Johnny Ford points out the elephant in the room.

[SpeedyBull]

While in the area, I always went to home games win, lose, even flat out pathetic offense and painful seasons. That said I think to energize the fan base, it is not just a key win, or the # of wins, but how we play. Last few years were painful to watch because we knew even while winning we were playing poorly. I am excited with our new OC and I hope he can bring the excitement to the field this year. I would rather see us play good football against good teams and lose than play okay football against ****** teams and win. 

[Fold FB Invest in BB]

A defense that can make plays like the one in 2007 puts butts in seats. Nobody likes to watch their team give up 300 yards on the ground to Tulane. That was frustrating to watch and I would have rather done so from home.

[Fold FB Invest in BB]

To put it another way, show me effort and I will support the team, win or lose. At times last year, it was apparent that some had stopped trying.

[Bausfkid]

Great question Johnny. Because USF and the city of Tampa does not support sports.  Further, there will never be an OCS without support first.  

Go Bulls!

[usfbullrider]

The product has become inconsistent and downright boring at times as even former players have mentioned on Twitter.  That's the main problem and it has been eating away at the fanbase since Holtz last year.  Like someone said take a business class or two Johnny.

[BDYZR]

Same old story as 100 other threads with the same old excuses.

[E.T.]

10 hours ago, Jonesy Bull said:

....

At least Kelly is setting us up for great OOC schedules.

Our fan base is pushing us to a 6 game Home schedule.

[Triple B]

32 minutes ago, Bausfkid said:

Great question Johnny. Because USF and the city of Tampa does not support sports.  Further, there will never be an OCS without support first.  

Go Bulls!

Totally agree with it being a great question but no need to bring Tampa into this in regards to supporting “sports” because that’s not supportable. This is a reflection on the USF “fan” base/alumni. The flimsy attendance excuse about winning looks hollow when you check the several year run leading up to the crash last year. Our attendance woes are tied to who/where we play, ie puc’s beloved AAC. Not enough people have enough love for USF football to overcome that at this point. 

Johnny may need business classes, but he also needs psychology classes. 

[BullyPulpit]

The program has about 20,000 die-hard fans that will be there through thick and thin. The real issue is growing that fan base beyond that number. It is difficult. In a way, the Big East was a blessing and a curse, as it spoiled a lot of us with big time, big name football on a weekly basis. The AAC conference slate just doesn't deliver that level of energy or excitement aside from 1 or 2 games per season. While we were in the Big East it was like the SEC says, it just meant more. Couple that with the abysmal showing from 2011 to 2014 and it was a recipe for disaster. USF football stumbled while the conference that brought us 50,000 fans per game was crumbling. We now have a VPofA in Kelly who gets it and has us on track to regain the casual fan and hopefully make life-long fans out of the students that are attending the games. 

[puc86]

Including students we probably have 30k fans, we also have around 20k people that may show up based on circumstances and we have perhaps another 10k fans of other teams in the area or that will travel here if their team is playing. It’s always beyond annoying that our fans get chastened for attendance when they keep showing up in spite of the fact our program has given them every reason not to and yet it’s their fault that they can’t be more people. USF needs to make more fans and that’s not the fault of the consumer that’s the fault of the product. If we don’t like people not showing up we should try doing things to win over the potential consumers and winning big games is probably not the worst way to try to go about doing that. We could also play in a better conference, play better out of conference teams, win more games, play more interesting of a playbook, have an atmosphere that doesn’t pride itself on being boringly sterile, not play weekdays, not play in thousand degree heat, offer extra entertainment options or perhaps even engage potential consumers instead of blaming the only people stupid enough to continue to support what has been a terrible waste of their entertainment dollars and time for the better part of a decade.