BDC, Rizzardini must spark imaginations
By osbeaver
One of my biggest beefs with BDC is his lack of imagination and preferring to settle with some boring standard and never doing anything to raise his game or spark fan interest. With the hire months ago of John Rizzardini many had hopes we would start to see some fresh marketing ideas. Not yet and it has been long enough now that I count myself among those who wonder if Rizzardini is going to do anything besides be another person to take some criticism away from De Carolis. Bottom line is it seems like they just don’t have much guts to try new ideas.
One thing that frustrated me a few years ago is when De Carolis heard they had rediscovered the Platypus Trophy and originally had interest in discussing bringing it back with the Oregon AD. The idea of a trophy was atleast something he was capable of wrapping his head around. Then, sadly, he decided the look of the trophy wasn’t good enough for some reason, and thinks that just puts the whole idea to rest for centuries apparently. Never mind that many folks think the Civil War would be well served with some kind of trophy to acknowledge it as one of the all time great rivalries. Maybe he is just afraid of losing to the Ducks so much and rarely getting it. If so this is not the capable leadership we need at OSU.
The Iowa-Iowa St game recently utilized an idea I have suggested for a few years now. If your only issue with a trophy is you think the design could be better, than have a contest to design a better trophy. That is exactly what they did with the Cy-Hawk Trophy. They let every fan in the state submit ideas and had a review panel to pick 6 final choices or abouts and then people voted on the winner that would be the new rivalry trophy. They ended up with a good and unique trophy that both sides are pleased to fight for. The process generated plenty of buzz and got both fanbases actively involved. A similar process for a Civil War trophy, whether a new Platypus Trophy or anything else, would work just as well and probably would garner 1,000 new die hard fans for OSU just because they see the AD caring about fans’ ideas and not just sticking with the boring or not even trying to get creative.
This is a major problem with BDC. Now that the track is making real progress and the basketball practice facility is being built, his future value is diminishing. We are starting to lose fans and not gain them in football. No way this should be happening with all of the exciting Pac-12 improvements. It just goes to show that BDC’s boring and stagnant approach and mounting losses in football are frustrating or rubbing people the wrong way. BDC can’t even try one thing and hold a small press release to generate a little bit of excitement.
The trophy idea would get both fanbases active on message boards and allow real community artists and others to express some creative and great designs. BDC though just doesn’t care. That is why he has earned the nickname of Bob Could Care Less. When your thinking is so set in stone that you can’t even see that all you have to do is make a new trophy with some design tweaks and that the whole process only needs to cost a couple thousand dollars then you are hopeless.
Rizzardini hasn’t brought anything yet either. What are his ideas? More calls for donations or free small popcorn at hoops games? Get creative guys and start giving fans something that is modestly interesting. The rebranding has excited most fans and they can only hope BDC keeps his distance so Tinker can give us a bold and powerful brand with plenty of uniform combos and visual hooks that will excite recruits. For some reason our effort takes 3 years though compared to everyone else getting the whole thing done in 1.
I am very confident fans would love to vote on a new Civil War Trophy just like we voted on the Pac-12 Championship logo. That contest got incredible amounts of hits and sorted itself out with a great design that spoke of the Pac-12 brand. A Civil War Trophy also would make more national fans care about Oregon State and not just Oregon. If Riley can’t win it I know Justin Wilcox would. He has beaten the Chip Kelly Ducks twice already and reports out of Washington are that the fans are loving him and the defense is looking much stiffer and dominating. If BDC can’t be a leader who will get the fanbase excited than why is he in one of our most crucial jobs for Oregon State to be nationally relevant?