Joel Maturi's tenure

[CWCWCW]

Every year, Joel Maturi reminds me more and more of a typical homegrown Minnesotan. His dealings with coaches seems to be passive aggressive. He can come across as Goober from Chisholm, but deep down his statements that are leaked are calculated. Plus, timing is everything. And as far as I can tell, Joel's timing stinks.

What do others think about some of the highlights of Joel's career as athletic director at Minnesota? Below, are some of the major happenings during his tenure that I can think of off the top of my head.

**TCF Bank Stadium. As far as I can tell, Maturi did his part, but I don't think he was an originator of ideas. I know Glen Mason was the one who had a major hand in convincing Bill Cooper from TCF to come up with the loot. On the other hand, Maturi was a good spokesperson for TCF, and overall the stadium is a slam dunk. He get's a for this one.

**Dan Monson as basketball coach. C'mon. That went on much too long. It was painful to watch. Here, he gets a

**Tubby Smith hire. Excellent. But, did this fall in Maturi's lap? Pressure was building at Kentucky and I think we caught Smith at the right time. Nonetheless, he's still here.

**Pam Borton hire. Blah. Took the air out of a balloon that was riding high. Five years later the passion is just not there. There's no Lyndsay Whalen or Janelle McCarville. They're fighting to be mediocre.

**Baseball stadium funding. Zzzzz. Swept under the rug for a long, long time.

**Academics and removal of black eye surrounding the U. I thought Maturi has done well here. Grades are on the upswing. There have been some terrible police blotter materials surrounding our athletic programs. I don't know if they are less in frequency, but the way he's handled the situation is fine with me. The leash isn't long.

So, overall, Maturi should get an extension, or he should be fired.

 

[Schnoodler]

The balance of Maturi's work has been pretty good. This is not a good situation. I'm going to say though, that perhaps Maturi's decision is located somewhere between a big rock and a really hard place. He may not even have the power to make a premature decision. He does represent the University and does answer to a boss after all.

 

[Bronko Nagurski Gopher]

Every year, Joel Maturi reminds me more and more of a typical homegrown Minnesotan. His dealings with coaches seems to be passive aggressive. He can come across as Goober from Chisholm, but deep down his statements that are leaked are calculated. Plus, timing is everything. And as far as I can tell, Joel's timing stinks.

What do others think about some of the highlights of Joel's career as athletic director at Minnesota? Below, are some of the major happenings during his tenure that I can think of off the top of my head.

**TCF Bank Stadium. As far as I can tell, Maturi did his part, but I don't think he was an originator of ideas. I know Glen Mason was the one who had a major hand in convincing Bill Cooper from TCF to come up with the loot. On the other hand, Maturi was a good spokesperson for TCF, and overall the stadium is a slam dunk. He get's a for this one.

**Dan Monson as basketball coach. C'mon. That went on much too long. It was painful to watch. Here, he gets a

**Tubby Smith hire. Excellent. But, did this fall in Maturi's lap? Pressure was building at Kentucky and I think we caught Smith at the right time. Nonetheless, he's still here.

**Pam Borton hire. Blah. Took the air out of a balloon that was riding high. Five years later the passion is just not there. There's no Lyndsay Whalen or Janelle McCarville. They're fighting to be mediocre.

**Baseball stadium funding. Zzzzz. Swept under the rug for a long, long time.

**Academics and removal of black eye surrounding the U. I thought Maturi has done well here. Grades are on the upswing. There have been some terrible police blotter materials surrounding our athletic programs. I don't know if they are less in frequency, but the way he's handled the situation is fine with me. The leash isn't long.

So, overall, Maturi should get an extension, or he should be fired.

the highlighted part: you are spot on. maturi is really nothing more than a local-yokel from chisholm. you also nailed the passive-agressive minnesotan part. maturi seems to have zero capability to be strategic in his actions/decisions. he has virtually no backbone publicly. maturi has horrible timing. he has shown time and again that he does not know how to use those members of the local media who are actually friendly to the U of M to the school's advantage.

so, i think you know the answer to this one: maturi should have been out on his bum a long time ago. just a really bad AD with no clue.

if there is one person in the athletics office who should be gone it is joel maturi........not tim brewster.

