The train wreck of the 1-AA

[Carl Spackler]

As you folks out there, read the latest (four decade old) re-iterations of creating new rules and divisions of the NCAA and/or schools breaking away from the NCAA.

Read this:

http://www.jetlaw.org/wp-content/journal-pdfs/Maney.pdf

 

[Doggie Style]

Uh... Do u have the "cliff notes" version?

 

[White Dwarf]

tldr

 

[Carl Spackler]

Take the 20 minutes to read the damn article. I'm trying edumacate all you people. This is the kind of piece of writing, coming out of the school that founded the SEC, that can actually influence people and create changes. Hopefully it makes it into the right hands, because this kind of message, coming quietly out of SEC land, is not what former college football association membership want to hear and somehow make it into say, federal lawmaker hands.

 

[thatguyed]

Take the 20 minutes to read the damn article. I'm trying edumacate all you people. This is the kind of piece of writing, coming out of the school that founded the SEC, that can actually influence people and create changes. Hopefully it makes it into the right hands, because this kind of message, coming quietly out of SEC land, is not what former college football association membership want to hear and somehow make it into say, federal lawmaker hands.

Lighten up Francis.

 

[freescooter]

1AA really was a train wreck for the schools that were pushed into it. The Ivy is a good example of a league that didn't "deserve" to be downgraded. So are schools like William & Mary whose schedule in the 1970s included Virginia, VaTech, West Virginia, Cincinnati, Miami, Tulane, BC, Rutgers, Army, Navy...They were a totally legitimate program. Even UConn and UMass took a hit at the gate when they were deemed 1AA. I couldn't find old attendance numbers but I remember reading UConn averaged about 10,000+- in the late 60s and 70s. By the mid-90s it was more like 7000 even though the quality of play was much better.

 

[Carl Spackler]

1AA really was a train wreck for the schools that were pushed into it. The Ivy is a good example of a league that didn't "deserve" to be downgraded. So are schools like William & Mary whose schedule in the 1970s included Virginia, VaTech, West Virginia, Cincinnati, Miami, Tulane, BC, Rutgers, Army, Navy...They were a totally legitimate program. Even UConn and UMass took a hit at the gate when they were deemed 1AA. I couldn't find old attendance numbers but I remember reading UConn averaged about 10,000+- in the late 60s and 70s. By the mid-90s it was more like 7000 even though the quality of play was much better.

I agree scooter. The history is all there, and the same groups of schools that have been threatening and acting on their own, and causing havoc in intercollegiate athletics for four decades, are still beating the same drums.

Frankly, I'm pretty disappointed in the reaction around here to that paper. The entire history of the NCAA, and everything that led up to right where we are right now in 2013, with the effects of the most recent Knight commission study, and the angle that the IRS, and the federal government would need to take, to create positive change for all of intercollegiate athletics, and stop the cartels, and stop the charade of the intercollegiate sports disguised as non-profit, academic oriented missions at the majority of colleges across the country that are now rolling in ESPN money and completely distorting the concept of and value of athletics in education, especially at state funded institutions, is all laid out right there neatly in that paper out of Vanderbilt university.

Perhaps we are just a bunch of dumb basketball fans.

 

[hthusky74]

1AA really was a train wreck for the schools that were pushed into it. The Ivy is a good example of a league that didn't "deserve" to be downgraded. So are schools like William & Mary whose schedule in the 1970s included Virginia, VaTech, West Virginia, Cincinnati, Miami, Tulane, BC, Rutgers, Army, Navy...They were a totally legitimate program. Even UConn and UMass took a hit at the gate when they were deemed 1AA. I couldn't find old attendance numbers but I remember reading UConn averaged about 10,000+- in the late 60s and 70s. By the mid-90s it was more like 7000 even though the quality of play was much better.

Actually, Yale was given the option of remaining 1A, however, there was no way they were leaving the Ivy League and offering athletic scholarships.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Actually, Yale was given the option of remaining 1A, however, there was no way they were leaving the Ivy League and offering athletic scholarships.

True, I think 1983 was the last season at 1A for Yale, and indeed it was leave the Ivy league and maintain on their own somehow, or agree to re-classify as 1-AA. It wasn't "given" the option though, Yale bowl - was the only Ivy league stadium that met the knew 1A classification seating requirements clause - that Joe Paterno pushed for.

