The unholy amount of money being poured into ludicrous pursuits like laser tag pavilions for football teams was brought up on the ACC board ( http://www.csnbbs.com/thread-821015.html ).



Am I indeed the only person on Earth who thinks the solution to this insanity is to institute facility spending caps and even coaches salary caps? At what point in this race to the financial bottom do we cross the line? In just 20 years we've gone from the million dollar head coach to the million dollar coordinator to the million dollar assistant coach. Are we going to start paying graduate assistants $400,000/yr too? At what point does a private Dave & Busters just for the football team seem like a crazy waste of money for an entity allegedly concerned with academics as its primary mission ... especially when the state and the taxpayer are the backstop, the loan facilitator, and in some cases even the piggybank for this sort of non-sense.

(06-29-2017 11:25 AM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  The unholy amount of money being poured into ludicrous pursuits like laser tag pavilions for football teams was brought up on the ACC board ( http://www.csnbbs.com/thread-821015.html ).



Am I indeed the only person on Earth who thinks the solution to this insanity is to institute facility spending caps and even coaches salary caps? At what point in this race to the financial bottom do we cross the line? In just 20 years we've gone from the million dollar head coach to the million dollar coordinator to the million dollar assistant coach. Are we going to start paying graduate assistants $400,000/yr too? At what point does a private Dave & Busters just for the football team seem like a crazy waste of money for an entity allegedly concerned with academics as its primary mission ... especially when the state and the taxpayer are the backstop, the loan facilitator, and in some cases even the piggybank for this sort of non-sense.

Seems odd for me to be arguing for less regulation than a libertarian wants, but I'll give it a shot anyway.

The first point is that I don't trust the athletic department financial reporting that is publicly released. Schools manipulate those numbers for their own benefit -- they exaggerate spending when they want to present the image of spending whatever it takes to win, and they hide spending when they want to look fiscally responsible. The only way to police a spending cap is to have outside independent auditing of each athletic department, and hell will freeze over before the schools permit that.

I'd be more concerned if I thought there was a huge advantage to an in-house D&B, or those HDTVs installed by Tom Herman in every Longhorn football locker. But IMO being able to recruit to a program that consistently wins, and having coaches that are A-plus recruiters, are far bigger advantages than toys.

Can't have coaching salary caps -- the NCAA already lost that lawsuit w/r/t limited-income assistant coaches, and the same principle would apply to a salary cap. It is a concern that Saban or Meyer can have a staff of "analysts" and "consultants" that makes their football staff three times the size of other schools even in their own conference, but that is another thing that is difficult to regulate without the genuine independent auditing that schools will never permit.

I'm not a fan of adding regulations that can't or won't be enforced against anyone with major influence and are only used to trip up the likes of UAB or Kent State.

Perhaps the best way to manage it is through donations?

(06-29-2017 03:31 PM)Lenvillecards Wrote:  Perhaps the best way to manage it is through donations?

I think you adjust limits on the number of scholarships (up) and set the ceiling on stipends and then stay the heck out of it. So the leveling of how many athletes you can have on scholarship and how much you can augment their time at the school levels the only aspect you can have some control over.

I don't think you can regulate any of the rest of it without an FBI like enforcement wing of the NCAA or P5 conferences being created. I think the abuses of that would be on equal footing with the cheating as far as how much further damage is done. So in other words the cure is as bad as the disease.

I don't think auditing is particularly that difficult. These people already have to keep the books for the taxpayers. Yes they can fudge those numbers ... but only some. And privates might, in theory, not be keeping books to the same level of detail but I doubt that's the case.

(06-29-2017 07:07 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(06-29-2017 03:31 PM)Lenvillecards Wrote:  Perhaps the best way to manage it is through donations?

I think you adjust limits on the number of scholarships (up) and set the ceiling on stipends and then stay the heck out of it. So the leveling of how many athletes you can have on scholarship and how much you can augment their time at the school levels the only aspect you can have some control over.

I don't think you can regulate any of the rest of it without an FBI like enforcement wing of the NCAA or P5 conferences being created. I think the abuses of that would be on equal footing with the cheating as far as how much further damage is done. So in other words the cure is as bad as the disease.

When I mentioned donations I meant from a fans perspective, if we don't like what we see we could stop donating.

Adding additional scholarships & increasing the amount of stipends only benefits the wealthiest & burdens the financially challenged P5 even more. I don't think we should develop an environment where only the wealthy can compete.

(06-30-2017 07:50 AM)Lenvillecards Wrote:  

(06-29-2017 07:07 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(06-29-2017 03:31 PM)Lenvillecards Wrote:  Perhaps the best way to manage it is through donations?

I think you adjust limits on the number of scholarships (up) and set the ceiling on stipends and then stay the heck out of it. So the leveling of how many athletes you can have on scholarship and how much you can augment their time at the school levels the only aspect you can have some control over.

I don't think you can regulate any of the rest of it without an FBI like enforcement wing of the NCAA or P5 conferences being created. I think the abuses of that would be on equal footing with the cheating as far as how much further damage is done. So in other words the cure is as bad as the disease.