 

[Bronko Nagurski Gopher]

The balance of Maturi's work has been pretty good. This is not a good situation. I'm going to say though, that perhaps Maturi's decision is located somewhere between a big rock and a really hard place. He may not even have the power to make a premature decision. He does represent the University and does answer to a boss after all.

but to be fair we have seen time and time again that it is usually joel maturi (or who knows perhaps it is bruininks that causes some of maturi's actions) that usually puts joel maturi "between a rock and a hard place".

 

[Maximus]

What do others think about some of the highlights of Joel's career as athletic director at Minnesota? Below, are some of the major happenings during his tenure that I can think of off the top of my head.

One addition: the fact that the athletic department doesn't lose money with all the sports they offer and the little income that has been received from football is truly amazing while at the same time having tremendous success as a whole (directors cup ranking). I thought I read that Ohio State lost money last year (?)

Monson, Mason and Brewster are of course huge black eyes.

 

[littlebigboy]

Maturi hasn't a clue!!!!!!!!!!!! He has no guts or idea of his own. Contrary to all the brilliant people here that want Brew. gone, he should see that he IS building the program the right way, and that it will take the full 5 yrs. to make the final assesment. If he fires him now, no other big time or good coach will come,knowing that he will not be able to show that he can build a program. By not standing behind his coach, Idiot, I mean Maturi is helping him to fail. I hurts recruiting and Brews chance at really showing what he can or can't do. Other coaches see this and will not want any part of it. The only part other coaches like, is if they are recruiting against us.

 

[Goldmember]

if there is one person in the athletics office who should be gone it is joel maturi........not tim brewster.

If our local media were not the farm league for Dallas, Chicago and Atlanta they might have raised this point by now.

If Brewster's tenue becomes a failure it would be the cherry atop what might have been the greatest botched firing-hiring in the history of college football. It will have been the Hershel Walker trade of personnel descisions.

Meanwhile, what's happening at Mariucci Arena is almost unimaginable. Does anyone remember a time when the U had a major college hockey program that used to play there? Two championships earlier this decade but you'd sure as hell never guess that now.

 

[Bronko Nagurski Gopher]

One addition: the fact that the athletic department doesn't lose money with all the sports they offer and the little income that has been received from football is truly amazing while at the same time having tremendous success as a whole (directors cup ranking). I thought I read that Ohio State lost money last year (?)

Monson, Mason and Brewster are of course huge black eyes.

ha! please. talk about spinning a statement so it matches up with your personal opinion of brewster.

the gophers athletics dept. would have cut a bunch of non-revenue women's and men's sports a long time ago if it wasn't for the real revenue the football program has brought into the dept.

it is joel maturi who keeps giving AD dept. money away in poorly timed contract extensions and buy-out decisions.

 

[Bronko Nagurski Gopher]

If our local media were not the farm league for Dallas, Chicago and Atlanta they might have raised this point by now.

If Brewster's tenue becomes a failure it would be the cherry atop what might have been the greatest botched firing-hiring in the history of college football. It will have been the Hershel Walker trade of personnel descisions.

Meanwhile, what's happening at Mariucci Arena is almost unimaginable. Does anyone remember a time when the U had a major college hockey program that used to play there? Two championships earlier this decade but you'd sure as hell never guess that now.

i will give you dallas and chicago. but atlanta? nah. the atlanta journal constitution isn't big time.

 

[DarrenTheGreek]

Maturi gets a big when it comes to how he handled the football program and Mason. Just like with Brewster now, he rode the fence too long in figuring out what to do with Mason.

I know some will say that Mason = stadium approval. That's a discussion for another day. But what I do know is this...(for emphasis) he let Mason hang around as a lame duck coach in 2005 and that killed our 2006 recruiting class. Then he fired Mason way too late in the recruiting season after 2006 and that killed our 2007 recruiting class.

