To be fair though I don’t think the typical fans goes “Man we are cooking. We are a top 15 learfield cup program”. They go “oh the sports I care about Football Basketball Baseball suck and that sucks since those are the games I go to and watch and have memories over”
2 Likes
I think it’s what a lot of people have been saying. Non-revs that can’t fund themselves are going to get cut, especially the teams that have big rosters and high expenses.
1 Like
Some tough decisions are going to have to be made.
My frustration with this situation, and root of my disdain for Carla, is that her primary job is secure the funding to be nationally competitive in the sports that we offer and baseball should be top 4 at the absolute minimum on her priority list (I think it should easily be top 3 ahead of women’s basketball but can see how some might disagree). We have a lot of deep pockets to pull from and she’s failed to make it an easy decision for BOC to stay. It seems like some people want to say that it’s not her fault if the donors don’t exist but I think it’s pretty much her only job to make the donors exist and she failed. In other professions, not bringing in enough money to successfully operate part of the business would get you quickly fired and instead she’s gotten a huge raise and contract extension. And it’s not like this baseball blunder is her only failure
3 Likes
Revenue sports were a smoldering crater, Baseball took a #2 preseason ranking and didn’t make the postseason, WBB was supposed to finally arrive and didn’t, our perennially dominant lacrosse team failed to make the post season.
Softball, Track, Golf, Soccer had nice (some really nice) seasons, and of course women’s swim and dive delivered, but that is not a compelling SEC application or really that great a product for fans. If that is where we’d rather focus our resources than Brian O’Connor then I have serious serious concerns.
I’d seriously consider cutting sports (unless donors want to step up for them on a case by case basis!) to fund whatever Oak needs. I’d also argue that we might just be wasting money throwing it at Football and would rather make the pivot to try and be great at Basketball and Baseball. I know we have to give a shit in football to try and get realigned in a good spot, but the ship might have sailed honestly.
1 Like
I mean, she’s brought in a ton of money. Just not in the sport that you care about so much. I’d feel the same way if it was MBB.
2 Likes
Here’s the reality:
If collegiate athletics were a steakhouse, football would be the steak. The primary sides (steak frites, mashed potatoes, etc) would be mens basketball. EVERYTHING else pales in comparison to those 2 absolutely crucial items. Dr. Williams has done a miraculous job when it comes to financial investment in the 2 most critical products in college athletics. I mean I never thought we’d see a world where UVA has done what its done (from a financial perspective) these last few months in football and basketball. Her ability/talent to fundraise for the only 2 sports that legitimately matter in this business is not up for debate. It just isn’t.
Losing Oak would be really devastating for us die-hards. There’s no question. He’s uneqiuivocally a top 5 coach in this sport. But make no mistake, baseball is like fucking oysters if we’re using that steakhouse metaphor. Certain people absolutely adore oysters. Most people don’t come to the steakhouse for that
12 Likes
The VAF already needs an extra 25 million dollars a year to fund the extra scholarships we’re going to be supporting under the house settlement. The JPJ reseating is supposed to make up some of that, but I think people aren’t grasping just how much money we’re talking about here. “Finding more donors” isn’t going to be all that easy.
2 Likes
Basketball has always had money flowing in. It took her forever to get money for football and now it’s being used to support a coach with 11 wins over 3 seasons. And now she’s failed with baseball. I’ll stop repeating myself but I’m unimpressed with her accomplishments and disappointed with her numerous failures
3 Likes
Her job is to deliver a successful Athletic Department in terms of wins on the field, pride (read: avoid controversy) among alumni, and engagement among the fanbase - all in a financially responsible way.
Fundraising is critical (the most critical?) element to that. But it’s not the only one.
She’s failed in retaining our best coaches, failed or TBD on her coaching hires, and has been non-existent or perhaps even negligent in PR and fan engagement.
The result? The first year (in forever?) that MBB, WBB, Baseball, Football, and LAX didn’t make the post-season - a clear downward trend in the athletic department in terms of aggregate results since Littlepage.
I love that she can fundraise (I genuinely do!). She can’t drop the ball like she has essentially across the rest of her duties, because recent years’ trended results are what happens when she does.
3 Likes
I just keep coming back to not knowing what she has done that is above a replacement level athletic director in the spot. Basketball has always had what its needed, thanks basketball mafia.
How many athletic directors could get funding for a football practice facility? It seems like relatively low hanging fruit that most D1 ADs with our resources could have gotten done.
Alexis Ohanian wants to invest in women’s sports and we are his alma mater. Don’t think we can give her a ton of credit there. And it’s being used to claw ourselves out of the hole she dug with Tina.
And her other hires have obviously left a lot to be desired-- those are certainly below replacement level on any metric imo.
Throw in the rebrand a couple other debacles like this one, and I just simply don’t see how she’s above replacement level. They’re all good fundraisers!! That’s sort of their job! I expect a school with our level of wealth to be good at that.
A seismic shift occurred to the college landscape while she was at the helm, and I really can’t point to anything she has done to alleviate that until about 5 months ago.
What programs have gotten better under her watch? Track (there are some questions about that hire tbh), WSwim (not her hire), Softball (not her hire), Golf (not her hire, will give her credit for the birdwood rennovation, but honestly should I?), Squash (lol), I’m sure I’m missing some… But not a great portrait!
