AHC & WI: American universities gracefully phase out football in 1950s?

Jasen777

Donor
Once US Universities figured out that sport - most often American football, and secondarily basketball were cash-cows creating revenue up the wazoo, it was "game-over" (pun intended). There's some schools that either would not exist today, or would be much smaller institutions. It has become the proverbial cart before the horse.

Top Athletic Budgets in NCAA - 2014

Only 20 schools make money off sports, and that includes fees students pay. Sure some universities would be less popular and others more so, but as a group they'd be fine without sports (or without "money making" sports).

edit: and as others have said the '50s are too late and the stopping the Roosevelt era reforms is the best chance of stopping football.
 

Driftless

Donor
Only 20 schools make money off sports, and that includes fees students pay. Sure some universities would be less popular and others more so, but as a group they'd be fine without sports (or without "money making" sports).

edit: and as others have said the '50s are too late and the stopping the Roosevelt era reforms is the best chance of stopping football.

It's not just the money directly connected to the sporting activity; it's also the shake down of wealthy alumni and other supporters for donations un-related to sport.
 

jahenders

Banned
I find it hard to believe that the lack of football will mean that colleges are less supported, many fold, the others become as expensive as Harvard, and no one can go to college ...

If the colleges didn't have football, the alumni would still be interested in other sports (and, occasionally, academics). In fact, they'd have more interest to spend on other sports -- rowing, fencing, soccer, etc, which might improve US olympic performance.

Even with the depression, state schools might contract, but they're not likely to fold completely and will be super-energized after WWII with the GI Bill, student loans, etc.

There's an alt history story with that premise. Although Teddy only bans the game in colleges. The outcome of the story is basically...

* With far less public and alumni interest thanks to the lack of "amateur" sports in college, higher education is isolated from mainstream American life. The Great Depression proves devastating. By 1939, there are fewer than seventy-five state-supported colleges left in the country, as state governments can't justify spending tax dollars on them. Even then, "state-supported" is more like "state-assisted" and they have to raise their tuition almost as high as private universities, and ultimately only one person out of a hundred can afford to attend a state university.
 

Driftless

Donor
I find it hard to believe that the lack of football will mean that colleges are less supported, many fold, the others become as expensive as Harvard, and no one can go to college ...

If the colleges didn't have football, the alumni would still be interested in other sports (and, occasionally, academics). In fact, they'd have more interest to spend on other sports -- rowing, fencing, soccer, etc, which might improve US olympic performance.

Even with the depression, state schools might contract, but they're not likely to fold completely and will be super-energized after WWII with the GI Bill, student loans, etc.

Jeez, you're trying to apply logic here.... :D I'm not saying the connection between success in sport and non-tax supported funding is a good idea, but it does happen.

A college closing is not done because they lack a powerhouse football program, it's because they lack a critical mass of students, and supporting finances - regardless of source. For small private colleges, it's often becomes a process of dwindling away - student by student. In a mobile society that prizes shallow celebrity above many other attributes, you need to create ways of drawing attention to your programs, which sport seems to provide. In the popular culture, more folks know the name of a second string cornerback for SMU than they know the name of any living Nobel prize winner.....
 
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Jeez, you're trying to apply logic here.... :D I'm not saying the connection between success in support and non-tax supported funding is a good idea, but it does happen. ....

In the popular culture, more folks know the name of a second string cornerback for SMU than they know the name of any living Nobel prize winner.....

So true. The USA is still largely governed by a popular mentality that depreciates intellectual endeavors and really only values university education when it provides a "professional" education (ie law, engineering, medicine, architecture, etc). Athletics is a bridge that provides the large state, taxpayer supported universities with a connection to broader society that ultimately pays it bills. When I was a university-based research archaeologist many years ago, it was very, very, beneficial when doing surveys in rural areas to be able to talk football with local landowners you met. Once they saw the "OU" logo on our truck, conversation immediately turned to "How do you think Sooners will do next season?" Since we needed to foster good relationships with the people who owned the land we wanted to investigate, being able to participate intelligently and knowledgably as a fan in such discussions was far more valuable than how many papers or monographs we had published.
 
http://www.cleveland.com/osu/index.ssf/2011/11/ohio_state-michigan_snapshot_n.html

' . . . The Rose Bowl extended an invitation to the 1961 team, but the OSU faculty council voted not to accept the invitation. Hayes was livid about the decision and said it would hurt recruiting; and students rioted over the decision. . . '
This is the wrong way to do it, an abrupt, clunk decision toward the end of a successful season.

But this does show both the possibilities and the problems.
 

jahenders

Banned
Sadly, that's largely true. Except, perhaps, Obama who won a Nobel prize either as a "participation award" or in a raffle -- not sure which.

In the popular culture, more folks know the name of a second string cornerback for SMU than they know the name of any living Nobel prize winner.....
 

jahenders

Banned
Somewhat true, though the pseudo-messianic annointing of Obama by much of academia and the media had a lot to do with it, coupled with a crazy/giddy "Look, we're so sophisticated that we really love this black president thing, even though we'll never have one or our own" mindset.

In any case, we'll call that a participation award -- you haven't scored any points yet, but thanks for playing.

He won it because he wasn't George W Bush.
 
And please keep in mind that most of the evidence is low-tech: basic academic achievement-like tests before and after an athletic season, studies of older athletes compared to nonathletes, autopsies which include thin sections and staining. And heck, they may have even been better with this last part and more comfortable with it in the '50s than today.

And you might need a POD in '46 and the reshuffling provided by the end of the war and the GI Bill. And athletes like to take care of and stand up for each other. You can probably think of a number of examples of this, both positive and negative. Just have it be more common knowledge that it's bad to stack one concussion on top of another, and even that repeated lesser blows aren't all that great.

I think it can be pulled off, but then I'm the guy who came up with the challenge. I'd like to know how you'd pull it off.
 
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