Do we have the worst alumni/boosters of the major conference universities?

[diehard]

If a coach really could land the top 3 then he can land the next big 3 (where ever they are from) another big 3 and a Fab 5. Bogus argument based on a quick fix. Getting big time recruits, future NBA players, is the only way a major basketball program wins. This isn't football here Jerry Kill can and likely will succeed over time using redshirts and 5 year players. SS, you know this better than anyone here.

The real question looming despite who is hired is a practice facility and continued 20+ win seasons with a raucous Barn.

 

[SelectionSunday]

Yes, Izzo has been on Jones for quite some time. Not sure if he's recruiting the other two.

 

[SelectionSunday]

If a coach really could land the top 3 then he can land the next big 3 (where ever they are from) another big 3 and a Fab 5. Bogus argument based on a quick fix. Getting big time recruits, future NBA players, is the only way a major basketball program wins. This isn't football here Jerry Kill can and likely will succeed over time using redshirts and 5 year players. SS, you know this better than anyone here.

The real question looming despite who is hired is a practice facility and continued 20+ win seasons with a raucous Barn.

So if the new coach comes in and doesn't land any of the Big 3, that means Teague's hire was a failure? Not buying that. Disappointing (if we don't get any of 'em), yes, but that's a pretty broad brush with which to paint Teague & the new guy.

Need time to see what the guy can do on and off the floor after he's been here for a little while, how he matches wits with the many great coaches in the Big 10, recruiting, gaining the trust of the local coaching community, scheduling, etc., before I come to any grand conclusion about Teague's ability/inability to hire a coach.

 

[fmlizard]

Can't speak for boosters, but we have the most sports apathetic alums in the B1G in general. Maybe Northwestern comes close, that's it. If you ever spend much time in the B1G melting pot of Chicago you know what I mean.

 

[...]

So I pose the question, is there a major conference university with worst boosters and alumni than the University of Minnesota? I can't think of any.

I think it has more to do with our administration's inability to fund raise from our boosters and alumni than our boosters and alumni being unwilling to give. T. Denny Sanford offered $35 million to name the new football stadium after him, but for some reason we decided we should take $35 million from a bank instead. Maybe there was more going on there than we know about, but that sure doesn't reflect well on Joel Maturi and President Bruininks. We'll see when the facilities plan comes out what kind of commitment the boosters and alumni are willing to make to the future of Gopher athletics. Hopefully Teague will prove to us that he's as good of a fundraiser as he's supposed to be.

 

[JMWZ]

**********If you don't like twitter length messages please do not read...**********

I can tell you haven't been in the booster or thinking about being in the booster business for very long. I have given at the high end of what my personal situation, my family situation and what my budget for charitable giving can allow. By many standards it would rank pretty damn low. However, it ranked high enough when we got our Football Season Tickets that we had any option to choose from that I could possibly want. So, I have tried to help provide scholarships for the student athletes at the U of M probably at the level many of the common folk who contribute and buy Football or Basketball or Football and Basketball season tickets do. I deserve no credit for this...it was what I wanted to do and what I could do. In the greater scheme of things it has been next to nothing....but....it has been what I could to be supportive of the sports programs I am a fan of.

I am truly in AWE of the huge amounts that some so very generously contribute. We ALL owe them a HUGE debt of gratitude. Quite frankly, MadtownGopher: you really pi$$ me off with your attitude that the Boosters OUGHT to be funding this horrendously run administration. I am careful what I will contribute to the U of M now and was from 2006 going forward when I saw the TERRIBLE mismanagement within the athletic department.



You have a LOT to learn young lawyer. Be appreciative that anybody even CONSIDERS answering the call when the fund-raisers at the U of M call based upon the past 7 or 8 years...no make that the past half century of horrible administrations at the U re: the revenue sports programs.

