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A Letter from Pat Hobbs

Per previous posts in the thread, note that the basketball team has just now snapped da U's 19 game home winning streak.

Which is fantastic. But will not erase 7 ugly Saturdays with few fans and the revenue that even a 6-6 type team could bring.
 
BTW, I am not sold that Hobbs will fire Ash next year at 0-12.

Whatever excuse he's using- money or really believes in Ash based on his experience at SHU- or some combo- ain't evaporating because Liberty and UMass destroy us when the buyout is only slightly less and we were hammered by Kansas and Buffalo.
 
what self serving dumb posts from those wanting their scalps--hobb's is right on--the letter was meant to explain his dissatisfaction and the hope that ,might I say , loyal fans,stick by the school--what was he supposed to say--give up --the decision was made, Ash is here for 2019--it serves no purpose other than to bitch--get on board or get off the train
Actually if the enablers who accept this shit sandwich would get off the train, something might actually get done.

I have been giving them the benefit of the doubt since 1980. Enough is enough.
 
BTW, I am not sold that Hobbs will fire Ash next year at 0-12.

Whatever excuse he's using- money or really believes in Ash based on his experience at SHU- or some combo- ain't evaporating because Liberty and UMass destroy us when the buyout is only slightly less and we were hammered by Kansas and Buffalo.

The hint will be in the assistant contracts inked this off season. There are as many as six assistants that need contracts. If some are for multiple years, then this isn't about decreasing Ash's guaranteed money.
 
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Total BS, do you realize that it took three different Athletic Directors and total of 8 years to raise a lousy $3 million for the Baseball training facility, the first new athletic facility RU built in 30 years, cheap Alumni who want the best but are not willing to spend a dime to attain the goals, has nothing to do with the President or BOG!
Anyone got some data on these so-called cheap Alums. It seems that most are just middle class folks struggling with living in one of the most expensive and highest taxed States in the country. Do we have a lot of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs or Nike owners among our Alums? Who are these famous and deep pocket Alums?
 
I’m a fan of Hobbs, and I think Ash will turn out to be a solid coach for RU. Football will be more enjoyable when the fan herd thins a little, and the people who are left realize this is a college sport. I’m not of fan of spending checks that can’t be cashed for the sake of random change, which is all you are going to get for what RU can pay now.
I think Hobbs should not be on the hot seat at all, give him time to build out the different programs. I agree with you on change for the sake of change when we really dont have a good alternative yet. When we have the money we should hire a real coach at that time. However, i cant see the part about Ash turning out to be a solid coach.
 
BTW, I am not sold that Hobbs will fire Ash next year at 0-12.

Whatever excuse he's using- money or really believes in Ash based on his experience at SHU- or some combo- ain't evaporating because Liberty and UMass destroy us when the buyout is only slightly less and we were hammered by Kansas and Buffalo.

This is what scares me. Most on this board know Ash needs to be chopped. We have been told the buyout is too high at 9.8 million. Why should we expect him to be fired next year if he sucks again when the buyout is 7.5 million.
 
This is what scares me. Most on this board know Ash needs to be chopped. We have been told the buyout is too high at 9.8 million. Why should we expect him to be fired next year if he sucks again when the buyout is 7.5 million.

We shouldn't. The only way it will happen is if Barchi feels personally humiliated about it. In other words, we need his buddies to casually start asking him, "Hey, what the hell is wrong with your football team? Why are you letting that guy lose every game?" before he'll take corrective action. This is because he is a buffoon who doesn't care if the football program (and his #1 available source of cheap advertising, increased goodwill, and increased donations) falls completely apart.
 
Someone has to put the numbers in front of him for what a tanking football program costs vs. a successful one. He's desperate to get off the subsidy, but repeated 1-2 win seasons is working against that goal - we may be getting more revenue in from the B1G, but if we are shrinking revenue from the team at the same time, we're working at cross purposes.
 
Someone has to put the numbers in front of him for what a tanking football program costs vs. a successful one. He's desperate to get off the subsidy, but repeated 1-2 win seasons is working against that goal - we may be getting more revenue in from the B1G, but if we are shrinking revenue from the team at the same time, we're working at cross purposes.

No coach is going to come in here and turn the gameday revenue around, sufficiently, in the first couple of years. So that's not a factor.
 
Someone has to put the numbers in front of him for what a tanking football program costs vs. a successful one. He's desperate to get off the subsidy, but repeated 1-2 win seasons is working against that goal - we may be getting more revenue in from the B1G, but if we are shrinking revenue from the team at the same time, we're working at cross purposes.

Lost gameday revenues in 2019 has already been factored in to RU’s decision to keep Ash, per a recent post here by someone with an understanding of the RU strategy. Forget who the poster was. His point was that lost revenues in the future do not deter the mission of getting RU FB to be revenue neutral as wanted by Barchi.

