Does USF need an on campus football stadium?

Although our household contains three degrees from USF, we were not part of the “stakeholders” survey regarding an on campus stadium for USF. But we did obtain a copy of the nine-question survey. We could only honestly answer yes to one of the questions – that it would enhance the college experience for current and future students. But no to us visiting the campus more often; the stadium elevating the school’s national profile; making the school more selective in enrollment (they tightened that up right after your humble blogger left); also no to increased fund raising across all departments; engaging more alumni; enhancing USF’s chances of moving to a more attractive conference or increasing student enrollment. We fudged on a question of it being a tremendous asset for enticing future recruits as we have a problem with “tremendous”, plus we imagine a lot of recruits salivate at the prospect of playing in a pro football stadium. To recap that’s one yes, seven no’s and a weak maybe. We’ll be anxious to see what fellow alums think.

Tampa Bay, politics and stuff

1. It’s not a particularly fun time to be in Clearwater city government with the salary and leave scandal at the Fire Department along with one of their staffers being hit with drug charges; missing money in the Parks and Rec. Department and a costly gas outage on Clearwater Beach requiring restitution to beach restaurants for lost earnings. The gas issue can be charged off to a freak situation – the rest strictly lack of oversight.  

2. If the city of Clearwater is going to do a long-rumored relocation of City Hall, they need to fast track it. Nearly a quarter million dollars in renovations to the half-century old building are scheduled. Why put that kind of money into something you’re going to soon tear down?

3. Moves are on to eliminate plastic straws in many communities including some in the bay area. Sea World already uses degradable paper straws. The rub is they cost approximately 20% more than a plastic straw. The logical answer is to make plastic straws an “asked for” item at restaurants.

4. Looking back fifty years ago to 1968, “new” items included the 747, the Big Mac and the 911 emergency phone number. The newest actor to burst on the scene was Dustin Hoffman who played the rather confused Benjamin Braddock in the classic The Graduate. The biggest new group of the year was Gary Puckett (a Clearwater resident) and the Union Gap.

5. You’ve lived in the bay area (or anywhere else) a long time if you remember returning your glass Canada Dry, Coke, Pepsi, Royal Crown or 7-Up bottles to the market and getting your deposit money back. In this era of trying to conserve resources, why don’t we still do that?

Sports, media and other stuff:

6. Earle Bruce, who passed away last week at age 87, made his mark at Ohio State but also coached the University of Tampa Spartans and gave current Ohio State coach Urban Meyer his first job.

7. The reincarnation of Roseanne is off to a strong start in the ratings and has already been renewed. Interesting spin – where arch conservative Archie Bunker was played by the very liberal Carroll O’Connor in All in the Family; the right-leaning Roseanne charter is indeed played by an actress with strong conservative views.

8. Word on the street is Amazon is developing a home robot. When it is able to vacuum the rugs and clean the bathrooms, give us a call.

9. Idle thought: while it is great to hop on the net and find any possible baseball item we want, we still miss the postman dropping off our weekly copy of The Sporting News, baseball’s Bible, which ceased publication five years ago.

10. A lot of our early selections in our best player/best pitcher series have dealt with expansion franchises, but this week is a bit tougher with the storied Boston/Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves franchise (see back story TBRR 3/25). You had two great third basemen in Matthews (the only man to play in all three cities) and Jones, but also had one of the greatest outfielders of all time in Hank Aaron, our choice. Pitchers – take your choice of Glavine, Maddox, Niekro, Smoltz or Spahn. We take Spahn as almost all of his success was with the Braves while the others, especially Maddox, thrived elsewhere.

MLB at the 1/6 mark

Baseball runs approximately six months. At the end of the first of those months, some observations: places where the season is going to seem awfully long –Cincinnati, Kansas City, Miami and, yes, here in Tampa Bay. Small sample size but early season disappointments are AL -- Twins, NL – Nats. Everybody who had Ryan Flaherty, Asdrubal Cabrera and Dansby Swanson in the Top Five batting averages in the NL, raise your hand. In the AL, not many surprises with names like Betts, Mauer, Moustakas and Judge in the Top Five. Turns out those predicting the downfall of the Nats’ Ryan Zimmerman in 2017 were a year early – he heads into the end of the month hitting .188 – although that’s up from .121 a week ago.

UP NEXT: Voters’ short memories; royal wedding; SS United States and Amelia