Not sure if it is fair to keep saying the UC Berkeley admin does not support athletics. We got a pricey seismic upgrade of Memorial, a new and expensive high performance center, a $30 million kick to the AD budget, etc. Yes we lack a dedicated practice facility for MBB, but given everything that happened with ticket sales and the stadium financing, it's sort of understandable. A few years ago the vibe on the football program was trending upwards and then a couple of disappointing seasons (with extenuating circumstances) derailed everything. I do think Mark Fox has worn out his welcome, but the idea that men's basketball can't succeed without an expensive new practice facility is bullshit. There is so much wasted money spent at universities on flashy new facilities and associated support staff, and it rarely has a transformational impact. Did the HIgh Performance Center that we so desperately needed really make that big of a difference? We are worse off now than we were before.
I think it's safe to say the resources admin have provided is robust enough to field competitive revenue teams. We've shown we have when we've had the right administrators in place. I think it's more a case of priorities, management and decision-making for how those dollars get spent. I agree that we over-emphasize the practice facilities. Although, as someone who still occasionally plays hoops at RSF, I sure wish they would get one, so it doesn't also impact court availability for the rest of us just trying to get our runs in.
Instead of spending $150 million, or whatever, for an on-campus practice facility shoe-horned next to Haas, why can't we acquire long-term control of a site off campus, renovate it, buy a few vans, and ferry the teams back and forth to practice? That would have to cost much less than $150 million, wouldn't it?
Also, quit focusing on the CS dude and the faculty on campus that were critical of athletics. Given the larger picture, they have a right to be....but more importantly, casting all of the faculty as disliking sports is inaccurate. There are lots of faculty on campus that like it. It's like painting a whole state as a partisan monolith when most states have lots of people with different views. There is love for Cal athletics across campus.
I think the incoming big change that could drastically alter collegiate sports will be the revenue sharing with the student-athletes, which supposedly a version is already drafted by the California legislation. Not Cal, but other schools might cut a lot of non-revenue sports as the effect thus allowing Cal to follow suit with lesser pushback.
Is it valid to say that if Cal sports were more successful and drew more paying customers and got more television exposure, the amount of institutional support needed would be reduced? If so, Clueless Carol needs to direct Empty Suit Jim to get his butt off dead center and upgrade every cash generating program. Fire deadbeat coaches and hire winning coaches. Maybe even drop some sports that are "dead weight" (for ex.,track and field, cross country, et al). Forget the Presidents Cup and dominate in the high profile cash producing sports (and maintain dominance in other positive sports - swimming, water polo, et al.- even the club sports - crew, rugby, et al). Sadly, I don't think Empty suit Jim can handle the assignment and he needs to go too. However, given his insipid contract extension, maybe he can be transferred to the grounds and maintenance department.
I'm not sure that's valid. You would for sure earn more revenue, but may be outpaced by outgoing expenses. And some of the benefit of the competitiveness may not show up for years, say when students matriculate into donors, etc. I think the question that's of most interest to me, is how athletic success contributes to the overall brand and financial success of a university. An example of this might be Oregon. When I was growing up, Oregon was a bit of an outlier school. Today, it's become one of the most popular and applied to schools for California high schoolers. Academically not much has changed in the past several decades, but the Oregon brand has been amplified several times over because of the athletic success. There is for sure a correlation.
Yeah I think Oregon is a good example of a transformational change in brand and image. But it has taken several billion dollars in infusion from Uncle Phil along with his ongoing support for operating expenses. Same with Boone Pickens at Oklahoma.
T.Boone is Oklahoma State, not Oklahoma. Oklahoma State is miles ahead of where they would be without his support, but nobody a fuck about Oklahoma State still.
Right, Oregon is an extreme example and we'll likely never be in a position to hope for the same influx--at least in yours and my lifetimes. But I am interested in how athletic success impacts revenue and brand credibility in ways that don't show up directly in the annual report. Berkeley remains and will always remain a top academic brand, but our academic standing has slipped slightly in recent years, mostly due to the continued strain of do-more-with-less budgets. If one could show a correlation that athletics success results in financial gains across the institution (not just athletics), then it may be easier to sell Christ and administrators on the idea that investment in athletics may ultimately feed the rest of the institution and its brand credibility.
Athletics, whether successful or not, indeed does affect overall contributions to schools. Along with all other aspects of university life, alumni maintain fond memories and connections through their participation in sports as well as fans of major college sports. This has been proved out at Oregon, Stanford, and other universities. Maybe Bob R. can find some citations on those studies?
