In less than a week, two of the state’s three largest universities have lost their head basketball coaches. But Mark Turgeon’s decision Monday to leave Wichita State University for Texas A&M is easier to take than Bob Huggins’ departure from K-State for West Virginia — even though Turgeon will be missed more. Turgeon spent seven seasons at WSU, while Huggins was at K-State only one year. So WSU fans can appreciate how much time and effort Turgeon spent rebuilding the Shocker program. And because Turgeon is a nice person, it is difficult not to be glad for him. The same can’t be said for Huggins.
On a side note, we tried to imagine during our editorial board meeting today an English or history professor getting a front-page spread in The Eagle if he or she left for another job. Of course, English professors also don’t do Spangles commercials.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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24 Comments
Perhaps an English professor who was the center of an activity carried on for the “entertainment” of the community for some four to five months a year, each year, and was otherwise engaged in the reaminder of the year in procuring the stars of such entertainment would warrant coverage such as this, even if s/he didn’t do Spangles commercials.
English Professors don’t have several thousands fans screaming and jumping in class either. :)
English Professors teach about the Gladiator, sports like basketball are the Gladiators.
The Romans realized this and built an arena. They gave academics small pools with pillars. :D
Remember “ol’ Flck”
He was a die hard Commie-Lib when I was at WSU.
He tossed around terms like “Nazi” and “Fascist” rather freely, so I don’t think he has a right to complain about my name calling.
Anyway, Ol Flick was an English or Drama Prof, I believe. His political outspokeness was right up there with that current nut in Boulder CO.
Ol Flick used to host late night movies on one of the local channels. That is how he got his nick name.
He also cut some commercial, for potatoe chips, I think.
I wish someone HAD recruited Ol’ Flick away from us.
Unfortunately, left-wing nuts are a dime a dozen on college campuses, not much of a market for them!
sorryDan Quayle moment there
Republican – and now we are following the lead of the Romans; building an Arena while education crumbles.
Paul – any evidence the he was a member of the CP as you allege?
Yup, thanks for that observation, Ben.
I was thinking the same thing.
Since when should we be emulating the Romans in anything? These are people that drank from lead pipes and routinely went crazy from time to time.
It’s typical of our decadent age that we pay people like Turgeon millions and pay people like Einstein and Tesla a small government stipend.
The capitalist apologists say that this is the unseen hand of the marketplace and that it’s natural and inevitable, like the seasons.
It’s not. Sports are a media driven non-event that adds nothing to our well being.
Hey Paul. Nice use of a topic to introduce a total red herring argumentum ad personam. Also shows a lot of class.
I wish Mark Turgeon well, although I am disappointed that he is leaving. I do have confidence in Schaus that he will make a carefully considered and good hire(more than I have in Weiser at KSU).
Where is education crumbling? Cost of education keeps increasing and has nothing to do with paying for sports.
Sports is a personal achievement, its dedication, physical effort, time and money.
Arena’s and stadiums are places of sports celebration. Every athlete needs a venue to perform at.
Many people attend arena and stadium events to see incredible physical efforts, cheers players and has a good time. Communities are rewarding athletes with those facilities.
It’s group social experience where those at the event can collectively value forever together.
When WSU basketball was bad, 5 to 7000 kept going to games. They had hopes for wins, never dimmed or died.
No one can ever take a fan from a sport they love to watch.
No community is denying the ability to get an eduction to pay for sports.
Unfortunately English professors also do not generate millions of dollars in revenue for their respective universities.
KIA–
Heck if they don’t.
Required general education courses like English and Math and History and Philosophy are where the colleges make all their real money–tuition dollars that are then re-distributed to upper level courses in arcane fields like IT and high-energy physics that suck down beau-coup amounts of money for very few students enrolled.
4 classes x 20 students x 3 credit hours x ($150 tuition/credit hour + $100 state subsidy/credit hour = $250) = 60,000 per semester x 2 semesters = 120,000.
Considering that the college probably pays about 60K to the professor, that’s a cool 60K profit per year per instructor.
College athletics on the other hand are lucky if they break even for the college.
