New Ask The AD

[FUBeAR]

I think the administration thinks the value we get out of basketball is much greater than football in terms of brand exposure. But admin is reluctant to move FB down due to cultural factors and such... but we don't fund it in the way theat Mercer and others do.

You can’t move football down without moving all sports down.

Correct, under current NCAA rules. So, under current NCAA rules, as FUBeAR sees it, these are the Athletics cost-reducing options for FU…

1) Stay as is & manage FU funded athletics budgets down, to whatever level deemed necessary, sport by sport (this budget management piece is also implied, as deemed necessary, in all other options below, except #12).

2) Move Football to the PFL (D1 FCS Conference), eliminating Football scholarships for Football Players.

3) Drop as many sports, besides Football and Men’s Hoops, as deemed necessary, as low as the NCAA minimum number allowed for D1, while maintaining Title IX compliance.

4) Do Options 2 AND 3.

5) Move all sports to D2, D3, or NAIA. (D3 would probably be the only option, within this option, that would make much sense for FU, IFBO).

6) Do Option 3 AND 5, with Option 3 adjusted to consider the minimum number of sports required at the ‘new’ level

7) Drop Football.

8) Drop Men’s Basketball (might require leaving the SoCon…dunno))

9) Do Options 3, 5, AND 7, with Option 3 modified to include doing Option 7.

10) Do Options 3, 5, AND 8, with Option 3 modified to include doing Option 8.

11) Do Options 3, 5, 7, AND 8, with Option 3 modified to include doing Options 7 and 8.

12) Eliminate FU intercollegiate athletics entirely


FUBeAR doesn’t like, but doesn’t hate only Option 1, if deemed necessary … but, while absolutely hating, could still live with the wildly unpopular, among Football peeps (and others), Options 2, 3, or 4. And, FUBeAR could even live with the wildly unpopular among Football AND Basketball peeps (and others), Option 5 (if D3 only, not with D2 or NAIA), or FUBeAR could even live with Options 6, 8, or 10.

Choose Options 7, 9, 11, or 12… and FUBeAR is “out.”

[Affirm]

When’s this due?

[Affirm]

I think the administration thinks the value we get out of basketball is much greater than football in terms of brand exposure. But admin is reluctant to move FB down due to cultural factors and such... but we don't fund it in the way theat Mercer and others do.

You can’t move football down without moving all sports down.

Correct, under current NCAA rules. So, under current NCAA rules, as FUBeAR sees it, these are the Athletics cost-reducing options for FU…

1) Stay as is & manage FU funded athletics budgets down, to whatever level deemed necessary, sport by sport (this budget management piece is also implied, as deemed necessary, in all other options below, except #12).

2) Move Football to the PFL (D1 FCS Conference), eliminating Football scholarships for Football Players.

3) Drop as many sports, besides Football and Men’s Hoops, as deemed necessary, as low as the NCAA minimum number allowed for D1, while maintaining Title IX compliance.

4) Do Options 2 AND 3.

5) Move all sports to D2, D3, or NAIA. (D3 would probably be the only option, within this option, that would make much sense for FU, IFBO).

6) Do Option 3 AND 5, with Option 3 adjusted to consider the minimum number of sports required at the ‘new’ level

7) Drop Football.

8) Drop Men’s Basketball (might require leaving the SoCon…dunno))

9) Do Options 3, 5, AND 7, with Option 3 modified to include doing Option 7.

10) Do Options 3, 5, AND 8, with Option 3 modified to include doing Option 8.

11) Do Options 3, 5, 7, AND 8, with Option 3 modified to include doing Options 7 and 8.

12) Eliminate FU intercollegiate athletics entirely


FUBeAR doesn’t like, but doesn’t hate only Option 1, if deemed necessary … but, while absolutely hating, could still live with the wildly unpopular, among Football peeps (and others), Options 2, 3, or 4. And, FUBeAR could even live with the wildly unpopular among Football AND Basketball peeps (and others), Option 5 (if D3 only, not with D2 or NAIA), or FUBeAR could even live with Options 6, 8, or 10.

Choose Options 7, 9, 11, or 12… and FUBeAR is “out.”

