[rmiller1959]

Big South football appears to be heading in the direction of the conference's name.
Coastal Carolina's announcement Tuesday that it will be leaving for the Sun Belt Conference was a big blow to the Big South, especially in football, which had just returned to seven member schools this season.

http://www.foxsports.com/college-footba ... xit-090115

[flameshaw]

Couple of questions?

Winning:
Based on the Sasser trophies, we have been in the top tier of the BSC and over the last 10 years have had as good an overall athletic program as CCU. Not in the last 5, I give you that, however there is very little difference in the two schools to make a major difference. One of the years that CCU makes the quarter finals in football, we beat them. Another year CCU gets in on a questionable tie-breaker system. Maybe a top 5 reason, but certainly not enough to tilt the scales towards CCU, especially with the the facilities advantage we have.

Right not a Privilege to be FBS:
I must have missed this. Who has been saying this? I read this board every day and I don't remember this being an overwhelming or even minor focus of many posters.

Additionally, look at how we presented ourselves as #FBSReady. "Liberty has over a billion dollars in assets. Over a hundred thousand students! And our own TV network!:
What is wrong with this? Are we just supposed to hope that the FBS conferences figure out that we want to be FBS. Should we just poor mouth our way into another conference? I saw the presentation that Jerry Jr. et al gave to the SBC schools. I saw it more of this is who we are and what we can bring to the conference, not we deserve to be here and you should let us in. That is lunacy.

This is evidenced by the number of people who now want to "sue our way into FBS.":
How many people want to do this? Have we taken a poll of posters? Has the administration even hinted to the fact that we should do this? Maybe this is more of a ready, fire, aim knee-jerk reaction to the situation.

Exhale.

[LUminary]

Great questions, fine post.

[rmiller1959]

LehighFootballNation ‏@LFN 14m14 minutes ago
With news that Coastal Carolina headed to Sun Belt rumors appearing that Monmouth might be interested in Patriot League football membership.

Didn't they just join the Big South?

[R i]

Right not a Privilege to be FBS:
I must have missed this. Who has been saying this? I read this board every day and I don't remember this being an overwhelming or even minor focus of many posters.

I saw the presentation that Jerry Jr. et al gave to the SBC schools. I saw it more of this is who we are and what we can bring to the conference, not we deserve to be here and you should let us in. That is lunacy.

[rmiller1959]

Here is President Falwell's statement on the Coastal Carolina invitation to the Sun Belt and its impact on Liberty's FBS plans:

http://www.newsadvance.com/sports/liber ... e067d.html

"Falwell said he texts regularly with Sun Belt commissioner Karl Benson. He also noted that Liberty has 'more than one option' in terms of a path to FBS, though he wouldn’t elaborate. LU has not been in contact with any other conferences recently, and when asked if suing to become an FBS independent has been discussed among the administration, he said, 'no, it hasn’t.'"

[flameshaw]

Here is President Falwell's statement on the Coastal Carolina invitation to the Sun Belt and its impact on Liberty's FBS plans:

http://www.newsadvance.com/sports/liber ... e067d.html

"Falwell said he texts regularly with Sun Belt commissioner Karl Benson. He also noted that Liberty has 'more than one option' in terms of a path to FBS, though he wouldn’t elaborate. LU has not been in contact with any other conferences recently, and when asked if suing to become an FBS independent has been discussed among the administration, he said, 'no, it hasn’t.'"

[ATrain]

For those who are interested, this is a pretty complete article on the CCU move:

http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/sports ... 78953.html

And there is the obligatory statement from the Big South commissioner:

http://www.bigsouthsports.com/entries/s ... l-carolina

An interesting round-table discussion with the Big South "experts and fans" reactions to the news:

http://www.midmajormadness.com/big-sout ... roundtable

The Big South commissioner reportedly said they might pull the Big South basketball tournament out of Myrtle Beach as a result of this move.

The domino effect is interesting to watch.

