Donors?
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rockytophigh
Rod Wilks is my co-pilot
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I was....until today. I sent this about 15 minutes ago to VASF. My apologies to the board for the language...it's a heart felt message and I apologize for any poor language choices in advance. :hi:
Before you start in with this....I would like you to know I have an undergrad degree from the college of Communications, have been a fund donor and season ticket holder for well over a decade. I attended the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 games in basketball this past year and actually have another trip planned for a return to Oxford for basketball in January (we had such a good time at the football game last year). In addition to being a season ticket holder....I have attended every SEC football championship game in addition to many away games, bowl games, the national championship game, etc.
My point being is since I graduated in '93, I have spent a ton of time, heart, and money following my Vols. I have never gotten my tickets through UT Tix but I got the e-mail and thought....what the heck, I'm sure a decades worth of donations, being and alumni, etc. should get me a halfway decent seat. So I go in and request tickets for my whole family to go since it's here in Nashville.......wow........
Thanks for the seats in ****ville section 1 row 1. That's ***ch no.1 which is actually the much smaller of the 2 ***ches I am pleased to share with you today. HeII I could have gone to Ticketmaster and done better than going to where I am a long time donor. It would have been cheaper and the seats 1000 times better. I could have called a buddy that works at LP Field and worked a favor, but NO, I have a concept in mind where my University surely wouldn't strap on the big orange screw for such a supportive alumni....that's only reserved for current students right? Oh, but I'm not the big money donor...which leads to major ***ch 2.
Since my time as a student....actually since we won the 1998 NC....the atmosphere in my beloved Neyland Stadium has become a **stard child of a nursing home and a yacht club. It is by far the least exciting venue in all of the SEC. Sure the pageantry is nice, the Vol Walk, the Vol Navy....yadda yadda yadda. Soon as that ball is kicked off it ZZZZZZZZZZ time. That place used to rock with Big Orange passion and now it sleeps with Big Orange checkbooks. The high dollar seats are full of holes as companies donate with no intention of supporting their team with their voices...heII, it's not even their team. The team belongs to the hearts and souls of millions of Tennesseans past and present. Men and women who listened while at their workbench in the garage.....or banged their head on the transmission when the Vols scored a touchdown.....or accidentally tapped the bumper of the car ahead of them at a redlight when dreaded Bama scored. Tennesseans of all generations gathered around the radio to hear the boys in orange fight for victory.....Grandfathers, Sons, & Grandsons put on various shades of orange, loaded in the car and headed east in the weeeeee hours of the mornings to cheer on their state team with all of their hearts. It was their pride on the line too you know. Normally the young boy would be sleepy but with thoughts of the Vols playing football, his eyes were wide as the middle linebackers in anticipation of what was to come. It was filling up at Cracker Barrel somewhere in Tennessee amazed at how everyone seemed to be wearing the same outfit today.....every race, color and creed....from babies to 95 year old checker players donned the orange. It was a stream of orange as you drove down I-40. Pickup trucks flying UT flags out of the beds....people you'd never met waving at you with big smiles and thumbs up. We're coming.....get ready visiting team we're coming.....and we are going to kick the **** out of you when we get there. There were times when the boy thought surely Memphis must be three feet higher today because every Tennessean must be headed east.
Then comes the boys acceptance letter. It was the only place he had applied of course. The place he'd loved because he was taught to love it....because it filled his eyes and heart so many years before.....when he exited the tunnel and saw tens of thousands of his family for the first time. He didn't have to pay for a student ticket.....he and his classmates funneled dozens of cheap beers and prepared themselves for battle. They were loud....oh my God were they loud. The stadium shook with thunder.....yet the skies were clear. You couldn't speak to the person next to you because it was pointless. A drunken high 5 would have to do. There were toilet paper streamers.....plastic cups launched like thousands of white, drippy missiles from the upper deck...the air filled with whiskey and big foam fingers.
I'm not going to continue down the road of nostalgia......not for fear that you're not enjoying my little big orange trip down memory lane...but because frankly, you don't ****ing deserve it. I'm sick of what has happened to my beloved home. You've come in my living room and took a big corporate dump on my momma's rug. You've added a nice deck on the back of my house, but I can't go out there because I'm not the kind of guy you want out there. You've somehow managed to **** up the best hot dogs in the whole world by switching to Sodexho. If a company can't cook a decent ****ing hot dog, how can you trust them to do anything right? You won't let smokers smoke out freaking side. I quit smoking but my God man....let them smoke out on the ramps if they want. You are now having ushers tell people to sit down....I've got to catch my breath here before I seriously lay into a stream of words that would give me automatic admittance into the Navy with commanding rank. Sit down at a UT game??? Are you ****ting me?? Please don't bother to tell me "that's not our policy" because I don't care, it's happening.
