Is that just to throw him enough money to make sure he stays after UF is done paying his buyout? Seems excessive
They took Summers from us a few years ago and then gave a terrible coach a raise/extension in Bobo. Now they are bankrupting themselves with a new stadium. Not the smartest Athletic Dept
Basically backloading his contract. If we assume he commands about a 550k salary on the market and we're only paying him 300k, we're functionally not paying half a million bucks over the next two years before his salary bumps up to 1 million. He's going to get paid well, but we really wanted to have him on as DC and he's supposedly worth it (especially when you consider we're hiring offensive minded head coaches).
I get my National Champions shirt tomorrow and I'll be driving through Tuscaloosa in a few weeks. Does anyone know if I can get a photo with our trophy? Is it on display for the public somewhere?
Yea let me call Saban up. He might even let you touch it as long as you promise not to break it. http://www.espn.com/college-footbal...-alabama-crimson-tide-bcs-championship-trophy
Could have been so much better without sounding like groveling. Would have 100% went with something like: "CONGRATS ALABAMA ON YOUR SHARE OF THE NATIONAL TITLE. With love, your co-champs UCF" Our old fans are not funny
The sad part is they probaby aren’t trying to be funny, they probably think the attention it gets will actually make them schedule a home and Home with us
Damn. I just got one a couple months ago. On a side note, basketball team looked bad last night. Lack of effort. Not sure if it was an off game, but Tacko has shown zero improvement from last year. We need BJ back bad.
AJ and Dayon were fucking atrocious. We have no shooters and it's killing us. We have great movement with the ball, find the open man, and it's one of the 10 mother fuckers on our team that won't take an open 3.
Losing Dawkins was an enormous blow to this team. Losing Taylor after that was a damn near death blow to our tourney hopes.
I don't understand how this became a problem. It's not like Dawkins won't let them. I know we had Matt Williams, but look at last year. I mean who doesn't love to throw up threes, whether they're a shooter or not.
I've been holding strong with my white pegasus plate since it matches my car better (douchy, i know).. But that'd totally get me to finally upgrade to the new one. Although I expect at least a dozen legit road rage incidents involving UF and UCF fans because of it.
Can't hurt Local congressman asks Big 12 commissioner to consider admitting UCF, USF By: WFTV Web Staff Updated: Jan 10, 2018 - 12:13 PM A Florida representative is asking a commissioner of the Big 12 conference that the University of Central Florida and the University of South Florida be considered for the Big 12 family. Rep. Robert "Bobby O" Olszewski, (R), of West Orange County, wrote a letter to Big 12 Conference Commissioner Bob Bowlsby asking that he keep the UCF Knights and the USF Bulls, “at the top of mind when your member institutions consider expansion in the Big 12 Conference.” The letter noted that the “War on I-4” game, the big rival game between the two universities, was one of the top television rated games of the reason. Watch: UCF Knights parade through Magic Kingdom after Peach Bowl win The Knights won the 2018 Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl in Atlanta on New Year's Day in a hard-fought battle against No. 7 Auburn, which beat both Alabama and Georgia during the regular season. The team became self-proclaimed “national champions” and celebrated with a parade at Disney World and a pep rally downtown at which the mayor presented the team with keys to the city. Photos: Thousands pack downtown Orlando to celebrate unbeaten UCF Knights USF had a 10-2 season with a win over Texas Tech at the Birmingham Bowl. Read the letter below: "Commissioner Bowlsby: I hope the New Year is off to a great start for you and your family. Congratulations on the completion of another successful Big 12 football season as well as a strong and exciting performance by the Oklahoma Sooners in the College Football Playoff. I enjoyed working with you early in my career when I served at Florida Citrus Sports and the Butkus Award. I am reaching out to ask that you please keep both the University of Central Florida (UCF) and the University of South Florida (USF) at the top of mind when your member institutions consider expansion in the Big 12 Conference. More than ever during this college football season, we saw how important television ratings are to bowl games, the conferences, and the College Football Playoff. With UCF and USF representing the greater Central Florida and Tampa Bay media markets, our annual "War on I-4" was one of the top television rated games this season en route to a 13 and 10 win season respectively for the UCF Knights and USF Bulls as well as both with top 25 final rankings. There is no question the passion and revenue their respective alumni bases across the country would bring to the Big 12 by having two conference members in Florida. As the Florida State Representative for the district that includes Walt Disney World, Universal Studios, and Sea World, there are no geographic areas in the world more vital to the overall success of the parent company of the College Football Playoff's media partner ESPN. In fact, Walt Disney World even hosted a championship parade for UCF at the Magic Kingdom celebrating their Peach Bowl victory. As a proud alumnus of both UCF and USF, I thank you for keeping these two outstanding academic institutions in your sights as the state of Florida would be proud to become part of the Big 12 family. If there is anything that I can do to help facilitate any discussions for UCF and USF, or promote the greater Central Florida and Tampa Bay regions in our great state of Florida, please do not hesitate to reach out. Thank you again Commissioner Bowlsby for your time, as I look forward to seeing you again soon. Sincerely, Rep. Robert "Bobby O" Olszewski, Ph.D. Florida House District 44"
