Observation

[Connell62]

Maybe it's due to some of the struggles we've had this year, but this place seems like a morgue lately. The level of animosity and general negativity regarding the program is head-scratching.

Unfortunately, it seems that they're running people off from the board. This is my observation, but it seems that for the most part, "discussion" has left town and the negative nellies now rule the roost.

Sure, you're going to have that with all message boards, but outside of 7-8 members (who seem to be posting less and less), it's the same ole tired crap.

That is sad because this used to be one of the best places around to talk GT hoops. Let's all do better!

 

[Northeast Stinger]

Maybe it's due to some of the struggles we've had this year, but this place seems like a morgue lately. The level of animosity and general negativity regarding the program is head-scratching.

Unfortunately, it seems that they're running people off from the board. This is my observation, but it seems that for the most part, "discussion" has left town and the negative nellies now rule the roost.

Sure, you're going to have that with all message boards, but outside of 7-8 members (who seem to be posting less and less), it's the same ole tired crap.

That is sad because this used to be one of the best places around to talk GT hoops. Let's all do better!

I certainly think we should all do better.

I think there is a kind of chain reactiongoing on.

When there is this much losing taking place there are people (myself included) who develop an unsatisfied feeling in the spot where we store our sports interests. We then check here daily to set if there is some new information that can fill the void. Since there is little to no new information we are left with speculations and opinions. Occasionally these strike a nerve with someone who feels these are damaging to the program, hurtful to student athletes trying their best, or advancing a false narrative that will lead down the road to further dissatisfaction with the program.

And of course we have our share of ornery malcontents.

Mix it all together and we get endless discussions / arguments / rants going down the same well worn paths.

To me right now here is where it feels like we are:

Our football program is at perhaps its lowest point in history relative to other programs around the country and this is the make or break year if we hope to turn that around in the lifetime of many of our fans.

Our basketball program is having a down year so far but many of the pieces, including the coach, appear to be in place for continued long term success. Unfortunately this year does not look like a tournament year for us.

Our baseball program looks very competitive and is the sport where traditionally we have the added benefit of always feeling hopeful in the spring.

Outside of any new revelations, or winning, there isn’t much to add and I don’t think conversations on here will get unstuck any time soon.

 

[Connell62]

Yeah, I hear you Northeast. I think that you are right, it all those factors that contribute, not to mention all of the external BS (CV-19).

I'm a big boy and I can accept differing viewpoints, but what drives bonkers, are the flat-out uninformed and broad stroke comments. Guess I should expect that from the internet..LOL

The biggest thing to me is that I remember this board being one of the best with respect to our hoops program, but I find myself coming less often. That's a damn shame.

 

[MWBATL]

It is difficult but I think @Northeast Stinger laid it out pretty well. My interest level in college athletics in general has dropped, in part because of GT's fortunes, but also in part because of the inexorable march towards semi pro ball in college sports. While this has been true longer in basketball, we used to be able to watch a guy develop over 4 years. Now, as in football, I almost expect to lose our best players to the portal or the draft. There certainly is NO certainty of "get old stay old" like there was even 4 years ago. Now, it's who can we attract in free agency, which I dislike. A LOT.

Perhaps it's just me.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

Yep.

Don’t know about others but the last 2 years of Covid have been a real bummer for my circle of family and friends. I’ll leave it at that but it’s not hard for me to believe that this has bled over into almost all aspects of life. Pessimism is an easy default setting right now if you’ve seen 2 years of sickness and death plus disruptions to travel, vacations and entertainment.

Adding to that there is a general sourness in our national mood. To say too much about that would get me into controversial territory but suffice it to say that for too many of us the only way we seem to know how to engage anymore is to attack or make snide and demeaning comments. I’m reminded of an idea found in the New Testament, “All things are lawful to me but not all things are helpful or build up.” It’s hard work to build something up and make it better. Patience is required but that is in short supply. Right now our free speech rights and general freedoms have become an entitlement that obscures the idea of working for a greater good. Heaven forbid we should sacrifice our feelings for someone else.

Having said all that I don’t want to ask too much of a sports blog or message board. To some degree this is the place where we can leave our dirty dishes in the sink, our underwear on the floor and not shave for three days. We can be less refined and vent our spleen. But the problem is, I think, many of us want a garden oasis away from the daily strife, an escape if you will.

I think some people leave this site or become inactive because it no longer seems to afford them a healthy escape. If the noxious tone of the internet and our national conversation is going to infect this place then why bother. Others will drift away because for them nothing can be learned right now from this experience.

 

[ESPNjacket]

I find this team hard to watch. I like watching how hard Usher plays but the offense is frequently stagnant and there doesn't seem to be much hope it will improve this year.

