Dear AD Benedict/UConn BOT: Spend Some Goddam Money On Football

[uconnell]

Given the massive budget problems, the UConn athletic dept won't be able to maintain its current spending.

While spending more on football is an easy response the likelihood is that ALL the athletic teams will face cuts.

O

And why do we have buses back to campus right at the start of the game?

How much do the buses cost to transport all these students From and to campus? Maybe that should be one of the first cuts!

 

[uconnell]

Manuel had ties to Michigan, I guess they liked that he was in the Bahamas during one of the monumental times of UConn athletics.

 

[Dooley]

Right, but where are we spending that the other schools aren't that makes us have the highest budget but lowest for football? Is it all in hockey and paying our basketball coaches well? Are we spending for all the bells and whistles for non revenue sports, and they are giving them the bare minimum?

I guess what im wondering, if we wanted to devote a higher percentage of our budget to football, would it require some tougher decisions like cutting other sports programs, or investing less in basketball? Or are there some easier ways we could shift money around?

Our current AD budget is around $70M. That is far and away the top AD budget in the entire G5. I think Cincinnati is next up at around $58M. I have no idea how our AD budget breaks down by sport but, yeah, I would guess that we are outbidding ourselves in a great many sports. No matter how many times it's been said over the past 10-15 years, football drives the bus everywhere...but UConn. We have to be able to find money somewhere. We're a basketball school and there's nothing wrong with that. We can't cut funding to hoops until, maybe, the day Geno retires. Devote 50% of his salary to hire his replacement and the other half gets put into the football coaching pool. That's $1M/yr right there. But we'll probably need more and that's on AD Dave and our BOT to find it.

Other schools have figured out how to spend competitive money to field competitive football programs. We haven't. If we just leveled the AD/Football spending %, we can be competitive too. If I'm AD Dave, I'm cutting ties with Aspire Group and using that money to hire an accounting firm to go line by line to find an additional $3-$5M or so to spend on football coaches. We're not selling tickets as-is anyway so no need for Aspire. If we're going to outpace all G5 schools in athletic spending, we have to outpace all G5 schools in football spending. Otherwise, what's the point?

 

[ASweet3781]

This is what Benedict signed up for.

The years of Edsall coaching Skip Holtz's kids 1999-2001 were some of the worst performances I have ever seen from a UConn program. What ended it was a future NFL QB staying home to build his home state U's program and being able to tell under ranked (yet talented) players to come play in a BCS league against Miami, BC, VA Tech, Syracuse, Pitt, etc). I don't see another Orlovsky coming and we certainly can't pitch the former anymore.

It's a really bad situation that should surprise no one. Especially Benedict if he did his homework.

 

[Chief00]

Sad! Very sad indeed!

At least they are part of some aspect of it - it’s a start and the school needs to figure out the rest of it in a positive not punative way.

 

[Chief00]

This is what Benedict signed up for.

The years of Edsall coaching Skip Holtz's kids 1999-2001 were some of the worst performances I have ever seen from a UConn program. What ended it was a future NFL QB staying home to build his home state U's program and being able to tell under ranked (yet talented) players to come play in a BCS league against Miami, BC, VA Tech, Syracuse, Pitt, etc). I don't see another Orlovsky coming and we certainly can't pitch the former anymore.

It's a really bad situation that should surprise no one. Especially Benedict if he did his homework.

Some famous historian said history doesn’t repeat itself, the World changes. The General who fights the current war like the last war generally loses. Infrantry of the Civil War was replacement by trench warfare in WW1, then armor divisions in WW2, followed by mobile air and helicopters since then. Submarines and aircraft carriers impacted naval warfare and GPS and missiles play a critical role in so much.
Randy 2.0 trying to do things like Randy 1.0 isn’t going to work.

 

[Chief00]

O




How much do the buses cost to transport all these students From and to campus? Maybe that should be one of the first cuts!

The kids leave when the police tell them to go in the stadium or leave. The bus drivers are getting paid anyways.
A friend made a proposal to UConn officials last year to give away a semester of Room and Board ( the school said tuition was too complicated) as a raffle for students in the stadium but it did not fly.
Cell and WiFi capacity needs to be dramaticslly increase at The Rent - the SEC schools are doing that after surveying the students.
There’s so many creative things we could be doing but aren’t. Of course fielding a competitive team would be a big help too.

Doing stuff as we did in the early 2000’s isn’t going to cut it.

