[threepointer]

Time to Write after the 29-0 beatdown of Colorado. 

First about me.  I was on the Stanford Athletic Board and Chairman of the Finance Committee back in the day.  I had the extreme pleasure of working with Bill Walsh and Bob Bowlsby.  This is is one story.  Sorry for the references to the other Stanford football site, but it is what happened.

We assembled a committee to study the endemic money losses of the Stanford Athletic Department.  Walsh was the interim AD.  This was in preparation for the incoming new Athletic Director, Bob Bowlsby.  In his first meeting as AD we met with Etchemendy the Provost to present our findings.  I had done most of the analysis so I did most of the presentation.

 

After the presentation I pulled the Provost (Etchemendy) aside and said, "No one understands what you do.  Especially Stanford sport fans."  He said, "I know, I get more letters and emails about the football program than any other topic."  I said, "you should grant an interview to the Bootleg."  He said, "What's that?"

 

I explained that the Bootleg was a Stanford oriented internet site that covered Division 1 programs from all points of view.  The reporter for the Stanford Bootleg was Mike Eubanks, a Stanford Chemical Engineering graduate who decided that he would rather be a sports reporter than a Chemical Engineer.  I said if you want to reach the rabid Stanford fan base and reduce the number of letters and emails you get, give an interview to Mike.  He said, "that's a great idea, can you arrange it?"

 

So at the Spring scrimmage, I sidled up to Mike Eubanks and said, "Mike, you should do an interview with John Etchemendy, the Provost."  He said, "Right, like that's ever going to happen.  I can't get past the door to his secretary's office."  I said, "Mike, I will make it happen."

 

So I connected the two of them and Mike wrote a 4 part article on Stanford Sports from the view of the Provost.  One of the major topics was that our Director of Admissions, Robin Mamlet, who had come from Swarthmore, had really clamped down on Athletic admissions in all sports, Men's and Women's.  She just didn't get it.  

 

Etchemendy said, "I don't think that's true, our admission standards for Athletes have not changed.  They are held to the same standard as other applicants, with modest flexibility to acknowledge the investment of time that they make in their sport."

 

Mike said, I can prove it to you."  And he did by giving Etchemendy the statistics on Athletic admissions before and after Mamlet."  One year later Stanford fired Robin Mamlet as the Director of Admissions and replaced her with Richard Shaw from Yale.  Previously, he was Director of Admissions at Michigan.  He knew that in order to fill a 110,000 seat stadium you had to deliver a good product.  And Stanford Stadium has only 50,000 seats.

 

I convinced Nancy Mohr, the Chairman of the Athletic Board, to invite Mike to an Athletic Board meeting.  Her reaction was, "We can't do that, we have never have had reporters at our meetings."  I explained that Mike would cover the meeting on background and not divulge anything that she did not approve.

 

So Mike attended an Athletic Board meeting and I introduced him to Bob Bowlsby.  Bob asked Mike what his job entailed.  He said, "well I write articles about the program, but the principal role of the Scout network is to identify talent and assign stars to athletes (5 stars, 4 stars, 3 stars, etc....).   In order to do that we start tracking athletes when they are freshman in high school and then track their progress.  Bob quickly realized that Mike was not just talking about Stanford targets, but through the Scout network he had an encyclopedic knowledge of talent in every state of the country (and Canada).

 

So Bob Bowlsby introduced Mike to Jim Harbaugh.  Harbaugh hired Mike to coordinate recruiting.  

 

I did that.  Or better put....I helped do that.

 

Eventually, I will wither and return to the earth.  But I will have the satisfaction of knowing that I helped Stanford sports and specifically Stanford Football improve from a bunch of underperforming Nerds into a bunch of really smart winners.  That was then.  I think that we are on the verge of another transformation and I have some thoughts on that topic.  In a later post.....

[threepointer]

Time to Write after the 29-0 beatdown of Colorado. 

First about me.  I was on the Stanford Athletic Board and Chairman of the Finance Committee back in the day.  I had the extreme pleasure of working with Bill Walsh and Bob Bowlsby.  This is is one story.  Sorry for the references to the other Stanford football site, but it is what happened.

We assembled a committee to study the endemic money losses of the Stanford Athletic Department.  Walsh was the interim AD.  This was in preparation for the incoming new Athletic Director, Bob Bowlsby.  In his first meeting as AD we met with Etchemendy the Provost to present our findings.  I had done most of the analysis so I did most of the presentation.

 

After the presentation I pulled the Provost (Etchemendy) aside and said, "No one understands what you do.  Especially Stanford sport fans."  He said, "I know, I get more letters and emails about the football program than any other topic."  I said, "you should grant an interview to the Bootleg."  He said, "What's that?"

 

I explained that the Bootleg was a Stanford oriented internet site that covered Division 1 programs from all points of view.  The reporter for the Stanford Bootleg was Mike Eubanks, a Stanford Chemical Engineering graduate who decided that he would rather be a sports reporter than a Chemical Engineer.  I said if you want to reach the rabid Stanford fan base and reduce the number of letters and emails you get, give an interview to Mike.  He said, "that's a great idea, can you arrange it?"

 

So at the Spring scrimmage, I sidled up to Mike Eubanks and said, "Mike, you should do an interview with John Etchemendy, the Provost."  He said, "Right, like that's ever going to happen.  I can't get past the door to his secretary's office."  I said, "Mike, I will make it happen."

 

So I connected the two of them and Mike wrote a 4 part article on Stanford Sports from the view of the Provost.  One of the major topics was that our Director of Admissions, Robin Mamlet, who had come from Swarthmore, had really clamped down on Athletic admissions in all sports, Men's and Women's.  She just didn't get it.  

 

Etchemendy said, "I don't think that's true, our admission standards for Athletes have not changed.  They are held to the same standard as other applicants, with modest flexibility to acknowledge the investment of time that they make in their sport."

 

Mike said, I can prove it to you."  And he did by giving Etchemendy the statistics on Athletic admissions before and after Mamlet."  One year later Stanford fired Robin Mamlet as the Director of Admissions and replaced her with Richard Shaw from Yale.  Previously, he was Director of Admissions at Michigan.  He knew that in order to fill a 110,000 seat stadium you had to deliver a good product.  And Stanford Stadium has only 50,000 seats.

 

I convinced Nancy Mohr, the Chairman of the Athletic Board, to invite Mike to an Athletic Board meeting.  Her reaction was, "We can't do that, we have never have had reporters at our meetings."  I explained that Mike would cover the meeting on background and not divulge anything that she did not approve.

 

So Mike attended an Athletic Board meeting and I introduced him to Bob Bowlsby.  Bob asked Mike what his job entailed.  He said, "well I write articles about the program, but the principal role of the Scout network is to identify talent and assign stars to athletes (5 stars, 4 stars, 3 stars, etc....).   In order to do that we start tracking athletes when they are freshman in high school and then track their progress.  Bob quickly realized that Mike was not just talking about Stanford targets, but through the Scout network he had an encyclopedic knowledge of talent in every state of the country (and Canada).

 

So Bob Bowlsby introduced Mike to Jim Harbaugh.  Harbaugh hired Mike to coordinate recruiting.  

 

I did that.  Or better put....I helped do that.

 

Eventually, I will wither and return to the earth.  But I will have the satisfaction of knowing that I helped Stanford sports and specifically Stanford Football improve from a bunch of underperforming Nerds into a bunch of really smart winners.  That was then.  I think that we are on the verge of another transformation and I have some thoughts on that topic.  In a later post.....