Athletic Director's Update

[MikeJackets1967]

A lot of you folks will not like what I have to say in this thread. It needs to be said,m however. I also intend to write essentially the same thoughts in a letter or email to Stansbury.

By way of background, I am a GT alum and have held GT season tickets for over 30 years now. I have absolutely loved GT football over the years and been (imho, of course...LOL) a loyal supporter. I am not a big $ donor, but a consistent small $ donor.

I had the choice this past Saturday of attending the GT-Duke homecoming game....or the LSU-Georgia game in Baton Rouge. I decided to go to Baton Rouge. I am SO glad that I did. Judging from the comments and write-ups I have seen, it sounds like GT was the same old GT that I have grown so so tired of seeing. A one-dimensional offense....which like ALL one-dimensional offenses can look great when you are playing inferior teams but is in trouble when you play a defense with a pulse. GT simply must, must learn how to have an effective passing attack. Watching this team play without a passing threat is painful, and I find I simply can not do it anymore.

The contrast of being in a sold-out Death Valley and cheering on a team that plays big boy football (and can match the Dawgs in physicality) was amazing. It appears to my untrained eyes that GT can no longer match Duke in physicality. LSU was able to succeed, but ONLY because UGa was never able to know what the Tiger offense was going to do. Their balance between running and passing was key. While I am not saying that GT has to pass as much as a 'standard' offense, they must be able to pass much more effectively and at least a bit more often than they do now to establish that passing threat correctly and keep defenses off balance.

Overall, the GT football program the last 4 years has sunk to a level that makes it unappealing for me to attend anymore. While certainly, I put some of the blame on the head coach, the problems certainly look like they go deeper to me. Our inability to recruit in this modern age is a serious...no, an enormous handicap. It sure looks to me like we can no longer seriously aspire to be competitive with Georgia or Clemson......and in fact, by all appearances we have sunk below Duke and into the bottom tier of ACC football programs. I think most rational observers would say we are on our way to a second straight losing season without a bowl, but more importantly, we simply cannot beat ANY Power 5 football team unless we play error-free and execute crisply.

Many of the problems GT faces are not of this coaches making. I find it very frustrating to read posts that say simplistic things like "O'Leary could recruit better"....it was a different world back then, folks. Just stop it with the simplistic solutions. While I obviously have problems with our head coach as cited above, the bigger issues that are plaguing GT are NOT his problems and will NOT be solved by firing CPJ.

This school has to decide if it wants to play big boy football. Those of you in the fan base who argue that 'GT is different' and that 'we will never sacrifice academic integrity for football' should be prohibited from complaining about results, imho. You are dooming a once proud program with a long history to the doldrums of Tulane, or perhaps Vanderbilt. You will lose fans like me, over the course of time. It takes a lot for me to wander away from GT football, but when I realize we can no longer realistically compete at the top levels, I lose faith, interest and desire. Under Gailey, we were horrid on offense but with the athletes we had we were still able to compete with most teams on any given Saturday. (His inability to beat UGa was inexcusable and got him fired.)

GT has to make changes, starting with changes at the very top, things that only Peterson can shove through the BOR, to compete effectively. This team is not merely one decent QB away forn competing. One decent QB would make us competitive with Duke, and Virginia....but we need more than that to be able to survive and thrive.

GT is in a town with many alternatives. GT needs to be able to grow its fan base, both so it can grow its revenue stream, but also so it can make the home stadium an electric and exciting place to play. The way things have been going the last 4 years, the opposite is happening. Not only are we NOT attracting the sidewalk college fans who might otherwise take an interest and become GT fans, we are in fact, slowly losing longtime fans like me. Many simply decide they won't go anywhere. A smaller number decide they have a rooting interest with other teams (in my case, where I grew up).

GT needs to take a serious and deep look at itself. Gour new guys helping with recruiting won't turn this around. Firing CPJ won't turn this around. Even Sy=tansbury cannot solve this by himself. He is doing the right things in trying to raise much more serious money, but in fact until I see GT address its fundamental issues, I am not willing to commit serious money to this program. GT now must prove to me that it is seriious about playing big boy football, and if it is not willing to do that...fine. But don't expect me to contribute to a program that is saying we will not compete at the highest levels because "we're different". Join Navy's conference and have fun. Continue down this path and drive away fans like me.