Christ isn't doing this for revenue sports, she's doing it to maintain 30 varsity sports, most of which have varying degrees of mediocrity, because she cares more about the traditional student athlete experience and is willing to fund cash burning programs
I thought Christ's reasoning was that some of Cal's athletics facilities was actually used for academic purposes so therefore a certain percentage should be paid from the Berkeley side.
The rationale for the university contributing to the Stadium renovation included the fact that the state required the seismic retrofits (so it wouldn't be fair for the athletic dept to BEAR that burden alone). Also, there are meeting rooms, weddings, graduations, and other events at the stadium that have nothing to do with athletics.
No, the High Performance Center, in particular. It's not the cost of using it; it's a share of the cost to build and/or finance it. Ergo the $30 M and whatever finance costs are incurred annually by both Cal and UC Berkeley.
Not the high performance center specifically, but there is also a smaller ancillary RSF weight room/gym in Memorial for students. There are also a number of conference rooms at the high performance center that I assume are also used for classrooms.
I don't know. All I remember is Christ saying that the entire project should have been partly shouldered by the university as a whole, not just Cal athletics, because it benefits the entire university.
That amount of general campus support to athletics tends to counter the popular narrative that a lack of institutional support is a sizable contributor to the struggles of FB/MBB/WBB/BB.
Zero chance there is a default. Possibly a negotiated refinancing. Keep in mind, the athletic department doesn't have a true loan, and the campus entity has the external liability, even if internally athletics has a large (and varying) degree of responsibility for it. Suppliers of building materials and cash will get paid. It's a matter of internal politics and arm wrestling whose' budget gets what sized hit. And given the size and duration of the debt for what has long appeared to be a very poorly managed project, a change of Chancellor is a certainty during the run of it, at which time whatever the status of the campus politics and bookkeeping is will be completely up for grabs.
Even better, UC issued 50-year bonds to fund the West Side Improvements project (aka Cal Memorial renovation). You may remember that the Regents' approval was required before the bonds could be issued.
Yeah they can’t default, as they know they will need bond financing again. If I had my druthers and I were Chancellor I would buy as many of the neighboring houses as possible in order to moot that opposition to revenue events there.
After I read what the enormous total cost was, and before I saw the end product for the first time, I assumed that was a part of it. For that money, a lot of clap-trap housing and old business fronts must have been acquired and torn down, to facilitate improved access and some semblance of parking, this for one of the hardest to access and egress venues in the west, and probably some cooperative venture to get some semblance of a modern hotel presence nearby. It was an obvious to anyone who had tried to navigate the terrible streets and lack of parking and facilities need. And low and behold, on the first trip back after the project, none of that was done. And the stadium was a poor man's early 70's endeavor.
Also just seems basic. If you are going to build a project that will attract a lot of people, you want to buy the neighboring lots, to capture the increase in value. Otherwise you are just gifting those folks a windfall
Just my two cents. The seismic retrofit of the grandstand and the new press box on the west side were very expensive. They should have demo'd the entire west side of the stadium (not retrofitted) and constructed an entirely new, and smaller, west grandstand with a new, and less lavish, press box (all up to current seismic standards). I think that would have been significantly less expensive than what they did.
And they should have done a little more on the east side. It's really silly when you have spent hundreds of millions and you still have porta potties and no decent concessions on the east side, isn't it?
The entire project was poorly conceived. And this leaves still open the question of whether they got their money's worth for what they actually ended up doing (ie, was the project as built well managed and overseen).
The die-hard Cal fan in me bristles at the thought of a smaller West side. We should wanna be the Big House like Michigan’s. As for the east side, yeah the austere accommodations might be just one reason why so many students don’t go to games.
(See also my response to Overall). The price for what they got was way overboard (whomever the GC was got away with stealing a massive amount of money), and a lot of what should have been done surrounding the project wasn't. Cal got a poorly lit version of Autzen (built decades ago) that has no parking.
I was comparing it in terms of stadium style (open concrete bowl with no upper deck), bench seating style, very limited box/lodge./club/covered seating, etc,; the fan experience aspects. Both look like a 60s era stadium (which Autzen actually is), not a 21st century stadium build.
I do realize the construction site is different, though every building everywhere has to meet seismic requirements, and Autzen sits near a river, in a floodplain, next to a wetland, on hydraulic grounds, which presents its own engineering complications, and costs, historically and currently.
And in a location also with wildly deficient street services.
