COACHES HOT SEAT BLOG

The Great Seve Ballesteros – R.I.P – 1957 – 2011

Before we get to the latest Fantasyland statements of Big Ten commish Jim Delany on the Bogus BCS (think George Wallace and standing in the schoolhouse door with the Feds telling him to get the Hell Out of the Way!) we first make a comment or two on the passing of Golfing Great Seve Ballesteros.

For those of us here at Coaches Hot Seat that grew up playing golf in addition to every other sport we could convince our parents to let us play (football, basketball, baseball, tennis, volleyball, swimming, track & field, etc.) Seve Ballesteros was a very large and dashing figure in our young lives and when Seve played the game of golf in his own very unique way he made it impossible for us to look away.

The first-time a lucky few of us laid eyes on Seve Ballesteros in person was at Masters golf tournaments in the late 1970s when Seve was making himself into the best golfer in the world and that was a time when Tom Watson, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino and a few other great American players were still winning major championships on a semi-regular basis and still dominating the game.

For most of us though our first chance to see Seve play golf in person was at the 1982 US Open at Pebble Beach which ended with Tom Watson chipping in on the 17 th hole and then making a birdie at the 18 th hole to beat Jack Nicklaus by two shots.  Seve Ballesteros missed the cut in the 1982 US Open but several of us followed Seve around in his practice and tournament rounds and Seve in-motion and playing the game of golf was very simply something astonishing to see.

In one of those practice rounds for the ’82 US Open at Pebble Beach Seve Ballesteros drove the ball wildly off the 14 th tee (as he tended to do at times!), which is a long par 5 that bends around to the right and up a hill to a very small green, and his ball landed very near where we were standing in the rough and we of course were not going anywhere since we would get a chance to see Seve and his golf swing up close and personal.  Seve and his caddie headed right towards and when Seve got within a few yards of the crowd gathered around his ball he flashed his smile at us and said…

“Not so good.”

….which got a good laugh from everyone standing there.  Seve looked over his lie and up the hill towards the 14 th green and then took a mid-iron from the bag being held by his caddy and lashed the ball up the fairway out of the rough in a manner that could only have been called “power matched to beautiful music.”

It wasn’t until 5 years later that most of us got to see Seve Ballesteros in person again, this time at the 1987 US Open at the Olympic Club in San Francisco which again had Tom Watson battling for another US Open title until he lost it to Scott Simpson on the last few holes.  In this US Open we all saw a much different Seve Ballesteros than the one we had seen 5 years earlier at Pebble Beach and with a much sharper overall game Seve played one of his best US Opens by tying for 3 rd place only 5 shots backs of winner Simpson. 

Of course, Seve Ballesteros in 1987 was the Seve that had the 1986 Masters golf tournament won until Jack Nicklaus made his charge down the back nine at the Augusta National and then in the ’87 Masters Ballesteros rallied again to tie with Larry Mize and Greg Norman only to lose in a playoff after making a bogey on the first playoff hole (The ’87 Masters was the one where Larry Mize chipped in on the 2 nd hole of the playoff to beat Greg Norman).  Yes, Seve Ballesteros was a much more polished golfer by the time we saw him at the US Open in the summer of 1987, but his winning of major championships was coming to an end with Seve only winning 1 more major (the 1988 British Open) in his career and if someone had told us that Seve would have won “only’ 5 major golf titles we would have laughed and immediately said he will win double that number…easy.

Seve Ballesteros was very simply a magnificent golfer that inspired young golfers around the world by his great play and even more importantly, he was a better man and person.  Seve Ballesteros is what all of our Heroes should be in that the Seve in public was the Seve in private and in a dozen or so times that we were lucky enough to encounter Seve in the last two decades he was always the very same person that the general public saw on TV which was a man that lived life to the fullest and played the game of golf with his heart and soul on his sleeve for all to see and greatly admire.

Paul Mahroney of Golf Magazine says it all in the title of his column on Seve Ballesteros:

You should never meet your hero, but Seve Ballesteros was an exception

“Meeting your heroes is almost always a disappointment. It’s not their fault; it’s ours. How can they possibly ever live up to the expectations we mortals have of them as gods in the sporting arena? Better to worship from afar and imagine them as perfect. But there are exceptions. America has Arnold Palmer. Europe had Seve Ballesteros.
 
The last time I spoke to Seve was at the 2006 British Open at Hoylake. On the eve of the championship, as the clubhouse was bathed in a glorious sunset, Seve was the only player on the practice green, putting with two of his sons. It was a fabulous private family moment — witnessed by half a dozen of us loitering around the edge of the green, and more than a 100 people drinking inside the clubhouse and craning their necks for a view through the windows.

