PlummMeanGreen

Earl?

This picture below points out one of those tough pictures, BV. Not saying we come anywhere close to duplicating them, but the school off Mockingbird Lane, University Park, Texas, has set the new standard in the AAC as far as the NCAA Facility Arms Race is concerned & that’s whether that end zone facility gets them in a P5 conference or not. No matter what, they did make Wren Baker’s job much, much tougher. My bet is that WB won’t shy down to the challenge.

Tom Osborne taking Big Red out of the Big 8 (later Big 12) was where their problems began.

Whoops! Did I hit a nerve? (Was it the Beep! Beep! part)? How many schools have you seen pass ours the last half century, Joe? I’ll help you count. If you are that bored—then read it again, Joe. The video was all Richard Pennington’s & his deal on the HOF! That far back I probably thought NTSU-Teachers was located in Denison as it was. After all, you Dentonites sorta’ kept it all close knit that far back as well, don’t you think? Still, all the College FB HOF hype for Abner should have come from your favorite town & its (almost not quite yet) adopted university. I was a middle school student near H-Town back then when you & Bahnsen could have been co-leading the HOF hype parade on behalf of a very deserving Abner Haynes. I’m sure Dr. J.C. Matthews would have opened up all the NTS alumnus coffers of that era to finance such a campaign since he was known for that kind of thing, right? (Uh, not).

Don’t they have to post the job opening 30 days before they can officially hire?

Jack, this guy Richard Pennington started hype’ing Abner Haynes for the College Football Hall of Fame many years ago. Have you ever met him? I have not. Denton & UNT should have done this decades ago, but as you know we don’t do many things with warp speed up there. (Maybe that one reason we are seeing one particular bird go Beep! Beep! past our Eagle)? 👍👍I admire you, Jack, for being a steadfast Mean Green fan during all these years as you near your 9’th decade. As one of our fellow alums formerly of the Golden Triangle of Beaumont/Orange/Port Arthur once posted: “UNT is just not the easiest football program to follow.” As I once heard Ron Shanklin call Abner: “Happy Birthday, Father Time!” https://youtu.be/dWQNKMyWpJg

Sounds like he went to the “Chuck Curtis School of TX HS Transferring From 1 School District To Coach Traylor’s School District.” 😳🙂 Oh well… (Whatever It Takes$)?😇 •••Chuck Curtis was an assistant coach at SMU under Hayden Fry. Also during that era as SMU assistant coaches were Andy Everest (an ex UNT assistant coach & UNT AD) plus ex Houston Oiler Coach Bum Phillips. What a cast! The late Chuck Curtis was also a member of the Parker County Sheriff Possee here in Weatherford. As I recall he wore his cowboy hat on the sidelines when he was head football coach at UT-Arlington. He was turning that program around & then they abruptly dropped football. GMG!

7 years on staff & being under .500 would be enough for a change at 99.9% of schools that have the kind of ambition UTSA, App.St., Marshall U., Coastal Carolina, Arkansas St. & South Alabama seem to have. They have all beaten P5 schools in the last 2 or 3 years. 👀 Look! From all I hear Seth Littrell is truly a stand up guy & I believe if he moves on he will continue coaching at a FBS level & probably as a coordinator but FWIW…UNT has not worked out for many my last 50 years as a devout Mean Green fan. We really need to start being a successful coaching destination point for somebody &…..I believe most of us think it can be. I think we have the right President, BOR’s & AD to make that happen. I honestly don’t think Wren Baker is appreciated like I think he will be sooner than later. 🎶 Now turn to your hymnals to page… GMG! Note: Did one of you take this photo? It’s great! Looks like Oahu’s North Beach with a huge wave fixin’ to roll in with a white cap already forming.

