Why such college football ignorance in the TC area? Fixes?

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Some of the things that people list as reasons why their so much football ignorance in this town don't really gel with my experience.

First, someone pointed the creampuff non-conference schedule. That is a RED HERRING, it only comes up when we have the creampuff schedule by idiots like Fat Pat. I was at the USC game, I was at the Cal game, there was not buzz around the area concerning those games. If there was buzz, it was mildly more than any Gopher football game and much less than the Gopher - Syracuse game (coming off 3 cupcakes). It's about wins. The whole "creampuff" argument only comes out when the Gophers have some mild success and the naysayers want to keep being grumpy. I've been around when we haven't scheduled creampuffs and there was NO DIFFERENCE in terms of excitement around the program.

Second, I don't think it's just about winning. This is not a college football area. It's too bad but I really think it has a lot to do with having the pro sports in town. It's not an excuse and I like the uniqueness of our situation, but to pretend that it doesn't have a real impact on U athletics is naive (IMO). I've told this story a few times, I remember listening to KFAN a couple months ago and Sludge was talking about how he went to the U and no one cared about Gopher football. He went on to talk about that it was because they weren't good yada yada yada....now he went to the U from 99 to 02. In that time, the U was successful. It isn't only about winning. We have had some success and we still did not captivate the fan base.

Gopher football just does not get the same kind of following as a lot of other programs get.

As far as the ignorance...well, that's just how it is. People don't want to read the "recruiting rankings" and say "goh, I don't know what means", instead they pick on the easy target, Gopher football.
 

B1GSportsGuy said:
Coach Jerry Kill was quoted on KFAN yesterday as saying that Northern Illinois had classes ranked 11th, 11th, and 12th in the MAC and those kids ended up in the Orange Bowl this year.

Some simple fact checking revealed the following about NIU's recruiting classes from the past 4 years in the MAC.

2009 - 7th
2010 - 3rd
2011 - 2nd
2012 - 4th

I realize Coach Kill is downplaying the importance of recruiting rankings, but he shouldn't be making things up.
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Wow that is a pretty major discrepancy. Wonder what he was bassing his numbers off of because doesn't seem like he would be that far off. Also I have not said it to this point but they seem to be trying to milk the fact that NIU was in the Orange Bowl this past season as validation for their recruiting ability. Anyone who watched that game could clearly see that FSU was a far supperior team to NIU and it was clear that NIU was there because they play in a very average conference and were in position to benefit from a loop hole that got them to a BCS game. To their credit they won the games on their schedule but there is no way that was a BCS bowl level team last season.

Kill has clearly proven he can identify talent that can be very successful at the MAC level. He now has to do the same thing at the Big Ten level, time will tell if he can or if he can't.
 

Part of the issue is that journalism isn’t what it was in years past, and this extends to most news coverage whether it is sports, politics or hard news. The current state of journalism focuses on crime, controversy, attention-getting sound bites, and a lot of fluff pieces. In addition most of the print media seems to have bias in its reportage and this applies to sports coverage.
Those of us that grew up in the 50’s and 60’s saw intense coverage of the Gophers, even in years when the team had a poor record. The old Sunday Tribune had a “Peach” section during the football season that had expansive coverage of college football, with a concentration on the Gophers. Alas, that disappeared ages ago. Many of our fans grew up in a time when one could rely upon the traditional media for thorough and competent reporting, and we retain some expectation that such an approach remains. However, that kind of information hardly exists anymore. Unfortunately, public perception is still largely driven by the old media.
The traditional media also has to compete with all forms of internet based information, and just hasn't yet figured out how to thrive (or even survive) in this evolving environment. A higher level of success by the team likely would result in a greater volume of coverage, but it’s doubtful that it would overcome the overriding influences that produce lazy, shallow, negative, sarcastic, biased and survey or poll-driven coverage. Thank goodness for sites like GopherHole.
 

