Why am I having trouble getting psyched for this season?

So for the past week or so the contributors have noticed were having a lot of trouble getting going on this season. Some of it is life, some of it is fatigue, and a lot of it is a lack of excitement.

The first two items happen, it has came and went often in the nine years Bull Run has been covering the Bulls. But the lack of excitement is something new, and quite frankly something pretty disturbing.

I have a couple of theories...

The first issue might be the Change of Leadership at the top: I’ve had conversations with Allen Greene, he is a nice guy, seems like he knows what he’s doing and he does have a hard job. But he’s not Danny White or Warde Manuel.

He’s not out there drumming up excitement with the fan base.

That would be ok if he had a number two who did a decent job covering that base, but the department does not have that personality. When you lead an organization you need a person, or people, to cover your weak spots and the UB Athletics department does not have that.

Even behind the scenes it’s sluggish. They don’t seem to be reaching out as much as they used to (and it’s not just us, I’ve heard this other places). That lack of engagement almost makes it feel like the UB leadership is just going through the motions. Trying not to rock the boat and get the local media jumping all over them like they did White.

Maybe the sour feeling comes from the stability of leadership in the football program.

The Leipold era has consisted of two very lackluster seasons, which included throwing away Joe Licata’s senior season and then picking Grant Rohach as a starter over Tyree Jackson.

Yet the person who ran those offenses is still...running the offense. We lost Matt Simon who has been an amazing running backs coach but not the guy who has shown nothing when running the offense. Instead we put him over the running backs after Simon departed.

The final thing just might be the downward trend. Quinn came in and did a decent job cratering the team in his first year, 2010. After that was a slow build up to 2013. Every year there were slight improvements eventually leading to a pretty decent season that included a bowl game.

UB came out strong(ish) in 2015 and then fell apart later in the year. They then put on a terrible 2016 season. There are some reasons to think this year will be better, but the proof is in the tasting of the pudding and since late 2015 everything UB football has served up has been bitter.

So here is my question for you guys. If you’re having trouble getting excited is it for one of these reasons? is it for another reason? or am I just plain wrong and you are all amped up for the year.