Hobbs has a tough sell with this situation. His letter tried to rally the season ticket holders to stay the course. Will have to wait and see how many renew.
 
It's also worth pointing out that while the number of season ticket seats is down, the number of individual season ticket accounts is up slightly.
 
No coach is going to come in here and turn the gameday revenue around, sufficiently, in the first couple of years. So that's not a factor.

I don't buy that. There are a significant number of fans who would not drop season tickets next year if a new coach was coming in the door, who will be dropping them facing another year of Ash.

And it's not about "turning gameday revenue around" - it's about stanching the bleeding, at this point. Next year will see drops in ticket sales, parking, concession, merchandise sales, donations, advertisements, television ratings... you name it. A new coach would have at the very least halted the drop for a year or two while fans gave him a chance to get things on track.

Attendance the last five years:
2018: 37,799
2017: 39,749
2016: 44,809 (Ash's first year)
2015: 47,723 (Preseason scandal, Flood fired at end of season)
2014: 50,632 (1st year in B1G)

I'd expect that to drop another 2-3K or so next year.
 
I don't buy that. There are a significant number of fans who would not drop season tickets next year if a new coach was coming in the door, who will be dropping them facing another year of Ash.

And it's not about "turning gameday revenue around" - it's about stanching the bleeding, at this point. Next year will see drops in ticket sales, parking, concession, merchandise sales, donations, advertisements, television ratings... you name it. A new coach would have at the very least halted the drop for a year or two while fans gave him a chance to get things on track.

Attendance the last five years:
2018: 37,799
2017: 39,749
2016: 44,809 (Ash's first year)
2015: 47,723 (Preseason scandal, Flood fired at end of season)
2014: 50,632 (1st year in B1G)

I'd expect that to drop another 2-3K or so next year.

You don't have to buy it, but you fail to do so at the risk of ignoring basic math.

10,000 seats = roughly $5 million in revenue. Right now the total base salary of the entire coaching staff is $5,117,475.

I'm assuming that you'll stipulate that a new coaching staff - a proper coaching staff, one that could recruit well, win games and drive attendance - would cost considerably more. How much more? A million? Two? Let's be RUCheap and call it $1 million. That means that total salaries would run about $6.1 million. Plus the $2.3 that we would have to pay Ash, assuming he doesn't get another job next year. That's $8.4 million. To cover that cost would require an attendance increase to over 50,000.

That ain't happening.

This is the math that Barchi and Hobbs have already done. The mandate is "no additional deficit spending".
 
The money to Ash is already committed - the decision is whether we want to pay more money and increase our revenue, or pay no more money and decrease our revenue. Hobbs chose to stick with "his guy", and we'll likely lose more money than we'll be saving by keeping Ash around another year.

I think whether Ash were replaced or not, season ticket sales next year will decline. And whether Ash were replaced or not, total revenue will decline, but I would expect it to decline more with Ash at the helm, unless he managed a miracle turn-around. The following season, we could see an increase in season ticket sales and total revenue if we have a coach next year who appears to be building something, or if Ash manages a miracle turn-around. As you noted, we've lost 7000 attendance in the past 2 years. That is at least $2.5MM in lost revenue. Another 7000 loss in the next 2 years is another $2.5MM in lost revenue.

Hobbs isn't stupid, or at least isn't stupid enough that he can't do simple math. He knows that he is facing revenue losses next year. He knows that with Ash in place and continued failure, he is facing additional revenue losses the following year. Hobbs knows that w ith Ash as head coach and failing, the budgetary constraints get tougher each year, not easier. He knows that the only way he can turn the tide on the revenue losses is either to replace Ash with a successful coach or for Ash to become a successful coach.

Since the revenue losses of keeping a failing Ash are greater than the cost of replacing Ash (assuming we pay the replacement at the Wisconsin level or lower), Hobbs knows that replacing Ash is better from a revenue & budget perspective than keeping Ash and letting him fail.

That's why I don't think the budget is the paramount factor in keeping Ash. I think Hobbs truly believes that Ash will actually be successful here.
 
You don't have to buy it, but you fail to do so at the risk of ignoring basic math.

10,000 seats = roughly $5 million in revenue. Right now the total base salary of the entire coaching staff is $5,117,475.

I'm assuming that you'll stipulate that a new coaching staff - a proper coaching staff, one that could recruit well, win games and drive attendance - would cost considerably more. How much more? A million? Two? Let's be RUCheap and call it $1 million. That means that total salaries would run about $6.1 million. Plus the $2.3 that we would have to pay Ash, assuming he doesn't get another job next year. That's $8.4 million. To cover that cost would require an attendance increase to over 50,000.

That ain't happening.

