If Warde Manuel Leaves

[OkaForPrez]

"I am not a candidate, have not been interviewed nor have I been contacted by Virginia Tech about its Director of Athletics position despite some recent media reports. I am very happy as the Director of Athletics at UConn and look forward to continuing to work with President Herbst, my coaches, staff, student-athletes, donors and fans to enjoy a high level of continued success in athletics at UConn. I wish Virginia Tech all the best in their search to replace, one of the legends in our business, Jim Weaver.”

http://runwayramblings.blogspot.com/2014/01/report-manuel-in-running-for-ad-job-at.html

That doesn't say he's uninterested. IMO

 

[FluxTZ]

 

[BlueDogs]

This would be a great post. If the LV over UConn decision was made over the internet by those who log onto ESPN.com. Given, however, that the choice was made by 12 University Presidents, each of whom had their own motives to help themselves and their institutions, the post is frankly absurd. Did we get blindsided -- you bet. But we got blindsided because those who run the conference told us we were in. There has not been one post on here, ever, by you or anyone else, to explain how a better PR campaign would have changed the mind of those at FSU and Clemson who wanted a higher ranked football program with more history, those in the Northeast who wanted less competition, and those in the ACC who were looking to break the control of the conference away from the Swofford -- Duke -- UNC axis. Rationally, it would not have.

And, for the millionth time, anyone who does business in the 21st century knows that geographic location when a crisis is occuring is almost totally irrelevant (and if it became relevant someone would have chartered a plane and headed back).

Must disagree. Anybody who does business knows, deals get done belly to belly, face to face. There is no substitute. Pushing papers in closing a transaction certainly can be done form afar, and even negotiations of a baseline LOI, but the basis for a deal is still a fundamentally human interaction and there is no substitute for personal presence.

As for your question, you are asking those who maintain a better PR campaign was required to prove a negative. What is certain is that there is ample economic rationale from a market perspective, academic standing, quality of facilities and historical athletic success to portray UConn as an exceptionally desirable candidate. Thus, one may rationally conclude a very poor job was done marketing UConn. As a general rule, these folks are not business professionals with experience in creating their own or recognizing business opportunities and that is what major college athletics have become. The TV marketing and advertisement dollars drive success. The ACC has been very astutely shaping itself and aligning to large market presence (Boston, Baltimore - DC, Penn, NY -Upstate (thus the conscious push to brand the fruits as NY's team). They were able to see the future and move. We, on the other hand, missed the boat. Working with Rutgers, Pitt and Syracuse as a package would have been a great strategy years ago, but we kept waving the BE flag as it imploded over our sentimental need to protect BASKETBALL. The business mind would have recognized its not about basketball, rather its about football revenue. The BIG 10 is where we need to be by whatever means necessary.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Must disagree. Anybody who does business knows, deals get done belly to belly, face to face. There is no substitute. Pushing papers in closing a transaction certainly can be done form afar, and even negotiations of a baseline LOI, but the basis for a deal is still a fundamentally human interaction and there is no substitute for personal presence.

As for your question, you are asking those who maintain a better PR campaign was required to prove a negative. What is certain is that there is ample economic rationale from a market perspective, academic standing, quality of facilities and historical athletic success to portray UConn as an exceptionally desirable candidate. Thus, one may rationally conclude a very poor job was done marketing UConn. As a general rule, these folks are not business professionals with experience in creating their own or recognizing business opportunities and that is what major college athletics have become. The TV marketing and advertisement dollars drive success. The ACC has been very astutely shaping itself and aligning to large market presence (Boston, Baltimore - DC, Penn, NY -Upstate (thus the conscious push to brand the fruits as NY's team). They were able to see the future and move. We, on the other hand, missed the boat. Working with Rutgers, Pitt and Syracuse as a package would have been a great strategy years ago, but we kept waving the BE flag as it imploded over our sentimental need to protect BASKETBALL. The business mind would have recognized its not about basketball, rather its about football revenue. The BIG 10 is where we need to be by whatever means necessary.

