Scarlet Knights Newzer

Talking to Tim some more

Anything from the print Q&A or Part One of the blog continuation rev you up - or raise your eyebrows? If not, here's the next section.

What is the ultimate financial goal for the athletic department? Long-term? The financial goal for the department long term would be to get to the point where we are eventually financially self-sufficient as a department. You well know this from being around that, at Rutgers, athletics is subsidized by the university. (To be self-sufficient) I’ve told people this: it’s not going to happen next year, it’s not going to happen three years from now.

Well, do you have a timeline for self-sufficiency? No, I don’t have a timeline.

 

Okay, then what's realistic? I don’t know yet. But there will be a timeline eventually. I don’t know what it is yet. But the only way it can happen is, it starts by reducing the university’s commitment on an annual basis, not just to reduce it, but by way of driving more revenue through athletics.

 

I'm guessing you already have some ideas on how to drive new revenue... There’s a lot of ways you can do that. Naturally there’ll be more revenue flowing through athletics this year with the expansion of the stadium. With the sale of more club seats, there’s more revenue flying through the athletic department. But we’re going to look at creative ways to drive more revenue, including looking at all the facilities that we have and looking at what if we bring outside events in and look at them almost as opportunities, whether we rent them out or allow outside companies to use them, where it makes sense and it doesn’t conflict in any way with what athletics has set its mind to do.

 

And yet, there are only six FBS athletic departments that have had positive net revenue in each of the last five years. Only 19 made money last year. Why do you think Rutgers one day can join that group?  I think because of where we are. I think our location has a lot to do with it. Being in the shadow of New York City, from the perspective of the number of media outlets we can take advantage of, to Madison Avenue and to the fact that we live in the wealthiest state in the country. That to me - I think our athletic development people have done a great job, but we all know quietly we haven’t really tapped in the way we can and I think that will start to net itself out. Even people who didn’t go here that live in this state claim this place as their own – there are so many people out there like that. I think athletics, I think the reason that we can eventually do that here is there are a lot more ways to drive revenue through athletics than just TV, ticket sales and development. You’ve probably read about some of them. We’ve talked about a lot of them, including our facilities, we’ve talked about concerts in our football stadium, we’ve talked about a lot of different initiatives that we think athletics can drive to our facilities.

 

What has the feedback been thus far to essentially renting out your stadium? There’s no resistance. In fact, it’s been purely encouraging from everybody I’ve spoken to about it. I don’t think it’s an original idea. I’m sure it’s been discussed before, they’ve had events in the football stadium before. I think we need to come out with a consistent plan about what we can do, about things we can run through the stadium when there’s not much going on. There’s a great opportunity for us to create some new revenue for athletics.

 

Your budget last year was $56.2 million. What is it this year? The budget’s sitting over at Old Queens right now. We submitted a budget. I can’t really speak to too many details of it until we get some feedback. What we’ve done is, we’ve presented a variety of versions of the budget and you know I think, as you’ve been reading about, there’s a lot of unknown out there right now about labor, where the union conversation’s going to net out, what the state funding will be and how that will trickle down and affect everybody in the university.

 

Are you preparing for athletics to be affected? I think everybody’s going to be affected. I don’t think anybody can be immune from what’s going on in the economy right now.

 

So with the university laying off employees and cutting courses, what cost-saving measures are you considering in athletics? We’re considering a lot of different things. The one thing I’ve tried really hard to examine and understand is sort of every process that takes place in the department: are we being completely effective and completely efficient in everything that we’re doing? To be honest with you, I know what’s been talked about for two years and all the reporting that’s been done, but I don’t see irresponsible spending going on anywhere in athletics. Everything has been done the right way, everything is very easily explained. I think going forward what we need to do is – this isn’t as much a cost conversation as it is a revenue conversation. People will constantly focus on costs. The whole world right now in business is just cut, cut, cut. And to me, I think, especially coming in here new, you can always look at different ways to do things that may end up saving money over time, may not, but can be more effective at driving revenue. To me it’s just as much a revenue conversation as it is cost-cutting. Because like I said, there’s things we can do with our facilities to drive new revenue, there’s sponsorship and media where I think we can do a much better job and there’s stadium naming rights which I think continues to sit out there. That’s an opportunity we have yet to take advantage of. Given the climate’s a little different, but it’s still an opportunity that I think we can take advantage of that I think will again help drive more revenue into athletics which allows us to turn around and over time reduce the university’s commitment to athletics.

