Oregon's new athletic complex

If you have any kind of allergy issues at all, stay away from Eugene in early June. It is hell.

 

So on Saturday The Register-Guard in Eugene ran a story from the New York Times on the new facility, with a sidebar talking about the UO calling SI and giving them exclusive first access, if SI returns the favor with a multipage spread including photos. SI obliges. NY Times got next crack. Local/regional media had to wait until yesterday to go on a media tour.
http://registerguard.com/rg/opinion/30269670-78/football-local-media-university-center.html.csp

 

You would think that with all the trappings, the UO athletic department would have cash to burn. But when it comes to burning cash, it is usually the students' cash, who have 300 FEWER seats at Autzen since the 12,000 seat expansion despite still subsidizing athletics, and the rest of campus which picks up the slack left by a special deal between a former AD and a former school president.

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/index.ssf/2011/11/at_the_university_of_oregon_sp.html

The school can do what it wants, but the fact is, the athletic department is now dictating terms to the rest of the university.

 

This is true in spades.

I spent 10 years in Eugene. I am off-the-scale allergic to all kinds of grass.

There were times in the spring when I would wake up and couldn't open my eyes because they were crusted shut.

 

Oregon's unofficial in-house publication weighs in. Reviews are not flattering.

http://www.uomatters.com/2013/07/what-to-call-knights-latest-gift-to-uo.html

 

Well, shit.

My allergies were horrid in Vegas, something about the wind whipping shit around. I'd have nights where I'd lay on the couch and just close my eyes because they were watering so much and I couldn't stop sneezing.

 

Eugene sits at the bottom of the Willamette Valley, which is filled with grass growing operations. All that shit blooms in the spring and the pollen ends up in Eugene. Supposedly, it's the worst place on Earth for grass allergy sufferers.

 

I love the Willamette Valley, I spent three days in Corvallis covering state basketball some years back. We had a team playing there but the big event was the state title game in Eugene, Lake Oswego and Kevin Love vs. South Medford and Kyle Singler.

Went to that game and spoke to both, Singler is a great kid, very friendly and incredibly smart. Love was cool, just gave off a different vibe.

Corvallis is stunningly beautiful, the OSU campus is amazing.

 

I think the thing I find curious about Oregon's ties to Nike is that the school made it to the 1995 Rose Bowl and the 1996 Cotton Bowl without Knight being uber-involved. They showed they could succeed at the top level without selling their soul. They weren't downtrodden, they weren't begging for help and fans seemed quite satisfied for the most part, though disappointed in the two bowl losses.
Enter Knight who begins making it rain in Eugene viewing the bowl losses as an insult to his company. But he can't just donate millions to the school, he organizes other major donors to withhold money if the school adopts a policy critical of corporations (like Nike) that rely on a third-world workforce, he gets "his people" into the athletic department and the administration. He even promises the university $1.4 Billion (with a b) if the school can break away from direct state oversight and engineer new state legislation that allows public schools to have boards of trustees.
I guess I just wonder why everyone there seems so willing to surrender. If they don't win a national championship will it all have been worth it? Even if they win a national championship, all they've really proven is that they know how to cash a check.

 

So... you're wondering why they would take a lot of money from an alum and compete for national championships when they had already shown they could take less money from that alum and get their asses kicked in a Rose Bowl?

 

It's just - well, I thought of the Ducks when I was looking at these cars and seeing the complaint that they "try too hard" - I think that fits the Ducks pretty well.

http://autos.yahoo.com/news/12-most-embarrassing-cars-192622446.html

 

In other words, fuck integrity and caring for the planet and thousands of downtrodden workers. We've got national championship trophies to shine.

It's about priorities. The same ones that would rather pay for a billion-dollar stadium than provide textbooks to kids in school.