Gopherprof said:
It's overrated, but it's not that overrated. You, frankly, seem to be a bit on the opposite end. They are overly negative; you might be a bit pollyannish. We talk a lot now about how we don't need 4* guys, but much of that is because we aren't getting them? If we were getting them, we would talk about how highly regarded they are and how the future is bright (I know this because it happened just a few years ago)

Yes, it is certainly possible to win with 2 and 3* guys, but do you know how hard that is? How unlikely that is? For every Boise State there are 10 UNLVs. To simply scoff at the ignorance of the average Minnesota sports fan (while perhaps true), without taking into that reality, is really no different/better.

I would also agree that there are many, particularly in the talk radio circuit (of which I've never listened a day in my life, but see things elsewhere) that make it a career to do nothing but take potshots at the Gophers. If you look at the comments section of anything, anywhere, it's going to be filled with mostly vitriol. That doesn't mean that every comment they make is necessarily wrong. The recruiting does need to improve. Hopefully this is all part of laying the groundwork so that the better recruits come later, but you can't blame people for being impatient after decades of embarrassing football. Even Kill has said as much.
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I can't speak for Ole, but my gripe is more with how team rankings are determined and how some people interpret them. You'd think sports "experts" would be able to go into a little more depth than just "the Gophers were ranked last in the Big Ten". If the Gophers were to sign four more players, two of which are the lowest 3-stars (5.5) and two 2-stars players, the overall team ranking would go up even though their star average would go down. Heck, just adding two low end 3-star recruits would have pushed the Gophers up two spots. Sign an additional one and we're ranked 8th.

It's really not a huge deal to me as misinformed or "only telling half the story" is pretty common now days.

Edit: The kicker ranking is kinda weird to me. You'd think a highly ranked kicker would be higher than a two star considering how important kickers/punters are.

BTW, the talk of kickers made me think about Kip Smith, the #1 rated kicker who changed over to UCLA because of the Goldy indecent at Penn St. a few years ago. I see he transferred to Oklahoma St. this past summer.
 

Why doesn't the The Non-Conference Season mean more? Because the years usally ends with a lousy Big Ten season.

Bob, 1999 to 2002 were "sort of" winning years, not winning years.

- 1999 they went 5-3 in the Conference and won 3 of the last 4 games. That WAS a winning year until the end. They lost that Sun Bowl game, giving up the winning TD in the final moments.

- 2000, they went 6-6 overall and 4-4 in the Conference. They lost 4 of their last 5 games.

- 2001 they went 4-7 and 2-6 in the Big Ten.

- 2002 they had a winning year. They went 8-5. They problem is they SUCKED in November. They lost all four of their last Big Ten games before beating Arkansas in the Music City Bowl

Only a hardcore, delusional Gopher Fan could call those "winning years".
 


B1GSportsGuy said:
Coach Jerry Kill was quoted on KFAN yesterday as saying that Northern Illinois had classes ranked 11th, 11th, and 12th in the MAC and those kids ended up in the Orange Bowl this year.

Some simple fact checking revealed the following about NIU's recruiting classes from the past 4 years in the MAC.

2009 - 7th
2010 - 3rd
2011 - 2nd
2012 - 4th

I realize Coach Kill is downplaying the importance of recruiting rankings, but he shouldn't be making things up.
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I think he was just speaking off the cuff but was trying to get at the players who really turned that program around. He had his years off a little bit, but I don't think he was lying.

What he was speaking to was that Northern Illinois was turned around with really poorly rated recruiting classes.

2008 Class: This contained all of the Seniors and most of the bigger names in the program, was 11th in the MAC
2007 Class: This is a class that helped him turn around Northern Illinois (Harnish) was also ranked 11th.

So if he would have made that statement last year, he would have been more accurate. His players would have come from the 11th ranked MAC classes.

Also keep in mind that the 2009 class at Northern Illinois had an average star ranking of 1.95. Yep...1.95. So it was high in volume, but really low in rated quality.

His point was that he turned around Northern Illinois with really poor ranked recruiting classes and that is absolutely true.
 

Iceland12 said:
Why doesn't the The Non-Conference Season mean more? Because the years usally ends with a lousy Big Ten season.

