Western North Carolina has its clogging … da beach has shagging … now wherever Tar Heel fans gather they have The (D)ickie Shuffle. America’s favorite much maligned and beleaguered director of athletics is the first Division 1-A sports executive to have his own dance craze. Tar Heel fans can trip this new light fantastic to any sort of music; but the current hot wax is “those gosh darn ads in Kenan Stadium”. The Little Prince “zigs’ and his “fans” “zag” … and BobLee just laffs and laffs.
Did the Hokey Pokey get started this way? Here’s the way this works:
Pick an issue … ANY issue! It sorta helps if it pertains to UNC Athletics but it really doesn’t matter. Watch the Official UNC Athletics website for whatever statement Dickie Baddour makes about the issue (he zigs) … then take absolutely the opposite opinion (you zag). Sure, most of the issue redefine trivial but, hey, this “is sports” not rocket surgery.
Today’s Issue De Jour is “those gosh darn ads” in Kenan and Dean’s Dome. This is, so far, a multi-set CD. Follow this:
- About a year ago it was “leaked” that the possibility was being explored to sell non-controversial corporate advertising in Kenan Stadium and Dean’s Dome. 98% of the Div 1-A schools already do this. No Chancellor has gone blind or had hair grow in his palm due to this action … but it’s only been tracked for 20+ years. Estimates of potential revenue ranged from $37.56 to $197,000,000,000+ . … The Internet Loons went berserk.
- The Little Prince formed a multi-ethnic diversity study committee to study the matter. After 6 months the committee decided it should meet on Thursdays rather than Wednesdays because Wednesday is too close to Monday. The two Thursday Adventists on the committee quit and filed a class action suit against Milton’s Clothing Cupboard for having too many “Frog Strangler” sales. … The Internet Loons went berserk.
- Dickie patched up his study committee with some duct tape and bubble gum and sent them back into closed session under the big oak tree in Polk Place. The committee decided it was OK to sell the ads so long as every living alumni got to vote on which corporate entities were deemed worthy. … The Internet Loons went berserk.
- Dickie took the verdict of his study committee to the Lord High Snoots otherwise known as The Bored Trustees. … The Internet Loons went berserk.
- Now The Bored Trustees have told Dickie it’s fine with them if he wants to sell “those darn ads in Kenan and Dean’s Dome” so long as any negative backlash from lunatic fans is directed at him and not at any of them. The Little Prince replied “What else is new?” The Internet Loons are going berserk.
OK … quick update here on The Little Prince aka UNC’s Brian Cashman. Who is Brian Cashman you ask. Brian is the General Manager of the New York Yankees. His job description contains three items.
- Put price stickers on Derek Jeter bobblehead dolls
- Pick up Ruben Sierra’s dry cleaning
- Take full blame if Yankees do not win World Series.
When Little Dickster was appointed UNC Director of Athletics he had four items in his job description:
- Clean out the financial dust bunnies that Johnny “World’s Greatest AD Ever” Swofford had been shoveling under the sofa for 10 years
- Be sure nothing screws up The Legend’s Retirement Party.
- Keep a low profile
- Don’t make any major decisions about anything, or else
So much for “best laid plans” …
I know it’s a stretch to believe this BUT Dick Baddour is NOT a futuristic, outside the box, work without a net, push the envelope, damn the torpedos fullspeed ahead kind of a guy. Really, he isn’t. He loves “tradition” and “status quo” and “because we’ve always done it that way, that’s why” sort of problem solving and conflict resolution.
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Swagger’s Stumper
What Walt Disney western hero
“… made’em do what they oughta cause if they didn’t they died.”
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When Ye Olde Legend extinguished his belly fire back in October 1997, Dickie had the water pitchers in the Skippa Bowles Room polished to a high shine and, at Dean’s request, did not try to hug him. After that high point, this whole Athletics Directing gig got waaaay out of hand. … and now he is “directing” the utter debashment of the Holy of Holies – Beautiful Kenan Stadium. You know Kenan … that large stand of sacred pine trees in the center of campus with the football field in the middle.
PINE TREES (said in Alan Iverson “PRACTICE” voice). We’re not talking Aspens or Maples or Live Oaks or Stately Elms or Eucalyptus … we’re talking PINE TREES. Hurricanes pick their teeth with PINE TREES after they eat a trailer park. PINE TREES! Nobody really likes PINE TREES … UNLESS Dickie might threaten one or two … then WHOA!
OK, those “darn ads” are no threat to the PINE TREES but when fans attack The Little Prince they throw anything and everything including the kitchen sink and PINE TREES. “If we let him put up the ads he’ll end up cutting down the PINE TREES and change the stadium’s name to Philip Baddour Attorneys At Law Stadium … WE MUST STOP THIS MAD MAN!
A moment of reality here … then we’ll go back to persecuting the little fella. It was NEVER intended that the “darn ads” be anything but well respected commodity institutions … Progress Energy, Coca Cola, a bank, a cellular company, a health care company with the word “Blue” in it’s name, etc. Bojangles, Viagara, Halliburton, and Jesse Jones Sausage never made anyone’s short list.
Now, the idea of “non-controversial” corporate entities drew a few snickers from the get-go. This IS Chapel Hill where ANY form of corporate exposure is HERESY unless it’s in the form of a research grant to study how academic squirrels can become deities without having to undergo circumcision.
Just as the legion of “Hang the little bastard” fans automatically oppose ANYTHING Dickie proposes, the campus fruitloop society will arm their undergraduate army of geeks and asocial flotsam and jetsam to storm the AD’s office as soon as he proposes the first corporate ad. Only Dickie could unite the campus squirrels AND the Internet Loons.
The Internet Loons despise Dickie so much they completely overlook their raison d’etre To Become A Major Football Power. Every “Major Football Power” in America already has “those darn ads” in their stadium … well, except for Michigan, Stanford, and Notre Dame … but Notre Dame doesn’t count since NC State even beat them a few years ago.
If Dickie had zigged “No darn ads in our sacred stadium” then the Loonie Brigade would have counter zagged with “You idiot, you are leaving $197,000,000,000 on the table … Get a rope!”
One classic Internet Idiot even posted … “Dick Baddour is ruining the reputation of MY University with this ad mess … if he had only hired Frank Beamer (who has recruited more felony prone athletes than any coach in America) he would not be destroying UNC’s reputation with this (tasteful corporate awareness) program.” … Read this last sentence again folks … it sums up the utter stupidity of a faction of your fellow Tar Heel fans.
In Part Two of The (D)ickie Shuffle we will discuss how much the average fan (1) understands, and (2) actually cares, about the financial state of his school’s athletic program. Hint … (1) not much and (2) not at all.
Paladin’s “logo” was a chess knight. His first name probably was NOT “Wire” and “Hey Boy” WAS running an Oriental whorehouse in the basement of that fancy San Francisco hotel.
Swagger visited North Alabama this week. He liked it and met a buncha fine folks. He will elucidate more in an upcoming column.
More BobLee Alive bookings … Raleigh’s Crabtree Rotary on August 26 … details to follow.
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