Friday May 30, 2008
Friday E-Mail Bag
Friday E-Mail Bag
Each Friday I publish your comments and answer your questions. To submit a comment or questions please e-mail me at mickeyplyler@hotmail.com.
Mickey,
It will be quite interesting to see if 2009 is simply a carbon copy of the 2008 for the Clemson Baseball team. I am willing to give Jack Leggett one more year to turn things around, but two consecutive years of a losing conference record will not be acceptable for a baseball program that should not be struggling to bring in and retain great players. It certainly seems that other head baseball coaches have been able to weather similar storms caused by early departures and decisions to forgo college for the college baseball draft. I am keeping my fingers crossed for Coach Leggett!
Kirk
Kirk,
Please go look at other programs before making comments like this. Have you? I have and I find every major college power has had down years in the last ten or so seasons. It has happened at Miami. It has happened at LSU. It has happened at Southern Cal. It has happened at Arizona State. It has happened at Oklahoma State. It has happened at Texas. There is not a team out there that has not had some down seasons. I also believe the new scholarship rules and transfer rules will make it even more difficult to maintain top status every year.
Look, I am not happy about the baseball season but I understand what happened and I also understand the industry. Please go look at the traditional powers and look at their records over the last 10 years. I think you will be surprised to see it. The records are facts. Please educate yourself on the powers across college baseball and understand that no one is immune to down years.
I also think Clemson may not have a great season next year but I am encouraged about the long-term future because I think Jack's passion will help rebuild.
Hey Mickey,
Let me start by saying that I love your blog. I confess that I mostly read it during football season as that is my favorite sport. I live in Nashville, TN deep in SEC country. I, like most Clemson fans that live outside of S.C. Are probably in the same boat when it comes to being starved for Clemson news...i.e.) articles, talk shows, etc. even television exposure. Rest assured that in this area if Clemson isn't on a nationally televised game, we probably aren't going to get it. I know some people that got ESPN game plan last year just so they could watch the tigers and a lot of the games were blacked out in this area(even though they paid all that money). Do you think that in this modern day and age we will ever see a "Sports Team Package" where we could buy a season pass to watch all the Clemson games. I remember in the past when games weren't being televised at all, meaning, that the only filming going on was from the coaching staff to review the game later.
It seems that these days, every game is televised somewhere. Last year I watched the Clemson vs. Furman game from Poplar Bluff, MO...but I couldn't watch it in Nashville? That was probably the smallest caliber game on our schedule but it was still shown on TV. Now I would love to make it to every home game but that isn't possible. The Nashville Clemson club is awesome to watch games with, but there were times when 50 of us would show up at our favorite sports bar to watch our beloved tigers and the game would be blocked out.
The "Clemson Season Pass"(or whatever team you want) doesn't seem like it would be that hard to do, but I guess that I am asking far too much from college football to give it's fans what they want...huh...umm...a playoff. Thoughts?
Thanks
Michael
Michael thanks for the interesting e-mail. I am not sure why you would have been blacked out in Nashville for a Clemson event. The ESPN game package is a pretty good deal and I did not think there were any blackouts. I will check.
Your point about specializing packages is coming. They already do it in NASCAR and other sports are following the lead. I get the MLB package and only watch the Yankees but individual tam packages are coming. I think the PGA Tour will have special "Tiger-like" packages also.
The demand has to be their first and I think the demand for individual team packages will continue to grow. It will have to be out of market though and at this point the demand has not been high enough yet.
Mickey,
In your write up, you spoke of Ohio State and Texas, see below:
"Ohio State-The Horseshoe. Dotting the I. Scarlett and silver. The Buckeye stickers on the helmets. I would give Ohio State a better review if they did not use word THE in front of its name.
Texas-Bevo and Hook 'em Horns! I always thought Texas should do more with the Lone Star flag and play itself up more as the State university. They have so many schools in the huge state but they could separate even more with that idea in my opinion."
Would you suggest that the University of Texas should put a "THE" in front of their name to distinguish themselves as "THE State university"?
Just curious, thanks!
-Ian
Ian,
Nice! You got me there. Good point.
Mickey,
I was curious to see if you had heard any updates on how the Seat Equity Plan was going. Do you know how many season tickets were requested this year, and how much turnover IPTAY is now expecting from donors? I was just curious to see what type of effect it has had on season tickets so far (and selfishly I want to know if by "upping" from $350 to $700 with 14 priority points, if I would get any seats better than Top Deck North, Row Z).
Sorry to bother you, I understand completely if you don't get a chance to respond. I don't get a chance to listen to your show, but I read the blog daily. Thanks for all you do for Clemson, and keep up the great work!
Joe
Joe,
I talked to Billy D about it again yesterday and they are very encouraged about the plan. They are not ready to publically release all of the figures yet because they are still collecting the data and analyzing it. However, I can tell you that the retention rate is high and IPTAY numbers are very high. Billy D is coming on my radio show as soon as they are ready to release the data and I will write a blog summarizing the conversation then. Hopefully he will have some good news on your personal seating situation.
Mickey,
I usually don't follow college golf but Clemson's success in the NCAA tournament has me glued to the computer. It is normal to have such huge swings in scoring? BTW-I met Otisman a few months ago and now understand why he is so bitter at the world. Pip Squeak who is mad at the world. Thanks.
Curtis
College golf is fun to watch but it is an emotional roller coaster. You can't get too high or too low with your emotions because of the tremendous swings in scoring. However, the second round was a bit unusual. Tim Bourret called it perhaps the biggest comeback in Clemson golf history. My advice is to still watch the hole-by-hole but don't get too high or too low. If Clemson can get in contention on the back nine in the final round then get really excited. Remember that we are talking about 270-300 shots per round and there are a lot of chances for highs and lows.
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