 

What about naming rights? Is that being tabled for a little while because of the economic climate? No. We’re actively seeking. We’re sort of making rounds. TJ Nelligan and his guys have done a lot of the work obviously. The climate changing certainly makes it a lot more difficult. We’re making rounds and getting face time with a lot of different people it maybe makes sense to talk to on a level of sponsorship in general, not just specifically naming rights. But the answer is I’m being as active on that front as I can. I’m getting out there as much as I can because I think the one thing we still need to be doing is, we need to take a breath and look at our stadium and evaluate what the opportunity is and evaluate the inventory and evaluate all the things that a naming rights deal brings to the table potentially. So that when we do start to talk to somebody specific that has a specific interest, we can talk intelligently about numbers and exposure.

Talking to Tim

Well, part of my Q&A with Tim Pernetti finally made The Record. But it's only part - we spoke for nearly an hour and I'll start putting up pieces of the rest of it up today. In the meantime, check this part out and note the big news: Tim wants to refurbish/expand the RAC and build a brand new practice facility NOW. Designs are being drawn, costs are being estimated and the plan is to have a full package to show donors by the start of the football season. Personally, I think working with Rutgers has on campus makes much more sense than a brand new arena in downtown New Brunswick, especially the way Tim's talking about it.

Okay, here's another segment. But I warn you... Tim's a talker!

What's a typical day at Rutgers for you? Here? Every day is a little different. I wake up, I’m usually out the door between – my commute’s changed a lot. It used to be I had to get out of the house before 6 in the morning unless I wanted to roll the dice on NYC traffic. I used to drive in. I don’t have to do that as much anymore, but it’s the same routine. Typically I’m out the door between 5:30 and 6, down here, whatever 45-50 minutes later and I usually work out downstairs.

 

Are there student-athletes in the gym with you? Usually I’m by myself. Some days I work out with Mike Johansson our strength coach that’s here, who was an assistant strength coach for football when I was here. Yeah, he trained me then. We work out together now. Then, he used to stand behind me and yell what to do and what not to do. Now we’re doing it together and realizing as we’re getting older we just don’t respond the way we used to. But I do that and am typically up here in the office probably around 8 o’clock. And then it depends on the day. I have a lot of meetings.

 

Who are these meetings with? Some days with the coaches. Other days it’s a mixture of coaches, guys like Jason (Baum of the athletic communications office) and members of the senior staff, student-athletes, across the river meeting with President McCormick and Phil Furmanski, various vice presidents in the university, deans, donors, you name it. It’s really a mixed bag of meetings. There are some days when I’ll spend an hour in here and then it’s out on campus all day.

But I promised myself early on I would be completely accessible as much as possible. Because it seems to me a lot of people feel disconnected to athletics at this university so I thought being accessible as much as possible in the beginning would help people feel more connected to it.

 

How has that gone so far - do you feel you're forging that connection? So far, it’s made people feel that way. I’ve volunteered to go to faculty council meetings and dean council meetings just to say hello, talk for a couple minutes about who I am and what we’re going to be doing and the state of things over here. Breakfasts over at the Rutgers club with deans of the various schools, Mason Gross or Arts and Sciences, you name it. I’m just trying to do as many of those things as I can because I want people to feel that they have a voice on the other end and there’s a connection. What’s already happened is we’re starting to talk more specifically about ways we can work together on both sides of the house. To me, like I said at the press conference, that’s the most important thing to everybody, to work more closely together.

 

Tell us about some of those visits with student-athletes. How many have you met with? It’s probably more like 50 (that I've met). They usually just drop in. I’ve scheduled a couple based on when they’ve called. I don’t know if it’s the way it used to be or way student-athletes feel about the athletic director, whatever it is, some kids I never hear from and all of a sudden they’ll pop up on my calendar. That’s fine too.

 

What sorts of things have they brought to you? Some of them come with issues. I’ve had a couple that have been involved with the student athlete advisory committee and they’ve come to me and said, 'You know I’m a senior, I’m graduating and I’ve been on SAAC, and here are the issues that can come up and maybe this be a road map for you as you get involved.' A couple of them have come in and talked about how their experiences have been in their specific sport, both seniors and underclassmen, how it’s been, things they think that can be better, things that are great that nobody talks about, more support, whether it be strength and conditioning, training, whatever. It’s a little bit different. Some have come in and said, 'Hey, I’m going to be a senior next year, I’m really interested in media, where do you think can be a great entry point for an intern, how important do you think internships are, do you have any advice, what do you know,' so it’s really run the gamut. Like I told every one of them that came in, especially on the job front, it’s tough out there right now but I’m trying to connect a lot of our student athletes who’ve done the job in the classroom as well as the field with opportunities wherever they are. Some just pop their head in and say, 'Hey I wanted to introduce myself,' they’ll come in and sit for 15 minutes and talk for really nothing much at all. Some will say hey I’m from Bergen County too.

