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Post by Bornthrilla on Feb 12, 2020 13:16:15 GMT -5
what i don't understand, is why folks are okay with partying with a pwc conference that never wanted us in the first place until they themselves were on "life support". far as i'm concerned, we're the biggest "suckas" on the face of the planet for falling for a "disingenuous, insincere, and selfish" offer from a pwc conference to join their league. they don't want us becaue they're interested in the mutual well being of us and their conference. they don't care whether we prosper or not, they only care that we're making their conference more stable for the long term and that we'll take their conference off of "life support" and that's all. i can just sense the "snickering" going on in the big south behind closed doors that a&t took their bait and fell for the "okie dope". meanwhile, we've left our fellow hbcu's to suffer a very uncertain future while we "cheese it up" with the snickering big south executives... Ouch. I hope you are wrong, but that is indeed a scary proposition.
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Post by DOOMS on Feb 12, 2020 14:16:08 GMT -5
That makes sense if you look at it as just a move to bolster athletics.
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Post by ALLnAggie on Feb 12, 2020 14:21:35 GMT -5
I like to think that we have administrators that are smart enough to trust but verify before making a move to the Big South. Maybe we are the ones pulling the oki-doke by paving the way for others to follow. You know how we like to move to a neighborhood and they move out and we are left with a better neighborhood than we were in before.
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Post by Bornthrilla on Feb 12, 2020 14:29:29 GMT -5
I like to think that we have administrators that are smart enough to trust but verify before making a move to the Big South. To be fair, our administrators reportedly voted against the Celebration Bowl concept when it was first presented ... and that turned out to be the best thing to happen to our athletic department in the past decade. So if we are keeping score, they did at least get that one decision wrong in the past.
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Post by A&T AGGIE 96 on Feb 12, 2020 14:37:50 GMT -5
I totally understand where you stand on the move and it isn't bad. Everyone has a right to their own opinion. I'm just trying to understand what is your selling point on staying in the MEAC from a perspective outside of just "kicking it with the bruhs at a handful of games" and homecoming for the rest our lives? Again the only thing the MEAC has done in the last 30 years is help create the Ultimate MEAC/SWAC bottom league bowl. You see the MEAC struggling and your Business Move response is to just stay the course and weather the storm until we're eventually disbanded anyway. As much as you're advocating for "black unity and no white mans ice" I hope you turned down every non minority company that came your way and only worked for Black Owned businesses while living in the same neighborhood you grew up in with a house the exact same size. If we fall flat on our face in the Big South we can always return back to what's left of the MEAC. I don't see what's the problem with atleast trying something new every 125 years. the problem is, we're currently the "flagship" institution of the meac. the problem is, the meac (our hbcu brother and sisters) can least afford the departure of its "flagship" institution at a time the league needs us the most. our departure is not akin to ssu leaving. ssu leaving the meac really didn't hurt the meac very much at all because ssu was nowhere near being the "flagship" institution of the meac. our departure is not akin to wssu leaving for the very same reason. wssu was nowhere near being the "flagship" institution of the meac, the league could easily recover from their departures. what i don't understand, is why folks can't see the "harm" we're bringing to institutions that we have a long historic history with in order to "save" the collapse of a pwc conference? what i don't understand, is why folks can't see that the big south will be largely "responsible" for destroying an hbcu conference by "poaching away" two of the meac's strongest athletic programs. what i don't understand, is why folks are okay with partying with a pwc conference that never wanted us in the first place until they themselves were on "life support". far as i'm concerned, we're the biggest "suckas" on the face of the planet for falling for a "disingenuous, insincere, and selfish" offer from a pwc conference to join their league. they don't want us becaue they're interested in the mutual well being of us and their conference. they don't care whether we prosper or not, they only care that we're making their conference more stable for the long term and that we'll take their conference off of "life support" and that's all. i can just sense the "snickering" going on in the big south behind closed doors that a&t took their bait and fell for the "okie dope". meanwhile, we've left our fellow hbcu's to suffer a very uncertain future while we "cheese it up" with the snickering big south executives... Oleschool you have made it very clear where you stand, and I get it....I'm lukewarm to the move myself. With that said you don't seem to hold the MEAC accountable for anything. Conference schools, A&T in particular are supposed to stay no matter what. I'm no MEAC conference insider, but I'm not aware of MEAC leadership offering any solutions to any of the issues A&T presented as reasons for leaving. Even thought those problems were well known for some time. We supposed to put the whole conference on our backs? I got no problems with helping out our sister HBCUs, but I don't think that's fair. A&T is not the cause...or the solution of some of the suffering of or fellow HBCUs. With all the problems BCU and SCSU are having I'm very surprised they haven't considered moving to D2. Maybe they have, I don't know. Delaware State has been rumored to have been exploring options for a long time and why not? They are the northern most school in a conference that stretches all the way to Florida. You can't tell me FAMU isn't looking around at other opportunities...even if it's jumping ship and going to the SWAC. Which wouldn't be much of an improvement from a travel perspective. If our HBCU leagues were actively trying to address these problems it would take a lot of pressure off our schools...but to expect schools...even the strongest of us to stay "just because" is wrong.
