Deals fall through all the time before the contract is signed, this is nothing new. The Houston AD did not do his job right he did not complete the contract correctly and was far past the deadline for getting the contract to Peterson. Peterson had to move on or risk the possibility of not having any opponent which would have been worse. As far as integrity, the Houston AD showed less integrity by bringing the failed deal to the public. Peterson could have done the same first with his version of how Houston has not responded for months past the deadline. It would have made the Houston AD look bad and saved face for Peterson, but Peterson chose the high road and let it go. Several deals fall through each year. Why bring this one up? It sounds like the Houston AD messed up by not meeting deadlines, selling tickets before a contract is done and is trying to cover his butt.

Pederson may be a horses patut...and may not be honest. See Houston Nutt.
But, when you see the chain of events happen, it isn't hard to see that this was mostly Houston's fault.
Maggart coming off all po'd seems to be just a front.
As far as a schedule with patsies, Wake Forest is much tougher than Houston.
and a statement like 75% of the OBJECTIVE people is a little bit of a misstatement, since the writer himself seems to have it out for SP, and doesn't appear objective.

And it would be a lot easier for Husker fans to see that were it not for the past gaffes Pederson has made.

Pederson and Maggard (sp) are two perfect examples of the Peter Principle, IMO.

I think most half intelligent fans don't mind that we're not playing Houston on the road to start the season. We got a good deal financially by adding another home game. The problem with Pederson, as usual, is that he doesn't think about his actions before he makes a move. Pederson has a major public relations problem and that matters in todays college football world. Getting the national news media on your side is key to getting positive exposure that can help with recruiting and even finances. Pederson's incompetence once again makes us the laughing stock of college football whether it's on ESPN, Jim Rome, CNN etc. Once again, Pederson stepped in a pile of dog crap because of the way he handles business. Why didn't he even think about calling the U of Houston or ESPN and being proactive in this process? If Pederson had called Maggard at the beginning of November and expressed concern about the contract instead of letting it reach the point where it did, Nebraska would not be in the predicament they're in now. More than likely, he saw the writing on the wall and found a great way to get out of a huge trap game. Pederson himself said he can get these contracts done in 24 hours. So what's the hurry then? In today's OWH Rich Kaipust has quotes from the ESPN people saying this was a done deal and it would be televised on ESPN. The facts are as the season progressed and it became clear that this year was a disaster, Pederson found out he didn't want to go on the road, during his contract year and start the season off with a potentially embarassing loss on national TV. Steve Pederson is fighting for his job right now and with the number of influential people he's pissed off and the manner which he's stepped on people in the past 2 years, it's very unlikely his contract will be renewed next December. The only thing that could keep him around is a winning season and a Big 12 North title. You can win 8-9 games a year and run an athletic department without being a (insert expletive). Anyone could make the decisions that Pederson has made over the course of the past 2 years but he's done it in a manner that had pissed people off and given the University a public relations nightmare. Certainly there are other AD's that could do things just as effectively but do them "cleaner."

Un-bee-buh-bul...

Scary thing is -- the AD is actually a UNL graduate. Makes you wonder, eh?

I don't think that SP gets the visceral level reaction his actions have caused in this state. It's like the past election cycle . . . you were on one side or the other & you weren't moving! FS kept Gillespie 5 years too long & put his own neck on the line in the process. It would have been nice for SP to have told FS to get his recruitment in order rather than use the ultimate solution on the program. I, like many of the rest of the fans was not happy with the 7-7 season. I was very encouraged, however, after my son attended NU FB Camp & came back ecstatic over his experiance there.
Ron Brown, Jimmy williams, Turner Gill & the rest(IMO the best staff since 72') put on a great camp & made him feel welcome even though he was nursing a sprained ankle he sufferered in a baseball game 2 days before camp started. He felt that in some small way that he was a part of something special just by the excitement & comradery the staff developed during the camp. FS made a big deal about the history of the Nebraska program & encouraged the kids to go through a lifting session in the strength facility as though they were players. In short FS made you feel wanted whether you were coming there or not. In contrast, when he returned under BC the camp, it was polar opposite. Unfriendly, Sterile & Aloof. He said that he felt like someone that had overstayed their welcome & that if last summer would have been his only contact with UNL, he would have never returned. I guess down deep that many (maybe 75%) of us regarded the staff that was fired as sort of our adopted family. We don't treat people that way. (fired after a successful season) We wear the underdog badge proudly when we are outmanned & we belive in the little engine that could . . . After all TO beat supposed great teams with great qb's (OU, Miami, Florida, Tennessee, etc...) the Nebraska way-hard work,great coaching & talent development (the greatest walk-on program in the country). In short we don't throw family out when things get a little rough, we redouble our efforts & work harder! (remember the bowl shut-out loss to Miami?)
The problem that faces us now is that if this grand experiment fails, we must replace; Perlman, Peterson, Callahan & Rose. This intertwined group has brought the collective deeds and accomplishments of the last 40+ years to the brink & all share responsibility for the records that have been shattered. The lot of them seem very different than what we see ourselves to be . . . NEBRASKAN'S

