Gianinni to step down as AD at USM effective this week...
- Thread starter Beretta.sixpack
- Start date
He needed to be fired long before the bowl fiasco. That was just the last straw. He did some decent things while at USM like upgrading the baseball and football facilities, hiring Berry and Fedora, etc. But he also flew the coup on a million different things. For instance, he just gave Eustacy a raise and extension
It isn't hard. The AD has the power and final say in bowl decisions. Point blank is that, in the end, it isn't the head coaches job to make. What Giannini should have said is, "what are you smoking? we just beat #6 and you want us to go play Nevada? We are going to play penn state and get another win under our belt and to hell with the sex scandal stuff. I am not giving you a free ride to Hawaii when I have heard that you might go somewhere else". Any AD with any gonads at all would see that going to play Nevada was not in our schools best interest short or long term. And please make no mistake. this was not a 'stepping down'. The president fired his butt and told him to quit gracefully or be kicked out to the street.Bigohh said:
Dear Athletic Foundation Board members & Circle of Champions,
Please
allow me to explain what has transpired in the last two or three days
and the details of the decision making process that concluded with our
accepting a bid to the Sheraton Bowl in Hawaii. I am aware that the
issue has created much controversy and I offer you this message in a
spirit of wanting you to understand the factors that led to our final
decision.
First and foremost, we congratulate our football team
for winning the C-USA Championship. The Championship Game was a totally
dominating victory over an undefeated, nationally ranked team with a
top Heisman Trophy candidate. It was the 11th victory of the season for
the Golden Eagles, the most wins of any team in Southern Miss history.
Several
years ago when all bowls were renegotiating their agreements for a new
four year cycle, the Auto Zone Liberty Bowl, the bowl the C-USA Champion
has played in since 1996, voted to include the SEC as a bowl
participant. The only arrangement C-USA was offered was to play in the
Liberty Bowl against a Big East team IF the SEC had 8 bowl eligible
teams. However, if the SEC had nine bowl eligible teams, an SEC team,
would play a Big East team in the Liberty Bowl. If the SEC had 10 bowl
eligible teams, then C-USA would play an SEC steam in the Liberty Bowl.
This year the SEC had nine bowl eligible teams and thus by contract,
C-USA could not play in the Liberty Bowl. The Conference-USA AD's,
coaches, and conference staff were not pleased with this arrangement
and looked for alternatives. It was unanimously decided Conference-USA
did not want to send our champion to New Orleans to play the Sun Belt,
or Mobile to play the Mid American Champion. At the time of our
negotiations the St. Pete Bowl was just getting started and the Ticket
City Bowl in Dallas was non-existent. Conference-USA AD's and football
coaches also felt the Armed Forces Bowl in Ft. Worth playing against
the Mountain West third place team was not a good choice. The Sheraton
Hawaii Bowl became available long term when the PAC 10 could not fill
the slot. Conference USA coaches and AD's then voted unanimously, that
if we were forced to vacate the Liberty Bowl, the Hawaii option would
be a great reward and recruiting tool for the C-USA champion. If
Tennessee had defeated Vanderbilt, which they had for 26 years or
Georgia had defeated LSU, we would have played in the Liberty Bowl.
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Larry
Fedora and I had several discussions over the course of the last two
weeks about our bowl options. He indicated to me if the team could not
go to the Liberty Bowl, he wanted to take the team to Hawaii.</span> We
discussed all available options and knew as C-USA champions, we could
choose our bowl location with the exception of the Liberty Bowl. Last
week, before the Houston game, Coach Fedora told me the team was
starting to talk about their disappointment that Southern Miss could not
go to the Liberty Bowl. He then told the team he did not want to talk
about any bowls and their only concern should be the bowl in Houston
last Saturday for the C-USA title.
In a last ditch effort I
worked with the C-USA office to see if other arrangements could be made
to allow Southern Miss to play in the Liberty Bowl. As late as 3 pm
Sunday an effort to move Vanderbilt to the Birmingham Bowl and place
Southern Miss in the Liberty Bowl was discussed and offered. I
personally had a conversation with the SEC and they were okay with the
switch, but Vanderbilt was not in agreement with the move to Birmingham.
