For the record, we didn't lose to a cusa cellar dwellar. Our losses were to the cusa champ (UCF) and the team that just beat nationally ranked Boise State in the Hawaii bowl (ECU).

the other Greg Childers Wrote:Why are people hesitant to take an honest look at the program?

Who is not honest? Some think Tommy West is fully capable of leading the program to its potential. Some don't. Months ago, it was discussed. Nothing has changed along that time. You fire the coach...............done that many times before. You upgrade facilities, budgets, etc...................not done that so much. Why not do that? You have tried the other.

It makes no sense to fire the coach when the underlying program is not changed.

All the stuff you posted above just shows that we had two poor seasons. This year was not as bad as the last one. No one is overjoyed about 7-6. You cannot seem to grasp that so why would anyone want to bother with you?

I can guarantee you that the people in charge are 1) pleased we went to a bowl this year; 2) anxious to see additional improvement. I can live with that.

Your only action related to this program is to sit in judgment from a keyboard. You do not go to games. You do not provide any support for fundraising or to the booster groups. That is fine. But don't expect those that do to say "Thank you. You are bringing us to a new realization of what the Utopia should be".

You upgrade the program's infrastructure and then we can talk coaches. Until then, you look like an ass when you start 17 threads wanting the coach fired.

georgiatiger Wrote:

TigerBill Wrote:

Chi-Town Wrote:

the other Greg Childers Wrote:missjtiger, RandyMc, UMTigerfan, tigerjeb, TigerBill......would you like to contribute to the honest, intelligent debate?

I told you to add me to your list.

When is someone intelligent coming by this thread to discuss this with us?

Be very careful. Ve haff you on our leest.

No, vait. Ve DON'T haff you on our leest. Vy do you vant to be on our leest? That is very suspcious. Be careful, or ve PUT you on our leest.

That was pretty funny, for you.

And that's rare praise coming from you.

I am one of those who think that TW is a solid game day coach - we don't turn the ball over too much, we seem to have pretty solid effort for virtually all of our games, we have experienced very little in the way of off-the-field issues.

That said, it seems fairly clear to me that our talent level has been declining versus other C-USA teams - especially UCF and ECU. And, our talent level has been declining versus our PAST (especially on the defensive side of the ball).

To this day, I believe the JLD hiring was an outright disaster. His failure to recruit really came to the fore this year and probably next year as well. Fichtner was a very good recruiter on the offensive side of the ball and whoever was responsible for defensive recruiting (which by default should be TW) has not kept up, to put it mildly.

The 'lack of commitment' argument simply doesn't hold water when TW is 0-4 versus the Sunbelt in the last two years and the fact that we got crushed so convincingly against ECU and UCF. We have a very sophisticated football market here in Memphis and they know when the product ain't so hot...and we have seen a decline in ticket sales as a result.

If next year we go 7-6 and end up in Mobile...I will go to keep my bowl streak intact. However, another 7-6 record will most likely result in very poor attendance again. TW ain't going anywhere this off-season, but he should be, in my opinion, be able to at least win the DIVISION title in either of the next two years or else I think it may be time to look in a new direction. In other words, if TW has not won the division title in 9 years (he's been here 7 years already), then I think it's time to look elsewhere.

RandyMc Wrote:

the other Greg Childers Wrote:Why are people hesitant to take an honest look at the program?

Who is not honest? Some think Tommy West is fully capable of leading the program to its potential. Some don't. Months ago, it was discussed. Nothing has changed along that time. You fire the coach...............done that many times before. You upgrade facilities, budgets, etc...................not done that so much. Why not do that? You have tried the other.

It makes no sense to fire the coach when the underlying program is not changed.

All the stuff you posted above just shows that we had two poor seasons. This year was not as bad as the last one. No one is overjoyed about 7-6. You cannot seem to grasp that so why would anyone want to bother with you?

I can guarantee you that the people in charge are 1) pleased we went to a bowl this year; 2) anxious to see additional improvement. I can live with that.

Your only action related to this program is to sit in judgment from a keyboard. You do not go to games. You do not provide any support for fundraising or to the booster groups. That is fine. But don't expect those that do to say "Thank you. You are bringing us to a new realization of what the Utopia should be".

You upgrade the program's infrastructure and then we can talk coaches. Until then, you like an ass and when you start 17 threads wanting the coach fired.

