Johnny Ford points out the elephant in the room.

[SilverBull]

9 minutes ago, NewEnglandBull said:

The sad part is that many of our alumni are doing that lame ass gator chomp or the annoying war chant instead of following USF. I will never ever have respect for those people. Any USF alumnus who supports another university...I wish them nothing but total damnation. 

There is some of that to be sure but our bigger problem is the non-alumni local fans who could support USF as the hometown team but don't elect to because of our relative lack of history, prominence, recent performance or whatever reason.   There are even lots like me who graduated from USF and at least one of those other schools you mentioned and can pick and choose their allegiance.  For me, the answer has always been simple: Buy Bulls' season tickets, show up and yell my head off for the home team.

[jchem1995]

Keep healthy and keep running. Win baby, win. Um  six straight losses can be a factor. Just saying.

[jchem1995]

24 minutes ago, SilverBull said:

There is some of that to be sure but our bigger problem is the non-alumni local fans who could support USF as the hometown team but don't elect to because of our relative lack of history, prominence, recent performance or whatever reason.   There are even lots like me who graduated from USF and at least one of those other schools you mentioned and can pick and choose their allegiance.  For me, the answer has always been simple: Buy Bulls' season tickets, show up and yell my head off for the home team.

Yep.

[puc86]

18 minutes ago, SilverBull said:

There is some of that to be sure but our bigger problem is the non-alumni local fans who could support USF as the hometown team but don't elect to because of our relative lack of history, prominence, recent performance or whatever reason.   There are even lots like me who graduated from USF and at least one of those other schools you mentioned and can pick and choose their allegiance.  For me, the answer has always been simple: Buy Bulls' season tickets, show up and yell my head off for the home team.

I think it’s a bit much to expect alumni of another university to spurn their allegiances and embrace a team simply because they live in a city. Our best chance at getting someone to attend would be a direct relationship such as graduating or attending USF, a secondary relationship such as having a child attend the university, third best would be a casual sports fan that lives in the area and I would assume the worst possible fools gold would be engaged sports fans or alumni of another team that happened to live in the city of Tampa. I could live in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium and the only reason I would step out into the stands if USF wasn’t playing there would be to tell them to try to keep down the noise.

[NewEnglandBull]

2 minutes ago, puc86 said:

I think it’s a bit much to expect alumni of another university to spurn their allegiances and embrace a team simply because they live in a city. Our best chance at getting someone to attend would be a direct relationship such as graduating or attending USF, a secondary relationship such as having a child attend the university, third best would be a casual sports fan that lives in the area and I would assume the worst possible fools gold would be engaged sports fans or alumni of another team that happened to live in the city of Tampa. I could live in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium and the only reason I would step out into the stands if USF wasn’t playing there would be to tell them to try to keep down the noise.

Or to take a poop...

[puc86]

2 minutes ago, NewEnglandBull said:

Or to take a poop...

They don’t need my help to fill the stadium with ****

[NewEnglandBull]

At the end of the day I have no problem at all with Johnny speaking up. It’s on his mind so it must be on the minds of other players too. I don’t think there is any meanness in his statement, simply a wish for more support. True it does come with wins but there is something about loyalty that is missing from USF. 

[puc86]

8 minutes ago, NewEnglandBull said:

At the end of the day I have no problem at all with Johnny speaking up. It’s on his mind so it must be on the minds of other players too. I don’t think there is any meanness in his statement, simply a wish for more support. True it does come with wins but there is something about loyalty that is missing from USF. 

Probably mostly history and stability. Surely there has to be an example out there of a die hard loyal fanbase that has less than a generation of fan growth and in attempting to establish a base has been in constant flux of leadership as well as standing. Take Alabama, take away generations of success and growth, add in a bad conference and flux and you are left with UAB and back and forth decision on shuttering the program. If you want a loyal fanbase you have to sustain something and not simply demand it because you randomly decided 51 years after you opened the institution that the time for a program was now and that means every person in the community has to fill your 70k person stadium regardless of what you choose to provide them with.

[Bulls On Parade]

35 minutes ago, jchem1995 said:

Keep healthy and keep running. Win baby, win. Um  six straight losses can be a factor. Just saying.

2018 had a nice bump in attendance compared to 2017. 

So if with Wisconsin and a good showing vs Gtech and BYU maybe we can continue to grow attendance some.

[NewEnglandBull]

11 minutes ago, puc86 said:

Probably mostly history and stability. Surely there has to be an example out there of a die hard loyal fanbase that has less than a generation of fan growth and in attempting to establish a base has been in constant flux of leadership as well as standing. Take Alabama, take away generations of success and growth, add in a bad conference and flux and you are left with UAB and back and forth decision on shuttering the program. If you want a loyal fanbase you have to sustain something and not simply demand it because you randomly decided 51 years after you opened the institution that the time for a program was now and that means every person in the community has to fill your 70k person stadium regardless of what you choose to provide them with.

Interesting that UAB had great support last year...maybe the trick is to remove the program for three years to let people not take anything for granted. That being said I don't think Johnny is being demanding here but is simply making an observation. In terms of filling a 70K stadium, I don't think anyone is looking to that as it would require consistent wins among other thing. But to get at lest 25k (actual) to a game shows, in my opinion, that many USF grads and fans have little to no loyalty. Thus, loyalty goes beyond wins and losses...it is supporting the alma mater because it is the alma mater. I know this is very idealistic but I am getting older and see things that way.