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Post by aggie2039 on Feb 12, 2020 14:48:35 GMT -5
Who in this group kids or grandkids attended or attends a PWI?
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Post by durhamgsoaggie on Feb 12, 2020 15:26:15 GMT -5
Who in this group kids or grandkids attended or attends a PWI?
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Maxell
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Post by Maxell on Feb 12, 2020 15:40:14 GMT -5
Who in this group kids or grandkids attended or attends a PWI? My older son went to A&T. My younger son went to a PWI closer to home. He was just too overwhelmed by GHOE having grown up in “suburban” schools.
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oleschoolaggie
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Post by oleschoolaggie on Feb 12, 2020 15:43:00 GMT -5
the problem is, we're currently the "flagship" institution of the meac. the problem is, the meac (our hbcu brother and sisters) can least afford the departure of its "flagship" institution at a time the league needs us the most. our departure is not akin to ssu leaving. ssu leaving the meac really didn't hurt the meac very much at all because ssu was nowhere near being the "flagship" institution of the meac. our departure is not akin to wssu leaving for the very same reason. wssu was nowhere near being the "flagship" institution of the meac, the league could easily recover from their departures. what i don't understand, is why folks can't see the "harm" we're bringing to institutions that we have a long historic history with in order to "save" the collapse of a pwc conference? what i don't understand, is why folks can't see that the big south will be largely "responsible" for destroying an hbcu conference by "poaching away" two of the meac's strongest athletic programs. what i don't understand, is why folks are okay with partying with a pwc conference that never wanted us in the first place until they themselves were on "life support". far as i'm concerned, we're the biggest "suckas" on the face of the planet for falling for a "disingenuous, insincere, and selfish" offer from a pwc conference to join their league. they don't want us becaue they're interested in the mutual well being of us and their conference. they don't care whether we prosper or not, they only care that we're making their conference more stable for the long term and that we'll take their conference off of "life support" and that's all. i can just sense the "snickering" going on in the big south behind closed doors that a&t took their bait and fell for the "okie dope". meanwhile, we've left our fellow hbcu's to suffer a very uncertain future while we "cheese it up" with the snickering big south executives... Oleschool you have made it very clear where you stand, and I get it....I'm lukewarm to the move myself. With that said you don't seem to hold the MEAC accountable for anything. Conference schools, A&T in particular are supposed to stay no matter what. I'm no MEAC conference insider, but I'm not aware of MEAC leadership offering any solutions to any of the issues A&T presented as reasons for leaving. Even thought those problems were well known for some time. We supposed to put the whole conference on our backs? I got no problems with helping out our sister HBCUs, but I don't think that's fair. A&T is not the cause...or the solution of some of the suffering of or fellow HBCUs. With all the problems BCU and SCSU are having I'm very surprised they haven't considered moving to D2. Maybe they have, I don't know. Delaware State has been rumored to have been exploring options for a long time and why not? They are the northern most school in a conference that stretches all the way to Florida. You can't tell me FAMU isn't looking around at other opportunities...even if it's jumping ship and going to the SWAC. Which wouldn't be much of an improvement from a travel perspective. If our HBCU leagues were actively trying to address these problems it would take a lot of pressure off our schools...but to expect schools...even the strongest of us to stay "just because" is wrong. help me to understand what these so called meac problems are and help me to understand why it is the meac's job to fix them? i think the meac has done quite well given our unique challenges. their strategy to add wssu and ssu didn't work, but that was because of those institutions' own lack of leadership. does the meac supposed take over those schools' leadership so that they could've stayed? i mean, help me to understand what these so called insurmountable meac problems are? and i'm not being sarcastic by asking that question because i literally don't know what they are. yes travel is a concern, but that's not easy to fix given the limitations of adding additional hbcu's such as d2 hbcu's. so how do you fix that? what else is so "insurmountable" that it forced us to leave? lack of streaming video services? really? lack of streaming video services "forced" us to leave? hail, it hasn't even been that long since we've "somewhat" fixed our very own streaming video services and its still not perfect by any means. i mean, please enlighten me to these "insurmountable" problems that has held us back? unlike (i assume) many other aggies, to me us being the largest hbcu in the country gives us an "unwritten" obligation to take on a "leadership" role relative to all hbcu's. i feel that howard university being perhaps the best known hbcu in country, also has an "unwritten" obligation to take on a "leadership" role relative to all hbcu's. again, i only speak for myself. but to me, large hbcu's such as us and howard university should take on a "big brother" role relative to the unique sisterhood and brotherhood that exists amongst all hbcu's. "to me", the last thing big brother should do is unforcibly contribute to (if not cause) the demise of an entire hbcu athletic conference. i do not concur that the meac nor any school in the meac is "holding us back", i just don't buy that notion whatsoever. i'd luv for anybody to explain to me how the meac or any member school in the meac is "holding us back" cuz i don't see how that's possible. again, i'm a loyalist by my very nature, i'm a "family" first kinda dude. and the way i was brought up and the values that were instilled in me were that once a family member, always a family member. and that big brother always looks out for little brothers and little sisters. not contribute to or cause them to breakup. but hey, that's just my values...
