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
