College Football

[legion]

I honestly think the whole college football system has become a farce. I guess the original idea was to have various student athletes compete with other schools for bragging rights. Over time, football became the dominant athletic competition and schools began recruiting people specifically to play football, offering free tuition in return.

Now, after over 100 years of evolution, the college football system has essentially become this:

1) Players are recruited for their football skills compensated by being given free degrees. Their academics are totally subservient to their football schedule, and players are often steered to degrees most compatible with football. The degrees themselves are often worthless.

2) Players risk physical injury for a shot at the pros. Very few players will make it. Meanwhile, the university makes TONS of money off of the players they do not pay. If a player has a career-ending injury, they are ejected from the team and the university. They are on their own with no degree and potentially a lifetime of medical bills.

3) The football coach is often the highest-paid employee at a university. Some can make millions a year.

4) Schools are deemed to be "bowl eligible" by the NCAA to protect the football revenue for elite schools and conferences. Schools outside this elite few have virtually no possibility of breaking into an elite conference or becoming "bowl eligible". Any non-elite school that shows success will probably have it's players and coaches poached by an elite school.

What I'd like to see:

-Have all football programs be on a level playing field, like basketball and other sports.

-Give up on the farce that is "student athletes". Acknowledge that college football is a big business. Allow students to get paid. Create a major called "professional athlete" that gives these people the correct skills to move on to the professional level. Classes should include topics like contract law, kinesiology, athletic training, personal finance, and investing.

-Have athletic scholarships continue to cover students even if they have a serious injury and can no longer play. This shifts some of the risk back onto the university.

[sammyg2]

I love college football.

[pwd72s]

Pretty much summed it up. Only one alteration..check out who is the highest paid "public employee" in any state. You guessed it. Football coach.

I see nothing that will change this.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by pwd72s

Pretty much summed it up. Only one alteration..check out who is the highest paid "public employee" in any state. You guessed it. Football coach.

I see nothing that will change this.

Football coach is prolly the only public employee held to a serious performance standard. Win or get fired.

And they gotta spend lots of years as an associate assistant coach at 30k to build up their res-zoom-A.
For the most part only the best get the big bux.

[ckelly78z]

Urban Meyer....worth every penny !

[pwd72s]

Sammy, you nailed that one. It cost the U of O around $20 million to fire their last coach. They coulda fired me for half that...

Oh well, Phil Knight can afford it.

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

I love college football.

Ditto. And I would have killed to have free school and be a god on campus, even with no realistic shot at the pros. These guys don't get overtly paid, but there are plenty of perks.....

Or you know, you could just go get a job straight out of high school, like maybe join the Army? Then you could get paid $30k for the strong likelihood that you will be killed or maimed. If that doesn't put things into perspective, there's really not much more to discuss.

[sammyg2]

I've seen the ugly side of college athletics up close and personal.

My brother was a star college scholarship athlete back in the day.
He had "tutors" take his classes for him (and tests).
He had a job on campus but wasn't sure what it was.
he went up north to play in summer league baseball and got 3 A's in college classes he didn't remember taking. Also won the college summer world series that year.

But eventually it caught up to him and his academic eligibility was in question, so he went pro a year earlier than planned.

When injury ended his sports career he had NOTHING to fall back on.

[matthewb0051]

I believe this bubble will burst in the next 5 to 10 years. The economics of it just can't be sustained. Lots of money coming in but most universities are operating in the red. Only a small percentage of the schools in the Power 5 conferences operate in the black. All other schools want to be like them and are willing to pay huge sums to placate supporters but in reality they will never get there.

I was hopeful when Ed O'Bannon sued the NCAA over wages, etc, that something might change. I'm a Tennessee guy. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting someone with a Manning jersey on in Knoxville. Dude left in '97ish and the university is still making huge money off of him.

Here are the findings of the 9th Circuit in the O'Bannon suit:

•The NCAA’s regulations are subject to antitrust scrutiny, and rules limiting football and men’s basketball players to receiving tuition, fees, room, board and books violate antitrust laws.
•While antitrust law requires that schools be allowed to provide these athletes with scholarships that cover all of their costs of attending college, including travel and personal incidentals, “it does not require more,” such as what it termed “cash sums untethered to educational expenses.”

So basically its like kissing your sister and the NCAA can continue to operate as usual.

On the coaches pay: a few years ago Tennessee was still paying 5 coaches during each FY that were no longer at the school to the tune of around $15 - $20 million per year total. Crazy, that's congressional math .

