[Mr. Baseball]

What I find most sad about this is that it betrays the ideal that Stanford is into intercollegiate athletics because excellence is an end in itself, and that the University takes the idea that funding for athletics is like funding for the humanities.  The University ought to do so, not because the funding makes economic sense, but because it is part of what makes Stanford "Stanford".  What we are left with is athletics as a business decision, ever more dependent on the revenue sports to keep the whole venture going, and thus ever more beholden to taking steps to maximize revenue rather instead of maximizing students' welfare.

It is a very sad day.

BC

Agree 10,000 percent.

Not even a warning fired across the bow that there would need to be further contributions to Stanford's athletic endowment to keep this from happening. Just we're cutting and the decision is final. That's a blow to the image and prestige of the university and will forever color how I think of it.

[Mr. Baseball]

What I find most sad about this is that it betrays the ideal that Stanford is into intercollegiate athletics because excellence is an end in itself, and that the University takes the idea that funding for athletics is like funding for the humanities.  The University ought to do so, not because the funding makes economic sense, but because it is part of what makes Stanford "Stanford".  What we are left with is athletics as a business decision, ever more dependent on the revenue sports to keep the whole venture going, and thus ever more beholden to taking steps to maximize revenue rather instead of maximizing students' welfare.

It is a very sad day.

BC

Agree 10,000 percent.

Not even a warning fired across the bow that there would need to be further contributions to Stanford's athletic endowment to keep this from happening. Just we're cutting and the decision is final. That's a blow to the image and prestige of the university and will forever color how I think of it.