“IF” THERE ‘s GOING TO BE A CHANGE… A few schools of thought on early or a delayed termination (with quotes) _________________ “If something needs to be done eventually, it must be done immediately.” (One P5 AD ‘s quote). “We didn’t used to fire coaches until after the season!” barks one athletic director who wished to remain anonymous. “When you’re thinking about firing your coach and you see five guys already having fired their coach, it makes your decision easier. In the old days, people would hang on and on to coaches.” ________________ “There is a correlation between investment and patience, says one recently retired AD. Of course, sometimes it’s just time for a change.” __________________ “For us, it was the culmination of a year-and-a-half evaluation,” says Jared Benko, athletic director at Georgia Southern. “We weren’t on the trajectory we needed to be.” _____________________ Quotes from a 2021 SI article. https://www.si.com/college/2021/10/27/college-football-midseason-coach-firings-search?amp_bc=1*1vyd2vw*amp_cid*T0NfTHVHbFE1eDcxVDh3VWRDSmd2WW9DRVlyYlhsMGFBVWlMdE44bVBUU3I2QWpCcjI2SVlUTDFvTXp1VnIwTA..

Some on GMG never said no to body bag games. Don’t we have a Covid make-up game with TAMU due? UL-Monroe lost to the Crimson Tide last Saturday & their Coach Bowden said: “Alabama just bought us a weight room.” Did anyone see App. States end zone facility in their “Hail Mary “ game vs. Troy U? GMG!

A little shocked that Kansas beat the Coogs in Houston yesterday. One Coog on GMG is already wanting UNT to hire UH’s HFC.😆 Just not a good time to be a P5 or G5 HFC (other than the money).

I’m impressed with all the talent evaluators in most all of the future AAC schools. We need to start doing the same pretty soon. Yesterday, we let a 2&10 team from last year run up 600 yards on us. I heard from a fairly reliable source that “the twins” were happy at UNT until they saw last February’s recruiting list & then how they thought we didn’t look like we cared. ** Probably that we didn’t add a couple of tall interior DL recruits was at the top of their list? Looking at the portal transfer list may have added to their reasoning? I was hoping my generation didn’t have to go thru another one of this that we’re going thru now. Hopes dashed. GMG!

I thought it was final before it was final.

I’m at a bar & misread it. I thought it said “Final.” Thanks for the correction.

Y’all may think I’ve been drinking too many margaritas, but I give UTSA a decent chance at DKR Memorial tonight.

No. After 7 years of (now) under .500 cumulative wins. It’s just time to shake hands & part ways. Right now we go into the AAC in the middle of the pack at best. Hell’s bells! Future conference-mate Temple U. almost beat Rutgers today.

Everyone except us are pulling these kind of close games against “somebodies”—except us. 🤢

We all mostly speculate what’s going on in the minds of our UNT athletic personnel & community. For instance, soon after SL turned down a Big 12 job to stay in Denton I noticed a marked change in his attitude, his sideline demeanor (or countenance) & that looking like he knew he had made a mistake by not taking the Big 12 job. I know I mentioned this to 1 or 2 of you 3 years ago. Then Dr. SoothSayer here started to believe SL went into a funk (or depression) that not even the building of the 3’rd largest Indoor Practice Facility in Texas could get him out of. I was thinking all the time: Please! Not this now when conferences & the NCAA were fixen’ to go thru changes & our having a consistent winning football program would be vital, but then I thought—“WTH! This is North Texas—why the hell expect any different?” Our timing has rarely been perfect, but good timing is now way over-due up there. I’m 71. That’s all I’m going to say other than how did 71 get here so damn fast? GMG!

Probably this? UNT has to do similar in the south Apogee end zone soon & very soon. Anyone got $40 million for Wren Baker?