Enter Tim Brewster. Brewster puts together 2 solid classes and how is left withering on the vine as a defacto lame duck. Maturi is in the process of killing our 2010 recruiting class.

Folks, you can't throw away 3 recruiting classes in a 5 year period and expect the Rose Bowl. Maturi is to blame for that, not Mason and not Brewster.

 

[GopherHomer]

Please don't include the Borton hire in evaluating Maturi...nobody cares about woman's basketball. They should just find the cheapest hire possible, as to free up funds for the sports that matter.

 

[Ski U Mah Gopher]

Please don't include the Borton hire in evaluating Maturi...nobody cares about woman's basketball. They should just find the cheapest hire possible, as to free up funds for the sports that matter.

In addition, Voelz hired Borton. It was her final act before leaving.

 

[Maximus]

the gophers athletics dept. would have cut a bunch of non-revenue women's and men's sports a long time ago if it wasn't for the real revenue the football program has brought into the dept.

Yes, those boatloads of cash brought in from averaging 64,000 fans per game at the Metrodome with all of the parking revenue given to them generously by the city of Minneapolis and all the concessions revenue given to them by the Metropolitan Sports Commission and of course Mike Lynn generously donating all suite revenue to the U over the past 25 plus years....I don't know how Ohio State and Michigan have been able to compete with the revenue the Gopher football program has brought in since 1982.

Great point.

 

[Bronko Nagurski Gopher]

Yes, those boatloads of cash brought in from averaging 64,000 fans per game at the Metrodome with all of the parking revenue given to them generously by the city of Minneapolis and all the concessions revenue given to them by the Metropolitan Sports Commission and of course Mike Lynn generously donating all suite revenue to the U over the past 25 plus years....I don't know how Ohio State and Michigan have been able to compete with the revenue the Gopher football program has brought in since 1982.

Great point.

i was speaking relatively, bud. where in the world did i try to compare the revenue generated by the U vs. tOSU or meatchicken? chill out.

 

[EG#9]

Joel Maturi is in his 8th year at Minnesota, in that time

-We have not won a single Men's NCAA Tournament basketball game
- We have not appeared in a single January bowl game
- We have not finished even as high as THIRD PLACE in the conference in either Men's Basketball or Football

These are AWFUL statistics for an A.D. at a major university such as Minnesota. I can't believe such results would be tolerated at other schools of Minnesota's size and stature.

And no, I don't care how well the indoor track team has done or that Minnesota is developing one of the top ping pong teams in the nation.

 

[50PoundHead]

I think Maturi does a pretty good job. He's not perfect, but he inherited a full plate when he came into the job and has kept his nose above the waterline in the process.

If anything, he let Mason play him by letting the new contract talks drone on and on. I'll never know the full story and maybe Mason was a bigger stadium player than I originally thought, but what Brewster is doing now is peanuts (if there is actually anything substantive pointing to the Kansas rumor being initiated by Brewster) compared to Mason's going down to the wire. I think Maturi failed that test with Mason (in fairness to Maturi, he inherited Mason and didn't feel fully invested one way or the other with him) and it's come back to haunt him. It would be oddly ironic that Maturi may "go on first movement" with Brewster after waiting and waiting on Mason.

I think resurrecting the football program is a ten-year project. We've got the stadium and I like what Brewster has done with recruiting, but there's so much more to be done and Maturi's successor is the guy who will be there if and when that happens. I think Maturi has been a decent "bridge" AD who came into an embattled athletic department and, at least for awhile, instilled a sense of calm.

EG#9, the same thing can be said about most big-time athletic programs. There are a lot more also-rans than winners.

 

[Ogee Ogilthorpe]

Ummm....

Every year, Joel Maturi reminds me more and more of a typical homegrown Minnesotan. His dealings with coaches seems to be passive aggressive. He can come across as Goober from Chisholm, but deep down his statements that are leaked are calculated. Plus, timing is everything. And as far as I can tell, Joel's timing stinks.

