Topic: Chuck Takes Swipe At Coach Huff

[mu79grad]

In Chuck Landon's H-D column, he talks about the less than stellar attendance at The Joan and then he adds this:  "...This is a Marshall problem. And a new face in the head coaching position has yet to make a difference. Of course, it would help if Huff didn?t demean MU?s fan base as he did at the end of his post-game press conference Saturday night.  ?Anybody who wants to jump off the wagon, go ahead and get off while we?re slowing down,? said Huff pointedly, ?because when we pick up speed you?re not going to be able to get on.?

I would post a link to the article but I understand that posting the link is not Kosher. 

[herd2win]

That is why Huffs comments all the way around were terrible Saturday night.  He just got here and has been on the fans more than once already.  Many G5 schools would love our attendance.  We have an aging fan base and covid concerns for some and we still get 25k.

Unless he wins big Huff will wear very thin with the fan base.

[W0lfman]

Links are fine to the article just don't think copy and pasting of articles is appropriate.

[herdfan429]

Oh also praised the fans for answering the call to the nccu game. There is nothing in huffs statement that is derogatory towards the fan base.  Ole chickadee is just trying to stir %^&* up.   

[coalherd]

Chuckie has got to stir the pot somewhere.  Remember he now writes for BOTH the Huntington AND Charleston papers under this new HD Media set up.  He can't be TOO critical of the NEERS in his columns else the Big EER boosters in the company's ownership group will pull little Dougie Reynolds puppet strings and have him rap Chuck's knuckles or, perhaps, even place Landon on, yep, you guessed it . . . "Double Secret Probation"!

As for Coach Huff, I'll give him a pass after 3 games in his HC tenure at MU.  He's in a learning process both in his head coaching performance and his performance dealing with the media, fans, etc.  Can't give him any sage advice in either area, but will tell him this:  Make giving up 3 unanswered touchdowns, scores, etc., in less than half of the last quarter of the game and thus losing a game a very, very RARE occurrence if you want to make friends and influence people in a positive manner while HC at MU.  Do that and you will have solid fans support behind you and your team and to a great extent I feel the attendance figures and numbers will improve and take care of themselves.

[mckayt]

Chuck is a journalist. No issues with his reporting - he's been covering Marshall for 50 years. No issues with Huff's comments either. It's not all roses when you give up a 17 point lead with 7 minutes to go.

[herd1990]

Too many excuses for poor attendance.  Covid, ticket prices, opponents.  If everyone who is tailgating goes into the stadium, we have 30k butts in seats.

[HoPPy785]

Geez is anyone really offended to the point that they wouldn't support the football team?

For some reason when I watched the post game, I thought his comment was directed at the media. He's constantly taking jabs at them. I took it as go ahead and write your stories about me being a bad hire now, but don't say how great I am later when we are rolling.

[coalherd]

Too many excuses for poor attendance.  Covid, ticket prices, opponents.  If everyone who is tailgating goes into the stadium, we have 30k butts in seats.

Yeah 1990 it makes me wonder with the comment in another thread that Appy had 30,000 fans for their home game against Elon.  That's in Boone, NC, which is, what, the size, population wise, of Barboursville or maybe Hurricane?  Just wonder, too, if Appy is one of those schools who "clears" with a siren, campus security, etc., their tailgating areas at a certain time prior to the kickoff and doesn't allow tailgating to resume until after the game, like a lot of schools do?

[hookem herd]

I love his post game comments. I agree that have too many weather fans.

[herdfan129]

Anyone who is whining about Huff's press conference is a little bitch....period.

THANK GOD we have a coach who actually cares, hurts when we lose because he puts so much work in to this, took 100% of the blame for the loss (fell on the grenade for his other coaches and players), and doesn't give coach speak answers every time.

Coach Huff is the man. Some of you have watched Doc for so long that you forgot what it was like to have a real coach.

[beau42m]

The "SECRET" is out - Coach Huff is in over his head! I bet Doc was having a big laugh somewhere over the outcome of Saturday's game. Could this hire be even more disastrous than that of Mark Snyder? I bet the Vegas bookmakers that are lining future games for Marshall deduct 1-2 points for Huff's ineptitude.

