why are college sports so important in US? I heard someone saying that high-school students look at how good the socker team is (amongst other things, of course) when deciding on a college. Unless you happen to be one of the few students selected in the football team, what does it matter whether the team is very good or sucks, when you go there to study law/medicine/art/science/engineering/etc.

because there are a ton of colleges and we don't know what kind of degree we're going to get and its nearly impossible to compare colleges anyway.

therefore pick our colleges based on the outcome of ritualized warfare.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2012 07:11PM by mattkime.

American football is the 800 pound gorilla. Basketball is a distance second (except in Kentucky and North Carolina.) The rest bring up the rear.

The difference in how sports are handled at US universities and those in Canada was somewhat breathtaking, speaking from experience of attending university in Canada. Sure, I participated in a club sport (rowing), but I'd venture a guess it was more in line with what was originally envisioned for collegiate athletics (nobody really pays attention and you do it because you enjoy it).

Football and basketball are multibillion dollar businesses in the US. Why do you think they'd be otherwise (i.e. such a big deal)?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2012 08:58PM by Z.

one word: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

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"They don't call me Colonel because I'm some dumb a$$ army guy" Colonel Homer J. Simpson

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colonel panic
one word: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Yep. In the Big 10, you can predict the amount of total alumni giving to the school by how well their football program did. Winning the Rose Bowl meant more money for engineering and the medical school.

Didn't say it was rationale, just explaining the crazy a$$ US system.

Being the alumni of a major college is fun and you immediately identify with other alumnae. You can talk about current events related to the sports programs or have a series of "where where you when..." that are unique to each institution. Not living very close to my alma mater, Cal, it is always fun talking to other alumnae that I run into.

Frankly, I don't understand why some people have so much allegiance to pro sports programs whether they are American, European, Indian, etc. I generally observe that these people didn't go to a college or university with a strong athletic tradition. I like the Lakers, Dodgers, etc because I grew up watching them on local TV and going to the games but I don't feel any connection with the team and definitely don't get overly emotional. However, I definitely don't go out of my way to attend a game or watch with fellow alumni of my alma mater and am giddy when my school is doing well. Unfortunately my school hasn't had a lot of recent success (unless you count rugby, swimming and softball) but it still fun to follow them and commiserate with others.

As a 17 year old, I made the choice because it was cheap, a good engineering school, was an adventure AND had a large sports program. There were comparable technical schools like Caltech, Harvey Mudd, RPI, MIT that just didn't appeal to me because of the dearth of sports. I didn't have to go to a school with a winning sports team, but it had to at least compete. I also like to play sports and although I was no where good enough to play at the college level, I found the bigger schools had a competitive intramural programs for all skill levels.

Going to college in the US isn't only about going to the best academic school. At least it wasn't for me. In hindsight there is very little that I learned in my education that I couldn't have learned from decent library.

I think college sports, especially football, have morphed into a completely ridiculous professional business that should have nothing to do with the universities they are attached to. When visiting my bro-in-law in South Carolina (the state where the college football stadiums are the grandest structures in town), I found out that the students for the most part can't even go to the games there because the tickets are all sold for absurd amounts of money to big businesses and rich alumni. At the university of california (just down the hill from me), one of (if not the) highest paid university employees is the football coach. The professors and administrators make only a tiny fraction of what he makes. The world turned upside down!

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"So be proud to be a decent American instead of just a w'anker whipping up fear!" - Michael D. Higgins, President of Ireland



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2012 09:18PM by davester.

>>Frankly, I don't understand why some people have so much allegiance to pro sports programs

You clearly didn't grow up in Wisconsin!



(college football games often look like a contest to see who can hang on to the ball)

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Only a fraction of college sports fans go to these colleges. They represent the region. Like The University of Georgia/Georgia Tech, Alabama/Auburn, UCLA/USC. It always sounds weird to me when a UCLA student hates USC, when most Angelenos like both schools.

Davester, up here in Northern California, Cal represents, more than any other school (inc. Stanford) collegiate athletics against all comers. Cal has "millions" of fans overall. If their teams do well, Cal makes "millions" of dollars. This is why Ted Tedford makes so much money. No other professor can generate that kind of income. Not even Nobel Laureates.

It's more about the identity. Yale vs. Harvard anyone?

The best way to bond people is with a common rival.