So, overall, Maturi should get an extension, or he should be fired.

Not to pick a fight but isn't your initial argument an indictment of Minnesotans in general?

Basically you're saying, "He's a typical Minnesotan, and that's why he sucks"? The sad thing is, you're probably not too far off.

I honestly don't know what some of you expect; a champagne coach with a beer budget basically.

One reason the U will likely not ever go out and spend the bucks to hire a big time coach (if they would ever come to MN) is the same problem that the state has always had with public funding for a stadium; it seems that Minnesotans fancy themselves as "way too smart" to spend money on things like this. Can't count how many times I've heard this argument when talking about stadium funding. Sure, other cities "fall" into the trap of voting for public funding for stadiums but "WE'RE" much smarter than that. After all, we're Minnesotans!!

 

[Schnoodler]

I wish they would just say, a winning football program generates alot of money and we need the money. End of argument.

 

[Goldmember]

... the same problem that the state has always had with public funding for a stadium; it seems that Minnesotans fancy themselves as "way too smart" to spend money on things like this. Can't count how many times I've heard this argument when talking about stadium funding. Sure, other cities "fall" into the trap of voting for public funding for stadiums but "WE'RE" much smarter than that. After all, we're Minnesotans!!

Not sure what you're talking about. The Metrodome was one of the first state-financed stadiums ever built for an NFL franchise. Few states have done more stadium-building at the expense of taxpayers than Minnesota. If we're unique in this respect, it's due to our abnormal willingness to susidize professional sports under the guise of a "public-private partenership".

The fact is, Lester Bagley saying, "We're preparing a new push for $700 million in stadium subsidies, and if the answer is no, then why would you own a team in this market?" would have him laughed out of most states.

 

[BrewsterBooster]

Not to pick a fight but isn't your initial argument an indictment of Minnesotans in general?

Basically you're saying, "He's a typical Minnesotan, and that's why he sucks"? The sad thing is, you're probably not too far off.

I honestly don't know what some of you expect; a champagne coach with a beer budget basically.

One reason the U will likely not ever go out and spend the bucks to hire a big time coach (if they would ever come to MN) is the same problem that the state has always had with public funding for a stadium; it seems that Minnesotans fancy themselves as "way too smart" to spend money on things like this. Can't count how many times I've heard this argument when talking about stadium funding. Sure, other cities "fall" into the trap of voting for public funding for stadiums but "WE'RE" much smarter than that. After all, we're Minnesotans!!

Well, Minnesota men are not known for their leadership qualities. There has been certainly more than one article written about that fact over the years. Our native Coen brothers humorously picked that characteristic out in the movie "Fargo". Minnesotans want to be known as "good shjts" and sit on the sidelines and take shots at others.

 

[zman]

I wish they would just say, a winning football program generates alot of money and we need the money. End of argument.

+1

 

[MRJ]

If our local media were not the farm league for Dallas, Chicago and Atlanta they might have raised this point by now.

If Brewster's tenue becomes a failure it would be the cherry atop what might have been the greatest botched firing-hiring in the history of college football. It will have been the Hershel Walker trade of personnel descisions.

Meanwhile, what's happening at Mariucci Arena is almost unimaginable. Does anyone remember a time when the U had a major college hockey program that used to play there? Two championships earlier this decade but you'd sure as hell never guess that now.

This is exactly where I come out on this as well. There is a thread over on the "other sports" board addressing this situation, but it bears repeating. The fact that Maturi is basically ignoring the issues surrounding the hockey team is completely unacceptable. He better act on that one soon otherwise there's going to be an uproar that could get both Maturi and Lucia fired.

 

[Too Long in the Wasteland]

Did Joel fire Darth Voelz? I can't remember if he did it, or if Moe gave her "Das Boot" when he was interim AD. If it was Joel, he deserves a contract extension for that one alone.

