6-2...middle finger to the following 10...

[mtrout]

A true leader could have bowed up and said you know, NCAA got us and then we added our own penalty with another year. But now our dues are paid, and watch out. We’re coming at you full force. We’ll do it right but we are not going to let the past dictate our future. I’m calling on all to rally and let’s make a commitment here and now to get this thing done.

Orsini basically did that and got canned.

[PonyTime]

Turner's first responsibility is to the academic side. I believe he has done an outstanding job with a number of new academic buildings, dorms and new academic programs and let us not forget the Bush Presidential Library. At the same time he has insured a steady boost for virtually all athletic programs. We now have a state of the art tennis center, golf complex and special golf course, aquatic complex to be dedicated on Friday, Nov. 3d at 3 PM, Ford Stadium plus numerous additions and improvements, new crew facilities, new venues for equestrian, Moody is special as well as the new basketball training facility. I think those complaining about Turner should examine the facts before ever complaining about his support of athletics. I have seen him at virtually every away game football tailgate that I have attended for the past 12 years. The IPF is probably the only facility not completed and it is still in the progress of design, permitting and needs funding. Turner has been a tremendous fund raiser and should be given credit for these efforts since he arrived.

Builds buildings - check
Academics - check
Tennis facility - check
Golf facility - check
Aquatic center - check
New dorms - check
Bush Library - check
Crew facilities - check
Equestrian facilities - check
IPF - assumed virtually "in progress"
Walking BLVD - check
Away games - check

If you agree that your football program is the university's face to the world, with basketball being say 1b, then I would think that with the exception of the Bush Library, all others are far enough down on the list as to have no discernable influence on Joe Q. Doe in Most places outside of Dallas/Metroplex/Texas. Facts examined. Next episode: SMU vs TCU facts since 1995. A tale of the tape.

Massive unsustainable debt due to building projects with very little to no funding up front - check.

[PonyTime]

First of all - we will probably drop at least 2 of the next three so not sure I'd be flipping anyone off just yet. Hope so, but odds are we get one more win this season. Better, but not back flip territory.

But not sure how anyone could not start this list with the 9 banned alums from the mid 80's who actually got us in all this mess and put us in a spot that was so weak that firggin Baylor got our spo in the big 12. Punish the guilty - not the players who had it handed to them, administrators who had to figure out how to clean up the mess and save the entire university, or athletic directors - all of which have had to try to make a pretty bow out of a pile of pig [deleted] because we never have enough money to compete.

Our alums give at an alarmingly high rate given how few of them there are, or what they have gotten back in return for 30 years. It really is remarkable. Most of the whiners are clueless about the real world.

The 9 banned alums were simply doing the exact same thing that every other booster was doing at the time - and what is still going on pretty much everywhere. I would put someone like Ed Cox down as perhaps one of the most generous and impactful alums of SMU in the history of the school and nowhere near a "blame" list like this.The University is going to desperately need alums like Mr. Cox to continue their generosity over the next decade.

[Stallion]

I know that kind of adulation of the "Immortal 9" makes you a "cool guy" at the Mustang Club Preseason Hoot-and Annie but those [deleted] devastated athletics and the university for generations. We didn't turn those guys into the NCAA-WFAA, the Dallas Morning News and Dallas Times Herald exposed the bumbling dumb-fucks leaving the university subject to the Death Penalty. So keep those "cool opinions" coming at the Mustang Club Jamboree among your fellow cheerleaders about how everybody was doing exactly what SMU was doing even though no other school has ever been caught red-handed doing what SMU did in the History of College Athletics-ie the Chairman of the Board and ad hoc committee of the Board authorizing the continued payment of a Payroll with the full knowledge of the President of the University, AD and Football Coach after 4 previous probations within a decade. Because after all guys like you can talk all you want on the sidelines and aren't one of the "Big Boys" that are responsible for coming in and cleaning up all the crap left behind when the NCAA, the Methodist Church, educational accrediting agencies want to have a talk. You aren't the one who is going to have to come in and fix the financial hole these idiots dug for SMU and lost revenue which runs into the hundreds of million dollars in damages. Screw all those [deleted]

[peruna81]

I know that kind of adulation of the "Immortal 9" makes you a "cool guy" at the Mustang Club Preseason Hoot-and Annie but those [deleted] devastated athletics and the university for generations. We didn't turn those guys into the NCAA-WFAA, the Dallas Morning News and Dallas Times Herald exposed the bumbling dumb-fucks leaving the university subject to the Death Penalty. So keep those "cool opinions" coming at the Mustang Club Jamboree among your fellow cheerleaders about how everybody was doing exactly what SMU was doing even though no other school has ever been caught red-handed doing what SMU did in the History of College Athletics-ie the Chairman of the Board and ad hoc committee of the Board authorizing the continued payment of a Payroll with the full knowledge of the President of the University, AD and Football Coach after 4 previous probations within a decade. Because after all guys like you can talk all you want on the sidelines and aren't one of the "Big Boys" that are responsible for coming in and cleaning up all the crap left behind when the NCAA, the Methodist Church, educational accrediting agencies want to have a talk. You aren't the one who is going to have to come in and fix the financial hole these idiots dug for SMU and lost revenue which runs into the hundreds of million dollars in damages. Screw all those [deleted]

Personal attacks and the Mustang Club assumption aside, I have only one thing to add to Stallion's rant....

Amen.