<span style="font-weight: bold;">On a second thought in the process, I knew almost every college
football team looking for a new coach would come after Larry. I knew he
would have an opportunity to vastly increase his salary and move to a
league on the level of the ACC, Big 12, SEC or PAC 12. We were looking
for ways to keep him as a Golden Eagle. If we were going to have the
turmoil that always surrounds a coaching change, I felt we were better
off playing the game before Christmas in Hawaii and being home on
Christmas Day during this unstable period. If we were faced with the
challenge of recruiting a new coach playing early in the Bowl Season
would be to our advantage, as it would be less disruptive to our
football team for them to play in Hawaii with the current coaching
staff. Moreover, it would be a trip of a life time and a fitting
reward for the players. </span><br style="font-weight: bold;">
Coach Fedora in four years has done what
we asked. He has graduated our student-athletes and won the C-USA
Championship. Larry has been both a players and fan coach. He and his
coaches have done a phenomenal job in recruiting and the future for many
championships is in place. I live every day with Coach Fedora and his
staff and I hope he would remain a Golden Eagle forever. However, we all
know the coaching cycles. Bobby Collins and Curly Hullman left Southern
Miss. Even Urban Meyer left Florida after two National Championships.
I
would hope our Board of Directors and major donors would rally around
the program. If you have questions, please call me. I have always
appreciated the wonderful support and generous contributions you have
made to the Golden Eagle program and look forward to your continued
support of Southern Miss Athletics.
RG
Please
allow me to explain what has transpired in the last two or three days
and the details of the decision making process that concluded with our
accepting a bid to the Sheraton Bowl in Hawaii. I am aware that the
issue has created much controversy and I offer you this message in a
spirit of wanting you to understand the factors that led to our final
decision.
First and foremost, we congratulate our football team
for winning the C-USA Championship. The Championship Game was a totally
dominating victory over an undefeated, nationally ranked team with a
top Heisman Trophy candidate. It was the 11th victory of the season for
the Golden Eagles, the most wins of any team in Southern Miss history.
Several
years ago when all bowls were renegotiating their agreements for a new
four year cycle, the Auto Zone Liberty Bowl, the bowl the C-USA Champion
has played in since 1996, voted to include the SEC as a bowl
participant. The only arrangement C-USA was offered was to play in the
Liberty Bowl against a Big East team IF the SEC had 8 bowl eligible
teams. However, if the SEC had nine bowl eligible teams, an SEC team,
would play a Big East team in the Liberty Bowl. If the SEC had 10 bowl
eligible teams, then C-USA would play an SEC steam in the Liberty Bowl.
This year the SEC had nine bowl eligible teams and thus by contract,
C-USA could not play in the Liberty Bowl. The Conference-USA AD's,
coaches, and conference staff were not pleased with this arrangement
and looked for alternatives. It was unanimously decided Conference-USA
did not want to send our champion to New Orleans to play the Sun Belt,
or Mobile to play the Mid American Champion. At the time of our
negotiations the St. Pete Bowl was just getting started and the Ticket
City Bowl in Dallas was non-existent. Conference-USA AD's and football
coaches also felt the Armed Forces Bowl in Ft. Worth playing against
the Mountain West third place team was not a good choice. The Sheraton
Hawaii Bowl became available long term when the PAC 10 could not fill
the slot. Conference USA coaches and AD's then voted unanimously, that
if we were forced to vacate the Liberty Bowl, the Hawaii option would
be a great reward and recruiting tool for the C-USA champion. If
Tennessee had defeated Vanderbilt, which they had for 26 years or
Georgia had defeated LSU, we would have played in the Liberty Bowl.
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Larry
Fedora and I had several discussions over the course of the last two
weeks about our bowl options. He indicated to me if the team could not
go to the Liberty Bowl, he wanted to take the team to Hawaii.</span> We
discussed all available options and knew as C-USA champions, we could
choose our bowl location with the exception of the Liberty Bowl. Last
week, before the Houston game, Coach Fedora told me the team was
starting to talk about their disappointment that Southern Miss could not
go to the Liberty Bowl. He then told the team he did not want to talk
about any bowls and their only concern should be the bowl in Houston
last Saturday for the C-USA title.
In a last ditch effort I
worked with the C-USA office to see if other arrangements could be made
to allow Southern Miss to play in the Liberty Bowl. As late as 3 pm
Sunday an effort to move Vanderbilt to the Birmingham Bowl and place
Southern Miss in the Liberty Bowl was discussed and offered. I
personally had a conversation with the SEC and they were okay with the
switch, but Vanderbilt was not in agreement with the move to Birmingham.
