RE: Not So Deep Thoughts
If you want a better conference affiliation, I can tell you exactly how to get there. The problem is that it won't be easy to do.
It's all about money, guys. UAB's financial subsidy to the athletic department is hard capped at twenty million, at least for as long as Dr. Watts is here, and I doubt the board will allow more. The 2016-17 UAB Athletic budget was $31,800,000.
There are four schools in the AAC whose subsidy alone is larger than our entire budget. Looking at 2015-16 figures on AAC, the highest athletic budget is $79m, and the lowest $44m.
If we want any shot whatsoever at getting into the AAC, we have to generate more donations. We raised impressive money while fighting to bring back football, but most of it came from local business donors and a relatively small group of big money UAB donors. I've heard that the majority of the individual money came from a pool of twenty-five or thirty people. These same groups are also doing the heavy lifting of the non-governmental finance on the BJCC stadium. They cannot sustain that level of giving over the long term. It is not reasonable to expect them to.
We are not UA. We don't have thousands of deep pocketed fans and hundreds of truly big money guys. We have what we have, and we have to find a way to grow that. It will take a lot of work, of giving till it hurts and then some more. It will take imaginative new thought to find new revenue streams. Realistically, we need to raise our athletic budget by a third at a minimum, and as much more as we can come up with to get a long look from the AAC. The AAC conference revenue would be better, but will not come close to making up the difference.
Getting football back on solid ground and winning games consistently will be big. The new stadium will be a big help both financially and in terms of perception, as well as our other facility upgrades. In general we're in a pretty good place with regard to that once we're playing at the BJCC.
The thing is that when you want to join a country club, they want to know you have the money to sustain yourself, to fit in. You can't roll up in a twenty year old beater and expect to make a favorable impression.
As to the various conference realignment threads, it's just that time of year, particularly as teams bust out of the NCAA. We're hitting the dead period, the silly season. You'll find those all over message boards and Reddit this time of year, every year. It's fun to talk about, to juggle members and debate who to invite and who to kick... but realistically, not much comes of it, not often. It's a lot harder than it sounds.
(This post was last modified: 03-19-2018 12:34 PM by UAB Band Dad.)
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