[herdfan129]

The "SECRET" is out - Coach Huff is in over his head! I bet Doc was having a big laugh somewhere over the outcome of Saturday's game. Could this hire be even more disastrous than that of Mark Snyder? I bet the Vegas bookmakers that are lining future games for Marshall deduct 1-2 points for Huff's ineptitude.

Doc's team would have already been fighting in the parking lot before the ECU game and ECU would have played their backups in the 2nd half cause we would have been blown out like Cincy.

[MicDrass1]

Our defense and Pk stunk.  Our Offense is the most dangerous since cato graduated.  So Huff has already improved that.  We lost our (2) best defensive players.  We couldn?t stop the pass by good passing qbs since Pruett was here.  Huff knows this and has signed bigger, longer cbs.  McCoy a huff transfer is our best secondary player.  Those catches were not on him.  Move him to cb. He is very fast twitched (Holliday recruiting didn?t understand fast twitch) which a Cb needs.  Our current starting cbs and S are not fast twitched enough.  They can?t break back on the ball fast enough. 

[svherd]

Too many excuses for poor attendance.  Covid, ticket prices, opponents.  If everyone who is tailgating goes into the stadium, we have 30k butts in seats.

I'll agree with you on that. But the things you mentioned do play into it. Actually, if anyone thinks our attendance is bad, Google 2019 NCAA college football attendance. It clearly show that we don't do a bad job at all supporting MU - all things considered. Many schools would kill to have the support we give. Look at what some schools get attendance wise. Houston in 2019 averaged 25K, SMU - 23K, Duke 25K, Coastal Carolina - 15K. The CUSA average was 18K plus. The MWC average was 23K plus.

We could do better for sure and we all want 30K a game; but that's never gonna happen in Huntington when the lowest ticket price for the ECU game was $30. That's $120 for a family of 4, not to mention $15 for parking and $20 plus for concessions. Just saying this isn't a prosperous area. In addition, not everyone in this area is a Herd fan, many WVU, UK, OSU, Va Tech fans that have no desire to watch Marshall play. It is what it is. Let also remember we averaged 28.9K for the greatest team we ever had, Huntington had 20K more people back then and multiple corporate sponsors (GAVE AWAY TICKETS) who are no longer here.

Chuck has become an old, bitter hack. Sad for him.

[elginherd]

I would post a link to the article but I understand that posting the link is not Kosher.

Posting the link is not a problem, because that link connects to a paywall in order to read the column. HD digital subscriptions are pretty cheap.
The problem occurs when someone copies and pasts the text of the whole piece into a post.
You are allowed to quote CL one or two of his lines...that's fine. Much more than that is ethically wrong.

To another poster: CL is not acting as a journalist for the Herd &USPAM; he's acting as a columnist. There's a big difference in the role. He ysed to be a journaist back in the day.

[Garbanjo]

Too many excuses for poor attendance.  Covid, ticket prices, opponents.  If everyone who is tailgating goes into the stadium, we have 30k butts in seats.

We?re down to the true believers after the Kayo/Snyder and Hamrick/Doc eras.

That?s 25K fans. Huff has to win big to bring the fire back to Herd football. Saturday certainly didn?t help and was a big setback but let?s see how the team plays Thursday night at App St.

Go Herd!

[parshall2marshall]

Saturday's issues:

1) Coaching
2) Execution. But refer to #1.

Even before the disastrous end to the 2020, I opined that Wells did not look like he had the experience to win big games. Not a popular opinion on here. Threw too many up for grabs. That didn't bite us until it bit us.

Loved Wells' beautiful throws Saturday, but he is not making great decisions all the time and the hurry-up I believe exacerbates mistakes. Reading between the lines it seems some of our most respected posters are doubting his long term viability as QB as I must admit I am.

Gammage isn't the first receiver here that has paid a price for carrying the ball like a loaf of bread. Probably won't be the last.

One of the things that sold me on Huff was attention to detail. The reflections in preparedness from his team and his strategic decision-making has now cast more than sliver of doubt in my mind. Snyder was always noting things needed to get fixed - early and often in his tenure - but they never did get fixed in quantity. I am certainly onboard with giving Huff some time to grow into the role of a HC, but don't throw team or coaching shortcomings in the face of the fanbase.

