December 17, 2010

Another reason buying tickets matters (embarrassing bowl sales at FIU)
10:19 AM Fri, Dec 17, 2010
Brett Vito

Adam Beasley had a pretty interesting story in the Miami Herald today, one that makes a point about how important it is for Sun Belt teams to have, you know, fans.

We have made a few cracks over the years about Florida International (the lower case U of Miami) having approximately 13 fans.

You thought we were kidding, didn't you?

Adam's story shows that we are not that far off.

The Golden Panthers have sold what Adam termed "a few hundred tickets" to the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl. Speaking from experience that probably means FIU isn't going to cough up the actual number, which isn't much.

There was some moaning in Miami that FIU was sent to Detroit, while Troy landed in New Orleans and Middle Tennessee in Mobile for bowl games. Victors don't always get the spoils, especially when there is a good chance there will be an embarrassing crowd in the stands.

If you have ever been to a game at FIU, which I know most of you haven't because I would have immediately recognized a lot of you in the throng of a couple thousand, know what I am talking about.

So how does this affect UNT?

Well, the Sun Belt is giving FIU $300,000 out of the league's BCS bowl money so the school won't lose money on winning (getting to a bowl). Troy got $250,000 and MTSU $200,000.

Adam's story said it all came out of the league's share of the $25 million of the BCS money that went to non-automatic qualifying leagues. The Sun Belt spent three quarters of a million bucks of its slice of the pie on helping finance bowl trips.

Another interesting tidbit from Adam's story is that Troy has sold more than 3,000 tickets for the New Orleans Bowl and expects several hundred more fans to buy tickets in New Orleans.

Adam's story also says that Middle Tennessee has already moved 1,300 tickets for the GoDaddy.com Bowl. The game is still more than three weeks away.

The whole reason FIU got shipped to Detroit is everyone knew that it would sell bubkus in the way of tickets.

That's something to think about when it comes to UNT. The Mean Green has struggled -- a lot -- since the 2004 New Orleans Bowl. If it ever gets back to being a bowl team, it will be important for bowl officials to believe that UNT fans will buy tickets to a bowl game.

It's just another reason butts in the seats at the new UNT stadium could be important down the line.

Be sure to read Adam's story. (link thru blog article below)

http://meangreenblog.dentonrc.com/

This comes as no surprise, I really think they will have less than 200 fans there. Come on, FAN up FIU!

I put this on the Troy board on thier discussion on this but sinces its over here now I'll be lazy and copy and paste.
__________________________________________________[/u]
Not surprised.

FAU sold over 2k for our Detroit trip in 08 with the majority of them being donated to local charities.

The F_U's are just very new to this and neither of us have a fanbase that is in a position to travel well, or have a larger dicretionary income. I say this because while both schools have a large alumni base, well over 90% of them did not have atheltics as a part of thier college experience.

Once the Alumni who went to school and had football as part of thier memories get out and make it in the world, the travel and ticket sales will increase. It hasnt helped FIU any that:

1.)They havent had a winning season ever
2.)This is thier first bowl game.
3.) They came out of the gate pissed off about getting Detroit instead of being happy.

That $750,000 is half of what the Sun Belt received from the BCS last year.

Actually the interesting part of the Herald article is the part about the formerly talkative Garcia not wanting to talk about the assistance from the league he indicated he wants to leave or talk about ticket sales.

As a person with some PR and journalism experience and being friends with some reporters, editors, and publishers, disappearing and being unavailable for comment when the news isn't good is a very bad strategy. The day comes when you have good news to get out to the world and you will find a much less receptive audience in the media when that comes after a disappearing act.

It's not all being young sporting universities. If North Texas wins 6 or 7 games next year and gets sent to a bowl in Detroit (or Boise, etc.)... I'm not going, either.

Some sports stuff is worth it (5 straight conference tournaments, NCAA game) and some isn't (middling bowl against an uninspiring opponent in a crappy town).

I don't blame anyone for not making a trip to Detroit and paying inflated bowl game prices.

(12-17-2010 02:31 PM)thetastygreek Wrote:  It's not all being young sporting universities. If North Texas wins 6 or 7 games next year and gets sent to a bowl in Detroit (or Boise, etc.)... I'm not going, either.

Some sports stuff is worth it (5 straight conference tournaments, NCAA game) and some isn't (middling bowl against an uninspiring opponent in a crappy town).