“I wanted my boys to get a sense of what the Open is all about,” Seve told me. His eldest son caddied for his first two rounds before the inevitable missed cut. “I don’t know if I’ll be back again next year,” he said. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
 
The first time I visited Seve at his tumbleweed home village of Pedrena (pop: 1,500) on a peninsula in northeastern Spain was in the late 1990s. We had lunch at the golf club where he grew up caddying and dreaming of far away glory. The clubhouse manager had known Seve all his life. “I have watched him grow up,” he said. “He is much the same now as he ever was.””

Yes, Seve Ballesteros was the same on the last day of his life as he was as child growing up in Spain and we all could be so lucky to have that said about the lives we have lived, especially for those people that are in the public eye and often have little respect for the fans that watch, admire and cheer for them.

Seve Ballesteros was a great golfer but an even greater man and he will be greatly missed, but the life he led and the dreams he chased are great examples for our children and Seve’s family and friends can be assured that Seve’s name will live on in our memories and the stories that we tell to our children about how a man named Seve showed up in our lives some 35 years ago and inspired us to chase our dreams as he made the game of golf and the world a better place for all of us.

Godspeed to you Seve Ballesteros and God Bless to Seve’s family and friends.

Getting back to the Idiots and Arrogant Bastards….

Big Ten commish Jim Delany was quoted by Steve Wieberg of USA Today late on Sunday saying about the US Justice Department’s inquiry into the BCS as saying:

Big Ten boss Jim Delany says BCS can stand up to federal scrutiny

“”You never should be overconfident on legal matters. Like anything else, once they’re in a courtroom or in front of a jury, you can’t predict outcomes,” Delany told USA TODAY. “Having said that, we know what (the college football postseason once) was, and we know what is. And we know there was a thorough vetting of all antitrust issues at the beginning and during (the life of the BCS) because our presidents have always wanted to know the legal basis on which we operate.”

Echoing Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick, Delany insisted that, if the BCS were dismantled, it wouldn’t lead to the kind of playoff Varney referenced in her letter. Schools and conferences more likely would return to a pre-BCS format in which they struck their own bowl deals, top to bottom.

“There’s no judge or jury in the world,” Delany said, “that can make you enter into an four-team, eight-team or 16-team playoff.””

The above is Jim Delany in his Pompous, Arrogant Ass Best and we would expect no less from Delany since he is the most Arrogant Ass we have encountered of people in public life in our 30 plus years of watching people in power in the United States of America (OK, the Pompous Arrogant Ass Al Gore certainly outdoes Delany in those categories…and by a long way!), but we have some news for Jim Delany and everyone else inside the BCS structure that don’t believe the US Government representing the American People, the US Taxpayers and thus the vast majority of college football fans that think the Bogus BCS needs to be tossed onto the dustbin of history (Every poll taken of college football fans in recent years has favored replacing the Bogus BCS with the same postseason playoff tournament format that is used by EVERY other sport administered by the NCAA as does this poll at College Football Talk, Poll:  Playoff in college football – yay or nay? – 82 percent YES to get rid of BCS – 18 percent to keep Bogus BCS), that is exactly where the Bogus BCS is headed.

What the Pompous Arrogant Ass Jim Delany and others like Ohio State University president Gordon Gee don’t seem to understand is that Delany and Gee represent and work for “public” institutions of higher learning that along with every public and private institution of higher learning in the United States of America receive Hundreds of Billions of Dollars of US TAXPAYER MONEY each year and that means that the US Government and US Justice Department has not only every right to investigate the Bogus BCS but also has the right to TELL Jim Delany and the dwindling number of people inside intercollegiate athletics that support the Bogus BCS to replace it with a Postseason Playoff Tournament as used by every other sport run by the NCAA.

The approximately $200 Billion Dollars that is sent to colleges and universities in America each year for student-aid and all kinds of research would be TRUMP CARD No. 1 Delany and that you, Jack Swarbrick, Gordon Gee and lots of other folks don’t understand that reality is not a big surprise to us here at Coaches Hot Seat.

If Gordon Gee and other university presidents and chancellors would like to run their schools without student-aid and money from the US Government and thus the US Taxpayer then they can go ahead and give it a try but Gordon Gee and every other college and university president in the country knows their schools would shut-down overnight if not for Federal Student Aid and the research monies that they get each year from the US Taxpayer and that means that this is all going to come down to these Bogus BCS Bastards:

Either institute the same type of postseason playoff tournament that student-athletes in other sports have access to as administered by the NCAA or US Government and US Taxpayer money to your school will cease….immediately.

The above realization is the moment when the Pompous Arrogant Ass Jim Delany will shut the Hell up and quit talking about the Bogus BCS as will Idiots like Gordon “I just hope he (Tressel) doesn’t fire me” Gee that has show N the world in recent months just what a Complete and Absolute Moron he really is and that the truth that the last thing Gordon Gee should be doing is running a school that is trying to teach OUR young people how to live their lives in a honorable and just way.

Yes, money sent to colleges and universities is TRUMP CARD NO. 1 for people like Jim Delany popping off about the Bogus BCS, but those that want to see an end to the Bogus BCS and for Major College Football to move to a postseason system that reflects the values and principles of the American Republic have a TRUMP CARD NO. 2 which is really a hand of 4 Aces, King High and a hand like that will forever shut-up the Delanys of the world and end the Bogus BCS, maybe even before the US Justice Department sends it packing.

We here at Coaches Hot Seat have an intense interest in higher education in America beyond just college football because we believe that the American Republic’s position as the world’s lone superpower and thus our country’s history of being a champion of Freedom, Liberty and Democracy around the world cannot continue without a strong system of college and university education and the reality is there are countries like China and India that will challenge America in the immediate future and thus the huge importance of continuing a strong system of post-high school learning in our country.

Since we follow college and university education very closely in America we also have a decent handle on the college and university presidents/chancellors and what they think about certain issues and how they are moving their institutions of higher learning forward and one of the peripheral issues that college and university presidents must consider is the current college football postseason bowl system and the Bogus BCS.

There are 120 college and universities now playing Major College Football and thus there are 120 presidents and chancellors running those 120 schools and over the past decade or so we have tracked the views of the presidents and chancellors on the current college football bowl system and the Bogus BCS and something very dramatic has happened in the last few years that would shock and surprise Jim Delany, Gordon Gee, Harvey Perlman and other pro-Bogus BCS folks:

The support for the current bowl system and the Bogus BCS has dropped dramatically among the 120 college and university presidents and on a large board at Coaches Hot Seat Central that lists each president/chancellor there are blocks that are checked either…

FOR BCS
AGAINST BCS
UNDECIDED

Guess what?  Right now only a minority of college and university presidents/chancellors are listed as “FOR BCS” and that is a BIG change from the summer of 2009 when over 70 percent of the presidents/chancellors favored the Bogus BCS and current bowl system.

It is hard for us to accurately ascertain what a majority of the college and university presidents want to see with the Major College Football postseason but from talking to a few of them and to people around them we can say that there is now a coalescing around the idea of a Postseason Playoff Tournament with “X” number of teams that would be combined with “X” number of postseason bowl games to give access to the postseason for deserving college football teams.

This new and emerging view of the what the postseason in Major College Football could look like and would provide the most benefits to college football, intercollegiate athletics, the players, the coaches and fans was best explained by University of New Mexico President David Schmidly who released the following statement this past Friday on the current US Justice Department – BCS debate:

UNM President fires back at BCS

“”Recently, BCS Executive Director Bill Hancock stated that looking into the Bowl Championship Series seemed like a waste of the taxpayer’s money, and that the Department of Justice should not investigate the legality of the BCS. The BCS and college football is a multi-billion dollar enterprise, and that is reason enough for why the Department of Justice needs to investigate the matter.

Having served as the president of two institutions that are members of the BCS, and now serving here at the University of New Mexico in the Mountain West Conference, currently outside of the BCS, I bring a unique perspective to the issue, having seen with my own eyes the differences in revenues that the BCS generates for the haves and the have-nots.

With state support declining, and all of us in higher education looking to alleviate the financial problems brought on by the current economy, to not investigate the legality of the BCS, and to not look at the potential revenue streams that can be afforded to all Division I FBS institutions through other postseason means is short sighted and irresponsible.

If there is a way to alleviate the burden on tax-payers, while potentially increasing revenues and finding a more equitable way to distribute those revenues throughout college football, then an investigation by the Department of Justice is well worth the time and energy, and I fully support it.””

Very well said President Schmidly and if there is anyone that doesn’t think David Schmidly knows what he is talking about, President Schmidly spent 25 plus years at Texas A&M University and was president at Texas Tech University which gives him unique insight into intercollegiate athletics and college football and how the BCS warps the current college football postseason in a very negative way, especially compared to EVERY other sport administered and run by the NCAA.

