sold out our new stadium vs. Kansas

And "home" games against Texas Tech........

[Big12Mustang]

It just pisses me off everytime I hear this negative debbie downers crying about how bad our attendance has been and how no matter how good we become we will never break 20K. What a joke, 32k will be easily reached with just 2 years winning more than 10 games. Win a Fiesta/Cotton Bowl and you'll see a waitlist for Ford Season tickets.

[WordUpBU]

SMU has the potential to get better in gameday turnout with 40,000 alumni in Dallas and 6-7k undergrads. If SMU can draw 70% of that group they could do it without a single t shirt fan.

The issue is momentum and winning has to take place at a high number of wins per year and a few highly visible wins to be the catalyst.

I don't think 50k as a season average is a very realistic long term hope. Dallas is already segmented with UT, Tech, BU, TCU, A&M, and OU fans and the national trend is towards less gameday attendance. I could see getting to 30k consistently though which the pre-DP Mustang teams averaged against BU (40k), TCU (44k), UH (29.5k), Rice (25.8k), Tech (27.9k) and Arkansas (38.6k). The average is over 30k even without BU and TCU in it and around 28k for UH, Rice, and Tech.

I think SMU can get to that turnout again with enough momentum over the next couple of years should SMU pull off a big win on the national stage. Knocking off A&M would do it.

[malonish]

It just pisses me off everytime I hear this negative debbie downers crying about how bad our attendance has been and how no matter how good we become we will never break 20K. What a joke, 32k will be easily reached with just 2 years winning more than 10 games. Win a Fiesta/Cotton Bowl and you'll see a waitlist for Ford Season tickets.

Momentum is correct. The people will not pack the stadium to the limit overnight. It would take a miracle season to break the apathy. If the only way to pack it is to win 10 games then you are less likely to get it than not. There's always the chance that every starting QB against us could get food poisoning before the game but I put that at negligible odds.

[Big12Mustang]

SMU has the potential to get better in gameday turnout with 40,000 alumni in Dallas and 6-7k undergrads. If SMU can draw 70% of that group they could do it without a single t shirt fan.

The issue is momentum and winning has to take place at a high number of wins per year and a few highly visible wins to be the catalyst.

I don't think 50k as a season average is a very realistic long term hope. Dallas is already segmented with UT, Tech, BU, TCU, A&M, and OU fans and the national trend is towards less gameday attendance. I could see getting to 30k consistently though which the pre-DP Mustang teams averaged against BU (40k), TCU (44k), UH (29.5k), Rice (25.8k), Tech (27.9k) and Arkansas (38.6k). The average is over 30k even without BU and TCU in it and around 28k for UH, Rice, and Tech.

I think SMU can get to that turnout again with enough momentum over the next couple of years should SMU pull off a big win on the national stage. Knocking off A&M would do it.

If Baylor and TCU can build a brand new 45K Stadium, they imply that they can fill the stadium with that amount of fans. SMU moving to a P5 conference (or the AAC gaining P6 status..although a longshot) as well as a very competitive football squad would help reach those numbers which would warrant filling the horseshoe to get to 45k as well. TCU and BU fill their stadiums with a strong contingent of their own fans (25-30K + tshirt fans) and the rest are visiting UT, OU, Tech, OK State fans. SMU could do the 30K base and the rest would be our visiting TCU, BU, A&M or whoever we play in the future.

[mrydel]

I saw a very empty TCU vs. Kansas stadium in Ft. Worth last year. Of course the "in the concourse" excuse was used but it was very sparsely attended.

If we played Texas, Tech, Baylor, Arkansas, A&M, we could sell out even though there would be more opponent fans there than we would desire.

[redpony]

As mryel insinuates- if we played top level competition like BU,A&M, UT, TCU every season and won a few of those games our 'attendance' problems would not exist.
However, with a coach who doesn't care about SMU, the fans or the students and complains when we play decent competition we won't achieve that goal. Good example- LB and bball, winning, interaction and respecting traditions does a lot to bring fans to the stands.

[SMUer]

You expect 70% of an alumni-base to be in one place on a Saturday!?! You guys are insane! We are absolutely dependent on the t-shirt fan. You know a majority of our studentd are women, right? That many of our students who go to SMU don't give a flip about football or sports.

Your way of thinking is the same as our marketing department has had up to two years ago. It is a pipe-dream; won't ever happen. Half of TCU's attendance never went to TCU, they just like winners.

[couch 'em]

Again, agreed. You can't fire a coach who takes you to 4 bowls in 5 years. Especially with SMU's track record. The ONLY way June leaves last year is if there were irreconcilable differences between June and Hart/Turner. Imagine how Hart would pitch that to the next candidate: "Yes, legendary offensive guru June Jones took us to 4 straight bowls, but he had an off-year, so we decided to go with you. How's $500k a year sound?"

Now if he stinks it up this year, maybe that's a different story, as you're several years removed from a bowl, and might be able to point steady decline as the basis for your decision.

But I think the best case scenario, regardless of what you might personally think of JJ, is for him to have 3-5 more successful years on the Hilltop, and then for there to be well-orchestrated handoff of a successful program to JJ's successor.

this is such a ridiculous argument. Every coach in college football knows how insignificant the bowl has become, and how poor sneaking into a garbage bowl just over .500 in a weak conference is.

[WordUpBU]

You expect 70% of an alumni-base to be in one place on a Saturday!?! You guys are insane! We are absolutely dependent on the t-shirt fan. You know a majority of our studentd are women, right? That many of our students who go to SMU don't give a flip about football or sports.

Your way of thinking is the same as our marketing department has had up to two years ago. It is a pipe-dream; won't ever happen. Half of TCU's attendance never went to TCU, they just like winners.

I assume that is directed at me. Obviously I don't think 70% of your DFW alumni base is going to show up at once. The point is that unlike TCU, Baylor, or others who have 15-25k fewer local undergrads+alumni than their stadium holds SMU has 15k more so if that big catalyst win happens it suggests it would be easier to catch a spark as fewer t shirt fans or out of town alumni are needed to sell out. It was never that t shirt fans are somehow not needed.

[blackoutpony]

FTHP is doing some of his hardest trolling in awhile in this thread. Most of this is so laughable it's mind numbing.

BU please ignore him. We all hate him, don't think he represents us as a fan base, but the mods won't boot him for some odd reason.

And yes, maybe you can buy me beer at ford next year you bet welching weasel

[SMU2007]

This board is becoming unreadable thanks to the complete nonsense posted by FHTP etc. Insists on reminding everyone how clueless he is day after day. We get it.

[Big12Mustang]

FTHP is doing some of his hardest trolling in awhile in this thread. Most of this is so laughable it's mind numbing.

BU please ignore him. We all hate him, don't think he represents us as a fan base, but the mods won't boot him for some odd reason.

And yes, maybe you can buy me beer at ford next year you bet welching weasel

In what way could you consider trolling what I just wrote before? You just don't like what I write. That is not considered trolling.
Now what you did was to personally insult a poster which is against the rules of PF.com...so if anyone deserves the boot, it is you.

[East Coast Mustang]

FTHP/B12M- please stop acting like an idiot and making us look like morons to people of other fanbases.

We will never need an on campus stadium bigger than Ford. The trend in the future will be for stadiums with smaller seating capacities- not larger. See the NFL. Best thing we could do is shave off some of the bleacher seats on the top of the east side of Ford and convert it into additional club/luxury boxes if the need ever arises, or add a second deck on the east end with club seating.