5 Likes
Fundraising is definitely the most critical element of a modern AD’s job, I def agree with that.
Listen, at this point some people are just not gonna believe in any way, shape or form that she’s isn’t responsible for Mendenhall and Bennett leaving. My opinion? That is completely and utterly absurd. I can’t even wrap my head around it. Those guys were gonna leave regardless. So I don’t buy into the “she can’t retain her top guys” argument if you’re gonna point to that.
As for coaching hires, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. Coaching hires are by pretty much all accounts a crapshoot. There’s very little rhyme or reason to it. Dabo Swinney had never been more than a position coach when he was hired at Clemson. Scott Frost was coming off an undefeated year when he was hired at Nebraska (in addition to being a school legend there). Tony Elliott was someone who was pursued by Tennessee, Auburn, Vandy, Georgia Tech, and even a handful of NFL OC gigs during his tenure at Clemson. He was absolutely a strong hire on paper at the time. I still believe him to be a strong hire, bc the primary reasons for his failure these past few seasons has been the lack of talent and depth (which have since been addressed). But the Duke AD had Elliott as her top candidate as well. When she didn’t get him, she pivoted to Elko. So clearly luck is a pretty major factor when judging that part of an AD’s performance (it was reported Elko was Williams no.2 after Elliott as well btw)
3 Likes
You’re a fanboi, we all get it. How could
we not with the “Dr. Williams” nonsense, at UVa of all universities. But you don’t know how another athletic director would do getting donors to pony up, or even if Carla had anything to do with it on the men’s basketball side. And any honest observer knows Carla has failed spectacularly at all her front-facing responsibilities.
By the way, throwing $10 million at football to get 1 or 2 more wins against some directional patsies doesn’t add to our bottom line one bit. We were already getting the TV money and fans aren’t going to be tricked into attending games. And if we’re positioning ourselves for a SEC invite, that ain’t going to be the reason for a future bid. You know what else won’t be? Punting on an elite baseball program, a sport they also care deeply about, in favor of fielding a slightly less shitty football program, or trying to field a slightly better than average women’s basketball program…or even keeping programs like wrestling and field hockey. If a rich alum wants to step up and fund them, great. Otherwise, gtfoh.
1 Like
I don’t disagree with this. Or maybe I’d restate it to primary is fundraising and compliance (with NCAA rules, state and federal laws, etc…).
I don’t know if it’s her job to artificially rank which sports to focus on. Your priority is baseball, which is fine, but I think the priority sports are the ones that donors care about and support. If there’s people donating to football, men’s and women’s basketball, swim and squash, you can’t take money from them to prop up baseball. What do you think a donor to WBB would respond if you told them, we spent 2 mil on WBB last season, but since you gave 1 mil, we’re spending 1.5 mil on WBB for a total of 2.5 mil so they’re better off than before. That’s clearly not going to fly.
I’m sure Williams has been looking for baseball donors along with soccer, lacrosse, field hockey, golf, volleyball, rowing and every other sport we offer and have traditionally had success in. Why should baseball get more time or efffort than any other sport?
If you’re a salesperson selling A, B and C where A sells really well, B sells moderately well and no one wants C, wouldn’t your boss criticize you more if you spent all your time trying to sell C and making no money instead of selling A and B and making money?
Re: football - I think the monetary infusion has given (1) Elliott the resources he needs to succeed, or perhaps more likely, (2) will allow us to attract a better replacement
(Trying to answer the perpetual : “why did we give a bad coach so much $$ ?” Question)
3 Likes
Wouldn’t bank on that - Hoos just lost the best trio in the history of college swimming … they have just regular human really good swimmers now.
Will Todd be able to coach em up?? Hopefully!!!
1 Like
Ok listen if you’re gonna say “we don’t know how any other AD would do getting donors to pony up” then I can say the same thing as it relates to retaining Mendenhall and Bennett, and the subsequent football and basketball hires. When you compare what she has done from a fundraising perspective to the rest of our athletic deparment’s history, it’s a massive improvement. That’s what I’m using as the metric to judge her performance in that regard.
“Punting on an elite baseball program” just doesn’t make much sense to me. She isn’t cutting funds to the program or anything. Oak was reportedly gonna stay until an absurd offer came from MSU. An offer that we may just not be able to compete with. idk. but UVA is still an incredibly well-funded and supported baseball program. Oak is fantastic but 7 CWS apperances doesn’t just happen without legit resources and investment
1 Like
If the figures in this link are accurate, Elliott has made $1.14 million per win at UVa.
Them’s some ‘spensive pelts.
https://www.si.com/college/virginia/football/tony-elliott-uva-football-contract-breakdown
3 Likes
Agreed. I have zero expectation that we’re going to pack our bags and head home with the baseball program if Oak leaves. Zero reason we can’t remain extremely competitive nationally. Oak has been complaining about being under-resourced for years. Certainly can’t tell we are under-resourced based on the results. Yes, much of that is attributed to him but we have consistently attracted a very high level of talent, which is something you don’t do with resources and investment.
2 Likes
Pretty easy - I can see 4-6 Varsity sports I would cut today and they can still play the club variety - like Paul Chang did in golf.
Men’s and women’s Lacrosse
Wrestling
Field Hockey
Rowing
Boom!
1 Like