It's a strain to reconcile the extreme costs for what Cal got relative to the costs of other relatively contemporary stadium construction and renovation projects without wondering if seismic issues weren't used as cover for at least some increased costs that don't seem to have been critically reviewed at the risk of being seen as cutting corners on safety. And at this point, its water under the bridge (or stadium), as the money is already spent.
I'd say opportunistic, when presented with a contract administrator that did not know construction or facilities design. And maybe of less than hoped for ethics, though that should be anticipated.
Oh, I'm certain there is animosity, resentment, and jealousy between various competing ivory castles and camps, not just athletics. It's a problem on many campuses, but evidence supports the notion that it must be a bigger than usual issue on the Berkeley campus, a condition built up over decades of not doing a very good job of coordinating efforts and focus.
If Revenue Sharing comes to pass, Cal will have no choice but reduce teams, or the then Chancellor will have to contribute more out of General campus funds.
Not sure if it is fair to keep saying the UC Berkeley admin does not support athletics. We got a pricey seismic upgrade of Memorial, a new and expensive high performance center, a $30 million kick to the AD budget, etc. Yes we lack a dedicated practice facility for MBB, but given everything that happened with ticket sales and the stadium financing, it's sort of understandable. A few years ago the vibe on the football program was trending upwards and then a couple of disappointing seasons (with extenuating circumstances) derailed everything. I do think Mark Fox has worn out his welcome, but the idea that men's basketball can't succeed without an expensive new practice facility is bullshit. There is so much wasted money spent at universities on flashy new facilities and associated support staff, and it rarely has a transformational impact. Did the HIgh Performance Center that we so desperately needed really make that big of a difference? We are worse off now than we were before.
I think it's safe to say the resources admin have provided is robust enough to field competitive revenue teams. We've shown we have when we've had the right administrators in place. I think it's more a case of priorities, management and decision-making for how those dollars get spent. I agree that we over-emphasize the practice facilities. Although, as someone who still occasionally plays hoops at RSF, I sure wish they would get one, so it doesn't also impact court availability for the rest of us just trying to get our runs in.
Instead of spending $150 million, or whatever, for an on-campus practice facility shoe-horned next to Haas, why can't we acquire long-term control of a site off campus, renovate it, buy a few vans, and ferry the teams back and forth to practice? That would have to cost much less than $150 million, wouldn't it?
Also, quit focusing on the CS dude and the faculty on campus that were critical of athletics. Given the larger picture, they have a right to be....but more importantly, casting all of the faculty as disliking sports is inaccurate. There are lots of faculty on campus that like it. It's like painting a whole state as a partisan monolith when most states have lots of people with different views. There is love for Cal athletics across campus.
Great, we have beaucoup bucks to fire Fox.
I wouldn't complain if we used up all the surplus to fire Fox
I think the incoming big change that could drastically alter collegiate sports will be the revenue sharing with the student-athletes, which supposedly a version is already drafted by the California legislation. Not Cal, but other schools might cut a lot of non-revenue sports as the effect thus allowing Cal to follow suit with lesser pushback.
Also, isn't this technically a $1.3M loss if we have to pay back the extra money the Pac-12 got paid out from media rights?
Had to stare at the title a bit to confirm it was not “mismanagement” - my natural inclination these days .
Is it valid to say that if Cal sports were more successful and drew more paying customers and got more television exposure, the amount of institutional support needed would be reduced? If so, Clueless Carol needs to direct Empty Suit Jim to get his butt off dead center and upgrade every cash generating program. Fire deadbeat coaches and hire winning coaches. Maybe even drop some sports that are "dead weight" (for ex.,track and field, cross country, et al). Forget the Presidents Cup and dominate in the high profile cash producing sports (and maintain dominance in other positive sports - swimming, water polo, et al.- even the club sports - crew, rugby, et al). Sadly, I don't think Empty suit Jim can handle the assignment and he needs to go too. However, given his insipid contract extension, maybe he can be transferred to the grounds and maintenance department.
I'm not sure that's valid. You would for sure earn more revenue, but may be outpaced by outgoing expenses. And some of the benefit of the competitiveness may not show up for years, say when students matriculate into donors, etc. I think the question that's of most interest to me, is how athletic success contributes to the overall brand and financial success of a university. An example of this might be Oregon. When I was growing up, Oregon was a bit of an outlier school. Today, it's become one of the most popular and applied to schools for California high schoolers. Academically not much has changed in the past several decades, but the Oregon brand has been amplified several times over because of the athletic success. There is for sure a correlation.