Anyway - i think it's important to know our own history of college football right in our own yard, recognize it, and embrace it and learn from it. COllege football in Connecticut, and in the Northeast, and in the all the regions where we will need to recruit to play at the level of competition we want to be at regularly (top 25 in the country) did not start in 2003.

BTW: I don't know what 2012 attendance was in Massachusetts, but 2011 paid attendance for Yale v. Harvard at Yale Bowl was 55,137.

There are plenty of people in Connecticut that are interested in TRUE intercollegiate football. We need to tap that, and make it grow for UCONN.


Here is an excerpt from the Knight Commission, recommendations on revenue sharing from the college football playoff - published in 2012. It's recommended that payouts be distributed among all division 1A schools (FBS?) not sure what letters they are going by now, or will in 2014,...but it's recommended that money be distributed acoording to football program graduation success rates.

That - as we've learned - apparently wasn't adopted by the BCS people. THe college football post season needs to get under control.

http://www.knightcommission.org/images/pdfs/model_summary_final.pdf

 

[frankthetank]

I agree scooter. The history is all there, and the same groups of schools that have been threatening and acting on their own, and causing havoc in intercollegiate athletics for four decades, are still beating the same drums.

Frankly, I'm pretty disappointed in the reaction around here to that paper. The entire history of the NCAA, and everything that led up to right where we are right now in 2013, with the effects of the most recent Knight commission study, and the angle that the IRS, and the federal government would need to take, to create positive change for all of intercollegiate athletics, and stop the cartels, and stop the charade of the intercollegiate sports disguised as non-profit, academic oriented missions at the majority of colleges across the country that are now rolling in ESPN money and completely distorting the concept of and value of athletics in education, especially at state funded institutions, is all laid out right there neatly in that paper out of Vanderbilt university.

Perhaps we are just a bunch of dumb basketball fans.

I see this argument regarding the tax-exempt status of sports programs lately, especially from those left out of the power conferences. While I understand the sentiment, the thing is that just because there's a colorable argument that you can tax athletic department revenue doesn't mean that there's any political will to do so from the people that actually matter (e.g. the Senators and Congressmen that reside in SEC and Big Ten states). And if there's no political will, then you're not going to get anywhere.

One of the larger political miscalculations that I see from the Gang of Five is that they mistake general outrage against the "system" at a macro level (e.g. "There's too much money in college sports") for a belief that those same people will apply that same logic to their own favorite schools at a micro level. You might easily get someone in Birmingham in an opinion poll to answer "Yes" to whether there is too much college money in college sports. However, if you then ask whether they would want the U.S. government to start taxing (AKA taking money away from) the football programs University of Alabama and/or Auburn, you're going to get a VERY chilly reception. Now apply that same logic to any lawmaker in Congress that has a power conference school within his/her jurisdiction and see how far you'll get with the argument that money should be transferred from the local universities that are very popular locally so that it can be spent on who knows what in Washington, DC.

It might be a popular position in the state of Connecticut since UConn got left out, but I don't think there's any political will for this in the South or Midwest at all, for sure. Transferring state/local money to Washington is already unpopular enough of a concept in those areas in general, so taxing the college football programs that they care a ton about (and the people supporting the power programs VASTLY outweigh the people supporting the Gang of Five programs) is going to be a non-starter. This is an interesting legal and economic argument, but there's just no political argument as to why this would push through (unless you think that Senators and Congressmen are suddenly going to start voting against their local self-interests).

 

[freescooter]

Actually, Yale was given the option of remaining 1A, however, there was no way they were leaving the Ivy League and offering athletic scholarships.