BenI personally heard Ol Flick call Reagan a Nazi and all Republicans Fascists.Only a Communist could think like that, in my opinion.Politically, the guy was nuts.I rarely resort to name calling, but that guy does not deserve your defense.Besides, I didnt even use his real name.
The only things I know about WSU are that they had a fairly cool FM radio station that played good rock and folk late at night back in the 1970s and that they used to have concerts at Henry Levit Arena (saw acts like 3 Dog Night, Peter Frampton and Aerosmith there). Other than that, I could not tell you who one coach or player was that was there for basketball or football. And going to coach at an “A&M” university is a demotion. A&M colleges are at the bottom of the university ladder. They get the students that the other state institutions rejected. University prestige is generally in this order:1. (state) University2. (state) Tech3. University of (state)4. (state) A&M
Kev,
Texas A&M is a major university. Defense Sec’y Robert Gates was TAMU’s president.
Mark Turgeon is moving to the Big-12, a major conference. If he succeeds, it will send a message that Wichita is a good mid-career place. Wichita is never going to be able or willing to support top-level sports. Turgeon recognized this fact. He’s going to face strong competion for talent recruitment against U Texas, U Oklahoma, U Kansas and Oklahoma State U. Let’s hope this Kansas native succeeds. Even if it isn’t in Kansas.
The difference in course work (professors) is the students are getting a value for the dollar (tuition).Major college sports (D1 football, basketball) is entertainment.College sports would be profitable if it were not for Title IX.
Econ101:
After I read your post this evening, I was trying to get it straight in my mind why conservatives don’t turn up on college campuses. Do they prefer to work in other fields or is there a big liberal conspiracy up in the sky to ban all conservatives from matriculation? Here’s my point: I did time in the late 80’s and early 90’s at more than one public university (Harvard thought about it at length and ultimately declined to invite me), and the profs never talked about politics. In Geology, for instance, they tried to give us the run-down on rocks. I tuned in to that extravaganza just enough to understand that obsidian, on average, is harder to bust open than sandstone…or maybe it’s the other way around. The lab for that installment, by contrast, captured my imagination more since my partner had a charming way about her. It’s possible, I suppose, that the lab instructor talked about politics and I missed it trying to be a team player. In Algebra, same deal, they stuck to the subject. You want the truth? I would have preferred, in College Algebra, to have heard a little something about politics, even if, on the outside chance the instructor was conservative and wanted to tell us all about Mr. Kline. (Hell, I would have arguably listened to Meadowlark. Did McClatchy own papers back then?) In any case, the teacher kept insisting on equations. The nuns taught us a long time ago that if it goes on the board, you write it down. I wrote it down and got the C in College Algebra. In English classes we always read a bunch of novels and they wanted you to throw together an essay. History? You know how that went: they looked to the past. I’ve been sitting here trying to remember a single event, in all the time I spent as a college student, when a prof dropped a political take on us. I can’t do it. Maybe it has been too long and my mind, in an attempt to repress the uncanny achievements of George W., inadvertently walled off the 80’s and 90’s. Yet I remember happier times with my lab partner, so bits and pieces, at any rate, are still available. I have no choice, therefore, but to conclude that your experiences were quite different. You and all the rest of the conservatives who go around getting hosed everywhere. If it isn’t McClatchy then it’s the media at-large or the Commies who still reside at universities. And it’s all in violation of the Founding Fathers, who apparently wanted tyranny from the right. So I return to my initial question: why can’t conservatives teach a class? Linear equations, in my experience, are not political.
TRTYou are more likely to remember an insult if it is directed at you or something you believe in.Nobody offended you.Perhaps, this is because conservatives tend to be well manored, at least in a college setting.The number of times that a conservative speaker has been shouted down on a college campus are too numerous to count.Free Speech?Only if the liberals agree with what is being said.
Now let me admit something: I am not a big sports fan.I watch a few games every year, but I am not a fanatic by any means.I really didnt get along very well with the Football Team at WSU, well a handful of them anyway, but that is another story and there are plenty of court documents to back that one up!Anyway, even for a guy like me, I see a strong need to teach values like courage and persistence and teamwork and playing by the rules, the things sports are supposed to teach kids.The bitter attacks against sports, sometimes on this Blog, a little bit on this thread, seem to miss the point that talent, genius and education are not the primary factors in generating success.