 

[Adios]

Randy Edsall's bonus for scoring first yesterday earned him a national headline on USA Today.

 

[the Q]

Some famous historian said history doesn’t repeat itself, the World changes. The General who fights the current war like the last war generally loses. Infrantry of the Civil War was replacement by trench warfare in WW1, then armor divisions in WW2, followed by mobile air and helicopters since then. Submarines and aircraft carriers impacted naval warfare and GPS and missiles play a critical role in so much.
Randy 2.0 trying to do things like Randy 1.0 isn’t going to work.

Maybe not. But some things can.

Germany fighting a two front war.

The kids leave when the police tell them to go in the stadium or leave. The bus drivers are getting paid anyways.
A friend made a proposal to UConn officials last year to give away a semester of Room and Board ( the school said tuition was too complicated) as a raffle for students in the stadium but it did not fly.
Cell and WiFi capacity needs to be dramaticslly increase at The Rent - the SEC schools are doing that after surveying the students.
There’s so many creative things we could be doing but aren’t. Of course fielding a competitive team would be a big help too.

Doing stuff as we did in the early 2000’s isn’t going to cut it.

The state just upgraded to a das a few years ago.

They are working to get one set up in gamble. Been trying for a while to.

 

[Rappin'Rodney]

Cell and WiFi capacity needs to be dramatically increase at The Rent - the SEC schools are doing that after surveying the students.

UConn's wifi for The Rent and the XL Center are now administered remotely by Global Research Network Operations Center (GlobalNOC) on Indiana University's campus. Weird. In fact, the entire Connecticut Education Network was ported over to GlobalNOC at least eight months ago, probably longer.

 

[BlueDogs]

AD Dave did I great job on Hurley. He needs to start fixing football in a hurry. The RE hire was reasonable and practical. It’s just not working and Ned’s to force change or force RE out.

 

[bmayuc]

I completely understand folks for the "Cancel Football" posts and opinions. We are the unquestioned worst team in the country. Nobody - not even UMass - is lower than us. We'll be #1 Bottom 10 on every sports site on Monday morning for the rest of the season.

But I want to do the exact opposite...

UConn boasts about having a G5 leading ~$70M AD budget. We pay Geno and Hurley very aggressively and rightfully so. We're a basketball school and always will be. But when it comes to the one and only sport that could lift our school and state economy out of the doldrums of college athletic's minor leagues, we go cheap. Incredibly cheap. Edsall is paid peanuts. We just let SMU (S.M.U.!) poach an assistant coach from us. Our assistant coaches could leave UConn and make more money bagging groceries at Big Y.

Why bother? You get what you pay for.

Either spend some goddam money and employ an actual FBS level coaching staff - assistants included - or the "Cancel/Drop Football" crowd will only get bigger, louder and, worst of all, 1000% right. What is the point of student subsidies - already astronomically high - if that money isn't being put the one and only use to get UConn into "The Money Club"?? The one and only college sport that could give the state economy a HUGE boost.

Put some goddam money into our football coaching pool. Call it Benedict's Last Stand. Call it our Doug Flutie moment. Call it whatever you want. Increase our football coaching pay pool today and put everything we have into it. Commit fully to it. Slash ticket prices, give students free tickets, and eat more money. Endure the frustrated complaints from the fans and alumni during yet another transition period. And in 3-5 years, when CR will firmly be closed, if we're no better than we are today, drop it and do what you have to do. But please please try. Partial commitment and half arsing is making this program worse, not better.

I like this attitude, but don't think it is aggressive enough. If you are going to go with the "Spend some cash now and to hell with it if it doesn't work close the program" model, you should really do some more creative thinking. They should NOT be spending that money on coaching. That is a saturated and expensive market.

The way to go is to funnel money directly to recruits. Think about it. If Top 10, NBA bound basketballers are only worth 40-100k to sign, a couple thousand here or there could be the difference in signing some decent high 3* and low 4* players. We don't need top 100 recruits. Lets find some guys in the top 250 and find ourselves a bagman. I find it highly likely this is a more effective strategy than rolling the dice in a costly coaching market.

Upside - the Louisville Model - Find an exit ramp in next round of CR because of our new football prestige mixed with basketball revitilization. We all enjoy football again and can unironically wear the Derp Husky hat. Maybe bowl games and we still have a football program?

Downside - maybe we get busted in a few years after the new round of CR, but by then who cares the NCAA is on its way out, and if worst comes to worse screw it we can just shut down football like we will anyway if we continue to suck so much.

