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UNLV Hiring Dan Mullen

OrediggerPoke said:
I take it you’ve not attended a Division 2 or Division 3 college contest. I’d hardly call the ‘free’ uniform and small bit of swag most of those athletes get as compensation and it would be hard to argue they are competing for anything but ‘the love of the game.’
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I take your point...As you bring the competition closer and closer to real "amateur" levels, the "love of the game" motivation begins to shine through. Plying your craft in an empty gym for some local junior college is really where dreams of the big time go to die though....virtually every guy that does that has the goal to make it to the next level. Yes they are not getting compensated much at that level .... but if you took away the hope that they would get to that level, "the love of the game" is not enough to get the vast majority through what is asked of them in terms of time and body commitment.
 
307bball said:
I take your point...As you bring the competition closer and closer to real "amateur" levels, the "love of the game" motivation begins to shine through. Plying your craft in an empty gym for some local junior college is really where dreams of the big time go to die though....virtually every guy that does that has the goal to make it to the next level. Yes they are not getting compensated much at that level .... but if you took away the hope that they would get to that level, "the love of the game" is not enough to get the vast majority through what is asked of them in terms of time and body commitment.
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I went to a D2. I can't think of any of the football or basketball athletes there who were playing as an audition to move to D1 or who had any realistic visions of the NFL. In fact, I roomed with the QB for a summer and he was just as surprised as everyone else that he ended up in a NFL camp and had to postpone his internship plans. They played largely because they loved the sport and commitment to their teammates.
 
OrediggerPoke said:
I went to a D2. I can't think of any of the football or basketball athletes there who were playing as an audition to move to D1 or who had any realistic visions of the NFL. In fact, I roomed with the QB for a summer and he was just as surprised as everyone else that he ended up in a NFL camp and had to postpone his internship plans. They played largely because they loved the sport and commitment to their teammates.
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There is a spectrum here.... Your experience of this level of athlete is valid. I can't just invalidate my own though.
 
OrediggerPoke said:
I went to a D2. I can't think of any of the football or basketball athletes there who were playing as an audition to move to D1 or who had any realistic visions of the NFL. In fact, I roomed with the QB for a summer and he was just as surprised as everyone else that he ended up in a NFL camp and had to postpone his internship plans. They played largely because they loved the sport and commitment to their teammates.
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Just watch the track or cross country teams we have. These kids work very hard. Some don't even have full scholy's. They love the sport and they love to compete and support their teammates. Most of the time, they don't have more than a few hundred spectators watching them. I'm sure other olympic sports are the same.
 
bladerunnr said:
Just watch the track or cross country teams we have. These kids work very hard. Some don't even have full scholy's. They love the sport and they love to compete and support their teammates. Most of the time, they don't have more than a few hundred spectators watching them. I'm sure other olympic sports are the same.
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and how many of these kids...who love thier sport and teammates, stay at UW if they get a 60,000 dollar per season offer at a different school? You don't even have to entertain the ridiculous giant offers to get a pretty large change in behavior.

Look, nobody is saying that these athletes don't "love" their sport....but when you start putting dollars behind things, you end up with different decisions being made and it's not because the player's don't love their sport or teammates.
 
Wicks said:
This Tom Burman contract situation is quite interesting. He basically has 6 months left and the only people talking about it are us here at WyoNation. Why is our longtime AD a lame duck? Either extend him or fire him, my guess is he will announce his retirement either in Jan or after the basketball season. Then the fate of Sawvel will be in the hands of a new AD. Hopefully this is an outside hire but I could see UW doing another internal promotion.

Interesting times are ahead!
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Randy Welniak, come on down
 
OrediggerPoke said:
At some point, I believe that integrity and rationality should prevail over an insatiable appetite to win. The legislature will answer this question with Burman’s emergency request for an additional 1 time 1.5 million athletic department funding in a non-budget year.

If I was in the legislature, I’d be a hard no. But Burman and the other detached University folks should thank Gordon for saving them from a lot of embarrassment. Burman’s original plan was to take this ‘emergency’ request for an additional annual $3 million per year to pay players. Gordon talked them off that cliff. Either way, I doubt the freedom caucus will support this and I wouldn’t either personally.
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