The Case for Firing/Keeping June Jones

[ponyinNC]

Agree with everything you said Redpony

[ponyinNC]

At what point will the true die hard SMU fans (and there aren't that's my if us) just not care anymore?? I will always support the kids and the school, but if our AD and admin don't care enough to make the necessary changes, at what point do fans just say eff it, I will root for a team and a school that actually gives a schit about football and national perception.

[Mustangs35SMU]

At what point will the true die hard SMU fans (and there aren't that's my if us) just not care anymore??

Am a long long way from that point.

[mrydel]

I will never quit on the players.

[lwjr]

NC- excellent post and analysis.
I suspect our first issue is with the admin. - specifically RGT. I just do not believe that he wants a top 25 team.. My impression is that he goes through the motions just to placate some of the money people who want a major program and who are also key donors on the academic side. My president was Willis Tate and I consider him one of the best SMU has had. IMO RGT in no way measures up to Tate. RGT should have dismissed jj immediately after the ASU fiasco. The issue was not that he talked to ASU but that he was recruiting our recruits to go with him and doing it on our nickle. IMO that smacks of a complete lack of integrity and ethics. Most any business enterprise would have immediately dismissed any of their employees who committed the same actions.

I hope we (SMU) can move on to the next level very quickly but am not optimistic as long as jj remains our coach.

You are pretty much dead on with your comments about the SMU administration. They have given in as much as they are willing to give in on athletic admission standards. The lip service is "we want to be like Stanford". This school has no interest in allowing athletics to go any higher than it already has. I think it is just a matter of time till you see the frustration on the basketball side.

[redpony]

At what point will the true die hard SMU fans (and there aren't that's my if us) just not care anymore??

Interesting point. I know my attitude changed after the first game this year. Last yr. about mid-week I would start thinking about the game and getting excited about how we might win. This yr. I just don't feel that way. I guess I had major expectations for this year and when I saw how we performed the first few games I was greatly disappointed. Yes, of course, I still support the team but not so much the admin. and to even a lesser extent the coaching staff.

[couch 'em]

I have about one more coach worth of caring before I just can't do it anymore. Why care if SMU isnt trying? The next hire will tell us.Hopefully if that doesn't work out bball will be going strong.

[SMU_Alumni11]

For=what he has done up to this season.

Against=this season.

I would say For, UCF last year

Against, the colossal collapse USM game

[JasonB]

for = 3 straight bowls. Regardless of circumstances, Cavan and Bennett never took us to a bowl, and the WAC was a significantly worse league than CUSA (for all of the negatives of CUSA, it does usually put out a handful ofdecent teams every year. The WAC was much worse).

Against = the first season and this season. Switching schemes significantly is painful (see wash st. this year), so the first year is a wash. Many of us expected a down turn this season because of the o-line. Really idsappointing to watch the defensive performance yesterday.

Almost every program hits a rebuilding point in year 5 or 6. The trick is that it can't be year 5 AND 6 because you lose all of your momentum. He has next year to turn it around.

[SMUer]

KSU is having a rough season, year five of the Snyder return. 9-0, number 2 in the nation, yeesh!

[couch 'em]

Look at recruiting. Next year won't be a turnaround. It will be worse not even considering the harder competition. June is done by his own recruiting hubris.

[Treadway21]

At what point will the true die hard SMU fans (and there aren't that's my if us) just not care anymore?? I will always support the kids and the school, but if our AD and admin don't care enough to make the necessary changes, at what point do fans just say eff it, I will root for a team and a school that actually gives a schit about football and national perception.

This is already here. Look at our attendance. Pye and RGT let this thing wither on the vine for so long, we are happy with 15k and 6-6 or 7-5 and taking a coach back that had one foot out the door.

[JasonB]

Look at recruiting. Next year won't be a turnaround. It will be worse not even considering the harder competition. June is done by his own recruiting hubris.

I gave my lowdown of next season's team in another thread, but everything for next year depends on how the young linemen are on both sides of the ball. Most of them were good recruits, and people expect an upgrade because they should be ready by next season. If they don't pan out, we are in trouble, and June won't be around. If they do pan out, I expect us to be pretty good next year because of a bump in play at WR and the secondary.

[PlanoStang]

All June does is beat cruddy Division One teams (of which there are plenty in C-USA) and as many Lower division teams that we can play.

Then we have the people that say..."Oh..but he changed the culture, we brought our admissions in line to succeed"....

BS!!!! The SMU admin already made that call when we paid the tiki god $2 mill a year, Bennett, Cavan, Rossely, all said the same thing, "SMU is held back because of Admin restrictions"...June had nothing to do with the change.

Well, he got the change, and did pitiful little with it, Lazy recruiting for an antique of an offense that middle schools adopted, but then made it better, more dynamic.

June just stumbled in at the right time and got to play a bunch of cruddy teams.

He deserves very little credit.

We used to get drummed by all those cruddy CUSA teams, and were perpetually in the bottom 10

[sbsmith]

At what point will the true die hard SMU fans (and there aren't that's my if us) just not care anymore?? I will always support the kids and the school, but if our AD and admin don't care enough to make the necessary changes, at what point do fans just say eff it, I will root for a team and a school that actually gives a schit about football and national perception.

The diehards will stop caring when they die. It's the students and our more casual alumni that we have to worry about defecting.