“The Sun Belt Conference has grown in strength today with the addition of Coastal Carolina University to its already thriving membership,” Sun Belt President and Texas State University President Denise M. Trauth said in a statement. “CCU is a well-rounded public institution that is reaching new heights with its remarkable growth. On behalf of the Sun Belt Conference Presidents and Chancellors, we welcome the addition of Coastal Carolina to the Sun Belt Conference.”

From the Sun News article. Key words highlighted.

[SuperJon]

Right not a Privilege to be FBS:
I must have missed this. Who has been saying this? I read this board every day and I don't remember this being an overwhelming or even minor focus of many posters.

With all of that said, I believe I need to address the elephant in the room. That is the perception we (Liberty fans) have in regards to how conferences should view our school. I've been part of this problem too. When Liberty first announced the new facility upgrades, I think we all knew what our aspirations were and that likely in the near future, we would be in a conference much larger than the Big South. As Liberty conducted studies, the sentiment on this board went from not "if" we were going to move to FBS, but when. And thus, many of us started to believe that Liberty being FBS wasn't a privilege but more of a right.

This is evidenced by the number of people who now want to "sue our way into FBS." If we can't get an invite to the party, than we need to try and force our way in anyways! And in my opinion, the idea that we have a right to be FBS is just plain ridiculous. Maybe it's possible that our approach to joining the Sun Belt was the completely wrong approach to take? And maybe it's possible that everything we proud ourselves on, are actually the exact reasons why the Sun Belt doesn't want us?

...

I'm not going to put the blame on Jerry Jr. or Jeff Barber. Despite what I said above, both have done an incredible job taking our school (which was an athletic joke not long ago) and positioning us to even have a chance at an opportunity like this one. However, this idea that we had a "right" to join any conference is just preposterous. If we would have just simply focused on joining the Sun Belt, and not been so focused on "becoming FBS at all costs," I can't help but think that we would have new conference mates by now.

It's the same thing I addressed last year about football success:

2) A Misconception of Who We Are - we try to act big time so people will see us as big time and in turn have created an entitlement issue among athletes and fans.

In 2006, when Jeff Barber got here, he was given an athletic department that was coming off a day known as Black Tuesday. You know something monumental has happened when it is big enough and negative enough to get it's own name. He had some of the core pieces in place from an administrative standpoint, but there was a perception issue among students, alumni, and prospective athletes that said Liberty Athletics weren't a big deal.

Jeff did what any good leader is supposed to do in that situation: he set out to change not only the perception, but also the culture. His goal was to make us a Top 25 athletic department and to get there, we needed top 25 coaches, recruits, and facilities.

Some schools take on the attitude of, "Let me prove it to you." In the beginning, we had that attitude. It was a unifying mantra that inspired coaches and athletes to work harder to prove we were legit. Fans and alumni showed up to prove that we could be a great fan base and could make great atmospheres at games.

Fast forward to the end of the 2009-2010 seasons. We'd won a few conference titles in football. We had a fun year or two in basketball. Baseball was making a run in the Big South. However, we'd also gone through the Curry/McKay debacle. We'd endured a few WTF losses in football. Baseball couldn't beat Coastal. At that point in time, we went from proving why we were a big time program to telling you why we already were one.

And it was at that point the things shifted: we all bought it.

Going into the 2010 season, there was a different attitude around our athletics. We thought we would have success because we were told we would. Without having ever actually gotten over the barrier, we (athletes and fans) believed it was our destiny to make the next step. We became the program that, if this were a high school, were the new kid walking down the hall saying, "Act like you belong, act like you belong. You are big time. You are big time."

Our school took on the attitude of, "Let me tell you why." In light of that, our athletes and fans bought into the reasons why without it ever being proven to us. We were cocky and expectant even when we had nothing to base those attitudes on.

The truth about who we actually are as an athletic program is that we're a program that's only been Division I for just under 25 years and is still building to become what we want to be. We're not there yet.

That's a ton to read, but it was easier to copy and paste than write it all over again.

