is boycott all the games, root for the team to fail, hope that the loss of revenue puts the entire school in financial ruin, and watch the whole thing come tumbling down on top of the “3 stooges”………..that will teach’em. But then I will have to find a new school for my kids to go to, but at least we will have sweet justice……or, wait

was not a point by point rebuttal of your post. It was a “response” as the title suggests.

I don’t bring venom…only a different opinion.

THIS is a point by point rebuttal of your post.

I do believe that you DO IN FACT imply that the fans somehow elevate a team to the next level.

This implication comes from your entire post as written and read.

The title: Will Texas Tech football take the next step? asks a question.

The meat and bulk of the post suggests that fans somehow come together and bring the team to the next step.

The beginning of your post that I “convienently left out” only sets up where we are. It doesn’t begin to answer your question of “next step”.

You begin to answer your question with this statement:

So will the team answer our call? Will these recruits supplant their mediocre “Rivals Rating” and push the Masked Rider and his steed into BCS stadiums? The answer is NO. Atleast not alone. No, because this type of step is one of such huge proportion that it requires the heavy lifting of not just the team………but also of it’s fans. If any large contingent of it’s fans withholds it’s support, the entire machine fails. It’s a self fullfilling prophecy you see. “We think we are doomed, so we cannot support”. But without the support, we are doomed. Don’t believe me, let’s take a look at our competition:

You basically state that the team can’t do it without the fans.

Pulling a list of “elite” teams and finding one common denomintor only further states that fans are the root of the success of a college football program:

This list represents our competition for elite status. The unicorn that has alluded our program since it’s inception. Many of these schools have won mulitple NCs during this decade in spite of these coaching changes. One large common denominator among all of these schools is that through out it all, the fans endured, remained strong, and even grew their base of influence. Their stadiums are huge, many twice our size, with waiting lists for season tickets.

Foundational evidence for your argument.

Then you go on to some strange fantasy about how a stadium overflowing with fans will somehow show the boot to “the three stooges”?

We have a choice. We can rightfully withold our monetary support for this team and protest the corrupt leadership who has surely embarrassed our great alma mater……….or we can support our squad in 2011 with such zeal and fervor that the “stooges” can’t expand the stadium fast enough! We can bring about a level of fan support in 2011 the likes of which this school has never seen as we set records for attendance and noise! Let the “3 stooges” not be fired for the Leach debacle, but rather for incompetence due to underestimating capacity requirements at the Jones!

Basically has reader draw conclusion:

If you root for your team hard enough and we pull together enough fans then all will be right. All wrongs will be undone?

You listed “elite” teams and stated such:

I agree that it takes more than the fans, but how impressive is it to recruits the garbage that Farnco and others post all over the internet about the failure that TT will be now that Leach is gone, or how TT will destroy the team? They spout hate and anger, and I am with them on many counts, but the article I read by TTUMAR tells me to be as angry as I want to be, but dont lose focus! We are not crumbling as a football program, but we will if we dont find a better way to make our protest heard! I love my university, and I love this football team and I will support it inspite of all of the people involved in this horrible situation that resulted in Leach getting canned! I will remind all of you that Leach was not totaly blameless here, but it is done and we have a season coming up that still has a chance to be great! Franco has no idea how it will turn out or what will happen with TT and his new coaches or the team! I dont either! But I agree with TTUMAR that if we choose to implode, we will! If what we want is death and destruction as our only method of protest, then that is what we will get! If that happens, then will we blame people like Franco, as much as we will blame the “three stooges”?

In the meantime I am not on a side, except the teams side.

I love me some Leach. Lost Leach, waiting to see if I love me some Tubs, but always love the team and will do all I can to see them succeed.

I had a nice little co-ed from the College of Arts and Sciences call me the other night asking for a $750 donation. I told her I couldn’t because of my DEEP dissatisfaction with the Admin. Without missing a beat, she immediately said she understood, like she had heard that response at least 50 times before talking to me. Of course she tried and tried and when I told her I couldn’t in good conscious give her a nickel, she finally gave up and thanked me for my time.

I didn’t feel so good about myself or my loyalty to my school as I sat back down on the couch and replayed that conversation in my mind. I kept trying to remind myself that I was in fact expressing my loyalty by doing the necessary thing to help push the status quo at the top out the door. But am I? And if I am, how long will this take? Alumni support equals cash equals improved facilities equals better recruits equals better teams equals more wins equals happier alumni equals more cash and so the cycle perpetuates.

But by simply withholding financial support, it could take years for the effects to be appreciated to the degree where somebody said this Admin needs to swept.

So how do we get our voices heard? Just like in politics, there is usually an outcry regarding this or that, akin to Leach’s firing. The higher-ups lay low for awhile, they wag the dog, things blow over and it’s back to business as usual. Protest emails are deleted, mail is trashed and phones ring on in perpetuity.

But what about a Statewide, or Nationwide, petition program? Surely readers of this site represent several states. What if some of our legal-eagle brothers in here draft some type of petition calling for the resignation or firing or Tech’s administration for reasons X, Y and Z or there will be consequences, monetarily speaking. We divvy up the work, stand out in front of Kroger, Buffalo Wild Wings (you get the idea) for a Saturday or two and get thousands of signatures. Have this delivered personally by an “established” alum to a BOR meeting or whomever and make sure that we are heard and that we are not going away. We could have people, out in Tech attire, in Dallas, Ft. Worth, Houston, Lubbock, Austin; hit all the metro areas not to mention other states. It would’t be that hard and wouldn’t take much of our time. We could create a volunteer list with email and phone contacts, arrange the dates to get it done and go from there.

I don’t know. It seems to me if we continue to hold out on monies to the school, we are all going pay ten fold in the long run. Petitions can carry thousands of voices to the ears that matter. Whatever the outcome of such a measure, we would know that we did something that didn’t detract from the quality of Texas Tech University and our Athletics Program.

OK, there’s one idea.

That’s been my point all along.

It’s the fans who get screwed the most.

We want to support our team AND we want to do what is right (to us).

Not only did I post a month ago that the “3 stooges” should be canned for their role in not protecting our brand, I re-posted the same information in the very post Damien is responding to. I have been consistent in two line of reason. First, Leach’s firing was a disaster that should result in the firing of the admin, and despite the disaster we should focus on hope for the future of the program.

You see when you participate in a blog, it always helps to READ the post of others, rather than just waiting for your turn to talk. Not only are you a troll, you are ineffective, uninteresting, and inaccurate. Feel free to hang on to your hate and lack of hope, human history has always been kind to that ideology (sarcasm font). And of course misery loves company. As for me and mine, I choose to look forward to continuing the West Texas tradition that has made our school great and strive for hope alongside my strive for honor.

Wreck’em

It seems you are not a troll after all. In my defense, when I saw that you had just joined, and were complaining about a coach who has yet to play a game as a Red Raider…….it was a logical conclusion.