ESPN 30 for 30: Pony Excess

#76
#76
Unimane said:
"The U" was really good, but only about 3rd or 4th on my list. Documentaries designed as love stories drop the greatness down a level.
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i totally agree. "the u" and the marion jones one were nothing more than love letter puff pieces.
 
#77
#77
The Two Escobars was the best of the 30 for 30 series so far. Hands down, IMO. For nothing more than the actual story, which was one of the most compelling I've heard and also pretty sad. I also liked One Night in Vegas. As a college football fan, The U and The Pony Excess are a close 3 and 4. I missed the one about July, 1994 and that's another one I'd really like to see.
 
#78
#78
My top 3 are:

1. Kings Ransom- Changed the future of the NHL Forever, at the same time ruining the existence of the same league in Canada.

2. Run Ricky Run- Someone mentioned it earlier, if a documentary can change how I view someone, it has done it's job, and therefore gets my vote.

3. The Best that Never Was- Enlightened me to the pressures that are on these kids, and how most of us could never go through what they go through. I throughly enjoyed this one.
 
#79
#79
Did anyone see the one about the tupac murder?

I missed that one
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#80
#80
I have to go with:

1. The U
2. Winning Time
3. The 2 Escobars
4. Pony Excess
5. The Best that never was
 
#84
#84
True. Could explain how SMU got Carl Wright considering his older brother was All-SWC at A&M. Carl would have looked good on those Phi Slamma Jamma teams at UofH. As for Bliss, there is a special place in hell reserved for him after the pain he put Patrick Dennehy's family through.
hatvol96 said:
One interesting fact: Dave Bliss was the basketball coach when all this went down.
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#85
#85
JokermanVol said:
i totally agree. "the u" and the marion jones one were nothing more than love letter puff pieces.
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The Marion Jones one was horrible. I had to stop watching after about 15 minutes. I also thought the Mike Tyson / Tupac one was terrible. Those were the two worst I have seen.

I like the Pony Express one a lot more than the "U" one.

I really liked the Escobar 30 for 30 and the Eastern European one about the Bosian Conflict that ripped apart their team.

The Marcus Dupree one was very good as well.
 
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#87
#87
iuvol2012 said:
Not GAVol, but that one got me too. Only guess I can give is that they were dumb enough to think that they would never get caught, so they didn't care what it was printed on.

Just my two cents.
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It was a dumb move by Henry Lee Parker, but I think they figured since everyone was doing it at that time (which everyone in the Southwest Conference was), that the NCAA would have to bring down the entire conference and not just SMU, and they figured the NCAA would never do that to an entire conference. They were obviously wrong.

What SMU did was crazy bad, but it was really no different at any other school in the SWC at that time. Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M, Houston, TCU....All of them were doing that exact thing extensively. SMU was just the best at doing it and they were really the only ones to pay the price. Right or wrong, the NCAA basically took all the cheating going on in the SWC out on SMU.
 
#88
#88
Montrell Hardy said:
It was a dumb move by Henry Lee Parker, but I think they figured since everyone was doing it at that time (which everyone in the Southwest Conference was), that the NCAA would have to bring down the entire conference and not just SMU, and they figured the NCAA would never do that to an entire conference. They were obviously wrong.

What SMU did was crazy bad, but it was really no different at any other school in the SWC at that time. Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M, Houston, TCU....All of them were doing that exact thing extensively. SMU was just the best at doing it and they were really the only ones to pay the price. Right or wrong, the NCAA basically took all the cheating going on in the SWC out on SMU.
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Arkansas, Baylor and Rice are the only schools that weren't investigated and sanctioned by the NCAA. Coach Teaff from Baylor chaired the Ethics and Rules committees for the NCAA and still serves as the Executive Director of the FCAA.
 
#89
#89
I liked this one, but thought it lacked in that most of the interviews were with the journalists of the day. It would have been better had more boosters and people inside the SMU athletic department at the time had been willing to give their account, and also if the players interviewed -- like Dickerson and James -- had just dropped the act and told us how much they were getting.

Dickerson especially. I mean you know they were paying that guy RIDICULOUS money.

But even though I think it could have been a lot better, I did enjoy it just because I didn't know a whole lot about what had gone done. And I found the brazen nature of the boosters to be quite fascinating. I mean, the fact that there was a meeting between the boosters and governor of Texas and they came away from that meeting having decided that they were going to keep paying the players just blows my mind.

I mean, it's one thing to bang a guy's wife. It's quite another to capture the footage, burn it onto a DVD, mail it to the guy in a package that also includes an itinerary of scheduled bangings for the next month.
 
#91
#91
Montrell Hardy said:
The Marion Jones one was horrible. I had to stop watching after about 15 minutes. I also thought the Mike Tyson / Tupac one was terrible. Those were the two worst I have seen.

I like the Pony Express one a lot more than the "U" one.

I really liked the Escobar 30 for 30 and the Eastern European one about the Bosian Conflict that ripped apart their team.

The Marcus Dupree one was very good as well.
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That has been my favorite so far, though it had a cheesy ending.
 
#92
#92
kidbourbon said:
I liked this one, but thought it lacked in that most of the interviews were with the journalists of the day. It would have been better had more boosters and people inside the SMU athletic department at the time had been willing to give their account, and also if the players interviewed -- like Dickerson and James -- had just dropped the act and told us how much they were getting.

Dickerson especially. I mean you know they were paying that guy RIDICULOUS money.

But even though I think it could have been a lot better, I did enjoy it just because I didn't know a whole lot about what had gone done. And I found the brazen nature of the boosters to be quite fascinating. I mean, the fact that there was a meeting between the boosters and governor of Texas and they came away from that meeting having decided that they were going to keep paying the players just blows my mind.

I mean, it's one thing to bang a guy's wife. It's quite another to capture the footage, burn it onto a DVD, mail it to the guy in a package that also includes an itinerary of scheduled bangings for the next month.
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I would definitely have liked to have seen more interviews with the boosters and former coaches, but I heard most of the boosters and coaches of that time refused to take part in the interviews for the documentary.

I can only remember 2 coaches that did interviews (Ron Meyer and one of his assistants) and also only 2 boosters.

Obviously from a player standpoint Sean Stopperich and David Stanley would have been great to have interviewed for this but both of them died, Stopperich a very long time ago. I did like that they included the old interview footage of him though from 1984. It was his recruitment more than any others that got the entire nation up in a frenzy.

I know the main booster, Sherwood Blount refused to be interviewed as did Bobby Collins. I thought it was done very well considering the people they could get to agree to go on camera.
 
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