Hobbs hits the ground running on Rutgers facilities
- Thread starter Scarlet_Scourge
- Start date
The article basically says that he's picking up on the work that was done by Julie Hermann.
This is not a criticism. It's actually a good thing - it means that he won't be wasting time trying to reinvent the wheel - but it's a reminder that a lot of what she was doing was laying the groundwork for more dramatic changes, particularly on the infrastructure side, that needed to happen.
This is not a criticism. It's actually a good thing - it means that he won't be wasting time trying to reinvent the wheel - but it's a reminder that a lot of what she was doing was laying the groundwork for more dramatic changes, particularly on the infrastructure side, that needed to happen.
There are also some bad ideas like creating a temp space for some teams in the basement of HPSS, that seem like a waste of money and lets face it temp space tend to be temp for many years.
He also understands that we can not just do the bare minimum is not going to cut it anymore.
All good signs.
That's because, unlike Julie, Hobbs decided not to completely scrap the work done by his predecessor and start from scratch.
If he did not agree with the overall plan, he would have scrapped it.
To be fair, it is not so easy to scrap the current plan. The current plan is part of the comprehensive university physical plan, which has gone through several rounds of vetting and revision. While it is certainly possible to tweak or modify the current athletics facility plan, scrapping and replacing it would have ramifications beyond athletics.
On the other hand, scrapping the previous plan was easy. It was pretty much nothing more than some incongruent artist renderings placed in fundraising material.
Pernetti proposed that god awful remake of the RAC, I'm glad Julie scrapped that. It actually made it look worse and didn't accomplish what we actually need which is dedicated practice space.
This might be the first message board post here using the word incongruent. I think your rating should immediately be elevated from All American to Heisman.
Temporary space can work great if its planned out during design to be repurposed in the future.
Care needs to be taken. That's how Maryland got in debt trouble. They spent borrowed millions to build new facilities for non revenue sports. Then they got worked into a panic trying to get football to pay for what they had done. Debbie Yow (the spender) and Fridge couldn't get the revenues going. Fix football first and then build shit
Just a question but how the hell do you build a locker room not big enough to fit all the players from the start? It's not like the NCAA has increased it's allotted scholarship amounts per team. I mean really how hard is it to figure out. 85 scholarships+Average amount of walkons+add ten to 15 lockers=Enough room for everyone. Architect's kill me sometimes and I work with them almost everyday.
Funny...I've always felt we dress an abnormally low # of kids for home games (not including RS/injured). I guess maybe we now know why?
That being said I love all he has to say here!
That being said I love all he has to say here!
Wasn't there supposed to be new locker rooms in the stadium expansion, and they got cut when money became an issue?
Its easy to hit the ground running when someone else already cleared the path and paved it for you.
you must be kidding--only thing julie did was create the opportunity for him to be hired--she paved nothing and just made huge potholes
Correct. Essentially a brand new locker room, and tunnel, IIRC under the east corner of the expansion, for one team, and the current ones under the Hale Center, I assume, would have been renovated into a single space.
I guess the same way you build a stadium expansion without enough restrooms, requiring you to put portapotties on the concourse. Or the same way the previous plans (now scrapped) for RAC renovation called for reconfiguration of the seating bowl in a way that significantly reduced the number of 100-level sideline seats meaning that 16% of the people sitting in the most expensive seats to sell would be forced to move to cheaper seats.
Obviously architects can't count.
Ooh Ooh is he going to work on the "Athletes' Village?" And the support system for athletes that was already in place?
The article pretty much demonstrates that, when it comes to facilities planning, you're off base here. Among other things, one of the items on his list is essentially to stick the first shovel in the ground on an already-paid-for project.
I was a Hermann fan, but also understand that she had to go if the donors weren't going to give while she was in charge. (I think this says more about them than her, but that's another issue and it's not worth going into on this this thread.) I think it speaks well of Hobbs that he's not tossing out the baby with the bathwater and ignoring the progress that she made on facilities issues.
I stand corrected. Her plans were already scrapped by the time Hobbs came on board.
The issue and challenge was never the plans. It was the funding for those plans. Can Hobbs get that done? Early returns say yes.
Everything in that article has absolutely zero to do with Hobbs.
All of it is from the University Master Plan, adopted while Julie was here. It is a University wide plan, including numerous athletics projects. You can inform yourself here. Athletics is covered at Section 4.6. If you care about Rutgers as a whole, its really interesting to read through it.
