I see many different schools of thought regarding the direction that our BYU
Cougars Football team should go.
I focus on two of them:
(1). Be patient. Rome was not built in a day. Go through the growing pains as
the end results are worth it.
As BYU is, Notre Dame once was. As Notre Dame is, BYU could become.
The same might be said about Boston College, Baylor, TCU, or any of the
other Faith Based Universities seeking respect in their Athletic
Departments.
It is expected that while learning to play vs the best of the P5 schools like
Washington and Wisconsin this season or USC next season, we will not be
beating up on a lot of teams and we may even not be well educated
enough in football vs the P5 teams we play, in order to to earn a Bowl Game.
But, if we do earn a bowl, it will be deserved, and we can be proud of it.
This group sees a need for the University to invest much more heavily in order
to get the the very best P5 type or NFL type coaches to come to BYU. We
need the coaches that can and will get the P4-5 star players to come to BYU.
All P4-5 star players are not bad, evil, and honor code violators. There are more
that are good than there are that are bad. I suspect that honor code wise, it
doesn't make much different if you are a 0,1,2,3,4, or 5 star athlete. There will
be good and not so good in each category.
We must stop using "No Sunday Play" or the "Honor Code" as reasons for not
doing what we need to do.
We have our heads buried in the sand if we believe that 0- 1-2-3 star players, can
consistently be successful vs. 4-5 star players that we play against in P-5 teams from P5
conferences.
It remains that the perhaps over used seminal message is that to be in a sweet Orange
Juice Contest, when the other teams use the best California and Florida Oranges, and we
continue to insist that our Utah home grown lemons are just as good, the honest fact is, one
can not make sweet orange juice out of lemons, no matter how good and pure our lemons
are. And yes, -- I do believe that we have the best and the purist lemons in the world. And
yes, in a G5 conference, there are few teams only, that could beat us in a Lemonade contest.
The question is this:
Are we satisfied making great lemonade in a G5 conference, or do we
want to make great orange juice is a P5 conference or be in the contest as a P5
Independent?
As for me, I prefer orange juice over lemonade. I need too much sugar for
lemonade while orange juice is sweet enough without all of that sugar. Because of the
sugar, the orange juice is much better for us in, (not all), but most cases,
(2). We should join a conference where we can win almost ever game we play;
Be conference champions ; And get a guaranteed bowl every year.
We may drop to a FCS conference in order to win every game, but it’s
worth it as long as we win. We must be winners.
To this #2 school of thought, I ask, “Winners of what? This is not what I
am about, and I hope that this is not what BYU fans are about. I really
don’t believe that this is what our coaching staff is about either. I need to
believe that our coaching staff is all about doing what ever it takes to get us
to the highest level. I need to believe that BYU is worth the effort.