A-B-C-D-E-F-G! ...... Won't you come and play with me?
When the Big 12 collegiate athletic conference invited TCU to join them as a replacement school for the departing Texas A&M yesterday, it really came as no big surprise. Over the past 14-15 years, TCU has done everything in the world it needed to do to build favor with the big boy schools that control things in this neck of the collegiate sports world. They had hired successful effective coaches, they had vastly improved their facilities, and they had proven their ability in football against top-flight competition. And along the way, they had turned a healthy profit, become a popular television player, and they had coalesced a supporting cast of power structure and political culture characters to direct and run interference for TCU on their way back to a first tier level BCS conference affiliation.
Today the Houston Post published a Department of Education report on 2009 football income at ten Texas universities. This bottom line tells the story pretty plainly. Look at the figures:
- Texas $93.9 million
- Texas A&M $41.9 million
- Texas Tech $26.2 million
- TCU $20.6 million
- Baylor $14.4 million
- SMU $12.5 million
- Rice $12.4 million
- UTEP $9.5 million
- Houston $7.5 million
- North Texas $4.3 million
As the dollar signs show, the University of Houston, my university, is on a later track to the same hoped-for destiny. UH is simply behind TCU on the capital improvements, record on the field, and the development of sociopolitical socko-squad backing for successful arm-twisting among the big boy decision-makers of Tier One college sports. We will get there. We just have to keep working at it. You don’t get the serious attention of a green-eyed monster like Athletic Director DeLoss Dodds of UT until you can hit him in the head with a payday that offends his most egregious fear of loss as an offer he cannot refuse.
That’s how far UH is from getting any positive support from UT that could possibly stack up and outweigh that school’s historic contempt, disdain, and regret over ever allowing UH into the old Southwest Conference in the first place back in 1976. We of UH do not count on UT ever coming around to our benefit. UH can only rise where UT has no power to prevent UH’s ascent. That says it clearly. UH must do all we are able to do to rise in spite of all that UT may do to actively or passively undermine our UH redemption.
Our University of Houston official slogan serves us well. – “In Time.”
In time, we will get there to Tier One in academics and athletics. It simply isn’t going to be now or anytime soon. And there may not even be a thing called the Big 12 by the time we get there. Those of us who can help at any level simply need to keep doing what we are able to support the Cougar Cause.
It’s a family thing.
The Pecan Park Eagle 
October 7, 2011 at 2:42 pm |
Though it seems that UH should jump at any AQ invite, I still hold out for the prospect that there are enough non-AQ schools that will be able to unify in terms of political clout on the national stage in conjunction w/ Congress to forestall any attempt to leave out schools such as UH, San Diego St., Coloroado St., Nevada, UNLV, Boise, Army etc., from being denied the chance to ultimately be a part of a playoff system which ultimately has to come to be.
As such, I almost prefer the continued instability w/ other feelers still out there, as opposed to being in a league with Texas and the goodwill that they extend to all competitors in every circumstance on and off the field.
October 7, 2011 at 11:18 pm |
UT will block UH forever. Deloss Dodds will never forget the dangerous temporary seats UH set up for UT fans the last time UT agreed to play in Roberson “Field” Cougar fan behavior and running up scores with the chuck and duck that never wins championships were ok in the SWC but UH’s cheapness with those temporary seats did you guys in. Plus the Big 12 flat out doesn’t need UH or Rice for Houston recruiting purposes. UT has more alums in Houston than all the UH and Rice alums combined. Sorry guys. You’ll have to eat em up in a minor conference for awhile longer.
October 7, 2011 at 11:55 pm |
Wayne:
At UH, we have no delusions about UT ever aiding anyone other than themselves and that’s OK too, but let’s get the dangerous temp stands at Robertson story straight. First of all, they were unfit from the start, but when UH decided to cancel their use because they could not pass safety inspections, Texas (Dodds) wanted UH to move the game to the Astrodome for additional seating. UH refused in preference to keeping the game at home, as they had a right to do. I’m not saying that was the greatest decision that UH could have made, but that was the reason that UT AD Dodds became our full-time enemy. Most, if not all of the lost seats in the condemned temporary stands had belonged to UT ticket-buyers. I don’t blame UT for that one. It was a big mess that was handled badly – but it wasn’t because we were trying to make anyone sit in unsafe seating. It was because we wouldn’t move the game to accommodate the UT fans who lost their seats to a bad plan.
I still say that UH going into Austin in 1976 and whipping UT 30-0 in their first first SWC season – and in the final year of Darrell Royal – was the real start of UT’s unhappiness with UH – and UH going to the Cotton Bowl in three of their first four SWC seasons didn’t help much either.
