Lettter to the editor in DC

[PonySnob]

http://www.smudailycampus.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2003/11/11/3fb083508c7b2

[i10pony]

Thats a worthless letter.

[GrapevineMustang]

Yawn - no new ideas there.

Why do I have the sneaky suspicion that guy is affiliated with one of the other teams he mentioned?

His idea that players should be rewarded with scholarships only if they produce would set back Coach Bennett's recruiting momentum more than reverting to A. K. Pye's noble-but-urealistic recruiting policies.

[MustangSally]

I looked it up on smumustangs.com. He runs "middle distance" for the track team. I am sure this guy is thinking "It's not fair, how come we don't get equal funding or scholarships or attention that the football team gets." Well, bud, think of it this way: you play for a sport (is running really a sport?) that no one cares about. I agree our olympic sports are important and round out the athletic program, but where do they get off complaining about other teams. Aren't they all in this together? It's not the player's faults they got scholarships to come here. I seriously doubt our football team just sits around thinking "This is great, we don't even have to win a game and we all get full rides. Look at those poor souls killing themselves on the track for only 1/2 scholarships. Hahahaha..."

Plus, I always thought of it this way: if say our track team is top 25 in the nation, why do they need more money? It seems like they do fine with what they have got, so why not use the money to help out the worse off sports.

[Nacho]

I will agree with him that this has been an unbearable season. We've had bad years before but I can't remember one so completely lacking in hope. Even Rice, a team that SMU has outrecruited for at least the past 10 years, is favored to win Saturday. We have zero imagination on offense and just seem to go through the motions. The defense naturally loses concentration when the opponent gets ahead by a touchdown. They know we can't come back. It is a complete and total disaster and that is my positive spin on it.

[Southland]

Originally posted by Nacho:
I will agree with him that this has been an unbearable season. We've had bad years before but I can't remember one so completely lacking in hope. Even Rice, a team that SMU has outrecruited for at least the past 10 years, is favored to win Saturday. We have zero imagination on offense and just seem to go through the motions. The defense naturally loses concentration when the opponent gets ahead by a touchdown. They know we can't come back. It is a complete and total disaster and that is my positive spin on it.

I say hire Mike Price...
We need the coaching he provides, and he needs the strip clubs Dallas provides.

[pony1988]

Actually Sally, The track team, and I am sure other olympic sports, gets less money each year because of the lack of success of football (so called revenue sport). In fact they are down to 1 coach for the men and 1 for the women because Copeland won't let them replace the assistants that have left (to be head D-I coaches). In fact they took out part of the track to build Ford Stadium, so they can't even have a track meet on campus anymore. If you think this is how a top 25 program is maintained then you need to stick to the subjects pertaining to the band.

[MustangSally]

Sorry, 1988, I didn't realize that. Thanks for pointing it out. It's just that I am such a huge fan of our football team, I am also a big apologist for them. I get kinda pissed when other students start knocking the athletes. I agree we are underfunded in ALL aspects of our athletic dept, I would love to see a new Natatorium or track complex as much as I would like to see Moody renovated.

[pony1988]

No need to apologize Sally, we are all fans here. I think this guy's letter would have been better served focusing on the lack of funding/facilities for the Olympic Sports vs. the increased spending on an unsuccessful football program instead of trying to knock the FB players themselves (I am sure they don't want to be 0-10). As you pointed out, not many people really know how bad this situation really is--and trust me it is bad.

[Stallion]

we have not outrecruited Rice for the last 10 years. I seriously doubt if SMU's senior and junior classes were rated better than Rice. It would be close but neither recruited many players on the recruiting radar screen in those years anyway so it probably would be speculation. Neither were competitive and now they have 2 wins between them. I went ahead and did some checking in the Texas Football Archives and indeed Rice's senior class was rated above SMU's class and SMU's junior class was rated above Rice's(at least in a preliminary ranking for the junior class. To key though is that in both years SMU and Rice were at the bottom of the rankings dead last and simply non-competitive. Four years later they are uncompetitive on the football field.

<small>[ 11-11-2003, 11:34 AM: Message edited by: Stallion ]</small>

[EastStang]

I am very proud of our Olympic sports program. That being said, the athletic budget is inextricably tied to football and will always be so. How many Mustang Club members would donate to the athletic department if there was no Division 1-A football team (even a bad one)? Answer: close to none. How many sponsors would the other sports have without football? Answer: fewer. I was saddened that they messed up the track for Ford Stadium, but that was after I had already been saddened that they tore down the baseball field to put in the track. If the track athletes think there are not enough track scholarships, they can work with Copeland to start a push for some endowed track scholarships (or even work to raise money for a new track facility). There are probably a pretty good sized group of track alums who could be hit on for such a project.

[gostangs]

Hate to be ignorant - but the track is still sitting there - what was done that restricts track meets? - Not that it matters - track is fun, but even when we were national champs nobody knew. No pressure - Football team gets better or say goodbye to everything.

[pony1988]

I agree with you EastStang, the longterm health of the program is definitely tied to football success. That being said, I think you might be surprised how many good contributers are former athletes from non rev sports (especially swimming) and conversely, how few contributions come from former football players.

Go Stangs: Part of the extension of the track straitaway was removed when they built the stadium so the sprint events can't be run. Not to mention that it hasn't been resurfaced in 10 years and you can't see the lines anymore. I'd say most real SMU fans knew we won 3 track titles in 4 years at SMU in the mid 80's and I will also say a lot of that had to do with plenty of funding from a great football team during the same period.

[leopold]

If he's a sprinter, then someone tell young Abraham to quit screwing around on the track team and go over to the football team -- we need the speed.

[PlanoStang]

Yeah, John Roderick reborn. See SMU vs. #2 Navy in 1963. Also, Bob Hayes :thumbupcool: