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Post by jdsippin on May 29, 2007 13:48:21 GMT -5
Strock did not have the $$$$ to recruit out of state....you cannot even compare budgets to the old budget with Mello and Strock...the $$$$ that Garcia and MC have to work with is on a whole new level compared to what they had before...
The expectations from the president and university officials is extremely high for the 07-08 season for all sports...and the responsibility and accountability rests with Garcia...realistically he should have some time, but the truth is that results are expected immediately from the University community
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Post by devonsmom on May 29, 2007 14:27:21 GMT -5
I do not have access to the budgets, so I can only go by what I was told by coaches (who probably did have access to at least some of that information). I was told that no out of state recruiting happened because Strock wanted a 100% in-state roster. He also turned potential walk-ons away if they were from out of state (I heard that with my own ears also).
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Post by alt7787 on May 29, 2007 22:52:54 GMT -5
I think Strock may not have wanted to recruit out of state because he may have believed it was a waste of time. He may have thought that FIU had no chance with a kid from GA or SC that had offers from USC or GT. This is just a theory.
There are two things I'd like to add my two cents to, both replies to devonsmom. First I agree that it makes no difference what religion or race or whatever you are in order to be a coach. the whole cuban thing is old. it seems that anyone who is anyone in Miami is cuban, so i wasnt surprised when both Garcia and Cristobal were hired.
Second I have to put myself out there for Mr. Mello. Many of you may not know, but he is the President of the Board of Directors of the Humane Society of Miami, a local animal rescue shelter. I do a lot of volunteer work with the Humane Society and i put a lot of money into helping them (i love animals). I have met Mr. Mello a few times and he is truly a good person. Helping the animals in the shelter is top priority and he does not allow for any animal to be euthanized unless it is VERY sick. now i will admit that he does have a little temper as I have heard from some people at the society, but it usually comes under stress and most of us can get a little pissed sometimes. I do remember that following Saturday that i went to the shelter and he did look pissed. I cant explain or defend how he acted that night and it probably was a little out of hand, but the Rick Mello I know is a caring man that works really hard to save animals that would otherwise not have a second chance.
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Post by formerstudent on May 30, 2007 9:16:14 GMT -5
Pete Garcia was the director of football opeartions. I am sure all he did was call ed reed after butch told him yea we need this guy. Time will tell about pete,but just remeber this there are 117 other Div.1 schools why so many people from scUM?ummmmmm..... Also,Rick mello has gone into our meetings and given his his personal cell number and told us to call him at anytime about anything. I would be a little mad as well after we just lost by one point to MTSU,and the team that we had.I liked Mello.He helped a lot of guys out in the athletic department and the guy would always call you back. Strock was never given the money trust me he was not.If you know any football players ask them about having there summer school paid for before cristobal got here.You need your top 50 guys here working out during the summer and we never really had our top 50 here ,because they would not dish out the cash.But how funny 9 months later the money shows up?
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Post by MiRi on May 30, 2007 9:21:20 GMT -5
I have gotten to know Mr. Mello a little too. He has always been very nice to us. I also can't defend his temper tantrum at MTSU.
It's nice to hear that he's working with the Humane Society. I am also a huge animal lover.
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Post by FIUFan on May 30, 2007 9:54:28 GMT -5
Pete Garcia was the director of football opeartions. I am sure all he did was call ed reed after butch told him yea we need this guy. Time will tell about pete,but just remeber this there are 117 other Div.1 schools why so many people from scUM?ummmmmm..... Also,Rick mello has gone into our meetings and given his his personal cell number and told us to call him at anytime about anything. I would be a little mad as well after we just lost by one point to MTSU,and the team that we had.I liked Mello.He helped a lot of guys out in the athletic department and the guy would always call you back. Strock was never given the money trust me he was not.If you know any football players ask them about having there summer school paid for before cristobal got here.You need your top 50 guys here working out during the summer and we never really had our top 50 here ,because they would not dish out the cash.But how funny 9 months later the money shows up? Let's see, you've got arguably one of the best football programs in the country over the last 30 years sitting in your own back yard and you 'don't harvest the fruit'? C'mon formerstudent, give us a break, if you can get the 'director of football op's' from a prominent program to be the AD of a school that is making football a priority (with an new stadium no less) you'd be a fool not to go after him. I've got nothing against the people from UCG my grudge is against the institution. The same institution that has made our lives difficult from before the time of our conception. However, I really can't understand the people here who are continually bemoaning the loss of our mediocre (and that's charitable) athletic dept. when you've got people who have raised the profile of their school to meteoric heights less that 10 miles away. And finally, big deal that Mello gives out his cell phone number; what do you want to do, give him a call so he can explain to you, in extremely verbose language, why something can't be done.... geez.
