[fullmetal]

Harris treated his players like dirt.  That's no way to coach young men who had the intellectual chops to get into Stanford, let alone the physical capability to play D1 football.  He didn't respect them, and he didn't advocate for them.

If Myles Jackson, with 1+ years of TT tutelage, isn't ready to go in garbage time, that's on TT, who has been here for every season of Jackson's college career.  What on earth?

It is not a hot take to say that this team would look great with average game-manager QB play.  It's probably the consensus opinion of the whole fanbase.  So say we all.

[fullmetal]

Harris treated his players like dirt.  That's no way to coach young men who had the intellectual chops to get into Stanford, let alone the physical capability to play D1 football.  He didn't respect them, and he didn't advocate for them.

If Myles Jackson, with 1+ years of TT tutelage, isn't ready to go in garbage time, that's on TT, who has been here for every season of Jackson's college career.  What on earth?

It is not a hot take to say that this team would look great with average game-manager QB play.  It's probably the consensus opinion of the whole fanbase.  So say we all.

[Mick]

Harris treated his players like dirt.  That's no way to coach young men who had the intellectual chops to get into Stanford, let alone the physical capability to play D1 football.  He didn't respect them, and he didn't advocate for them.

If Myles Jackson, with 1+ years of TT tutelage, isn't ready to go in garbage time, that's on TT, who has been here for every season of Jackson's college career.  What on earth?

It is not a hot take to say that this team would look great with average game-manager QB play.  It's probably the consensus opinion of the whole fanbase.  So say we all.

They would probably even perform acceptably with an average game manager like Brock Purdy under center...

[Mick]

Harris treated his players like dirt.  That's no way to coach young men who had the intellectual chops to get into Stanford, let alone the physical capability to play D1 football.  He didn't respect them, and he didn't advocate for them.

If Myles Jackson, with 1+ years of TT tutelage, isn't ready to go in garbage time, that's on TT, who has been here for every season of Jackson's college career.  What on earth?

It is not a hot take to say that this team would look great with average game-manager QB play.  It's probably the consensus opinion of the whole fanbase.  So say we all.

They would probably even perform acceptably with an average game manager like Brock Purdy under center...

[jacket3ree]

My "hot take" has nothing to do with individual games or seasons and goes back at least to the 2010 season when a Top 6 (I looked it up) Stanford led by Andrew Luck (21/30, 305 yards, 4 TD) played in front of nobody against Oregon State. Shutout. Total crush job. Too boring I guess - we need events in the Bay Area to get excited. The next two games were beat downs of Cal in Berkeley and VPI in Miami Gardens. My son (no game that day) and I roamed the empty stadium trying out different locations and talked to an OSU family because their linebacker son's brother is a close friend of my daughter. They were aghast at the lack of a crowd. A 4:30 start and a beautiful night. No excuses. No people. We knew then there was no way Harbaugh would stick around to lead a top ten program into an empty stadium at home.

Remember the epic 2013 Big Game? Rose Bowl on the line. Threw down 63 points. My wife said we leave early or divorce. (Well, outcome is in hand and divorce is expensive, so I left when directed.) I got walk up tickets for me, my wife, and six Midshipmen in town for the Friday night Navy game in San Jose. Granted, Cal sucked that year so a lot of their fans stayed out tailgating and never made it inside. Wide swaths of empty seats in the upper deck.

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

[jacket3ree]

My "hot take" has nothing to do with individual games or seasons and goes back at least to the 2010 season when a Top 6 (I looked it up) Stanford led by Andrew Luck (21/30, 305 yards, 4 TD) played in front of nobody against Oregon State. Shutout. Total crush job. Too boring I guess - we need events in the Bay Area to get excited. The next two games were beat downs of Cal in Berkeley and VPI in Miami Gardens. My son (no game that day) and I roamed the empty stadium trying out different locations and talked to an OSU family because their linebacker son's brother is a close friend of my daughter. They were aghast at the lack of a crowd. A 4:30 start and a beautiful night. No excuses. No people. We knew then there was no way Harbaugh would stick around to lead a top ten program into an empty stadium at home.

Remember the epic 2013 Big Game? Rose Bowl on the line. Threw down 63 points. My wife said we leave early or divorce. (Well, outcome is in hand and divorce is expensive, so I left when directed.) I got walk up tickets for me, my wife, and six Midshipmen in town for the Friday night Navy game in San Jose. Granted, Cal sucked that year so a lot of their fans stayed out tailgating and never made it inside. Wide swaths of empty seats in the upper deck.

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

[d4cohn]

My "hot take" has nothing to do with individual games or seasons and goes back at least to the 2010 season when a Top 6 (I looked it up) Stanford led by Andrew Luck (21/30, 305 yards, 4 TD) played in front of nobody against Oregon State. Shutout. Total crush job. Too boring I guess - we need events in the Bay Area to get excited. The next two games were beat downs of Cal in Berkeley and VPI in Miami Gardens. My son (no game that day) and I roamed the empty stadium trying out different locations and talked to an OSU family because their linebacker son's brother is a close friend of my daughter. They were aghast at the lack of a crowd. A 4:30 start and a beautiful night. No excuses. No people. We knew then there was no way Harbaugh would stick around to lead a top ten program into an empty stadium at home.

Remember the epic 2013 Big Game? Rose Bowl on the line. Threw down 63 points. My wife said we leave early or divorce. (Well, outcome is in hand and divorce is expensive, so I left when directed.) I got walk up tickets for me, my wife, and six Midshipmen in town for the Friday night Navy game in San Jose. Granted, Cal sucked that year so a lot of their fans stayed out tailgating and never made it inside. Wide swaths of empty seats in the upper deck.