My brain is, or at least my time availability at present is, a little too limited to fully evaluate. But I do want to submit something before the deadline.
ASK THE AD IF HE WOULD PLEASE GIVE CONSIDERATION TO INVESTIGATING THE FOLLOWING POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE OF FURMAN ATHLETICS:
1.Join A-10 plus Pioneer for football like Davidson.
Or
2.Join A-10 plus Patriot for football like Richmond.
Or
3.Join Patriot for all sports if it could be arranged for good combination of the following schools to join at the same time we do (listed in order of my preference, some combination of perhaps 3 or more of the following): W&M; CofC; Wofford; Citadel; VMI.

[apaladin]

Affirm, pardon my french but those are some dumb options you presented. First can’t understand why you want FB to go no scholly. It would kill FB. I would no longer support or attend and I know many others feel the same. Not to mention the extended travel. The Patriot League has teams from the mid-atlantic to the northeast with most being in the northeast, only Flagman would make those trips. As for basketball the A-10 already has 15 teams scattered from NY, to Chicago to St.Louis with only a couple being driveable. We would have very little chance to ever making the NCAA tourney again. Everything you proposed is cost prohibitive and not fan friendly. Regards.

[Affirm]

Affirm, pardon my french but those are some dumb options you presented. First can’t understand why you want FB to go no scholly. It would kill FB. I would no longer support or attend and I know many others feel the same. Not to mention the extended travel. The Patriot League has teams from the mid-atlantic to the northeast with most being in the northeast, only Flagman would make those trips. As for basketball the A-10 already has 15 teams scattered from NY, to Chicago to St.Louis with only a couple being driveable. We would have very little chance to ever making the NCAA tourney again. Everything you proposed is cost prohibitive and not fan friendly. Regards.

“First”: no, Pioneer football would not “kill football”
“The extended travel”: It’s 2025. Many conferences are spread out tremendously (ACC, SEC, Big 10, Big 12. And we would be no more spread out for travel than Davidson and some others in A-10. For Patriot, I stated the need to get schools closer to us to go along with us, such as W&M (note that UR has already moved to Patriot for FB), CofC, Wofford, Citadel, VMI.

[Affirm]

Affirm, pardon my french but those are some dumb options you presented. First can’t understand why you want FB to go no scholly. It would kill FB. I would no longer support or attend and I know many others feel the same. Not to mention the extended travel. The Patriot League has teams from the mid-atlantic to the northeast with most being in the northeast, only Flagman would make those trips. As for basketball the A-10 already has 15 teams scattered from NY, to Chicago to St.Louis with only a couple being driveable. We would have very little chance to ever making the NCAA tourney again. Everything you proposed is cost prohibitive and not fan friendly. Regards.

“First”: no, Pioneer football would not “kill football”
“The extended travel”: It’s 2025. Many conferences are spread out tremendously (ACC, SEC, Big 10, Big 12, Big Sky, Missouri Valley, others.) And we would be no more spread out for travel than Davidson and some others in A-10. For Patriot, I stated the need to seek schools closer to us to go along with us, (note that UR has already moved to Patriot for FB), such as W&M , CofC, Wofford, Citadel, VMI, UNCG, UNCW, WCU, Elon, ETSU, Mercer.

[apaladin]

Yes Pioneer would kill football interest. No FBS games, could not compete with other scholarship programs/conferences, Ex: as bad as we were last year we still beat the snot out of a Pioneer team. All those conferences you mentioned have buckets of money so they can afford expenses. How many foitball players do you think would pay $70k to go to FU? FU cannot aftord a baseball team so how are they going to pay for all these far away trips for non-revenue teams? As far as getting other teams together, why go thru that headache when we have a perfectly fine and compact, easy travel league now?

[FUATT]

I think the administration thinks the value we get out of basketball is much greater than football in terms of brand exposure. But admin is reluctant to move FB down due to cultural factors and such... but we don't fund it in the way theat Mercer and others do.

You can’t move football down without moving all sports down.

That's right, forgot that they changed it. You can play D1 in one sport and D3 in all others but that one sport cannot be football or basketball. So that protects Football. Good.

[FUBeAR]

I think the administration thinks the value we get out of basketball is much greater than football in terms of brand exposure. But admin is reluctant to move FB down due to cultural factors and such... but we don't fund it in the way theat Mercer and others do.

You can’t move football down without moving all sports down.

That's right, forgot that they changed it. You can play D1 in one sport and D3 in all others but that one sport cannot be football or basketball. So that protects Football. Good.

Football not “protected” by that from making a move to the PFL.