Oh, and by the way, LSU fans HATED having a day game as well

You make very good points

 

[RiseUpATL]

I didn’t watch GT the last 2 weeks. After the Pitt loss I needed a break. I was busy during the first half of the game yesterday so I recorded it. Tried to engage. But the whole game I had a feeling of just waiting for the wheels to fall off. I was not disappointed after the 4 turnovers. I knew it was coming. Just our brand of football the last few years.

I’m just done making time for GT games. If they don’t care enough to work on improving the program, then they don’t care enough about my time as a fan.

Sad state of affairs when we have a losing streak to Duke.

 

[Tech93]

A lot of you folks will not like what I have to say in this thread. It needs to be said,m however. I also intend to write essentially the same thoughts in a letter or email to Stansbury.

By way of background, I am a GT alum and have held GT season tickets for over 30 years now. I have absolutely loved GT football over the years and been (imho, of course...LOL) a loyal supporter. I am not a big $ donor, but a consistent small $ donor.

I had the choice this past Saturday of attending the GT-Duke homecoming game....or the LSU-Georgia game in Baton Rouge. I decided to go to Baton Rouge. I am SO glad that I did. Judging from the comments and write-ups I have seen, it sounds like GT was the same old GT that I have grown so so tired of seeing. A one-dimensional offense....which like ALL one-dimensional offenses can look great when you are playing inferior teams but is in trouble when you play a defense with a pulse. GT simply must, must learn how to have an effective passing attack. Watching this team play without a passing threat is painful, and I find I simply can not do it anymore.

The contrast of being in a sold-out Death Valley and cheering on a team that plays big boy football (and can match the Dawgs in physicality) was amazing. It appears to my untrained eyes that GT can no longer match Duke in physicality. LSU was able to succeed, but ONLY because UGa was never able to know what the Tiger offense was going to do. Their balance between running and passing was key. While I am not saying that GT has to pass as much as a 'standard' offense, they must be able to pass much more effectively and at least a bit more often than they do now to establish that passing threat correctly and keep defenses off balance.

Overall, the GT football program the last 4 years has sunk to a level that makes it unappealing for me to attend anymore. While certainly, I put some of the blame on the head coach, the problems certainly look like they go deeper to me. Our inability to recruit in this modern age is a serious...no, an enormous handicap. It sure looks to me like we can no longer seriously aspire to be competitive with Georgia or Clemson......and in fact, by all appearances we have sunk below Duke and into the bottom tier of ACC football programs. I think most rational observers would say we are on our way to a second straight losing season without a bowl, but more importantly, we simply cannot beat ANY Power 5 football team unless we play error-free and execute crisply.

Many of the problems GT faces are not of this coaches making. I find it very frustrating to read posts that say simplistic things like "O'Leary could recruit better"....it was a different world back then, folks. Just stop it with the simplistic solutions. While I obviously have problems with our head coach as cited above, the bigger issues that are plaguing GT are NOT his problems and will NOT be solved by firing CPJ.

This school has to decide if it wants to play big boy football. Those of you in the fan base who argue that 'GT is different' and that 'we will never sacrifice academic integrity for football' should be prohibited from complaining about results, imho. You are dooming a once proud program with a long history to the doldrums of Tulane, or perhaps Vanderbilt. You will lose fans like me, over the course of time. It takes a lot for me to wander away from GT football, but when I realize we can no longer realistically compete at the top levels, I lose faith, interest and desire. Under Gailey, we were horrid on offense but with the athletes we had we were still able to compete with most teams on any given Saturday. (His inability to beat UGa was inexcusable and got him fired.)

GT has to make changes, starting with changes at the very top, things that only Peterson can shove through the BOR, to compete effectively. This team is not merely one decent QB away forn competing. One decent QB would make us competitive with Duke, and Virginia....but we need more than that to be able to survive and thrive.

GT is in a town with many alternatives. GT needs to be able to grow its fan base, both so it can grow its revenue stream, but also so it can make the home stadium an electric and exciting place to play. The way things have been going the last 4 years, the opposite is happening. Not only are we NOT attracting the sidewalk college fans who might otherwise take an interest and become GT fans, we are in fact, slowly losing longtime fans like me. Many simply decide they won't go anywhere. A smaller number decide they have a rooting interest with other teams (in my case, where I grew up).

