Where Are We Bowling?

[hammb]

Playing in the bowl, regardless of cost, helps the team. As has been said multiple times in this thread you get an extra month of practices. The value of that cannot be overstated. Not to mention the huge recruiting boost you get by being a bowl team. Going to a bowl is nothing but helpful to the team itself. To suggest otherwise is asinine.

So really the crux of your argument is that the way funds are distributed is foolish and that you do t feel the marketing for the school is worth the cost.

Firstly I'll say that my understanding has always been that the expenses for the team are deducted before the conference starts divvying up the bowl payouts.

Secondly I'll just have to say you're wrong. The football program is costing a lot of money no matter if they go to a bowl game or not. This is one kid the few instances where we actually get hours of national tv exposure with good viewership numbers directly for our money.

If you're trying to argue that the bowl game is not worth the cost then you may as we'll be saying the football program as a whole isn't worth the investment. I'm willing to listen to that argument but if you're going to have a football program you damned well better let them go to any bowl berths they earn.

[gspointer]

Please just go away.......

[kdog27]

So 1970, if i understand you correctly, you would kill every non-revenue sport because they lose money and thus every sport would have to be cut because of Title IX and the requirement to have equal men's and women's sports. So you're point is to kill all college athletics? Just seeing if I have your point right?

That's how I take it.

[BGFalconfromCincy]

So, how about that MAC Championship we found in football last night.....

[threestooges]

My guess is Detroit.

[Flipper]

Hmmm...if we play in Detroit maybe the team can scrounge the streets for .10 bottles to earn gas money for the ride home....

[BGSU33]

I have my preferences on who and where I would like to see us play, but I honestly don't care as much who or where it is as I do that we win. We've dropped our last three bowl games and we need to end this season with a victory! Go BG!!!

[Falcon1970]

So 1970, if i understand you correctly, you would kill every non-revenue sport because they lose money and thus every sport would have to be cut because of Title IX and the requirement to have equal men's and women's sports. So you're point is to kill all college athletics? Just seeing if I have your point right?

No, I would not kill any none revenue sport. I would not allow for any team to participate in a contest like a bowl game. Where it will cost the school money. Conference championships and the like associated with business of playing in a league are anticipated costs. In the case of the bowl game your dealing with a crazed money grab. The Conference takes a full 1/3 off the top, then each team is due 1/14. In this case the Mac is taking 250k
And each member receives 35k
It is simply outlandish to believe those instructions are due any compensation before the participating team can make the date. Should the playing team be able to cover all expenses to properly get to bowl game. Then any funds remaining should or could clearly be divided up. In every instance bgsu has gone to one of these games the university has paid big money. Needlessly.
Further I said nothing about title xi. But since you bring it up, it only applies to those sports funded with university monies. This is why slowly but surely some men's sports are climbing back into varsity ranks in swimming, diving, wrestling as self funded. Those teams won't go "bowling" if they can't pay for it
Football is no different, as I said its common sense economics. If this one game is as vital as it seems the MAC has ample time to meet and make sure those funds get the team to the game. If they can not. The team should not go
I stated my case in call this afternoon. I enjoy sport as much as the next person. I just can not condone frivolous spending.
Congratulations on winning the most important game. The MAC championship!

[BGSUFanatic7]

Well. We will play in a bowl game every single time we get invited.

[Falcon Fanatic]

a bowl game is a great reward for the team, but an "educational opportunity"?... lol, cmon. nope, it's just one more football game (and if we end up playing somebody like Arkansas State, not a very meaningful one)."

I can't let this one go.

Last year at the Military Bowl, our student athletes were touring many of our nation's monuments and historical sites. If it wasn't for the Bowl Game, they would not have had that opportunity. I talked to some of the players who had seen the Viet Nam memorial... something they had only heard about hit them between the eyes. Heck, even some of the Coaches had never been to DC. History came alive. There were banquets where they met students from other schools, and got to hear from inspirational speakers and made some contacts. AND they went to a children's hospital to visit sick kids. Talk about educational-- it puts football in perspective.

In Mobile, there is the trip to the Battleship, and other opportunities.

Heck, just taking the Falcon Fanatic students to Detroit was educational. We talked with some of them about the reality of seeing the decay of Detroit in person. You can read about the problems, but seeing them in front of your face makes a great difference. Maybe one of them will do great things for Urban Renewal some day.

Any chance a student gets to be exposed to a different place or part of the country is a good experience. Debate team or Football team.

