Game Day

NT80 · July 9, 2007

In all fairness NT80, you, me, and the rest of the ppl on here are not your typical fans and we couldn't fill 1% of the stadium if we could all show up. If we even brought 4 friends, a liberal # would be 1.5%. So while I admire your faithfulness there are 25,000 other seats to try to attract people to. I come to watch the games as well, but your Freshmen-Seniors and even some alumni come for an experience. And, how that gets displayed is whether people will come again or not and support.
I think establishing traditions is far from 'gimmicks'. You would not call the ATM yell practice, or the war eagle hey, or the War chant, a gimmick.
Traditions are not going to get started with 50 ppl holding up the eagle claw or yelling stuff. It's going to have to be an organized attempt. Hence, my suggestion of writing stuff on towels and giving them away. Everyone loves free stuff.
And the stuff about bouncing in the stands in anticipation for the drive. You're right it might be a little loud for our QB to read their rush defense. Give me a break! We better just wisper during our drives too so not to distract our players. BTW you will also see that no where in that post did I make mention of creating a ton of noise for our drives. So you say doesn't DUKE do this. Doesn't UT have a cannon and light their tower too? Almost all of our 'traditions' are done by other schools and they most asuredly did them before we did.

I think you greatly misunderstand. You can't attract those "other" 25,000 people to Fouts on the basis of a car giveaway or a new chant, it's the game they must want to come see, not all the other fluff. Everything you want to propose IS a gimmick. Get over it.

Daddy Dumpsalot · July 9, 2007

I think you greatly misunderstand. You can't attract those "other" 25,000 people to Fouts on the basis of a car giveaway or a new chant, it's the game they must want to come see, not all the other fluff. Everything you want to propose IS a gimmick. Get over it.

I never said giving away a car will get ppl here, infact I said quite the opposite. What will get ppl in a game if you will read my posts...please...is a great gameday experience (recognizable opponents, wins, traditions). I think you should go to ATM and call their traditions Fluff, you would have a lot of friends there. EVERYTHING that I propose is nothing different than what we do now, just built upon it. Is what we do now a gimmick? Why dont you read what chomp has to say Here.

I love you guys!

Daddy Dumpsalot · July 9, 2007

I like that, its cute, almost poetic. I bet you have heard that a few times huh tasty.

I still love you!

For you!

NT80 · July 9, 2007

I never said giving away a car will get ppl here, infact I said quite the opposite. What will get ppl in a game if you will read my posts...please...is a great gameday experience (recognizable opponents, wins, traditions). I think you should go to ATM and call their traditions Fluff, you would have a lot of friends there. EVERYTHING that I propose is nothing different than what we do now, just built upon it. Is what we do now a gimmick? Why dont you read what chomp has to say Here.
I love you guys!

It is Fluff. I went with some friends to an ATM game once, vs. Alabama. I didn't go to sing war hymns or see boys wave swords, I went to see two good college football teams play. All the other stuff is part of the atmosphere for some, but NOT the main reason they go, it's THE GAME!

Quoner · July 9, 2007

It is Fluff. I went with some friends to an ATM game once, vs. Alabama. I didn't go to sing war hymns or see boys wave swords, I went to see two good college football teams play. All the other stuff is part of the atmosphere for some, but NOT the main reason they go, it's THE GAME!

You know who gets to games early at A&M to see the band?

Girls.

untgirl04 · July 10, 2007

In all fairness NT80, you, me, and the rest of the ppl on here are not your typical fans and we couldn't fill 1% of the stadium if we could all show up. If we even brought 4 friends, a liberal # would be 1.5%. So while I admire your faithfulness there are 25,000 other seats to try to attract people to. I come to watch the games as well, but your Freshmen-Seniors and even some alumni come for an experience. And, how that gets displayed is whether people will come again or not and support.
I think establishing traditions is far from 'gimmicks'. You would not call the ATM yell practice, or the war eagle hey, or the War chant, a gimmick.
Traditions are not going to get started with 50 ppl holding up the eagle claw or yelling stuff. It's going to have to be an organized attempt. Hence, my suggestion of writing stuff on towels and giving them away. Everyone loves free stuff.
And the stuff about bouncing in the stands in anticipation for the drive. You're right it might be a little loud for our QB to read their rush defense. Give me a break! We better just wisper during our drives too so not to distract our players. BTW you will also see that no where in that post did I make mention of creating a ton of noise for our drives. So you say doesn't DUKE do this. Doesn't UT have a cannon and light their tower too? Almost all of our 'traditions' are done by other schools and they most asuredly did them before we did.

I think you're underestimating the number of Mean Green faithful. There are plenty of very active fans who don't read this board daily. For instance, our gameday tailgate has typically 15-20 regulars, and only about 3 of them (myself included) actually post on this board. From my experiences with getting fans to games, what really brings them in is the before-game experience, which is where we can all have an impact. Food is typically the quickest way to garner interest, and many members of this board have been feeding students for years. The second thing is general friendliness. We've had many opposing fans come up to us during the tailgating and compliment us on such a nice atmosphere. It stands to reason that if a school gets a reputation outside of the city that it's a great place to spend a few hours on the weekends, that reputation will grow within the city as well.

I doubt anyone here is saying that the traditions you listed above are gimmicks. But many of your suggestions were. A gimmick is something done once to get people in the door. It's not a "tradition" to aution off free tuition or books or something to students at the end of each quarter (this may have been someone else's idea). If the school did that, half the student body would attend classes for free (yes, that's an exaggeration, but you see my point...). It's not a "tradition" to yell when we're driving inside the 15 because, as has been pointed out several times, the offense needs to hear the snap counts...unless you'd like it to be a tradition that we always have 3 false starts and a bad route every time we're in the red zone.

And actually, the Athletic department did print stuff on towels and hand them out. In 2002 when Brandon Kennedy was up for a couple of awards, they printed "Booger" towels. I still carry mine to every game, but the idea never really stuck.

And actually, traditions can get started when 50 people (or less) do something. The First Down chant that you hate so much is an example of that. I agree that organized attempts are best, but even if it's just everyone on GMG getting together, we can still get things started. In fact, Rick, I think it would be a great idea for us all to start using your chant for the kickoffs. We've got some fans on the students side, and even more on the alumni side. It'll be harder to coordinate, but usually, if some people start yelling something, lots of other people join in just to fit in. Finally, it doesn't matter whether or not another school has a tradition we share. Those traditions didn't happen because someone started griping about how their school needed a new tradition, but rather someone in the heat of the moment took some action.

Quoner · July 10, 2007

It's not a "tradition" to yell when we're driving inside the 15 because, as has been pointed out several times, the offense needs to hear the snap counts...unless you'd like it to be a tradition that we always have 3 false starts and a bad route every time we're in the red zone.

Great post - but are you sure that last part isn't already a tradition? It seems so...familiar.