[matthewb0051]

When those amounts are balanced, USA TODAY Sports found, all 50 of the public schools that were in a Power Five conference in 2013-14 were self-sufficient. But only three Bowl Subdivision schools outside the Power Five and two non-FBS schools were self-sufficient.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2015/05/26/ncaa-athletic-finances-revenue-expense-division-i/27971457/

"You've still got 300 other Division I men's basketball schools where" self-sufficiency doesn't exist, Schulz said. "So, even if we give that broader definition, I still think that pressure on those 300 schools is going to be intense. … There are a lot of really outstanding schools (that) have to rely on state dollars coming from general funds to do those athletic programs and to remain competitive with the haves."

College athletic departments are taking in more money than ever – and spending it just as fast | The Washington Post

●After a decade marked by surging income, 25 departments still ran a deficit in 2014. Twelve departments, including Auburn and Rutgers, actually lost more money in 2014 than in 2004.

[legion]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

I've seen the ugly side of college athletics up close and personal.

My brother was a star college scholarship athlete back in the day.
He had "tutors" take his classes for him (and tests).
He had a job on campus but wasn't sure what it was.
he went up north to play in summer league baseball and got 3 A's in college classes he didn't remember taking. Also won the college summer world series that year.

But eventually it caught up to him and his academic eligibility was in question, so he went pro a year earlier than planned.

When injury ended his sports career he had NOTHING to fall back on.

I guess that was part of my point. For college football in particular, for every 500 kids that get scholarships, only something like 1 gets to the pros. Of those, most only last a season or two on a practice squad. The vast majority of these kids are being railroaded through a system that will never pay off for them, they just don't know it at the time.

[pwd72s]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0reywtH5Cw&list=RDb0reywtH5Cw

[matthewb0051]

Sheer nonsense:

In 2013-14, Auburn paid Gus Malzahn $4.3 million to coach its football team. That same season, Auburn also paid Chizik and three assistants a combined $4.1 million to not coach its football team.

That year, Auburn also paid $400,000 to former baseball coach John Pawlowski (fired in May 2013), and $242,000 to former men’s basketball coach Tony Barbee (fired in May 2014) as part of $2.4 million the school will pay Barbee, in monthly installments, until 2017.

[sammyg2]

It is NOT nonsense, is is good business.
A winning football team can bring in many times the $$$ it costs.
A losing football team does not get a bowl game, does not get guaranteed TV coverage, and does not fill the stadium. IOW it LOOOSES money. Millions of dollars.

Auburn athletics reports more than $15 million profit, record revenue in 2016
Updated on February 15, 2017 at 2:58 PM Posted on February 15, 2017 at 1:39 PM


Auburn athletics reported a more than $15.2 million profit thanks to a program record revenue of over $140 million for the 2016 fiscal year, according to the school's NCAA financial report.

The annual report, released Wednesday in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, lists Auburn with generating $140,070,592 in total revenue and $124,864,399 in total expenses for a profit of $15,206,194.

It is the second straight year Auburn athletics has operated at a profit, thanks to a more than $15 million increase in revenue from the 2015 fiscal year.

Auburn Athletic Finances

Year Total Revenue Total Expenses Surplus/Deficit
2016 $140,070,593 $124,864,399 $15,206,194
2015 $124,657,247 $115,498,047 $9,159,200
2014 $113,716,004 $127,340,380 $(13,624,376)
2013 $103,680,609 $104,546,603 $(865,994)
2012 $105,951,253 $97,128,835 $8,822,418
2011 $103,982,441 $100,497,784 $3,484,657
2010 $92,611,558 $90,908,902 $1,702,656
2009 $87,001,413 $85,480,343 $1,521,070
2008 $89,311,824 $69,841,200 $19,470,624
2007 $81,799,266 $68,910,465 $12,888,801
2006 $66,599,925 $63,249,119 $3,350,806
Auburn saw increases in ticket sales (from $30,181,317 to $32,165,386), revenue guarantees from playing in away games ($458,000 to $3,240,000), which was due almost entirely to playing in the 2015 Chick-fil-A Kickoff game for $3.2 million, media rights ($27,386,761 to $33,967,851), conference distribution ($8,680,947 to $10,043,683) and other areas. However, contributions fell from $36,949,743 to $35,570,146.

Expense increases came in student aid ($14,945,396 to $15,559,381), coaching salaries ($21,120,891 to $22,553,348), support staff and administration compensation ($21,249,298 to $23,077,255) and other areas.

