And So It Begins - The Attempt to Drag ND back to Mediocrity
Subject: Uh oh: We\'re back! You know how you know?
Body of Message:
BECAUSE OUR CRITICS ARE TELLING US WE\'VE SOLD OUR SOULS!
Whenever ND gets back in the game big time the critics come out and claim we\'ve sold our souls for football glory.
It\'s important to know what this is. It is nothing more than to get ND to stop being aggressive. The critics absolutely loved Monk because they knew they could throw a criticism out there and it would hobble ND.
I can only hope, after watching my school for decades, and from a deep knowledge of our collective history, that this administration will not be cowed by this type of empty criticsm.
Now, to specifically answer some of his points. I saw absolutely nothing wrong with the Zibby boxing adventure. Rockne, without doubt, would have LOVED it. Knute was all about publicity, spectacle, New York, etc. If Rockne were behind this, I guarantee that the pub would have been louder and more sustained. He would have been at the fight as well. As for boxing in general, Rockne started the Bengal Bouts for crying out loud!
There was nothing wrong with the amatuerism either. An empty bogus point. The whole thing was extensively vetted by the NCAA. They had ZERO problem with it.
The Clausen thing was over the top. There was nothing wrong with it, but it was cheesy. We probably deserve a little crap for that.
This is a nothing point. However, the thing we have to watch when articles like this is not what others think; it\'s how the ND admin reacts. In the past this was all it took to for them to go into shell. If there is to be a return to championship form, that can not be the response as Charlie wins and, inevitably, provokes the ire of those that certainly do not have ND\'s best interests at heart.
Frankly, I hate this Couch guy. I identified him as a NDHater during the whole Willingham thing. He was consistenly critical of ND and was consistently biased.
ND becoming all it once was against
June 18, 2006
BY GREG COUCH SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
That Tom Zbikowski fight at Madison Square Garden was quite a show. Well, not the fight. But the buildup! He entered the ring through a gauntlet of his teammates in their Notre Dame jerseys. His warmup read, "Fight Like a Champion Today,'' playing off the famed Irish football sign "Play Like a Champion Today.'' And gospel singer BeBe Winans sang the Notre Dame fight song.
This is certainly something new, Notre Dame football cross-promoting with the world of professional boxing. That's Irish football, the tasteful example of U.S. amateur football, in the same world with Don King. Or, in this case, Bob Arum.
Something is changing at Notre Dame, and nothing happens there without the stamp of coach Charlie Weis, who sang "Take Me Out to the Ball Game'' on Tuesday at Wrigley Field. Notre Dame used to put itself above self-promotion and manufactured hype, above what everyone else does. Now, it is becoming one of the gang.
You can look at that one of two ways: Either Weis has moved Notre Dame into the modern era, or he has become a carnival barker just like everyone else. This certainly will help Notre Dame with recruiting, but it's also a little sad. It was nice having someone, especially the face of the sport, holding itself to a higher standard. But the Irish were a little out of touch.
Still, in the last few months, they have crossed over the line into bad taste at times. At other times, they stepped right up to the line and danced around it.
What have we seen? A high school recruit, Jimmy Clausen, held a news conference at the College Football Hall of Fame, arriving in a stretch white Hummer with an entourage and a police escort, to announce that he would play at Notre Dame.
We saw athletic-department officials send letters to several national football writers inviting them to sit down with quarterback Brady Quinn. And while it was done without gimmick, it was clearly a way of kicking off a Heisman Trophy campaign. Everyone runs Heisman campaigns of some sort. Notre Dame used to think that was tasteless.
We saw Weis singing at Wrigley, which was fine. And what did you make of the hype surrounding Zbikowski's fight, a quick knockout victory?
In all, it's nothing gaudy, other than the stretch Hummer. But Notre Dame used to sniff at anyone who did things like this. And while that always looked to be a little arrogant, it also was classy.