[RGV Pony]

I know that kind of adulation of the "Immortal 9" makes you a "cool guy" at the Mustang Club Preseason Hoot-and Annie but those [deleted] devastated athletics and the university for generations. We didn't turn those guys into the NCAA-WFAA, the Dallas Morning News and Dallas Times Herald exposed the bumbling dumb-fucks leaving the university subject to the Death Penalty. So keep those "cool opinions" coming at the Mustang Club Jamboree among your fellow cheerleaders about how everybody was doing exactly what SMU was doing even though no other school has ever been caught red-handed doing what SMU did in the History of College Athletics-ie the Chairman of the Board and ad hoc committee of the Board authorizing the continued payment of a Payroll with the full knowledge of the President of the University, AD and Football Coach after 4 previous probations within a decade. Because after all guys like you can talk all you want on the sidelines and aren't one of the "Big Boys" that are responsible for coming in and cleaning up all the crap left behind when the NCAA, the Methodist Church, educational accrediting agencies want to have a talk. You aren't the one who is going to have to come in and fix the financial hole these idiots dug for SMU and lost revenue which runs into the hundreds of million dollars in damages. Screw all those [deleted]

Man I need to get an invite to this hoot and annie [sic]. I've not been privy to such a thing.

Here's a question - who were the naughty nine? I've never seen a list. There's the one that everyone knows.. And I think another one of them wound up being a Baylor booster and was mentioned in the Bliss thing down there yeah?

[StallionsModelT]

The only thing they did wrong was being arrogant and openly brazen about what they were doing. The reward was worth the risk. They just didn't count on the NCAA actually using us as the experimental bomb drop. Can't fault them for having deeper pockets in an era where cheating was the norm. Just maybe don't make a public mockery of it.

[smusportspage]

Stallion I am not disaggreeing with everything you are saying. Just wondering if you justify the almost 40, heck maybe 60 years if you include the 4 previous probations, of NCAA hypocrisy with the same argument?

[PonyTime]

I know that kind of adulation of the "Immortal 9" makes you a "cool guy" at the Mustang Club Preseason Hoot-and Annie but those [deleted] devastated athletics and the university for generations. We didn't turn those guys into the NCAA-WFAA, the Dallas Morning News and Dallas Times Herald exposed the bumbling dumb-fucks leaving the university subject to the Death Penalty. So keep those "cool opinions" coming at the Mustang Club Jamboree among your fellow cheerleaders about how everybody was doing exactly what SMU was doing even though no other school has ever been caught red-handed doing what SMU did in the History of College Athletics-ie the Chairman of the Board and ad hoc committee of the Board authorizing the continued payment of a Payroll with the full knowledge of the President of the University, AD and Football Coach after 4 previous probations within a decade. Because after all guys like you can talk all you want on the sidelines and aren't one of the "Big Boys" that are responsible for coming in and cleaning up all the crap left behind when the NCAA, the Methodist Church, educational accrediting agencies want to have a talk. You aren't the one who is going to have to come in and fix the financial hole these idiots dug for SMU and lost revenue which runs into the hundreds of million dollars in damages. Screw all those [deleted]

You can say all you want about the 9 and present them as worse than what went on elsewhere, but the reality is that the school itself is to blame for allowing the boosters to proceed. I don't attend the Hoot and Annies as I am not a "cool guy".

The Truth...

The school and its boosters implemented a “phase-out” plan, which meant they would continue paying the dozen or so athletes to whom they had promised money until their graduation. One of those students-athletes, David Stanley, came forward after being kicked off the team and gave a televised interview outlining the improper benefits he had received from SMU. His words alone may not have been enough to damn the university, but an appearance on Dallas’ ABC affiliate, WFAA, by Coach Collins, athletic director Bob Hitch and recruiting coordinator Henry Lee Parker sealed the program’s fate.

Their interview with WFAA’s sports director Dale Hansen is a mesmerizing watch. Hansen sets a beautiful trap for Parker involving a letter that the recruiting director had initialed, and the recruiting coordinator walks right into it, all but proving that payments to players came directly from the recruiting office. The fact that Parker, Collins and Hitch looked uncomfortably guilty the entire time didn’t help their case.

http://time.com/3720498/ncaa-smu-death-penalty/

On another note - how is paying some players a small amount of cash worse than players being BOUGHT and SOLD by their HS coach in the SEC without the player even knowing that this is happening. See Albert Means case and Alabama.

[One Trick Pony]

I think there is a contemporary naughty nine. And not necessarily parallel with the aforementioned.

Any guesses who would be on that list?

[StallionsModelT]

After seeing what happened with UNC I say bring it back full throttle. Paper tiger if ever there was one. I'd have Sherwood slapping RGT on the back with a giant PGA Tour sized check.

[Charleston Pony]

let's not forget pye's role in this debacle. he did everything in his power to destroy the football program.

I was warned by one of the coaches at Duke when Pye was hired that he thought athletics should be non-scholarship so I suppose we should be thankful SMU isn't competing at the Division III level

[stc9]

I have issues with Turner, but the Athletic Department isn't one of them. I'm more worried about the amount of debt the school is carrying. I'm also more concerned about our stalled progress up the rankings.

On the rankings part, I know a lot of schools game the system (e.g. Northeastern) and I don't know if SMU tries to play that game.

[82Pony]

I say we invite the banned 9 back and have them pay for the IPF. Everybody's happy.

[StallionsModelT]

I say we invite the banned 9 back and have them pay for the IPF. Everybody's happy.

Absolutely. The Sherwood Blount Indoor Performance Center would be so great.