The problem with these projects is not the plan, although I think the Multi-Use Faility with Integrated Parking (a/k/a The Barchi/Hermann/Lesniak Parking Garage with a Basketball Court and a Wrestling Room) is a total disaster and a waste of money. The problem is that they are all funding dependent. The Multi-Use Facility is listed as part of Phase 1 (begin by 2020) but again, dependent on receiving funding.
All of it is from the University Master Plan, adopted while Julie was here. It is a University wide plan, including numerous athletics projects. You can inform yourself here. Athletics is covered at Section 4.6. If you care about Rutgers as a whole, its really interesting to read through it.
The problem with these projects is not the plan, although I think the Multi-Use Faility with Integrated Parking (a/k/a The Barchi/Hermann/Lesniak Parking Garage with a Basketball Court and a Wrestling Room) is a total disaster and a waste of money. The problem is that they are all funding dependent. The Multi-Use Facility is listed as part of Phase 1 (begin by 2020) but again, dependent on receiving funding.
wrong she had to get every program and a very deficient and clueless department up to speed on what had to be done to get Rutgers ready for the Big 10. You can continue to hate all you want but she laid the groundwork with donors and plans for Hobbs to come in and fundraise.
Listen man you don't like her, that's fine, but if you think she didn't do anything, to help get this athletic department moving in the right direction, then you ZERO credibility when it comes to what goes on inside Rutgers Athletics.
Julie may have been hired for reasons other than merit, and I now understand the AD position at Rutgers is highly unique and needs a guy like Hobbs, with his political connections. Though I don't think she was right person and could have handled some things better, specifically football, she did move the needle on a number of Olympic sports, through better funding. I will always recognize that as her legacy at RU, as short as it was.
you cant argue with the guy, he is just a turd there is no other way to put it. The department is in much better shape than it was when TP left and that we can thank Julie for
yes Julie was terrific and I'm a turd, unlike you, who wore blinders and defended someone that did much more bad than good for RU--hey she's gone and deserved it yet your shyt doesn't stink? ---i'm not getting the last laugh but close to it since I hoped for better from her
it seems you are the one with agendas...did you see me crying that Julie was fired like the TP tards who cared only about themselves and their own stupid agendas. I care about Rutgers. Julie did some very good things here and got the department up to speed but you seem oblivious to that as if RU was Big 10 ready. Anyhow she had limitations and it involved a faction against her. Barchi was very shrewd because he picked a great time to do it lumping it in with Flood which unfortunately his awfulness got lumped in with her. Julie moved us forward and got us ready to do battle but perhaps Hobbs is the better choice for the funding issues and to move things along politically. He has a tough job ahead with fundraising even with his expertise there.
unfortunately you come across as a bitter old toad who only worries about your stupid vendettas against certain posters and Julie Hermann. You have had zero opinion on everyone else from Fred Hill to Kyle Flood to Eddie Jordan.
unfortunately you come across as a bitter old toad who only worries about your stupid vendettas against certain posters and Julie Hermann. You have had zero opinion on everyone else from Fred Hill to Kyle Flood to Eddie Jordan.
I have to give Bac major credit here. He was a very vocal supporter of Hermann. And while he did not want to see her fired, he has accepted the fact that she was fired. And he did so without bashing Rutgers, the administration, or Hermann's replacement. This is in stark contrast to how some on this board have handled the dismissal of previous ADs.
Debbie Yow was much more nefarious. She essentially cooking the books. She borrowed from all sorts of revenue sources (future revenues, restricted private funds for specific sports, whatever she fancied) to make the AD look solvent. Annual reports consistently showed a department in the black, but it really wasn't.
It wasn't the non-rev facilities that got her and Maryland in trouble (in fact, she only built two such venues), it was expansion of Byrd Stadium. She built it and they didn't come.
Here are a few of her other notable blunders:
- She negotiated poor naming rights deals for the football stadium and basketball arena.
- She was dead set on paying staffs of men's programs below market rate and paying women's staffs above market rate. She had no remote understanding of ROI.
- She publicly feuded on numerous occasions with her Hall of Fame, national championship winning basketball coach. Yes, she'd actively work to block his recruits from being admitted to the University and do other crap, but Gary also really loathed her for paying Brenda's staff disproportionally.
It's also quite amazing how quickly the finance have improved since she left. Maryland actually made a $2.4 million dollar profit this year. Far cry from Ohio State, but certainly progress.
You have to include funding a competitive cheer team as a major lapse.
She sold it as a way to boost Title IX compliance. Only problem was the DOE didn't buy it.
Washington Post
Title IX anniversary: Maryland cuts cheerleading, but was it ever a sport?
