With the return of football, the ETSU athletic budget will become front and center as the process moves forward. With the shift in spending from the major to the minor sports these past ten years, have the minor sports performed, achieved, and helped the front porch appeal of athletics to a degree that confirms this shift in spending was justified and fiscal responsible, and, thus, verifying that the funding for the minor sports at their current levels should continue?

over the past 10 years the students have been forced to fund more and the community has chosen not to fund minor sports

(03-11-2013 08:59 PM)bucfan99 Wrote:  over the past 10 years the students have been forced to fund more and the community has chosen not to fund minor sports

Which proves one important thing in college athletics: Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever make the tennis coach athletic director.

(03-11-2013 09:07 PM)bucfan81 Wrote:  

(03-11-2013 08:59 PM)bucfan99 Wrote:  over the past 10 years the students have been forced to fund more and the community has chosen not to fund minor sports

Which proves one important thing in college athletics: Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever make the tennis coach athletic director.

Let me add One more ever for good measure !

At this point if they want to be greedy and add extra to the football budget by cutting minor sports budgets then great, but I'd rather see them generate new money, increase the overrall budget. Maybe some small cuts here and there that can add up to additional money for coaches, but that's about it.

(03-11-2013 08:59 PM)bucfan99 Wrote:  over the past 10 years the students have been forced to fund more and the community has chosen not to fund minor sports

On what do you base the second part of your statement? Who funded the "Green" golf center?
Have you forgotten how strongly the local tennis community has supported both teams over the last 15-20 years? Maybe true for track and cross-country, but they were never heavily financially supported by the "community". Certainly what you write is not true for tennis and golf. Futbol, baseball, and softball are hybrid situations; some of both. Lot of both, actually.

Doc - Bill Green supported golf before Mullins became AD so his donations do not count toward Mullins increase in community donations.
The donations for tennis over the last 15-20 years? Mullins has been AD over the last 10 years so the donations from 15-20 years ago once again do not count toward improved community support toward the athletic department. Marcy and Bill stopped giving to men's tennis when Yasser decided to not have snow volleys but asked them for the same donation...how arrogant! So...Mullins increased the men's travel budget by $15K to make up the difference. Probably the only donor to stay on is a doctor who moved to Hawaii.

But the Green golf center is less than 10 years old, no? Unless I'm in a time warp (which may be the case considering Brooks [see other thread]).

As to tennis, I'm not talking about earlier than 10 years ago. My retort was specifically in the past 10 years, which is what you wrote. You wrote "...and the community has chosen not to fund minor sports". I think the Green golf center and the *continued* support for tennis shows that, for those two sports at least, the community has *continued* to support those two minor sports. I'm not comfortable discussing particular donors, as most of those folks are friends of mine, and I really don't think this forum is a proper place to divulge personal contributions. (But since you already named some names, and you clearly have some knowledge, you'll also know that the couple you mentioned has had "other issues" to deal with, too.) And let me say that plenty of my friends and contacts still support tennis. Is there some bit of pushback? Well......yes, but it's spotty, and, truth be told, Yaser has had to look at things more from a business perspective than he used to. Too long a story and too complex to go into.

Green is different as all that was very public.

Now, if you want to consider futbol, softball, and baseball, we all know the very public "community" support, as General Shale, Thomas, etc., have in large part built the futbol and baseball fields (I just can't call them "stadia".) We also know that student funds have been a big part of those projects, too. But it's simply inaccurate to say that in the last 10 years that "...the community has chosen not to fund minor sports".