redmule
Ramblin' Wreck
- Messages
- 664
Had two things happen this last week that I found interesting. Saturday night, my wife and I were having dinner with a former client of her's and the client's husband. He is an Auburn grad, a pharmacy major that had been a regional sales manager covering several states for a major pharmaceutical company before retiring. We were talking about our college days. He said he really liked chemistry and would take chemistry classes as electives. I told him I had struggled with chemistry, and did not enjoy the classes I had taken at all. He said WTTE, "Of course the chemistry at Tech is a lot harder than the chemistry at Auburn so I probably wouldn't have liked it either."
At a Super Bowl party, I was talking with a church friend, an MD as is his wife, LSU grads. Their son (a smart kid) will be a high school senior next year, and my friend said his son wanted to study engineering. They were planning to visit UF (I live in Florida), Auburn, and Mississippi State to tour the campuses and find out about the engineering schools there. I told him I'd be glad to have them join me at a Tech football game and I hope his son was considering Tech. He told me they had talked about it but his son was "intimidated" by Tech, and they would be looking at other schools.
Tech's reputation as an elite and difficult school is widespread and well known especially across the Southeast. If people like my friends that have achieved success in difficult fields are somewhat "intimidated" by Tech, then the typical high school football player must be absolutely terrified of what awaits them academically there. Imagine you are a 3 star football player, and you even have an SAT of 1000+ and B's in your math and science classes so you are ahead of most recruits in your classification in that respect. You know you are going to have to bust your butt to earn any playing time, plus you are taking on the academic challenge of an institution that even doctors and pharmacist find daunting. Why would you do that? How do we get ANY players with offers from other teams? The pool of players even willing to consider playing for us must be small indeed. I can only imagine the frustration of our coaches out on the recruiting trail when they see a player they know could be exceptional in our system and would fill a crying need, but the kid just does not want to take on the academics or is scared by Tech's (well-deserved) reputation just as my friend's son is.
I know we say that Ross and Dodd did it. Why can't Johnson? I think we have more of a problem than we suspect, and it's going to get worse. Tech's academic reputation seems to me to be better regarded than it was a quarter century ago when Ross was here. The Administration is focused on raising that even higher, and I agree with that. Also, what it takes to be accepted is higher, and I'm not talking about for football players. Take my example of the football player with the 1000+ SAT and B's in math and science. He hears about the guy in his high school with A's in the AP math class and a 1300 SAT being turned down by Tech. Then he gets a call from Johnson saying, "We want you at Tech and are sure you can handle the academics here." I'd say, "Riiiight! Been nice talking to you."
I know this is a dead horse I'm flogging, but those two incidents so close to NSD gave me new respect for what our coaches and teams have accomplished in the last two decades. That goes also for the guys that just signed our LOI. They are not backing down from a tremendous physical and mental challenge. We should not forget that when we discuss the merits and shortcomings of our new signees. Just by signing, they have demonstrated a toughness even a courage that the signees of another team nearby (that shall remain nameless) have not, and that is an unmeasureable that you want in your players.
At a Super Bowl party, I was talking with a church friend, an MD as is his wife, LSU grads. Their son (a smart kid) will be a high school senior next year, and my friend said his son wanted to study engineering. They were planning to visit UF (I live in Florida), Auburn, and Mississippi State to tour the campuses and find out about the engineering schools there. I told him I'd be glad to have them join me at a Tech football game and I hope his son was considering Tech. He told me they had talked about it but his son was "intimidated" by Tech, and they would be looking at other schools.
Tech's reputation as an elite and difficult school is widespread and well known especially across the Southeast. If people like my friends that have achieved success in difficult fields are somewhat "intimidated" by Tech, then the typical high school football player must be absolutely terrified of what awaits them academically there. Imagine you are a 3 star football player, and you even have an SAT of 1000+ and B's in your math and science classes so you are ahead of most recruits in your classification in that respect. You know you are going to have to bust your butt to earn any playing time, plus you are taking on the academic challenge of an institution that even doctors and pharmacist find daunting. Why would you do that? How do we get ANY players with offers from other teams? The pool of players even willing to consider playing for us must be small indeed. I can only imagine the frustration of our coaches out on the recruiting trail when they see a player they know could be exceptional in our system and would fill a crying need, but the kid just does not want to take on the academics or is scared by Tech's (well-deserved) reputation just as my friend's son is.
I know we say that Ross and Dodd did it. Why can't Johnson? I think we have more of a problem than we suspect, and it's going to get worse. Tech's academic reputation seems to me to be better regarded than it was a quarter century ago when Ross was here. The Administration is focused on raising that even higher, and I agree with that. Also, what it takes to be accepted is higher, and I'm not talking about for football players. Take my example of the football player with the 1000+ SAT and B's in math and science. He hears about the guy in his high school with A's in the AP math class and a 1300 SAT being turned down by Tech. Then he gets a call from Johnson saying, "We want you at Tech and are sure you can handle the academics here." I'd say, "Riiiight! Been nice talking to you."
I know this is a dead horse I'm flogging, but those two incidents so close to NSD gave me new respect for what our coaches and teams have accomplished in the last two decades. That goes also for the guys that just signed our LOI. They are not backing down from a tremendous physical and mental challenge. We should not forget that when we discuss the merits and shortcomings of our new signees. Just by signing, they have demonstrated a toughness even a courage that the signees of another team nearby (that shall remain nameless) have not, and that is an unmeasureable that you want in your players.
