ESPN: Big Ten must tackle new scheduling; Maturi has no strong alignment preference

Donate To GopherHole

Maximus said:
Why did the Gophers build TCF Bank Stadium?

Why did the Gophers pay big money for coordinators in 2007?

Why is there new turf in the indoor facility?

Why is Brew using a helicopter to travel 10 miles?

Why are the coaches flying all over the country at a greater rate than the previous regime?

Why did the coaches visit every high school in the state?

Imagine if the AD wanted them to succeed.
Click to expand...

I won't go as far as to say Maturi's got no motivation to see the program succeed, but many of those bulletpoints are a direct result of Brewster budgeting for things other than his own salary.
He took less to hire better coordinators in 07, he budgeted for the helicoptor and coaches flying all over, and for the coaches to visit every school in MN. He may have even budgeted the indoor facility upgrades, probably not on than one though.
 

Maximus said:
Why did the Gophers build TCF Bank Stadium?

Why did the Gophers pay big money for coordinators in 2007?

Why is there new turf in the indoor facility?

Why is Brew using a helicopter to travel 10 miles?

Why are the coaches flying all over the country at a greater rate than the previous regime?

Why did the coaches visit every high school in the state?

Imagine if the AD wanted them to succeed.
Click to expand...

On point #1, the which credit goes as much or more to Glen Mason, President Bruinicks, the Pohlad's, etc. as it dos to Maturi. The other items are mainly things Brewster has wanted and Maturi managed to get out of the way of. I guess for him that his an accomplishment.
 

I'm not saying that I believe that Maturi is trying to submarine the program at all. I was just letting some things rattle around in my tiny little brain and my original post in this thread was an attempt to convey that.

Think of it this way:

Think of the U as an employer and every department as an employee.

Let's say that football is the equivalent to your top sales person. But that sales person is not paid on commission, or it is a very small part of his/her package (hehe...package).

If that employees' pay package is relatively static, and they can still go out and budget to fly first class, and conduct business as they always have, what is their motivation to increase sales? It is clearly diminished.

Now...the big failing in my post is that I have no recommendations for the football department on what to do to ensure that they will be competing for B10 titles, etc. I don't know what separates the haves from the have-nots. It is entirely possible that they are on the right path with the changes to facility and staff in the past few years to get us to the promised land. It just appears, to me at least, that Maturi sees that as a tertiary objective to the overall health of the Athletic Department. I would be happy to be proven wrong. In this time between the U sports that I follow closely, I just wanted to throw something out there for discussion, rather than rehash what I think the ideal conference divisions would look like. East/West by the way...end of discussion.
 

streetfighter said:
Uhhh, no. What would make you think the Twin Cities (3.5 million residents) would generate twice the revenue of Iowa (3 million residents) and Wisconsin (5.65 million residents) combined?
Click to expand...

My argument is that the UofM sits directly in the middle of a 20 mile radius of 3.5 million people whereas Wisconsin sits within a 200 mile radius of 3.5 million people. Which of those is more lucrative to the Big Ten now and in 30 years?
 


Unregistered User said:
I'm not saying that I believe that Maturi is trying to submarine the program at all. I was just letting some things rattle around in my tiny little brain and my original post in this thread was an attempt to convey that.

Think of it this way:

Think of the U as an employer and every department as an employee.

Let's say that football is the equivalent to your top sales person. But that sales person is not paid on commission, or it is a very small part of his/her package (hehe...package).

If that employees' pay package is relatively static, and they can still go out and budget to fly first class, and conduct business as they always have, what is their motivation to increase sales? It is clearly diminished.

Now...the big failing in my post is that I have no recommendations for the football department on what to do to ensure that they will be competing for B10 titles, etc. I don't know what separates the haves from the have-nots. It is entirely possible that they are on the right path with the changes to facility and staff in the past few years to get us to the promised land. It just appears, to me at least, that Maturi sees that as a tertiary objective to the overall health of the Athletic Department. I would be happy to be proven wrong. In this time between the U sports that I follow closely, I just wanted to throw something out there for discussion, rather than rehash what I think the ideal conference divisions would look like. East/West by the way...end of discussion.
Click to expand...

I can't go so far as to say Maturi doesn't care. But he clearly views the volleyball team team making the Final Four as equal to the football team making say the Outback Bowl, or the basketball team making the Sweet 16. He thinks they are equal accomplishments and is just as happy with one as the other. Similarly, John Anderson's contract extension is just as important as Tubby's. So Tubby has to wait 8-9 months for it to get done. And the baseball stadium is equal to the practice facilty and since they asked first, they get funding priority. In his world these things are equal. In the world of 99% of Gopher fans, they are not.
 

GoGophers2005 said:
My argument is that the UofM sits directly in the middle of a 20 mile radius of 3.5 million people whereas Wisconsin sits within a 200 mile radius of 3.5 million people. Which of those is more lucrative to the Big Ten now and in 30 years?
Click to expand...

