Friday, October 19, 2007

109 Mill On College Sports

In the Wall Street Journal today there is an article called, "Inside College Sports Biggest Money Machine."

Even if you don't like sports, this thing is pretty crazy:
At $109,382,222 for the current year, Ohio State's athletic budget is the largest in the nation and the biggest in the history of college sports. It allows the school to field 36 varsity teams in everything from baseball and soccer to riflery and synchronized swimming. The school spends about $110,000 on each of its 980 athletes, which is triple the amount the university spends per undergraduate on education.


There are all kinds of shocking numbers in there, too many to go over, but the article is simultaneously sickening and refreshing. Football and basketball are the big money makers for the school, but they don't keep it all for themselves:

OSU's pistol team maintains a supply of about 30 firearms for the team's 11 members, and all shooters receive an array of free Nike gear, including polo shirts, a jacket and shoes. "We're a good-looking team," says James Sweeney, OSU's pistol coach since 1999. This year, for the first time ever, OSU's rifle and pistol teams received scholarship money to recruit top competitors.


Recruited to shoot guns? A bit odd.

2 comments:

Snaxxx said...

florida's budget must be up there too.

Anonymous said...

I wonder how much money they make on Bowl Games for football, I have to believe this is one of the reasons that College Football is so screwed up because they won't give up that $$$ for a real playoff system. The lower divisions in College Football already have a working playoff system and none of this BCS / Poll crap.

Good story.