If he wants to talk about bandwagons then in IMHO the Herd better come out with fire in their eyes against Appy and also provide outstanding execution. Not necessarily a loss there, but a poor showing and it would be a major red flag for me regarding Huff. In other words back up what you are saying.

[goherd50]

Yeah 1990 it makes me wonder with the comment in another thread that Appy had 30,000 fans for their home game against Elon.  That's in Boone, NC, which is, what, the size, population wise, of Barboursville or maybe Hurricane?  Just wonder, too, if Appy is one of those schools who "clears" with a siren, campus security, etc., their tailgating areas at a certain time prior to the kickoff and doesn't allow tailgating to resume until after the game, like a lot of schools do?

Boone's population is a shade under 20,000 so a little bigger than Barboursville.  However, your point is well taken.  There is no other population within an hour or so.

They will probably have a small turnout this week since a Thursday night game will dampen their mostly two plus hour drive fan base.

[GreenWhite]

I have a problem with the media attacking fan attendance. As someone mentioned, it would have been well over $150 for a family of four to attend. The media, on the other hand, does not pay for a ticket to the game. They do not have to worry about paying for parking as they are given a pass there. For food, it is usually catered by some restaurant in the area. The only two restrictions I know of when they are in the press box are 1) you cannot cheer for your team 2) no alcohol. Yes, they are doing this for a living. But, if they weren't, I wonder how many of them would go to the game and treat themselves they way they are treated as media.

[herd2win]

The attendance is fine.  The one change I would make would be $10 end zone seats for students under 18.  Also think they could do a $100 family fun pack with 4 hotdogs, 4 waters or sodas and 4 small popcorns.

Have an area set up away from regular concessions to distribute.  Basic hot dogs, canned soda or bottled water and then the popcorn.

[svherd]

As posted somewhere else. I remember when St Mary?s, Cabell Huntington, Ashland Oil would all buy huge blocks of tickets and give to employees. Usually that meant a buddy or spouse bought a ticket as well to come with them.

We used to have midget football day where kids were given tickets. Then mom and dad usually bought one. Do that and have the kids walk around the field at half time.

Have a huge band day. It used to be much bigger. Families and parents like to support the HS Bands.


Jmo

[herdfan129]

The attendance is fine.  The one change I would make would be $10 end zone seats for students under 18.  Also think they could do a $100 family fun pack with 4 hotdogs, 4 waters or sodas and 4 small popcorns.

Have an area set up away from regular concessions to distribute.  Basic hot dogs, canned soda or bottled water and then the popcorn.

Upper endzone and upper corners should be $10 EVERY game for EVERY person. Period.

[puma]

As posted somewhere else. I remember when St Mary?s, Cabell Huntington, Ashland Oil would all buy huge blocks of tickets and give to employees. Usually that meant a buddy or spouse bought a ticket as well to come with them.

I'm not sure if it's impacting Athletics yet but the St. Marys/Cabell-Huntington merger is really hitting a lot of local non-profits hard too. They used to be the two biggest sponsors but they're just one entity now and advertising dollars and donations have essentially been halved since it's just one entity instead of two competing ones.

[CoachMaclid]

We?re down to the true believers after the Kayo/Snyder and Hamrick/Doc eras.

That?s 25K fans. Huff has to win big to bring the fire back to Herd football. Saturday certainly didn?t help and was a big setback but let?s see how the team plays Thursday night at App St.

Go Herd!

I don't get to second guess this - I've been saying this since 2017 -

There is statistical and visual evidence that our fanbase has drastically shrunk since 2015.  We kept Doc a minimum of 3 years too long.  Our C-USA TV deal is so poor we aren't visible in our home area anymore.  The combo has killed interest.  Our core fanbase is no longer 27-28k, its 23-24k.   Go look back at the 2018 NC State game - with the extra bump of a name ACC team in town we only mustered 32k.

I also think this is why we needed a major shakeup in the AD department.  We have a basketball program with a legit star player back that should be of interest.  We have a men's soccer program that has become a national player and is starting to create top level crowds and atmosphere.  We have a new baseball stadium on the way.  We have a softball program that could be a ranked top line program...

We need to find life with football - we need to go back to having swagger, being entertaining, and really pulling out all stops to get people into the gate.  Huff started some of that engagement in the offseason, but not really sure I saw much of anything else to REALLY get people to the game.