"We are not, never were, and likely never will be one of the big boys nationally."

I'd take out the "never were" and then agree with him completely.

To me, "big boys nationally" means have a top 15 team pretty much every year. Everything you listed is great and all, but in no way does it qualify BYU as one of the big boys nationally. Our football team is no where close to being on that level for almost a decade or more now. With how college football is run these days I don't ever see us getting back to national prominence.