The folks behind the Bogus BCS should not blindly assume that President Schmidly’s views on the BCS is the “minority” view of college and university presidents/chancellors because as we look up a the board of “120 College and University Presidents/Chancellors View on BCS/College Football Postseason” the number of “FOR BCS” checked-off blocks is less than 50 PERCENT and three presidents/chancellors were changed from “FOR BCS” in just the last 30 days.

Yes, TRUMP CARD NO. 1 against the Bogus BCS is the money that the US Taxpayer is giving to the colleges and universities in OUR country and unless presidents and chancellor of schools that play Major College Football are willing to live without US Federal Aid and research monies then they WILL change the college football postseason to the same system that ALL other student-athletes in EVERY other sport at those very same schools have access to…which is they ALL have an opportunity to play for the National Championship via a Postseason Playoff Tournament.

Yes, TRUMP CARD NO. 1 means Jim Delany can sit down and shut-up, but Pompous Arrogant Asses that believe they are better than everyone else on Planet Earth often have to be told directly by people far above their paygrades the FACTS OF LIFE and that is exactly what Jim Delany and others that support the Bogus and Un-American BCS are going to get in the coming months and years as the actions, the money spent and just where all of these “non-profit” bowl games have been spending their money makes it way into the public domain.  (Yes, all of those “gifts” given by the “non-profit” bowl games to people may lead to some Big Tax bills for the folks that took those “gifts” because once the US Government representing the US Taxpayer starts looking into ALL of these bowl games there is going to be a WHOLE DAMN LOT that comes out that will make the idiocy of folks like Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick implying things like if the BCS goes away that college football will go return to the “pre-BCS” format look very stupid indeed.  Uhhh, Jack didn’t teach you better than that at Stanford Law?  The “pre-BCS” format would not only be a Big money loser for college football, especially compared to a Postseason Playoff Tournament, but Swarbrick we are guessing assumes that Notre Dame University and some other large universities will refuse US Government monies for education and research because that is the ONLY WAY that the old “Pre-BCS format” will ever see the light of day again!  Yes, leave it to the Notre Dame AD that makes a lot of money off TV to support the old bowl format while schools that are losing money with their athletic departments are just left out in the cold!)

TRUMP CARD NO. 2 is the quickly changing opinions of the college and university presidents/chancellors that are starting to come to the realization that a postseason bowl system that forces universities to buy millions of dollars worth of tickets and hotel rooms after they have been “awarded” the right to play in their game with the schools often losing money in the process!  Yes, that makes perfect sense to keep that kind of Bogus bowl system going….to Morons that is!

David Jones of the Patriot-News did a Q&A with Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports and Death to the BCS fame and here is a portion of that Q&A that should be very enlightening to the less than a majority of the college and university presidents/chancellors that are still behind the Bogus BCS:

A Q&A with Dan Wetzel about the BCS and whether we’ll ever get a college football playoff

“P-N: When you began examining public records in researching the book, what was your first reaction to discovering what the bowl chieftains made in exchange for doing almost nothing, for preparation of one game most of which they did no work on themselves?
DW: That this is big, big business. And that’s why there’s such a resistance to even moderate change that would make sense to 99 percent of the people.

 This is about a small group of people making a large amount of money off of college athletics. And it’s about the most illogical business deal in sports.

 No business I’ve ever heard of outsources its most profitable product. If you went to Roger Gooddell and said, “Rather than the NFL own, operate and receive all revenue from the Super Bowl, why don’t you let me run it? And I’ll take 60 percent off the top. Then, we have some add-on costs. What do you think?” He’d throw you out of his office in two seconds. But that’s what’s going on here. It doesn’t make any sense.

 Where did all this money come from for [Fiesta Bowl CEO] John Junker to spend on all these people, on his salary, his golf club memberships, the cars, everything? It came from universities playing football games for him.

P-N: Part of the revelation of Death To The BCS was that university athletics directors are often complicit in perpetuating the system because they enjoy all sorts of fringe benefits. The bowls grease them up but good. What percentage do you think wittingly realize what they’re doing and how many do you believe are just sort of ignorantly coasting along with the status quo?

DW: Well, the culture of the NCAA — which will tell you how little self-awareness they have — is to accept gifts from those with whom you’re doing business and ostensibly regulating. I think many of them didn’t even look at it and say, “I’m an athletics director. Maybe I shouldn’t be accepting a 4-day, complimentary cruise to the Caribbean from the Orange Bowl.” Some did. But many didn’t. And that’s what’s so strange about it. You’d think more people would say, “Wait a minute, I can’t do that.” But they didn’t.

