Ken Suguira writes:
As Papp and Dooley roused the student body in Kennesaw, raising black helmets with the school logo, the regents met at a retreat in Cartersville, where a staffer informed them of the announcement. It came as a surprise to many of them, and the initial reaction was less than arms raised in a touchdown signal. Regent Don Leebern worried that a team would be a “misdirection of funds” away from the university’s academic mission. Regent Rich Tucker hoped Papp didn’t set a date for starting a team, unaware that Papp had provided 2014 as a possible start.
“We don’t need to be backed into a decision based on some public outcry,” Tucker said. “I would like to know what they want to accomplish on this. I don’t have an opinion. I just want to be able to weigh in on it before they get too far down the road.”
If this announcement “came as a surprise” to anyone, particularly anyone who has presumably spent time on campus in the past GOSH five years or so, you’d begin to wonder about that person’s perception and attentiveness.
I’m not saying they’re wrong or even commenting on any of that at all. It does sound like Papp, Dooley & Co. have put the regents on the spot, challenging them to either OK the school’s participation in the greatest sport God ever invented or surround their ivory towers with moats and those loudspeakers that disperse riot crowds. This sounds like a smart move to me by Team Football because it means I get to go to $4 football games across the street from a PGA Tour Superstore with an oceanic parking lot. #focus