[rmiller1959]

We are not alone!

http://www.kentucky.com/2015/09/01/4015 ... vr.it&rh=1

[rmiller1959]

Poll question: Since Coastal has to fill up its FCS transition year schedule in 2016, would they schedule a game against us? Would we be interested?

[flameshaw]

Right not a Privilege to be FBS:
I must have missed this. Who has been saying this? I read this board every day and I don't remember this being an overwhelming or even minor focus of many posters.

With all of that said, I believe I need to address the elephant in the room. That is the perception we (Liberty fans) have in regards to how conferences should view our school. I've been part of this problem too. When Liberty first announced the new facility upgrades, I think we all knew what our aspirations were and that likely in the near future, we would be in a conference much larger than the Big South. As Liberty conducted studies, the sentiment on this board went from not "if" we were going to move to FBS, but when. And thus, many of us started to believe that Liberty being FBS wasn't a privilege but more of a right.

This is evidenced by the number of people who now want to "sue our way into FBS." If we can't get an invite to the party, than we need to try and force our way in anyways! And in my opinion, the idea that we have a right to be FBS is just plain ridiculous. Maybe it's possible that our approach to joining the Sun Belt was the completely wrong approach to take? And maybe it's possible that everything we proud ourselves on, are actually the exact reasons why the Sun Belt doesn't want us?

...

I'm not going to put the blame on Jerry Jr. or Jeff Barber. Despite what I said above, both have done an incredible job taking our school (which was an athletic joke not long ago) and positioning us to even have a chance at an opportunity like this one. However, this idea that we had a "right" to join any conference is just preposterous. If we would have just simply focused on joining the Sun Belt, and not been so focused on "becoming FBS at all costs," I can't help but think that we would have new conference mates by now.

It's the same thing I addressed last year about football success:

2) A Misconception of Who We Are - we try to act big time so people will see us as big time and in turn have created an entitlement issue among athletes and fans.

In 2006, when Jeff Barber got here, he was given an athletic department that was coming off a day known as Black Tuesday. You know something monumental has happened when it is big enough and negative enough to get it's own name. He had some of the core pieces in place from an administrative standpoint, but there was a perception issue among students, alumni, and prospective athletes that said Liberty Athletics weren't a big deal.

Jeff did what any good leader is supposed to do in that situation: he set out to change not only the perception, but also the culture. His goal was to make us a Top 25 athletic department and to get there, we needed top 25 coaches, recruits, and facilities.

Some schools take on the attitude of, "Let me prove it to you." In the beginning, we had that attitude. It was a unifying mantra that inspired coaches and athletes to work harder to prove we were legit. Fans and alumni showed up to prove that we could be a great fan base and could make great atmospheres at games.

Fast forward to the end of the 2009-2010 seasons. We'd won a few conference titles in football. We had a fun year or two in basketball. Baseball was making a run in the Big South. However, we'd also gone through the Curry/McKay debacle. We'd endured a few WTF losses in football. Baseball couldn't beat Coastal. At that point in time, we went from proving why we were a big time program to telling you why we already were one.

And it was at that point the things shifted: we all bought it.

Going into the 2010 season, there was a different attitude around our athletics. We thought we would have success because we were told we would. Without having ever actually gotten over the barrier, we (athletes and fans) believed it was our destiny to make the next step. We became the program that, if this were a high school, were the new kid walking down the hall saying, "Act like you belong, act like you belong. You are big time. You are big time."

]Our school took on the attitude of, "Let me tell you why." In light of that, our athletes and fans bought into the reasons why without it ever being proven to us. We were cocky and expectant even when we had nothing to base those attitudes on.

The truth about who we actually are as an athletic program is that we're a program that's only been Division I for just under 25 years and is still building to become what we want to be. We're not there yet.

That's a ton to read, but it was easier to copy and paste than write it all over again.

A lot of broad-brushing and personal opinion, nothing substantive to back it up. I haven't sensed any of this from the fans and staff that I come in contact with, quite the opposite. You are certainly entitled to your opinion, but it is just that. No more or less valid than any one else.

