but hadn't created an account until now because I was afraid at how much time I may end up wasting on here. I want to weigh in on this because, like everyone else, I think having this game in Denver really sucks. I went to the 98 game here, when I was still in high school, and I can remember at that time thinking that it was cool the Buffs were going to get to play in Mile High. We had crappy end zone seats, but at least at the old Mile High, the atmosphere was so much different. At any rate, it never crossed my mind that having the game in Denver had any bearing on the status of CSU's program whatsoever. I was barely cognizant that CSU even had a football team and to me the whole thing was just something that happened because the Buffs were big-time.
For various reasons, I didn't go to any of the games in Denver from 99-01, but I ended up going in 02 and 03, this time as a CU Student. I have got to say, I have never had less fun at any game than I had at the 02 game. I know most of it has to do with us losing, the way we lost, and the expectations we had going in to that season. But the atmosphere was just terrible. The new stadium sucks, and even though those two years the game was well attended, I thought it sucked having to drive all the way to Denver just to have to deal with a bunch of CSU fans. In those years the game always seemed like a road game because the Denver media would always make the Rams such sentimental favorites, I felt like our University was totally disrespected and undermined and I have always hated CSU very passionately for that to this day. After the 03 game, when we beat them, I can remember walking down the ramp, enduring insults from CSU fans to the effect that our degrees were going to be worthless because of this mythical "scandal," and the Ram fans telling the celebratory CU students that we'd be lucky to win 5 games that year. Even though they were right, we did only win 5 games, that was small-time to me. I never had given any thought to what CSU would do after they played us, but now I could tell that neither did CSU fans--they were more interested in watching and rooting for us to lose than watching their own team.
I went to the 04 and 05 games in Folsom, but when they brought the series back to Denver, I decided not to go. I haven't bought season tickets since then because given the state of the team under the last coaching staff, it was pretty easy to get tickets in Folsom on the cheap. Therefore I have never been confronted with making the choice to buy tickets to this game in Denver. But this year, I happened to be listening to the radio and I won a pair of absolutely awful tickets from a station. I called the CU ticket office to ask if I could exchange them for better seats and pay the difference, and they said, no, they couldn't do that. I suppose there are good reasons that they can't do it, but to me it seemed a little offensive that I called and offered to give them money for something that I had already basically gotten for free, yet they acted as if I was wasting their time. Yet, I look out in the stadium Saturday and see all those empty seats. I was at the Cal game and it was the best atmosphere for a game I have seen since 2004. The way Embo energized the crowd and the way the CU fans showed out to support the Buffs made me feel proud to be a CU fan for the first time in years, even though the team got beat. We could have built on that momentum if this game had been in our home stadium, but instead we got stuck in this crappy venue with the ridiculous DPD and security staffs basically giving fans of both teams every reason in the world to prefer watching the game anywhere else but at the stadium. The CSU fans are even more small-time than I remember them being and frankly, kind of an embarassment, not just to their school, but even to us, since it is our home game and only on tv because of us.
Even listening to Fairchild's comments before and after the game, he kept saying how CSU is "extremely fortunate" to even get to play in that game, practically begging the fans to show up and support their team, knowing in the back of his mind that the series won't last much longer if things continue as they are, and yet no one shows up and instead are calling for him to be fired so that they can hire a more expensive coach. Have they lost their minds? I feel sorry for Fairchild because in my opinion he called a pretty good game Saturday and it was pretty obvious that the Rams have absolutely no talent. He did a pretty good job even keeping the game close. It is pretty evident that the success CSU had in the late 90s and early 2000s was during a period when college football had more parity. Now, with the re-alignment stuff and the way television money is being distributed, as you guys have already alluded to, it is pretty evident that that period of success for CSU is over, probably never to return. At this point, I think, like everyone else, that CSU should be happy to come to Folsom and get whipped every year, or give up playing the game. Listening to some of their people talk, it seems like they have themselves almost become resigned to this realization, yet we have this ridiculous contract to play in Denver where it is not working out for either AD. Don't know what the solution is to that, but even if I get free tickets to next season's game, it would take some convincing to get me to go. Why would I, when I can go watch the Buffs play in Folsom 6 other times?