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I'm kidding.
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But you thought about it, right?

 

[Dooley]

I like this attitude, but don't think it is aggressive enough. If you are going to go with the "Spend some cash now and to hell with it if it doesn't work close the program" model, you should really do some more creative thinking. They should NOT be spending that money on coaching. That is a saturated and expensive market.

The way to go is to funnel money directly to recruits. Think about it. If Top 10, NBA bound basketballers are only worth 40-100k to sign, a couple thousand here or there could be the difference in signing some decent high 3* and low 4* players. We don't need top 100 recruits. Lets find some guys in the top 250 and find ourselves a bagman. I find it highly likely this is a more effective strategy than rolling the dice in a costly coaching market.

Upside - the Louisville Model - Find an exit ramp in next round of CR because of our new football prestige mixed with basketball revitilization. We all enjoy football again and can unironically wear the Derp Husky hat. Maybe bowl games and we still have a football program?

Downside - maybe we get busted in a few years after the new round of CR, but by then who cares the NCAA is on its way out, and if worst comes to worse screw it we can just shut down football like we will anyway if we continue to suck so much.

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I'm kidding.
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But you thought about it, right?
View attachment 35959

Nice guys finish last. But we did manage to get sparkling APR scores out of the last decade. Very important metric.

 

[huskymedic]

You get what you pay for...

48. Memphis, Mike Norvell $2,600,000
58. Navy, Ken Niumatalolo $2,163,000
60. Cincinnati, Luke Fickell, $2,000,000
67. Houston, Major Applewhite $1,750,000
69. UCF, Josh Heupel $1,700,000
71. Tulane, Willie Fritz $1,629,000
73. Tulsa, Phillip Montgomery $1,518,177
78. ECU, Scottie Montgomery $1,102,500
80. UConn, Randy Edsall, $1,100,000
82. South Florida, Charlie Strong, $1,000,000 (Note: Strong due to make $2.5M in 2019)

Legit question because I don't know, how do the other schools do it? Did they cut non-revenue sports or just never have them? Do they just spend less? I'm sure we invest more in basketball but that can't be the only difference.

Other schools/ADs prioritize football considerably more than we do. They devote a far larger % of AD expense to their football programs than we do... just like Pitt, Louisville, BC, Miami, West Virginia, Syracuse, TCU, Utah, and Rutgers did.

I went back and looked @ number of varsity sports each AAC school reports because I remember doing this exercise during the B12 presentation days.

UConn - 20
ECU - 20
Cincy- 19
Memphis - 19
Temple -19 (dropped baseball a few yrs back)
Tulsa - 18
SMU - 17
Houston - 17
USF - 17
UCF - 16
Wichita State - 15
*Navy - 30 but a totally different animal*

 

[Dooley]

I went back and looked @ number of varsity sports each AAC school reports because I remember doing this exercise during the B12 presentation days.

UConn - 20
ECU - 20
Cincy- 19
Memphis - 19
Temple -19 (dropped baseball a few yrs back)
Tulsa - 18
SMU - 17
Houston - 17
USF - 17
UCF - 16
Wichita State - 15
*Navy - 30 but a totally different animal*

Well done, medic (as always).

Yup, 20 sports is alot of sports. I hate the idea of cutting sports but we wouldn't be the first nor the last school to do it. We're still trying to operate like a P5 athletic department while bringing in peanuts G5 revenue. Kudos to UConn for trying...but it's not working when the one and only sport that can bring more money to our school/state is 1-8 and getting worse by the week.

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

The problem is... what money? State is hurting, UCONN 2000 is just a faded memory, and the appetite for subsidizing UConn Athletics is... not great.

I don't know what the solution is besides "get rich, donate money." I'm working on Step 1 right now.

 

[Dooley]

The problem is... what money? State is hurting, UCONN 2000 is just a faded memory, and the appetite for subsidizing UConn Athletics is... not great.

I don't know what the solution is besides "get rich, donate money." I'm working on Step 1 right now.

If I win Powerball, I will be buying Nick Saban to UConn. Ha!

I don't think UConn should add on to its already high AD budget or student subsidies. I think they should move existing expenses around so that football is funded at an appropriate FBS level. Our head coach salary and assistant coach salary pool is dead last or in the bottom half of the AAC. That can't happen for a school with the G5 leading budget (by far).

 

[tduconn]

You get what you pay for...