When I mentioned donations I meant from a fans perspective, if we don't like what we see we could stop donating.

Adding additional scholarships & increasing the amount of stipends only benefits the wealthiest & burdens the financially challenged P5 even more. I don't think we should develop an environment where only the wealthy can compete.

Unfortunately, the biggest donations come from fans who are happy to participate in a football arms race. Fans who would be concerned about this sort of thing aren't donating in amounts that are meaningful in this context.

And I agree about the scholarships (but not the stipends). I would much rather see a reduction in the number of scholarships - 70 sounds about right to me. This one thing would do more to increase parity than anything else. Scholarship reduction isn't about reducing cost. A modest increase in the stipend amount to, say, $10K per year, would offset the reduced spending for housing, meals, books and fees. And tuition doesn't really cost the schools anything - it's not like adding more scholarships would result in more hiring of faculty at most P5 schools.

Now, if Alabama or Ohio State have fewer scholarship players, they will be just as good as they are now. The 15 players they lose are just being redshirted most of the time anyway. It's the Virginias and Oregon States of the P5 world who will be better because the 15 players that don't get to go to Alabama are probably a lot better than the bottom 30 players on Virginia's roster.

The question is, what do the NCAA and ESPN/Fox want for college football? Do they want parity or do they want dynasties? What they want depends on what they think will sell better. There is some evidence that it's the latter.

(06-30-2017 09:10 AM)ken d Wrote:  Now, if Alabama or Ohio State have fewer scholarship players, they will be just as good as they are now.

Probably not. Depth and the ability to survive recruiting misses are key. Let's say that Bama recruits two 4 or 5-star LBs each year and one of them is still a 4-star as a college sophomore or junior while the other turns out to be no better than a practice player. If they can only recruit one of those guys, then they have only a 50-50 chance of having an all-SEC LB from that recruiting class.

Extend that out to every position, and it means that a roster with 70 scholarship players will produce a few or several marginal starters, even for the Tide and Buckeyes, in contrast to the current situation in which every Ohio State starter could start for more than half of their Big Ten opponents.

I always get amused at these defeatist style threads. "We can't keep up with them because we lack the will so let's bring them down to our level."

(06-30-2017 01:37 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  I always get amused at these defeatist style threads. "We can't keep up with them because we lack the will so let's bring them down to our level."

Yea, because total equality has been the outcome in the NFL, NBA, and MLB right? And all three have salary caps and all three have luxury taxes.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using CSNbbs mobile app

(06-30-2017 03:00 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 01:37 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  I always get amused at these defeatist style threads. "We can't keep up with them because we lack the will so let's bring them down to our level."

Yea, because total equality has been the outcome in the NFL, NBA, and MLB right? And all three have salary caps and all three have luxury taxes.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using CSNbbs mobile app

Explain why one school should be penalized because they are better at raising money than others?

(06-30-2017 04:38 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 03:00 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 01:37 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  I always get amused at these defeatist style threads. "We can't keep up with them because we lack the will so let's bring them down to our level."

Yea, because total equality has been the outcome in the NFL, NBA, and MLB right? And all three have salary caps and all three have luxury taxes.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using CSNbbs mobile app

Explain why one school should be penalized because they are better at raising money than others?

Rollerball. Jonathon E must be defeated because the pursuit of excellence must be subservient to the corporate interests which are best served when only they have the ability to define excellence and mobilize the masses. Individual achievement and therefore the achievements of an individual unit must not be used as a standard since it calls into question the standards of all others. After all Kaplony excellence makes all other standards seem to be what they are, weaker. And if a person or system is made to appear weak it emboldens all offended by it to defeat it. Those entities that have seized control must always be perceived "too big to fail." And those who seize control usually do so by appeasing the masses which statistically speaking will always lack excellence.

(06-30-2017 04:50 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 04:38 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 03:00 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 01:37 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  I always get amused at these defeatist style threads. "We can't keep up with them because we lack the will so let's bring them down to our level."

Yea, because total equality has been the outcome in the NFL, NBA, and MLB right? And all three have salary caps and all three have luxury taxes.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using CSNbbs mobile app

Explain why one school should be penalized because they are better at raising money than others?

Rollerball. Jonathon E must be defeated because the pursuit of excellence must be subservient to the corporate interests which are best served when only they have the ability to define excellence and mobilize the masses. Individual achievement and therefore the achievements of an individual unit must not be used as a standard since it calls into question the standards of all others. After all Kaplony excellence makes all other standards seem to be what they are, weaker. And if a person or system is made to appear weak it emboldens all offended by it to defeat it. Those entities that have seized control must always be perceived "too big to fail." And those who seize control usually do so by appeasing the masses which statistically speaking will always lack excellence.

Like I said earlier.....it's a defeatist attitude. Because Georgia Tech fans suck, do not attend games or donate to GT athletics the programs who have strong booster clubs should be penalized.

(06-30-2017 04:38 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  Explain why one school should be penalized because they are better at raising money than others?

