When the Texas A&M athletic department made the move from their longtime Big 12 home to the SEC, leaving historic rival Texas in the dust, no one could have expected such immediate and positive results. Link The in the dust part must have been written by an aggie.
aggy will max out Pyle Field, and we still have the south endzone to build. They can enjoy having a larger stadium for awhile, but only for awhile. Po' aggy
$450 million to put icing on a turd. Why the hell won't they tear down that piece of **** and start over? OOPS! That's a question best answered by Governor Rick Perry. Let's see if once again they number seats actually in the aisles and sell nonexistent seats like they did in 1979.
PJ, How abt using your contacts at CS to recommend an implosion of Pyle that would take the place of the late Bonfire? Could still be some exciting destruction for the faithful as well as a bonding moment. Plan it around the week before whoever is your big rivalry game now. I'm sure the LHN would be happy to telecast it live....be great for the badly-needed ratings. Maybe bring in RC and Jackie for in-the-parking-lot analysis?
They're redoing the entire west (home) side, a new south end zone, and the entire facade of the building. They're not doing much to the student side or The Zone, except facade stuff like bricks.
It is not a total tear down and rebuild. The Read Building, G Rollie White, the west (alumni) side stands, and I believe the Steed building (south side of the stadium will be torn down. The west stands will be rebuilt, and stands will be built on the south side of the stadium. The lower deck of the west (student) side will be torn down and completely rebuilt. But the second and third decks on the east side will not be torn down. They will, however, be renovated to the extent possible, with new concourses and bathrooms. There will also be minor changes to the Zone (north side of stadium). Part of the renovation will be to lower the field and move it further to the south, so that some additional seats can be added to the front of the zone.
I dont blame them for expanding the stadium. Kyle field is commonly sold out. Been to one game there, when Colt had that long draw run, and I have never been to a louder stadium. I was also very pleasantly suprised at the hospitality shown by the Aggie fan. Very nice people even after the heartbreaking loss.
What has happened to this board? Not only does someone start a new thread every time their quarterback takes a dump, but now we're getting updates on their stadium renovations. I wonder if they are as obsessed with us as we are with them? Do you miss them THAT much?
I find it interesting that almost everyone here laughed at them leaving saying they would be the doormat of the SEC while saying our recruiting wouldn't suffer. They had a good season and we are losing recruits to them which rarely happened before. Now they are expanding their stadium with many expecting a good season and folks around here are still laughing. With our program in an obvious state of question, I'd hesitate before making fun of their intentions. We'll see how it all plays out, but they seem to be making positive strides lately.
The original seating capacity was 102,000, but it's now 102,500 to make it something less than 100 seats larger than the stadium at Tennessee, and the largest in the SEC.
I agree with Vol. I was mistaken, but privately I felt that we were watching Aggie jump off a cliff. It's still too early, and IF the SEC figures the Aggie offense out, I still think a few 6-5 seasons will turn the tide back. I wish them well, actually because Texas still has so many good HS talent, I'd rather Aggie get recruits that used to go to OU.
“They are trying to secure funding for three maroon lights on each corner (for a total of 12) that would light up after victories.” I don't believe anyone has pointed out the excellent "new" idea aggy has come up with of lighting up a building if the football team wins. Morons.
I didn't realize how weak the Ags schedule is. Good grief- Rice, Sam Houston, SMU, UTEP, 9 home games, 4 away Next year Lamar and SMU??? UT next year UCLA and BYU 2015 Notre Dame, Cal
I could care less. I am only concerned with what Texas does. Take care of business on the field and everything else falls into place.
The $16 mill was paid back years ago, that was just a temporary cash flow issue. A&M is about to start rolling in some big dollars with the SEC TV deal along with the huge increases in donations and merchandise sales. The way they are building Kyle it will be a money machine with tons of luxury boxes. They will sell it out because of 2 primary factors. First off, A&M is graduating over 12k students per year now and going up and they are replacing classes of 1-2k from the '40s and '50s. It will soon surpass 400k living alumni, most of which are in Texas. Second, the SEC schedule guarantees feature home games. LSU and Bama are the conerstones and they are in opposite years, those games alone will sell a ton of season tickets. Obviously A&M has to win to sell out a 102k stadium, so does everyone. The base of support is there though and there is no reason to think A&M won't continue to be successful in the SEC with the money they are putting in the program and the Texas recruiting base. As has been mentioned the SEC schedule is tough but also sets up for success well with only 8 Conference games. Can A&M fall back? Sure, but the odds are no worse than any other big school. Personally I think the key will be holding on to Sumlin, as long as he is there A&M is going to be very good. Texas will be fine of course, but A&M is going to continue to be a force for the forseeable future. I could see a Florida/Florida State scenario from the '90s where both schools are consistently Top 10.
Aggressor, I didn't realize that I had slept through "years". In fact, the Aggies are the only Big XII school to take their share of Nebraska/Colorado exit fee ($20 million) and used that cash to pay back the administration. I applaud their renovating Kyle Field, I just wish they would level it and start over (possible exception of the north endzone addition. What is the deal with the maroon lights. Top quality maroon LEDs aren't massively expensive. The entire project can't be $25,000, if done properly.