I also agree with you that the Big 12 doesn’t need UH or Rice to tap the Houston market, but I will add that neither UH or Rice needs UT to achieve Tier One status in either academics or athletics. Without your UT treasure chests and connections, it will just take us longer in some areas.
UT will play UH again someday – when they have no choice.
October 8, 2011 at 1:28 am |
Dear Wayne,
Please be specific as to UH “fan behaviour”. Consensus on the street is that UT fans are the worst of all. That’s been my personal experience, and that of fans from many other schools other than UH.
This assertion that UH ran up scores was foremost in the minds of UT fans when they were on the bad end of that equation during that time, and didn’t have much of an offense at all. But it hasn’t seemed to bother the orangebloods at other times when they could run up the score. It’s just that the UT influenced media dare not lay that charge at UT’s feet, being the great institution thay are w/o ever having felt the wrath of NCAA penalties (though they have had an ongoing series of criminal activities among UT football players for several years now), but they were comfortable in laying that charge at UH when they had nothing else to do but detract from UH’s success.
It did seem convenient to put the blame on the chasm between UH and UT on the bleachergate incident, but I think that was just an excuse to avoid a program that has long been the truest threat to UT, and that will continue to be. A look at the series records, but for the five years from 1991 to 1996 will support that contention, and the same can be said for basketball.
October 9, 2011 at 1:52 am |
First the UH 30-0 win was a great game for UH; no one I know ever held that against UH. The problem came when UH started running up the scores on opponents. Specifically, when UH beat UT at the Dome one year in a blowout, I forget the year, Cougar fans were shouting obscenities and throwing beer cups at UT fans trying to exit the Dome. My wife and I were both assaulted by beer cans tossed by UH fans in the Dome parking lot. The behaviour was well covered in the Austin media when we got back the next day. UH fan behaviour became less of an issue when the tide turned and UH couldn’t draw fans to any games. Frankly, UH-UT games in the Dome were always more UT home games because the Cougar “fans” couldn’t buy up the tickets. Unrelated, was the blowup at the end of Yeoman’s period with the NCAA investigations revealing team sanctioned abortions for UH football player girlfriends. That went over well all over the rest of the conference. That and John Jenkins pretty much gave the UH program a reputation as classless. UT does not run up the scores like Stoops does orJenkins did. Yeoman is the jerk who ran up 100 on Tulsa around 1968, not UT. Isolated criminal incidents with the players does not equate to NCAA sanctions. Abortions paid for by UH staff and rapes in OU dorms far and away exceed the dwi and pot arrests of the several UT players. Yes, UT fan behaviour got very bad during the Malkovic years (for no good reason given their record). When Mack Brown came in UT made a concerted effort, and still does, at keeping fan behaviour in check. As a season ticket holder for over 30 years, I witnessed many events at Memorial Stadium that were embarrassing, but it no longer occurs. However, it takes a long time to get rid of the memories. The real reason for everyone hating UT is we kick everyone’s rear, most of the time, except for OU, of late. Also, for the record, my vote for most classless in the region is Texas Tech with those stupid tortillas tossings. OU fans spit. I’ve not enjoyed that experience either, but at least OU fans can generally read.
October 12, 2011 at 5:24 pm |
Let’s face it—UT and UH hate each other (the nature of Dogs and Cats). UT has always stuck it’s nose up at UH. I remember they use to call us “Cougar High”. I have followed UH since 1965, when I was freshman at UH. High school friends that went to UT always looked down on UH. If you remember, Bill Yeoman was the first Texas coach to recruit Black Athletes—Warren McVea. Darell Royal didn’t want to recruit Blacks.
October 12, 2011 at 10:28 pm |
Darrell Royal wasn’t the one who kept UT from recruiting Blacks but I will concur that the delay was shameful. For the record, I’ve never turned my nose up at UH, y’all are just so easy to get riled up, just like the goofy Aggies. Y’all got hosed when the Big 12 was formed but it was a combination of your behavior during the Jenkins era so one wanted to come to your aid and then that gawdawful Ann Richards did you in, along with Bullock. Baylor whined so much that they got in when they had no business. Face it, you haven’t had a powerful legislator looking out for you since Bill Hobby. Tech has had decades of clout which shows up in the special item appropriations. Frankly, UT and A&M don’t do well in the Legislature compared to Tech. Without going into the history of the PUF since 1969, take my word that Tech, Tech HSC, UT Southwestern in Dallas, and TAM-International or the ones who get porked on an ongoing basis. The Houston delegation has done squat for UH and the Austin delegation does less for Hook ’em High.