Be careful or you'll be on the list.

Wait, you're already on the list. Okay, be careful or you will be OFF the list. But if the list has a limited membership that would open up a spot for Chi-Town, so maybe he's actually trying to get you thrown off the list so he can take your place.

So much intrigue around here.

ddramone Wrote:I am one of those who think that TW is a solid game day coach - we don't turn the ball over too much, we seem to have pretty solid effort for virtually all of our games, we have experienced very little in the way of off-the-field issues.

That said, it seems fairly clear to me that our talent level has been declining versus other C-USA teams - especially UCF and ECU. And, our talent level has been declining versus our PAST (especially on the defensive side of the ball).

To this day, I believe the JLD hiring was an outright disaster. His failure to recruit really came to the fore this year and probably next year as well. Fichtner was a very good recruiter on the offensive side of the ball and whoever was responsible for defensive recruiting (which by default should be TW) has not kept up, to put it mildly.

The 'lack of commitment' argument simply doesn't hold water when TW is 0-4 versus the Sunbelt in the last two years and the fact that we got crushed so convincingly against ECU and UCF. We have a very sophisticated football market here in Memphis and they know when the product ain't so hot...and we have seen a decline in ticket sales as a result.

If next year we go 7-6 and end up in Mobile...I will go to keep my bowl streak intact. However, another 7-6 record will most likely result in very poor attendance again. TW ain't going anywhere this off-season, but he should be, in my opinion, be able to at least win the DIVISION title in either of the next two years or else I think it may be time to look in a new direction. In other words, if TW has not won the division title in 9 years (he's been here 7 years already), then I think it's time to look elsewhere.

Pretty fair summation.

ddramone Wrote:I am one of those who think that TW is a solid game day coach - we don't turn the ball over too much, we seem to have pretty solid effort for virtually all of our games, we have experienced very little in the way of off-the-field issues.

That said, it seems fairly clear to me that our talent level has been declining versus other C-USA teams - especially UCF and ECU. And, our talent level has been declining versus our PAST (especially on the defensive side of the ball).

To this day, I believe the JLD hiring was an outright disaster. His failure to recruit really came to the fore this year and probably next year as well. Fichtner was a very good recruiter on the offensive side of the ball and whoever was responsible for defensive recruiting (which by default should be TW) has not kept up, to put it mildly.

The 'lack of commitment' argument simply doesn't hold water when TW is 0-4 versus the Sunbelt in the last two years and the fact that we got crushed so convincingly against ECU and UCF. We have a very sophisticated football market here in Memphis and they know when the product ain't so hot...and we have seen a decline in ticket sales as a result.

If next year we go 7-6 and end up in Mobile...I will go to keep my bowl streak intact. However, another 7-6 record will most likely result in very poor attendance again. TW ain't going anywhere this off-season, but he should be, in my opinion, be able to at least win the DIVISION title in either of the next two years or else I think it may be time to look in a new direction. In other words, if TW has not won the division title in 9 years (he's been here 7 years already), then I think it's time to look elsewhere.

I think we have talent at least as good as all of the teams in the conference on offense, better than most. Defense, nowhere close. This must be addressed, and we need a QB to step up next year. We don't have one coming back with any proven experience. This is the second time in four years we've had that problem. Really three years since our record was so bad in 06. Time for some continuity at that position. And we need a gamebreaker running back, so Pitts or Barnes are going to have to step up or someone better should be coming in that can play. Doss played with a lot of heart, but he never busted one.

Arkelon Hall is either a jcuo QB or a new dorm, I get confused.

I say give Tommy next year to do better against our out of conference schedule, and compete for the CUSA East championship. It was a freak of nature that we finished in the conference like we did, but played so poorly out of conference. Got to do better and got to get to the Liberty Bowl, if not, the #2 CUSA bowl spot in 08.

If none of that happens next year, then 09 Tommy is on notice and RC needs to start on his short list.

salukiblue Wrote:For the record, we didn't lose to a cusa cellar dwellar. Our losses were to the cusa champ (UCF) and the team that just beat nationally ranked Boise State in the Hawaii bowl (ECU).

We also lost to 3-9 Mississippi, 5-7 ASU, 5-7 MTSU, and 8-5 FAU.

The difference between this year's schedule and last year's is the difference in our record.

