Would you support the return of football at WSU?

[Stickboy46]

Would Bill Parcells coach a CFB team? Go big or go home Dr. Bardo!

That would be one heck of a way to land some recruits....

[pie n eye]

Shouldn't we move this over the the football forum?

[ShockdaWorld]

Would Bill Parcells coach a CFB team? Go big or go home Dr. Bardo!

I actually momentarily considered the thought that he may be one of the donors that wanted to see it running again. That wouldn't surprise me.

[_kai_]

Bardo is a brilliant man.

[HarpBros]

if we ever bring it back think it would awesome if Parcells had some influence is developing the new program

[_kai_]

I merged the "DAMMIT BARDO" thread into the football mega thread in Men's Sports

[Shock Top]

Shouldn't we move this over the the football forum?

What a day that will be!

[tropicalshox]

What we know is a consultant has been hired to study the future of WSU athletics. If the helmet came from the consultants, seems like they see their job as steering the way for football. You don't hire consultants to send you in a direction you don't want.

[proshox]

I think fot the first time I have to disagree with proshox.

It takes a load of $$$ to fund football.

$$$ comes from donors. These same donors are a big part of our current success in a number of academic and athletic arenas.

I assume our donors are intelligent people. I assume intelligent people are likely to see this as big waste of money and a huge liability for WSU.

Now let's pretend you are an intelligent donor and you are asked to meet with WSU leadership. During this meeting you are asked to put up a large sum of $$$ for what you view as a "fool's errand." How do you feel? How likely are you to support the next reasonable project?

Finally, how many major donors do we have? how many of these donors are needed for football? How many can we afford to offend?

[tropicalshox]

I don't think it would go this far without discussions already occurring with donors and favorable responses.

[IdahoShocker]

Latest tweet from Sully.
"Dr. Bardo says nothing's changed with football. Meeting with consultants."

[ShockdaWorld]

It takes a load of $$$ to fund football.

$$$ comes from donors. These same donors are a big part of our current success in a number of academic and athletic arenas.

I assume our donors are intelligent people. I assume intelligent people are likely to see this as big waste of money and a huge liability for WSU.

Now let's pretend you are an intelligent donor and you are asked to meet with WSU leadership. During this meeting you are asked to put up a large sum of $$$ for what you view as a "fool's errand." How do you feel? How likely are you to support the next reasonable project?

Finally, how many major donors do we have? how many of these donors are needed for football? How many can we afford to offend?

How are you so sure that these donors see football as a "fool's errand?" It sounds like you think it is, and it's fine for you to have that opinion, but to assume that the majority of the donor base agrees with you is quite a stretch. Aside from that, I'm pretty sure that Dr. Bardo wouldn't embark on a journey to restart the football program without the input of at least some of the donors that would be necessary to complete that journey.

[wsushox1]

It takes a load of $$$ to fund football.

$$$ comes from donors. These same donors are a big part of our current success in a number of academic and athletic arenas.

I assume our donors are intelligent people. I assume intelligent people are likely to see this as big waste of money and a huge liability for WSU.

Now let's pretend you are an intelligent donor and you are asked to meet with WSU leadership. During this meeting you are asked to put up a large sum of $$$ for what you view as a "fool's errand." How do you feel? How likely are you to support the next reasonable project?

Finally, how many major donors do we have? how many of these donors are needed for football? How many can we afford to offend?

+1

[SHOCKvalue]

Good: Would allow us to leave the MVC for one of the football conferences, which would be good for athletics. I don't think that's likely, as the geographically close one, the Big 12, would likely have a member to the NE of here throw a hissy fit, if we were invited. The others are unlikely: Pac12 (nearest: Colorado), Big10 (nearest: Nebraska), SEC (nearest: Missouri) to want a new member with a brand new football program. I do think the Big 12, with it's member to the NE, and near parity with WSU football is the most likely.

No one's thinking WSU will ever get a P5 BCS invite.

First: Marshall has said he doesn't want to be at a football school. I think it's part of the reason he's here.

Marshall had his bags packed for the biggest football school in the country, were it not for the urging of his family, and a huge new salary.

Second: Money, unless the donors want to fund it entirely, it's going to hurt the university. The WSU budget is already under attack from Topeka, and is likely to see reduced funding, thanks to the Legislature's tax screwups. Spending money on a program which doesn't help and will hurt the university's primary focus on academics is a BAD idea. WSU is a pretty good university, minus a few areas. Really great in some areas, such as Aerospace Engineering. Throwing money down into a hole was the reason we closed it, and that was a good thing, for the university at that time.

WSU athletics is essentially a non-profit business unto itself. It gets a subsidy from the institutional side, but is somewhere around 25% to 30% of operating budget, from the numbers I've seen. Many schools give MUCH more subsidy to their athletics. Besides, athletics and academics are partners working towards a common goal, not enemies.

Third: Parking, We just turned the lot west of Jabara into a dorm. People complain about parking already. Can you imagine 3x the number of people trying to park as go to basketball, now? (I remember when it was used before, and I seem to recall a lot more parking.)

I wouldn't be surprised if MBB games that take place during school hours create a total on campus population similar to what we might expect for football. Besides, lots of schools have football stadiums right smack dab in the middle of campus, with almost zero nearby parking. Have you seen KU's setup?

Fourth: Facilities. From what I've heard, Cessna stadium is currently stable, but there were concerns about it in the near term. (Granted, it's along the grape vine) Due to lack of maintenance. (To be fair, it was a few years ago, and they might have dealt with the issues, I do seem to recall a new batch of paint since then.) We'd likely need to renovate the stadium's facilities.

The plan has never included Cessna Stadium, but instead a new-build facility.

Fifth: People, how many people will support it? I don't think we'll be seeing a lot of people unless it's successful, especially when they play (Fall/Winter) outside in Kansas. Chipping Ice off the baseball seats is bad enough. and the baseball program seems to be seeing a lot less people after it's been down.

Who knows, but college football is a much larger part of US culture than it was 30 years ago.

Home game college football goes into late November, and this is south-central Kansas, not northern Minnesota. It is a beautiful time of the year, in general.

Sixth: Conference, if we do football, we will probably need to move to another conference, because if we spend the money on it, we don't want it to be on a non-FBS (or whatever it's called now) conference. The MVC football is not.

To say "that's the entire point" is an over-statement, but not by much.

If we just join the MVC football conference: then that's a no, in my book.

Again, that's never been part of the proposal. Have you not read any of the prior stuff?

[wsushox1]

How are you so sure that these donors see football as a "fool's errand?" It sounds like you think it is, and it's fine for you to have that opinion, but to assume that the majority of the donor base agrees with you is quite a stretch. Aside from that, I'm pretty sure that Dr. Bardo wouldn't embark on a journey to restart the football program without the input of at least some of the donors that would be necessary to complete that journey.

That's what they pay consultants to do.