 

Do you have all their names down? Are you good at remembering? I used to be terrible at that, but now I have this, it’s not even a system, you hear the name and just stare at the person and keep saying the name over and over in your head and some I remember. For the most part, I remember most of them. The only test I’ve had, I was at Big East meetings all week, flew back Thursday morning, dropped my stuff at home, then came down here to meet with Phil Furmanski and President McCormick. So I went over to Old Queens and I came out and I walked right into commencement. They’re all lining up to walk through the building onto the mall and 12 or 15 of the student-athletes were there and so I was mugging for pictures with a lot of them and aside from the ones I hadn’t yet met, I remembered everyone’s name. Kareem, there’s a kid named Kareem who’s on the wrestling team, I think he was surprised. I think it was Kareem. No, it wasn’t Kareem, it was uh, Isaac, a guy on our golf team. I met him, Isaac Lim, L-I-M! I met him at the student athlete advisory committee meeting and he pulled me aside afterward and said, 'I’m graduating, I’d love to just come visit with you, is that okay' and I said sure. He came in and we met and that was like a week before graduation and then I saw him and he was with his parents and I remembered him.  

Hmm, really? Isaac Lim - are you out there to confirm this for us? Okay, enjoy that and there's more to come in a few hours! 

Season Tickets on sale

Rutgers releases a block of season tickets today, the first made available to the general public since 2006. With a newly expanded Rutgers Stadium set to open this fall, and athletic director Tim Pernetti very frankly admitting to fans that what had been a two-year waiting list "[is] not converting at the rate we expected," Rutgers is pulling out the stops: new ticket purchasers can select their seats – and get a T-shirt, magnet and an up-close look at the refurbished stadium June 20.

Pernetti said roughly 90 percent of last year's 24,000 season-ticket holders have renewed at this year's prices of $280 and $350. Combined with students who've purchased season tickets to avoid the weekly lottery and those who've come off the waiting list, he estimated Rutgers has sold 30,000 season tickets thus far. Capacity of the expanded facility is 52,454.

Scheduling in the E Street Band

Maybe Coach Butler CAN see Bruce Springsteen.

Greg Schiano and Jay Butler, Rutgers' strength coach, are apparently pretty big Bruce Springsteen fans. (There's no apparently with me.) They went to a show together last July at Giants Stadium, Coach Butler told me - seemingly forlornly - after the spring game that he couldn't go to either of the two Meadowlands shows last month (I went to the Thursday show) and tonight, at Greg Schiano's charity golf outing, he asked me how I could possibly miss a Wednesday practice to go to the Sept. 30 Giants Stadium game. I told him his jealousy was obvious. He then said he couldn't go to any of those shows because Texas Southern would be in town and then we both realized... actually, no.

Just as the golfers were coming off the course, a schedule change went through. The Oct. 3 visit from Texas Southern will now be an Oct. 10 Homecoming game. Rutgers and Pitt are facing off Friday, Oct. 16 and ESPN thought it would be fairer, and more competitive, if both teams had the same six-day break between games (as opposed to Rutgers getting 13). Rutgers said yes and now the Butlers and the Schianos can see the wrecking crew come in before the wrecking ball. (That's what Bruce said at my show to announce these dates. I swear.)

Ray Rice Day

Joe Fosina is the Yankees' uniform maestro and he's also the president of the New Rochelle Youth Tackle League. I met him at the old Yankee Stadium a few years ago, he's told me some of the best Ray Rice and Courtney Greene stories I have (he's known them both since they were in elementary school) and I'm always pumped to catch up with him. Which I got to do yesterday, before Chien-Ming Wang made his return to the Yankees' rotation.