[SuperJon]

If you go back to the original thread where I posted that, many people on here agreed with that broad bushed opinion. Then again, your perception of most things is the exact opposite of mine. And that's totally okay.

[thepostman]

In all honesty jon I feel like the way you go about these kind of things you place yourself higher than the rest of liberty fans. I get it liberty as a whole does things that annoy you. Me too and I have been around long enough to voice those frustrations on this board but it's always the same tune. Liberty fans are terrible and you are somehow better. I don't get it.

Now granted I may be getting more annoyed by it because of recent events and the real feeling we will be stuck FCS for a long, long time but your "I am not like the rest of them" act had gotten a bit old today.

You are a liberty alum and like it or not by continually talking down about liberty fans wherever you go you do more harm then good.

Just my 2 cents. I love your insight most of the times but it just has been grinding on my nerves lately.

[flameshaw]

If you go back to the original thread where I posted that, many people on here agreed with that broad bushed opinion. Then again, your perception of most things is the exact opposite of mine. And that's totally okay.

And THAT my friend is something we can agree on 100%.

[SuperJon]

In all honesty jon I feel like the way you go about these kind of things you place yourself higher than the rest of liberty fans. I get it liberty as a whole does things that annoy you. Me too and I have been around long enough to voice those frustrations on this board but it's always the same tune. Liberty fans are terrible and you are somehow better. I don't get it.

Now granted I may be getting more annoyed by it because of recent events and the real feeling we will be stuck FCS for a long, long time but your "I am not like the rest of them" act had gotten a bit old today.

You are a liberty alum and like it or not by continually talking down about liberty fans wherever you go you do more harm then good.

Just my 2 cents. I love your insight most of the times but it just has been grinding on my nerves lately.

Everything you said is 100% true.

Edit to add: I do consider myself to be "higher" than the average Liberty fan. For the most part, our fan base is a very ignorant fan base. That doesn't mean they're not passionate or that they aren't enthusiastic. It means that, more often than not, our fans don't know how the process works. They were indoctrinated to the Liberty bubble and have stayed there ever since. Not only were they in the Liberty bubble, but a large portion of our fan base comes from Christian school and home school backgrounds and really have no clue how public schools - especially public universities - operate.

[Rooster Cogburn]

I am around this program a lot. I know a lot of people that work in and around the department and I talk to them often. I don't pick up on the arrogance that is quite often alleged here. I think folks are putting in the work. I think they are trying very hard. Is there talk? sure. Is there an entitlement? not that I see. Talking about wanting to be FBS, working hard to do all you can, and talking about it is not arrogance. It's passion.

All of this is my opinion from my frequent observations and speaking with some very passionate leadership. Things are on the way up, and it's OK to be into that direction.

Please don't tell me how to be a fan.

[thepostman]

In all honesty jon I feel like the way you go about these kind of things you place yourself higher than the rest of liberty fans. I get it liberty as a whole does things that annoy you. Me too and I have been around long enough to voice those frustrations on this board but it's always the same tune. Liberty fans are terrible and you are somehow better. I don't get it.

Now granted I may be getting more annoyed by it because of recent events and the real feeling we will be stuck FCS for a long, long time but your "I am not like the rest of them" act had gotten a bit old today.

You are a liberty alum and like it or not by continually talking down about liberty fans wherever you go you do more harm then good.

Just my 2 cents. I love your insight most of the times but it just has been grinding on my nerves lately.

Everything you said is 100% true.

Edit to add: I do consider myself to be "higher" than the average Liberty fan. For the most part, our fan base is a very ignorant fan base. That doesn't mean they're not passionate or that they aren't enthusiastic. It means that, more often than not, our fans don't know how the process works. They were indoctrinated to the Liberty bubble and have stayed there ever since. Not only were they in the Liberty bubble, but a large portion of our fan base comes from Christian school and home school backgrounds and really have no clue how public schools - especially public universities - operate.