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Post by Aggie Monster on Feb 12, 2020 15:46:33 GMT -5
Would people be in this type of uproar if we made this move when were were like 0 and ten thousand in football? Would we have been the MEAC flagship then? Would we be exploiting or using our HBCUs then? Basketball was bad, football was bad. We were not the flagship anything except track was on the rise and maybe women bball.
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Post by durhamgsoaggie on Feb 12, 2020 16:09:07 GMT -5
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oleschoolaggie
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Post by oleschoolaggie on Feb 12, 2020 16:48:46 GMT -5
Would people be in this type of uproar if we made this move when were were like 0 and ten thousand in football? Would we have been the MEAC flagship then? Would we be exploiting or using our HBCUs then? Basketball was bad, football was bad. We were not the flagship anything except track was on the rise and maybe women bball. i didn't think it was a problem when morgan state, nccu, umes, and famu previously left because none of those departures jeopardized the future of the meac. nor did hampton leaving, wssu leaving, or ssu leaving. and no, i do not believe had we left while in the midst of our "worst days" as an athletic department that it would've caused the future of the meac (at that time) to be uncertain primarily because we weren't contributing "jack" to the meac at that time anyway, the application fee for d2 hbcu's was still very "affordable" which means other d2 hbcu's could've been invited to join the meac, and our attendance at the meac tournament was "minimal" due to our pathetic men's basketball team at that time. so to answer your question, had we left back then, no it would not have had the same devastating effect that it has now. but i still would not have advocated leaving the meac back then unless it was to drop back down to the ciaa because we were not competitive in any sports except wbb. and to be clear, i would not have advocated dropping down to d2 during our dire days...
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Post by Bornthrilla on Feb 13, 2020 8:52:40 GMT -5
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Post by durhamgsoaggie on Feb 13, 2020 10:07:34 GMT -5
Right now most people are trying to be optimistic, but what factors, if any, would make you eventually regret this decision? For me it would be if the MEAC is still around in 3 years and if another school is cashing a $800k Celebration Bowl check and getting national airtime on ABC. I am not really expecting any major revenue benefits from the Big South streaming contract, and I think the travel benefits are probably overstated as well, but I am under the curent impression that the MEAC is a sinking ship. If the MEAC somehow survives without us, however, I honestly think it would have been a mistake to leave. Time will tell ... Couple of items... 1. Our net revenue from each of the four Celebration Bowls has been around $500K each time. 2. I'm hearing that the estimated savings off of our travel budget ($1.4 million in 2018-19) is projected to be between 30-40% with the move to the Big South. If we split that and take the 35% number, that would be a $490K savings in travel that is all but guaranteed... compared to a Celebration Bowl windfall that is NOT guaranteed. 3. Our move trades off one POTENTIAL day of national airtime/exposure witht the MEAC and the CB for CONSISTENT increased regional airtime/exposure with the Big South and its ESPN+ sponsored Digital Sports Network. 4. I root for the MEAC to re-up for the CB and stay solvent. If we were to have gotten 3 of 6 CBs on the next contract, well that's a loss of $1.5 million net revenue for other MEAC schools. Now, another HBCU gets that $500K net revenue for those 3 years that needs it, while we're getting in the $500K neighborhood in travel savings ANNUALLY while discovering increases in other revenue streams. That's a win-win to me for us & the MEAC, IMO.
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Post by DOOMS on Feb 13, 2020 10:24:54 GMT -5
Would we be better situated to help the other MEAC schools by staying in the MEAC and saying "this is what we did" or leaving for a more viable conference with more viable schools, calling up our former MEAC brethren, and saying "this is what we did, this is what we're doing, and this is what we've learned from our new conference?" I for one don't think for one second just because we left the conference we'll stop communicating and sharing ideas.
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