Guest...I'm with you on every part of that comment, with the exception of replacing Jim Rose.

In comparison to the roles Perlman, Peterson and Callahan have played in the demise of the Husker tradition, Rose's role is minimal at best. All Rose does is call the play-by-play of Husker football, in addition to his other on-air and behind-the-scenes work for Pinnacle Sports Productions. Rose never fired a coach, hired an incompetent athletic director or gutted a team's tradition.

I will admit that Rose sounds like he loves the sound of his voice...having been in the radio business, the number of broadcast personalities I can stand listening to for more than 5 minutes at a time is relatively small (most of them, oddly enough, are friends of our sport).

But if you look back at recent history, Warren Swain was a p-b-p man that had no gray area when it came to fans. Same with Kent Pavelka (some would say he is easily the most egotistical, arrogant jerk in the state's media, but others -- including himself -- consider him a radio god). There were even those who preferred Joe Patrick over Lyle Bremser back in the pre-network days (and vice versa).

Everybody hated to see Jim Rose leave the state when he went down to KC four years ago. Then everybody wanted him to replace Warren Swain, and now that he has, everybody wants to send him on the next plane out of town.

Rose is no Lyle Bremser. NOBODY is (not even Pavelka). But to finger him as part of the problem with the tradition of Husker football is going a little too far.

As for Perlman and Pederson -- the sooner they are handed their pink slips, the better. I'm willing to let Callahan build a program, but if it doesn't happen in five years, he can follow P&P out the door as well.

quote:

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Originally posted by Guest:
I don't think that SP gets the visceral level reaction his actions have caused in this state. It's like the past election cycle . . . you were on one side or the other & you weren't moving! FS kept Gillespie 5 years too long & put his own neck on the line in the process. It would have been nice for SP to have told FS to get his recruitment in order rather than use the ultimate solution on the program. I, like many of the rest of the fans was not happy with the 7-7 season. I was very encouraged, however, after my son attended NU FB Camp & came back ecstatic over his experiance there.
Ron Brown, Jimmy williams, Turner Gill & the rest(IMO the best staff since 72') put on a great camp & made him feel welcome even though he was nursing a sprained ankle he sufferered in a baseball game 2 days before camp started. He felt that in some small way that he was a part of something special just by the excitement & comradery the staff developed during the camp. FS made a big deal about the history of the Nebraska program & encouraged the kids to go through a lifting session in the strength facility as though they were players. In short FS made you feel wanted whether you were coming there or not. In contrast, when he returned under BC the camp, it was polar opposite. Unfriendly, Sterile & Aloof. He said that he felt like someone that had overstayed their welcome & that if last summer would have been his only contact with UNL, he would have never returned. I guess down deep that many (maybe 75%) of us regarded the staff that was fired as sort of our adopted family. We don't treat people that way. (fired after a successful season) We wear the underdog badge proudly when we are outmanned & we belive in the little engine that could . . . After all TO beat supposed great teams with great qb's (OU, Miami, Florida, Tennessee, etc...) the Nebraska way-hard work,great coaching & talent development (the greatest walk-on program in the country). In short we don't throw family out when things get a little rough, we redouble our efforts & work harder! (remember the bowl shut-out loss to Miami?)
The problem that faces us now is that if this grand experiment fails, we must replace; Perlman, Peterson, Callahan & Rose. This intertwined group has brought the collective deeds and accomplishments of the last 40+ years to the brink & all share responsibility for the records that have been shattered. The lot of them seem very different than what we see ourselves to be . . . NEBRASKAN'S

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Very well put. Thank you for the positive input on this topic.

