Re: RPI Off-Season Thread 2010 -- The Calm Before the Storm
What ARE you talking about? Please explain. But, don't give the "they're men of fine character"etc. I'm sure they are, I'm sure you probably are as well, but that doesn't mean I want to watch you play hockey. RC, the game is played to be won.
You see everything in black and white, but we live in a gray world. That is why you will never understand why your point of view on this is, quite frankly, idiotic.
Let's take a trip back in time, back when Dan Fridgen was the head coach. Let me start by saying this: I consider Mr. Fridgen to be a friend. I saw him last month for the first time in a couple of years and had a great conversation with him. I miss talking to him and having him around regularly.
That said, let's be all the way real here. By the time he left the Institute, his list of supporters among the boosters was getting pretty slim. Teams were underperforming - that is, playing more poorly than they had been expected to do - and the quality of recruits was down significantly. People were not happy.
A new coach comes in, and far too many people started expecting the sun and the moon and the stars right away. The approach was simple, perhaps too simple for a person such as yourself to understand - Seth Appert learned how to win from some of the best in the game. Now, he decided, he would work to emulate their success. But it just wasn't possible with the players he inherited. It was a different system than they were recruited to play. Some took to the system well. Others didn't. All should be commended for giving it their best (at least, those who did).
The "bedwetters," of which you are a prime example, were impatient. They didn't want to hear about what it took to build a foundation of a solid, winning program. They didn't want to wait for the cake to finish baking, they wanted to eat it now. They wanted results in 2007-08, not 2010-11.
The first three years were painful, it's true. No one was jumping for joy at the losses, the heartaches, the entire seasons of misery. But those of us who were willing to look past the records (the forest) and see the groundwork being laid for a successful future (the trees) had consolation. The bedwetters continue to refuse consolation.
Last season, I think, turned out worse than even those optimistic about the direction of the program thought it would be. Last season, the naysayers came out in full force, only to be oddly silenced after the win over Dartmouth in the first round. That will happen. The best laid plans of mice and men are often go awry. But we could still see the basis. The foundation. We could see the building blocks in place for future glory.
Tell me, crossbar, who is Jacob Laliberte? Who is Luke Curadi? Do you know these people? Vaguely heard of them? Did you know who Jerry D'Amigo was before October? If not, I can understand your trepidation, but your opinion of the state of the program comes from a position of extreme ignorance.
The best team doesn't always win, and the better team did not walk away from Houston Field House this weekend with a ticket to the next round. The team had a bad weekend and paid for it with the end of their season. Yes, I wish things had been different. The game is played to be won - but playing for the short-term means a longer, more difficult long-term. I had thought that was a lesson that had been learned with bitter tears in the early part of the last decade, but perhaps I was mistaken. Some people are content to repeat the mistakes of yesteryear if it earns them instant gratification. And that's why you are upset - you have no instant gratification.
Meanwhile, down the stretch, when the team IS more successful because of these last few seasons of tears (of which this season was NOT one of them - precisely BECAUSE they put together the record you so ruefully disdain), you will care not about what happened before it, or why it was that they are successful. All you will care about is that they are winning and now you're happy.
But you won't be anywhere nearly as happy as those of us who paid attention, who saw the building blocks going into place, who saw the greater plan, and are now watching it reach fruition.
You know what should be the most embarassing part of all for you? Fans of other teams - Union, St. Lawrence, and Colgate already in just this thread alone - see what is happening and have noted that they expect bright things ahead based on it. You're a supposed supporter of this team, and you don't see ANYTHING.
That's sad. I pity you.