The news Joe had for me this time is that his plans for a Ray Rice weekend are officially on. On Friday, June 19, New Rochelle is hosting a reception for Ray Rice at City Hall - mayor Norm Branson  will give Ray a key to the city, there'll be drinks and finger food and anyone's invited. The next day, out on the New Rochelle High School fields, NRYTL is having a day of free instruction and coaching for what Joe expects will be 300 third-through-eighth graders. Ray's going to be there, he's bringing Ravens QB Joe Flacco and Ravens running backs coach - and former Eagles running back - Wilbert Montgomery and he told Joe Fosina he'd pay for the whole thing. (Joe told him to get out. Joe's actually lined up enough sponsors on his own to give each of the kids a t-shirt and Ray Rice logo wristband.)

Joe said Rutgers fans are welcome Friday and he said the Saturday day of instruction isn't only for kids from New Rochelle. So if you have a child that age and want to bring him out, definitely check out NRYTL's registration info. Regardless, I'm sure we can all smile a little that Ray hasn't forgotten where he's come from.

A bad, bad move

When I sat down with AD Tim Pernetti last week, he was newly back from the Big East meetings in Florida and so we chatted a bit about how that first real experience as a member of the group went. He said he'd gone down with the expectation of listening more and talking less and admitted it was a good feeling when talk turned to TV and the other ADs turned toward him. ("I jumped all over TV," he said, with a very wide grin.)

I asked what exactly those conversations entailed, he said it was mostly general talk, and then he said the one topic that really stood out was women's basketball and TV, the "promotion of women's basketball (and) doing a better job because we're one of the better leagues in the country and (the question is) what can we do as a group to better that front?"

Imagine my surprise then to see a Big East release pop in my inbox yesterday announcing the END of the BEST rivalry in the league. The women right now play 14 Big East members once and a 15th twice, both home and away. For the past four years, that 15th team for Rutgers has been UConn. In the past four years, Rutgers has given an undefeated UConn team its toughest game (08-09), its given a then-undefeated UConn team its sole loss (07-08), its upended UConn and ended the Huskies' stranglehold on the Big East regular season title (05-06) and tournament title (06-07). The games have been sellouts, they've been primetime national TV match-ups and they've borne all sorts of sound bites for the biggest headline-grabbing voice women's basketball has, UConn coach Geno Auriemma. The players all know each other, the fans all despise each other, New Jersey's governor comes to these games... why the heck would you break that up? Does Rutgers-Syracuse sound like ESPN's ideal Big Monday match-up?

C. Vivian Stringer has always said "you have to play the best to be the best." She'll schedule anyone, as will Geno. Both care about the progress and profile of the game and I promise you neither one is sitting there saying, "Whew, we only have to face UConn/Rutgers once."

This is a horribly disappointing move. Let's hope in two years, when this issue will apparently be re-visited, the Big East realizes promoting its teams means fostering rivalries, not killing them.

Rutgers on ESPN

ESPN's College Football Live is on a 50 States Tour, begun Monday, running through August 7 and landing this afternoon in New Jersey. Well, sort of. We have to share our day with Delaware. ESPN's press release says "every state has a football story, memorable moment, legendary coach, great players, rivalries or esteemed high school" but apparently the bigwigs in Bristol didn't think New Jersey could manage that on its own. In any case...

Today at 3:30 p.m., College Football Live will focus on New Jersey (and Delaware). I'm covering the Yankees this week and so I'll miss it. But if any of you see it, I'd love a review.  

Ramel Meekins fighting on

I love checking back in with kids I covered and I love when they're still the people I thought they were. Ramel Meekins is that and then some and I'm going to ask you to please read this piece. It's an incedible story of overcoming tragedy, chasing a dream and the true meaning of community and I promise my request has nothing to do with who wrote it - Ramel's story tells itself.

It's been almost six years since I met Ramel for the first time. I never met his mom, but I did speak to her on the phone a few times and I very vividly remember her talking about her "ornery single mother" ways (I quoted her on that) and how she whispered to me that she was proud of Ramel, that I should maybe not write that in case his head got big. That's obviously never been a worry with this kid. I can still see the way he shrugged when ESPN's College Gameday crew gave him a helmet sticker after that insane game at Navy in 2006 - 12 tackles, two sacks, three forced fumbles and he shrugged, "That's nice."

Ramel's giving this football thing another go and I am so hopeful for him. The run up in ArenaFootball2 was just to re-acclimate himself to football, and he made himself a huge fan in his coach in Manchester, a man who on that same team coached a player who now starts for the Dolphins. CFL camps open in these next few weeks and Ramel's hoping for an invite. If not that, then maybe one of the four teams in the new United Football League, which could one day be a development league for the NFL, will give him a look at the end of the summer.