GT needs to take a serious and deep look at itself. Four new guys helping with recruiting won't turn this around. Firing CPJ won't turn this around. Even Stansbury cannot solve this by himself. He is doing the right things in trying to raise much more serious money, but in fact until I see GT address its fundamental issues, I am not willing to commit serious money to this program. GT now must prove to me that it is serious about playing big boy football, and if it is not willing to do that...fine. But don't expect me to contribute to a program that is saying we will not compete at the highest levels because "we're different". Join Navy's conference and have fun. Continue down this path and drive away fans like me.

Oh, and by the way, LSU fans HATED having a day game as well

I agree with the above, but will emphasize that Peterson is a big inhibitor of moving our teams forward. He could do much more to see that our football program is better. I will also point out that GTAA lacks good marketing people and tends to have a proudful/elitist attitude. We do not need that to reach players, supporters and fans.

 

[Mojo71]

I agree with you MWBATL 250%, great read, great TRUTH. And guess what...?
If our basketball team doesn't get their act together (recruiting,coaching), they will be the same damn way.

 

[684Bee]

A lot of you folks will not like what I have to say in this thread. It needs to be said,m however. I also intend to write essentially the same thoughts in a letter or email to Stansbury.

By way of background, I am a GT alum and have held GT season tickets for over 30 years now. I have absolutely loved GT football over the years and been (imho, of course...LOL) a loyal supporter. I am not a big $ donor, but a consistent small $ donor.

I had the choice this past Saturday of attending the GT-Duke homecoming game....or the LSU-Georgia game in Baton Rouge. I decided to go to Baton Rouge. I am SO glad that I did. Judging from the comments and write-ups I have seen, it sounds like GT was the same old GT that I have grown so so tired of seeing. A one-dimensional offense....which like ALL one-dimensional offenses can look great when you are playing inferior teams but is in trouble when you play a defense with a pulse. GT simply must, must learn how to have an effective passing attack. Watching this team play without a passing threat is painful, and I find I simply can not do it anymore.

The contrast of being in a sold-out Death Valley and cheering on a team that plays big boy football (and can match the Dawgs in physicality) was amazing. It appears to my untrained eyes that GT can no longer match Duke in physicality. LSU was able to succeed, but ONLY because UGa was never able to know what the Tiger offense was going to do. Their balance between running and passing was key. While I am not saying that GT has to pass as much as a 'standard' offense, they must be able to pass much more effectively and at least a bit more often than they do now to establish that passing threat correctly and keep defenses off balance.

Overall, the GT football program the last 4 years has sunk to a level that makes it unappealing for me to attend anymore. While certainly, I put some of the blame on the head coach, the problems certainly look like they go deeper to me. Our inability to recruit in this modern age is a serious...no, an enormous handicap. It sure looks to me like we can no longer seriously aspire to be competitive with Georgia or Clemson......and in fact, by all appearances we have sunk below Duke and into the bottom tier of ACC football programs. I think most rational observers would say we are on our way to a second straight losing season without a bowl, but more importantly, we simply cannot beat ANY Power 5 football team unless we play error-free and execute crisply.

Many of the problems GT faces are not of this coaches making. I find it very frustrating to read posts that say simplistic things like "O'Leary could recruit better"....it was a different world back then, folks. Just stop it with the simplistic solutions. While I obviously have problems with our head coach as cited above, the bigger issues that are plaguing GT are NOT his problems and will NOT be solved by firing CPJ.

This school has to decide if it wants to play big boy football. Those of you in the fan base who argue that 'GT is different' and that 'we will never sacrifice academic integrity for football' should be prohibited from complaining about results, imho. You are dooming a once proud program with a long history to the doldrums of Tulane, or perhaps Vanderbilt. You will lose fans like me, over the course of time. It takes a lot for me to wander away from GT football, but when I realize we can no longer realistically compete at the top levels, I lose faith, interest and desire. Under Gailey, we were horrid on offense but with the athletes we had we were still able to compete with most teams on any given Saturday. (His inability to beat UGa was inexcusable and got him fired.)

