Why Small Schools Are Overriding FCOA

JIM DELANY VS THE COLONIAL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION: FIGHT

[UPDATE: Original credit for the PDF should go to Christian Dennie. Andy Staples also has a good piece on this.]

Get the Picture unearths the reasons given by 100+ schools for overriding the $2k stipend recently adopted at the behest of the Big Ten and SEC. Two of them are BCS schools: Wake Forest and Rutgers. Rutgers manages to lose buckets of money, so that's obvious. Both schools bring up the Title IX implications as their reasoning, and even if I don't agree with how Title IX is implemented that's a federal mandate you can't get around. It's a legal concern.

Anyway, some of the reasons presented by smaller schools are valid:

The way this legislation was adopted was through channels intended for emergency or non-controversial issues.  Neither applies in this case.  [Miami (Not That Miami)]

Another reason for overriding this legislation should be the need to at least eliminate its application to FCS football.  The football championship division exists because there are about 120 Division I institutions that sponsor football programs and choose to spend less on scholarships, coaching staffs, etc. than the Division I FBS members.  Taking a stand against the Cost of Attendance, at least for FCS football, would be consistent with this philosophy. [Tennessee-Martin]

However, many are fist-shakingly cynical, totally oblivious, and/or as misspelled as this blog's "full cost of attedance [sic] scholarships" tag:

The insitution [sic] is not in a position to fund the additional costs associated with the miscellaneous expense. Many institutions are likely to be in the same position which would create a competitive advantage for those insitutions [sic] who had [sic] large budgets [Marshall]

Trying to legislate cost saving in other areas, while adding this potential hugh [sic] expense to institutions [Maryland-Baltimore County]

2011-96 provides an unfair disadvantage to smaller institutions that will struggle to find the funds necessary to provide the additional $2,000 to student-athletes. Some schools may only be able to provide these funds to their revenue producing sports by pulling money away from their other sports which could have a negative impact on the student-athletes involved in those sports. [Wright State]

"Unfair"? Unfair? IS THIS AMERICA OR NOT, YOU LILY-LIVERED PINKOS AT WRIGHT STATE? THIS IS CAPITALISM YO, SINK OR SWIM LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT.

We are a "have-not."  This rule benefits the Division I "haves" and would widen the chasm between "BCS" schools and non BCS schools. [Southeastern Louisiana]

Southeastern Louisiana's 2010 athletic department budget shows about 2.5 million in actual money taken in*, almost half of which consists of NCAA distributions from basketball tournament revenue and guarantee games from bigger schools. They should take their 1.1 million a year and say "yes, sir" if they want to keep up the fiction they are capable of competing as a Division I school.

*[They claim 10m in revenues with 6.9 million of that "direct institutional support" and 660k in "indirect facilities and administrative support." Also who knows what the 260k listed as "other" consists of.]

The Board of Directors passed this legislation that will cost 75% of the membership millions of dollars they don’t have. In addition to the obvious costs there are gender-equity implications of this initiative that make the costs even higher.  It's not realistic to maintain that this legislation is permissive and not acknowledge the costs it will create because of competitive equity. [Tennessee-Martin]

In 2006, Tennessee-Martin's annual budget for men's basketball was $134,264, 331st of 331 teams then competing in D-I. (Since then 14 additional schools have decided to add basketball programs.) They are making same argument NBA owners make when they demand CBAs that prevent them from throwing outrageous contracts at bad players.

And then there's this from Tennessee Tech:

I want to share a very supportive and knowledgeable university professor's view of this change in legislation.  He writes "Perhaps my biggest grievance is the apparent insensitivity and bad timing involved. It seems most dubious to give some student athletes what amounts to "tattoo money" at a time when far too many others are unable to put food on the table, and the institutions themselves are almost all facing choices among various undesirable options.

I'm not sure whether to high five the guy for calling the stipend "tattoo money" or mock this tweed-jacket-with-elbow-patch-wearing pipe smoker for deploying "most dubious" and expecting people to take him seriously. We are not contemplating an invasion of the Hottentots. Your diction is invalid.

I've apparently gone with the mocking option. In retrospect, it was inevitable.

BONUS: A number of overrides have been submitted for the next proposal, 2011-97, which allows institutions to offer scholarships longer than a year. It's like Boise State just came to this planet:

When you combine 2001-97 [multi-year offers] with 2001-96 [FCOA] it creates a culture of brokering. For a prospective student-athlete, the decision as to where to attend college and participate in athletics is most likely the biggest decision they will make at that point in their lives. That tough decision becomes more complicated when the student and his/her family have to factor in what school "offers the best deal" versus where they may want to attend if all offers were for one year without the enticement of 2,000. [Boise State]

I don't even know where to start with this being portrayed as a negative. A "culture of brokering" sounds a lot like "the exact goal of the legislation."

The current system works.  We don't need to get into bidding wars where one school offers a $75% for 2 years and the other school then offers 85% for 3, etc., etc.  This puts the kid into a situation where they almost need an agent/advisor just to determine the best "deal."   Again, if it isn't broke, don't fix it. [Indiana State]

The person who does this for Indiana State watches ice skating exhibitions on Saturdays instead of football. ISU also submitted overrides for every proposal that attempted to increase academic standards.

BTW, Rutgers also objects to this proposal making me think ill of their athletic department. Utah is the only other BCS school to submit an override (because the "Student-Athlete advisory council" is against it since "they feel it locks student-athletes in," which it doesn't, and "eliminates the potential for other athletes to receive aid," which it does by increasing degree completion rates).

With only 48 overrides in for 2011-97, it looks like multi-year grants will pass even if they open the schools up to a horrifying world wherein they have to compete in one of those market things. Commies.