<span style="font-weight: bold;">On a second thought in the process, I knew almost every college
football team looking for a new coach would come after Larry. I knew he
would have an opportunity to vastly increase his salary and move to a
league on the level of the ACC, Big 12, SEC or PAC 12. We were looking
for ways to keep him as a Golden Eagle. If we were going to have the
turmoil that always surrounds a coaching change, I felt we were better
off playing the game before Christmas in Hawaii and being home on
Christmas Day during this unstable period. If we were faced with the
challenge of recruiting a new coach playing early in the Bowl Season
would be to our advantage, as it would be less disruptive to our
football team for them to play in Hawaii with the current coaching
staff. Moreover, it would be a trip of a life time and a fitting
reward for the players. </span><br style="font-weight: bold;">
Coach Fedora in four years has done what
we asked. He has graduated our student-athletes and won the C-USA
Championship. Larry has been both a players and fan coach. He and his
coaches have done a phenomenal job in recruiting and the future for many
championships is in place. I live every day with Coach Fedora and his
staff and I hope he would remain a Golden Eagle forever. However, we all
know the coaching cycles. Bobby Collins and Curly Hullman left Southern
Miss. Even Urban Meyer left Florida after two National Championships.
I
would hope our Board of Directors and major donors would rally around
the program. If you have questions, please call me. I have always
appreciated the wonderful support and generous contributions you have
made to the Golden Eagle program and look forward to your continued
support of Southern Miss Athletics.
RG
level division. The conference they're in is falling apart and apparently they have no offers to move sideways...much less an upgrade...AND South Alabama could take their place which would be an upgrade for them...and they will of course start moving in on Mississippi Southern's recruiting territory.
we are not moving down. That is nuts. We are merging to form one conference with MWC. This year we have 6 bowl teams (Wyoming, Air Force, Nevada, So Miss, Tulsa, Marshall), in hoops we will have at least 4 bids this year (Memphis, Marshall, New Mexico, UNLV) and in baseball we will get at least 4 to 5 bids with these (Tulane, So Miss, East Carolina, Rice, Fresno State). 8 teams in each side of the conference and actually just as good or better than what we had with SMU (first good couple of years in football in 30 years and NO hoops or baseball worth a chit), Houston (See last year without keenam, sucks in hoops, and baseball has gone down the last few years), and UCF (one decent one bad year every other year in football, o.k. hoops, and o.k. baseball). We will be fine.
being in an entirely new conference all over again. New conference patches for everyone's uniform ... aGAIN !!!11!111
It'll be great fun never really knowing what your schedule will look like. Kind of like living with a dementia patient. "What conference are we in again?" "Where are we going?"
It'll be great fun never really knowing what your schedule will look like. Kind of like living with a dementia patient. "What conference are we in again?" "Where are we going?"
Herein lies the problem for Hardy High. Where in the hell is the money to pay a new ad and head coach going to come from? You got Memphis and Tulane both out throwing money for a football coach and the Hardy High. Not looking good for them.</p>
We are in position to spend close to the $1 million mark if needed. Dykes at LT makes 400k for instance. The program is in much better condition now than it was when we hired Fedora for 700k. We can get a coach...that I'm not worried about. Its the boneheaded school officials in charge that worry me. Thank goodness the main one is out the door now.TheGodFather said:
With the Big East losing West Virginia, Syracuse and Pittsburgh and only getting Boise, SDSU, SMU, UCF and Houston...the CUSA and MWC merger actually looks about on par. The competition CUSA teams had to play have gotten marginally better while the Big East... is about the same, but maybe just a little worse.<div>
</div><div>The tv markets are really the only things that will even separate these conferences and that's really sad if you ask me.</div>
</div><div>The tv markets are really the only things that will even separate these conferences and that's really sad if you ask me.</div>
But if you look at it, Boise is losing 18 starters this year. And Idaho is not a place you're ever going to be able to consistently recruit good player to. See this tweet from Ohio's punter after they wound up in whatever bowl game is played in Boise.
Try living there in December, and January, and February. Boise is going to just what Marshall and Hawaii did after they got a national name. Fall back to their natural level.
This may sound funny, but I really believe that in the long run.. the CUSA/MWC merger will actually last longer than the Big East especially if Connecticut and maybe one other (Louisville? Rutgers?) jumps ship to the ACC. The Big East will pretty much only be a basketball conference with all of their relevant football teams gone to other conferences.<div>
</div><div>By that point, however, I'm not even sure if the merged conference will even have a BCS bid since I'm willing to bet that we're seeing the last few years of the BCS, and by that point, it may already be dead. Which makes me wonder if all of this conference realignment wasinevitablyfor naught.</div>
</div><div>By that point, however, I'm not even sure if the merged conference will even have a BCS bid since I'm willing to bet that we're seeing the last few years of the BCS, and by that point, it may already be dead. Which makes me wonder if all of this conference realignment wasinevitablyfor naught.</div>
We do not know how good we have it here in the SEC. Could you imagine going to New Mexico, Wyoming, Nevada and Fresno State every other year for a conference game.
talk about not having fans travel- . And a lot of our fans won't even go to Lexington KY because they say it is too far.
