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Post by aggiechamp on Dec 9, 2023 13:23:45 GMT -5
I don’t agree with much that Deion says, but I do agree with this: it’s stupid to play these guarantee games where we have no chance of being competitive and every chance of our kids being injured and demoralized!
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DECKS
Official BDF member
2008 Poster of the Year
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Posts: 10,405
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Post by DECKS on Dec 9, 2023 14:56:36 GMT -5
That train of thought is why Deion couldn't win a Celebration Bowl. Even though he had a roster loaded with FBS transfers and multi star players he was scared to play a P5. Made no sense to me.
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Post by aggiechamp on Dec 9, 2023 21:34:00 GMT -5
I hear what you say but, remember 2004 when we were all excited that we were playing P5 Wake Forest. The prior year we had won the MEAC going away and were ready to conquer the world and Wake Forest. Our starting quarterback had been loss for the season the week before but we weren’t afraid because we had Marshall Glenn, the prior starter as our backup. We lost Marshall Glenn on the first series of plays for the season and we were blown out 42-3. That injury as well as others were a primary cause of us finishing 3 and 8 that year. We did however get paid $125k! Was it worth. No. Is it worth $500k. No. Is it worth whatever we get paid in basketball to start 0 for 10 or 3-7. In my opinion, no. It is unfair to our kids and it is unfair to our fans. Okay. I’m getting off of the soapbox. But, I feel better.
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Post by planoaggie on Dec 9, 2023 21:39:14 GMT -5
I don’t agree with much that Deion says, but I do agree with this: it’s stupid to play these guarantee games where we have no chance of being competitive and every chance of our kids being injured and demoralized! I disagree with Deion on this topic. A lot of kids do not get injured in these types of games, but lots of bruises and soreness. If this was the case they would ban these games from being played. This helps a lot of schools financially. What I don't get are games like these in the middle of the season. Why get all banged up and turnaround and play a conference game? Play these games early in the season and use your depth chart to alleviate too many banging or hits in the OL and DL. Oh and by the way Lawrence Taylor and Reggie White are not going to play the entire game in a blowout on the dominant team. Lots of bench players will get to play.
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Post by aggiechamp on Dec 9, 2023 22:22:27 GMT -5
In fights they have weight classes for a reason. In football, we also have weight classes. Our last season is a perfect example of this. Last season we were six inches shorter and 30 pounds lighter than our foes. We didn’t get trounced but we didn’t win any games in conference. Most of the FBS is above our weight class. Georgia certainly is. And as the Wake Forest game shows us, being outweighed and outclassed for a series can devastate a season. I just don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze.
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Post by planoaggie on Dec 9, 2023 23:35:27 GMT -5
In fights they have weight classes for a reason. In football, we also have weight classes. Our last season is a perfect example of this. Last season we were six inches shorter and 30 pounds lighter than our foes. We didn’t get trounced but we didn’t win any games in conference. Most of the FBS is above our weight class. Georgia certainly is. And as the Wake Forest game shows us, being outweighed and outclassed for a series can devastate a season. I just don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze. You are combining being too small within conference play or FCS play versus FCS teams being too small to play FBS teams argument. Being outweighed or blown out is not the biggest concerns in those games. Injuries are. Historically, what major player loss for A&T has occurred over the last 10 years we have played a FBS school? The experience and financial benefits far outweigh the risk of injuries. And if you so happen to upset a FBS school this will do wonders to your recruiting, marketing, etc.
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Post by aggiechamp on Dec 10, 2023 9:43:21 GMT -5
Here’s a basic rule of sport: “You play to win the game!” With guarantee games, you don’t. If you want our athletic teams to be major fundraisers for the university instead of vehicles in which we can compete and be victorious, let’s say so. But let’s stop pretending that we want winners.
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Post by planoaggie on Dec 10, 2023 10:16:31 GMT -5
Here’s a basic rule of sport: “You play to win the game!” With guarantee games, you don’t. If you want our athletic teams to be major fundraisers for the university instead of vehicles in which we can compete and be victorious, let’s say so. But let’s stop pretending that we want winners. I actually like your post, but A&T and others are clearly telling you and I that they are chasing those dollars as well while competing on the field or court. Coaches don't tell their players to go out and lose, but they do throw in the towel early if the game becomes out of reach and play their bench players. Take our last game of the season. Did Coach Brown think that we could win that game and told his players the same? When he inserted Hooker in the game in the 4th quarter do you believe Coach Brown thought we could win the game at that point? The answer is no, but that did not stop players from both teams in the game at that time from competing hard and the coaches from coaching those players so that they can develop and as you witness A&T did some good things. The same thing would happen if we played Georgia. We would play to win up to a point, unless an upset is in hand then we play to win to the end. 😁 Come on, we do this in basketball all the time. Did we not play University of South Carolina women's basketball team last year or 2 years ago? Football and baseball are no different. In football we just worry about injuries more and the upsets are few and far between.