The bowl lobby is very powerful and they’re very entrenched and there’s a culture of cronyism that’s keeping it alive against the financial interests of college football.

College football could run their own bowl games. Other than the Rose Bowl, there really isn’t a bowl game that does a whole lot. You could run your own games. Does anyone really think a 4-team playoff would dramatically alter anything in college football? Except they make more money and control the product?”

Very well said David Jones of the Patriot News and Dan Wetzel…Very well said!

Getting back to Jim Delany’s whistling past the graveyard that will in the very near future have the BCS in it…just keep whistling Jimmy….but in the end the American People and the vast majority of college football fans that want to see the Bogus and Very Un-American BCS go the way of Osama Bin Laden…to the bottom of the ocean….are going to get their way and Major College Football WILL HAVE a College Football Postseason Tournament that will be run by the NCAA and will crown the NCAA National Champion every year.

Of that you can be VERY SURE OF Jimmy and when that change comes to college football that will be a VERY GOOD DAY for America because the principles and values of the American Republic will be strengthened and celebrated with college football teams, players and coaches winning a National Championship on the Field of Play….not in the back rooms with Bogus and Biased Human Polls, Bogus Computer Programs run by Geeks and just plain Absolute Stupidity determining who will have the “chance” to play in a Bogus title game.

Yes, a Legitimate and NCAA National Championship Postseason Tournament is coming to Major College Football…and there is not a Damn thing in the world the Jim Delanys of the world can do to stop that from happening.

Oh, this is going to be great fun to watch Jim Delany being told to Sit Down and Shut Up! 

Yes, another Great Day in America is on the way!

Nebraska’s exclusion from membership in AAU (Association of American Universities)

On an unrelated issue to the Bogus BCS but still a very interesting story is that the University of Nebraska – Lincoln was last week tossed out of the Association of American Universities and the Omaha World-Herald has the story:

Theories on AAU split from University of Nebraska – Lincoln

“As they followed the story about the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s ouster from a prestigious group of research universities, some sideline observers spotted what they believe is a troubling Texas connection.

Two former presidents of the University of Texas now are top officials at the Association of American Universities. Texas, meanwhile, has been Nebraska’s chief nemesis in Big 12 athletic conference politics, with Texas calling the shots on everything from academic requirements for athletes to the way revenues were distributed.

AAU leaders and others in the know say they caught no whiff that Texas was trying to punish Nebraska for leaving the Big 12.

“In all of this, throughout this entire event, that’s the silliest idea I ever heard,” said AAU spokesman Barry Toiv.

UNL Chancellor Harvey Perlman said that while the AAU connections with the University of Texas are “intriguing,” they do not explain the decision.

“I’m not much of a conspiracy buff,” Perlman said. “There was a conspiracy here, but it didn’t have anything to do with Texas.””

We would agree with Nebraska chancellor Harvey Perlman that Nebraska being tossed from the AAU was not about “Texas,” but we will say what Perlman will not say…

It was BOGUS and embarrassing decision for American education.

No, the University of Nebraska is not Stanford University or on the same level of many schools in AAU, but the University of Nebraska is a better overall school than at least a dozen of other current AAU member schools (see AAU list of schools here) and if we were Perlman we would raising Holy Hell about this Bogus decision to kick Nebraska out of what is becoming a club full of “elitists” that are more and more not representative of the values of most Americans.

Now, we could list the current AAU schools that do not measure up to the University of Nebraska but anyone that looks over the list of current AAU members can see for themselves schools that have no business being a member of AAU if the University of Nebraska isn’t as well.

The future of American education beyond high school should not be defined by “elitists” that often have little contact with average Americans that raise their children hoping they will have a chance to pursue their dreams which often go through our country’s colleges and universities.  Schools like the University of Nebraska that have made huge gains in recent years to become world-class institutions of higher learning should be recognized for their hard work and when organizations like the AAU which often have committees that are made up with pointy-headed academics that have no experience in the real world make Bogus decisions as the one here to toss out the University of Nebraska out of AAU are just flat-out shameless and only do harm to American education with their foolishness.

We don’t know if this decision by the AAU to toss out the University of Nebraska can be challenged or not, but we sure wouldn’t take this nonsense lying down and UNL chancellor Harvey Perlman shouldn’t either.

Here is what Harvey Perlman should figuratively say to these AAU Bastards!  (Oh, but that might offend their precious egos though!)

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