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Post by FIUPantherFan on May 30, 2007 9:57:46 GMT -5
You know why it (the money) showed up, because Pete Garcia was SMART enough to demand it as part of him coming to FIU. Obviously Mello & Strock didn't have gravitas within the university to make and get those type of demands. As such, you have proved my point that they were either dumb (by not requesting the money) or ineffective (by not getting the money). Take your pick and either one is not going to get you wins. Goodbye and goodluck to both of those gentlement, however, a new era has begun. GO FIU!
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Post by FIUFanatic on May 30, 2007 10:55:25 GMT -5
I don't know the specifics, nor have access like some of you do, or reportedly do, but if it is true that not enough money was given to recruit then a big reason is precisely because of who the administrators were. If Garcia came in and demanded a better budget, instituted another increase in athetic fees that will generate over $1.2 million a year to the department, increased the suites numbers from 14 to 19, instituted the 2 for 1 season tickets packages so that more people could get into the ownership of tickets....then all the power to PG and MC. Period.
Mello was, and is, a very nice guy. I likd him a lot, and he did very well in the financial aspects of his leadership. He did OK as our AD, but now he is gone. Period. Water under the bridge. Let's look forward.
Now we have a new set of administrators that have been very, very aggresive in their dealings, and going public and setting the bar a lot higher...IN PUBLIC...than any other administrator has EVER done at FIU.....Folks, that is what we have now...and you know what?...I LOVE IT!!
Let's band together, for once, recognize the good job Mello and company did at FIU, put aside their shortcomings they might have had, and respect the guy.
But, please...also, let's recognize the fact we have new leadership, with a change in the "Athletics Culture" at FIU, and let them be and try to take us where the vast majority of die hard fans (like me and many others I've known for years) want FIU to go for. Why settle? Let's aim high and hope it works...If PG turns out to be a disaster, then let's have another AD...truthfully guys, after what FIU has done in its athletic history, I can wait another couple of years to see if it will work...why can't we?
I love FIU and want the best for the institution, including its Athletics. It seems that a lot of good folks that also love FIU, and for many years some of them, have a lot of resentment for what has transpired over the last several months at FIU. While I will not make any judgments to all these good FIU people who may have more emotional attachments to some of the people that have left FIU, I would hope that some, or all of them, will eventually turn around and keep supporting FIU and what it aspires to do. You don't have to love our new administrators, but at least give them the benefit of the doubt....It's time all good FIU folks come together again. God knows that if we start winning the bandwagon will be full...So, why jump off now?
Go FIU!!
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Post by pantherlakes on May 30, 2007 11:14:41 GMT -5
Again, I am looking forward and hoping for better days. Another 0-12 football season would be unbearable.
In regards to the last post, I would like to clarify a couple of points. PG was not the person who secured the new student fee money, that has been in the works for two years. It taked that long to get fee increases passed (I was in student government). Mr. Mello worked this process.
According my friend insude the department, the suites have not acutally increased. The additional five are there because the pressbox was removed from the design and those will be needed for that purpose.
The two for one season ticket idea came from the current ticket staff last year.
By the way, did anyone notice how far we moved up in the conference all sports rankings. I think up to fourth. That was also done before PG.
I hope he succeeded but I will never like him. I will always love the Golden Panthers.
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Post by FIUFanatic on May 30, 2007 11:30:28 GMT -5
With Rick Mello, we had one fee increase when it was announced we were going to IA in 2004 or 2005 I believe. Back then, Mello said he would not ask for more increases, as this was to fund our "upgrade" to IA....I remember this vividly. The previous fee increase was passed in either 2000 or 2001 in order to provide for the advent of football...then a brand new IAA program which started in 2002...by the way Mello wasn't the AD back then, as there was a vacancy in the AD position, and Gallagher was sort of "leading" the department.