Ok fair enough but most of those people aren't here on this board. Some are but most of us are well aware of how it works and your approach on here at times comes off as arrogant.

I get where you are coming from I really do but I just think that spending more time on here and twitter and wherever else talking down about liberty and their fan base does more harm than good.

[SuperJon]

Ok fair enough but most of those people aren't here on this board. Some are but most of us are well aware of how it works and your approach on here at times comes off as arrogant.

I get where you are coming from I really do but I just think that spending more time on here and twitter and wherever else talking down about liberty and their fan base does more harm than good.

I'm not disagreeing with most of what you said. With that said, many of the things I say are said knowing that there are probably 2-3 times the amount of people reading/lurking FF than there are posting.

The part where I'll disagree is the more harm than good. A random guy on a message board/Twitter doesn't really harm a fan base. People may not like me, what I say, or how I say it, but at the end of the day, it's just the words of a loud mouth opinionated blowhard.

[Purple Haize]

The 'Fan Quotent' has gotten better over the years. I remember people pitching a fit when we started getting stricter about people actually PAYING for tickets. Granted,mother on field product wasn't worth much, but people, even within the Department, were incredulous that we would make people pay instead of just handing out tickets. Now people are paying to join the Flames a Club just to buy certain season tickets
The fans have come a long way, there is a way to go to get to the average FBS schools but we are getting there. We certainly are up there in terms of FCS schools. IMO, as that continues the old school sense of entitlement that SJ accurately talks about will dissipate

[Yacht Rock]

I do consider myself to be "higher" than the average Liberty fan. For the most part, our fan base is a very ignorant fan base.

So are you saying most of our fans are ignorant?

Can you give some examples how the majority of the fan base is ignorant beyond being critical of their upbringing?

[01LUGrad]

Coastal is in and we aren't because of 2 obvious reasons:
1. Coastal was tired of being smoked by our track and cross country teams.
2. The Sun Belt was afraid of what Coastal was tired of.

/thread

[Yacht Rock]

The 'Fan Quotent' has gotten better over the years. I remember people pitching a fit when we started getting stricter about people actually PAYING for tickets. Granted,mother on field product wasn't worth much, but people, even within the Department, were incredulous that we would make people pay instead of just handing out tickets. Now people are paying to join the Flames a Club just to buy certain season tickets
The fans have come a long way, there is a way to go to get to the average FBS schools but we are getting there. We certainly are up there in terms of FCS schools. IMO, as that continues the old school sense of entitlement that SJ accurately talks about will dissipate

As a relative newcomer to the area and new fan of Liberty Flames I can say that the LU fans I've interacted with since moving out here have been on par with the average sports fan I've interacted with before coming to Liberty.

One thing to remember is that there are a lot of schools that simply have a huge head start on us when it comes to the evolution of their fanbase. As PH says, still room to grow, but certainly nothing to be ashamed of.

[SuperJon]

I do consider myself to be "higher" than the average Liberty fan. For the most part, our fan base is a very ignorant fan base.

So are you saying most of our fans are ignorant?

Can you give some examples how the majority of the fan base is ignorant beyond being critical of their upbringing?

The easiest example is the amount of times we had to tell people that it wasn't possible to move to FBS as an independent. Our fans were ignorant of the rules in place.

Also, I wasn't critical of Christian school or homeschool upbringing. I was pointing out a fact that has led to why our fans may know less about how things work than your typical school.

[Yacht Rock]

I do consider myself to be "higher" than the average Liberty fan. For the most part, our fan base is a very ignorant fan base.

So are you saying most of our fans are ignorant?

Can you give some examples how the majority of the fan base is ignorant beyond being critical of their upbringing?

The easiest example is the amount of times we had to tell people that it wasn't possible to move to FBS as an independent. Our fans were ignorant of the rules in place.

Also, I wasn't critical of Christian school or homeschool upbringing. I was pointing out a fact that has led to why our fans may know less about how things work than your typical school.

I must have missed the class in my public high school that taught NCAA bylaws.