What people don't understand right now is a kids main objective has gone from playing for a great college team too making money in the NFL.

This isn't to say that Frank Solich wouldn't have had successful years but even Frank saw this happening and knew he needed to make a switch in the offense and start recruiting towards a more balanced offense. The problem with this was that recruits think of Nebraska, They think 90/10 Run:Pass ratio and they think option option option, This makes it impossible to recruit any good quarterbacks that can eventually make the switch in the offense because they want to go to the NFL, This makes it impossible to recruit OLineman anymore because you need to pass block to be in the NFL, This makes it impossible to recruit WR's because they want to be in the NFL.

Now Steve Pederson seen this problem and how did he solve it? By instead of waiting it out for 20 years like we did with Tom Osbourne. He made a switch right away and brought in a coach that recruits knew wasnt going to run the option. Not only that he brought in a SUPERBOWL coach, and don't even bring up the next season with me because he had 60% of his starting lineup go down at one point or another and New England wouldnt have won more the 4 games with those injury issues...

Did it work?

You really can't use this year as a judge of wether its going to work or not because this really was a throw away year, It was a year the staff worried about the experience more than the end results. The players with enough talent to compete got the knowledge they needed to do so this season and the coaches grew into the college game and started to understand the college game...

And one final thing http://nebraska.rivals.com/commitlist.asp
and
http://nebraska.rivals.com/teamrank.asp?SID=928&Sport=1


also with other sports thriving right now how Steve Pederson has done a great job with, well, his job... And the thing i love about him is he couldnt care less about public relations...

S0404...The big thing, especially in today's instant-opinion society, is public perception and Pederson is failing miserably in that regard and it is going to wind up costing him his job and the UNL athletic department's reputation.

This is a what-have-you-done-for-me-today society, and he has done nothing to advance himself in the eyes of the Husker Nation. His boondoggle with the Solich firing and subsequent Nutt/Callahan fiasco made this painfully obvious, and the subsequent problems -- the latest being the Houston scenario -- only further cements a negative perception about him, not only within the Husker Nation, but nationally as well.

Pederson has become the laughingstock of college athletics, and I dare say he has done more to damage the reputation of this university AND this state than the Lawrence Phillips situation of a decade before. Even Billy Byrne understood the importance of good public relations while he was telling us we'd need to shell out more coin for season tickets, and while nobody shed any tears when he left for Texas A&M, it's obvious his efforts left a positive mark on the Husker Nation.

As for Callahan's stint with the Raiders, you can make the argument that he rode Gruden's coattails and inherited a team that was already a Super Bowl contender. You can also assume that he was not the problem in the Raiders' implosion of a year ago...a fact made brutally obvious by the way they have performed this year with essentially the same talent as 2003.

I think anybody with half a brain could see that this was going to be "one of those years" -- I told anybody who would listen that a 6-5 season should be considered a blessing and we would be lucky to win three games this year (of course, I'm the same guy who said we'd go 8-4 in 1997 and we ended up winning the national title, so for once I hit the gloom-and-doom jackpot...LOL).

We should expect at least 1-2 more years similar to what we've seen so far. It's going to take time to build this program back up, and it may end up that Callahan is our Howard Schnellenberger/John Blake disaster before another Bob Stoops type of coach comes along to take the program back to the top.

One thing's for sure...as long as Pederson remains as athletic director, we are going to be taking a lot of hits, both inside the lines and in the area of public relations.

And as long as SP keeps making good moves i could care less how is PR is... and i think both him and Harvey Perlman feel the same way...