Well, I disagree with this. Business deals get done, primarily because the people that are responsible for some kind of transaction or action, know each other, and respect each other...they may even like each other and are friends outside of business..... and either way communicate with each other regularly, or enough in a meaningful fashion that you don't have to do through the secretary's waiting list to have a conversation. Getting business done, does not matter at all if it's done face to face or not. That, I am in complete agreement with BL.

What happens face to face, I think, is the initial meetings and introductions among people with the POTENTIAL to do business. I would hope that by now, Warde Manuel has done all of those meetings and introductions and lunches and dinners with the power players and decision makers in the intercollegiate landscape that matter to us and has established relationships.

The AD at Louisville, at the time, had 16 years of building contacts and relationships regarding the University of Louisville, and it's place in the TV revenue and college football strata. The AD at UCONN, didn't have that much time to build relationships and contacts among the people that were responsible for the decision making on such matters, and probably didn't have much working knowledge of the entire mess , coming from Buffalo via being an assistant at Michigan.....both of those schools, being completely opposite ends of the spectrum, than UCONN or Louisville was at - Michigan, having never any worry at all about their place int eh college football hierarchy, and Buffalo, on the other end, not going to be cashing in the big coin anytime. UCONN and Louisville though - right on the battle lines. These are things that a person like me, with absolutely no inside information can be reasonably sure of. And for me, these things are more than enough to explain why Louisville got an invite to the ACC and UCONN did not.

Or it might just be that he eats too many donuts.

 

[sdhusky]

It might have been poor optics. But that is entirely different than concluding it changed anything except the perception of a decision that would have come out the same way.

Why didn't Warde tell Clemson and FL St that UCONN just beat FL in the Orange bowl?

 

[sportsart]

Yes....a post telling Bizlaw how business is conducted.

Priceless......

 

[Tenspro2002]

Anybody who does business knows, deals get done belly to belly

If that's true, then Warde missed a huge opportunity.

 

[businesslawyer]

Must disagree. Anybody who does business knows, deals get done belly to belly, face to face. There is no substitute. Pushing papers in closing a transaction certainly can be done form afar, and even negotiations of a baseline LOI, but the basis for a deal is still a fundamentally human interaction and there is no substitute for personal presence.

As for your question, you are asking those who maintain a better PR campaign was required to prove a negative. What is certain is that there is ample economic rationale from a market perspective, academic standing, quality of facilities and historical athletic success to portray UConn as an exceptionally desirable candidate. Thus, one may rationally conclude a very poor job was done marketing UConn. As a general rule, these folks are not business professionals with experience in creating their own or recognizing business opportunities and that is what major college athletics have become. The TV marketing and advertisement dollars drive success. The ACC has been very astutely shaping itself and aligning to large market presence (Boston, Baltimore - DC, Penn, NY -Upstate (thus the conscious push to brand the fruits as NY's team). They were able to see the future and move. We, on the other hand, missed the boat. Working with Rutgers, Pitt and Syracuse as a package would have been a great strategy years ago, but we kept waving the BE flag as it imploded over our sentimental need to protect BASKETBALL. The business mind would have recognized its not about basketball, rather its about football revenue. The BIG 10 is where we need to be by whatever means necessary.

Name one opportunity for a face to face meeting that he turned down. And which meetings from Storrs wouldn't have required the same kind of airplane that he could have gotten on from the USVI?

I'll wait.

 

[DarthGrumpy]

If Warde hasn't officially denied this yet it must be true. He probably interviewed in San Diego last week. I'm sure he and Susan have already had an awkward conversation.

I really started to like Warde this year, but at this point I hope he gets the V Tech job. Don't want anyone who is not 10 toes in.

Bring in the former Rutgers AD, he got hosed out of his job.