I haven't been commenting much since I have missed about half of the games and made no effort to watch a replay.

 

[orientalnc]

@Connell62 this is a good topic. Thanks for posting.

Personally, I hope to be a more frequent poster re basketball. But, I agree with @Northeast Stinger for the most part. There is so much divisiveness in our universe and it can drain your energy. Both mental and emotional. Plus the January weather here in eastern NC has be abysmal.

 

[YlJacket]

NES you have expressed it well. though I do want to gently correct you that our FB program was indeed worse in the late 70s prior to the ACC. On your other point, I had a very good friend of mine blow up at me for what I thought was some gentle joking of him on the political side. Didn't want to hear it was at best "sour". It carries over to places like this. I do my best to not really engage in rabbit trails but won't claim total innocence.

As for the team, other than the fact they almost always play hard, there hasn't been a lot to really get positive about. And a couple of UNC/WF type games that make really negative comments almost unavoidable. But it is hard to see this team the way it is currently constructed being anything other than maybe middle of the pack ACC level for a while. And I do consider myself more of an optimist. So it isn't hard to understand folks who are less optimistic in their outlook simply saying muck it and not showing up or showing up and expressing an arguably legit pessimism about the team.

I have played on teams that were not very good and have had kids play for programs that were at times not very good. It is hard - really hard to keep your drive and focus as a player when it isn't going well. So I have a lot of respect for Pastner and the players that they generally play really hard. Major league kudos to them. And I try to keep to a minimum my comments/thoughts that they are having to play a lot harder than they should primarily because of their offensive strategy.

 

[GTbball2016]

God I’m going to get heat on here for this, but what is there to be optimistic about? I see people say the core is in place, but I feel like they couldn’t be more wrong. There is uncertainty across the board after Usher and Devoe leave. PG and Center play is as bad as I’ve ever seen at GT. The health of the program relies on the portal this offseason, and we’ve seen that you can hit or miss pretty significantly in that area. It’s frustrating a bit to read how much Pastner is blaming the struggles this year on Bubba being out. Basically the only thing this team does well is shoot from the perimeter. It’s the interior play and finishing at the hoop which is scary bad. Now I totally get if people disagree across the board with me, but I’m not trolling and welcome any conversation about what I’m incorrect with.

 

[tmhunter52]

Yep.

Don’t know about others but the last 2 years of Covid have been a real bummer for my circle of family and friends. I’ll leave it at that but it’s not hard for me to believe that this has bled over into almost all aspects of life. Pessimism is an easy default setting right now if you’ve seen 2 years of sickness and death plus disruptions to travel, vacations and entertainment.

Adding to that there is a general sourness in our national mood. To say too much about that would get me into controversial territory but suffice it to say that for too many of us the only way we seem to know how to engage anymore is to attack or make snide and demeaning comments. I’m reminded of an idea found in the New Testament, “All things are lawful to me but not all things are helpful or build up.” It’s hard work to build something up and make it better. Patience is required but that is in short supply. Right now our free speech rights and general freedoms have become an entitlement that obscures the idea of working for a greater good. Heaven forbid we should sacrifice our feelings for someone else.

Having said all that I don’t want to ask too much of a sports blog or message board. To some degree this is the place where we can leave our dirty dishes in the sink, our underwear on the floor and not shave for three days. We can be less refined and vent our spleen. But the problem is, I think, many of us want a garden oasis away from the daily strife, an escape if you will.

I think some people leave this site or become inactive because it no longer seems to afford them a healthy escape. If the noxious tone of the internet and our national conversation is going to infect this place then why bother. Others will drift away because for them nothing can be learned right now from this experience.

You are wise. Wisdom has no place on this message board. LOL!

 

[GTbball2016]

Connell, are you concerned that Pastner’s “get old, stay old” strategy will be harder to utilize given the portal/NIL world? The days of stashing players on the bench a few years and bringing them along slowly are done. Would guys like Moses and Lammers have stayed in the program in today’s environment? This staff needs to be killers in the portal to succeed.

 

[AUFC]

I think we are going to slay the transfer portal this offseason. There is a lot of talent in the metro Atlanta area that leaves for greener pastures and figures out they miss home. It is now very easy and there are few blockers from making that transfer happen. What we need is the Walker Kesslers selecting Georgia Tech over Auburn, UGA, Alabama, Clemson, etc...gonna be real challenging because Auburn looks like the next powerhouse and has a ton of momentum.