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

One of the arguments I was making was that lower attendances are not isolated to Stanford football. Pull names outside the marquee teams in the Big 10 and SEC from a hat, and I could easily find countless with the same/similar set of circumstances.

As a sport as a whole, college football attendance peaked some years ago.

Also, why couldn't someone have argued in the 80's, when we had a cavernous 80,000+ seat stadium that looked empty and we weren't filling, that that was the "end" of Stanford football.

We went on to make Rose Bowls in the 90's, in the 2000's, downsized our stadium in the mid 2000's and went on an epic 5 year run that fans look back on fondly.

I think the shifting conference/NIL landscape is far more likely to have a deleterious effect on Stanford football/Stanford athletics specifically than a phenomenon that is far from unique to Stanford.

Also, the operative phrase in my post was "a bit [hot-takey]". Given what I just said about conference realignment/NIL, a precipitous and permanent decline in Stanford football is not out of the realm of possibility. It just feels like an overreaction in that, if we were say 4-1 in a hypothetical world with wins over TCU and Va Tech (because say Brown doesn't get hurt in practice), I don't think the argument would have the same salience.

[d4cohn]

My "hot take" has nothing to do with individual games or seasons and goes back at least to the 2010 season when a Top 6 (I looked it up) Stanford led by Andrew Luck (21/30, 305 yards, 4 TD) played in front of nobody against Oregon State. Shutout. Total crush job. Too boring I guess - we need events in the Bay Area to get excited. The next two games were beat downs of Cal in Berkeley and VPI in Miami Gardens. My son (no game that day) and I roamed the empty stadium trying out different locations and talked to an OSU family because their linebacker son's brother is a close friend of my daughter. They were aghast at the lack of a crowd. A 4:30 start and a beautiful night. No excuses. No people. We knew then there was no way Harbaugh would stick around to lead a top ten program into an empty stadium at home.

Remember the epic 2013 Big Game? Rose Bowl on the line. Threw down 63 points. My wife said we leave early or divorce. (Well, outcome is in hand and divorce is expensive, so I left when directed.) I got walk up tickets for me, my wife, and six Midshipmen in town for the Friday night Navy game in San Jose. Granted, Cal sucked that year so a lot of their fans stayed out tailgating and never made it inside. Wide swaths of empty seats in the upper deck.

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

One of the arguments I was making was that lower attendances are not isolated to Stanford football. Pull names outside the marquee teams in the Big 10 and SEC from a hat, and I could easily find countless with the same/similar set of circumstances.

As a sport as a whole, college football attendance peaked some years ago.

Also, why couldn't someone have argued in the 80's, when we had a cavernous 80,000+ seat stadium that looked empty and we weren't filling, that that was the "end" of Stanford football.

We went on to make Rose Bowls in the 90's, in the 2000's, downsized our stadium in the mid 2000's and went on an epic 5 year run that fans look back on fondly.

I think the shifting conference/NIL landscape is far more likely to have a deleterious effect on Stanford football/Stanford athletics specifically than a phenomenon that is far from unique to Stanford.

Also, the operative phrase in my post was "a bit [hot-takey]". Given what I just said about conference realignment/NIL, a precipitous and permanent decline in Stanford football is not out of the realm of possibility. It just feels like an overreaction in that, if we were say 4-1 in a hypothetical world with wins over TCU and Va Tech (because say Brown doesn't get hurt in practice), I don't think the argument would have the same salience.

[Goose]

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

Agree it isn't a good look. Don't agree about the 10,000. When one is trying to walk through them that seems like a low estimate :-). What I frankly don't understand is why the back N ranks don't just leave. They can't see the field anyway. On TV they could and the refreshments are cheaper at home.

[Goose]

This just isn't a good look, no matter how many people are supposedly packed in a concourse.  (It can't be 10,000.)

Enter Sandman, alright.

Agree it isn't a good look. Don't agree about the 10,000. When one is trying to walk through them that seems like a low estimate :-). What I frankly don't understand is why the back N ranks don't just leave. They can't see the field anyway. On TV they could and the refreshments are cheaper at home.

[SkiBum80]

Rather than a dead program walking, I hope rather we are on a path, albeit long and windy and with some backtracking, to earning respect again.
Felt like as Coach Shaw was exiting and Coach TT coming in that the Tree was no longer feared nor even respected.
In fact, more likely to have doggy saunter up and micturate on the tree rather than have doggy respect the tree.
I thought the Colorado and Wash St games last season gave some glimmer of hope that respect might be able to be regained.
As did the Syracuse game this season.
I'm not expecting a win this weekend, but respect can still be earned in a defeat if tight fought with determination.
So we'll see if our path this weekend hopefully takes a step forward, not backward, towards respect the tree, as a milestone on the path towards the ultimate destination of Fear the tree.

[SkiBum80]

Rather than a dead program walking, I hope rather we are on a path, albeit long and windy and with some backtracking, to earning respect again.
Felt like as Coach Shaw was exiting and Coach TT coming in that the Tree was no longer feared nor even respected.
In fact, more likely to have doggy saunter up and micturate on the tree rather than have doggy respect the tree.
I thought the Colorado and Wash St games last season gave some glimmer of hope that respect might be able to be regained.
As did the Syracuse game this season.
I'm not expecting a win this weekend, but respect can still be earned in a defeat if tight fought with determination.
So we'll see if our path this weekend hopefully takes a step forward, not backward, towards respect the tree, as a milestone on the path towards the ultimate destination of Fear the tree.