Bob, 1999 to 2002 were "sort of" winning years, not winning years.

- 1999 they went 5-3 in the Conference and won 3 of the last 4 games. That WAS a winning year until the end. They lost that Sun Bowl game, giving up the winning TD in the final moments.

- 2000, they went 6-6 overall and 4-4 in the Conference. They lost 4 of their last 5 games.

- 2001 they went 4-7 and 2-6 in the Big Ten.

- 2002 they had a winning year. They went 8-5. They problem is they SUCKED in November They lost all four of their last Big Ten games before beating Arkansas in the Music City Bowl

Only a hardcore, delusional Gopher Fan Gopher fan could call those "winning years".[/QUOTE]



It's delusional to think that a top 20 team in the entire country is a winning team? D'ok!
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Bob_Loblaw said:
Iceland12 said:
Why doesn't the The Non-Conference Season mean more? Because the years usally ends with a lousy Big Ten season.

Bob, 1999 to 2002 were "sort of" winning years, not winning years.

- 1999 they went 5-3 in the Conference and won 3 of the last 4 games. That WAS a winning year until the end. They lost that Sun Bowl game, giving up the winning TD in the final moments.

- 2000, they went 6-6 overall and 4-4 in the Conference. They lost 4 of their last 5 games.

- 2001 they went 4-7 and 2-6 in the Big Ten.

- 2002 they had a winning year. They went 8-5. They problem is they SUCKED in November They lost all four of their last Big Ten games before beating Arkansas in the Music City Bowl

Only a hardcore, delusional Gopher Fan Gopher fan could call those "winning years".[/QUOTE]



It's delusional to think that a top 20 team in the entire country is a winning team? D'ok!
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Saying that 1999 to 2002 were winning years is delusional. Picking out ONE year to justify it? That's just more of an outright lie actually. D'oH! :eek:
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Minneapolis will always be a Viking town. The question is whether it can be a Viking and Gopher town. We don't know the answer yet, let's hope we find out in the next five years.
 



Iceland12 said:
Bob_Loblaw said:
Saying that 1999 to 2002 were winning years is delusional. Picking out ONE year to justify it? That's just more of an outright lie actually. D'oH! :eek:
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It's a lie? Do you understand the definition a lie? It could be a difference of opinion, but nowhere did I even make a statement, much less a false one.

Now onto your point...

you said that "only a delusional Gopher fan could call those "winning years"". That implies that I said that those were "winning years", what I said was that during that time the team had some success. Here is the direct quote "we have had some success and we still did not captivate the fan base". Wow...what hyperbole from a delusional Gopher fan. I was speaking in such exaggerated terms, what fluff! I can't believe that I called a top 20 team "somewhat successful".

As to the "lie". . .

you said that we did not have winning years those years. I pointed out that we were top 20 in the country in one of those years and which somehow led you to forget what a "lie" is.

Now, I obviously only pointed the most obvious. You still didn't call that season a success in your other post. You said it became a failure because we lost the Sun Bowl, despite the fact that we were ranked 20th in the country. So you're wrong there, you even admitted it by now conceding that that was a winning year. So we can move on from that point.

All of the seasons, taken as a whole, could easily be considered "somewhat successful" (those were my words, so please use that standard). In those 4 seasons, we finished in the top 20 in the country, we played in 3 bowl games and won 2 (including the Sun Bowl), we had 2 8 win seasons. In general, most college football fans of middle tier college football teams (who receive much more support than we receive) would consider a 4 year stretch to be "somewhat successful".
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badgergopher said:
Minneapolis will always be a Viking town. The question is whether it can be a Viking and Gopher town. We don't know the answer yet, let's hope we find out in the next five years.
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I think it can be, but if the Gophers aren't successful, it will resort back to being a Viking town (regardless of their success).

It's like any other sport, if Gopher Basketball got really good, they would get the spotlight.

The difference is that the pro teams never really leave the spotlight (Wolves getting awfully close).
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
Iceland12 said:
It's a lie? Do you understand the definition a lie? It could be a difference of opinion, but nowhere did I even make a statement, much less a false one.