This is the math that Barchi and Hobbs have already done. The mandate is "no additional deficit spending".
If the current coaching staff is $5.1MM, and the cost of a replacement staff (including Ash's buyout salary) is $8.4 MM, the additional cost that needs to be covered is just the $3.3 MM difference. At $50 per seat, that's additional attendance of 9400. If keeping Ash means that attendance declines by 4700 and replacing Ash means that attendance increases by 4700, the difference in coaching staff salaries is completely covered by the difference in attendance.

The math suggests that the revenue equation is not sufficient enough in itself to explain keeping Ash. I think Hobbs is keeping Ash because he actually believes Ash will turn it around.
 
You don't have to buy it, but you fail to do so at the risk of ignoring basic math.

10,000 seats = roughly $5 million in revenue. Right now the total base salary of the entire coaching staff is $5,117,475.

I'm assuming that you'll stipulate that a new coaching staff - a proper coaching staff, one that could recruit well, win games and drive attendance - would cost considerably more. How much more? A million? Two? Let's be RUCheap and call it $1 million. That means that total salaries would run about $6.1 million. Plus the $2.3 that we would have to pay Ash, assuming he doesn't get another job next year. That's $8.4 million. To cover that cost would require an attendance increase to over 50,000.

That ain't happening.

This is the math that Barchi and Hobbs have already done. The mandate is "no additional deficit spending".

First off, you're estimating that each lost ticket is just $500 in lost revenue? Where are you getting that number?

Aside from the upper corners, ticket prices range from $305-735, not including donations required to keep priority seating. A parking pass anywhere but the Black Lot ranges from $250-$2.5K minimum annual donation, plus the cost of the pass. Then there's lost concession and merchandise sales, 50/50 ticket sales, other donations not directly tied to tickets/parking, etc. And that's entirely ignoring the further damage that will be done to the program with another year of poor recruiting, further slipping ratings and negative press/hot seat talk, and other harder to measure longer-term losses.

Second, that $2.3M is already a sunk cost for next year (plus whatever guarantees are in any other staff member's contract that we'd need to pay for next year). We're paying it whether we fire the whole staff or not. Keeping the salaries flatline incurs whatever gameday, donation, ancillary revenue losses that will follow due to fans jumping ship. Hiring a new staff also relies on the assumption that a new coach/staff can put a hold on those losses and put fans in a "wait and see" mode (or even generate some buzz to increase season ticket holders for the first year of a new regime) - which is in no way guaranteed.

Ash's salary for next year isn't really relevant. The question is which is a bigger number: [Cost of new coach + gameday impact of new coach] vs. [Gameday impact of not hiring a new coach].
 
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Our goal is to turn our football program into one that is bowl eligible every year, that graduates young men of high character and that is a source of pride to the Rutgers community and our State.

Talk about setting the bar low. I guess he doesn't want to even be a top 25 programs let alone compete for championship. I guess he will be happy with 6-6 record and going to the no one cares bowl.
There a 7-4 and 8-4 teams in the Top 25... don't you think "bowl eligible every year" would mean hitting that bar every now and then? You are being pedantic.

I don't like the whole letter.. the need for such a thing means total failure in my book. But I sat here wondering if I should even respond until I saw your message. The problem is not defining achievable goals from where we are now.. it is not being closer to those goals now.
 
I think whether Ash were replaced or not, season ticket sales next year will decline. And whether Ash were replaced or not, total revenue will decline, but I would expect it to decline more with Ash at the helm, unless he managed a miracle turn-around. The following season, we could see an increase in season ticket sales and total revenue if we have a coach next year who appears to be building something, or if Ash manages a miracle turn-around. As you noted, we've lost 7000 attendance in the past 2 years. That is at least $2.5MM in lost revenue. Another 7000 loss in the next 2 years is another $2.5MM in lost revenue.

Hobbs isn't stupid, or at least isn't stupid enough that he can't do simple math. He knows that he is facing revenue losses next year. He knows that with Ash in place and continued failure, he is facing additional revenue losses the following year. Hobbs knows that w ith Ash as head coach and failing, the budgetary constraints get tougher each year, not easier. He knows that the only way he can turn the tide on the revenue losses is either to replace Ash with a successful coach or for Ash to become a successful coach.

Since the revenue losses of keeping a failing Ash are greater than the cost of replacing Ash (assuming we pay the replacement at the Wisconsin level or lower), Hobbs knows that replacing Ash is better from a revenue & budget perspective than keeping Ash and letting him fail.

That's why I don't think the budget is the paramount factor in keeping Ash. I think Hobbs truly believes that Ash will actually be successful here.

Revenue from ticket sales may decline, but out B1G share grows every year.
 
First off, you're estimating that each lost ticket is just $500 in lost revenue? Where are you getting that number?