But it had to be clear to Weis that the Notre Dame mystique thing wasn't working the way it used to. It's still there, but 16-year-old recruits today can't be expected to know much about Notre Dame's grand history. And while having its own TV network, NBC, is a big sales pitch, Notre Dame had fallen behind Florida, Florida State and maybe even Miami, not to mention USC and Texas, in the eyes of recruits. These guys make big fusses, big shows about everything.
Meanwhile, Notre Dame has obvious advantages, from national TV games to movies made about its heroes, and Weis apparently decided to put Rudy back to work. Well, that's not quite right. That would be a way of playing on the old name. Weis moved up with modern stuff, including flashy news conferences for high school kids.
The problem is that when you decide to mud-wrestle with your opponents, you have to be careful not to get dirty.
The Zbikowski fight pushed the line. It's hard not to like his wholesome story, about a suburban Chicago kid who is growing up to be a football star at Notre Dame. He passed the firefighting test recently. And here he was, a proven amateur fighter, in his pro debut. He got Weis' approval before agreeing to the fight.
This was within NCAA rules, but it still pushed the principles of amateurism. I know that Zbikowski is allowed, under NCAA rules, to be a professional in one sport and an amateur in another. His pro boxing career, though, should be conducted separately from his amateur football career at Notre Dame.
But how many people get a top flight promoter, Arum, and have their pro debut at Madison Square Garden? Come on, Zbikowski was there because he is a Notre Dame football star. Sure, he had a good amateur boxing career. But all that hype and a first fight that happens to be at the most storied fight venue in America?
Now, Zbikowski apparently is looking to be on a championship card for his next pro fight, in February in Las Vegas.
Look, I don't begrudge this guy a chance to get his career started. But be realistic about what he was there: a Notre Dame football player. But, hey, he was cleared, and he took advantage of it.
Nothing happens at Notre Dame without Weis. He is, after all, the ringmaster.
Letters to our sports columnists appear Sunday. Send e-mail to inbox@suntimes.com. Include your full name, hometown and a daytime phone number.
Copyright © The Sun-Times Company
Body of Message:
BECAUSE OUR CRITICS ARE TELLING US WE\'VE SOLD OUR SOULS!
Whenever ND gets back in the game big time the critics come out and claim we\'ve sold our souls for football glory.
It\'s important to know what this is. It is nothing more than to get ND to stop being aggressive. The critics absolutely loved Monk because they knew they could throw a criticism out there and it would hobble ND.
I can only hope, after watching my school for decades, and from a deep knowledge of our collective history, that this administration will not be cowed by this type of empty criticsm.
Now, to specifically answer some of his points. I saw absolutely nothing wrong with the Zibby boxing adventure. Rockne, without doubt, would have LOVED it. Knute was all about publicity, spectacle, New York, etc. If Rockne were behind this, I guarantee that the pub would have been louder and more sustained. He would have been at the fight as well. As for boxing in general, Rockne started the Bengal Bouts for crying out loud!
There was nothing wrong with the amatuerism either. An empty bogus point. The whole thing was extensively vetted by the NCAA. They had ZERO problem with it.
The Clausen thing was over the top. There was nothing wrong with it, but it was cheesy. We probably deserve a little crap for that.
This is a nothing point. However, the thing we have to watch when articles like this is not what others think; it\'s how the ND admin reacts. In the past this was all it took to for them to go into shell. If there is to be a return to championship form, that can not be the response as Charlie wins and, inevitably, provokes the ire of those that certainly do not have ND\'s best interests at heart.
Frankly, I hate this Couch guy. I identified him as a NDHater during the whole Willingham thing. He was consistenly critical of ND and was consistently biased.
ND becoming all it once was against
June 18, 2006
BY GREG COUCH SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
That Tom Zbikowski fight at Madison Square Garden was quite a show. Well, not the fight. But the buildup! He entered the ring through a gauntlet of his teammates in their Notre Dame jerseys. His warmup read, "Fight Like a Champion Today,'' playing off the famed Irish football sign "Play Like a Champion Today.'' And gospel singer BeBe Winans sang the Notre Dame fight song.