Now onto your point...

you said that "only a delusional Gopher fan could call those "winning years"". That implies that I said that those were "winning years", what I said was that during that time the team had some success. Here is the direct quote "we have had some success and we still did not captivate the fan base". Wow...what hyperbole from a delusional Gopher fan. I was speaking in such exaggerated terms, what fluff! I can't believe that I called a top 20 team "somewhat successful".

As to the "lie". . .

you said that we did not have winning years those years. I pointed out that we were top 20 in the country in one of those years and which somehow led you to forget what a "lie" is.

Now, I obviously only pointed the most obvious. You still didn't call that season a success in your other post. You said it became a failure because we lost the Sun Bowl, despite the fact that we were ranked 20th in the country. So you're wrong there, you even admitted it by now conceding that that was a winning year. So we can move on from that point.

All of the seasons, taken as a whole, could easily be considered "somewhat successful" (those were my words, so please use that standard). In those 4 seasons, we finished in the top 20 in the country, we played in 3 bowl games and won 2 (including the Sun Bowl), we had 2 8 win seasons. In general, most college football fans of middle tier college football teams (who receive much more support than we receive) would consider a 4 year stretch to be "somewhat successful".
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You were talking about "Winning years". You didn't say "somewhat successful" and I DID say they had a winning year but it ended badly.

- You: "Second, I don't think it's just about winning."

- You: "now he went to the U from 99 to 02. In that time, the U was successful"

- Me: - The Gophers have won 8 or more games THREE times in the last 40 years! They finished on a losing note in one of those years (1999)

- You: "You said it became a failure because we lost the Sun Bow"
- Me: 1999 they went 5-3 in the Conference and won 3 of the last 4 games. That WAS a winning year until the end. They lost that Sun Bowl game, giving up the winning TD in the final moments.

Lie: "An intentional false statement". You said that they were "successful from 1999 to 2002" and then picked out ONE year to show that they were. That's an "intentional false statement".

You talked about "winning years", you said they "were successful from 1999 to 2002", you then either forgot or lied about typing it.

This shouldn't be a "pissing contest".
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It all starts with the media.

90% percent of what's written or said is done so for vastly different reasons than one would think. When Denny Green was the coach of the Vikings I thought he was the victim of racism because of the vicious heat he took. I came to realize it was because he kept EVERYONE in the media on the outside looking in. If you want love from KFAN go on the air with them, make sure they have broadcasting rights. Make sure somebody over there is making some money from your program.

It's absolutely embarrassing the extremes Danny B has gone to grease the wheels for Tubby to get fired and his on the air buddy Flip Saunders to get the U job. Danny wants excess, currently Flip is a friend to the program and Danny wants to take care of his buddy. If Tubby get's in the way? It's nothing personal it just business. The issue I have is in the process he purposely misinforms his listeners.

These guys will sit on stories because they don't want to jeapordize access into sports programs. They will spin stories to keep that access. They will purposely mislead their readers and listeners to keep that access.

This doesn't apply to all of them but it does apply IMO to the most.....at least the popular or most well known ones.
 



As a long-time MN resident and sports fan, I think it's a broader issue than just Gopher Sports.

The MN fan is a fickle, band-wagon jumper. If a team wins a few games or receives some positive media coverage, the MN fan will follow them. (example - MN Timberwolves last yr when Rubio was generating buzz.) BUT, as soon as that team starts losing, or receives negative media coverage, the MN fan will bail in a heartbeat. I've seen this happen over and over again. In 1981, the North Stars made a surprising run to the Stanley Cup finals, and they became the "buzz" team in town. People were waiting in line to buy standing-room only tickets. A few yrs later, the buzz was gone and Met Center had lots of empty seats. Or, look at the Twins: coming off the 1987 World Series, the Twins drew over 3-million fans in the freakin' Metrodome - but when they had a down year, attendance plummeted until they won the series again in '91. When the Twins moved into Target Field, it was sold out every nite - until the team started losing, and the fans started staying away.