Don't think this is a rant about the tickets I got....because half are already on Fleabay and I'm giving half of them away. The whole family just won't get to go and several will be relieved not to freeze.
You don't owe me better seats, you don't owe me an explanation......you owe that little boy, his daddy....and his grandaddy a full ****ing explanation as to why you've turned Tennessee Football into a high-society social event. You owe ALL Tennesseans an explanation.......you owe the new generations of little boys an explanation. Please explain to the new generation who are priced out of Neyland exactly why you have done it....why have you stolen their future memories because it's easier and cheaper to just take 'em to a Titans game. Maybe you won't need those little Volunteers in the future? Maybe you won't need the diehard, orange bleeding fan..........
With that being said, you kind sirs of the VASF can take my donation, and season tickets.....put them on some of those ****ty new hot dogs....drop those silky slacks...and, well I'll spare you the details. Please pass this along to anyone there you might think still cares about Tennessee Football. Don't bother passing it on to Mike Hamilton....I'll save you the trouble making that decision. I'll still support my Vols by attending games and cheering my heart out....but our relationship is over.
With reverence and respect,
****** ******
Account Number: 82*** or ***051 (because you could never straighten that **** out either)
PS- Don't you dare ask me to work another Big Orange Caravan event because I've done my last one of those.
Before you start in with this....I would like you to know I have an undergrad degree from the college of Communications, have been a fund donor and season ticket holder for well over a decade. I attended the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 games in basketball this past year and actually have another trip planned for a return to Oxford for basketball in January (we had such a good time at the football game last year). In addition to being a season ticket holder....I have attended every SEC football championship game in addition to many away games, bowl games, the national championship game, etc.
My point being is since I graduated in '93, I have spent a ton of time, heart, and money following my Vols. I have never gotten my tickets through UT Tix but I got the e-mail and thought....what the heck, I'm sure a decades worth of donations, being and alumni, etc. should get me a halfway decent seat. So I go in and request tickets for my whole family to go since it's here in Nashville.......wow........
Thanks for the seats in ****ville section 1 row 1. That's ***ch no.1 which is actually the much smaller of the 2 ***ches I am pleased to share with you today. HeII I could have gone to Ticketmaster and done better than going to where I am a long time donor. It would have been cheaper and the seats 1000 times better. I could have called a buddy that works at LP Field and worked a favor, but NO, I have a concept in mind where my University surely wouldn't strap on the big orange screw for such a supportive alumni....that's only reserved for current students right? Oh, but I'm not the big money donor...which leads to major ***ch 2.
Since my time as a student....actually since we won the 1998 NC....the atmosphere in my beloved Neyland Stadium has become a **stard child of a nursing home and a yacht club. It is by far the least exciting venue in all of the SEC. Sure the pageantry is nice, the Vol Walk, the Vol Navy....yadda yadda yadda. Soon as that ball is kicked off it ZZZZZZZZZZ time. That place used to rock with Big Orange passion and now it sleeps with Big Orange checkbooks. The high dollar seats are full of holes as companies donate with no intention of supporting their team with their voices...heII, it's not even their team. The team belongs to the hearts and souls of millions of Tennesseans past and present. Men and women who listened while at their workbench in the garage.....or banged their head on the transmission when the Vols scored a touchdown.....or accidentally tapped the bumper of the car ahead of them at a redlight when dreaded Bama scored. Tennesseans of all generations gathered around the radio to hear the boys in orange fight for victory.....Grandfathers, Sons, & Grandsons put on various shades of orange, loaded in the car and headed east in the weeeeee hours of the mornings to cheer on their state team with all of their hearts. It was their pride on the line too you know. Normally the young boy would be sleepy but with thoughts of the Vols playing football, his eyes were wide as the middle linebackers in anticipation of what was to come. It was filling up at Cracker Barrel somewhere in Tennessee amazed at how everyone seemed to be wearing the same outfit today.....every race, color and creed....from babies to 95 year old checker players donned the orange. It was a stream of orange as you drove down I-40. Pickup trucks flying UT flags out of the beds....people you'd never met waving at you with big smiles and thumbs up. We're coming.....get ready visiting team we're coming.....and we are going to kick the **** out of you when we get there. There were times when the boy thought surely Memphis must be three feet higher today because every Tennessean must be headed east.