Last year our OOC games:

Mississippi
UT-Chattanooga
Tennessee
ASU

This year we played

Mississippi
Jacksonville State
MTSU
ASU

We went 1-3 both times, even though this year we had an easier OOC schedule.

Our conference schedule last year compared to this year was the same, except we exchanged Tulsa, Houston, and UTEP for SMU, Rice, and Tulane. The three teams from last year went a combined 21-16 this year, while our three new opponents went a combined 8-28. Our conference schedule got SIGNIFICANTLY easier.

RandyMc Wrote:

the other Greg Childers Wrote:Why are people hesitant to take an honest look at the program?

Who is not honest? Some think Tommy West is fully capable of leading the program to its potential. Some don't. Months ago, it was discussed. Nothing has changed along that time. You fire the coach...............done that many times before. You upgrade facilities, budgets, etc...................not done that so much. Why not do that? You have tried the other.

It makes no sense to fire the coach when the underlying program is not changed.

All the stuff you posted above just shows that we had two poor seasons. This year was not as bad as the last one. No one is overjoyed about 7-6. You cannot seem to grasp that so why would anyone want to bother with you?

I can guarantee you that the people in charge are 1) pleased we went to a bowl this year; 2) anxious to see additional improvement. I can live with that.

Your only action related to this program is to sit in judgment from a keyboard. You do not go to games. You do not provide any support for fundraising or to the booster groups. That is fine. But don't expect those that do to say "Thank you. You are bringing us to a new realization of what the Utopia should be".

You upgrade the program's infrastructure and then we can talk coaches. Until then, you look like an ass when you start 17 threads wanting the coach fired.

If facilities are the difference between a good program and a bad one, why have we lost four consecutive games to Sun Belt teams with worse facilities than we have?

Hold on--TOGC asked to discuss football in an intelligent manner and take a critical look at the state of the program, and ya'll are clowning him? I asked him, and others time and time again to talk about the footall season when it was over.

You know one the difference between Memphs and some big time programs? They dicuss their programs year round--not onl that-we want it moved off the main board? calm down. The man asked for an intelligent conversation--- no one is forcing you to enter the talk.

Yes, I will defend TW. Your strength of schedule arguement doesn't hold water. With the exception of the non conf schedule--we have no control over how strong the other teams are. The sos is subjective for one, and in addition, more a reflection the teams in the conf are getting worse.

The defense has gotten worse,and I can in no way defend that. TW has stated that the defense we had was not good enough to win championships, and that he had to start over. I am not blaming JLD,but if you follow the program closely, you know that JLD an "bubba" were awful, awful recruiters. We are paying the price for that now. I will say the time for that excuse has passed, and I don't wanna hear it anymore and I won't go there again. Is Kravitz the answer? Dunno. If I am in charge, he has got next year to show us. I will also say I see loads of potential on this defense, and a few key players can turn the whole thing around. It all starts with the front 4 on defense--if we can start getting some heat from them, it will make the entire defense look better. Even Champ Bailey can't cover the wr forever.

I also say this is chess, not checkers,and we will be okay.
Answer another question for me. Before the first NO bowl, did you ever imagine we would be this upset over a winning season and a bowl game?I say that is proof that TW has the program ina better place than it was.
Whoever called the football program crumbling---come on. That is a joke, right?

i maintain that the defense problem is NOT the front 4, but the linebackers.

we got good push all season, there just wasnt anyone there to clean up behind them. losing greg jackson was a KILLER, that was the only guy we had who could come off the edge with authority. i'll give the dbs credit for a bit of improvement, just because they actually turned and looked for the ball on occasion. the past 3 seasons, our db's all looked like they had neck fusions.

JLD, hubba bubba and CB were a collective disaster. defensive recruiting was nil. practice was just look busy. if you wanna hang TW for anything, do it because he let ithose 3 go on as long as he did. and you dont fix that with out time and recruiting, something the new defensive staff is just getting a turn a bat with.

our practice fields are unusable for 3 days after it rains. that is something that HAS to be addressed NOW. anyone who witnessed the MATA cluster before the last scrimmage at the LB before leaving for new orleans knows that having to pile up and going to the stadium for practice because the practice fields are a swamp is a major disruption.

egrizzard Wrote:Hold on--TOGC asked to discuss football in an intelligent manner and take a critical look at the state of the program, and ya'll are clowning him? I asked him, and others time and time again to talk about the footall season when it was over.