https://frntofficesport.com/ucf-national-championship-2e73c9288a31 Inside UCF’s Social National Championship How a 13–0 season and being left out of the College Football Playoffs helped the Knights win the internet. Spoiler While procrastinating during the search for what my first blog topic would be, I stumbled upon a Netflix documentary called Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond. It was an in-depth, behind the scenes look at the Andy Kaufman biopic Man on the Moon. While it was interesting, one quote from Jim Carrey stood out above the rest. “At some point when you create yourself to make it, you’re going to have to either let that creation go and take a chance on being loved or hated for who you really are, or you’re going to have to kill who you really are and fall into your grave grasping a character you never were.” That’s when it hit me. That quote describes the duality of being a social media professional, especially in sports. You spend your time being the voice of a brand that you help construct that is separate from yourself. In some cases you even create a character that convinced others that you’re an expert, guru or some other grandiose descriptor. The problem is, there are no masters of social media. It’s a role that some try to play but here, in this blog, I’ve decided to embrace the truth and myself. We’re all just students of social media continually trying to learn as much as we can in an industry that gets changed more often than an infant’s diaper. I experienced it first hand over my five years running social for the Phoenix Suns. When I started, social consisted of being able to write short and pithy text to catch attention on Facebook and Twitter. Within a year we had seen Google Plus pull a Justice League arriving with much fanfare and being forgotten almost as fast. Facebook quickly began to reward stronger visuals while also syphoning off organic reach with a stronger algorithm and instagram arrived to literally change the way we all looked at social. And that’s before you even mention Snapchat or talk about the social graveyard that includes one hit wonders like Peach and VoiceByte. It was a lifetime’s worth of change and growth jam packed into a little over five trips around the sun.. Over the next weeks, months and hopefully years we’ll go on the journey together studying the latest and best examples in #SMSports. I’ll share lessons I’ve learned along the way and observations I have in the moment. So Social Studies class is in session and our first lesson is on the importance of understanding your brand voice and utilizing it in opportune moments. Enter the University of Central Florida Knights. UCF football was nothing to talk about three seasons ago. They were the Cleveland Browns of collegiate football having finished 0–12. Not ideal for creating social buzz, I know from experience. Fast forward to the 2017 season. They were the darlings of everyone who believes in the Joker’s stance that chaos is fair. They were a team who, by entering Bowl season undefeated, could disrupt the established norm of the College Football Playoff. With their Peach Bowl victory over Auburn, the team, just two years removed from not winning a game, completed a perfect season. Oh, and they also had a unique claim. That claim was that they deserved to be recognized as National Champions. Not just because of their perfect record but because they beat the Tigers who had beaten the two teams, Alabama and Georgia, who were in the title game. It was the perfect storm. A once in a lifetime opportunity to create buzz and engagement around their team and brand. A chance to make a name for themselves and point out a major flaw in the current system. The athletic department, and in particular their social team, didn’t waste any time fully capitalizing on it. “Once the playoff field was set and we saw the matchups, we knew that when we beat Auburn, and if Alabama and Georgia won, we’d be able to to be aggressive in our claim as Undefeated Champions,” Eric DeSalvo, Director of Digital and Social Media for the UCF Athletic Department told Front Office Sports. “We’d been pretty outspoken all season against the CFP weekly rankings, so going aggressive as the clock hit 0:00 wasn’t going to be out of the norm for us.” Exactly how outspoken could they really be? Their Athletic Director set the tone and the direction following the Peach Bowl victory. “It had been discussed and debated if we should come out right away and say National Champions, but I don’t think anyone outside of Danny White (UCF Athletic Director) knew he was going to drop those lines when I had my phone on him during the celebration,” DeSalvo said. The key to being able to capitalize on the moment was preparation. While the terminology and copy used may be decided in the moment, the look and feel of a entire campaign doesn’t. DeSalvo and his team put in the work throughout the year and in the weeks leading up to the bowl game to ensure that everything had a look and feel that would match their lofty claims. They planned in advance so the graphic design team could act in the moment. “We had the initial motion graphic with “Who’s Next” created on New Year’s Eve — thanks, Chris