HERE ARE A FEW THOUGHTS FROM TLSN CONCERNING SOCIAL MEDIA Longhorn Facebook sites. 

It is the nature of Longhorn fans to take the wins for granted and obsess over the losses.

Even though recruiting is not science, grown men and women, spend hours snorkeling on the internet, pouring over frivolous recruiting gossip that is morphed into faux facts.

Many of the Longhorn Facebook sites are doing better at screening trash-talking fans who make predatory, repugnant, and mean-spirited remarks. Maybe, just maybe, Longhorn fans are also maturing with social media sites learning that it is possible to disagree with the UT administration or another fan, coach, or player without lowering the level of discourse to guttural tribal comments. Quality content should always be job one on Longhorn’s Facebook pages. The membership will grow if Longhorn’s Facebook pages are true to its founding mission. 

A message to all fans who use social media to judge Longhorn student-athletes harshly

The Man in the Arena by Theodore Roosevelt

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds: who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory not defeat.

Predatory Horn Fans on Social Media are prickly and Dangerous to the Longhorn Nation

Some Longhorn fans know just enough about sports to make themselves dangerous to the Longhorn Nation and the recruiting process. Their primal passions suppress all logic and common sense. They can’t just enjoy the build-up and the process of a sport. They have to be cynics and scorners. Morphing into dark souls typing posts from the deep recesses of their closets that are mean-spirited hindsight-driven tirades. In a worst-case scenario, their words are predatory, and in a best-case juvenile. Unfortunately, the Internet cannot discern the difference between intelligent and stupid remarks, so all post-receive equal billing on the internet extending power and influence to those who don’t deserve it.

Horn Fans have a history of “Riding” the Coaches.

Duke Carlisle says about hindsight fans in his book “Longhorn and Tall Tails,” “Fans think coaching is a common-sense profession. With a sense of humor, he says, “fans also have certain rules they expect a coach to follow, such as don’t pass if it’s going to be intercepted, or never go for two unless you make it.” Hindsight makes fans great coaches, and fan hindsight has cost many good coaches their job.

In September 1956, The Ranger paper stated, “Texas fans in basketball and football are considered rude, ruthless, and unforgiving.” The article goes on to say, “although the alumni have many ways of reaching a football game, they usually ride the coaches.”

Under Coach Akers, Texas went bowling often, but many fans still gave him the moniker “Not Ready Freddie.” Aker’s said about critical Longhorn fans, “that’s what coaching has in common with the world’s oldest profession. It’s not the long hours that get you; it’s the amateur competition.

There is a reason that the Aggies have not won a football national championship since the 1930s. Past Aggie Coach R.C. Slocum says, “Fans can create a lot of turmoil. Your own fans can cause your program problems because they can be such a negative thing.”

For more about Longhorn fans and sports history, read Death, Taxes, and Longhorn fans.

Longhorn nation must learn as Bill Murray did in the movie groundhog day.

Unlike Bill Murray, many Longhorn fans are caught in a never-ending bad loop of Groundhog Day, refusing to learn how to be civil. At least Murray learned a little more about civility each visit through the time-warped Groundhog loop. Many Horns have chosen not to learn from history. Instead, they choose to use social media to magnify their bad behavior by spewing mean-spirited and predatory remarks. They enjoy sitting in the scorner’s seat hurling cynic comments that result in character assassination of the Longhorn brand to impressionable high school athletes.

Poet Sam Walter Foss says it best. He pleads with readers to enjoy the process of life instead of spewing venom at those who pass their way. The whole poem is below.

In the video, Bill Murray, after many Ground Hog loops, finally learns how to be civil and caring.

As Jim Bob Moffitt said, “controversy breeds defeat. Unity breeds success.”

11/15/2020

 I have not commented on the negative comments on Facebook surrounding Coach Herman’s tenure. It is not worth the time to enter the fray and share my observations when I know I will be hammered by words from someone I don’t know.

Instead, I choose to share Longhorn sports history, hoping we can look backward to move forward with lessons learned years ago. If we don’t remember lessons learned, we will never have an elite football program again.

This historical story starts in the worse year in the history of Longhorn football. The 1956 Longhorn record was 1-9. On this 1956 team was a young man named Jim Bob Moffitt. Jim had a front-row seat to the dynamics of the 1956 losing season and the 1957 winning team (Royal’s first year as Texas coach).

After graduating from Texas, Mr. Moffitt absorbed the lessons learned in 1956 and 1957 and founded Freeport-McMoRan, one of the world’s largest natural resources companies. He used some of his wealth to develop Westlake, Texas, and support the UT Athletic Department.

Jim says, “You can’t win with controversy, whether it’s corporate America or athletics.” Controversy “breeds defeat. Unity breeds success.” In the 1950s, “we lost that chemistry, that unity, and that led to our demise.” Everyone has to rally around: we have to support the program.”

In 1957 Royal, the administration, and fans built a winning program. In 2020 fans, the UT administration, and Coaches have not done so. Like it or not, in 2020, Longhorn fans are now the heart and soul of the Texas sports decision-making process. The U.T. administration listens to the fans more than they should, forcing some coaches into untenable situations beyond their control.

What happened to Mack Brown and Coach Strong has now occurred to Herman. Fans have moved from just analyzing the game to firing and hiring coaches. Like it or not, the Longhorn fan base is now the recruiting staff at Texas, and when the recruiting staff discusses hiring and firing, it hurts Texas recruiting and helps our competitors.

Fan derogatory remarks about the Horns reach deep inside the homes of impressionable high school athletes and their parents. By making mean-spirited remarks, Longhorn fans are effectively working for competing universities, unknowingly giving them ammunition to eliminate Texas from the high school players’ wish list.

If the recruiting staff does not get their act together, I don’t ever see Texas as an elite football program again.

Horns up and “Eyes” up!

Billy Dale