The 1 team that has avoided the bandwagon effect has been the Vikes - but even they've had some ticket issues and worries about blackouts when they're not playing the Packers or Bears.

Bottom line - MN fans will support a winner, but they will not support a losing team, or a team that is getting negative media coverage. It's almost like they're "too cool" to exhibit real fanaticism about a team. Until the Gophs rattle off a 9-or-10 win season, or play in a major bowl game, the average Twin Cities fan just doesn't give a rat's behind.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As a long-time MN resident and sports fan, I think it's a broader issue than just Gopher Sports.

The MN fan is a fickle, band-wagon jumper. If a team wins a few games or receives some positive media coverage, the MN fan will follow them. (example - MN Timberwolves last yr when Rubio was generating buzz.) BUT, as soon as that team starts losing, or receives negative media coverage, the MN fan will bail in a heartbeat. I've seen this happen over and over again. In 1981, the North Stars made a surprising run to the Stanley Cup finals, and they became the "buzz" team in town. People were waiting in line to buy standing-room only tickets. A few yrs later, the buzz was gone and Met Center had lots of empty seats. Or, look at the Twins: coming off the 1987 World Series, the Twins drew over 3-million fans in the freakin' Metrodome - but when they had a down year, attendance plummeted until they won the series again in '91. When the Twins moved into Target Field, it was sold out every nite - until the team started losing, and the fans started staying away.

The 1 team that has avoided the bandwagon effect has been the Vikes - but even they've had some ticket issues and worries about blackouts when they're not playing the Packers or Bears.

Bottom line - MN fans will support a winner, but they will not support a losing team, or a team that is getting negative media coverage. It's almost like they're "too cool" to exhibit real fanaticism about a team. Until the Gophs rattle off a 9-or-10 win season, or play in a major bowl game, the average Twin Cities fan just doesn't give a rat's behind.
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What you are saying is spot on but I think you could expand it to most major markets that have a variety of professional and college sports available to the fan base. The other thing that has happened across all sports is as prices have gone up and peoples incomes have not kept pace it has gotten harder and harder for families to attend live sporting events. It is really hard to fault someone who doesn't want to spend a ton of money on a season ticket for a team that is struggling. And to take your family to an individual game can cost a couple hundred dollars with tickets, parking, and consessions....a lot of people just don't have that kind of money these days.

The diehards will stick it out year in and year out and will find the money for the tickets in order to support the team. But for the casual fan if the value isn't there for the money they are spending it becomes a pretty tough sell.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As a long-time MN resident and sports fan, I think it's a broader issue than just Gopher Sports.

The MN fan is a fickle, band-wagon jumper. If a team wins a few games or receives some positive media coverage, the MN fan will follow them. (example - MN Timberwolves last yr when Rubio was generating buzz.) BUT, as soon as that team starts losing, or receives negative media coverage, the MN fan will bail in a heartbeat. I've seen this happen over and over again. In 1981, the North Stars made a surprising run to the Stanley Cup finals, and they became the "buzz" team in town. People were waiting in line to buy standing-room only tickets. A few yrs later, the buzz was gone and Met Center had lots of empty seats. Or, look at the Twins: coming off the 1987 World Series, the Twins drew over 3-million fans in the freakin' Metrodome - but when they had a down year, attendance plummeted until they won the series again in '91. When the Twins moved into Target Field, it was sold out every nite - until the team started losing, and the fans started staying away.

The 1 team that has avoided the bandwagon effect has been the Vikes - but even they've had some ticket issues and worries about blackouts when they're not playing the Packers or Bears.

Bottom line - MN fans will support a winner, but they will not support a losing team, or a team that is getting negative media coverage. It's almost like they're "too cool" to exhibit real fanaticism about a team. Until the Gophs rattle off a 9-or-10 win season, or play in a major bowl game, the average Twin Cities fan just doesn't give a rat's behind.
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The bold part is so true. Luckily they are an NFL team and benefit from the NFL's popularity, otherwise there fans would be EXACTLY like us. Quite frankly, the Vikings have NEVER won ANYTHING. Lost 4 Super Bowls, WAY BACK, that's it. The Gophers at least have some National Championships & Rose Bowls they have won, albeit, further back than the Vikings last success (Assuming, Super Bowl appearances is your standard of success.). All of which happened WAY before I was born.