Then comes the boys acceptance letter. It was the only place he had applied of course. The place he'd loved because he was taught to love it....because it filled his eyes and heart so many years before.....when he exited the tunnel and saw tens of thousands of his family for the first time. He didn't have to pay for a student ticket.....he and his classmates funneled dozens of cheap beers and prepared themselves for battle. They were loud....oh my God were they loud. The stadium shook with thunder.....yet the skies were clear. You couldn't speak to the person next to you because it was pointless. A drunken high 5 would have to do. There were toilet paper streamers.....plastic cups launched like thousands of white, drippy missiles from the upper deck...the air filled with whiskey and big foam fingers.
I'm not going to continue down the road of nostalgia......not for fear that you're not enjoying my little big orange trip down memory lane...but because frankly, you don't ****ing deserve it. I'm sick of what has happened to my beloved home. You've come in my living room and took a big corporate dump on my momma's rug. You've added a nice deck on the back of my house, but I can't go out there because I'm not the kind of guy you want out there. You've somehow managed to **** up the best hot dogs in the whole world by switching to Sodexho. If a company can't cook a decent ****ing hot dog, how can you trust them to do anything right? You won't let smokers smoke out freaking side. I quit smoking but my God man....let them smoke out on the ramps if they want. You are now having ushers tell people to sit down....I've got to catch my breath here before I seriously lay into a stream of words that would give me automatic admittance into the Navy with commanding rank. Sit down at a UT game??? Are you ****ting me?? Please don't bother to tell me "that's not our policy" because I don't care, it's happening.
Don't think this is a rant about the tickets I got....because half are already on Fleabay and I'm giving half of them away. The whole family just won't get to go and several will be relieved not to freeze.
You don't owe me better seats, you don't owe me an explanation......you owe that little boy, his daddy....and his grandaddy a full ****ing explanation as to why you've turned Tennessee Football into a high-society social event. You owe ALL Tennesseans an explanation.......you owe the new generations of little boys an explanation. Please explain to the new generation who are priced out of Neyland exactly why you have done it....why have you stolen their future memories because it's easier and cheaper to just take 'em to a Titans game. Maybe you won't need those little Volunteers in the future? Maybe you won't need the diehard, orange bleeding fan..........
With that being said, you kind sirs of the VASF can take my donation, and season tickets.....put them on some of those ****ty new hot dogs....drop those silky slacks...and, well I'll spare you the details. Please pass this along to anyone there you might think still cares about Tennessee Football. Don't bother passing it on to Mike Hamilton....I'll save you the trouble making that decision. I'll still support my Vols by attending games and cheering my heart out....but our relationship is over.
With reverence and respect,
****** ******
Account Number: 82*** or ***051 (because you could never straighten that **** out either)
PS- Don't you dare ask me to work another Big Orange Caravan event because I've done my last one of those.
Fanforlife21
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EasyVolunteer
Like Sunday Morning
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rockytophigh
Rod Wilks is my co-pilot
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Oh I'll still go to the game....it's not about the seats although they're not the greatest. It's about what they've done/are doing to the whole atmosphere at Neyland. No, I'm not a big enough donor to seriously hurt them...nor would I want to. I sent it to a guy who will read it, laugh his @ss off, and pass it on....and yes, someone else can have my seats....I'll just get 'em through others.
and yeah, I'll loan you $10 if you really need it lol.
and yeah, I'll loan you $10 if you really need it lol.
hatvol96
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SpaceCoastVol
Jacked up on moonshine and testosterone
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dembewbs
TheManTheMythTheLegend
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OrangeByBirth
Old time Vol
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This is just another of the long list of "Summer's Eve" Hamilton's successes. He has pi$$ed off season ticket holders, donors, and long-time fans. He has made sold out Neyland Stadium a walk-up and game day purchase like the Univ of California. I have been a donor and season holder for decades and am seriously considering a similar letter. It has become about $$ rather than sports/athletics and I find it shameful.
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