It's a stupid system. Go to school to learn something!

In Europe, football is also the big gorilla, (but it is played with a round ball). However it is rightfully kept out of the universities.

The highest salaried person in Arkansas is was the University of Arkansas football coach.

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davester
I think college sports, especially football, have morphed into a completely ridiculous professional business that should have nothing to do with the universities they are attached to. When visiting my bro-in-law in South Carolina (the state where the college football stadiums are the grandest structures in town), I found out that the students for the most part can't even go to the games there because the tickets are all sold for absurd amounts of money to big businesses and rich alumni.

That's not really true, except at the particularly massive schools like Ohio State and Texas (~50,000 students). Student sections (at least in the SEC, which includes the University of South Carolina) are huge, around 15,000 seats, and students get deeply-discounted tickets. With enrollments in the 20-30,000 range, the vast majority of students who are interested can attend home games. At the really gigantic colleges, they have a lottery system for student tickets.

Slagging off on the "rich alumni" and "big businesses" who buy the full-price tickets might be fun, but it misses the point that most college athletic programs are self-funding. In many cases that's a matter of law; in Alabama, for instance, it's flatly illegal for any state funds to go to athletics, all those facilities and salaries are paid for by whatever money the programs themselves generate.

Personally, I've never understood allegiances to professional teams, especially in this day and age when the team members change so quickly. I never understood why I should give a crap about, say, Atlanta's NBA team just because I happen to live in the same area code as they do.

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davester
I think college sports, especially football, have morphed into a completely ridiculous professional business that should have nothing to do with the universities they are attached to. When visiting my bro-in-law in South Carolina (the state where the college football stadiums are the grandest structures in town), I found out that the students for the most part can't even go to the games there because the tickets are all sold for absurd amounts of money to big businesses and rich alumni. At the university of california (just down the hill from me), one of (if not the) highest paid university employees is the football coach. The professors and administrators make only a tiny fraction of what he makes. The world turned upside down!

I'm with davester - football programs are mostly a drain on our public university system and in some cases private universities too, including some of the top ones.
A few top tier programs rake in millions for their school with TV contracts and bowl games, but most college football programs lose money for their schools. About half of Division 1A teams (or whatever it's called now) lose money on football.

And the rest of the athletic program takes the hit, because football is so popular that schools are reluctant to give it anything except top priority, even though it costs 3 or 4 times more than a sport like soccer.
Schools have been cutting programs right and left, usually blaming the recession. And reducing the number of students they take, and laying off professors.
But not football. Somehow the money is there for football.

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Z
The difference in how sports are handled at US universities and those in Canada was somewhat breathtaking, speaking from experience of attending university in Canada. Sure, I participated in a club sport (rowing), but I'd venture a guess it was more in line with what was originally envisioned for collegiate athletics (nobody really pays attention and you do it because you enjoy it).

Football and basketball are multibillion dollar businesses in the US. Why do you think they'd be otherwise (i.e. such a big deal)?

Totally agree about rowing. My son is rowing for his college as a varsity freshman/novice this year and loving it. He qualified for the Western Intercollegiate Championships, which were this past weekend. But you're not going to get Fox Sports to broadcast this, you can't even charge for tickets to watch.
But for the athlete and his team it's fantastic. And as you say, I think that was the original idea behind college athletics.

Why? Popular college sports like football and basketball are high dollar entertainment, and serve as developmental programs for the pro leagues.

Football comes to mind first when most think about big time college sports, but the NCAA rakes in over a billion in annual TV revenue for the men's basketball tournament alone. Combine that with the formal and informal betting pools that occur, and it can't be mistaken for a small-time enterprise.

A big difference between football and basketball is that the schools have bypassed the NCAA middleman for their postseason competition, and a coalition of larger conferences have set up their own racket (aka the BCS in the current incarnation) to extract the most they can in revenue.

The popular sports like football and basketball are often made out to be the bad guys, but the fact is, without them, the revenue-producing sports, programs for the non-revenue sports would rely even more on subsidies, or wouldn't exist at all. That doesn't negate the fact that poorly-run programs can overwhelm and cause harm to some athletic programs as a whole, but there are risks and reward in everything.

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Frankly, I don't understand why some people have so much allegiance to pro sports programs

Why do people have allegiance to anything? It's a part of human nature.