One thing that few appreciate is there's a lot of crap going on behind the scenes that we never see. And a good AD makes sure it stays that way. IMHO Joel has done a good job of that. As a project manager, I look at it as a large part of my job to deal with a lot of BS from higher ups (the analogy would be fatcat boosters, media, BB) so that the people under me can do their jobs. If I'm doing that well my team never knows half the crap I'm getting so they can focus on what they should be doing.

My guess is that we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg. The interesting thing to me is where did Marcus Fuller get his tip? Was it Brewster or his posse? If someone who works for me tries to use an offer from somewhere else to leverage a promotion or a raise, that's fine. Its the way the game is played, and I've done it myself. But if I found out that person was pulling skank and made up the offer (as may be the case with Brewster and Kansas) said person would be gone. Well, actually, in my company unless you're embezzling, caught redhanded looking at hungarianhoneys.com, or you whizz on someone's desk its hard to get fired. But they'd be persona non grata with me in any case.

 

[zman]

Did Joel fire Darth Voelz? I can't remember if he did it, or if Moe gave her "Das Boot" when he was interim AD. If it was Joel, he deserves a contract extension for that one alone.

One thing that few appreciate is there's a lot of crap going on behind the scenes that we never see. And a good AD makes sure it stays that way. IMHO Joel has done a good job of that. As a project manager, I look at it as a large part of my job to deal with a lot of BS from higher ups (the analogy would be fatcat boosters, media, BB) so that the people under me can do their jobs. If I'm doing that well my team never knows half the crap I'm getting so they can focus on what they should be doing.

My guess is that we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg. The interesting thing to me is where did Marcus Fuller get his tip? Was it Brewster or his posse? If someone who works for me tries to use an offer from somewhere else to leverage a promotion or a raise, that's fine. Its the way the game is played, and I've done it myself. But if I found out that person was pulling skank and made up the offer (as may be the case with Brewster and Kansas) said person would be gone. Well, actually, in my company unless you're embezzling, caught redhanded looking at hungarianhoneys.com, or you whizz on someone's desk its hard to get fired. But they'd be persona non grata with me in any case.

Another +1

 

[50PoundHead]

Too Long in the Wasteland, great post. I believe, and I could be wrong, is that Moe as interim director put together the unified athletic department plan that brought the men's and women's department together under one director and Maturi was then hired to be that director. I'll admit I'm foggy on that.

 

[WAGopher]

Too Long in the Wasteland, great post. I believe, and I could be wrong, is that Moe as interim director put together the unified athletic department plan that brought the men's and women's department together under one director and Maturi was then hired to be that director. I'll admit I'm foggy on that.

That's pretty much how I remember it too. I just looked it up and Chris Voelz was released the week of June 9th, 2002 and Joel Maturi was hired on July 12, 2002. So they didn't work together and Tom Moe must have engineered the merger of the men's and women's athletic departments.

 

[gopherdudepart2]

I don't know how you evaluate Maturi without bringing up Brewster

These two are forever linked and yet now they kind of sound like they can't stand each other and
would both be happy to be rid of each other. Who know's what to believe, you hear a lot of opposing views on what is really going on, only the one's that are there now know what is going on.

I do know this there is a lot of stuff said privately about what is happening that conflicts with the things that parents of players have said in the forums it is like there is entirely two different camps on Brew. Some say they love Brewster and he is going to bring us a championship, some say half the team has tired of his BS and don't think he can coach a lick, even some of his own coaches who do you believe? Sounds like a lot of former players are unhappy and do not think this coach is an actual football coach. Now this Kansas name dropping crap and the rumblings that Brewster is a chasing around. Really bored with all of this rumors and inueendo crap that people are saying behind the scenes. What do you believe, is it all really that big a Soap opera or do we have football coach that just want's to coach and win games for the Gophers. This stuff is all really getting really old and I'm kind of tired of debating with other season ticket holders if Brewster should stay or go, god Knows Joel Maturi kind of got us in this mess, if someone should put a stop to this it is him. At least we can hope him or President Bruininks will do something.