; 0 (

*****If you like twitter-type messages please do NOT read..*****

You're doing more than one should expect from an alum. Personally, I have no ability to donate because I'm a current college student. Someday I may donate, but currently I don't even attend the U. I asked my grandfather about his donations to the U over the years and he had something interesting to say. He said that if he had the money he has now twenty years ago, that he would have paid for the practice facility outright or at least for half of it. This coming from a guy who also never went to the University of Minnesota, but grew up loving the Gophers. 15-20 million dollars is not a lot of money he says, and if the U wasn't ultra liberal and PC, they would have a better ability to generate funds from business people. But he says that he stopped donating to the University when they decided it was more important to pay for the tuition for students from other countries than the kids from Minnesota.

I personally think that the U, has an administration problem. They don't care about the state or about being fair. And they definitely would prefer to pay for a croquet team than a basketball one, because it is the PC thing to do. It's frustrating watching the city and state we love get throttled all across the media because we have incompetent administrators with screwed up brains. I guess that's what you get when you stick a bunch of tenured people with no knowledge of the real world together in a room.

It's disheartening. But who know, maybe it'll turn around.

 

[Iceland12]

"if the U wasn't ultra liberal and PC, they would have a better ability to generate funds from business people"

The University gets millions from the "business" community. It just doesn't go to the Athletic Department. I think they're down to getting only 3% of their budget from the State of Minnesota. They raise the rest themselves.

Honestly UW Madison, Cal and Northwestern make the University look like Right Wing U and they're not a hotbed of anti-PC thought either and Title 9 makes them throw money at those "other" programs too. Probably can throw UCLA in there and a few others also. None of them have the trouble we do getting donations, TCF aside. If that's fair to do.

Maybe it's because they don't win and we're just f-ing cheap and my name's on the damn stadium.

 

[station19]

Absolutely spot on.

Those wanting to base this hire largely on the new coach's ability to land any of the Big 3 are -- there's no other way to say it -- completely off their rockers. This hire needs to be made with the long term in mind, not based on the maybe or maybe-not whims of 3 high school juniors.

If we get any of 'em, that's great, but if Teague's making this decision based on Jones, Vaughn, and Travis, he's equally off his rocker. Thankfully, I don't think he is.

Same thought here SS, though I think a lot of people don't want to hear it.

 

[station19]

"if the U wasn't ultra liberal and PC, they would have a better ability to generate funds from business people"

The University gets millions from the "business" community. It just doesn't go to the Athletic Department. I think they're down to getting only 3% of their budget from the State of Minnesota. They raise the rest themselves.

Honestly UW Madison, Cal and Northwestern make the University look like Right Wing U and they're not a hotbed of anti-PC thought either and Title 9 makes them throw money at those "other" programs too. Probably can throw UCLA in there and a few others also. None of them have the trouble we do getting donations, TCF aside. If that's fair to do.

Maybe it's because they don't win and we're just f-ing cheap and my name's on the damn stadium.

That last I remember hearing was 17%. That from Brunnicks a year or two ago.

 

[imthewalrus]

I think it has more to do with our administration's inability to fund raise from our boosters and alumni than our boosters and alumni being unwilling to give. T. Denny Sanford offered $35 million to name the new football stadium after him, but for some reason we decided we should take $35 million from a bank instead. Maybe there was more going on there than we know about, but that sure doesn't reflect well on Joel Maturi and President Bruininks. We'll see when the facilities plan comes out what kind of commitment the boosters and alumni are willing to make to the future of Gopher athletics. Hopefully Teague will prove to us that he's as good of a fundraiser as he's supposed to be.

Re: new norwood's fund raising ability? Who knows? He has been so busy observing his first six months, letting bjmacturi extend contracts, and now pushing the v-7 story that I highly doubt he has raised too many funds. Mark me down as "skeptical..." about our new norwood. I really have not been impressed so far... I'll watch to see what he does...I won't buy a word he says. Actions mean more to me than b.s. and lots of talk...