But that option was more theoretical than real. Yale wasn't leaving the Ivy League. But the point is that there were programs that were every bit as deserving of remaining 1A but were downgraded for no real reason. The Southern Conference was one example. Among northeastern schools, besides the Ivies, Colgate, Lehigh, Holy Cross and some others of what makes up the Patriot League now. In many respects those teams were caught in the middle. They played mostly each other, plus some Ivy League teams and a few others. Colgate had a 40 plus year season ending rivalry with Rutgers. Holy Cross had an even longer one with BC. There were actually a bunch of schools on either side of the line, Rutgers and Temple were two who ended up 1A but played similar schedules against schools who ended up 1AA. If you compare Rutgers, Temple and Colgate, for example, in the 1970s, Say 1973 just at random. Temple: Xavier, BC, BU, Akron Cincinnati, Holy Cross, Rhode island, Delaware, Drake, Villanova. Rutgers: Lehigh, Princeton, Lafayette, UMass, Delaware, UConn, Air Force, Columbia, Colgate, Holy Cross, Tampa. Colgate:Lafayette, Cornell, Yale, Holy Cross, Princeton, Bucknell, Lehigh, William & Mary, BU and Rutgers. I'm not sure there is a heck of a difference in terms of who they each played. There were a bunch of schools who played more or less comparable schedules yet some ended up 1AA and others 1A based soley on stadium size or some other crazy criterion.

 

[CTMike]

Dammit Carl... You actually got me to read (ok, skim) that 64 page PDF... And I found it really interesting.

 

[Fairfield 1st]

I see this argument regarding the tax-exempt status of sports programs lately, especially from those left out of the power conferences. While I understand the sentiment, the thing is that just because there's a colorable argument that you can tax athletic department revenue doesn't mean that there's any political will to do so from the people that actually matter (e.g. the Senators and Congressmen that reside in SEC and Big Ten states). And if there's no political will, then you're not going to get anywhere.

One of the larger political miscalculations that I see from the Gang of Five is that they mistake general outrage against the "system" at a macro level (e.g. "There's too much money in college sports") for a belief that those same people will apply that same logic to their own favorite schools at a micro level. You might easily get someone in Birmingham in an opinion poll to answer "Yes" to whether there is too much college money in college sports. However, if you then ask whether they would want the U.S. government to start taxing (AKA taking money away from) the football programs University of Alabama and/or Auburn, you're going to get a VERY chilly reception. Now apply that same logic to any lawmaker in Congress that has a power conference school within his/her jurisdiction and see how far you'll get with the argument that money should be transferred from the local universities that are very popular locally so that it can be spent on who knows what in Washington, DC.

It might be a popular position in the state of Connecticut since UConn got left out, but I don't think there's any political will for this in the South or Midwest at all, for sure. Transferring state/local money to Washington is already unpopular enough of a concept in those areas in general, so taxing the college football programs that they care a ton about (and the people supporting the power programs VASTLY outweigh the people supporting the Gang of Five programs) is going to be a non-starter. This is an interesting legal and economic argument, but there's just no political argument as to why this would push through (unless you think that Senators and Congressmen are suddenly going to start voting against their local self-interests).

But you don't tax the schools... you can tax the conferences. That's low hanging fruit for the politicans. Its like taxing internet gambling.

I read that law review article. Pretty good stuff. I could see a judge in the Second Circuit being open to it

 

[frankthetank]

But you don't tax the schools... you can tax the conferences. That's low hanging fruit for the politicans. Its like taxing internet gambling.

I read that law review article. Pretty good stuff. I could see a judge in the Second Circuit being open to it

Technically, yes. However, you don't think the University of Alabama and all of its massive money boosters that also happen to be political donors aren't going to lobby their home state politicians to make sure that the SEC doesn't get taxed? What about Ohio State lobbyists and donors doing the same with Ohio politicians or Texas and Texas A&M lobbyists doing it with Texas politicians? Once again, you're looking at it from the perspective of a school that has been left out (whether it's fair or not is a different matter) and thinking that this is going to be a popular measure. There's a whole lot more power with those on the inside - they're the ones that have a disproportionate number of alums that are politicians and political donors (not to mention repositories for political pork and patronage). When politicians are fighting for every federal dollar to take HOME to their respective state universities (e.g. research funding, institutes, loans, etc.) , they sure as heck aren't going to turn around and start taxing them to take money AWAY from them (even if you try to phrase it as a "conference tax", which won't get you very far in practicality). That's the crux of it - this isn't so much a pure legal matter (as you can argue that virtually anything is taxable) as it is a political matter.

 

[zls44]

It reminds me of Congress.