Tim Pernetti got hired by the new MLS Expansion team in New York (owned by the Yankees and Man City) last fall as their Chief Business Officer. Even after being thrown under the bus by Rutgers President Barchi, who is one of Christie’s guys, he would not take a job at UConn because of his loyalty to Rutgers. A good guy.

 

[2Infinity]

jaltavilla12:27pm via Web
Warde Manuel says in email he was not aware his named linked to VaTech job. Waiting for statement from school refuting his interest #UConn

jaltavilla12:31pm via Web
Only thing certain: Manuel's reputation is established, rising and he will continue to be discussed when jobs arise #UConnwomen#uconnmen

Well I guess there's nothing better than high-quality reporting! John Altavilla decides to run a possible big story using a blogger as his source, only to find out that...surprise...the story isn't true?!? Wow...who'd have thunk it?? I'm just not sure which is worse...being a reporter for a significant newspaper in our state who passes this following of a blogger's self-admitted questionable source off as... "reporting", thereby, to a degree tarnishing his own reputation...OR....the posters here on the BY who decided to turn into lemmings, assume it just had to be true, thereby following him over the cliff.

 

[DarthGrumpy]

And, for the millionth time, anyone who does business in the 21st century knows that geographic location when a crisis is occuring is almost totally irrelevant (and if it became relevant someone would have chartered a plane and headed back).

No kidding. I went out to dinner and drinks at a mid-scale chain restaurant in some god forsaken corner of the Midwest once with a couple of executives from a company and partners of a big Private Equality firm. They drafted hundred million dollar deal on some scratch paper while drinking cheep domestic draft beer and finger food that was greasy enough to kill half the people there. The lawyers and bankers were brought in later and those meetings were in nice offices.

 

[MattMang23]

He could have used gotomeeting.com. You get a % off if you type in Colin Cowherd's first name. Maybe he couldn't figure out how to spell Colin.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Gee - it was the Hartford Courant that did this again huh?

I'm shocked. Shocked I say.

Very poor job by Altavilla here. Running a story (albeit on a blog) using some idiot's blog as his source of information? Shoddy work.

 

[huskymedic]

Well I guess there's nothing better than high-quality reporting! John Altavilla decides to run a possible big story using a blogger as his source, only to find out that...surprise...the story isn't true?!? Wow...who'd have thunk it?? I'm just not sure which is worse...being a reporter for a significant newspaper in our state who passes this following of a blogger's self-admitted questionable source off as... "reporting", thereby, to a degree tarnishing his own reputation...OR....the posters here on the BY who decided to turn into lemmings, assume it just had to be true, thereby following him over the cliff.

This is where the original story came from to start with (drive time sports show in Roanoke): http://wfirnews.com/grlpodcast/GRL5pm.mp3 -- go to 30 minute mark. The reason WM name got thrown out is speculation about AD's trying to bail out of the AAC because of P5 autonomy (outside looking in theory).

 

[Carl Spackler]

This is where the original story came from to start with (drive time sports show in Roanoke): http://wfirnews.com/grlpodcast/GRL5pm.mp3 -- go to 30 minute mark. The reason WM name got thrown out is speculation about AD's trying to bail out of the AAC because of P5 autonomy (outside looking in theory).

This would be the same thought process, in essence, espoused by a Syracuse lackey that's in position to write for the NY Times and SI, and came up with the concept that an AAC school like UCONN, could not be a desireable location for a football head coach........must be the same for AD's then right......if it was written in SI?

Internet media world makes me sick sometimes.

 

[cohenzone]

What total bs from the high school crowd on this board. A "rumor" starts what on the surface seems an unlikely if not improbable thing on at least a few levels of reality. Then the silly chickens who thinks WM was sipping rum swizzles in the Bahamas while Rome was burning start that idiocy all over again. May those people be stranded on a cold mountain top without a cell phone until their fevered brains cool down.