; 0 )



I'm not usually one to defend prexy b and badger joel macturi in any way, shape or form. However, while you have part of the story re: T, Denny Sanford, you do not have the most important part of the story. T. Denny put MANY directives and "Have to's" into his proposed $35 million Gift of a stadium to the U. You see junior member, (I don't know how to spell your moniker) T. Denny's offer was that the U would build a 35 million dollar stadium and NOT one penny more would be spent on that stadium. It would be a $35 million dollar stadium...period. So, IF you remember that the stadium came in at something like 285 or 290 million as it is today, you perhaps can understand why prexy b and badger joel macturi said "thank you T. Denny...BUT...No thank you..." And, you can realize how the TCF BANK offer for 35 million for 25 years was such a huge factor in presenting the proposed bonding issue for the rest of the money to the state legislators was possible. Some day, the U can sell the naming right to raise another lump-sum of money. With T. Denny's proposal, it's name would have always been it's name. It really would not have been Big Ten in scope and presence. Some people from border states even talk about our "cute little stadium..." any way.

To T. Denny's credit: he did not just go away mad...but he has been VERY generous with what he has done for the Football Stadium. And, at the time, maybe just the fact that he was willing to make an offer helped keep the dream alive that it would be possible to bring football back to the campus. Up until that point in time it had been pushed hard by only Glen Mason and Tom Moe.. prexy b and to an extent Prexy Y used to chastise Mason for even talking about the need for football to return to campus.

 

[...]

Re: new norwood's fund raising ability? Who knows? He has been so busy observing his first six months, letting bjmacturi extend contracts, and now pushing the v-7 story that I highly doubt he has raised too many funds. Mark me down as "skeptical..." about our new norwood. I really have not been impressed so far... I'll watch to see what he does...I won't buy a word he says. Actions mean more to me than b.s. and lots of talk...

; 0 )



I'm not usually one to defend prexy b and badger joel macturi in any way, shape or form. However, while you have part of the story re: T, Denny Sanford, you do not have the most important part of the story. T. Denny put MANY directives and "Have to's" into his proposed $35 million Gift of a stadium to the U. You see junior member, (I don't know how to spell your moniker) T. Denny's offer was that the U would build a 35 million dollar stadium and NOT one penny more would be spent on that stadium. It would be a $35 million dollar stadium...period. So, IF you remember that the stadium came in at something like 285 or 290 million as it is today, you perhaps can understand why prexy b and badger joel macturi said "thank you T. Denny...BUT...No thank you..." And, you can realize how the TCF BANK offer for 35 million for 25 years was such a huge factor in presenting the proposed bonding issue for the rest of the money to the state legislators was possible. Some day, the U can sell the naming right to raise another lump-sum of money. With T. Denny's proposal, it's name would have always been it's name. It really would not have been Big Ten in scope and presence. Some people from border states even talk about our "cute little stadium..." any way.

To T. Denny's credit: he did not just go away mad...but he has been VERY generous with what he has done for the Football Stadium. And, at the time, maybe just the fact that he was willing to make an offer helped keep the dream alive that it would be possible to bring football back to the campus. Up until that point in time it had been pushed hard by only Glen Mason and Tom Moe.. prexy b and to an extent Prexy Y used to chastise Mason for even talking about the need for football to return to campus.

Like I said, Teague needs to prove that he can fund raise. I haven't seen anything about HIM pushing the v-7 story, I believe that's all been gopherhole posters and unnamed sources. I also have no idea how he was supposed to stop Maturi from extending contracts when he wasn't yet working here. That's all on Kaler, he should never have approved the extensions.

If you can provide some evidence that a businessman as smart as Sanford was delusional enough to believe that we could build a B1G football stadium for $35 million, I will admit that was a smart move by Maturi and Bruininks. I've looked around to try to find anywhere where it said that and all I could find as reasons his donation were turned down were that he wanted permanent naming rights and wanted to give the donation at the conclusion of construction. Without any evidence, I don't believe that he wanted to build a $35 million dollar stadium.

 

[...]

T. Denny's offer was that the U would build a 35 million dollar stadium and NOT one penny more would be spent on that stadium. It would be a $35 million dollar stadium...period.

Here's the only thing I could find regarding other donations toward the stadium: http://www.surf-hier.com/browse.php...Y29tL2FydGljbGVzLzIwMDQvMTAvMTkvMTA3NjY=&b=13

Sanford said he had hoped his gift would spur other large donations.

Why would he hope his gift would spur other donations if his gift was conditional on there being no other donations?