Congress always has a low approval rating. But when people are asked about their individual congressman, they typically rate very well.

 

[frankthetank]

It reminds me of Congress.

Congress always has a low approval rating. But when people are asked about their individual congressman, they typically rate very well.

Yes! Exactly right! If you ask people whether they like the BCS, that's going to score very low. However, if you ask people whether they like their local BCS school, that's going to score fairly high. Don't mistake disdain for the amorphous "system" (which is a faceless monolith) for disdain for specific individual schools (whose sweatshirts you own) - they are very different concepts (as political pollsters know very well).

 

[Carl Spackler]

But that option was more theoretical than real. Yale wasn't leaving the Ivy League. But the point is that there were programs that were every bit as deserving of remaining 1A but were downgraded for no real reason. The Southern Conference was one example. Among northeastern schools, besides the Ivies, Colgate, Lehigh, Holy Cross and some others of what makes up the Patriot League now. In many respects those teams were caught in the middle. They played mostly each other, plus some Ivy League teams and a few others. Colgate had a 40 plus year season ending rivalry with Rutgers. Holy Cross had an even longer one with BC. There were actually a bunch of schools on either side of the line, Rutgers and Temple were two who ended up 1A but played similar schedules against schools who ended up 1AA. If you compare Rutgers, Temple and Colgate, for example, in the 1970s, Say 1973 just at random. Temple: Xavier, BC, BU, Akron Cincinnati, Holy Cross, Rhode island, Delaware, Drake, Villanova. Rutgers: Lehigh, Princeton, Lafayette, UMass, Delaware, UConn, Air Force, Columbia, Colgate, Holy Cross, Tampa. Colgate:Lafayette, Cornell, Yale, Holy Cross, Princeton, Bucknell, Lehigh, William & Mary, BU and Rutgers. I'm not sure there is a heck of a difference in terms of who they each played. There were a bunch of schools who played more or less comparable schedules yet some ended up 1AA and others 1A based soley on stadium size or some other crazy criterion.

Yup. And just in the past year, the Patriot league has again basically flipped the bird at the concept of being marginalized and is ramping up scholarship football again.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I see this argument regarding the tax-exempt status of sports programs lately, especially from those left out of the power conferences. While I understand the sentiment, the thing is that just because there's a colorable argument that you can tax athletic department revenue doesn't mean that there's any political will to do so from the people that actually matter (e.g. the Senators and Congressmen that reside in SEC and Big Ten states). And if there's no political will, then you're not going to get anywhere.

One of the larger political miscalculations that I see from the Gang of Five is that they mistake general outrage against the "system" at a macro level (e.g. "There's too much money in college sports") for a belief that those same people will apply that same logic to their own favorite schools at a micro level. You might easily get someone in Birmingham in an opinion poll to answer "Yes" to whether there is too much college money in college sports. However, if you then ask whether they would want the U.S. government to start taxing (AKA taking money away from) the football programs University of Alabama and/or Auburn, you're going to get a VERY chilly reception. Now apply that same logic to any lawmaker in Congress that has a power conference school within his/her jurisdiction and see how far you'll get with the argument that money should be transferred from the local universities that are very popular locally so that it can be spent on who knows what in Washington, DC.

It might be a popular position in the state of Connecticut since UConn got left out, but I don't think there's any political will for this in the South or Midwest at all, for sure. Transferring state/local money to Washington is already unpopular enough of a concept in those areas in general, so taxing the college football programs that they care a ton about (and the people supporting the power programs VASTLY outweigh the people supporting the Gang of Five programs) is going to be a non-starter. This is an interesting legal and economic argument, but there's just no political argument as to why this would push through (unless you think that Senators and Congressmen are suddenly going to start voting against their local self-interests).

See, this is why the founding fathers were smart to create an executive, judicial and legislative, three branched system of government. You're only talking about the legislative body.

It is the executive and judicial, that is what I'm talking about. All it takes, is the right kind of lawsuit, filed in the right place, by the right people, and supported by the right people in Washington. it's all laid out right here, and last I checked - jetlaw.org, is the website for the Vanderbilt University Journal of Entertainment and Technology Law- and Vanderbilt, IS an SEC school. This information is not coming from somewhere outside the cartel.

