BU Athletic Dept. & Mens Basketball transparancy

[wizard1]

It seems like the Athletic Dept. and Mens Basketball has almost built a wall around themselves since the season ended, and have not communicated very much at all with fans and this board. Our only real source of information has been this message board which does an excellent job of digging things out. However, Chris and Brian have almost disappeared and we get nothing much from them. IMO one of the keys to increasing fan interest and ultimately game attendance is to communicate. While I recognize that most recruiting needs to be done behind the scenes, There are still some things which could be discussed....For example:
...Which positions are we trying hard to fill.
...Which recruits are visiting
...What is the true status of Ari Boya. What are the chances he can enroll and be eligible this year?
......Are any open gyms or practices planned?
....Any Summer "meet the team events/picnics planned?
What is our promotion schedule for this Fall and Pre-Season?...Spaghetti dinner? Bus Trips...Etc.
Cummon Gang...You don't have to tell us everything but you could open up a little.
Wizard

[Da Coach]

To be fair, they did have a Voice of the Braves event on April 26 where Coach Wardle was publicly available to answer questions from the fans. And it was Coach Wardle who approached us about doing a chat session with the fans, which we are working on scheduling and hope to do soon.
Historically, in the months of May and June we have usually gotten very little news. These couple months are also mostly recruiting "quiet periods", which allow for some of the people in the basketball offices to take their vacations, which they deserve, and the coaches are busy arranging and running their summer camps. And schedule news usually doesn't start trickling out until later in the summer.

[tornado]

It seems like the Athletic Dept. and Mens Basketball has almost built a wall around themselves since the season ended, and have not communicated very much at all with fans and this board. Our only real source of information has been this message board which does an excellent job of digging things out. However, Chris and Brian have almost disappeared and we get nothing much from them. IMO one of the keys to increasing fan interest and ultimately game attendance is to communicate. While I recognize that most recruiting needs to be done behind the scenes, There are still some things which could be discussed....For example:
...Which positions are we trying hard to fill.
...Which recruits are visiting
...What is the true status of Ari Boya. What are the chances he can enroll and be eligible this year?
......Are any open gyms or practices planned?
....Any Summer "meet the team events/picnics planned?
What is our promotion schedule for this Fall and Pre-Season?...Spaghetti dinner? Bus Trips...Etc.
Cummon Gang...You don't have to tell us everything but you could open up a little.
Wizard

Wiz - hold on a minute....don't blame Coach Wardle or our Athletic Dept. for the blackout of coverage the PJStar offers -- Most DI teams have a friendly local media - or at minimum, a neutral one - and they get coverage in the off-season. I have pointed that out plenty of times - even UC-Davis gets 100 times more off-season coverage & stories than we do...
We have a hostile media with apparently nobody who cares about Bradley basketball....so take it up with them. I don't even bother, I have cancelled my subscription since everything they write has already been covered & discussed here for weeks.

BUT.......

-First, the entire staff has been working 100 hours a week during the open recruiting periods - traveling and observing kids for the Classes of 2018, 2019, 2020 and beyond...not to mention after a long, long season - the staff has a right to a little time to themselves, with their families and getting to see their own kids play soccer...

-BUT in between they HAVE made efforts to engage the fans & donors...

- they held that 2-hour Voice of the Braves event at the Bullpen, and almost an hour of that was devoted just to questions from anyone who wanted to ask!

-THEN - Brian Wardle personally approached MULTIPLE people on this board, myself included- and asked if he could do a CHAT SESSION with BradleyFans in order to reach as many fans as he could - and Brian specifically said he wants to open it up to recruiting questions, personnel questions, scheduling, etc...

I am all for even MORE events this summer - but it's only Mid-May and I think they have done a great job already -

and be sure you join in the Chat as soon as it gets finalized...

[Serbiansniper34]

I would not be worried about Boya. I have heard nothing but good things as far as his academic priorities are concerned.

[wizard1]

BU Athletic Dept. & Mens Basketball Transparency.

t...I understand what you are saying but your contention that the Athletic Dept. is openly communicating with fans and Central Illinois is simply not correct. I share much of your feelings regarding the PJS. However, I don't believe that you can blame the local paper 100% for the lack of transparency since the season ended....We now have lots of people in the Athletic Dept. and while I understand that our coaches are traveling a lot, This travel comes with the territory and they are being well-paid to do this job. My complaint is not that the coaches are working hard.... I'm sure that they are. My concern rests with the cut off of the flow of information from the Athletic Dept. and the mens basketball staff. Example: We still don't know anything about pre-season promotion/events, etc. Are these being planned? When and where? While we are apparently now in a nice pre-season tournament, BU was dead last in the MVC in scheduling a tournament and we still do not have full details on it. We have no info on season ticket holder breakfasts/lunches, open practices, soccer game outings with the team, the spaghetti dinner, etc. We did not have a post season banquet after a good rebuilding year which IMO is a major oversight. We apparently are not planning any bus trips this again this year and have had none since Ken Goldin retired. All of this says that while we are building our BB program, we still do not have a full BB program and have a way to go due to a lack of good communication with fans and reaching out to our fans with promotions and "meet the team" events.
IMO, all of this will affect game attendance and Central Illinois fan interest/support. Again, while local newspaper support can help and they bear some responsibility for this, that is not the reason for the transparency problem. If BU truly wants better game attendance, they need to "get off the dime" and start promoting BU Basketball.
Wizard

[tornado]

with that I agree - I was hoping some high profile past Bradley player would take the job as Special PR expert in the Athletic Department

Here is a story about how Karl Malone was hired as
Director of Basketball Promotion at his alma mater

Many schools have a Director of Fan Engagement

and in another thread that I posted titled 'Ideas for Next Year' (that has since, for some reason, been deleted)
I suggested hiring Hersey or Roger Phegley or one of the popular past Braves to connect with fans and
help get back those 5,000 who bolted when they were insulted and ignored by the Glasser/Cross regime.
Remember - we were told to stop being so impatient for simply wanting to see quality basketball or DI-caliber players or for wanting to win. And were were called uneducated when Cross was hatching the plot to move all the games to the tiny women's gym.
And I challenge anyone to try to recall ONE SINGLE TIME Mike Cross ever greeted them, made them feel welcome or even said hello at a Bradley event of any kind!
All of this damage still needs to be reversed. Dr. Reynolds is doing a great job but we need MORE fan engagement!