Buzz Bissinger: Why College Football Should Be Banned

They are forced the D-I route (or in smaller amounts, D-II) if they want their schooling paid for. The thing is, they're not allowed to negotiate compensation beyond that point.

 

They get the free tutoring because they are on the road part of the time and miss classes.

And the education isn't worth shit if they're not allowed to pursue the degree they want to, or they're told to take basketweaving because they must stay eligible for their sport and they can't have classes interfere with their 40 hours of practice time and meetings (yeah, I know, there's a 20-hour rule. That's for the mandatory stuff, not the "voluntary" stuff).

 

Um, if players are given the price of their tuition costs, then all the advantages go to the Ivy League and private schools. Costs a little more to go to Harvard, Yale, Duke or Stanford than State U.

Point understood, but a big hole in the grand scheme ...

 

Assuming that the idea of reining in or eliminating big-time college football ever gains any momentum - and I'm not holding my breath waiting for that to happen - one of the very interesting sideshows will be the reaction of the athletes and coaches in the sports that are supported financially by football at places like Texas and the SEC schools. If you take away the football money, the huge salaries for coaches in sports like baseball (5 SEC baseball coaches make at least $500,000 a year), and the support/infrastructure for sports like volleyball, tennis, track, and others that lose vast amounts of money annually, are going to go poof.

People talk, and rightly so, about football coaches and ADs getting rich off the labors of football players. But you don't hear much about how football (along with basketball, to be fair) subsidizes all the other sports that Division I megaprograms support. A nonrevenue athlete at a place like Ohio State or Florida is also getting a huge amount of financial benefit from the football cash cow.

 

That's a point of some confusion.

www.nwlc.org/resource/debunking-myths-about-title-ix-and-athletics

Myth: Football and men's basketball finance other sports in colleges.

Fact: Most football and men's basketball teams spend much more money than they bring in. A 2011 NCAA study shows that almost half of Division I-FBS football and men's basketball programs do not generate enough revenue to pay for themselves, much less any other sports. Programs that lose money reported annual deficits averaging about $2.9 million and $975,000 respectively. And, how do some of the football programs spend their money?

Some spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to fly their football teams to games on chartered jets (instead of commercial planes).
The University of Texas spent $120,000 to repanel the football coach's office in mahogany while it insisted that there was not enough in school coffers to add sports opportunities for women.
The University of Oregon spent $3.2 million on a two-story locker room with three 60-inch plasma TVs, Xboxes, and a "squint-no-more" lighting system, which matches the lighting conditions in the locker room to the conditions outdoors.

Eliminating these excesses would provide more money for other men's and women’s sports.

 

Where does conference revenue contributions from post season tv money fit into your example? Is that part of football / basketball budget or does it go into general athletic budget?

 

Those figures include all current revenue. In some cases lately, schools have even been pulling money out of the general fund to cover their marquee sports programs.

When some of these new TV contracts start paying out, though, that may change. Or not. Interesting article here:

articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/15/sports/la-sp-1016-pac-12-money-20111016

 

The source Azreal quoted says that almost half of the big-time programs lose money, but it doesn't say which half. Mid-American Conference schools and the lower half of Division I, I agree, do lose money on football; what I had in mind was the real football giants. There is simply no way that places like Texas, Florida, Alabama, LSU, and Ohio State aren't making money, and a lot of it, off the football program. Hell, Minnesota even claims to make money on football (although that's largely due to the Big Ten TV money and bowl revenue they share in but don't actually generate, and only if you find other ways to account for the cost of the new stadium they just built). And it's the schools like that which find it possible to support nonrevenue sports in very lavish fashion; if football goes away as a source of funding, I find it hard to believe that model won't have to change profoundly.

 

And going to a D-III or NAIA school isn't cheap, unless you go to a state that has a university system like Wisconsin (UW-LaCrosse, Stevens Point, Eau Claire, or UM-Duluth). Remember, Division III doesn't hand out athletic schollies.

I went to a D-III school and served as a student manager for the football team. Their parents had to take out the same loans that my folks did, did work study/work part-time job as I did, and had to stay on top of academic work too.

Students at Grinnell College has to come up with $40k+ to attend there...including athletes.

Student-athletes, particularly those in poor areas/neighborhoods and who's family or environment is worst off, they are shooting for that D-1 athletic scholarship and a chance to be in a better situation for themselves. To them, D-1 is their minor league and stepping stone to the pros. For every Dexter Manley, there's a Robert Smith who uses their smarts in the classroom, as well as sports.

There is no such thing as a "fun" D3 school, if you are going to class and participating in an extracurricular activity. The only "fun" you get is the lifelong friends and people who help you be a better person when you leave with that B.A. in your hand.

 

Agreed. I don't object to universities having teams. But million-dollar coaches? TV contracts? Conferences that span 2,000 miles? Special benefits for star athletes? Definitely against all that.

If college sports were handled the way they are at the D-III level, the NFL and NBA could run developmental leagues for their future stars and let those who want to get an education and still play sports along the way do so.

 

Suitable TV contracts are indeed the Magic Twanger, Froggy.