 

[Carl Spackler]

But you don't tax the schools... you can tax the conferences. That's low hanging fruit for the politicans. Its like taxing internet gambling.

I read that law review article. Pretty good stuff. I could see a judge in the Second Circuit being open to it

Exactly. Pandora's Box was opened up by Chuck Neinas and his leadership of the CFA with the three pronged attack of legal filings against the NCAA, by the CFA, and University of Texas, and the joint filing of Oklahoma Board of Regents and University of Georgia in 1981. Oklahoma made it to the supreme court and all hell broke loose intercollegiate athletics since, and intercollegiate athletics has lost its mission and has become solely about grabbing as much television money as possible.

It's going to take the court systems, again, I think, to close that box, and set things right again, because IMNSHO, the only other way, to stop the cartel, is to actually install a true post season for the highest level of college football, where it's actually about intercollegiate athletics and the financial aspects are split among the divisions similar to the way every other intercollegiate championship event does it.

 

[CTMike]

The TL;DR version of the PDF for those curious : by instituting a Division 1-AA (and to a lesser extent, the non "major" D1-A conferences), the NCAA has caused significant financial harm to those schools by arbitrarily excluding them from competition for a national championship. It then goes on to make a case why an antitrust lawsuit would be successful, if amendments to the NCAA by laws could not be made to be more inclusive.

 

[Fairfield 1st]

Technically, yes. However, you don't think the University of Alabama and all of its massive money boosters that also happen to be political donors aren't going to lobby their home state politicians to make sure that the SEC doesn't get taxed? What about Ohio State lobbyists and donors doing the same with Ohio politicians or Texas and Texas A&M lobbyists doing it with Texas politicians? Once again, you're looking at it from the perspective of a school that has been left out (whether it's fair or not is a different matter) and thinking that this is going to be a popular measure. There's a whole lot more power with those on the inside - they're the ones that have a disproportionate number of alums that are politicians and political donors (not to mention repositories for political pork and patronage). When politicians are fighting for every federal dollar to take HOME to their respective state universities (e.g. research funding, institutes, loans, etc.) , they sure as heck aren't going to turn around and start taxing them to take money AWAY from them (even if you try to phrase it as a "conference tax", which won't get you very far in practicality). That's the crux of it - this isn't so much a pure legal matter (as you can argue that virtually anything is taxable) as it is a political matter.

Huge Fan of yours Frank, but I think you mis-read the politics of this.. Jeff Sessions of Alabama cannot overly influence the decision to tax the conferences any more than Richard Blumenthal can get us into the ACC or BiG... the conferences themselves have NO constituencies in Congress,.. For cryin out loud they are doing all they can to fight off the Anti Trust issues percolating and as discussed in the law review article.. Texas senators could careless if the BIG 12 is taxed., so long as Tex and A&M athletic departments are left alone (and there in lies the deal... leave the Athletic Depts alone but wack the conferences themselves)

 

[Fishy]

How can you tax the conferences and not have an impact on the schools?

I don't really care about the answer. I want bad things to happen to everyone.

 

[Nostical]

I don't really care about the answer. I want bad things to happen to everyone.

Ha! Priceless.

 

[FAIRTIDES]

Ha! Priceless.

As the above relates to the day-to-day operation of the UCONN AD. Please disregard! Do not allow the hope of being saved by Messrs. Sherman, Taft, Hartley, Smoot, Hawley, Blumenthal, the Courts, the White House, holding your breath or other tantrums to deter your pursuit of a good conference and that dirty, tainted, ethically challenged, morally questionable TV money. Please!

 

[UConnNick]

True, I think 1983 was the last season at 1A for Yale, and indeed it was leave the Ivy league and maintain on their own somehow, or agree to re-classify as 1-AA. It wasn't "given" the option though, Yale bowl - was the only Ivy league stadium that met the knew 1A classification seating requirements clause - that Joe Paterno pushed for.

Anyway - i think it's important to know our own history of college football right in our own yard, recognize it, and embrace it and learn from it. COllege football in Connecticut, and in the Northeast, and in the all the regions where we will need to recruit to play at the level of competition we want to be at regularly (top 25 in the country) did not start in 2003.