Yeah I think Oregon is a good example of a transformational change in brand and image. But it has taken several billion dollars in infusion from Uncle Phil along with his ongoing support for operating expenses. Same with Boone Pickens at Oklahoma.
T.Boone is Oklahoma State, not Oklahoma. Oklahoma State is miles ahead of where they would be without his support, but nobody a fuck about Oklahoma State still.
Right, Oregon is an extreme example and we'll likely never be in a position to hope for the same influx--at least in yours and my lifetimes. But I am interested in how athletic success impacts revenue and brand credibility in ways that don't show up directly in the annual report. Berkeley remains and will always remain a top academic brand, but our academic standing has slipped slightly in recent years, mostly due to the continued strain of do-more-with-less budgets. If one could show a correlation that athletics success results in financial gains across the institution (not just athletics), then it may be easier to sell Christ and administrators on the idea that investment in athletics may ultimately feed the rest of the institution and its brand credibility.
Also the non-reliance on standardized tests is for me, a major negative for Cal in the future.
Athletics, whether successful or not, indeed does affect overall contributions to schools. Along with all other aspects of university life, alumni maintain fond memories and connections through their participation in sports as well as fans of major college sports. This has been proved out at Oregon, Stanford, and other universities. Maybe Bob R. can find some citations on those studies?
Hah.
Man if I only had won Powerball
Christ: "How do you like me, now?"
Bear Fans: "Stop hobbling revenue sports and you want have to give us so much."
Christ isn't doing this for revenue sports, she's doing it to maintain 30 varsity sports, most of which have varying degrees of mediocrity, because she cares more about the traditional student athlete experience and is willing to fund cash burning programs
She painting the entire porch.....which is a wrap around porch.
I thought Christ's reasoning was that some of Cal's athletics facilities was actually used for academic purposes so therefore a certain percentage should be paid from the Berkeley side.
The rationale for the university contributing to the Stadium renovation included the fact that the state required the seismic retrofits (so it wouldn't be fair for the athletic dept to BEAR that burden alone). Also, there are meeting rooms, weddings, graduations, and other events at the stadium that have nothing to do with athletics.
Like the Simpson Athletic Study Center at Memorial?
Sure some finals are held at Haas Pavilion, but there's no way students incur $30M in cost for using athletic facilities each year
No, the High Performance Center, in particular. It's not the cost of using it; it's a share of the cost to build and/or finance it. Ergo the $30 M and whatever finance costs are incurred annually by both Cal and UC Berkeley.
Can normal students actually use the center? I thought this was limited to the student athletes only
You said the magic word ---- STUDENT athlete! :)
Not the high performance center specifically, but there is also a smaller ancillary RSF weight room/gym in Memorial for students. There are also a number of conference rooms at the high performance center that I assume are also used for classrooms.
Yeah, but wouldn’t that share be based upon usage?
I don't know. All I remember is Christ saying that the entire project should have been partly shouldered by the university as a whole, not just Cal athletics, because it benefits the entire university.
Don't forget Hearst Gym too. That would add additional few million in costs.
LOL. That'd be a whole lot of electricity and custodial costs. Do they do GRE and other testing there, too?
A positive finding
Let's see how much we get from UCLA's B1G bag.
"REPORT: Cal manages $3.7 million surplus in FY2022, with huge assist from UC Berkeley"
ISWYDT. Sly devil, you.
So Cal gets financial support from another university? How much does Cal's own university pay them?
Add UCLA paying Cal also! Money is just flowing in!
Yes, with support from both UC Berkeley and UCLA, Cal State should be able to aim for something higher than even the Red Box Bowl!
I totally missed that! Hilarious!
That amount of general campus support to athletics tends to counter the popular narrative that a lack of institutional support is a sizable contributor to the struggles of FB/MBB/WBB/BB.
Interesting point and perhaps reveals the claims of non-support from sources in the althletic dept as an excuse for poor coaching.
What about rigid and punitive admissions requirements implemented after Tedford?
That narrative includes admin doing nothing, either moral or practical, to promote and enable revenue sports.
And, honestly, is the Chancellor going to allow us to default on the loan?
Zero chance there is a default. Possibly a negotiated refinancing. Keep in mind, the athletic department doesn't have a true loan, and the campus entity has the external liability, even if internally athletics has a large (and varying) degree of responsibility for it. Suppliers of building materials and cash will get paid. It's a matter of internal politics and arm wrestling whose' budget gets what sized hit. And given the size and duration of the debt for what has long appeared to be a very poorly managed project, a change of Chancellor is a certainty during the run of it, at which time whatever the status of the campus politics and bookkeeping is will be completely up for grabs.
