[BillBradley]

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.

[BillBradley]

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.