[Mick]

When evaluating the worth of successful football and basketball programs to a university in the "new world", I find that practically all of the discussions center around these topics:
1) The cost of becoming competitive
2) The acceptance of change
3) The hypocrisy of academic institutions increasing the priority/investment in athletics
4) Negative impact on the college athlete (time, pressure, travel, etc.)

As with any complex decision on change, it comes down to weighing the pros and cons. Each of the topics in the above list are cons. Spending more money. Change. Hypocrisy. Negative impact. The discussions are mostly downers, and center around debating the extent of the cons. Those who have spent time in their careers as strategy/management consultants know that this is a rather typical experience that large organizations go through when faced with a major decision. That's why they are hired. 

The Stanford community needs to spend more time on creating a new vision of a Stanford in the new world of college athletics and articulating the associated benefits. How does a successful football and basketball program benefit the university? What is the version of a Stanford in the new world of athletics that's better than today's Stanford?  What does that look like and why is it better? Without something to compare against the current version of Stanford, no one will ever need, want or accept the change. They will stay stuck on their favorite con or two and continue to steer discussions in that direction.

Work like this is difficult and I don't want to spend my time trying to lay something out on a sports board that's nowhere close to complete. I will say though that high on my list of benefits of the new version of Stanford would be some sort of improved picture of student life/culture. I believe the students that get to enjoy Duke or Gonzaga mens basketball or Iowa womens basketball or Alabama/Ohio St <insert pretty much any SEC/B10 school here> simply have a more enjoyable experience at their university because of their teams vs. if they had gone to Stanford. I believe the students that got to experience the Luck/CMac years have a leg up on today's students as far as their enjoyment of their years in college goes. To me, that's really important.

I like your framing.  But we also have to remember that while the Luck/CMac years were great for many of the students at Stanford, not everyone is into athletics or cares about how the sports teams do.  It's not like the only thing that differentiates between a pleasant experience at Stanford is a winning versus a losing team.

I also believe that one of the things (at least to me, a student in the mid-90's) that made athletics at Stanford particularly enjoyable (despite the fact that we had a losing record in football two of the four years) was that the students were "like the rest of us" in many important ways.  Athletes lived in our dorms, they went to our classes, they ate the same crappy food we did, they had to apply and be admitted along with the rest of us.  Unfortunately, a lot of the proposed solutions to the competitiveness issues involve separating athletes from the rest of the student body, whether it is allowing athletes to come to start early, accommodations due to the now more onerous travel schedules, training tables for the athletes, etc.  Let's face it, much of what it would take to be competitive is to attract athletes to Stanford by privilege athletes compared to the student population.  Not sure that's great.

BC

Nice post as always, BC. Two quick thoughts: I took my one-and-only art class which involved a visit to the San Jose Museum of Art. The featured exhibit was a collection of soup tureens. My 18-year-old self probably rolled my eyes a little too much and probably questioned the validity of said art to the teacher who reasonably replied "Fine, you don't have to like the exhibit. But please recognize that some people do like it."

A campus experience is an entire environment. Maybe you like Rodin's sculptures, maybe you don't...but they add a lot to the campus experience. At the same time, Stanford is all about excellence, in everything. Except men's basketball and football. What would SU lose if (a) the team continues to stink or (b) gets eliminated? And what would SU gain if the team regains the excitement, wins and prestige of a decade+ ago?

Incidentally, I agree fully with your comments on athletes in classes. Athletes were in all of my classes, and I have worked with a bunch of them. And they've done very well after college. Next week, I'm talking with the former QB of our football team, we're in the same business. I'd hate to segregate athletes from other students.

[Mick]

When evaluating the worth of successful football and basketball programs to a university in the "new world", I find that practically all of the discussions center around these topics:
1) The cost of becoming competitive
2) The acceptance of change
3) The hypocrisy of academic institutions increasing the priority/investment in athletics
4) Negative impact on the college athlete (time, pressure, travel, etc.)

As with any complex decision on change, it comes down to weighing the pros and cons. Each of the topics in the above list are cons. Spending more money. Change. Hypocrisy. Negative impact. The discussions are mostly downers, and center around debating the extent of the cons. Those who have spent time in their careers as strategy/management consultants know that this is a rather typical experience that large organizations go through when faced with a major decision. That's why they are hired. 

The Stanford community needs to spend more time on creating a new vision of a Stanford in the new world of college athletics and articulating the associated benefits. How does a successful football and basketball program benefit the university? What is the version of a Stanford in the new world of athletics that's better than today's Stanford?  What does that look like and why is it better? Without something to compare against the current version of Stanford, no one will ever need, want or accept the change. They will stay stuck on their favorite con or two and continue to steer discussions in that direction.

Work like this is difficult and I don't want to spend my time trying to lay something out on a sports board that's nowhere close to complete. I will say though that high on my list of benefits of the new version of Stanford would be some sort of improved picture of student life/culture. I believe the students that get to enjoy Duke or Gonzaga mens basketball or Iowa womens basketball or Alabama/Ohio St <insert pretty much any SEC/B10 school here> simply have a more enjoyable experience at their university because of their teams vs. if they had gone to Stanford. I believe the students that got to experience the Luck/CMac years have a leg up on today's students as far as their enjoyment of their years in college goes. To me, that's really important.

I like your framing.  But we also have to remember that while the Luck/CMac years were great for many of the students at Stanford, not everyone is into athletics or cares about how the sports teams do.  It's not like the only thing that differentiates between a pleasant experience at Stanford is a winning versus a losing team.

I also believe that one of the things (at least to me, a student in the mid-90's) that made athletics at Stanford particularly enjoyable (despite the fact that we had a losing record in football two of the four years) was that the students were "like the rest of us" in many important ways.  Athletes lived in our dorms, they went to our classes, they ate the same crappy food we did, they had to apply and be admitted along with the rest of us.  Unfortunately, a lot of the proposed solutions to the competitiveness issues involve separating athletes from the rest of the student body, whether it is allowing athletes to come to start early, accommodations due to the now more onerous travel schedules, training tables for the athletes, etc.  Let's face it, much of what it would take to be competitive is to attract athletes to Stanford by privilege athletes compared to the student population.  Not sure that's great.

BC

Nice post as always, BC. Two quick thoughts: I took my one-and-only art class which involved a visit to the San Jose Museum of Art. The featured exhibit was a collection of soup tureens. My 18-year-old self probably rolled my eyes a little too much and probably questioned the validity of said art to the teacher who reasonably replied "Fine, you don't have to like the exhibit. But please recognize that some people do like it."

A campus experience is an entire environment. Maybe you like Rodin's sculptures, maybe you don't...but they add a lot to the campus experience. At the same time, Stanford is all about excellence, in everything. Except men's basketball and football. What would SU lose if (a) the team continues to stink or (b) gets eliminated? And what would SU gain if the team regains the excitement, wins and prestige of a decade+ ago?

Incidentally, I agree fully with your comments on athletes in classes. Athletes were in all of my classes, and I have worked with a bunch of them. And they've done very well after college. Next week, I'm talking with the former QB of our football team, we're in the same business. I'd hate to segregate athletes from other students.