“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan Press On! has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”President Coolidge
I think it is important for many reasons for Colleges to have sports teams.They serve as goodwill ambassodors to the community in many ways.The WSU basketball team gave a signed basketball to my brother when he was dying from a brain tumor.Somehow, I dont think it would have brought as big a smile on his face if an English professor brought him a signed manuscript of his latest publishing effort.Yes, education is important.I like sports on campus because it reminds us that there is life outside the ivory towers.
Pauly said, “Perhaps, this is because conservatives tend to be well manored, at least in a college setting.”
Well manored? Let me tell you something there, some of us do not have the luck of being born with a silver spoon in his mouth like you. Some of us have to grow up in som rickety ol shacks, y’know… :P
I can see how much you hate English Lit. Can’t even use the correct word to convey the correct meaning, only the “Right” ones.
With due respect to your brother, I assume he’s a fan of basketball. I’m certain that had he been a huge fan of Star Trek, he’d be overjoyed to receive a signed replica of a phaser. Ditto with Star Wars and light saber. My point is, you’ve been trying so hard to discredit education in colleges — due to perceived “liberal” leaning — whatever that is, in favor of semi-”commercial” college sports which in all honesty are not much more than empty bragging rights. And as for your whining about life outside ivory towers, why don’t you try to apply for government research grant and jumping through hoops to justify why your research is important. My guess is that you’ve not been a well-mannered — and well-rounded — student during your college career, despite your claim otherwise.
Well, enough of handing you back a taste of your bitter pills. Can we now get back to the issue of Mr. Turgeon’s departure? Or, are you still itching for another dose of campus reality? Speaking of which, there have been countless times that non-conservative speakers at WSU being harassed and harangued. So, it’s pretty much an equal opportunity place, to say the least.
Now back on the issue, I think Turgeon shouldn’t had been given a long over-the-top contract in the first place. As for the profits from Spangles ads, it should’ve been for the benefit of Shocker Athletics Dept. I mean, he wouldn’t be there had he not been the head coach. An aside, any ad ideas for Mr. Stephenson? :)
If college sports were so profitable then the Universities could use that profit to fix the buildings that need repaired instead of going to the state for extra tax dollars.
Total Atheltic Department revenue for the University of Florida (Men’s football and basketball champions) is in excess of $77,000,000.Big time college sports in the elite conferences is big business for the schools.This certainly is the exception rather than the norm considering the number of colleges and universities with athletic programs.At these elite levels however, athletics mean much more than bragging rights to the schools.
Big time college athletics are a big business, with the revenue garnered therefrom going to the Athletic Departments, and not to the universities proper. Athletic Departments, by and large, are separate corporations from the universities themselves; in the case of KU, it is the KUAC. Revenues flow into these corporations, and are used to fund the athletic scholarships, coaches salaries, equipment, etc., with donations to the various fund raising organizations (the Williams Fund, at KU; SASO, at WSU) obtaining additional money for athletic scholarships. Generally speaking, the only direct university employee of an athletic department is the Athletic Director, with the coaches, etc., being the direct employees of the athletic department.
The benefit of big time athletic programs to a university itself is the publicity generated for the institution by the teams, primarily men’s football and men’s basketball. It is said, although open to dispute, that success on the athletic field (court) will, from time to time, result in donations to the university proper by well-heeled alums infatuated by the success of the athletic teams.
An example of the separate nature of the athletic departments and the universities themselves was the donation, by KUAC of $1 million to the University of Kansas for the Medical Center cancer research program, which occurred at half-time of a basketball game last season. If the funds from the athletic program flowed directly to the university, there would have been no need for the big ceremony, together with the oversized check; the funds would have merely been transferred internally.
Roo HaWow, you caught a typo!I can find quite a few typos in Eagle Blogs, some of them are even in the original Eagle Post!I should proof read my work better than I do.However, capitalist tool and insomniac that I am, I often come on at night and write until I am sleepy.That isnt right, I know, because it makes those of us on the right look like we dont know our left from our right and those on the left think that they won the fight since I obviously can not write, ain’t that right?.