The athletic corporations at the state’s big universities have long lacked transparency. The Kansas Legislature had to pass the “Lew Perkins law” in 2005 — named after the University of Kansas’ athletic director — to force them to disclose compensation agreements. But Kansas State University’s athletic corporation was so secretive that even K-State’s president and attorneys didn’t know about an agreement to pay former football coach Ron Prince (in photo) an additional $3.2 million to buy out his contract. K-State is suing to break the agreement, and it forced former athletic director Bob Krause, who made the deal, to resign from his current position at the university. But K-State, KU and Wichita State University need to make their athletic corporations more transparent. The combination of big budgets and little public scrutiny invites problems.
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11 Comments
Yep we need more transparency just like the transparency that surrounds the stimulus package structured by the Obama administration.
Do as I say not as I do.
How about more transparency in the Fed? I’d say that is by far a bigger fish.
HR 1207
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-1207
It’s an odd niche business, but as long as taxpayers are involved in the enterprise, we need to know what’s going on.
Most athletic programs — at least the profitable ones — operate on alumni donations, media contracts, and conference agreements.
Most K-State football fans probably think paying Ron Prince another $3 Million dollars to go away is a bargain. But they probably should have been made aware of it beforehand.
Since college football is, essentially, the minor league for the NFL; and since college basketball is, in essence, the minor league for the NBA, those professional organizations should subsidize the sport, perhaps based on the number of professional athletes the college programs developed.
These guys — the coaches — who build A-List programs are pretty special performers, even if you’re not a fan of sports.
Mark Mangino gets the left-overs the football giants overlook and builds teams that beat ‘em.
Bill Self is at the top of the heap of schools where aspiring NBA’ers want to play. If you know anything about high school kids these days it’s not because of the KU tradition we Jayhawks pine about; it’s because KU is a place to go to get noticed and get to play if you’re very, very good.
Ron Prince got screwed at K-State. He wasn’t given enough time to create his own program, develop his own approach to winning football games (again, as important as that might be). So he probably earned the extra bucks for being screwed over by Silo Tech.
Poor ol’ Bill Snyder might be able to pull off another Manhattan Miracle. But I doubt it.
The first time around Snyder had only to turn a college football joke into something respectable.
This time, anything less than a National Championship will be considered a failure. And the smart money is on failure.
This particular expose will naturally lead to an investigation of the Bob Huggins and Michael Beasley “Era.”
That can’t be good for the Mildcats.
But K-State, KU and Wichita State University need to make their athletic corporations more transparent. The combination of big budgets and little public scrutiny invites problems.
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Yes and yes it does.
I find it ironic that most Athletic Coaches could really use some exercise.
SolDevVB,
Did you notice who is sponsoring the companion Senate bill?
S. 604
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s111-604
Politics make strange bedfellows.
Can’t say as I know much about Mr. Sanders. Watched one of his youtube video’s He seems fond of quoting the bible in legislature. Not my cup of tea.
K-State would have better served if they payed the $3.2 million dollars to KU – Jayhawks football team and let them win some football games for them. :D
“SolDevVB
Posted May 21, 2009 at 1:50 pm | Permalink
Can’t say as I know much about Mr. Sanders..”
Most people call him Colonel
Good grief. Why would he make that deal? Did Prince have something on Krause?
#
SolDevVB
Posted May 21, 2009 at 1:50 pm | Permalink
Can’t say as I know much about Mr. Sanders. Watched one of his youtube video’s He seems fond of quoting the bible in legislature. Not my cup of tea.
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Sanders is unabashedly socialist. I hope the effort to audit the Fed gets some traction and these bills pass.
It’s just interesting that the sponsor in the House and the sponsor in the Senate are absolute polar opposites on the political spectrum. This is truly a bi-partisan effort.