I don't blame anyone for not making a trip to Detroit and paying inflated bowl game prices.

you all do realize thats this bowl does take place the day after a major holiday? i mean im one of the first people in the stands every game but i have my family to think about.. and im not goin to convince them that goin to detroit for xmas would be great... im buying my complimentry ticket just to say i got one.. but i cant make it out there

You'll be hard pressed to find many MT fans that didn't have a blast in Detroit in 2006.

Arksfan, to place this in context, the FIU beat was foisted on Adam and he for whatever reason never gives FIU the benefit of the doubt on anything. There are some incorrect and negative innuendos in the story, like the charter (172 seat charter jet which included seating for students, as far as I understand was sold out). So it may not be a " return no calls from the media" but may be specifically the individual.

That said, it is what it is. I have to agree with owlfamily, we don't have that critical mass yet that has that strong association with FIU athletics. Would we have had more fans going to the game in NO vs Detroit? Clearly yes. Would that fan count be greater than what MTSU or Troy would bring? Probably not.

(12-17-2010 02:46 PM)FIU4Ever Wrote:  That said, it is what it is. I have to agree with owlfamily, we don't have that critical mass yet that has that strong association with FIU athletics. Would we have had more fans going to the game in NO vs Detroit? Clearly yes. Would that fan count be greater than what MTSU or Troy would bring? Probably not.

It's going to take a while and a whole lot of winning to make it happen to for both of us. The 2 years of losing seasons has killed the moementum we had built up after the bowl wins in 07-08. Hoepfully the OCS will help reestablish that.

There is really only one thing that the F_U's have for certain.

Potential.

This is what happened 2 years ago. Going to be the same thing this year. I have purchased my tickets and donated them to the University. Unfortunately, flights to Detroit are more than twice as much as to New Orleans and I had friends to stay with in NO, not so in Detroit. I hope others will do the same.

Detroit harder for FAU than Big Easy

Last year, Florida Atlantic University football fans had all the makings of a great party: a victorious first bowl game in New Orleans, a warm climate, cheap travel packages and Bourbon Street.

This year, they get Detroit the day after Christmas.

Fans are happy that the FAU Owls secured their second consecutive bowl bid this year, as they take on Central Michigan Dec. 26 in the Motor City Bowl. But they say it won't compare to last year, when FAU, the 2007 Sun Belt conference champs, defeated the University of Memphis at the New Orleans Bowl. About 5,000 fans cheered them on inside the Louisiana Superdome.

This year, the timing, the costs and the blustery location likely will result in a smaller and more subdued crowd, fans predict. The band and dance teams aren't going, and it's still up in the air whether any cheerleaders will go.

Last year, FAU offered $650 charter flight, hotel and ticket packages. Student government offered a bus package for $94 per student. Neither are being offered this year because of the timing of the game, the distance and the economy.

"Detroit's going to be tricky," said Eric Shaw, an FAU alum and marketing professor who leads the Faculty Senate. "Students last year wanted to get the New Orleans experience. There's not much of a Detroit experience. Almost everything that was in our favor about New Orleans is working against us for Detroit."

So far, about 1,300 tickets have been sold, but the vast majority were donations that will go to youth groups and military personnel in the Detroit area, said Dexter Lamont, assistant athletic director. President Frank Brogan launched a challenge to alumni, businesses and supporters to buy tickets to raise money for the team to travel.

Still, the Owls will have some fans to root them on, even if they're not crazy about spending part of their holidays in Detroit.

"I'm ecstatic that we're going to a bowl game," said Owls fan Jim Slowiak of Boca Raton, who plans to fly up Christmas Day with his wife, Leigh. "A bowl game is a bowl game, and if it's got an FAU team there, it's that much better."

I'm still too busy worrying about my own team's problems to comment.

(12-17-2010 02:36 PM)CJPanther Wrote:  you all do realize thats this bowl does take place the day after a major holiday? i mean im one of the first people in the stands every game but i have my family to think about.. and im not goin to convince them that goin to detroit for xmas would be great... im buying my complimentry ticket just to say i got one.. but i cant make it out there

No offense, but it really wouldn't make much of a difference for FIU no matter where they went. You could send FIU to the Little Caesar's Bowl, the GoDaddy.com Bowl, or New Orleans and you wouldn't see the dramatic difference that you get from Troy and Middle Tennessee State who have been there before.