GT has to make changes, starting with changes at the very top, things that only Peterson can shove through the BOR, to compete effectively. This team is not merely one decent QB away forn competing. One decent QB would make us competitive with Duke, and Virginia....but we need more than that to be able to survive and thrive.

GT is in a town with many alternatives. GT needs to be able to grow its fan base, both so it can grow its revenue stream, but also so it can make the home stadium an electric and exciting place to play. The way things have been going the last 4 years, the opposite is happening. Not only are we NOT attracting the sidewalk college fans who might otherwise take an interest and become GT fans, we are in fact, slowly losing longtime fans like me. Many simply decide they won't go anywhere. A smaller number decide they have a rooting interest with other teams (in my case, where I grew up).

GT needs to take a serious and deep look at itself. Four new guys helping with recruiting won't turn this around. Firing CPJ won't turn this around. Even Stansbury cannot solve this by himself. He is doing the right things in trying to raise much more serious money, but in fact until I see GT address its fundamental issues, I am not willing to commit serious money to this program. GT now must prove to me that it is serious about playing big boy football, and if it is not willing to do that...fine. But don't expect me to contribute to a program that is saying we will not compete at the highest levels because "we're different". Join Navy's conference and have fun. Continue down this path and drive away fans like me.

Oh, and by the way, LSU fans HATED having a day game as well

This was triggered because you went to an LSU-UGA game in Baton Rouge?

Cmon, man.

While you have some decent points, this is rooted in emotion and not logic.

 

[RiseUpATL]

This was triggered because you went to an LSU-UGA game in Baton Rouge?

Cmon, man.

While you have some decent points, this is rooted in emotion and not logic.

I didn’t read it that way at all. I think his post was spot on and rooted in neither logic nor emotion but rather reality. I think your response to him is rooted more in emotion than it is reality.

 

[Lawyer mark]

Since we have so many open seats, maybe bring back the $99 season tickets. I don’t buy season tickets due to cost. I go to one or two games per year, but if they were cheaper, I would go to most games... while there, I buy concessions and make noise...

I am frustrated with cpj,but will be a tech fan until I am dead. Sidewalk fan since the mid-80’s.

 

[GTFLETCH]

Since we have so many open seats, maybe bring back the $99 season tickets. I don’t buy season tickets due to cost. I go to one or two games per year, but if they were cheaper, I would go to most games... while there, I buy concessions and make noise...

I am frustrated with cpj,but will be a tech fan until I am dead. Sidewalk fan since the mid-80’s.

Not sure anyone would pay 99 bucks to see this... 99 dollar seats and the ability to see someone develop...like Tobias or James.... Taquon had not improved his passing enough and should have been at A back to start the season.... oh well.... it appears we are entering dark times at GT... the worse since Bill Lewis...

The coaching staff is not interested in developing for the future.... which tells me things may not be as rosy as everyone think between Coach Johnson and AD TStan

 

[Techster]

Since we have so many open seats, maybe bring back the $99 season tickets. I don’t buy season tickets due to cost. I go to one or two games per year, but if they were cheaper, I would go to most games... while there, I buy concessions and make noise...

I am frustrated with cpj,but will be a tech fan until I am dead. Sidewalk fan since the mid-80’s.

A problem with that is a lot of those seats are already paid for. You can't sell the same seats twice...well you can, but the person who paid the first time may not be happy when he arrives to find someone else sitting in the seat he paid for.

A lot of those empty seats are just fans who no longer choose to come.

 

[UgaBlows]

I wonder how CPJ would take it if Tstan told him to hire a spread-option offensive Coord for next season?

 

[4shotB]

The coaching staff is not interested in developing for the future.... which tells me things may not be as rosy as everyone think between Coach Johnson and AD TStan

Here is another conundrum. When a coach needs to win to retain employment, how or why would he invest in letting youngsters play for the sake of the next guy? He needs to win out to keep his job and I'm guessing he isn't in a state of mind to run experiments to appease the fan base. You might think that playing TO and JG may give us better chances, but if Paul doesn't then he's sticking with TM.

