All things football...

[IndyTreeFan]

A few stream of consciousness thoughts. Please feel free to comment...

Our new helmets sure look nice. Hope the uni's are similarly good looking. Can the uniforms make a difference in winning attitude?

I don't know much about what was going on in football, other than waaaaaaay too much losing, but does it seem to anyone else that the "inmates were running the asylum" for the last 10 years or so?

Keep those ears peeled for big donors who might like to have a football stadium named after them. Remember, Don Gongaware gave $6 million to ISU because he was impressed with the Insurance program - he isn't an alum, and before moving to Indiana, he never had anything to do with ISU. Think outside the box, and if you know of someone who might be a "target," email Ron Prettyman.

I love the change in the program that we've seen since Trent Miles was hired as our coach. A lot of kids were told not to come back (is he a blood sucking pig, too?) and a lot didn't want to put out the effort required to be a championship caliber program. The whole thing has a new look and feel to it. I can't believe it, but I'm excited about football.

Does anyone else think we might win a National Championship with Trent Miles at the helm? He's certainly running the program with that kind of attitude.

How many wins do you expect this year? I'm hoping for three. That would be SEMO, and two upsets. As with basketball, I'll be happy if I can see we're improving each week. A couple of November wins would be a nice springboard into the 2009 season.

Let's hope we can see some improvement in fan attendance this year. Obviously we're not going to get 15,000 out to see a team that has won once in the past three years, but maybe some more students could show up and actually cheer for OUR team. Maybe we could get the "Hooters Girls" halftime show to get some of our red-blooded American boys to come to the game...:bigsmile:

Well, that's all I've got right now. Feel free to flame, or discuss, or whatever...

GO TREES!

 

[TLS49]

Miles has made a few good moves, yes, but many moves are iffy.

The moves I have a problem with are kicking off players for tiny mistakes, and in some cases, kicking kids off for making decisions that involve issues far more important than football.

We'll see how the fall goes. Looking at what he has done this offseason I would not be surprised to see 15-18 of his freshman playing immediately, ready or not.

 

[bent20]

Not sure what issues you're referring to, but I'm fine with him kicking kids off the team simply because they aren't talented enough to be playing at this level. If athletic scholarships are the equivalent of paying players as so many love to claim, then a kid should lose it for failing miserably. Just because there is a new coach and it's the off season let's not forget just how awful ISU has been for three years now. Blame West if you want, I certainly do, but I hope Miles cleans house and brings in some talent. He has a different system anyway and can't be expected to win with players who couldn't even handle West's system properly.

 

[TJames]

same rules for all

if a kid fails academically, the school boots him or her. if a kid fails athletically, they usually quit, transfer or are booted off the team. if a kid does things, such as criminal activity, he or she are kicked out of school. the same goes for athletes.

just like schools as a whole aren't required to keep kids around who dont follow the rules, coaches have the same leeway.

if a new boss comes into a company, he is free to fire/hire anybody they want in order to improve the organization.

students and student/athletes aren't like college faculty members. they don't get tenure (you know what tenure is, don't you? the right to stay as long as they please even if they are terrible instructors).

it's too bad that faculty members aren't held under the same pressure or the same standards to produce college graduates as coaches are. i once had an english instructor at isu tell our class that he didn't care if we attended or not and that he got paid either way. now that's a good motivational technique.

 

[TLS49]

I understand that people will get on me for feeling the way I do about about removing players, and not even I am totally against it. I am against how swiftly it was done.

How many players were removed? More than 20. The fact is that some were removed just because.

Not because they were bad in school.

Not because they were bad players.

Not because they were in trouble.

Just because.

What do you think that does to the kids left? Makes them feel good? Hell no. It creates a poison. Simply put, Miles was making room for "his" kids. Only explanation there is for it. But the coaches aren't around the kids all the time, and kids talk. Opinions of coaches are based on coach's actions only until July 31. Then the older players are who the younger players take after.

As I've said before, this fall is all but written off due to the severity of the off-season moves. Very rarely do you find freshman who will be all-gateway caliber performers right out of the gate, nevermind the 10-20 we will need to be competitive this year.

He should have given a lot of the older players an entire year to prove themselves...not winter workouts and 1 spring ball.

Mock me if you wish.

 

[TJames]

not meant to mock

tls....i didnt intend to mock you or any other person who has made their opinions known on this website...if that's the way you perceived my comments, then i apologize.....

i was just trying to make a point. college coaches removing players from rosters happens all over the country, at all levels of competition and in all sports. especially when a new head coach comes in (just take a look at what tom crean is doing with the iu men's basketball program).

now from what i understand, the primary reason that many of the players were not asked back was due to either academics or the failure to fully comply with team rules. either players were not going to be academically eligible in the fall or they did not attend the team's off-season conditioning program when they were supposed to be there.

many of the players under the old regime basically had a free rein to come and go to off-season drills as they pleased. football players on the collegiate level should know never to schedule classes in the fall and spring in the afternoons, due to practice schedules.

unfortunately, a group of players did that this past spring. isu then proceeded to have early morning practices, so that those kids could still go to their classes. but they were also told not to schedule any classes beginning with the fall semester in the afternoons, usually after 1 p.m.

from talking to people associated with the program (not coaches), most of the players bought in to what coach raetz tried to instill last fall during his interim stay as head coach. and, again, most have bought in to the similar type things that coach miles is attempting to install.

but there are always going to be those players who liked the way the previous coaching staff did things and rebel. of course, as we all know, the previous coaching staff didn't win very many games doing it their way.

some people, though, are just resistant to any kind of change. they would much rather keep doing things the way that they have been doing them rather than play in a potential winning program.

as a famous coach once said, you can't make chicken salad out of chicken s---, well you get the point. nobody said that all the kids not asked back were bad people. but you either have to buy in to what the new coaching staff is implementing or you need to do something else.

oh, and one other thing, collegiate scholarships are NOT for four years. Scholarships are renewed each year. And it's up to the coaching staff to determine who gets a scholarship and who doesn't. if a player doesn't measure up athletically, academically, socially, then chances are they won't be asked back.

coach miles gave those kids a chance during the spring semester. but it was up to them to prove to him and the rest of the coaching staff that they belonged and should stay with the program. those that did are most likely still there. those that didn't probably didn't get asked back.

they had the opportunity to stay, but they didn't take full advantage of it. i know coach miles very well. he's a good man. i have known trent since he was a ballboy for the ISU football program during games back in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

he knows what it's like to be down the pecking order in terms of playing time. but he also knows that if you work hard, both on and off the playing field, you'll have a chance to play at some point. that's what happened to him at ISU. and those are the kind of kids that appeal to him as a coach -- hard workers who get the most out of their opportunities and takes full advantage of their chances when (and if) they come.

 

[TLS49]

You make a good point. I didn't think about the scheduling conflicts, when I heard they were going in the early morning I thought it was some pointless showing of authority...I remember Coach West allowing players to show up to practice an hour late if they had class. Definitely not how it would be done at Ohio State, USC, or wherever.

Hell, for all I know he got wind of the poisonous people in the locker room and those were the guys who were eliminated just "because". I suppose thats a better reason to eliminate someone than academics and performance combined.