Maybe, your view of Bowl Games is colored by the hoopla of the BCS. I've been to every single bowl game we have played in after 1974. There hasn't been a one where our students have not been exposed to something new and different besides football. How many have you been to?

We aren't going to lose money. We may not make much, but others are correct- the MAC helps out as do alums.

And don't start. I also strongly support our academic departments.

The soapbox is now turned back over to someone else, and I will go back to not reading for another year.

+10000000000

[FalconTurf]

Hey, lets try this again. I am opposed to spending money to go play. There is NO WAY spending 50k,100k or more to play in football game helps the team, or the school in any way. The athletics teams at BGSU operate on shoe string budgets to begin with, playing in one of many feel good bowl games is far less meaningful than the MAC Championship. That is not even arguable, its just true. It is not fair for one game to burden the student bodies fees in any way, or be cause for the University to assign funds from other areas. I am tired of people feeling Bowls are equal and some how magic money makers, or they increase students wanting to come to the school. They do not.
Listen, the MAC takes a cool 30% off the top, and 14 schools dividing up the remaining before the costs of getting the team to the game is crap. ALL THE MONEY should be used to pay for said team go. That schools band to go, the students to go (transportation and free admission only) The point is, there is no point spending to play a football game, when the game is more than capable of being self funded, if those funds from that game are properly applied. BGSU just won a post season game. The Mac Championship. The biggest most meaningful game the team will play all season, in any season. That is BIG NEWS. That is the recruiting tool. BG will not flip a recruit from the big ten, big east, ACC or SEC with the xyz bowl. We get recruits from other MAC schools with the Championship, that's the gravy. The Football team did not take in revenue this season to fund this trip, they dont have some magic coffers swelling with donors. Back in the 1950's BGSU passed on bowl games due to costs, the players in fact made that decision for the same reasons they should today. Going makes no economic sense, and if the MAC will not all the team to cover the costs via full utilization of the estimated 750k take, to pay for our trip in full. Its bunk. That is what I am saying. Anyone with common sense, and a reasonable sense of responsibility in spending agrees.
The money is there to fund this trip, in the bowl pay out. I am open to even saying after covering all the teams expenses, if there is anything left, divide that up. Give the MAC 30% off the top of the remainder, and divide the rest 14 ways. BUT any team traveling to any bowl, should not have to pony up a dime, the bowl take should cover it, and does, if the you cut off the leeches, and cover expenses first. Not as some random after thought, as it is now. As a proud Alumni, and donor I can say I don't make my donations, then figure out how to cover my living expenses. I use my excess for donations, or reasonable planed giving. The same fundamental rules should apply here. Commonsense economics.

I don't imagine you will see this as common sense but I'll give it one last try - last year due to NIU going to a BCS bowl the income BG athletics received for dividing the money among conference schools just paid for this year. Additionally we received money in other years when we did not attend bowl games form 3-5 other schools. I think we will be closer than you think to breaking even on bowl activities.

Now as far as letting athletics go to the NCAA track meet or NCAA baseball tournament they may lose money. Should we let NCAA bids go since they probably don't meet expenses? They did already win the MAC tournament which was a tournament they were capable of winning unlike most NCAA competitions.

I also suspect the travel to Detroit was a financial loser as well after the band, dance team, cheerleaders and others were transported and possibly given a meal. Should the football team have voted not to compete which would have resulted in a bigger paycheck for them when NUI still has a bid for a BCS bowl?

[factman]

Ryan Autullo from the Blade just posted on Twitter, that Toledo is NOT going to a bowl game!

Don't you all feel bad for them? It will give them plenty of time to get another one of those #1 MAC recruiting classes!
OU to Beef O'Brady Bowl.

[Flipper]

Should we have told Brooke Pleger to stay home and NOT be the first BGSu athlete to qualify for the NCAA's in track and field in a decade or so because it would be too expensive? This discussion is ...for lack of a better term...asinine.

[JohnnySwoop '85]

I agree with Flipper, besides if you criticize college sports isn't that an indictment of our whole American Educational system? Well I for one am not going to stand here while you bad mouth the United States of America....

*poof* over to the real bowl thread

[mscarn]

LOL...

I'm for sending the entire squad to Detroit in limousines. The coaches will travel in open-top maybachs with gold rims lighting Cuban cigars with $100 bills while swigging Dom Perignon. They will transported to the field itself on top diamond plated litters after dining on steak, lobster and truffle ice cream. Ideally.