You know one the difference between Memphs and some big time programs? They dicuss their programs year round--not onl that-we want it moved off the main board? calm down. The man asked for an intelligent conversation--- no one is forcing you to enter the talk.

Yes, I will defend TW. Your strength of schedule arguement doesn't hold water. With the exception of the non conf schedule--we have no control over how strong the other teams are. The sos is subjective for one, and in addition, more a reflection the teams in the conf are getting worse.

The defense has gotten worse,and I can in no way defend that. TW has stated that the defense we had was not good enough to win championships, and that he had to start over. I am not blaming JLD,but if you follow the program closely, you know that JLD an "bubba" were awful, awful recruiters. We are paying the price for that now. I will say the time for that excuse has passed, and I don't wanna hear it anymore and I won't go there again. Is Kravitz the answer? Dunno. If I am in charge, he has got next year to show us. I will also say I see loads of potential on this defense, and a few key players can turn the whole thing around. It all starts with the front 4 on defense--if we can start getting some heat from them, it will make the entire defense look better. Even Champ Bailey can't cover the wr forever.

I also say this is chess, not checkers,and we will be okay.
Answer another question for me. Before the first NO bowl, did you ever imagine we would be this upset over a winning season and a bowl game?I say that is proof that TW has the program ina better place than it was.
Whoever called the football program crumbling---come on. That is a joke, right?

The strength of schedule argument does hold water. We put MTSU on the schedule to fill the fourth OOC game. We could've gone after a ranked BCS bowl team, but we went after a second Sun Belt team. Almost unanimously everyone was agreeing at the beginning of the season that we had one of the worst schedules ever.

The defense has not been spectacular in any of Tommy's teams. His best team gave up 19.2 ppg, but five out of seven of them have given up 25 points or more. With three defensive coordinators in seven years, it appears Tommy doesn't know what he wants to do with the defense.

As for the "4 bowls in 5 years", it's due more to the fact that we now have 12 games to win 6, we have a conference affiliation with 6 guaranteed bowls, and we have 64 available bowl slots for the 120 Division 1-A teams. It's ridiculously easy to make a bowl today compared to how difficult it was in the past, when we had an 11-game schedule, we played as an independent, and we had 48 available bowl slots.

there werent 48 slots available to us though. they were all contracted to schools in conferences. thats how the whole liberty bowl alliance started.

we could have gone 10-1 in the late 80s-90s and not made a bowl. easily.

I wish it was a joke, but I see it crumbling when you get hammered by a team called FAU, lose 4 straight to sunbelt teams. I am guessing that you went to at least the home games this year? You cannot tell me that the defense just made you sick to your stomach ?? Don't get me wrong, your my friend because you share a love like me for Tiger Athletics, but it seems like you have tunnel vision and cannot see all that is wrong ? Are you not concerned with the lack of quarterback and running back for next year ?? Hudgins looked just awful in the bowl game, pitts and barnes are not gamebreakers they are backups. We lack depth, we lack team speed, our special teams have to rank at the very bottom. Are you not concerned with the fact that the defense will look the same next year ? I mean its great when you return starters but not our starters... please give a little here, your being fooled by wins over terrible competition and then a bowl game for those cheap wins.

tigerjeb Wrote:there werent 48 slots available to us though. they were all contracted to schools in conferences. thats how the whole liberty bowl alliance started.

we could have gone 10-1 in the late 80s-90s and not made a bowl. easily.

Which further illustrates how much easier it is to get a bowl bid today and how difficult (if not impossible) it was to get it back then.

ddramone Wrote:I am one of those who think that TW is a solid game day coach - we don't turn the ball over too much, we seem to have pretty solid effort for virtually all of our games, we have experienced very little in the way of off-the-field issues.

That said, it seems fairly clear to me that our talent level has been declining versus other C-USA teams - especially UCF and ECU. And, our talent level has been declining versus our PAST (especially on the defensive side of the ball).

To this day, I believe the JLD hiring was an outright disaster. His failure to recruit really came to the fore this year and probably next year as well. Fichtner was a very good recruiter on the offensive side of the ball and whoever was responsible for defensive recruiting (which by default should be TW) has not kept up, to put it mildly.

