IMO that doesn’t really make a lot of sense. It seems to me to be nothing more than a cover phrase for ‘bringing in as much money under any and all guises’ which is not in itself a bad thing, but let’s not overdo the righteous routine.

please

I still love the place

IMO Notre Dame has become the most mercenary place imaginable. Those hideous unis for the Miami game are merely the most recent example.

While living in Valparaiso, Indiana in 1994 I went to the annual spring game. While waiting in line outside the stadium to get a ticket I noticed the guy standing in line behind me seemed familiar. A few very prosperous looking people who seemed to be recent grads recognized him – it was Tony Rice. They gushed over him and asked to have their picture taken with him and he was very gracious in accommodating them.

Here’s a guy who 6 years before had led the team to the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP and he has to stand in line to get tickets to see the spring game. Something to be proud of?

I live in New England now but when I was living in Indiana around 2000 I was told that the play ‘The Vagina Monologues’, which had become an annual occasion during the winter at ND in that period, would be having the opening performance for that year at Washington Hall, and that just HAPPENED to be Ash Wednesday. Some friends of mine had some 3 1/2 x 5 cards printed up in protest and took them to Mass in the Basilica. We were told – very politely but firmly – that we could not distribute them. We went to the radio station and tried to get some air time but were refused, and the students there did not think it was any big deal anyway.

I still love the place.

Not for nothing, but CA to IN is a three-hour time difference. IN to IRE is a six-hour time difference.

No one is saying the players are “babies”. They’re saying there’s no reason to make a schedule that already has acceptable difficulty even more difficult for non-football reasons.

In response to Jag167 – I hope ND players arent as big of babies as you insinuate. Just what they need more excuses. They also must be pretty spolied brats to not appreciate a trip to Europe for “no good reason”. Every ND scholarship football player has a personal tutor which probably helps with the classes.

Why does USC have no problem traveling “all the way to Nothern Indiana” everyother year and dismantling ND? Teams travel more than ever. Time to get over it. Rockne’s teams took a freaking train out to USC and won.

If you want to say the schedule is difficult this is not disputed this year or most. But i dare you do go tell a fan of a differnt team its tough to go play NAVY in Ireland then have to come all the way back to play PURDUE. You will be laughed out of the room. Swarbrick is doing what he can to save the “brand”. Other teams have already copied ND’s 7-4-1 model. A game in Dublin is clearly generating some buzz.

Jerrod, I don’t think you quite understood the point. When he said ‘business trip’ he meant that ND really only scheduled the game there to promote the ‘brand’ and make more money without really thinking of the toll this could take on the team. How much time or opportunity do you really think they will have to see/experience Dublin?

Think about it…they fly in a few days before the game and have a small amount of jet lag, all the while missing a few days of classes (granted it is week one and they aren’t missing much). They spend those few days practicing, going over film, etc. They then fly all the way back, have some more jet lag, and little time to rest as they have classes and need to begin prepping for Purdue. Then they travel to a tough MSU the following weekend, them home against a tough Michigan. Not to mention later in the year they have to head all the way out to Southern California. They have a pretty difficult September and having a game all the way over in Europe for really no good reason doesn’t help. Oh, and also, the trip to Hawaii was during bowl season after classes had ended…its definitely a little different.

No, when I was a student there from 2004-2008 there were signs at Anthony Travel the entire time promoting the game in Dublin this year. This has been in the pipeline for a long time

All those things need to be fixed. The video screen is part of the solution, albeit a very small part. But if you want the university, boosters, alumni, etc. to stop spending money on the football program until it delivers a consistent top 10 program, then you’re asking a lot and taking away the means.

I was agreeing with you; Notre Dame has it backwards with regards to the football program. “Football at Notre Dame should be all about winning with integrity. If you accomplish that goal, the promotion you seek will follow naturally, and because it is natural and not forced, it will be much more effective.” The promotion you were talking about was for the University. The video screen should promote the football team and the fans in the stadium and the gameday atmosphere.

But if we don’t start winning consistently, the video screen, field turf, uniforms, etc. are all cheapened. If we do start winning, then people may say it was because ND modernized. But this modernization does not affect, one way or the other, the quality of the football team. It may, however, make the experience more enjoyable for some of the fans and that is where we differ.

Wasn’t Rockne’s whole point of playing on the West Coast to promote the University? It seems ND is trying to do that as more and more football schools look to make their schedule easier. Many teams have played in the Chik-Fil-A Classic including Georgia and Tennessee and I rarely hear their fans complain about having to travel for a home or neutral site game. Even VT went to DC.

Now I don’t know how the negotiations with Navy work but I doubt we get final say on where Navy wants to play that “home” game. Case in point, they are getting sued for money owed and not us.

Lastly, in 1996 we played in Ireland in November, three weeks later we played at USC. What’s the difference between doing it then and doing it now?