Published Aug 4, 2019
100 Questions: What am I most excited for?
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Matt Hall  •  EMAWOnline
Managing Editor
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@Matthew_D_Hall

***Yesterday's Question HERE***

In an attempt to pass the time this off-season we're fortunate to have secured the help of scottwildcat from Boscoe's Boys. Scott is going to provide 100 questions about the past, present, future (and who-knows-what) involving Kansas State sports, and I'll do my very best to answer them.

Let's dive in to the 100 Questions.

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Question No. 96: What part of you (your fan side or your media member side) is most excited about year one of a new football coach? What is the one thing that is the most exciting from each of those personas? Media Matt and Fan Dale?

You know what, this was shockingly easy for me to answer once I stopped to think about it.

The fan side of me is far more excited than media me about this change.

I know K-StateOnline has only existed for two football seasons, but I'm not sure you'd ever be able to go back through anything I've written or said on The KSO Show that could be construed as criticizing, complaining about or - to be blunt - whining about lack of access under Bill Snyder.

Of course there were times I criticized his answers or interactions with the media, but lack of access has never seemed worth talking about.

Would I have loved practice access, assistants available to the media, etc.? Sure, but either way I had a job to do, and spending time fussing about what we do or don't get was never going to help our product.

In fact, in some ways I liked the limited access under Snyder, as it allowed our work ethic and ability to work to go find info to make us different, in my opinion, and was a strength of ours.

Now, don't get me wrong, I prefer things under Klieman from a media perspective, too. But the part of me that's more excited is that fan side, one who's very engaged in watching this program try and build its roster and market itself at a higher level. I'm selfishly interested in seeing the progress, and I'm also fascinated by the idea of having no preconceived notion of what I'm going to see this season on the field.

All of that far outweighs the excitement I get about increased media access.

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All that said, I still need to answer what makes me most excited, both as a media member and follower of the program.

MEDIA - Availability of assistants. One, this is a group that seems very willing to talk football and not immediately assume a media member can't follow along. Now, some can't - and I've seen coaches already talking over some heads in these conversations - but they're going to give you that opportunity. The respect they show is appreciated, and the different perspective they can give to their own parts of the program is very, very valuable. Also, I love that they get the ability to defend themselves. I think K-State fans in years past may possibly have been more understanding of a coordinator or assistant under fire if that coach ever had a chance to explain his thought process through the media.

FAN - I'm most interested, and have the most fun, following along with recruiting and the building of the roster. I'm certainly of the belief results on the field are more important than recruiting rankings, but I'm also of the belief those results and your ability to manage your roster from a scholarship distribution perspective are also tied together. I know this staff sees the value in trying to have certain numbers, split up between specific classes, built into each position. Recruiting shouldn't be simply about who you can get or who wants to come to your school, but instead about you deciding what you need - specifically - and then trying to go and get it. That's happening right now at Kansas State. And the process, both the hits and misses, are fun for me to follow.