BTW: I don't know what 2012 attendance was in Massachusetts, but 2011 paid attendance for Yale v. Harvard at Yale Bowl was 55,137.

There are plenty of people in Connecticut that are interested in TRUE intercollegiate football. We need to tap that, and make it grow for UCONN.


Here is an excerpt from the Knight Commission, recommendations on revenue sharing from the college football playoff - published in 2012. It's recommended that payouts be distributed among all division 1A schools (FBS?) not sure what letters they are going by now, or will in 2014,...but it's recommended that money be distributed acoording to football program graduation success rates.

That - as we've learned - apparently wasn't adopted by the BCS people. THe college football post season needs to get under control.

http://www.knightcommission.org/images/pdfs/model_summary_final.pdf[/quote]



The Yale Bowl was not the only Ivy League football stadium which satisfied the 30,000+ seating requirement for NCAA D-IA. Back in the early 1980's, Penn (Franklin Field), Princeton (Palmer Stadium) Harvard (Harvard Stadium) and probably also Cornell (Schoellkopf Field) had stadiums with seating capacities above 30K. Palmer Stadium was razed in the late 1990's in favor of a new stadium which seats slightly less than 30K.

It was more likely the idea that the Ivy League would have to disband which forced those Ivy members who could have maintained D-IA status to accept DI-AA status in order to keep the league intact. For that matter, if it were necessary, I'm sure Columbia, Brown and Dartmouth could have come up with enough cash to increase the seating capacity of their respective stadiums back in the day if it would have meant maintaining I-A status. In 1956 when the Ivy League was formally chartered, the schools voted to never go to bowl games, so staying in the upper division of NCAA football didn't really matter much if you were voluntarily excluding yourselves from playing in bowls, as they still do to this day. I imagine that had a lot to do with the Ivy members going along with the demotion to D-IAA.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Not exactly, the membership of the Ivy that could have remained at 1A in 1982, but eventually went to 1-AA did it because the other option was to leave the Ivy League, but they were hardly unique.

The NCAA membership voted (led by the CFA membership) and effectively wiped out dozens schools from 1A football at an 'emergency' meeting over the weekend of Dec. 3&4th, 1981. In 1978, only five conferences voluntarily accepted the 1-AA label. Yankee, SWAC, Big Sky, MEAC, and the Ohio Valley Conference - who would hire one James Delany as commissioner, shortly after in 1979 - and after 10 years of running a 1-AA conference, Delany moved to the Big 10 in 1989, and established the Big 10 network, and understood the importance of television money in college football - and how it applies to actually running a university at large scale with an actual academic and athletic mission that work together.

THe Ivy didn't accept the 1-AA label, based on stadium size and attendance, nor did the MAC, Missouri Valley, SoCon, and most of the independants (of which there were MANY) . THe Ivy led the way with the 12 sport exemption rule, meaning that if you sponsored at least 12 varsity sports at division 1 level, including football, the stadium and attendance rules that established 1-AA football, were waived.

At that meeting in December 1981, the membership of the CFA, repealed the 12 sport exemption rule, and effectively booted about 40 football programs out of 1-A football. It was repealing the 12 sport exemption that forced the move down to 1-AA for all those programs, and indeed, for Yale - it was the prospect of having to either leave the Ivy, or down grade. The MAC, managed to put in their own version of exemption, because they had ins with the Big 10 coaches and arranged scheduling that worked and basically signed the Big 10 conference up as a big brother.

It was all entirely, about wanting television money and appearances kept within a certain group, and it happened no differently than grade school clique politics.

For the record, no school, has ever made the choice to move down to 1-AA football, after having moved up to 1-A football. In September 1982, several Ivy schools, and about a dozen other schools spread across the Missouri Valle, SoCon, Southland, and Independants that still met the stadium and attendance requirements, all chose to go to 1-AA football, becuase other members of their conferences, failed to meet that 1-AA attendance and stadium requirements - and no longer had the 12 varsity sport rule exemption in place, after the repeal.

 

[hthusky74]

I think everyone is too hung up on the stadium attendence issue. The Ivies do not give athletic scholarshups, and would obviously be dead meat in 1A without scholarships. Their education philosophy had more to do with their remaining in 1AA than anything else.