This can be a brutal forum on various themes, but one only has to look back thru the years to see the gauntlet Mean Green faithful fans have had to run. Our HS coaches preferred the bull ring over a straight line gauntlet. “CIRCLE UP, BOYS!” 😳 Pleasant memories, eh? GMG

And I think SMU will kick TCU all the way into next week, too. It will be close but the Ponies will win the highly coveted Iron Skillet. Winning does have its perks.🙂

Yes, the SBC is for now, but like another poster said & I liberally paraphrase: “In this era of NIL & transfer portals such continuity among schools in the G5 may not be possible.” I would add conferences to the above, too. GMG!

I hope they win & get ranked. Wouldn’t we rather go to the AlamoDome playing a ranked UTSA than not? The RR’s were ranked #22 when we beat them in the rain last November at fabulous Apogee Stadium. NCAA college football is so weird. I remember Fry’s 1975 team that opened with the OSU Cowboys. They kicked the Mean Green’s butts 61-7. It felt like the SMU game of a few weeks ago but—later that season we beat the UH Coogs 28-0 & then the SEC’s Tennessee Vols 21-14 in what is still arguably our greatest win ever. (North Texas was the talk of that winter’s NCAA convention). The UT Vols were not chopped liver, either. They finished with a 6 & 5 record & would have been a bowl team in todays NCAA. After that 1975 season, the Vols Bill Battle got fired; he left coaching; he got a loan from Bear Bryant & started College Licensing, Inc. & (as they say)—the rest is history. Talk about turning 🍋’s into 🍋-ade! GMG!

JUST RAMBLING, MAN… I don’t think Gary Patterson would leave Austin & 6’th Street music row for Denton. TCU paid him well & gave him a nice retirement. Don’t think he needs the headaches of a G5 program during this NIL era. He was publicly unhappy with NIL even when he was at TCU. What he did at TCU was admirable. Gosh! Looking back did any of you ever go to a TCU game at Amon Carter Stadium in the 1960’s & 1970’s? Without visiting SWC fans that stadium would have been near empty at many games. They solved that problem by connecting to Fort Worth. Remember “TCU: Your Home Team” bumper stickers ? TCU’s endowment coffers & UT’s retiring DeLoss Dodds (who sponsored TCU) bought them a Big 12 membership. SMU will probably one day do the same for some P5 conference. Big money & being active in the athletic venues Arms War really does big things for a school in the NCAA. Gary Patterson created a sad ending for his career at TCU & is a big reason you never put a statue up for a coach still on your payroll. GMG!

Well….Louisville, Memphis, Tulsa, Cincinnati, Houston (in the mid 50’s), Boise St. & the 1976 Fla. St. (of Fouts Field snow game fame) all who at one time were either in the same conference (or competitive level) as UNT. Nevertheless, they all moved up while we stayed the same; that is we mostly floundered then sank down to D1-AA in 1980; then we joined the Sun Belt—then we left the Sun Belt which became stronger soon after; then we advanced(?) to CUSA from what to me was a surprisingly emerging Sun Belt. Then the new CUSA we joined became SBC 2.0—that is; the SBC without all their recent Top 25 wins. All this keystone comedy conference-jumping while our favorite school just kept on doing things the same in 2 universities town Denton, Texas. Now we hold our respective breaths on what happens with the future American Athletic Conference. NIL will dig in & change G5 conferences forever. A fiction novelist could never have made any of this up. 🏳🏳🏳🏳 🏳? So time to wave the white flags? Hell no! UNT, UNT DFW Alums, Denton & Denton County growth will never allow any white flags. I do think we have good leadership. UNT basketball is in the best shape its ever been. Once football follows suit it will be a New Day in Denton. Just time to dig in & make sensible changes while setting a path of consistent winning like few of us Older Nestor’s have ever seen in Denton. 🚨 •••Right now we’re on a projectory to where our all time football W/L record is in jeopardy & will no longer be over .500 with wins-–& that my fine feathered friends will not be a happy day for the Mean Green Nation. The present projectory must be stopped cold in its tracks. Hopefully our football future will soon be seeing that sleeping giant every UNT HFC in my lifetime has said we were to-—wake up. GMG