WoolyBully

Maybe. But given the residual animosity some have towards the last time taxpayers had to chose to fund a stadium, maybe the enthusiasm for moving a baseball team thirty miles to an already NFL, NHL, and NCAA city was somewhat more tepid than was publicly let on. Kind of like put up an obligatory minimum effort just to say "Ok, yeah - we participated but, oh well...".

- Conference realignment is - first and foremost - about the football bidness. Plain and simple. Touting academic excellence is a fig-leaf, so the process doesn't look so much like the bottom-line business it really is. Who-plays-who on Saturday is what pays the bills. I could trot out that tired old adage about filling the stadium to watch a kid do a chemistry experiment, but I won't. Any university has a lot of moving parts, and at times, those parts seem to be working against one another. It's an interesting observation as to where schools fall academically within conferences, but I don't think athletic conferences really consider that when it comes to expansion. Lemme ask you: if another part of the equation was cutting schools that don't perform heavy lifting and contributing to the bottom line, you think their academic prowess (AAU inclusion) would be enough to save them? I'm dropping Best & Brightest University because of their perennial losing record and bringing in Middle o'the Road University because they have a better football program that does generate eyes on screen (which is what advertisers want)? Which is more important - not in the grand philosophical sense of what a university is - but in the bottom-line business?

That seems reasonable. Texas and A&M are the big draws, much like FSU & Florida are in Tampa. Although USF is in Tampa, I suspect that a poll of the bay area populous would show more interest in Gainesville & Tally-hassle, as we see with local media coverage. Serve your market's interest.

I've got a team of analysts working on this very product as we speak. In order to drum up interest in attending games, I'm considering a means of replacing these Morgan & Morgan billboards with this info. I'll get back to you with the details.

Poking the ESPN estimator tool, some of U of SF's odds-to-win numbers have gone up: ...the highlighted cells are the ones over 50%, but Rice & Uconn are not difficult reaches (as of 12:19 a.m. 9/18/23).

'Cause that's how upsets work!

The online copy would not be discounted. That's the direction the organization is headed - 100% online. As soon as feasible, the paper rendition - which only gets published on Wednesday and Sunday - will be discontinued. But I wouldn't bet on the 'transportation fee" dollar value disappearing! OK, you no longer have to pay $50 admin fee for your ticket, but the base price of a ticket is going to increase $50. See! It all works out!

Yes, because when you've had four abysmal losing seasons, pulling the upset - after losing to G5 Western Kentucky - might not necessarily be the "finally arrived" marker. The news is P(x), everybody else - get in line. Tomorrow, 'Bama QB consternation will be the topic on the airwaves / podcasts, not USF's field goal.

Pretty sure the agreement is (a) fully digital or (b) digital with physical on Wednesday & Friday. There are different e-versions depending on market (e.g., Pasco, Hernando, etc.). And there is different content between the digital and print editions, with much more content online.

It would have been clipped and shoved into WB's "interesting USF stuff" box in the hall closet.

I'd say that's accurate. Although the IPF & OCS are huge on Fowler Avenue, the big story - the HUGE GIANT STORY - is (a) how close the game was because of (b) the QB situation at Bama. Power conference football versus infrastructure development at a G5. It's not a commercial opportunity, it's a game.

Front Page of the sports EXTRA section, below the fold: "There are no moral victories" pretty good coverage of the game. What are you looking for, front page eight-column piece with multiple photos of a 17-3 loss? The local team lost - DID NOT BEAT, DID NOT UPSET - a ranked opponent at home. Maybe some color shots of the volume of crimson shirts in the stands would have added some perspective, but if you're looking for coverage, it's there. If you're looking for cheerleading - it's here. Lots of college coverage.

This wasn't the arse waxing that it was expected to be, so hopefully it fuels the effort going forward. A win would have been over-the-top-fantastic, but this was, as much as a loss is palatable, not crippling.

Yep, this is long overdue.