 

[Oakland]

Stansbury has a mess on his hands. Our small fan base either likes Johnson or dislikes him. We only had about 41,000 fans show up yesterday so I don't think Stansbury has to worry about the Tech Nation (we're more like a county) getting upset with him if he decides to go in a new direction. My understanding is Stansbury has never hired or fired a major sports coach. If the management at the GTAA doesn't get tough soon, we're going to go back to the Bill Curry days. Yesterday screams wake up call with the smallish attendance for a homecoming game. Stansbury really needs to lead now. He needs to tell the head coach either get to a minor bowl game or we have no choice but to go in a new direction. This program is really on a slippery slope.

 

[GTFLETCH]

Here is another conundrum. When a coach needs to win to retain employment, how or why would he invest in letting youngsters play for the sake of the next guy? He needs to win out to keep his job and I'm guessing he isn't in a state of mind to run experiments to appease the fan base. You might think that playing TO and JG may give us better chances, but if Paul doesn't then he's sticking with TM.

Agreed.... I think that is why he is sticking with TM, he does not have the security to develop younger players.

 

[684Bee]

I didn’t read it that way at all. I think his post was spot on and rooted in neither logic nor emotion but rather reality. I think your response to him is rooted more in emotion than it is reality.

He said he w

I didn’t read it that way at all. I think his post was spot on and rooted in neither logic nor emotion but rather reality. I think your response to him is rooted more in emotion than it is reality.

To make statements like “LSU plays big boy football” and “LSU can match Uga physically” is just silly.

First of all, we never have, and never will, recruit on the level of State U’s like LSU and Uga. The overall talent level discrepancy between us and them has always been pretty wide.

Yet, despite that, we have beaten Uga three times with our one-dimensional high school offense (something we didn’t do for 7 years with a former NFL OC as our coach). One of those times, we did it throwing all of two passes, and one of those times was 2016, just two seasons ago. Not exactly ancient history.

What does that tell you? Logic would say it’s not that the offense is inherently flawed.

I think a change is coming. I’m not calling for it, but I think it’s coming. I just don’t buy into this blaming the x’s and o’s of this offense.

 

[GTFLETCH]

Stansbury has a mess on his hands. Our small fan base either likes Johnson or dislikes him. We only had about 41,000 fans show up yesterday so I don't think Stansbury has to worry about the Tech Nation (we're more like a county) getting upset with him if he decides to go in a new direction. My understanding is Stansbury has never hired or fired a major sports coach. If the management at the GTAA doesn't get tough soon, we're going to go back to the Bill Curry days. Yesterday screams wake up call with the smallish attendance for a homecoming game. Stansbury really needs to lead now. He needs to tell the head coach either get to a minor bowl game or we have no choice but to go in a new direction. This program is really on a slippery slope.

That has already happened... the new contract basically says CPJ is safe with 6 wins and a bowl game.... less than 6 and then the scenarios come in.... CPJ retires, fired get a another year....

 

[684Bee]

I wonder how CPJ would take it if Tstan told him to hire a spread-option offensive Coord for next season?

This is essentially what we run. We just do it from under Center and with our slot receivers bunched in tight as A backs.

 

[UgaBlows]

This is essentially what we run. We just do it from under Center and with our slot receivers bunched in tight as A backs.

Please, i understand what our offense is. I'm talking about THE college offense- shotgun spread, RPO, an actual passing game.

 

[slugboy]

First of all, we never have, and never will, recruit on the level of State U’s like LSU and Uga. The overall talent level discrepancy between us and them has always been pretty wide.

NCST is the little brother in North Carolina. We don’t recruit at their level. We can find tons of examples of universities that aren’t the favorite pet of the governor that recruit better than we do.

We’ve also recruited better in the past, based on the numbers we’ve sent to the NFL. We’ve declined in who we send to the NFL since even the Gailey days, much less O’Leary.

For the life of me, I don’t understand why we don’t have an offensive lineman drafted every other year (or at least making an NFL squad). I can see the arguments for other positions, but OL has had 11 years of relative stability, it’s the cornerstone of our offense, and there are teams like the Broncos and 49ers that use more agile linemen. Linemen do the best overall on the Wonderlic, so curriculum shouldn’t be the issue there.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[slugboy]

This is essentially what we run. We just do it from under Center and with our slot receivers bunched in tight as A backs.

I think he meant a pass option.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[stech81]

I wonder how CPJ would take it if Tstan told him to hire a spread-option offensive Coord for next season?

Good question , 2 nd question if he said ok I need 1.5m to hire Coach X what would Tech say ?