48. Memphis, Mike Norvell $2,600,000
58. Navy, Ken Niumatalolo $2,163,000
60. Cincinnati, Luke Fickell, $2,000,000
67. Houston, Major Applewhite $1,750,000
69. UCF, Josh Heupel $1,700,000
71. Tulane, Willie Fritz $1,629,000
73. Tulsa, Phillip Montgomery $1,518,177
78. ECU, Scottie Montgomery $1,102,500
80. UConn, Randy Edsall, $1,100,000
82. South Florida, Charlie Strong, $1,000,000 (Note: Strong due to make $2.5M in 2019)

Most of the names on the list were high profile winners (whatever their title) at other venues........and went to the highest bidder.

We got Edsall cheap because he was not high profile, and probably did not have other offers. Somehow I don't think UConn is going to attract a high profile coach........no matter what we offer. The best we can hope for is "up and coming" unproven rock stars.

 

[uconnfan68]

UConn's wifi for The Rent and the XL Center are now administered remotely by Global Research Network Operations Center (GlobalNOC) on Indiana University's campus. Weird. In fact, the entire Connecticut Education Network was ported over to GlobalNOC at least eight months ago, probably longer. View attachment 35952

Last time I was at the Rent, even my work phone was useless.

 

[junglehusky]

Hate to say it but 8 wins a year = you'll be lucky if the Rent is half full. People in CT just don't care about seeing AAC schools for football. Even if the top end is technically better than the BE was.

If you throw money at football you might as well light it on fire.

 

[kemba]

The Rent is currently half full when the weather is good so I don't know how you figure we couldn't do better than that with a good team instead of an unwatchable team. People want to go, tailgate and hang out, and be entertained for 3 hours watching football. I think people overestimate how big of a draw most of the other teams were for football in the Big East. Maybe WVU in its best years was a big draw on its own, but other than that if we were this bad then we wouldn't have drawn well. Have a team that makes people confident they'll see a competitive game then people will come back

 

[Dooley]

Hate to say it but 8 wins a year = you'll be lucky if the Rent is half full. People in CT just don't care about seeing AAC schools for football. Even if the top end is technically better than the BE was.

If you throw money at football you might as well light it on fire.

The Rent has been half full for every game, except UMass, this year. We're the undisputed worst team in the country and all of these games have been against AAC (or worse) opponents. It's quite literally the same situation that UConn hoops was in before Calhoun was hired. The fanbase is there - UConn has a huge fanbase - it's just uninspired right now...and rightfully so.

Just like hiring Calhoun, you have to at least try with so much money on the line. If it fails, then hoops and all other sports will be in the exact same position as they are in today: outside of the money club, looking in.

 

[Dooley]

Most of the names on the list were high profile winners (whatever their title) at other venues...and went to the highest bidder.

We got Edsall cheap because he was not high profile, and probably did not have other offers. Somehow I don't think UConn is going to attract a high profile coach...no matter what we offer. The best we can hope for is "up and coming" unproven rock stars.

No question. I don't know what the best approach is to hiring a head coach here. We've tried retreads, we've tried a Broyles Award winner, we've tried re-hiring a coach who had moderate success here. I think what's more important is paying for high quality assistants.

Prioritizing part-time hockey arena over a high quality FBS coaching staff is beyond asinine. $45M could be put to really good use to turn around football and get us back inside the P5 red zone.

 

[Yup!]

No question. I don't know what the best approach is to hiring a head coach here. We've tried retreads, we've tried a Broyles Award winner, we've tried re-hiring a coach who had moderate success here. I think what's more important is paying for high quality assistants.

Prioritizing part-time hockey arena over a high quality FBS coaching staff is beyond asinine. $45M could be put to really good use to turn around football and get us back inside the P5 red zone.

1000% correct

 

[Rappin'Rodney]

Last time I was at the Rent, even my work phone was useless.

I honestly don't care about reception at the Rent or XL. I care about who is overseeing those facilities' respective communications systems. GlobalNOC is a proxy for the B1G, and they're monitoring all our feeds from IU's campus. Let me put this into perspective, The State of Pennsylvania, and their flagship PSU, is the only other eastern state-wide system on the this particular network.

Arkansas and Oklahoma are the only other two, non-eastern state-wide systems with direct connections on this network. GlobalNOC is handling the joint GENI campus trials for UConn, Arkansas and Oklahoma, as well as connecting the same three to Open Science Grid.

If you're looking for breadcrumbs for UConn ever joining the B1G, this is it. Not twitter, not Jeff Jacobs, nor anyone else.