Ramel's working hard obviously, but at the same time, he seems to have a really good read on what he wants to do after football, whenever that is. He said this experience since his mother's death has cemented that, "I don't want to just get a paycheck. I want to help someone develop and mature. I want to invest in people." We talked about coaching and teaching and especially about being a guidance counselor, and whatever it is, Ramel said he'll have to go back to school. Whenever that happens, I really, really hope Greg Schiano has a graduate assistantship for him.

Sadly, through all of this, Rutgers wasn't able to offer Ramel any real help. Rick Upchurch, Ramel's old little league coach who ultimately became the estate administrator, said he had several very pleasant conversations with both Greg Schiano and deputy AD Kevin MacConnell right after Ramel's mom died. Rick said both wanted to see if they could mobilize help in some way, but their hands were tied by NCAA rules and that by the time they'd navigated that bureaucracy, everything was taken care of by the people of Westwood.

Obviously Rutgers doesn't owe any former student-athlete anything; I just found it disappointing that this captain and team MVP who left school with two years of student loan debt because he wasn't on scholarship couldn't easily turn to what was ostensibly his "family," the football program. But hey, there are a lot of things about the NCAA that are screwy.

Okay, on another front, will you e-mail me if you have particularly strong feelings about Penn State coach Joe Paterno's mumblings that the Big Ten should annex Rutgers? My address is kinkhabwala@northjersey.com. Thanks!

UCLA, Rutgers Stadium and future opponents

Newly returned from his first set of Big East meetings in Florida, athletic director Tim Pernetti gave me an hour of his time earlier this week. We met in his office, he sat us at his mini-table so we wouldn't be distracted by either a beeping computer or Blackberry and I really wish newspapers were as big as they used to be, so we could get the whole interview in The Record. At least we have blogs.

A compressed Q&A will run in The Record sometime in the next week, but I'll be sharing some tidbits until then - and I'll post whatever we haven't yet run by then here afterwards. So today, let's start with a little bit on the football program, its home and who it brings to that home.

First, Tim is indeed still in talks with UCLA. There's no news yet, but Tim is very confident that's just a yet: "We're interested, they're interested, we've exchanged some dates and years that we think we can do it. We're still trying to figure it out." Tim re-iterated that the earlier announcement of Miami and Penn State on future schedules was meant to prove "that we're going to aggressively look at all of our opportunities with our future football schedule and work in advance as much as the opportunities present themselves."

Now, that doesn't mean every opportunity that presents itself is one Rutgers needs to jump at. Tim's predecessor, Bob Mulcahy, was adamant about not playing home games at Giants Stadium. With both Notre Dame and Army expressing an interest in playing at Yankee Stadium, I asked Tim if he felt as strongly as Bob about not leaving campus. Turns out, he does. 

"I think we want people here. I think it makes sense," he said. "I will not stick my head in the sand and say we won't look at any other opportunities... But having said that, we've made a huge investment in this stadium, $102 million for this expansion, and the reason it's been done is so we can accomodate the demand by our fans to come see games in Rutgers Stadium. So to me, and prior to me they had conversations about various different places and various opportunities, but to me, the most important thing we can do is have our seven home games here every year."

So what do you think? Good policy, or would you be into seeing Rutgers at the new Giants Stadium, or the new Yankee Stadium? 

Earl Pettis is transferring

Earl Pettis must really want to go: nine more days and he could've gotten a free trip to Spain and the Canary Islands with the men's basketball team. Instead, the sophomore guard - who started 20 games this past season and who coach Fred Hill just floated as an option to run the point if JUCO William James Beatty doesn't sign - is leaving Rutgers. An official announcement will come later today. Not that that will tell us the why.

So I'll just speculate. On its face, I wouldn't think this transfer is a jumping-a-sinking-ship sort of thing, not like freshman Christian Morris' almost immediate departure or Courtney Nelson's supposed consideration of departing. Fred Hill gave Earl good minutes (he averaged 17.6 this past year, 13.2 the previous year) and he drew up late-game shots for him (one, a three against Rider Dec. 3, that was a game-winner). The way I'm hearing it, this decision has a little more to do with something personal than with basketball. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Earl ends up somewhere close to his Philadelphia hometown.

So now, where does this leave Rutgers? Well, there are eight days until the spring signing period ends, the NCAA allows Division I men's programs 13 scholarships (women's teams are allowed 15...) and Rutgers currently has 10 players on scholarship. This will be a busy last week... which may be why Fred Hill hasn't twittered in three days.