The 'lack of commitment' argument simply doesn't hold water when TW is 0-4 versus the Sunbelt in the last two years and the fact that we got crushed so convincingly against ECU and UCF. We have a very sophisticated football market here in Memphis and they know when the product ain't so hot...and we have seen a decline in ticket sales as a result.

If next year we go 7-6 and end up in Mobile...I will go to keep my bowl streak intact. However, another 7-6 record will most likely result in very poor attendance again. TW ain't going anywhere this off-season, but he should be, in my opinion, be able to at least win the DIVISION title in either of the next two years or else I think it may be time to look in a new direction. In other words, if TW has not won the division title in 9 years (he's been here 7 years already), then I think it's time to look elsewhere.

Now that has been the most honest answer I have seen on the subject, for that, I thank you!

the other Greg Childers Wrote:

tigerjeb Wrote:there werent 48 slots available to us though. they were all contracted to schools in conferences. thats how the whole liberty bowl alliance started.

we could have gone 10-1 in the late 80s-90s and not made a bowl. easily.

Which further illustrates how much easier it is to get a bowl bid today and how difficult (if not impossible) it was to get it back then.

so you are saying that you would be happier to have a great team and get frozen out of a bowl than to have a so-so team and go to a bowl?

tigerjeb Wrote:

the other Greg Childers Wrote:

tigerjeb Wrote:there werent 48 slots available to us though. they were all contracted to schools in conferences. thats how the whole liberty bowl alliance started.

we could have gone 10-1 in the late 80s-90s and not made a bowl. easily.

Which further illustrates how much easier it is to get a bowl bid today and how difficult (if not impossible) it was to get it back then.

so you are saying that you would be happier to have a great team and get frozen out of a bowl than to have a so-so team and go to a bowl?

I don't believe in rewarding mediocrity. It only breeds more mediocrity.

Besides, the argument is irrelevant. Both great teams and mediocre ones make bowls these days. Given the choice between the two, I'd rather we have a great team that makes a bowl.

With our conference schedule if we didn't go 6-2 it would have been horrible. We played what has been called by outsiders the most easy schedule in D-1a football. On the topic of ooc games I would much rather get killed by ranked teams rather than lose to two sun-belt teams. Tommy West very frankly lacks major recruiting skills and can't direct a team on the field. He in uncharismatic. It doesn't make any sense to me for Tommy West who makes $950,000 to lose to FAU and Skip Holtz who makes $425,000 to win against a nationally ranked team- Boise State. I think Tommy West has some value but I don't understand the Athletic department spending $950,000 for a Jimmy Sexton special that can't seem to win a conference championship with the best team the university has ever had. If Memphis fans honestly desire mediocrity at the low end of Division 1 football than I guess Tommy West is the way to go. Memphis fans need to figure out what they want- A competitive football team or Tommy West. I think the two are mutually exclusive

Without going all the way back into ancient history like Greg did going all the way back to 1917 and use a coach who only coached two seasons as part of his percentage review, I'm going to go back to 1975 and start with Richard Williamson. In fairness, the previous coach, Fred Pancoast is the only coach on record to leave the Tigers to take another head coaching position with a winning record.

-----Coach-------------Record--------seasons-------winning seasons
Richard Williamson-------31-35-0---------6---------------3
Rex Dockery------------- 8-24-1---------3---------------0
Rey Dempsey------------ 7-12-3---------2---------------0
Charlie Bailey------------12-20-1---------3---------------1
Chuck Stobart-----------29-36-1---------6---------------3
Rip Scherer--------------22-44-0---------6---------------0
Tommy West------------41-44-0---------7---------------4

So, let me get this straight. The coach with the most winning seasons in the last 30 years, who has taken us to 4 bowl games in the last 5 years is taking the program down and should be fired? I'm not looking at only one or two seasons but the last seven years. I'm sorry but calling for Tommy West to be fired with a record like this does not show intelligent thinking. People seem to forget that we don't exactly have the most history in football. We need to build a stable program and to do that you have to have stability at the coaching position.

For comparison, I'm sure most of you have heard of Frank Beamer at a school called Virginia Tech. After his first seven seasons his record was 33-43-2, with one bowl appearance in the Independence Bowl. They stuck with him and look where they are now.

Can Tommy West do this here? I don't know and neither does anyone else and anyone who says they do has probably been calling the Psychic Hotline and believing what they hear.