Food for thought

Eight Legger

Eight Legger

Bench player
Honest question: From a pure business standpoint, why would we not at least consider firing Mooney and hiring a younger up-and-coming coach for $400k or $500k and then reallocating the other $1 million we are spending annually on Mooney's contract to buy the best players we can?

I can't imagine we are paying any player more than $50k-$75k a year right now. Someone in the know correct me if I'm wrong. But if that's the case, think about the difference in talent level we could attract if instead we did something like this:
• Point guard – $250k
• Scoring guard – $250k
• Big man – $250k
• 2 wings – $125k each

Is that not a much better way to spend $1 million every year? What am I missing?
 
Eight Legger said:
Honest question: From a pure business standpoint, why would we not at least consider firing Mooney and hiring a younger up-and-coming coach for $400k or $500k and then reallocating the other $1 million we are spending annually on Mooney's contract to buy the best players we can?

I can't imagine we are paying any player more than $50k-$75k a year right now. Someone in the know correct me if I'm wrong. But if that's the case, think about the difference in talent level we could attract if instead we did something like this:
• Point guard – $250k
• Scoring guard – $250k
• Big man – $250k
• 2 wings – $125k each

Is that not a much better way to spend $1 million every year? What am I missing?
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UR doesn’t make basketball decisions based on performance, whether that’s on court or at the ticket booth.

But you know this.
 
I had a thought on the old forum of how I think we should implement our NIL. I’m curious if others think this approach could work. I read once thst after the house settlement funds that the expectation is for A10 teams to operate with a $1-2 million recruiting budget each year. Let’s assume that is true and assume that Richmond is somewhere in the middle of that around $1.5 million.

Right now, our recruits are guys whose other offers are places like Stonehill university. I’m not saying they aren’t good players or won’t be good for us, but they aren’t highly sought after players and I can’t imagine their NIL would be too high. Are we paying those incoming freshmen the same as we are paying an Argabright? What I want us to do is use $750K of that $1.5 million and get 2 players with that. But those 2 players are highly sought after high school recruits or transfers. Then the rest of the NIL is given on returning players depending on how good they are.

So going into next year our priorities should be 1) Trying to have Argabright stay and 2) Trying to get 2 really good players who are highlight sought after.

So we can still recruit “under the radar guys” but use significantly less money with NIL them. And then guys like Tyne, we should be paying less because he has not contributed at a starting PG level and not based on seniority.

If we are bad at recruiting, bad at managing our NIL money, and bad at player development then that is not a good combination to turn things around. Managing NIL money effectively to maximize recruiting efforts, which can make developing already great players more easily is key.
 
All I know is that we have an endowment of 3.5 billion and are supposedly worried about buying out a coaching contact of a couple million dollars. To put this in perspective, if you made $200,000 per year, this would be the equivalent of worrying about a hundred dollar purchase.
 
97spiderfan said:
All I know is that we have an endowment of 3.5 billion and are supposedly worried about buying out a coaching contact of a couple million dollars. To put this in perspective, if you made $200,000 per year, this would be the equivalent of worrying about a hundred dollar purchase.
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Government’s new endowment tax affects us which may have some impact. Add that to the fact that we have never - or at least in a long time - fired a coach and we can see what direction this is going to go.

 
Spider17 said:
Government’s new endowment tax affects us which may have some impact. Add that to the fact that we have never - or at least in a long time - fired a coach and we can see what direction this is going to go.

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Off topic a bit I realize but fyi that Pres Hallock in a couple of recent chats/interviews I have been at has indicated that UR counsel is going to try to make the case that we have less than 3K tuition paying students and would be exempt from the increased tax - we'll see how this play out.
 
Section9_RowD said:
Off topic a bit I realize but fyi that Pres Hallock in a couple of recent chats/interviews I have been at has indicated that UR counsel is going to try to make the case that we have less than 3K tuition paying students and would be exempt from the increased tax - we'll see how this play out.
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Is the argument to exclude students with full ride scholarships?
 
Section9_RowD said:
Off topic a bit I realize but fyi that Pres Hallock in a couple of recent chats/interviews I have been at has indicated that UR counsel is going to try to make the case that we have less than 3K tuition paying students and would be exempt from the increased tax - we'll see how this play out.
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In a conversation I had with him, he seemed certain the count only included tuition paying students.
 
The key piece of criteria from the law states "which had at least 3,000 tuition-paying students during the preceding taxable year."

They do not seem to have defined "tuition-paying," but it's certainly a reasonable argument to say "hey, these students on scholarship or full need-based aid aren't paying tuition, so they shouldn't count toward the 3,000-student threshold." Whether Congress meant to include those students in the count or not, who knows, but by the text as the law was passed, it's not a stretch to argue they shouldn't count.

There is a section on counting students, but it doesn't explicitly address the "tuition-paying" qualifier.

Determination of Number of Students.—For purposes of subsections (c) and (d), the number of students of an institution (including for purposes of determining the number of students at a particular location) shall be based on the daily average number of full-time students attending such institution (with part-time students taken into account on a full-time student equivalent basis).
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Let's hope we come out on the right side of this. Pretty significant hit otherwise, and to be singled out with other elite schools is particularly ludicrous, but it's obvious why.
 
If the language specifies tuition based student then I think it’s fair that they mean just that. Otherwise they would’ve worded by total full-time student enrollment. Another assumption is that tuition based does not include room and board. Also, I wonder how they factor in partial tuition or athletic scholarships. UR has ~3700 or so total students. Some sports have full scholarships, but others have partial scholarships. Presidential scholarship is a merit based scholarship that covers 1/3 of tuition. So do 3 students on presidential scholarship count towards 1?

If it assumes tuition only and not room & board and that includes tuition coverage from athletic, merit, and financial (from UR directly) aid and also accounts for the cumulation of partial tuition coverages, I think we definitely get below that 3,000 threshold. Will make a huge difference. From paying 10s of millions a year to being exempt is quite the difference.
 
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We certainly have some programs that cover full tuition...beyond the full athletic scholarships, there's the Richmond Scholars that are 25 full rides per class, and the Promise to Virginia program that provides full rides to Virginians with incomes of $75k or less, and then other need-based awards. I just don't know how many that is, but 700 feels like a lot to have to reduce the number by since all students count, not just undergrads.
 
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