That 8:50 puck drop was an unpleasant reminder of what we'll inevitably see in the first round. Fun game but I'm dragging ass today. We've got to figure this 3rd period thing out. Shit isn't going to fly against better teams. Good to have a nice streak though going into the break and Olympic hockey should be great.
I discussed with someone involved in NIL at FSU a couple of years back during their undefeated year. That season 'NIL' was largely funded by a single donor. I don't know recall specifics but it was known at the time to be a one-shot deal (can't remember if inheritance or write-off related or what but it was known it was not sustainable the following or future years absent new material investment). Sure enough the results of the next 2 years speak for themselves.
I was thinking about the post-NCG game players. For those that hear things, are teams playing in the playoffs (particularly semis and MNC) sometimes "signing" players to binding contracts next season with the proposal that it mitigates injury risk? Are players leveraging playing in the games on hitting a certain number for next year? I think I read this happened to us last season with a few players (Moore?) The college football calendar is idiotic in numerous respects but especially portal formally closing Friday except for teams playing in the Championship. This has to get fixed but I'm curious what Agents are advising players playing in these games. On one hand some of the lower profile players may have limited options while some of the higher profile players at need positions for multiple teams may end up in a crazy bidding war when literally last remaining additions.
Funny you say that but he actually wasn't, at least initially. I get random high quality info at times and the Texas evaluation of Ojo going into junior day was definitely not to the "can't miss 5 star" level he was rated by the recruiting services. Maybe that changed over time as it was a bit dated when I saw the eval. At the time I thought Flood knew what he was doing so we probably dodged a bullet when he committed to Tech (at least at that crazy price point). Then as I watched our OL shit itself, I thought back to that evaluation and then assumed Ojo will be a day 1 All American in Lubbock. Didn't follow Ojo after he committed to Tech so no idea what current expectations are for him or how his SR film looked.
OL in the portal era going to be very interesting to follow. Obviously we had already fucked the position up so we aren't the best case study but ideally you have players come and sit and develop for 2 years before being expected to contribute. That is one position you might be willing to pay to develop to some extent. But if your 2nd year player that isn't ready can get starter snaps and money at a middling Big 12 school, do you just never develop depth and pay juniors and seniors with experience year after year? One thing that seems to be true of damn near every contending team at multiple positions is that injury luck is going to play a major part in results in any given year. Significantly more than it has historically.
Enforceable multi-year contracts with very material buyout provisions for each side. There has to be a way to limit this idiocy where everyone is a free agent annually. I hope this portal is the tipping point. As others have pointed out, seems like damn near every school is dealing with this chaos.
As it comes to retaining current players, I wonder if some of this is an overcorrection or trying to reset expectations. Reading between lines it seemed like we spent a ton of money on both retention and HS recruiting the past 2 years to the detriment of portal recruiting. So if we overpaid on retention and recruiting previously, I'm guessing a lot of these guys leaving we didn't necessarily want to leave had expectations based on past performance. Agreed with sentiment that overall it looks like a complete mess right now in desperate need of professional roster management.
I think it's beyond clear there has to be an expectation of binding multi-year contracts in this sport moving forward. Constant 1 year deals is an absolute shitshow. We absolutely need a real professional GM (and I've been saying so for years) but I can't fathom how anyone can effectively budget/plan in this chaos.
This kind of shit from our fanbase wears me out. Sark took over a lost program and since we've been to 2 semis and should have been in the playoffs this year but for a committee that doesn't understand math or probability (outside of counting losses). There aren't 5 programs in the country that have had a better 3 year run and probably just OSU and UGA (and I fully expect one of them to win it again). I don't know if Sark will take the next step or not (it's a really hard step to take) but cry me a fucking river acting like it's been so god awful with "Sark running the show". Amazing how many people have forgotten what 14 years of garbage looked like.
Same. I have elementary school kids and it's regularly a madhouse with neighborhood friends. Couldn't pay me to work from home during the summer with all that chaos.
Maybe I'm now just an old but anyone that chooses WFH in this scenario isn't going to ever get promoted beyond that 120K. Which I'm sure is fine for those that would make the choice. Fair or not, I absolutely think electing to work from home is seen by senior mgmt as lack of commitment and/or ambition. If you combine that with someone turning down a raise, then yeah, that person isn't moving up in their role.
My wife went to HS in Knoxville and hasn't been back since as her parents moved back to Texas while she was in college, so we are going and taking the kids. She keeps up with a handful of friends that are big TN fans so should be fun.
I swear someone posted this was going to happen like a week or 2 ago here or on twitter or somewhere and assumed some idiot making things up. Or like Crabtree I just dreamed it in my head.