sbmcruise
100+ Posts
Cliff Gustafson played 1 year as a player at Texas and served 29 years as the head baseball coach. His teams won 2 National Titles. He was 1466-377-2 overall, the most successful coach in NCAA baseball history when he retired.
Tommy Harmon played 3 years as a player at Texas and served 23 years services as an assistant baseball coach.
One could debate whether they had well passed their prime and/or significantly contributed to their dismissal by civil disobedience (Gustafson) or refusal to change with the times (Harmon), but no one can seriously debate how they individually and collectively contributed to The University of Texas Baseball program.
Unfortunately DeLoss Dodds has made it virtually impossible for us to honor these former coaches. In each case the firing was most disrespectful and created a climate which probably has and will continue to deter Augie and other Texas coaches from inviting them to make future public appearance at University of Texas events and games. I assume that at the time of the firings tempers were pretty hot and that the coaches had their reasons not to just retire. While Coach Gustafson has occasionally appeared at Texas Baseball games, those appearances have been significantly less frequent and celebrated as Darrell Royal appearances at football games and other Texas gatherings. We will see how Tommy is treated next time he is at the Disch.
I agree that UFCU Disch-Falk Field already has enough names, so renaming it to include one or more of their names seems out. Instead, I propose that the university commission roughly life-sized statutes of them (maybe together) to be placed in some publically accessible place inside the stadium to honor their contributions to the program. If you put in 20 years here and/or win a national championship or two, you shouldn’t be a persona non grata and should have an identifiable monument at the stadium.
As Rodney Kings simply put it ”Can we all get along?”. Coach Gustafson was fired in 1996. Hasn’t that been long enough? Let’s properly honor him now, before he dies. Unfortunately DeLoss Dodds seems to hold grudges and so it seems unlikely anything will be done during his administration. Maybe someone higher-up will hold DeLoss Dodds responsible for the collapse of the football, mens and women’s basketball, and the softball teams in recent years. He’s certainly held enough coaches accountable and deserves his own ladle of responsibility for the complacency and overall poor performance of those programs the last several years. I hope that DeLoss Dodds retires or gets fired soon, so the healing can begin and these former coaches can be properly honored during their lifetimes.
Tommy Harmon played 3 years as a player at Texas and served 23 years services as an assistant baseball coach.
One could debate whether they had well passed their prime and/or significantly contributed to their dismissal by civil disobedience (Gustafson) or refusal to change with the times (Harmon), but no one can seriously debate how they individually and collectively contributed to The University of Texas Baseball program.
Unfortunately DeLoss Dodds has made it virtually impossible for us to honor these former coaches. In each case the firing was most disrespectful and created a climate which probably has and will continue to deter Augie and other Texas coaches from inviting them to make future public appearance at University of Texas events and games. I assume that at the time of the firings tempers were pretty hot and that the coaches had their reasons not to just retire. While Coach Gustafson has occasionally appeared at Texas Baseball games, those appearances have been significantly less frequent and celebrated as Darrell Royal appearances at football games and other Texas gatherings. We will see how Tommy is treated next time he is at the Disch.
I agree that UFCU Disch-Falk Field already has enough names, so renaming it to include one or more of their names seems out. Instead, I propose that the university commission roughly life-sized statutes of them (maybe together) to be placed in some publically accessible place inside the stadium to honor their contributions to the program. If you put in 20 years here and/or win a national championship or two, you shouldn’t be a persona non grata and should have an identifiable monument at the stadium.
As Rodney Kings simply put it ”Can we all get along?”. Coach Gustafson was fired in 1996. Hasn’t that been long enough? Let’s properly honor him now, before he dies. Unfortunately DeLoss Dodds seems to hold grudges and so it seems unlikely anything will be done during his administration. Maybe someone higher-up will hold DeLoss Dodds responsible for the collapse of the football, mens and women’s basketball, and the softball teams in recent years. He’s certainly held enough coaches accountable and deserves his own ladle of responsibility for the complacency and overall poor performance of those programs the last several years. I hope that DeLoss Dodds retires or gets fired soon, so the healing can begin and these former coaches can be properly honored during their lifetimes.