This is certainly something new, Notre Dame football cross-promoting with the world of professional boxing. That's Irish football, the tasteful example of U.S. amateur football, in the same world with Don King. Or, in this case, Bob Arum.
Something is changing at Notre Dame, and nothing happens there without the stamp of coach Charlie Weis, who sang "Take Me Out to the Ball Game'' on Tuesday at Wrigley Field. Notre Dame used to put itself above self-promotion and manufactured hype, above what everyone else does. Now, it is becoming one of the gang.
You can look at that one of two ways: Either Weis has moved Notre Dame into the modern era, or he has become a carnival barker just like everyone else. This certainly will help Notre Dame with recruiting, but it's also a little sad. It was nice having someone, especially the face of the sport, holding itself to a higher standard. But the Irish were a little out of touch.
Still, in the last few months, they have crossed over the line into bad taste at times. At other times, they stepped right up to the line and danced around it.
What have we seen? A high school recruit, Jimmy Clausen, held a news conference at the College Football Hall of Fame, arriving in a stretch white Hummer with an entourage and a police escort, to announce that he would play at Notre Dame.
We saw athletic-department officials send letters to several national football writers inviting them to sit down with quarterback Brady Quinn. And while it was done without gimmick, it was clearly a way of kicking off a Heisman Trophy campaign. Everyone runs Heisman campaigns of some sort. Notre Dame used to think that was tasteless.
We saw Weis singing at Wrigley, which was fine. And what did you make of the hype surrounding Zbikowski's fight, a quick knockout victory?
In all, it's nothing gaudy, other than the stretch Hummer. But Notre Dame used to sniff at anyone who did things like this. And while that always looked to be a little arrogant, it also was classy.
But it had to be clear to Weis that the Notre Dame mystique thing wasn't working the way it used to. It's still there, but 16-year-old recruits today can't be expected to know much about Notre Dame's grand history. And while having its own TV network, NBC, is a big sales pitch, Notre Dame had fallen behind Florida, Florida State and maybe even Miami, not to mention USC and Texas, in the eyes of recruits. These guys make big fusses, big shows about everything.
Meanwhile, Notre Dame has obvious advantages, from national TV games to movies made about its heroes, and Weis apparently decided to put Rudy back to work. Well, that's not quite right. That would be a way of playing on the old name. Weis moved up with modern stuff, including flashy news conferences for high school kids.
The problem is that when you decide to mud-wrestle with your opponents, you have to be careful not to get dirty.
The Zbikowski fight pushed the line. It's hard not to like his wholesome story, about a suburban Chicago kid who is growing up to be a football star at Notre Dame. He passed the firefighting test recently. And here he was, a proven amateur fighter, in his pro debut. He got Weis' approval before agreeing to the fight.
This was within NCAA rules, but it still pushed the principles of amateurism. I know that Zbikowski is allowed, under NCAA rules, to be a professional in one sport and an amateur in another. His pro boxing career, though, should be conducted separately from his amateur football career at Notre Dame.
But how many people get a top flight promoter, Arum, and have their pro debut at Madison Square Garden? Come on, Zbikowski was there because he is a Notre Dame football star. Sure, he had a good amateur boxing career. But all that hype and a first fight that happens to be at the most storied fight venue in America?
Now, Zbikowski apparently is looking to be on a championship card for his next pro fight, in February in Las Vegas.
Look, I don't begrudge this guy a chance to get his career started. But be realistic about what he was there: a Notre Dame football player. But, hey, he was cleared, and he took advantage of it.
Nothing happens at Notre Dame without Weis. He is, after all, the ringmaster.
Letters to our sports columnists appear Sunday. Send e-mail to inbox@suntimes.com. Include your full name, hometown and a daytime phone number.
Copyright © The Sun-Times Company
posted by Rocket at 11:53 PM
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