kreed5120

That 12 million includes 4.3 million for the football stadium. Eliminating the football program in its entirety reduces 7.7 million in expenses, not 12 million. A buy game is going for 1.25 million. We could and should be scheduling 2 of those per year. That would be an additional 1.25 million in revenue above the numbers you posted. I also mentioned cutting coaching salaries. Edit: Not to mention the additional travel costs for the other sports If we left the MAC as no other conference is as good as a regional fit for us as the MAC.

If you cut football, you're also cutting all the revenue that comes with football (cfp money, tv deal, buy game guarantees, ticket sales, advertisements, etc). Football probably is responsible for 70%, if not more, of the athletics non-subsidy revenue. Outside of Infocision, which we're stuck paying regardless of what we do, football is the closest thing we have to a revenue neutral sport. There is still plenty of fat to trim from the football program though. For one our coach shouldn't be making $500k. Assistant salaries are bloated too. At a $500k salary a coach should be packing Infocision. We haven't been getting that. The athletic student aid section is heavily inflated IMO. The school charges the athletic department the full cost of attendance, but the marginal cost of rooming and boarding ~400 extra scholarship athletes is less than ~30k per student. Besides schools are in the business of educating. What bothers me is the money that gets blown on coaches, administration, and over the top facility upgrades.

'Athletics currently spends something in the neighborhood of 30-35 million. A 20% reduction would mean we're needing to trim $6-$7 million. Some costs like infocision and the field house we're stuck with long-term. I believe Groce and Arth both have 4 years left on their guaranteed contracts so we can't do anything about those costs either. Wouldn't most coaches be locked into multi-year deals? I think it's going to be real challenging to hit that threshold in cuts this year. We can make cuts, but some of those cuts will take a few years to recognize some of the cost savings.

I could be wrong, but I don't believe those were lump sum payments. I believe we're getting paid that money over 7-10 year payments. The university is paying ~$5 million per year to service the debt, but certainly the Infocision and Summa money is reducing the amount the university is really paying towards it.

Infocision was financed with I believe a 30 year bond issuance. We're paying about $5 million per year, but the early years you're paying mostly interest. We maybe have the principle 1/3 of the way paid off. I've posted in great detail previously that football (excluding Infocision which is a sunk cost) is pretty much a break even sport given all the revenue streams it produces. If we actually scaled back spending on coaches and supporting staff, it could actually turn an operating profit.

I think you're just going to see the MAC/C-USA/Sunbelt programs run an FCS budget program at the FBS level. This allows them to save face by not having to move down, but also allows them to greatly reduce costs. Akron's program has been running at an FCS level on the field for 3 decades now. All this does is lets us save some money in the process.

FCS is already D1A. D2 is what Ashland and Walsh compete at. I don't think Akron will drop to FCS, but I do see them drastically reducing funding for the program. If all the other MAC schools are doing the same, the status quo will remain the same. Athletics at the G5 level has only been able to spend at the levels they have been because of the universities willingness to subsidize them. Take away or greatly reduce those subsidies and all coaches would be making significantly less. Also, schools will spend quite less on facility upgrades.

I've been arguing for a leaner, more focused university for years. Akron and Kent are 10 miles apart. They both should be focusing on what they're best at and eliminate programs the other school is far superior at. Kent should be focusing on becoming an elite liberal arts school for the NEO region and Akron should be looking to do the same in STEM.

I at least like to see we're going after players programs like Colorado St and Temple are interested in. Belmont I'd say is about on par with us as a mid-major. The only one that I don't like seeing is us losing a player to BGSU, especially given his offer lost.

Georgia Tech actually had a postseason ban this year. Not that it mattered any since there was no postseason.

He has displayed pretty good footwork in the post, but has lacked touch finishing near the rim. Perhaps playing against smaller front courts will help. Overall, he didn't play big minutes for us, but down the stretch he played with lots of effort on both ends when you did get in. I think it says a lot because a lot of other upperclassmen would pout and look to transfer midseason if they weren't getting the minutes they were wanting. In the American East I can see him averaging something along the lines of 8 points and 6 boards if he's able to get 20-25 minutes of playing time.

I agree those schools will be fine long-term. In the short-term losing 10s of millions of dollars is going to put a hurt to them. They have a larger TV deal sure, but they have significantly higher overhead as well so that TV money gets eaten up fast. They pay their head coaches nearly 8 figures and top assistants are making 7 figures. They spend significantly more on non-revenue sports and on facilities. Not to mention if they eliminate games at the start of the season, the TV networks are going to cut what they make. Akron already doesn't generate much in ticket sales so it's really not losing much there. If anything this should help slow down the escalating athletics arms race. A race Akron wasn't able to keep up with.

Those big schools actually fill their stadium though. An Alabama or Michigan likely generates more ticket revenue from 1 home football game than a school like Akron generates in ticket ticket revenue for all sports combined. It would certainly be a big blow to them.

Not all that surprising. I said on a post back in January or February that I felt Sayles would transfer because he's good enough to be a 25 minutes guy in a conference like the American East. Coincidentally that's exactly what conference he ended up going to.

Not to mention Sayles who even though he didn't play much provided extra depth.

While we're at it let's get Pistol Pete, Bill Russell, Jerry West, and Larry Bird...

Teams are realizing it's better to have a 6'8 big that can run the floor and guard multiple positions than a 6'11 big who has cement legs. While we're at it maybe the MAC should ban point guards. Preston was probably the only true ball distributor in the MAC last season. All the others were pretty much either combo guards or 2 guards. As the game evolves the positions reinvent themselves. The center position as many of you know it from the 70s or 80s is slowly going extinct.

I don't know if what Jupiter posted is accurate or not, but the current trend of athletic budgets soaring and enrollments shrinking isn't sustainable long-term. It's not just an Akron issue either.

The article states that Cincy has been considering dropping soccer for years. I found this below quote from the article to be pretty spot on. This seems like the opportune time for AD and university presidents to slash sports without public backlash.

With or without the coronavirus we should be scheduling tougher. I can't speak for the rest of you, but I found it much more entertaining to watch Akron give #2 Louisville all they could handle on the road than watching us beat Concord by 50 at home. Of course the Louisville game would have been better with a win, but the more times you play those games, the more your odds increase of actually winning them. Plus those type of games prepare you for March.

It's probably not that they all have something in common, but he likes them all for different reasons. For example, he's from Oregon so Portland State & Montana would get him closer to home

We went 0-12 last season. We need players that can play. If Arth thought we had much better options than Williams at the WR positions, he wouldn't have taken him back.

There is a difference between being a preseason favorite and actually winning the league. They play the games for a reason. It's extremely rare that the MAC has a team like Buffalo 2 years ago that's clearly a runaway favorite from the get go. It's part of what makes the MAC such an entertaining mid-major conference to watch. BG very well may not win the regular season title, but I'd be stunned if they don't finish with one of those top 4 coveted seeds.

On paper BGSU should be the favorite to win the MAC with Turner returning. Turner had a long list of offers. If he really wanted to be out of BG, he'd have transferred. I can't see anyone faulting him for weighing his options.

Big East for basketball