Our team, unfortuantely, has been average or below for so long with only a few bright seasons in the last 40 + years, that even the long time writers, Fat Pat, can hardly root for them. Now, we have have opportunities to break through more recently (see 2003 season), but we lost a outside chance at a Rose Bowl in such a humiliating fashion (Michigan 4th quarter), or fumbling away a punt vs. Wisconsin ('05 I believe?), opportunities for good, successful seasons, that we have now become the punchline for a lot of the Twin Cities media. Which really blows.
 

Barreiro and the state of the media

During Barreiro's interview with Coach Kill last night, Barreiro asked if the Gophers would ever consider running the read option play like the SF 49ers do with Kaepernick? OMG I was simultaneously embarrassed for Barreiro and his stunning ignorance of Gopher football and furious that he was so stunningly ignorant. It is not just that the local media are ignorant of Gopher recruiting but obviously Barreiro never watched a game or, if he did, he had no idea of what was going on. For the most part, I think Barreiro is representative of the media in this town.
 

We're upset there's not more positive press/excitement about a recruiting class that's ranked last in the B1G and has one local kid on it? Really? What do you expect? I follow the Gophers more closely than most, but I wouldn't know who any of these kids are if not for Gopherhole. Unless there's a couple Seantrell Henderson types, it's never going to be a big deal here, whether we end up ranked 17th or 67th. It's nothing to get upset about. And it certainly has nothing to do with the Vikings (I mean I know they're just sucking up the sports headlines lately and shutting the Gophers out.)
 

diefirma said:
During Barreiro's interview with Coach Kill last night, Barreiro asked if the Gophers would ever consider running the read option play like the SF 49ers do with Kaepernick? OMG I was simultaneously embarrassed for Barreiro and his stunning ignorance of Gopher football and furious that he was so stunningly ignorant. It is not just that the local media are ignorant of Gopher recruiting but obviously Barreiro never watched a game or, if he did, he had no idea of what was going on. For the most part, I think Barreiro is representative of the media in this town.
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Wow. Just wow. That is just sad AND lazy on his part.
 

diefirma said:
During Barreiro's interview with Coach Kill last night, Barreiro asked if the Gophers would ever consider running the read option play like the SF 49ers do with Kaepernick? OMG I was simultaneously embarrassed for Barreiro and his stunning ignorance of Gopher football and furious that he was so stunningly ignorant. It is not just that the local media are ignorant of Gopher recruiting but obviously Barreiro never watched a game or, if he did, he had no idea of what was going on. For the most part, I think Barreiro is representative of the media in this town.
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That is awful. Kill really should use a moment like that to go Mike Gundy on him, but he'd never do it.
 

B1GSportsGuy said:
Coach Jerry Kill was quoted on KFAN yesterday as saying that Northern Illinois had classes ranked 11th, 11th, and 12th in the MAC and those kids ended up in the Orange Bowl this year.

Some simple fact checking revealed the following about NIU's recruiting classes from the past 4 years in the MAC.

2009 - 7th
2010 - 3rd
2011 - 2nd
2012 - 4th

I realize Coach Kill is downplaying the importance of recruiting rankings, but he shouldn't be making things up.
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Maybe I'm wrong but I think he actually said 112th and 113th in the country. I don't think he mentioned MAC numbers.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
First, someone pointed the creampuff non-conference schedule. That is a RED HERRING, it only comes up when we have the creampuff schedule by idiots like Fat Pat. I was at the USC game, I was at the Cal game, there was not buzz around the area concerning those games. If there was buzz, it was mildly more than any Gopher football game and much less than the Gopher - Syracuse game (coming off 3 cupcakes). It's about wins. The whole "creampuff" argument only comes out when the Gophers have some mild success and the naysayers want to keep being grumpy. I've been around when we haven't scheduled creampuffs and there was NO DIFFERENCE in terms of excitement around the program.
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I'm not sure if you were addressing something I said or not, but to clarify, I have absolutely no problem with scheduling weak OOC opponents, I'm just not going to give them much credit for doing so. People who talk about 6 wins like it's a major accomplishment should at least keep in mind that three of those six wins were against teams that shouldn't even remotely be in our league. If you're talking about changing the attitude around here, you have to beat Big Ten teams, not UNLV and Western Michigan.