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Post by aggiechamp on Dec 10, 2023 10:37:53 GMT -5
There’s physical injuries and there’s mental injuries. Basketball provides a perfect example of the latter. When we schedule 10 guarantee games during a season which we are almost certain to lose, when we do so you can’t tell me that our kids psyche are not affected. Think about it: in a 30 game season where you are almost guaranteed to lose 10 games, you have to win 16 of the remaining 20 games to finish with a winning record of 16/14. Winning breeds confidence, losing not so much. To me handicapping our kids with a losing record is just as serious as losing our point guard for the season in the first game. It’s also a price that is too high to pay simply to allow the university to prosper financially.
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Post by planoaggie on Dec 10, 2023 15:00:32 GMT -5
There’s physical injuries and there’s mental injuries. Basketball provides a perfect example of the latter. When we schedule 10 guarantee games during a season which we are almost certain to lose, when we do so you can’t tell me that our kids psyche are not affected. Think about it: in a 30 game season where you are almost guaranteed to lose 10 games, you have to win 16 of the remaining 20 games to finish with a winning record of 16/14. Winning breeds confidence, losing not so much. To me handicapping our kids with a losing record is just as serious as losing our point guard for the season in the first game. It’s also a price that is too high to pay simply to allow the university to prosper financially. Aggiechamp, I don't know whether you have kids that have played competitive sports or coached competitive sports, but playing against order kids or bigger kids have been ingrained in these kids since grade school. This is standard practice in competitive ball. They are not as fragile as you make them out to be mentally. I once played my BB team of 5th graders up 1 or 2 age groups an entire season. We did good but did not win a single tournament championship. At the end of season we played in the state of Texas national basketball tournament at our age group and we lost in the championship game to finish 2nd. I believe that the colleges saw that this was occurring so frequently at the youth level that they incorporated this strategy of playing tough OOC opponents into their college schedule to increase their success in achieving their true goal of winning a conference championship followed by national playoff bid and championship. The delay with implementing this at the college level was always finding good teams to play lesser teams because the big teams were worried about their strength of schedule and NCAA seeding. Well at the youth level you don't have to worry about that unless it is an invitation only tournament.
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Post by aggie2039 on Dec 10, 2023 22:15:13 GMT -5
State needs an early home game... 202408/31 - at Florida A&M 09/07 - at The Citadel 09/14 - at Georgia Southern 10/05 - at Tennessee Tech SCSU 202508/30 - Wofford 09/06 - Florida A&M 09/20 - at USF NC A&T 2024 as of 10 Dec08/31 - at Wake Forest 09/07 - Winston-Salem State 09/21 - at NC Central NC A&T 202509/13 - Furman 09/20 - NC Central
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Post by aggie2039 on Jan 7, 2024 11:12:50 GMT -5
Hearing 28 Sept we will be playing at SCSU
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Post by aggiegrad97 on Jan 7, 2024 14:15:34 GMT -5
Hearing 28 Sept we will be playing at SCSU The only other “classic” that really mattered to me leaving the MEAC. I was sick when I saw a Norfolk series as the consolation when leaving the conference 😂
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Post by aggie2039 on Jan 7, 2024 15:01:07 GMT -5
Hearing 28 Sept we will be playing at SCSU The only other “classic” that really mattered to me leaving the MEAC. I was sick when I saw a Norfolk series as the consolation when leaving the conference 😂 Personally, none of the meac games excite me. I do not get enjoyment out of playing and beating severely underfunded programs that play very basic and poorly executed brand of football.
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Post by Bornthrilla on Jan 7, 2024 15:19:34 GMT -5
You don’t like fellowshipping with other HBCU graduates. A lot of A&T fans do. We saw this at Norfolk this past season. That is a big reason why those historic rivalries are more well attended than our matchups against PWC opponents.
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