I'm putting both of you in for an award right now! You've earned it. Yeah, ******** about a conference we've never ever won and our abysmal record as of late are not selling points. Un uh. I do snicker when I roll across a suggestion to jettison the 'dead weight, crappy schools' in our conference, because I find it hard to believe there ain't one dammned mirror in the whole building! If we go back to '79 and look at all of the teams now playing FBS, who were not around prior to that year, we see a list of: UCF, UAB, USF, FAU, FIU, UTSA & CHARLOTTE (as well as Georgia State, Old Dominion, and Coastal Carolina, but that's beside the point). If we omit UCF, four of those other five teams are now conference mates of ours. Interesting, huh?! Do we have JV practice on Monday? No, boyz, I'm afraid we are required to spend considerably MORE time in the gym - working on that upper body development - before the girls at that table by the window cast a glance in our direction. Dats just the way life be!

Well, if I were playing with real money, I'd bet on being in the AAC for more than a "few" years (how is 'few' defined? Is it three years? Five?). Our old drinkin' buddies in Orlando are the youngest (measured history of playing football) FBS team, having started in '79, a full eighteen years before USF began playing. So, assuming a measure of historical precedent, USF making it to 'the bigs' anytime soon (similarly defined as "few") would be miraculous. And I don't put much stock in miracles.

My old compañeros at Nielsen actually do measure screens (phone, mobile, streaming, cable, etc.) per household. These were huge hurdles for Nielsen to latch onto. When I worked there - along with our good friend @MaltLiquorBull - the big project was tallying eyeballs on 'time shifted viewing' where a program is viewed outside of the broadcast window (DVRing, video recording, etc.) The old days of ma and pa and Junior and Susie sitting in front of the tee-vee watching a program is way in the rear-view mirror. So, some of the demographic measurements might not be that accurate, but at least you can count active devices and eyeballs. In other Nielsen news, after losing its accreditation, the ever-coveted status has been reinstated in 2023 for national audiences. This was always the argument with cable companies, do we really need the demographics or just headcount? Fun exercise: figure out the age demographic for advertisers with commercials during your television viewing. Do you fit that demographic? Just asking ...

Today must be some sort of holiday or something. In my travels about the grater Tampa metropolitan region, I'm seeing a lot of 'bama attire...much greater quantity than normal. I find it offensive.

Let us remember, that someone's stated position may be what is released for public consumption and not necessarily the full-disclosure truth. It might sound better - moral high ground, righteous indignation, swimming downstream or whatever. The reasons stated are the official position and that's all we'd have to go on. All that being said, I can understand taking a more transactional position as the years go by: is this still enjoyable? What's going to happen with the new digs (since nothing is etched in stone at this point) based on my assessment that ticket expense will increase in dollar value with no guarantee of a related increase in the 'experience'. If I were a gamblin' man, which I am, I'd bet that the OCS revenue model is going to be such that a lot of people who have, for years, enjoyed the benefits of being 'grandfathered in' will now have to have the big discussion. And along with that comes the confession. Did I drop the tix because of increased cost, or did I drop tix because of my feelings about the program? There is no polygraph attached to the board, and spin, in the best of times and the worst of times, is our friend. Cynical ole Mister Robinson thinks that people are a bit more transactional than they like to let on. Not everyone, but a large chunk of the population.

I don't think it's unreasonable to expect some drop in attendance from current season ticket holders once the OCS is up and running. Anytime there is a change in the pricing model, the hard decision gets made. Do I value the experience enough to part with $X? Have I capitalized on being grandfathered in at $x? Do I really want to attend games without club access and seats for the experience of a concourse and benches? At the same time, however, I think the new stadium will generate sufficient interest to sell enough season tickets to offset the drop. It's new, it's on campus (which might not be a strong selling point to absolutely everyone), and people want to be a part of that, even if it is AAC football. I think the stadium will be more of a draw for future generations of Bulls fans than might be the case with those who have become comfortably numb with an NFL venue. Out with the old, in with the new.

And how do I get off this Title IX hook if I split from the NCAA to become a football-unto-itself entity? Safe to assume that our new, non-P(x) status means we are exempt from such things, correct? Is it the steerage class that will now be picking up the Title IX responsibilities?

They're in the basement.

Yes, if U of SF wins, I fully expect every 'Bama fan in the stadium to storm the field and strike their players and coaches repeatedly about the head and shoulders with blunt instruments.

This one is similar, but uses EST: https://fbschedules.com/college-football-tv-schedule/