Aztec Football: Future, Past and Present

The first Wednesday of February is National Letter of Intent signing day for prospective college football players and a day in which we revel optimistically in the efforts of Brady Hoke and his staff.

It appears that we are concentrating locally with players from wildly successful Oceanside High School, San Diego County the rest of the state. Today, I find myself dwelling on Hoke rule # 61: BELIEVE.

At the same time, we have the opportunity to assist in righting a wrong long overdue and that is to collectively will Coach Don Coryell into the hallowed National Football League Hall of Fame. It is a bit frustrating that the alleged voting media cognoscenti don’t yet understand what all Aztecs fans know: That Don Coryell was responsible for transforming football into the immensely watchable product it has become. While going on-line to cast your vote at www.fanschoice.com does not actually count in the official balloting, the karma couldn’t hurt.

And finally, it is comforting to know that regardless of the outcome of Sunday’s Super Bowl, one Aztec for Life will be crowned current champion. Congratulations to Freddy Keiaho of the Colts and Lynell Hamilton of the Saints.

GO AZTECS!

Aztecs for Life

Union Tribune

Thanks for you continual excellent coverage of the Farmers Insurance Open by Tod Leonard.

Regarding your sub headline concerning the Scott Piercy: "Ex-Aztec Piercy has the first-round lead"

FYI there are no Ex-Aztecs. We are all Aztecs for Life!

Count the toes

Ok listen up fine Aztec alumni. We need your help. There seems to be some controversy lurking regarding the number of toes on the left foot of our venerable iconic symbol: The Aztec. As you likely know the original Aztec was sculpted by Donal Hord and sits in the Prospective Student Center, while his grandson is the awesome centerpiece of the rotunda of the brand new Parma Payne Goodall Alumni Center.

You tell us: Is his left pinky toe hidden beneath his robe as is asserted by SDSU alum and architect Jeremy Blake, or does our beloved Montezuma suffer from a digital deficiency?

Today's UT

Today's UT reports that the "Big 6 BCS conferences expect pay outs from bowl games of either $22 or $17 million per school. Meanwhile the Mountain West and the WAC lead the have-nots with around one million per school. This payday due to the great seasons from Boise and TCU.

Eventually some powers that be will figure out that every game played requires one loser. And that long term, the schools with no chance of competing for victories with a 20 million dollar handicap will elect to invest their scarce dollars into educating students.

About Ken Kramer

Ken Kramer, investigative optimist, is back on the airwaves with his genuinely uplifting and iconic “About San Diego.”

I know this because I like Ken Kramer and I have enjoyed his show ever since I moved to San Diego in 1984 and listened to it on the radio. Since then, of course, Ken moved to television and for many years and 600 episodes on NBC 7/39 we were regularly treated to truly powerfully positive heart-melting vignettes about San Diego and our eclectic denizens. These stories were always delivered with Ken’s great voice, comfortably paced presentations and, most importantly, his ability to cajole us towards a prideful place.

I know I am sounding like a media critic who has been wined and dined and wooed and bamboozled into drinking Ken’s Kool aid.

Yes, I have.

I think as we age we get the ability to truly know the things we appreciate. We actually understand what makes us feel good. For me, one of those things is Ken Kramer’s “About San Diego.”

And I understand why we regularly get bombarded with bad news, scandal, treachery, crime, disaster and malfeasance. But to get it occasionally punctuated with stories about goodness is essential to my well being. Perhaps yours, too.

So last night Ken Kramer announced his new partnership with KPBS. This only happened, he told us, because of the “underpinnings which define the character” of the principles from NBC 7/39 and KPBS which agreed to allow Ken and KPBS to use all of the material from his previous 600 shows aired on NBC 7/39. Wow. Hats off to NBC former general manager, Phyllis Schwartz, (SDSU ’77); current General manager, Jackie Bradford; KPBS GM Tom Karlo, (SDSU ’75) and, obviously, Ken himself (SDSU ’74, and current SDSU Alumni Association board member) for putting the public good ahead of the usual corporate agenda.

Here is when you can see Ken’s new show on KPBS. Enjoy some happy time!

www.kpbs.org/tv/schedule/

Aztec Athletics

As we commence the process to hire a new Director of Intercollegiate Athletics, I’d like to weigh in on some of the things we have going for us.

First of all, athletics at the Division One level is part of who we are at San Diego State University. We have incredible athletic history; lengthy and potent. And we have tens of thousands of graduates who claim to have attended games in the fog in Aztec Bowl, who met the train when the 1941 Basketball team triumphantly returned from Kansas City and who never missed a Marshall Faulk touchdown.

So our tradition of fielding Division One teams, despite the constantly increasing financial challenges, isn’t likely to go away. And it shouldn’t.

In 1985 we hired a visionary athletic director who was resolutely determined to upgrade our facilities. And lo and behold, here we are with first-class everything where 24 years ago we had nothing. Do you need a recount? Okay, Tony Gwynn Stadium, new Aztrack, new Softball Stadium, new Tennis complex, new Aquatics complex, colossal athletics administration complex with state-of-the-art weight room, a still-beautiful Viejas Arena at Aztec Bowl, a fantastic Rec Center and even a new Parma Payne Goodall Alumni Center.

So we have an aging Qualcomm Stadium and some legitimate angst regarding the future of the Chargers and the stadium trickle down. We can only hope and work and will ourselves to collectively conquer this community challenge.

And let’s not forget our coaching staff. Plenty of sports have surged lately with some new and some veteran coaches who seem to share the mindset that winning games within the proper parameters of academic transcendence and NCAA regulations is doable at a place like San Diego State. Our “big three,” of course, - Burns, Hoke and Fisher - have our confidence like no previous triumvirate. Ever.

Finally, and most importantly, we have a great university. We have the brain power on our own campus to attack and conquer the challenges and opportunities presented by having Division One Athletics. So let’s get to it!

Brian Sipe

At 6:43 this morning I was pulling into PS 5 to go to work at the Parma Payne Goodall Alumni Center. I saw Aztecs Quarterbacks Coach Brian Sipe walking up 55th Street. Since I was stopped at the left turn light I had the chance to observe Brian and I took some pride in seeing that he was staring at our beautiful new alumni center and its exquisite rotunda.

After all, this was Brian Sipe, Little League World Series champion, Aztec superstar, NFL MVP, accomplished architect, and outstanding high school football coach, among many other accomplishments. Here was a man whose extraordinary tangible achievements have only been exceeded by his extreme humility and graciousness.

And just as I was thinking we have to start rallying our alumni around the Aztec team that Coach Hoke and his staff have begun to put together, what did I see?

Brian Sipe leaned over and plucked a piece of trash off of the sidewalk and deposited it into the next trash can.

Perhaps this is the time for all of us Aztec fans to start pitching in.