Faded Beauties

A beautiful little car isn’t it.
A 1979 Triumph Spitfire that cost the owner (and writer of this blog) a small fortune each time it went out on the road which was on nice Sunday mornings. Love, care, history, and mounting repair/towing bills could not hide the weakness of a late 1950’s design and an owner with limited mechanical skills. The cost per mile to operate the car was never calculated out of fear of seeing the truth but the love faded and the Spitfire past into personal history of facing the truth about a car that had been an object of desire for the previous 30 years.

The Orange, Cotton, and Rose are three of the best know venues in football but with their advancing age of the facilities it may be that their time has past and a realistic if cold hearted future may be in order. Of the three the Rose will be able to weather this storm and justify the cost of renovation as this of the three may sit on hallowed ground. However, as Chip Jacobs explains in Tunnel Vision reputation is not the same as having the cold hard cash in hand.

The Cotton Bowl has followed the lead of the Fiesta, Orange, and Sugar Bowls and decided to move in with the nearest NFL team, the Dallas Cowboys, leaving behind the Texas Fair Grounds that gave the game life but became the millstone that held them back from the glamour of the BCS (fans at a big time game must not be exposed to cold). This move of the three has the most controversy with the game moving form Dallas to Arlington and the resulting finger pointing with “coulda, shoulda woulda’s” to go around. The 2007 edition the fans from Auburn were less than thrill as measured by the secondary market for tickets to see their team in the also ran bowl. The outdated venue reduced the Cotton Bowl’s sizzle that any marketer will tell you is the most important part of the product.

Finally the Orange Bowl which no longer hosts the BCS game with which it shares a name. Dave Hyde will not shed tears over the passing the old stadium although one wonders if he will miss the bonus of football and fights the Canes provided fans with last fall. A neat swap would take place with the Canes considering shacking up with the Dolphins a temporary use of the stadium by Florida International University and eventual redevelopment of the site for a Marlins baseball stadium.

There is no cute line to end this post rather just the sobering realization that the world changes.