Make up your mind. Either this is an amateur endeavor pursued by students ... or it's a farm league. If it is an amateur endeavor it's pretty indefensible for institutions of higher learning to be spending tens of millions of dollars on laser tag pavilions. If it isn't an amateur endeavor then stop the pretense of recruiting and replace it with a draft. Stop the pretense of degrees and have them not even be required to attend class. Hell, they don't at UGA or UNC already anyway.

If you want to parlay this demand for consistency into GT fans suck, that's a pretty amusing lack of argument. And, well, that's big words coming from the IPTAY boys who have all of one title to their names that wasn't bought in free cars for players. And still less than GT if you throw in the cheater title in the 80s.

(06-30-2017 09:01 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(06-30-2017 04:38 PM)Kaplony Wrote:  Explain why one school should be penalized because they are better at raising money than others?

Make up your mind. Either this is an amateur endeavor pursued by students ... or it's a farm league. If it is an amateur endeavor it's pretty indefensible for institutions of higher learning to be spending tens of millions of dollars on laser tag pavilions. If it isn't an amateur endeavor then stop the pretense of recruiting and replace it with a draft. Stop the pretense of degrees and have them not even be required to attend class. Hell, they don't at UGA or UNC already anyway.

If you want to parlay this demand for consistency into GT fans suck, that's a pretty amusing lack of argument. And, well, that's big words coming from the IPTAY boys who have all of one title to their names that wasn't bought in free cars for players. And still less than GT if you throw in the cheater title in the 80s.

Clemson University hasn't spent a dime on any of our athletic facilities in the past four decades, IPTAY has through donations, gifts, and membership dues.

As for the "fluff" facilities....it's a double edged sword with some of you. The same people who complain about the mini-golf course at Clemson are the ones who bash a coach/program for out of control athletes when they commit a crime. Clemson built what they did so that they could help keep accountability of the football players.....hard for them to get into trouble when they are at the Reeves Center grilling out and shooting hoops. The recruiting aspect is just a fringe benefit.....the main purpose of all the "fluff" is to ensure accountability.

The amount of money being spent is ridiculous, but it will never change until the system collapses (sooner than later).

(07-01-2017 08:08 PM)Go College Sports Wrote:  The amount of money being spent is ridiculous, but it will never change until the system collapses (sooner than later).

Most of these are state schools. The same can be said for the nearly 20 Trillion dollar national debt. Nothing will change until the system collapses. The problem is the system won't collapse as long as global entities are getting wealthier on paper by keeping it going.

Now to put that into a micro view appropriate to the OP, it won't change as long as our economy can create wealth on balance sheets and leverage that into all kinds of spurious loans to state entities which are covered through bonds, or until people totally quit attending and supporting the programs.

Whether you're talking about college football spending or federal/state budget spending, there's an economic cliche that applies: Expected change takes longer than expected to arrive, but when it does arrive, it happens rapidly.

If there really is a bubble that bursts -- in TV money, donor money, ticket sales, or maybe all of the above -- it might take 20-30 years to get there, but if the money evaporates, the fallout will be rapid.

One might ask: why don't you see this level of "exorbitance" in facilities in the NFL?

You could say because it's 18-22 year olds you're dealing with.

But I think another valid argument is that facilities are a way that schools can attempt to make up for the fact that players can't be paid (more). So, top revenue programs like Alabama, Clemson, etc. can show recruits "we can't straight up pay you, but we can lavish you like you could never imagine".


I've seen coaching pay caps suggested before, but usually in the same thread someone shoots it down as being unconstitutional/illegal. No idea if that's really true, maybe no would really knows until/unless it's tried and challenged.


And then there's the following idea: either the NCAA, the conference, or in the case of public schools, the state, make it illegal to "subsidize" the athletic department. But even if you assume that, and assume it can be enforced, as far as this thread is concerned ... is that "good enough"?? Because then it still means that Alabama, Texas, Clemson, can indeed spend much more than Vandy, K-State, and Wake, because they bring in much more.

(07-02-2017 09:14 AM)MplsBison Wrote:  One might ask: why don't you see this level of "exorbitance" in facilities in the NFL?

You could say because it's 18-22 year olds you're dealing with.

But I think another valid argument is that facilities are a way that schools can attempt to make up for the fact that players can't be paid (more). So, top revenue programs like Alabama, Clemson, etc. can show recruits "we can't straight up pay you, but we can lavish you like you could never imagine".


I've seen coaching pay caps suggested before, but usually in the same thread someone shoots it down as being unconstitutional/illegal. No idea if that's really true, maybe no would really knows until/unless it's tried and challenged.


And then there's the following idea: either the NCAA, the conference, or in the case of public schools, the state, make it illegal to "subsidize" the athletic department. But even if you assume that, and assume it can be enforced, as far as this thread is concerned ... is that "good enough"?? Because then it still means that Alabama, Texas, Clemson, can indeed spend much more than Vandy, K-State, and Wake, because they bring in much more.

See the following case for the coaching pay caps - https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/15...aw-v-ncaa/