We have it good here in the SEC.
talk about not having fans travel- . And a lot of our fans won't even go to Lexington KY because they say it is too far.
We have it good here in the SEC.
But it won't be so convenient in the SEC next year with A&M and Missouri in the mix. It will be especially hard for those two schools' fans to travel to most of their games ... I guess Arkansas is reasonably close to both but that's about it. Can you imagine being a Missouri fan and going to a game in Gainsville, or vice versa?<div>
</div><div>Several years ago Georgia Tech's bowl game was in Boise on the blue field. Not very many fans made the trip ... minor bowl and a long trip to an outdoor game in the Arctic.</div><div>
</div><div>And if our bowl was a long way away, I wouldn't go ... unless it was a BCS bowl or for the NC. I might make some sacrifices then, but not for a regular season game or a minor bowl.</div>
</div><div>Several years ago Georgia Tech's bowl game was in Boise on the blue field. Not very many fans made the trip ... minor bowl and a long trip to an outdoor game in the Arctic.</div><div>
</div><div>And if our bowl was a long way away, I wouldn't go ... unless it was a BCS bowl or for the NC. I might make some sacrifices then, but not for a regular season game or a minor bowl.</div>
Yep. This was just the last straw. Too bad this didn't happen two years ago.GerryBertier said:
Hell, maybe we can't do much better on our budget but I damn sure want to try, and it never felt like Giannini was trying. If you think small time, you're going to be small time.
He upgraded the facilities; but, IMO, the football expansion project was NOWHERE NEAR worth what we paid for it. Think paying the price of a f*cking Bentley for an Acura. Nice car...but holy ****, did you get ripped off. The baseball upgrades have been great. As a big baseball fan, I've sure enjoyed/will enjoy them; but I feel like those upgrades have come at the expense of a revenue sport (basketball) that was far more desperate for upgrades.
For the smart USM fans (the few), our main beef with Giannini is the basketball program. For God's sake, the lights barely turn on at Reed Green (no....I'm serious). We still have those old 70's era scoreboards with lights that spell out things like "Get loud" to the 700 fans at the games and form the shape of a little man running with a basketball. In the mean time, baseball has a state of the art scoreboard with a brick facade and is playing in front of more people. We saw that we can draw fans to basketball games in the 80's and early 90's when we were dwarfing Ole Miss and State's home attendance, but Giannini never tried. He supposedly cut off funding and other resources to try to force James Green into quitting back in the 00s only to somehow find a coach who plays an even more boring brand of basketball than Green.
Somewhere out there, a very confused USM fan is just waking up from a week-long coma, looking at a newspaper and thinking "Giannini is gone. Fedora is gone. We're going to Hawaii for our bowl game. And wait a minute...we WON the conference championship game?"
"Somewhere out there, a very confused USM fan is just waking up from
a week-long coma, looking at a newspaper and thinking "Giannini is
gone. Fedora is gone. We're going to Hawaii for our bowl game. And
wait a minute...<span style="text-decoration: underline;">we WON the conference championship game</span>?"
Just not much value in <span style="font-weight: bold;">winning</span> a "Coosa Champeenship" these days.**
wouldhavebeenbettertohavelostthegametohoustonku
a week-long coma, looking at a newspaper and thinking "Giannini is
gone. Fedora is gone. We're going to Hawaii for our bowl game. And
wait a minute...<span style="text-decoration: underline;">we WON the conference championship game</span>?"
Just not much value in <span style="font-weight: bold;">winning</span> a "Coosa Champeenship" these days.**
wouldhavebeenbettertohavelostthegametohoustonku
bruiser said:
Yuck yuck.
No, there's value. You just need to be able to correctly solve questions like:
1. Which is better?
a. Playing a bowl in Dallas against a top-25 Penn State
b. Playing a bowl in Hawaii against Nevada, the third-place team in the WAC
#youforgotthehashtagandthatwasntreallyallthatfunnyanyway
Not necessarily saying that it was the right decision, but if you played Penn St. in a bowl this year the whole game would be about Penn St. and what happened there. No need to get yourself anywhere near that situation if you can avoid it. Also, by playing before Christmas, Fedora can still coach the team in the bowl game. That's good from a continuity standpoint and it's good to see a coach stick around for the bowl game after he takes another job.