I hope we got a 30 yr fixed on the stadium.
Even better, UC issued 50-year bonds to fund the West Side Improvements project (aka Cal Memorial renovation). You may remember that the Regents' approval was required before the bonds could be issued.
Yeah they can’t default, as they know they will need bond financing again. If I had my druthers and I were Chancellor I would buy as many of the neighboring houses as possible in order to moot that opposition to revenue events there.
In other words, buy Panoramic Hill.
After I read what the enormous total cost was, and before I saw the end product for the first time, I assumed that was a part of it. For that money, a lot of clap-trap housing and old business fronts must have been acquired and torn down, to facilitate improved access and some semblance of parking, this for one of the hardest to access and egress venues in the west, and probably some cooperative venture to get some semblance of a modern hotel presence nearby. It was an obvious to anyone who had tried to navigate the terrible streets and lack of parking and facilities need. And low and behold, on the first trip back after the project, none of that was done. And the stadium was a poor man's early 70's endeavor.
Also just seems basic. If you are going to build a project that will attract a lot of people, you want to buy the neighboring lots, to capture the increase in value. Otherwise you are just gifting those folks a windfall
That is what the Cubs did, basically. Was a good idea!
So you predict Christ goes down for a CMS boondoggle? What about the project was poorly managed?
Just my two cents. The seismic retrofit of the grandstand and the new press box on the west side were very expensive. They should have demo'd the entire west side of the stadium (not retrofitted) and constructed an entirely new, and smaller, west grandstand with a new, and less lavish, press box (all up to current seismic standards). I think that would have been significantly less expensive than what they did.
And they should have done a little more on the east side. It's really silly when you have spent hundreds of millions and you still have porta potties and no decent concessions on the east side, isn't it?
The entire project was poorly conceived. And this leaves still open the question of whether they got their money's worth for what they actually ended up doing (ie, was the project as built well managed and overseen).
The die-hard Cal fan in me bristles at the thought of a smaller West side. We should wanna be the Big House like Michigan’s. As for the east side, yeah the austere accommodations might be just one reason why so many students don’t go to games.
(See also my response to Overall). The price for what they got was way overboard (whomever the GC was got away with stealing a massive amount of money), and a lot of what should have been done surrounding the project wasn't. Cal got a poorly lit version of Autzen (built decades ago) that has no parking.
The cost of renovating Cal Memorial was inflated by the need for seismic engineering and construction. Cal Memorial is not comparable to Autzen.
I was comparing it in terms of stadium style (open concrete bowl with no upper deck), bench seating style, very limited box/lodge./club/covered seating, etc,; the fan experience aspects. Both look like a 60s era stadium (which Autzen actually is), not a 21st century stadium build.
I do realize the construction site is different, though every building everywhere has to meet seismic requirements, and Autzen sits near a river, in a floodplain, next to a wetland, on hydraulic grounds, which presents its own engineering complications, and costs, historically and currently.
And in a location also with wildly deficient street services.
It's a strain to reconcile the extreme costs for what Cal got relative to the costs of other relatively contemporary stadium construction and renovation projects without wondering if seismic issues weren't used as cover for at least some increased costs that don't seem to have been critically reviewed at the risk of being seen as cutting corners on safety. And at this point, its water under the bridge (or stadium), as the money is already spent.
Hmm, imagine that a crooked GC. Lands sake, I can scarcely believe it. <sarcasm font>
I'd say opportunistic, when presented with a contract administrator that did not know construction or facilities design. And maybe of less than hoped for ethics, though that should be anticipated.
Looked at another way institutional support is necessary to balance the Athletic Department books.
"Institutional support" is also a source of resentment among academics at UC Berkeley, if you get my drift.
Oh, I'm certain there is animosity, resentment, and jealousy between various competing ivory castles and camps, not just athletics. It's a problem on many campuses, but evidence supports the notion that it must be a bigger than usual issue on the Berkeley campus, a condition built up over decades of not doing a very good job of coordinating efforts and focus.
Cal needs to reduce # of sports.
Good luck with that.
I know, but it's what needs to happen unless some field hockey mega donor contributes.
If Revenue Sharing comes to pass, Cal will have no choice but reduce teams, or the then Chancellor will have to contribute more out of General campus funds.
I don't think it's weird that the $30M is booked as revenue. I thought that was standard accounting, even if it misses context.
The Athletic Dept is a non-profit, and 501c3's have some flexibility on wording.