I can see that the fee may have been in the works before PG took over but it had not been made public there was another fee increase until PG took over in 2006, by the way. We follow FIU news very intensely, as the other members of this board do, and I can assure you that no news of that matter had been made public, or "found out" by any member of this, and other boards I frequent for information. But, as you said, maybe that was in the works, but it was well hidden, but I doubt that for over 2 years. I may be wrong, but I don't think so.
Still, it doesn't really matter. What matters is that more funds are now in use, and nobody should use that against the new administrators, unless some really want him and FIU to fail. I would say all FIU fans don't want that.
I have a concern with something you wrote though...does that mean the New Cage won't have a pressbox?...
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Post by devonsmom on May 30, 2007 12:17:59 GMT -5
Pete Garcia was the director of football opeartions. I am sure all he did was call ed reed after butch told him yea we need this guy. Time will tell about pete,but just remeber this there are 117 other Div.1 schools why so many people from scUM?ummmmmm..... Also,Rick mello has gone into our meetings and given his his personal cell number and told us to call him at anytime about anything. I would be a little mad as well after we just lost by one point to MTSU,and the team that we had.I liked Mello.He helped a lot of guys out in the athletic department and the guy would always call you back. Strock was never given the money trust me he was not.If you know any football players ask them about having there summer school paid for before cristobal got here.You need your top 50 guys here working out during the summer and we never really had our top 50 here ,because they would not dish out the cash.But how funny 9 months later the money shows up? I know for a fact that summer classes for the players was paid for prior to Coach Cristobal's arrival (or at least in 2006 it was). That I can say first hand without any doubt.
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Post by TrueBlue on May 30, 2007 12:58:44 GMT -5
I hope he succeeded but I will never like him. I will always love the Golden Panthers. You don't have to like him just stop talking smack based on what you hear. Unless you know him personally and work alongside him it's rather unproductive to spread this infectious hearsay all over the board. It's only causing a divide here and if we can't come together and we here are supposed to be the core tried and true fans then how is the rest of the GP Nation supposed to come together. Give him the benefit of the doubt because we won't see the results for a few more months. As for Mello being a nice guy, well like they say nice guys finish last and apparently their teams finish last too. As for all this moaning and complaining about us getting staff from UM what is the point?! Like someone said you have a school that has arguabl one of the best programmes ever (as much as it pains all of us to hear that) and they are right here. We don't have to pay for them to relocate, we don't have to inconvenience their families, we don't have to interrupt their usual day-to-day lives and THEY ARE HERE! Do you think the president of Pepsi Co would have a problem hring the VP of Coca-Cola if he's seen his track record and knows he going to produce results. Stop thinking like bystanders and think like business people (this is the school with one of the best B-Schools in the nation right?). These are all business moves...Maidique is the CEO, PG the CEO, MC the chairman of the board and we are the stockholders (our degrees).
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Post by formerstudent on May 30, 2007 15:31:32 GMT -5
Yea Devonsmom for the incoming freshmen not the returners.By the way if you lived in miami-dade or broward county you had to pay for housing.Which is a big chuck of this team. I think summer B was like a thousand dollars!I know a guy on this team that had great grades,yet they refused to pay for his summer school mind you the guy was a starter and produced.Yea,your paying the freshmen,but all the other guys?That brings me back to the money thing.Strock was never given the money.He tried to run this program and still keep it in the green not in the red.
Mello did a lot here. He was the one that got that staduim done.Not "pistol pete".Like panther lakes said he did do a lot.I to do not like garcia.Neither do a lot of other people.
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Post by FIUFanatic on May 30, 2007 17:30:33 GMT -5
As I said....turn the page and get over it....Thanks to the ones who brought us here are in order...I agree that Mello was there all the time to bring the stadium to fruition under his tutelage and hard work. PG is just finishing it, I agree. Now, it's time to unite behind our CURRENT leaders and stop making excuses for ex-employees that are not relevant nor needed at this point. It is water under the bridge. Kaput. Over.
It is what it is now. Fortunately, FIU Athletics has, apparently, more resources today than what they had Yesterday.....GREAT!!! What's the problem with that? We should all be happy about this...not b...itching about it....Hopefully, we will have....WHOEVER IS LEADING ATHLETICS.... more resources next year and the year after that.....
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Post by jdsippin on May 30, 2007 22:27:18 GMT -5
why did this get moved here...this board is crazy
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