I guess there's really no way of knowing for sure, but the Sun Belt did right this time by refusing to gamble on more financial losses on ticket sales. The most a Sun Belt team purchased for the Little Caesar's Bowl I believe was around 2,000. MTSU and Troy have shown that with a closer bowl they could push an additional 2-3K and then some.

I don't think it would've been fair to ask the Sun Belt to gamble on additional financial losses by seeing if an unproven FIU fanbase could sell 5,000 tickets to New Orleans or Mobile while MTSU or Troy would likely still sell no more than 2,000 if they were sent to Detroit.

ArkStFan mentioned that the Sun Belt is forking out half of its BC$ allowance from last year to pay for these bowl trips this year. The SBC would've had to pay even more if one of the two established members with proven fanbases were sent to Detroit instead. At least FIU gets pardoned for being in this bowl with its fanbase. No one would ridicule them for struggling to sell for this game since most other teams outside of the Midwest would do the same.

Now, if FIU was invited to New Orleans or Mobile and we saw the same figures on ticket sales, then FIU would have a hard time covering up its struggles to attract fans to a bowl game. That would be a huge PR blow to Florida International because then the entire country would be watching a game whose likely attendance would be comparable to the Troy/FAU game where the announcers made use of their time by commenting on one fan's gameday attire for about 30 minutes.

(12-17-2010 03:29 PM)AstroCajun Wrote:  I'm still too busy worrying about my own team's problems to comment.

Maybe that Brett Vito guy should take your advice.

(12-17-2010 03:35 PM)TennesseeBoyintheRockies Wrote:  Now, if FIU was invited to New Orleans or Mobile and we saw the same figures on ticket sales, then FIU would have a hard time covering up its struggles to attract fans to a bowl game. That would be a huge PR blow to Florida International....

That's pretty much a moot point now isn't it TBR.

A fairer comparison would be who would travel better to a bowl in St. Pete; FIU or MTSU. Starting to see the issue here?

p.s. even then it wouldn't really be that fair a comparison as MTSU would be heading south in the winter instead of north.

Are you guys done choosing your new assistant coaches in football, this would be interesting topic that should be more important to you, any good ones? What about Fauquier, he wasn't bad at FIU and MTSU, we might be in need of a new DC as there are rumors that our current DC might be headed to UF.

(12-17-2010 03:29 PM)AstroCajun Wrote:  I'm still too busy worrying about my own team's problems to comment.

(12-17-2010 03:42 PM)FIUFan Wrote:  

(12-17-2010 03:35 PM)TennesseeBoyintheRockies Wrote:  Now, if FIU was invited to New Orleans or Mobile and we saw the same figures on ticket sales, then FIU would have a hard time covering up its struggles to attract fans to a bowl game. That would be a huge PR blow to Florida International....

That's pretty much a moot point now isn't it TBR.

A fairer comparison would be who would travel better to a bowl in St. Pete; FIU or MTSU. Starting to see the issue here?

p.s. even then it wouldn't really be that fair a comparison as MTSU would be heading south in the winter instead of north.

How would how both teams travel to St. Pete be a better comparison? Murfreesboro is over twice as far from St. Pete.

I fully agree with you on this statement:

(12-17-2010 03:35 PM)TennesseeBoyintheRockies Wrote:  ...
I guess there's really no way of knowing for sure, ...

The rest I partially agree with, in that we are a young program so much is unknown right now. As an FIU alumni and fan of FIU athletics, I would love to see better fan participation in attendance and other support of all our sports. Though some here like to joke about our 15 fans, we know our fan base is growing, slowly but it is growing.

When all is said and done, we are a 9 year old football program.

FIU must make it a priority to get it's student body more involved . That is a huge asset that many in the SBC do not have. How many students are enrolled currently at FIU ?

This years FIU team and the 06 MT team are very similar. We were both in the same position to where if we won our last game of the year, which was at home, then we'd be outright champs and would be going to our first ever bowl game in New Orleans. And if we lost then we're going to Detroit the day after Christmas. The difference is that MT fans embraced the bowl game and were excited about it, while a majority of the FIU fans feel screwed and want to complain about it.

JohnnyRed says that FIU needs an inspirational video to get your fans jacked up and excited for your first ever bowl game. Stop whining about having to be in Detroit, MT fans had to go, and MT fans represented well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2BzpML4hew

Why doesn't FIU have something like this? And if they do, where can I find it?