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[QUOTE="Orijinal, post: 1393639, member: 2359"]
He said "44 is back."  He did not say "44 is officially unretired" or "44 will now be made available to certain future student athletes at Syracuse."  Both of which could easily had been said.  People and fan forums start planting this idea that 44 will be unretired at the groundbreaking ceremony before the ceremony actually happens, and then people automatically think that "44 is back" means "44 will be on the field next year!" This is ridiculous.  It's the fan base's own assumptions that are at fault and not the athletic department's use of phrase.

"44 is back" could have meant a multitude of things.  None of those things were EVER expounded on.  It was just the simple statement.  In context of the ceremony, the first thing we had a right to assume was that "44 has a prominent place again."  But nope.  Everybody thought "it's unretired!" because that's what everyone wanted to see.  Should the AD have said a little more?  Absolutely, yes.  The phraseology was completely ambiguous.  Did he say that 44 is back with the blessing of Floyd Little and Jim Brown.  Yes.  Does that make it SOUND like it's coming out of retirement?  Yes.  It absolutely does.  And if that wasn't the AD's complete intention, he should have left that part out.  But he never made any statement that 44 is unretired in that ceremony.  None.

Again, my rant is over.
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