Editorials & Other Articles

Purveyor

(29,876 posts) Thu Dec 27, 2012, 02:06 PM Dec 2012

Financial Madness Behind The College Bowl Schedule

By Brad Flory | brad@lifeinplaid.com

Published: Thursday, December 27, 2012,

JACKSON, MI – Football is one of my great loves, but lately it is a love tainted by harsh questions.

Have American colleges gone crazy over all these bowl games? Or are they merely gullible when spending money? It’s a tough call.

--CLIP--

The overload of games would be fine except colleges, which are usually public institutions supported by taxpayers, abandon financial sanity for the dubious honor of making the watered-down field. Universities invited to bowl games agree to buy thousands of tickets, guaranteeing income for promoters.

Colleges often – not always, but often – cannot sell their “allotment” of tickets because few people want them. They pay full price for empty seats.

Michigan State University reportedly (and predictably) sold about 3,000 of its 11,000 tickets to the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl on Saturday in Arizona.
Face value of those tickets is $25 to $125. If the average price is $50, MSU will lose about $400,000 by purchasing 8,000 empty seats.

MORE...

http://blog.mlive.com/bradosphere/2012/12/financial_insanity_props_up_ou.html#incart_river_default

6 replies

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Financial Madness Behind The College Bowl Schedule (Original Post) Purveyor Dec 2012 OP

silly me wilt the stilt Dec 2012 #1

Me too... truebrit71 Dec 2012 #2

Or rather building billion dollar 'endowment funds'. That is another issue I can't wrap my mind Purveyor Dec 2012 #5

Great article exboyfil Dec 2012 #3

I had no idea the colleges where taking such a hit to go to the bowl games. I always thought Purveyor Dec 2012 #4

The article doesn't take into consideration the payout the school gets by going in the first place. Angleae Dec 2012 #6

wilt the stilt

(4,528 posts)

1. silly me

Reply to Purveyor (Original post)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 02:20 PM

Dec 2012

I thought college was for education

truebrit71

(20,805 posts)

2. Me too...

Reply to wilt the stilt (Reply #1)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 02:29 PM

Dec 2012

Purveyor

(29,876 posts)

5. Or rather building billion dollar 'endowment funds'. That is another issue I can't wrap my mind

Reply to wilt the stilt (Reply #1)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 06:49 PM

Dec 2012

around.

exboyfil

(17,865 posts)

3. Great article

Reply to Purveyor (Original post)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 02:30 PM

Dec 2012

Thanks.

Our local university bundles up $3 to $5 million of general revenue to keep our sports programs going (at a cost of about $500/yr per student). I hate the practice.

Purveyor

(29,876 posts)

4. I had no idea the colleges where taking such a hit to go to the bowl games. I always thought

Reply to exboyfil (Reply #3)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 06:48 PM

Dec 2012

TV rights covered most expenses. Silly me!

Angleae

(4,497 posts)

6. The article doesn't take into consideration the payout the school gets by going in the first place.

Reply to Purveyor (Original post)

Thu Dec 27, 2012, 07:08 PM

Dec 2012

Last year the minimum payout was $320,000 going up to $22,300,000

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/29/bowl-game-payouts-map-2011-2012-bcs_n_1174808.html

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