It would be very bad for this school if he were to jump out in such a hurry. His hires are all seeming quite good, including how he handled Ollie after having been shoved into a corner by the exiting coach who deeded the throne to an untested guy. The sports facilities are going great guns and on the surface, he hasn't pissed off a single major donor. The exclusion of UConn from the supposedly big boy conferences was as close to a done deal as they could have been when he entered the scene. To assume that because he didn't appear on TV every two seconds at the time he was doing nothing to try and improve our chances is pretty ridiculous. I guarantee anyone who thinks showing up on Mike Francesca would have made a difference is to think that the college presidents and ADs making the decision are shallow nincompoops.

 

[2Infinity]

This is where the original story came from to start with (drive time sports show in Roanoke): http://wfirnews.com/grlpodcast/GRL5pm.mp3 -- go to 30 minute mark. The reason WM name got thrown out is speculation about AD's trying to bail out of the AAC because of P5 autonomy (outside looking in theory).

Your research is always appreciated Medic! Discussions can be far-ranging for sure, but when a hypothetical "guess" turns into a newspaper's sports section's lead story...then it's time to question the "reporter" who decided it was print-worthy.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Very poor job by Altavilla here. Running a story (albeit on a blog) using some idiot's blog as his source of information? Shoddy work.

The courant has been generating sports readership for years, based on what is often blatant adversarial reporting on UCONN info, and in many times, is just shoddy journalism work and reporting.

You know what would have been really good, to have, would be a reporter that after coming across that blog info - actually contacted Warde Manuel about it - before reporting, and then putting out a report based on Manuel's response.



somebody please post a nice big bold headline. "Warde Manuel refutes internet blog post about Virginia Tech AD job." with the proper citations.

I wish that was the Hartford courant actually published, rather than what they did......because no matter how poor the reporting is, if it comes from an actual news outlet, rather than a blog website, or website like the boneyard, it carries more weight in the court of public perception. Bloggers, for whatever reason, don't have the same pull as a paid reporter for an AP outlet. Regardless of content.

If we had media coverage, such that headline above was actually in the news paper, it would actually generate positive reinforcement for the university and the courant's readership rather than paranoia and negative feedback interest.

 

[Carl Spackler]

What total bs from the high school crowd on this board. A "rumor" starts what on the surface seems an unlikely if not improbable thing on at least a few levels of reality. Then the silly chickens who thinks WM was sipping rum swizzles in the Bahamas while Rome was burning start that idiocy all over again. May those people be stranded on a cold mountain top without a cell phone until their fevered brains cool down.

It would be very bad for this school if he were to jump out in such a hurry. His hires are all seeming quite good, including how he handled Ollie after having been shoved into a corner by the exiting coach who deeded the thrown to an untested guy. The sports facilities are going great guns and on the surface, he hasn't pissed off a single major donor. The exclusion of UConn from the supposedly big boy conferences was as close to a done deal as they could have been when he entered the scene. To assume that because he didn't appear on TV every two seconds at the time he was doing nothing to try and improve our chances is pretty ridiculous. I guarantee anyone who thinks showing up on Mike Francesca would have made a difference is to think that the college presidents and ADs making the decision are shallow nincompoops.

You are correct, in that if Warde were to jump ship, this early into a job at UCONN, it would be a negative thing for UCONN. That's why it pisses me off that it was reported so shoddy by the Courant. Completely irresponsible reporting over there, and it's getting very tiresome. Couldn't have placed a call to Warde first?

As for the rest, it's entirely the effect of a world we live in where people have unlimited, infinite information available to read at their fingertips, are literate, but the vast majority have not developed the skills to adequately interpret information as to it's quality and merit.

Journalism is dead.

 

[Husky25]

You are correct, in that if Warde were to jump ship, this early into a job at UCONN, it would be a negative thing for UCONN. That's why it pisses me off that it was reported so shoddy by the Courant. Completely irresponsible reporting over there, and it's getting very tiresome. Couldn't have placed a call to Warde first?

As for the rest, it's entirely the effect of a world we live in where people have unlimited, infinite information available to read at their fingertips, are literate, but the vast majority have not developed the skills to adequately interpret information as to it's quality and merit.