 

[orientalnc]

God I’m going to get heat on here for this, but what is there to be optimistic about? I see people say the core is in place, but I feel like they couldn’t be more wrong. There is uncertainty across the board after Usher and Devoe leave. PG and Center play is as bad as I’ve ever seen at GT. The health of the program relies on the portal this offseason, and we’ve seen that you can hit or miss pretty significantly in that area. It’s frustrating a bit to read how much Pastner is blaming the struggles this year on Bubba being out. Basically the only thing this team does well is shoot from the perimeter. It’s the interior play and finishing at the hoop which is scary bad. Now I totally get if people disagree across the board with me, but I’m not trolling and welcome any conversation about what I’m incorrect with.

If you limited your fan interest to football, I would agree with you.

The Men's basketball team is where you are pessimistic. Yet they are the defending ACC champions.

The Women's basketball team is one of the top teams in the country with a great recruiting class coming in. The Women's volleyball team was an elite 8 team this year. We have potential Olympians on the track and in the pool. Our baseball team is a good bet for the College World Series. This is not a time to be depressed about GT athletics.

 

[GTJason]

I feel like I have a slight hangover from last season. We had all of the momentum going into the tourney only to get cut down in the first round with our best player out. I know this happens to half of the teams who make it and the team we lost to went pretty deep but I'm still hanging on to "that should have been us"

This season feels like a rebuilding year and it's tough to get excited. I mainly lurk here especially since the board has become so big but it's hard to get on here and see all of the fire the coach nonsense. I want to feed the troll. Okay unlimited budget, who are you going to hire who is going to turn us around? But I know better than that.

The reality is I trust the guy at the helm and we can afford him. For the complaints about interior play, this is literally the first year in his entire tenure we have been so awful and I have to believe Reveno combined with who we have and the portal we can get back on track in that area. The 2019 recruiting class is screwing us up here. Hopefully 2022 doesn't give us a bad year in 2025. Gotta get some transfers in and Coleman level recruits next year and we'll be fine

 

[JacketRacket]

Maybe it's due to some of the struggles we've had this year, but this place seems like a morgue lately. The level of animosity and general negativity regarding the program is head-scratching.

Unfortunately, it seems that they're running people off from the board. This is my observation, but it seems that for the most part, "discussion" has left town and the negative nellies now rule the roost.

Sure, you're going to have that with all message boards, but outside of 7-8 members (who seem to be posting less and less), it's the same ole tired crap.

That is sad because this used to be one of the best places around to talk GT hoops. Let's all do better!

I used to join at least the gtswarm chat for games, but I've had a harder time watching games this season (thanks to Bally + my old streams being unavailable) so I can't do that as often. It's sort of killed my interest for it/engagement. I've watched more GTWBB than mens this year cause the women's games are usually either on ACCN or ESPN+/ACCNX and not Bally.

Chat's still my preferred way of watching games when I do watch . At least with chat, you know the negative nellies actually watched them play. Participating in sports forums is a huge energy suck. Even more when your team isn't doing well.

 

[Jack]

Maybe it's due to some of the struggles we've had this year, but this place seems like a morgue lately. The level of animosity and general negativity regarding the program is head-scratching.

Unfortunately, it seems that they're running people off from the board. This is my observation, but it seems that for the most part, "discussion" has left town and the negative nellies now rule the roost.

Sure, you're going to have that with all message boards, but outside of 7-8 members (who seem to be posting less and less), it's the same ole tired crap.

That is sad because this used to be one of the best places around to talk GT hoops. Let's all do better!

This team has been hard to watch early on. I began liking them again when they played such hard core defense against Florida State.
Crimens

I feel like I have a slight hangover from last season. We had all of the momentum going into the tourney only to get cut down in the first round with our best player out. I know this happens to half of the teams who make it and the team we lost to went pretty deep but I'm still hanging on to "that should have been us"

This season feels like a rebuilding year and it's tough to get excited. I mainly lurk here especially since the board has become so big but it's hard to get on here and see all of the fire the coach nonsense. I want to feed the troll. Okay unlimited budget, who are you going to hire who is going to turn us around? But I know better than that.

The reality is I trust the guy at the helm and we can afford him. For the complaints about interior play, this is literally the first year in his entire tenure we have been so awful and I have to believe Reveno combined with who we have and the portal we can get back on track in that area. The 2019 recruiting class is screwing us up here. Hopefully 2022 doesn't give us a bad year in 2025. Gotta get some transfers in and Coleman level recruits next year and we'll be fine

Crimens used to say that to do good in D1 basketball, you needed three players with NBA potential and his teams that had that did good.
Last years team had that in Jose, Wright, and Devoe and they had some role players that shined some.
One good player cracks up a defense
a little but the defense can easily adjust like has been done with Devoe, but three good players can wreck a defense and it is hard for a team to adjust, especially if a couple role players come through because the defense slacks off them.
It was painful to watch this team early on but I’ve adjusted my expectations and what really jacked me was the way they played defense against Florida State and they hung with Miami for a while. I think the young wing from Alabama ( his name is Moore I think) has raw talent kinda like Wright had and I hope to see him play more. Anyhow I’m going to enjoy the rest of the season.

