Turns out Manti Te’o’s girlfriend was the one doing the actual burying, considering she never made it into the ground, much less this world.
She managed to bury the news of Chip Kelly leaving Oregon, but college football’s most ingenious offensive mind of the decade wasn’t the only victim, as the sports coverage would have you believe. In fact, this whole week showed just how confused our priorities – i.e. those of the media, the region, our own university system – really are.
A report surfaced early this week stating that public universities participating in Division I athletics spend three to six times more money on sports than academics. In 2010, the average amount spent on athletes was $91,936, while the amount spent on the typical student averaged $13,628.
Don’t be alarmed Tigers; it gets much worse.
To not even Te’o’s surprise, as evidenced by his team’s play against Alabama in the BCS National Championship, the Southeastern Conference schools’ spending gap is by far the widest, with the league spending 12 times more on its student-athletes than on its other students. That’s 40 percent more than the Big 12, which spends the second most, and 60 percent more than the PAC-12, which came in third.
You do indeed get what you pay for. The SEC’s hyper-inflated number is undoubtedly affected by its affinity for football, which requires by far the most extensive roster and expensive equipment.
These numbers are the kind of thing that perpetuates the negative stereotypes the rest of the country has of our otherwise rich Southern culture. This is Honey Boo Boo in football pads. We can’t get away from it.
We are in a unique situation among this mess as LSU students. Our athletic department is one of seven nationwide that doesn’t dip into taxpayer money, according to USA Today, and the only one that’s ever kicked money back into the system. At least we have that.
But it’s still not enough to make me feel better about this. While our Tigers thrive, our University struggles to hold on to administration, faculty and entire colleges.
From 2008 to 2012, the Athletic Department’s budget increased by nearly 27 percent while the school’s state funding has been slashed by almost half, as The Daily Reveille reported. With “Bumbling” Bobby Jindal in office until 2016, there’s no end in sight.
This is what we have in common with the rest of these schools. What will it take to change what is an absolutely backward collegiate athletic system? A sweeping takedown of top-tier programs, which all skirt the NCAA’s rules in one way or another to simply have a chance to compete, would shock the system and reset the bar. But would that ever happen?
No way.
Forget that our love of football, to which I admit subscription, and other displays of athletic prowess are so ingrained that we’d miss it too much to kill it: money rules everything. These monstrous young men bring in the bread, none of which, I must mention, they ever see. And where there’s bread to break, there will always be more bread. It’s a cycle as vicious as the sport we glorify.
But hey, at least our athletes are notable enough to date real girlfriends. Thanks for backing us up, Brent Musburger.
Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o answers a question during Media Day for the BCS National Championship college football game Saturday, Jan. 5, 2013, in Miami. Notre Dame faces Alabama in Monday's championship game. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