Journalism is dead.

Better to be first than correct...Wait a minute...

 

[ZooCougar]

Why didn't Warde tell Clemson and FL St that UCONN just beat FL in the Orange bowl?

That happened after the ACC made a decision.

 

[cohenzone]

Better to be first than correct...Wait a minute...

How true. I've been toying with writing a novel that raises the question about what the impact might have been on certain historical figures had they been faced with a world of bloggers, 24 hour tv news cycles driven by talking heads rather than real journalists, and the need by the public for instant gratification. The major strength in our world to counter the negative impact of internet blogging , tweets and the 24 news cycle is that bad information can be refuted relatively fast compared to just a few decades ago and definitely compared to pre-20th century when rumors and purposeful misinformation did a lot of damage before they could be countered. It's how American politics ran until the telegraph started to cut the response time down.

Of course, a little research by a "reporter" before spreading the news would be nice like a phone call or e-mail something like. "Hey WM, care to comment on the story that you're an AD finalist at VTech?" "Say what, John????"

 

[huskyrob1]

Rumors going around that Warde is a finalist for the VaTech AD spot. If he leaves, who are the candidates? Herbst needs to be proactive on this, where there's smoke, there's fire. Even if he doesn't get this gig, he's obviously looking, despite only being here a couple years.

http://courantblogs.com/uconn-women/virginia-tech-looking-for-an-ad-guess-who-is-on-the-list/

Give the job to Geno, and I'm not kidding. The guy is a legend. He would get us into either the ACC or the Big 10. We need a salesman and there's none better than Geno. Someone once said of him "Geno could sell ice cubes to the Eskimos". He could still coach the womens team or turn the reigns over to Chris Daily. There have been several AD's in the recent past who coached a major sport while holding the title of AD.

 

[Carl Spackler]

How true. I've been toying with writing a novel that raises the question about what the impact might have been on certain historical figures had they been faced with a world of bloggers, 24 hour tv news cycles driven by talking heads rather than real journalists, and the need by the public for instant gratification. The major strength in our world to counter the negative impact of internet blogging , tweets and the 24 news cycle is that bad information can be refuted relatively fast compared to just a few decades ago and definitely compared to pre-20th century when rumors and purposeful misinformation did a lot of damage before they could be countered. It's how American politics ran until the telegraph started to cut the response time down.

Of course, a little research by a "reporter" before spreading the news would be nice like a phone call or e-mail something like. "Hey WM, care to comment on the story that you're an AD finalist at VTech?" "Say what, John????"

What historical figures are you thinking about?

 

[Colt house75]

You are correct, in that if Warde were to jump ship, this early into a job at UCONN, it would be a negative thing for UCONN. That's why it pisses me off that it was reported so shoddy by the Courant. Completely irresponsible reporting over there, and it's getting very tiresome. Couldn't have placed a call to Warde first?

As for the rest, it's entirely the effect of a world we live in where people have unlimited, infinite information available to read at their fingertips, are literate, but the vast majority have not developed the skills to adequately interpret information as to it's quality and merit.

Journalism is dead.

How true. I've been toying with writing a novel that raises the question about what the impact might have been on certain historical figures had they been faced with a world of bloggers, 24 hour tv news cycles driven by talking heads rather than real journalists, and the need by the public for instant gratification. The major strength in our world to counter the negative impact of internet blogging , tweets and the 24 news cycle is that bad information can be refuted relatively fast compared to just a few decades ago and definitely compared to pre-20th century when rumors and purposeful misinformation did a lot of damage before they could be countered. It's how American politics ran until the telegraph started to cut the response time down.

Of course, a little research by a "reporter" before spreading the news would be nice like a phone call or e-mail something like. "Hey WM, care to comment on the story that you're an AD finalist at VTech?" "Say what, John????"

It's TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11
WHAT EVER HAPPENED to the BONEYARD PRESS PASS?