Also next year will be alot better than ur expecting

quote:

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As for Callahan's stint with the Raiders, you can make the argument that he rode Gruden's coattails and inherited a team that was already a Super Bowl contender. You can also assume that he was not the problem in the Raiders' implosion of a year ago...a fact made brutally obvious by the way they have performed this year with essentially the same talent as 2003.

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oh come on Mikey you have more sense than this... Look where you're going with this one...

Callahan doesnt get credit for the superbowl team because he didnt coach the team the previous year? hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm you're kinda a glass half empty kinda guy arnt you?

No...I'm a half full and more water on the way kind of guy.

Fact is -- Gruden had the Raiders on the cusp of the Super Bowl before he left for Tampa Bay. I'm not saying Callahan doesn't deserve credit, but you have to admit his cupboard was mighty full when he took over. He was also, if memory serves, their offensive coordinator under Gruden.

The next year, the team basically went Benedict Arnold on him and have never recovered. You could say Callahan took a step up leaving that craphole and coming to Nebraska to rebuild a program.

quote:

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Originally posted by NWI:
No...I'm a half full and more water on the way kind of guy.

Fact is -- Gruden had the Raiders on the cusp of the Super Bowl before he left for Tampa Bay. I'm not saying Callahan doesn't deserve credit, but you have to admit his cupboard was mighty full when he took over. He was also, if memory serves, their offensive coordinator under Gruden.

The next year, the team basically went Benedict Arnold on him and have never recovered. You could say Callahan took a step up leaving that craphole and coming to Nebraska to rebuild a program.

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but with your previous statement you have to acknowledge that the cupboard was pretty empty here and this season should be credited to Frank Solich?

so pick your battles, either Callahan is a coach good enuff to take a team to the superbowl, or Callahans coaching had no influence on this season because he was coaching Frank Soliches team

S040, you aren't swaying anyone on this subject! Your NFL arguement doesn't hold up as of 1-year ago NEBRASKA had the most active alumni in the League. And one thing is for sure, they didn't come from "fun n gun" roots. Bill Callahan was not even available when Steve fired Frank so don't even start to promote his genius hire after the Arkansas fiasco. Pellini found a way to rally the defensive troops to play to their potential, WHY couldn't COSGROVE? Don't give that tired excuse that they weren't his guys . . . they weren't Pellini's or Cotton's either!

Get real S040, since when has Nebraska Football had "throw away years"????????????????????

quote:

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Originally posted by S0404:
And as long as SP keeps making good moves i could care less how is PR is... and i think both him and Harvey Perlman feel the same way...


Also next year will be alot better than ur expecting

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How does one rationalize that Steve Pederson is making good moves???? The only attention that he has drawn to the university and himself has been extremely negative. Hitler had loyal supporters right up to the very end and didn't concern himself with public opinion either.

quote:

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How does one rationalize that Steve Pederson is making good moves???? The only attention that he has drawn to the university and himself has been extremely negative. Hitler had loyal supporters right up to the very end and didn't concern himself with public opinion either.

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I find it hilarious that you think he should concern himself with public opinion... If I create rockets for a living am i going to ask the public what i should do? lmao He knows that 99.9% of the public have no clue as to whats going on and that him and a few inside people are the only ones that know whats best for the program, and im glad we have a guy there thats looking out for the best of the program instead of making himself look pretty to the public

Making himself look pretty is EXACTLY what he is doing right now. And it's getting ugly fast.

SOS404...you're continuing to make youself look really silly with your comments. Which side of your last comment do you believe you're on...the.01% or the 99.9%? What makes you think you know so much more about the situation in Lincoln than anyone else? Because you read Huskerpedia and Rivals.com?? Like a previous poster wrote, you are not convincing anyone with your current logic that the situation in Lincoln is good. Like it or not, in the real world, other peoples perceptions and opinions DO matter. I'm going to suggest you read Dale Carnegie's best seller "How to Win Friends and Influence People". Successful people in the real world become sucessful not through deception, lies, and devicivness... but by getting a group of people with common beliefs in the boat with you, and all rowing in the same direction. Unfortunatley, it appears that the majority of the people in the state feel the boat in Lincoln is running amuck. Believe me, Steve Pederson cares IMMENSELY about the public's perception of him...and so does his boss, Harvey Perleman.