 

[lv20gt]

The problem, and it's a huge problem on the football board, is some posters just have their one negative point and the force it into every situation and every conversation. And it's made worse because many of those posters don't actually want a discussion. You can, and there has been, really good threads about issues, and the one trick pony posters add nothing despite being the ones who constantly bring up the issues. Then they go quiet for a bit and then pop up with the same thing starting for square one.

For instance, we have a poster on this board that when he posts you can pretty much guarantee he's complaining about how bad the team will be next year. We've had topics here about what we need to see this year development wise to be in a good position next year, or what we need to add in the transfer market to cover holes.

Another, and actually a couple, who do nothing but point to the lack of recruiting success we've add off of the back of the ACC Tournament win. It simply doesn't matter that I went into depth about our roster situation and why we may want to go an alternate path for next year (transfers). That same point keeps being brought up adding nothing of substance over and over.

It's fine to have negative opinions.

I thought Pastner royally messed up last year not making it a bigger focus to try and get Howard into the rotation more. IMO that decision throughout the year cost us in the NCAAT. It also cost us this year, and his decision to try and go tiny was a horrible decision this year. However, we've had discussions and I don't really bring it up often (game chat aside). Because it doesn't really add anything. Same with my belief that running the ball through the high post has both stalled our offense, that many people point out, but has really delayed the development of Sturdy and Smith. But again, there's no point in just rehashing that same issue every single thread.

People will point to the state of the programs as justification for that, but in reality nothing is forcing anyone to post. It's just adults who don't know how to be a productive member of a group and would rather just complain for cathartic release. I wish mods were far stricter about things like that but it's not my message board to run.

 

[Root4GT]

One of the things that makes it hard to stay excited over GT BB is how bad CJP's teams start every year. When we think we have a team that should compete for a decent NCAA seed like last year's team we start the season with two really bad losses while CJP figures out the team. That cost us even though we won the ACC last year. We were a 9 seed which makes it very hard to advance in the NCAAT.

This year expectations were that we could be a Bubble NCAA team. That flew out the window with a bad home loss to Miami of Ohio followed by dropping all our games against P5 teams less Georgia in OOC play.

At some point if CJP want's to get fans involved his teams need to start the season on a roll and win 11-12 games prior to January! When that day arrives there will be a lot of interest and support! Until then it's meh at best!

 

[orientalnc]

The problem, and it's a huge problem on the football board, is some posters just have their one negative point and the force it into every situation and every conversation. And it's made worse because many of those posters don't actually want a discussion. You can, and there has been, really good threads about issues, and the one trick pony posters add nothing despite being the ones who constantly bring up the issues. Then they go quiet for a bit and then pop up with the same thing starting for square one.

For instance, we have a poster on this board that when he posts you can pretty much guarantee he's complaining about how bad the team will be next year. We've had topics here about what we need to see this year development wise to be in a good position next year, or what we need to add in the transfer market to cover holes.

Another, and actually a couple, who do nothing but point to the lack of recruiting success we've add off of the back of the ACC Tournament win. It simply doesn't matter that I went into depth about our roster situation and why we may want to go an alternate path for next year (transfers). That same point keeps being brought up adding nothing of substance over and over.

It's fine to have negative opinions.

I thought Pastner royally messed up last year not making it a bigger focus to try and get Howard into the rotation more. IMO that decision throughout the year cost us in the NCAAT. It also cost us this year, and his decision to try and go tiny was a horrible decision this year. However, we've had discussions and I don't really bring it up often (game chat aside). Because it doesn't really add anything. Same with my belief that running the ball through the high post has both stalled our offense, that many people point out, but has really delayed the development of Sturdy and Smith. But again, there's no point in just rehashing that same issue every single thread.

People will point to the state of the programs as justification for that, but in reality nothing is forcing anyone to post. It's just adults who don't know how to be a productive member of a group and would rather just complain for cathartic release. I wish mods were far stricter about things like that but it's not my message board to run.

You have been around the block more than once, so I don't pretend to give you advice. That said, the mods would welcome your POV.

 

[awbuzz]

Losing makes it a lot more difficult for sure.

Regarding GT MBB, 9PM games suck time wise for those are normally zonked by halftime. Throw in losing gives folks even less reason spend time watching much less posting or chatting.

I've been around long enough to put up with the "punishment" so that we we do win it's all the sweeter.

Thankfully volleyball and WBB have been a ray sunshine. They just aren't major sports that the masses follow.

Regarding the OP, yep, you are right fewer folks posting...

Regarding MBB, if we can miraculously end up above .500 in the ACC that should stir some more input.