The one that will give them the most subscribers. At between 70 and 80 cents per subscriber in the 8 Big Ten states and 10 or 11 cents elsewhere there is a big premium paid.

The question is how many households in Minnesota subscribe? If it's based on Cable penetration not as many as elsewhere.

Going back to the original premise Minnesota, Indiana, NW, Illinois, Purdue, Iowa and probably Michigan State are "along for the ride" when in comes to decisions on alignment. Barry Alvarez is always quoted about expansion so maybe Wisconsin is a player. Or maybe, as is more likely NO AD is being courted or listened to. At least that's what the ADs always say.

Who knows. The only real point of the thread is people don't like Maturi. Not novel or new but always good for a lot of posts.
 

Maturi should wake up - we don't want to be in the EAST. East-West along obvious lines makes the most sense - teams rise and fall. Iowa or Wisconsin could fade in the future, though not Nebraska, which will probably thump us every year.
 

GoGophers2005 said:
My argument is that the UofM sits directly in the middle of a 20 mile radius of 3.5 million people whereas Wisconsin sits within a 200 mile radius of 3.5 million people. Which of those is more lucrative to the Big Ten now and in 30 years?
Click to expand...

The 3.5 million figure is for the over-sized CSA that includes places as far away as St. Cloud, so it's way more sprawling than that.
 



Hopefully Maturi has the stones to advocate for the U of M.

Things he needs to do:
1) Get Minnesota in the best situation to win
2) Create games Minnesota fans would enjoy

The teams he should be pushing for in the MN division, in order (based on the two criteria equally)....
1) Wisconsin
2) Iowa
3) Indiana
4) Illinois
5) Northwestern
6) Purdue
7) Michigan State
8) Michigan
9) Nebraska
10)Penn State
11) Ohio State

If he cannot get 4 of the top 7 he should resign.
 

Rosemountian said:
Hopefully Maturi has the stones to advocate for the U of M.

Things he needs to do:
1) Get Minnesota in the best situation to win
2) Create games Minnesota fans would enjoy

The teams he should be pushing for in the MN division, in order (based on the two criteria equally)....
1) Wisconsin
2) Iowa
3) Indiana
4) Illinois
5) Northwestern
6) Purdue
7) Michigan State
8) Michigan
9) Nebraska
10)Penn State
11) Ohio State

If he cannot get 4 of the top 7 he should resign.
Click to expand...

Am I the only person who's upset that we're probably going to be seeing a lot less of Michigan? I know it's not much of a rivalry from their perspective, but I've always circled those games as special, both for the Little Brown Jug (the oldest rivalry trophy in America) and because of the 2003 game (which is probably the most intense game of anything I've ever seen, and the most upset I've ever been about the result of a sporting event.)
 

RedPoo said:
Am I the only person who's upset that we're probably going to be seeing a lot less of Michigan? I know it's not much of a rivalry from their perspective, but I've always circled those games as special, both for the Little Brown Jug (the oldest rivalry trophy in America) and because of the 2003 game (which is probably the most intense game of anything I've ever seen, and the most upset I've ever been about the result of a sporting event.)
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm not sure many people would be upset to not have to play a Michigan team that the Gophers have only beaten 3 times in the last 42 years...
 

streetfighter said:
Yeah, I'm not sure many people would be upset to not have to play a Michigan team that the Gophers have only beaten 3 times in the last 42 years...
Click to expand...

If we want to stick with teams we regularly beat, we should probably consider leaving the Big 10.
 



streetfighter said:
Yeah, I'm not sure many people would be upset to not have to play a Michigan team that the Gophers have only beaten 3 times in the last 42 years...
Click to expand...

Michigan doesn't consider it a rivalry at all. It is historic, sure, but it will still be historic meeting twice every four years.
Ranking the gophers rivalries:

Wisconsin
Iowa

(Huge Gap)

Michigan

Michigan is much closer to the rest than Iowa WI in terms of how intense the rivalry is
 

Perhaps some day in the future, the Gophers will meet Michigan for the Little Brown Jug in the conference championship game. Get on that rebuilding, Brew.
 

13 Lined Ground Squirrel said:
Perhaps some day in the future, the Gophers will meet Michigan for the Little Brown Jug in the conference championship game. Get on that rebuilding, Brew.
Click to expand...

I never even thought of that, how does THAT work?

Let's say we don't play Michigan or Penn State during the regular season if they're in the other division, and then we play them in the Championship, I assume the trophy is off the table since there's a different trophy at stake?
 

Nope, all the trophies are at stake. If we are playing Michigan in the championship game, we're playing for one trophy which the Big Ten is handing out, and another one that our opponent hands out.

So, in the event that this matchup takes place, we grab the jug from Michigan (or... vice versa), but wait until the officials give out the other one. The Jug is a prize, the Big Ten championship trophy is an award.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom