/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/59516249/82912373.jpg.0.jpg)
Ralphie Report is now officially a decade old. Ten years ago was yesterday, on April 24, 2008. Myself and Bob Bell launched the old blogspot site (it still exists - please ignore that we were excited about Dan Hawkins) because we believed Colorado Buffaloes fans needed a place to talk football and basketball. We envisioned a community without excess negativity, where fans could share their own opinions and insights without fear of being mocked or ridiculed. A digital destination that would be a version of a sports bar where everyone was rooting for the same team.
A LOT has changed since that fateful day in April. The Buffaloes have seen two head football coaches fail in pretty spectacular fashion, they’ve moved conferences, saw the hiring of Tad Boyle and the Pac-12 Championship, seen numerous Buffaloes drafted and succeed at the highest level (miss you Alec, Spencer, Andre, Derrick, Nate, Paul, Chidobe, and many, many others), witnessed the facilities receive a MAJOR upgrade and got to watch the Buffaloes rise from the depths of the Pac-12 to claim a division championship. But even after all that, our goal remains the same.
Over the years my role has grown smaller with each passing year, but I have never been the engine for this website and community. I’ve really never been anything more than a conductor, pushing and pulling the few available “levers” and doing my best to recruit and attract a talented group of individuals who share one thing in common, a passion for the Colorado Buffaloes.
The long list of writers that have graced our digital pages over the past ten years have been the engine that made sure the Ralphie Report has kept on running. They’ve worked day and night during the odd hours that news decides to break and kept covering our Buffaloes teams through a number of rough seasons that would have caused many people to throw their hands up in the air and say, “I’m done,” all for little more than a love for this University and its athletic programs. For all of you, you have my thanks and respect and I hope to see you hanging around the comment section from time to time.
You, our community, readers, followers... however you may engage with the Ralphie Report, you are the fuel that keeps all of us going. You’ve shared in the ups and downs with us. You’ve affirmed some of our opinions and you’ve slammed others. You’ve kept us honest, pointed out our proofing errors and you may have left and come back again many times over the past ten years, but as a community of Colorado Buffaloes fans you’ve always been standing right there with us, Shoulder to Shoulder, as only we can.
For that, I speak for everyone here at TRR in saying how eternally grateful we are that you’ve shared this journey with us.
To celebrate ten years of Ralphie Report we’ve decided to take a look back at the ups, downs and everything in between that have happened over the last decade. We’ve gotten a good part of the band back together, authors who haven’t graced the pages in years will join those that you know and love, and will be looking back at each year from 2008 and 2017 over the next few days. We hope you enjoy reminiscing as much as we did and, much more importantly, we hope that you’ll stick around for the next ten years, where the sky is the limit and we expect nothing but greatness.