Second, I don't think it's just about winning. This is not a college football area. It's too bad but I really think it has a lot to do with having the pro sports in town. It's not an excuse and I like the uniqueness of our situation, but to pretend that it doesn't have a real impact on U athletics is naive (IMO). I've told this story a few times, I remember listening to KFAN a couple months ago and Sludge was talking about how he went to the U and no one cared about Gopher football. He went on to talk about that it was because they weren't good yada yada yada....now he went to the U from 99 to 02. In that time, the U was successful. It isn't only about winning. We have had some success and we still did not captivate the fan base.
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Eh....they were still sub .500 in Big Ten play in those years, and were coming off of a decade of being downright terrible under Wacker. If you expect that to "captivate the fan base" so quickly, I think your expectations are way too low. People compare us to Iowa and say "Iowa has more fan support because there's nothing to do". That's undoubtedly true, but Iowa was 98-61 in the Big Ten under Hayden Fry! We can't even imagine a record like that. So, yeah, it's embedded into the culture because Iowa fans were raised with having the expectation that Hawkeye football is a fun experience with a competitive team. You're mentioning a three year period where we were almost mediocre. That's not even remotely the same thing.

I like a lot of your posts. You are one of the fairest and most thoughtful people here. But in this case I think you're too into the program to see it for what it is. You say that "this isn't a college football area". My God, how could we ever know?
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As a long-time MN resident and sports fan, I think it's a broader issue than just Gopher Sports.

The MN fan is a fickle, band-wagon jumper. If a team wins a few games or receives some positive media coverage, the MN fan will follow them. (example - MN Timberwolves last yr when Rubio was generating buzz.) BUT, as soon as that team starts losing, or receives negative media coverage, the MN fan will bail in a heartbeat. I've seen this happen over and over again. In 1981, the North Stars made a surprising run to the Stanley Cup finals, and they became the "buzz" team in town. People were waiting in line to buy standing-room only tickets. A few yrs later, the buzz was gone and Met Center had lots of empty seats. Or, look at the Twins: coming off the 1987 World Series, the Twins drew over 3-million fans in the freakin' Metrodome - but when they had a down year, attendance plummeted until they won the series again in '91. When the Twins moved into Target Field, it was sold out every nite - until the team started losing, and the fans started staying away.

The 1 team that has avoided the bandwagon effect has been the Vikes - but even they've had some ticket issues and worries about blackouts when they're not playing the Packers or Bears.

Bottom line - MN fans will support a winner, but they will not support a losing team, or a team that is getting negative media coverage. It's almost like they're "too cool" to exhibit real fanaticism about a team. Until the Gophs rattle off a 9-or-10 win season, or play in a major bowl game, the average Twin Cities fan just doesn't give a rat's behind.
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The Vikings have had attendance woes many, many of the last 30 years, with a few good years here and there. People forget that if it wasn't for the "blackout buy-outs" by Pillsbury, Burger King, and even WCCO, their might have been several dozen games blacked out. In fact, they didn't fully sell out a season at the dome until 1999! I also don't buy the listed attendance figures in the Red Era. He was trying to sell a damaged product.

If Adrian goes down and the product suffers...
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As a long-time MN resident and sports fan, I think it's a broader issue than just Gopher Sports. The MN fan is a fickle, band-wagon jumper.
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As a recent MN resident, I can tell you that almost every fanbase is like this. It's just that you Minnesotans have a particular sense of guilt about stuff like this. :)

People like to associate themselves with winners. There are only a handful of franchises that can sustain multiple years of losing and not have a majority of their fanbase bolt to something new. Such is life.