Stoney! — go out a minute after our final-score graphic to make the initial splash. We then felt that an altered playoff bracket motion graphic following the Rose and Sugar Bowls would make another splash. They both did the trick, reaching over 1.25M on each as of January 4th.” “Our awesome graphic designer, Carlos Phillips, also had to quickly build off of his Peach Bowl Champions logo and create the National Champions one. I later found out that he created the font himself (he’s a beast) to match the font that Nike was going to be using on the championship shirts our team got on the field.” With time being of the essence with these type of social posts, sometimes needing approval from higher ups can be the death knell for potentially viral content. So how did UCF overcome that? Buy-in long before posting. “After our initial talks before the bowl game, the trust was in me and our team to deliver the talked about motion graphics and there was no real approval system after our talk,” DeSalvo explained. “I did talk to Danny [White] on the phone the day after the game and he told me to continue to push and be aggressive. I haven’t stopped smiling since hearing those words.” In social there are a lot of well thought out, well designed and well planned posts and campaigns that don’t pay off despite so much hard work. That wasn’t the case for UCF. Their efforts paid off immensely in the short term. “The two motion graphics that dropped on Jan. 1 got 225+ direct replies each, but the posts announcing our National Championship with UCF President John C. Hitt’s quote garnered 1,400+ replies on Twitter, while a square version on @ucf.football Instagram has gotten 1,100+ comments. Both numbers are absolutely unheard of for us,” DeSalvo shared. (Numbers were as of January 4th) It wasn’t just the responses to single posts that increased. So did their overall following. Since completing their perfect season on December 31st, the Knight’s football accounts have seen a 9.9% grown on Instagram, 9.4% grown on Facebook, and a 5.2% increase in followers on Twitter. By having a consistent voice throughout the season and creative content at the right moments, UCF captured the feeling and passion of their fan base and made waves. “At UCF, our teams and fans all have a chip on their shoulders,” DeSalvo said. “They’ve been told what they can’t do for so long despite having continued success on and off the field. We’ll always have that mentality on social and really unleash at the right time. This is one of them.” And unleash it they did. Regardless of Alabama winning the College Football Playoff National Championship game, it is the University of Central Florida who already won the title on social media. While that might not come with a trophy of its own, it’s helped establish the Knights as a brand to be reckoned with.
I love that we recognized the possibility of the campaign and prepared for it prior to the bowl game. I also love that Danny wants to be aggressive with it, shows he gets how social media works in this day and age
Somewhere, there's a timeline where GOL remained the AD and none of this happened. Truly the darkest timeline.
I hope whoever we hire as a new university president is just as strong with athletics as Hitt has been. If we get a nerd who decides that its a waste of money ill be pretty sad.
i can't imagine going backwards on the progress athletics has made at this point. If "high-level of understanding of the power and importance of athletics" isn't a top-3 talking point in the interview, I'd be completely shocked.
The trickle of these is quite irritating. Debated waiting longer to buy, didn't, and this is what I get.
I'll probably give my crappier non-nike one away as a gift to someone when it arrives. They're going to sell a ton of these.
I actually like the first T shirt over the nike ones. The nike ones always seem too thin and clingy to me
Why do I still love that man? He was so perfect here. In the begining he was timid with the media and sort of awkward. In the end he grew into a troll coach that we needed, calling people who doubt us out, talking shit to Willie Taggart, not giving a fuck about the Civil ConFLiCT, backing up our natty claims, calling out the CFP, yelling at Nebraska media about his family. He became Bro Oleary in the personality department. I'll root for him at Nebraska even if it is with a broken heart
When he ran up the score he promised him he wouldn't forget that. Never got a chance to run it up on him back though since that was willies last game basically.
If Taggart and Frost would have stayed it would have been a fantastic shit show this year and every year in the future.
“Hey, let me start with this. What got you guys here is the brotherhood. It’s the love, it’s the work ethic, it’s the togetherness, it’s the unity. I don’t care if I’m your coach or somebody else is your coach, never forget it. Alright? You take it with you when you leave UCF. You take it with you into everything else. Together a group of people like this can accomplish anything. I’m going to be the biggest UCF fan in the world for those of you that are staying. For those of you that are leaving, I am so glad you got to experience a year like this before you got out of here. All you young players at this school, you guys can keep on accomplishing this stuff every year if you just keep working like you’ve worked the last two years. I’m going to go try to get another group of guys to play together and to love each other like you guys, but never forget it here."
It’s like Justin Timberlake, you want to dislike him but he is just so good at everything you can’t help but like him