Thursday, November 20, 2008

Louisville fans hate Kragthorpe, Tom Jurich hated 93.9 the Ticket

First off, kudos to Beisner for this hilarious parody of what would happen if Tom Jurich hosted a radio show.

Secondly, who the fricking heck does Tom Jurich think that he is to pull the crap that he did. We get it. You hate the fans' criticism of you not doing anything to Steve Kragthorpe. Kentucky fans can't help but laugh when Louisville loses. With two games left, Louisville is sitting at 5-5 with a depressing 1-4 Big East conference record. Meanwhile, UK is sitting at 2-5 in the SEC but has a 6-5 overall record.

Jurich doesn't have that thick skin that is required of the guy running the athletic program at Louisville.

Go read what Bryan had to say on the subject and this is just the Jurich factor.
Right after UL lost to Syracuse, I know we could not keep the callers coming on fast enough from UL fans criticizing Steve Kragthorpe, with the occasional Tom Jurich basher. I can not even estimate how many CARDS fans were calling for his head. And during that whole week, the theme from the Front Row Hosts (Zach McCrite and Rick Bozich) was that it is NOT good to fire a coach after two seasons. So, all criticism of the UL program was coming from fans. Obviously the calls continued after bad losses to Pittsburgh and Cincinnati. After the Pitt loss, some of you all may have read Jurich’s criticism of the UL fan base for expecting too much out of their football program.

Once again, CARDS fans called in droves to bash Jurich this time. But, word began to get around the station that Jurich was not happy with 93.9 The Ticket, feeling we were unfair to the Cards program, and instigating fans to be negative towards Kragthorpe.

Let’s address this: First of all, the football program SUCKS. We didn’t have to do a damn thing at 93.9 to anger fans. They were angry by not only the awful product on the field, but also their jerk athletic director being critical of them. Second of all, the hosts straight down the line said that Kragthorpe should keep his job. Jurich was also angry at liners that 93.9 The Ticket ran that said things such as “We don’t tow the company line at 93.9 The Ticket, Real Cards Radio”. These were created as competiton against the other station in Louisville, which the UL athletic department helps run, and basically is always positive to the program, and certainly would never criticize it. IT’S CALLED TRYING TO COMPETE TOM!!!! SOMETHING YOUR FOOTBALL PROGRAM CAN’T DO!!!!!

Jurich thinks that it is inappropriate for the media to be critical of the local school, as it only leads to problems. What he will never tell you is that he may have made a mistake in the Kragthorpe hire. Just as he blames fans for expecting too much, he would never admit he has been too leniant in the decline of the program.

So the question you might ask is: So what if Tom Jurich is a jerk? How does that hurt the radio station? Well, quite frankly, Jurich is very powerful in the city. He threatened and possibly went to the levels of telling advertisers of the UL program to not even consider advertising with 93.9 The Ticket, or lose their contracts with UL. That is the lifeblood of sports radio. You have to get advertising to survive. Jurich tried to railroad the station, from what I have heard unsuccessfully. I don’t think it is too crazy to think he MAY have had a hand in knocking us off the air. I have no proof of that, but after all the links he went to show his dislike of the station, it just would not suprise me.

This post has run on pretty far, so let me wrap up with this: Tom Jurich is a bad guy. He is in my opinion a very good athletic director, but he is a man who is a coward. I truly hope the failure of Steve Kragthorpe also brings him down. I hope the UL fans turn on him, which has already started to happen. He has made slam dunk hires in nearly all his sports, and has made one bad hire. Hey Tom, it happens!!!! Man up and take some blame. You have a hand in the demise of your football program.

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