SyraCRUZ Tailgate 2023 - Time to Step Up!

[SUFaninNJ]

Should have held off a couple of hours. Just heard back from Mark Wheeler. He suffered a lower body injury on vacation and has been out, but says our transactions look fine and he will move them to approved.

Camp hasn’t even started and the owies have already started.

 

[Consigliere]

Camp hasn’t even started and the owies have already started.

Damn FieldTurf!!!!

 

[bigmike]

Should have held off a couple of hours. Just heard back from Mark Wheeler. He suffered a lower body injury on vacation and has been out, but says our transactions look fine and he will move them to approved.

Consig:
Love the use of the term “lower body injury”. Next time I stub my toe on the leg of the bed in the middle of the night and my wife asks what happened, I’m gonna use that.

 

[Consigliere]

Another milestone breached as we surpassed $13,000 in pledges for the 2023 season last night. We are only $3000 short of last year’s total donations with 32 days until kickoff. If you haven’t pledged yet, now is the time. If you have pledged and not submitted, get your payment in or let me know if something has changed and you won’t be contributing. No harm, no foul, I just need to be able to accurately plan.


Talking to Enrique later this morning to discuss adding to the video guest program and supporting a few more football players. We have several great applicants from all levels of the team.
Tailgate guest program has gotten off to a slow start in terms of responses. All registered mens and women’s lacrosse and basketball players and men’s soccer players can see details about the initiative and apply. After 8 days we only have 5 views vs. 157 last year. Mark Wherler and John Wildhack have pledged their support but if anyone has any connections to these teams, urge them to log on to INFLCR, click on the initiatives / bulletins and check out the Tailgate Guest offer and apply.

As TexanMark noted, T shirts and baseball style jerseys are ordered and expected in about 10 days. We cut the order to about half of what we sold in adult shirts last year and do not anticipate reordering. See the separate thread for information on how to order for pick up at the tailgate or mail order.

Our two year total ( well, really just 14 months) of donations and merchandise profits is now over $35k. I am stunned by the response to something that started as a little offhand joke in a text chain!

 

[MSOrange]

 

[Consigliere]

 

[OburgOrange]

 

[Consigliere]

How about a flood of $44 donations for Enrique’s birthday? Or should it be $70 for his number? Who’s in?

 

[Consigliere]

All right all you soccer fans out there. We wanted to be sure to support a member of our National Champion soccer team with a $500 guest appearance fee at one of our tailgates. We hoped to receive an application from one of the three Onondaga County natives who will play prominent roles on our Number 1 ranked 2023 team.
Good news. I received applications from Jeorgio Kocevski, Francesco and Nino Pagano! I would love to have all three join us for the Colgate tailgate but am a bit short. If the soccer fans on this forum step up with $500 in donations by noon Monday, I will front the other $500 and we will celebrate our 2022 championship in the Henry St Lot on September 2 with the entire group. If we can’t raise the funds, the selection committee will choose one of the three. Come on! You don’t really want to risk turning brothers against each other, do you!

If anyone knows of other soccer fans who don’t frequent this forum, please spread the word!

 

[SUFaninNJ]

All right all you soccer fans out there. We wanted to be sure to support a member of our National Champion soccer team with a $500 guest appearance fee at one of our tailgates. We hoped to receive an application from one of the three Onondaga County natives who will play prominent roles on our Number 1 ranked 2023 team.
Good news. I received applications from Jeorgio Kocevski, Francesco and Nino Pagano! I would love to have all three join us for the Colgate tailgate but am a bit short. If the soccer fans on this forum step up with $500 in donations by noon Monday, I will front the other $500 and we will celebrate our 2022 championship in the Henry St Lot on September 2 with the entire group. If we can’t raise the funds, the selection committee will choose one of the three. Come on! You don’t really want to risk turning brothers against each other, do you!

If anyone knows of other soccer fans who don’t frequent this forum, please spread the word!

There was a thread that got hijacked by soccer fans recently. I don’t recall which one now. If someone on here remembers, maybe you can copy this post there.

 

[Consigliere]

Quick update since I last posted. We have confirmed our video guests to appear with Enrique on his weekly video welcomes posted on the SyraCRUZZZ YouTube Channel. Each week he will be joined by a different guest or guests from among:
LeQuint Allen (likely September 2)
Josh Ilaoa
Jakob Bradford
Josh Kubala (for Army for reasons that will become apparent)
Joe More
Caleb Okechukwu
Chris Bleich
Donovan Brown.

Our in person guest roster is being finalized. More concrete details shortly. We have confirmed applications from Men's basketball, Women's Basketball and Women's Lacrosse and will start off with a bang with three local members from our National Champion Men's Soccer Team, Jeorgio Kocevski and Nino and Francesco Pagano.

If you have made a pledge and haven't yet submitted, please do so now or let me know that you have decided not to. If you HAVEN'T pledged yet please consider jumping onboard this revolutionary example of NIL done the right way. More funding gives us the opportunity to support more Orange student athletes. I would love to include additional tailgate guests each week and am toying with a year end, pre bowl game initiative as well.

 

[MSOrange]

 

[Consigliere]

Enrique is probably getting sick of being asked about us!


But the publicity is certainly helping. Pledges for the year have blown past $15k since my last financial update. In fact, we've blown past $16k and are less than $400 behing our 2022 total. Unbelievable! Starting to think about other opportunities to support our student athletes this year and beyond!

 

[Consigliere]

Passed an incredible milestone yesterday. When we moved the SyraCRUZ Tailgate NIL Initiative into year 2, no one on the executive committee expected us to meet last year's fund raising total in terms of pure donations. There was a novelty factor last season that we expected to fade and other NIL initiatives popping up around the Cuse Community, some with affiliated tax benefits, that compete for your dollars. But you amazed us again.

With 2 weeks until kickoff, total pure donations for 2023 stand at $16,685 from 93 unique donors. $15,541 of that total has already been banked for 93%. That compares to last year's total of $16.432 from 76 unique donors with 100% follow through.

Adding in profits from 2022 merchandise and assuming 100% follow through on this year's pledges, that means that in roughly 15 months we have raised $34,919 to support Orange Student Athletes in 6 sports with more to come!

Still time to add to this total, donations are always accepted and appreciated and what we don't pay out this year will help establish a foundation to ensure we will continue into 2024 and beyond. See payment information at the top of this thread or PM me if you can help.

There have been a couple of teaser posts but expect a complete picture of our 2023 merchandise offerings shortly. We picked up the apparel yesterday and opened sales during a tailgate planning session at The Wildcat. The Tshirts and baseball jerseys look GREAT! And the youths T's featuring Otto are cute as can be. If you pre-ordered with mail delivery your merchandise will be shipped early next week. If you pre-ordered for pickup at a tailgate your merchandise is being packed as I type and will be marked with your name at our merchandise table for the Colgate game and all others including several roadies, If you have not yet ordered, I'll repeat that inventory is somewhat limited this year. We have already sold out of a couple of sizes on the jerseys and the T's promise to go fast. We will have an expanded selection of autographed photos available shortly. I will post mre details later, but this is a great way to support individual student athletes including a great action shot of LeQuint Allen. We also have a limited number of highly coveted koozies left!

Tailgate video guest offers have all been issued and accepted. We will pay Joe More, Jakob Bradford, Chris Bleich, Josh Ilaoa Donovan Brown, Caleb Okechukwu and Josh Kubala $250 to sign our 50-50 raffle football and appear with Enrique in one of his weekly videos. We have an enhanced offer in place for LeQuint Allen to do the same for a payment of $1000.

Tailgate guet appearance offers are being finalized. We will kickoff at the Colgate game with three members of our National Champion men's soccer team. Rather than a single $500 payment, Jeorgio Kocevski and the Pagano brothers, Nino and Francesco have agreed to appear en masse for $400 each. Sadly I have yet to get a response from Judah Mintz for the WMU game, so we are working on a women's lacrosse day. Army is shaping up as a mens lacrosse guest and Clemson will likely feature women's basketball, Boston College will be a men's basketball feature with at least two prominent members of Red's inaugural squad interested. I am leaving Wake Forest open for now as a holiday weekend game may be challenging to fill and applications will continue to trickle in. I'll confirm names as these dates are locked in.

 

[Trueblue25]

Wonder if Home Team Pub or Wildcat would allow you to team up for a preseason “tailgate” fundraising party at their establishments

 

[Consigliere]

Wildcat certainly would. Dan is a great guy and his place has become a favorite for team outings. Check out his signature wall in the back room for evidence.

Just don’t think I have the energy to plan it out at this point. Hey, I hit the 2/3 mark on my way to 100 a couple days ago!

 

[Trueblue25]

Wildcat certainly would. Dan is a great guy and his place has become a favorite for team outings. Check out his signature wall in the back room for evidence.

Just don’t think I have the energy to plan it out at this point. Hey, I hit the 2/3 mark on my way to 100 a couple days ago!

No doubt you’re already crushing it. Just an idea assuming this may expand into an annual fundraiser with some longevity. Happy its taken off as it has, good job.

 

[MSOrange]

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[OrangeXtreme]