šŸˆ More than 400 players expected for cook-off

BAMANEWSBOT

BAMANEWSBOT

Staff
By Chase GoodbreadSports Writer

TUSCALOOSA | Thad Turnipseed and Derrick Oden sat last summer on a dock on Smith Lake, a short drive southwest of Cullman, and hatched ideas for strengthening the fraternity of former University of Alabama football players and, in turn, their bond with UA fans.

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I would love to go, but just like the National Championship celebration. Poor timing (weather) and no t ax return yet. Why dont they have a BBQ outdoor event in spring. Someone needs to sit down and have a talk with them.
 
First, the positive... the players were great. And the kids activities were nice... And got to watch a win in Bball.

However, the organization of this event was severly lacking. They advertised the event to be limited to 3000. Well, there was closer to 7000. And they did not have any organized lines for autographs. So you had chaos trying to get to the tables. There were lines flowing both directions at the tables and people trying to cut in from all directions. My two kids (5 and 3) gave up trying to get any autographs and went and played on the field. Additionally, they put the BBQ vendors in the same area as the autographs cauing even more congestion. And one of the worst concepts, was allowing access to the field from a single gate on the West side. Overall, this event needs some serious organizational work. The concept of a roped off line would have been a start.

Oh, if anyone had any BBQ let me know how it tasted. I never made it to the front of those lines.
 
I completely agree with Tider-n-SC's comments on the organization. There were simply waaayy to many people there for the way it was set up. I never even tried to get any autographs. Couldn't really tell where to get them until the event was almost over. I was also confused as to why there would only be 1 gate in and out of the field, other than the north end zone tunnel. That was frustrating.

I did thoroughly enjoy getting to into the locker room, through the tunnel, and out onto the field. Considered that to be worth the cost of admission.

BBQ was good. I've had the potato salad before, but I couldn't remember where. Baked beans seemed to have come from a can.

Overall it was a great event, I thought. It was just clearly laid out for 3,000 when there were obviously way more there.
 
I agree about needing the area roped or even maybe using the steel barricades to help keep a line.It truely was chaos fighting the crowd between those wanting signatures and those in line for the BBQ.I'm glad I didn't try to get any sigs. The only one I would have been able to get was while I was standing along the fence to the field one of the guys came up and stood sort of beside me on the other side. Then before I knew it a crowd started to swarm over to get his autograph. I knew he was a part of the team but I had no idea what his name was. Maybe I should have just taken a pic while he was doing the signing.

As for all the snow we had,I had to drive thru it for 5 hours just to get there. I already had my ticket and motel room reserved so there was no way nature was going to stand between me and my first time going to Bryant-Denny Field. Even tho the crowd was was unreal when trying to get the food (yeah I made it),I just thoroughly enjoyed being there for the first time in my life.

The BBQ was pretty good.it came with baked beans,potato salad,BBQ potato chips,and a drink.Instead of the coke I got a cup of hot chocolate to try to warm up my insides. After standing in line for a couple hours before going in,I was shivering. Plus being in the shade doesn't help. Once we got to the field where the sun was,that helped.

here are a few pics I took...View attachment 1426View attachment 1427View attachment 1428View attachment 1429View attachment 1430
 
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Hardkore said:
I agree about needing the area roped or even maybe using the steel barricades to help keep a line.It truely was chaos fighting the crowd between those wanting signatures and those in line for the BBQ.I'm glad I didn't try to get any sigs. The only one I would have been able to get was while I was standing along the fence to the field one of the guys came up and stood sort of beside me on the other side. Then before I knew it a crowd started to swarm over to get his autograph. I knew he was a part of the team but I had no idea what his name was. Maybe I should have just taken a pic while he was doing the signing.

As for all the snow we had,I had to drive thru it for 5 hours just to get there. I already had my ticket and motel room reserved so there was no way nature was going to stand between me and my first time going to Bryant-Denny Field. Even tho the crowd was was unreal when trying to get the food (yeah I made it),I just thoroughly enjoyed being there for the first time in my life.

The BBQ was pretty good.it came with baked beans,potato salad,BBQ potato chips,and a drink.Instead of the coke I got a cup of hot chocolate to try to warm up my insides. After standing in line for a couple hours before going in,I was shivering. Plus being in the shade doesn't help. Once we got to the field where the sun was,that helped.

here are a few pics I took...View attachment 1426View attachment 1427View attachment 1428View attachment 1429View attachment 1430
Click to expand...
Your links are not working.
 
They have never been good with events like this. I stopped goign to the autograph portion of a-day back when they did it the same day. I;ve heard the same things about the "fan day" the last couple of years. They need to contact one of these companies that setup large autograph events for teams.
 
Not at all,go ahead.

Here are a few more.




I just wish I had gotten some of Wayne Mills Bands performance. I could have uploaded some vids to share. They were pretty good.
 
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We had a horrible time, $150 to get a few autographs, and 2 not really great BBQ plates that took almost an hour to get. My son did have fun in the kid fun zone, but we could have done that for a lot less $ somewhere else. We live in South Alabama and left 3 inches of snow. Should have stayed home. I just don't understand why the organization was so poor. It wouldn't have been hard to come up with a much better plan than they had. It was neat to actually be on the field and see the locker room and I ALMOST got Jay Barkers autograph. Oh well, that's just the way it goes sometimes.
 
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