Edit: Frankly, the idea of loyalty in pro sports never made much sense to me anyway. I support all of the collegiate programs of which I am an alumnus, because of multiple reasons that probably don't need mentioning. Pro sports teams are a diversion, but they have about as much communal loyalty as the taxpayers are willing to spend on them.
 


GopherInPittsburgh said:
Maybe I'm wrong but I think he actually said 112th and 113th in the country. I don't think he mentioned MAC numbers.
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This might be what he's referring to:

2005 83rd
2006 112th
2007 114th
2008 116th
2009 91st
2010 83rd
2011 78th
2012 94th
2013 107th

Guess the Orange Bowl appearance didn't help this year...


SEE BELOW...
 

diefirma said:
During Barreiro's interview with Coach Kill last night, Barreiro asked if the Gophers would ever consider running the read option play like the SF 49ers do with Kaepernick? OMG I was simultaneously embarrassed for Barreiro and his stunning ignorance of Gopher football and furious that he was so stunningly ignorant. It is not just that the local media are ignorant of Gopher recruiting but obviously Barreiro never watched a game or, if he did, he had no idea of what was going on. For the most part, I think Barreiro is representative of the media in this town.
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So, nobody looked over Dan's questions before the show? Not even Justin Gaard, whom I believe to be his producer as well as the sideline analyst for the Gophers on their flagship station? He should be fired.
 

I do think it is lazy reporting. Reps from Rivals, Scout, or whichever service you are talking about, all flat out admit the truly elite players are easy to figure out but after that it is simply a crapshoot. So why such an emphasis on it all? Because it sells. It is no different then Mel Kiper. Does anyone truly believe Kiper is a "draft expert"? He would be running his own team is he truly was. It is made for TV drama. If all of us stopped paying attention and reading the different recruting sites, it would all go away and the media wouldn't be able to point at it any longer.

We all know the haves select, they don't recruit. The rest have to recruit and develop. Kill chooses to recruit players that fit his system and develp them. Brewtser wanted "stars" and he got them, he just forgot or didn't know how to develop. The local media forgets to mention Brewster had such a highly rated class and still failed. But it is sure easy to point at Kill and say 12th out of 12 teams. Let's also not forget Brewster completely effed over the one true potential program changer this program has had in a long time.

Also, why doesn't local media ever bring to light that Wisconsin doesn't bring in top recruiting classes year in and year out, yet they have been to three straight Rose Bowls. Same thing with Iowa when they were rolling a few years back. They recruit to their systems and they develop. It's easy and lazy reporting by the local media to simpy point directly at the "rankings" as to why the Gophers haven't turned the corner. Their is so much more at play than that.
 

As already mentioned, every fan base has bandwagon fans. I've lived a few different places around the country and I think there's just a general difference in what fans do once they are off the bandwagon.

Most places, when a fan jumps off the bandwagon, they just don't care that much anymore. They're almost more indifferent.

In MN, fans generally go from being a fan to actually enjoying a team's failures. This way they can enjoy the team when they are winning and call themselves a fan, and then enjoy the team sucking during the bad times because it's easy to pile on when things aren't going well.
 

B1GSportsGuy said:
Coach Jerry Kill was quoted on KFAN yesterday as saying that Northern Illinois had classes ranked 11th, 11th, and 12th in the MAC and those kids ended up in the Orange Bowl this year.

Some simple fact checking revealed the following about NIU's recruiting classes from the past 4 years in the MAC.

2009 - 7th
2010 - 3rd
2011 - 2nd
2012 - 4th

I realize Coach Kill is downplaying the importance of recruiting rankings, but he shouldn't be making things up.
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He said "we were 12, 12, 11 and that team went to the Orange Bowl". He was referring to NIU as a program.

MAC Rank:
2006 11th
2007 11th
2008 12th

Since it's your first post, I suggest that you be kinder...
 

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