Ticket sales increased for football ($28,396,362 to $29,827,136), men's basketball ($1,090,598 to $1,538,608), baseball ($321,067 to $343,553), softball ($144,457 to $265,745) and women's basketball ($47,337 to $69,659), but dropped slightly in gymnastics ($98,088 to $91,263).


Contributions dropped in football ($28,899,968 from $30,421,313) but increased in men's basketball ($2,598,514 from $2,355,884).

In coaching salaries, Auburn reported total compensation and benefit to Gus Malzahn of $5,536,958, up from $4,486,760, though the total compensation for the football coaching staff dropped, as expected, from $6,728,710 to $6,306,821.

Bruce Pearl's total compensation increased from $2,364,259 to $2,607,076 and the men's basketball coaching staff increased from $717,905 to $768,144.

Severance payments (buyouts to former coaches) decreased for both former men's basketball coach Tony Barbee ($822,938 from $1,015,017) and former football coaches ($2,415,787 from $3,637,141).

Recruiting expenses decreased for football ($1,040,148 from $1,108,660) but increased slightly in men's basketball ($263,521 from $226,516).

Also of note is Auburn's reported cost of attendance, which the athletic program now covers for scholarship athletes, increased slightly from for in-state ($29,164 from $28,098) and out-of-state ($46,348 from $44,610). This is compared to the full grant-in-aid for in-state ($23,178 from $22,204) and out-of-state ($40,362 from $38,716), which used to be all that was covered by athletic scholarships.

Auburn athletics reports more than $15 million profit, record revenue in 2016 | AL.com

[legion]

So football has basically become a side-business that universities engage in, that is slowly overtaking academics as their reason for existing?

[Baz]

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by legion

So football has basically become a side-business that universities engage in, that is slowly overtaking academics as their reason for existing?

Slowly overtaking? That's your spin, Not sure how you got there.

College football has been a big deal for over 100 years.

It started off as bragging rights, then as a recruitment tool to be used in the competition over the best prospective students. with the advent of television the $$$$ became a factor.
Colleges have had bigger football stadiums than the NFL for longer than I've been around.

Bowl games became very profitable, television revenues went through the roof, and sports became a revenue-generating SIDE business, run in parallel with academia.

And with the slanted biased crap they are brainwashing students with nowadays, I'd say the students get a better edumacation on the ball field than in the classroom.

How about we look at the ENORMOUS and RIDICULOUS salaries they are paying the so-called professors to spew hate and anti-American sentiment for 20 hours a week?

The average salary for a professor at Columbia is $236,300.

That's about $200k more than they are worth and i am being kind.

[matthewb0051]

In response to post #14 Sammy:

True, however, the vast majority of programs are not operating at that level and some of them are trying to spend at the 'Bama, Auburn, et al spending levels.


Then again if that sort of money is being brought in why does tuition keep rising?

And why do students pay fees to support athletic budgets?

The University of Connecticut is one example. Although its $72 million in operating revenue in 2015 put it higher than a number of Power Five programs, the American Athletic Conference school with its top-ranked men's and women's basketball teams pulled $28 million of that revenue from student fees and university subsidies -- an amount that has more than doubled since 2008. Since then, revenue from ticket sales and contributions has decreased, according to data UCONN reported to the NCAA. Officials from the UCONN athletic department did not respond to a request for someone to be interviewed for this story.

This fall, returning UCONN students are facing a 6.7 percent tuition increase, part of a plan university regents approved last year to raise tuition by 31 percent over the next four years to help close a $40.2 million budget deficit.

Power 5 conference schools made $6 billion last year as gap between haves and have nots grows

Don't get me wrong. I love college football. I just think they need to get this settled before it all goes bust.

[sammyg2]

small fish gotta stay in the small pond. If they try to compete with the big fish in the big pond they're gonna drown.
That's why we have div 2 and 3

Cal state Fullerton used to have a football team. they sucked.
Eventually the school figured it out and dumped the football team and kept the nationally ranked baseball and (sometimes good) basketball teams.
Problem with that is revenue.
How many people go to watch a baseball or basketball game? A lot less than go to watch football. And how many people see those games on TV? No one.


They would have been smarter to dump all collegiate sports EXCEPT men's football and focus on it until they got good. THEN they'd bring in the big bux.

But the protesters would have a field day with that.






Any maybe if schools didn't give away education to every minority and PO' people that walk through the door the rest of the students wouldn't have to pay 10x what it's worth.

You don't have to be an athlete to get a free edumacation, you just gotta be from the wrong side of the tracks.

[Don Ro]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

I love college football.