Re: prefer Clemson play a California team

quozzel

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Nov 19, 2017, 10:13 AM

One thing to keep in mind: extensive travel for an entire football team is extremely expensive...and extremely disruptive and draining.

"Exposure" is great, but if you fly 3,000 miles across the country, there's a very good chance you're going to arrive jet-lagged, frayed around the edges, and get exposed in quite another way.

It costs you. It also costs you in travel and recovery time. Instead of taking a 2-or-3-hour bus ride back from, say, Athens or Opelika, and then right to the tub in the Clemson facility and the comfort of your own bed, you spend the next 24 hours in airports and airplanes, dragging whatever injuries you incurred right along with you. You're tired as heck and you start the next week basically short an entire day of prep time.

I'm a firm believer that there's absolutely no reason to travel to UCLA when you've got the likes of Georgia, Auburn, heck, even Tennessee right in driving distance. While it'd be nice if we were a more "national" brand, is that really our bag? While we do occasionally get the likes of Hunter Johnson from Indiana or Christian Wilkins from Connecticut, we're still largely a super-regional power that does the vast bulk of our recruiting from those inside-2-hour and inside-4-hour circles the recruitniks always talk about. And our selectivity is such that we don't really like long-distance relationships a ton anyhow; we wanna get to know you. We want to see how you fit in our culture, in our locker room. Guys like Trevor Lawrence and Xavier Thomas have basically been part of the Clemson family since they committed; they're just going to make it official in a few weeks when they enroll.

The nice part about being where we are is, we really don't have to go that far to find some really good OOC games. And we're in such a deep talent pool we don't really have that much need to recruit nationally anyhow beyond the occasional bit of opportunism when a Hunter Johnson or Christian Wilkins presents themselves.

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I too and am alumnus and I too think academics are an inportant part of the equation. Hence why I would readily thumb down anyone who would in the past suggest we should be in the SEC.

I am also a big picture intuitive thinking strategery person. And while it is true that we could extend our brand even further across the country, there really isn't any need to at this point. If anything - as quozzel points out - it could dilute the brand. And by dilute, I mean losing. Or if not losing, then not sure your ROI would justify such an undertaking. Brand equity isnt going to increase by much as the result of playing in Jerry's World or the Rose Bowl (unless part if the CFP).

Clemson has a record number of applications already and every year admission criteria increases. Recruiting wise we get who we need. The best social media team in the business AND winning has made us a national brand as much as a football team can be (with the exception of ND).

That being said - having a home and home with a Big 10 or PAC 12 would be great to see. But I can understand why DRad doesn't jump on this idea.

Lastly, the way things are shaping up you might have the opportunity to visit the west coast for New Year's.

prefer Clemson play a California team

Have to stay up way too late to watch West Coast games

Re: Have to stay up way too late to watch West Coast games