Aside from the upper corners, ticket prices range from $305-735, not including donations required to keep priority seating. A parking pass anywhere but the Black Lot ranges from $250-$2.5K minimum annual donation, plus the cost of the pass. Then there's lost concession and merchandise sales, 50/50 ticket sales, other donations not directly tied to tickets/parking, etc. And that's entirely ignoring the further damage that will be done to the program with another year of poor recruiting, further slipping ratings and negative press/hot seat talk, and other harder to measure longer-term losses.

Second, that $2.3M is already a sunk cost for next year (plus whatever guarantees are in any other staff member's contract that we'd need to pay for next year). We're paying it whether we fire the whole staff or not. Keeping the salaries flatline incurs whatever gameday, donation, ancillary revenue losses that will follow due to fans jumping ship. Hiring a new staff also relies on the assumption that a new coach/staff can put a hold on those losses and put fans in a "wait and see" mode (or even generate some buzz to increase season ticket holders for the first year of a new regime) - which is in no way guaranteed.

Ash's salary for next year isn't really relevant. The question is which is a bigger number: [Cost of new coach + gameday impact of new coach] vs. [Gameday impact of not hiring a new coach].

1. Math. 3 years worth of NCAA financial reports from which I've taken gameday revenue and divided it by attendance.

2. I'm only going to address the rest by saying, simply, this - Hobbs has been told to eliminate additional deficit spending. You cannot guarantee any increase in attendance. You can talk about "if we fire Ash and hire some great guy, attendance will go up" but you can't cite a number and you can't guarantee increased revenue. The ONLY thing you can guarantee in this scenario is increased cost.

Again, bear in mind - as I have repeatedly stated - RU athletics blew its budget by more than $11 million last year, which necessitated additional, unplanned and budgeted, institutional support. The hole cannot get deeper.
 
1. Math. 3 years worth of NCAA financial reports from which I've taken gameday revenue and divided it by attendance.

2. I'm only going to address the rest by saying, simply, this - Hobbs has been told to eliminate additional deficit spending. You cannot guarantee any increase in attendance. You can talk about "if we fire Ash and hire some great guy, attendance will go up" but you can't cite a number and you can't guarantee increased revenue. The ONLY thing you can guarantee in this scenario is increased cost.

Again, bear in mind - as I have repeatedly stated - RU athletics blew its budget by more than $11 million last year, which necessitated additional, unplanned and budgeted, institutional support. The hole cannot get deeper.

Here's the thing. We established that the actual math, based on your own numbers, is a $3.3m difference between firing Ash & not (based on small raises). You then said the athletic budget can apparently be variable by $11m in a year due to who knows what. So, the difference is 1/3rd of the variability in the budget? Or, essentially noise. And that's assuming not $1 of additional revenue based on donations or attendance between the case of Ash being hired and a new staff.
 
Here's the thing. We established that the actual math, based on your own numbers, is a $3.3m difference between firing Ash & not (based on small raises). You then said the athletic budget can apparently be variable by $11m in a year due to who knows what. So, the difference is 1/3rd of the variability in the budget? Or, essentially noise. And that's assuming not $1 of additional revenue based on donations or attendance between the case of Ash being hired and a new staff.

The additional factor that you may be overlooking is that last year RU athletics reported a $47 million deficit, as per nj.com's numbers.

Now, those numbers are inflated because nj.com counted as deficit spending the roughly $11 million in student fees - which Rutgers considers baseline revenue. So if you back that out, the real deficit number is $36 million.

We have the highest athletics deficit in the nation.

Yes, we're not getting a full share of B1G revenue. And we won't, for another couple of years. Until we do, additional deficit spending is verboten, as per the current president of the university. You can crunch the numbers any way you want to try and talk yourself into the notion that firing Ash and spending more money on a crackerjack coaching staff will help more than it hurts, but the reality of that notion is that it results in additional cost. That is incontrovertible.
 
The additional factor that you may be overlooking is that last year RU athletics reported a $47 million deficit, as per nj.com's numbers.

Now, those numbers are inflated because nj.com counted as deficit spending the roughly $11 million in student fees - which Rutgers considers baseline revenue. So if you back that out, the real deficit number is $36 million.

We have the highest athletics deficit in the nation.

Yes, we're not getting a full share of B1G revenue. And we won't, for another couple of years. Until we do, additional deficit spending is verboten, as per the current president of the university. You can crunch the numbers any way you want to try and talk yourself into the notion that firing Ash and spending more money on a crackerjack coaching staff will help more than it hurts, but the reality of that notion is that it results in additional cost. That is incontrovertible.

I'm not arguing that we don't have a deficit, and that it isn't large. I'm arguing the $3.3m is well under the basic fluctuation in spending/revenue you expect when your budget is as large as ours is for the whole AD. When we put together our budget, revenue and spending, $3.3m in under the error tolerance for the year. Fund raising, ticket sales, unexpected events of some kind will move the needle in unexpected directions more than the $3.3m difference between one staff and another.
 
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1. Math. 3 years worth of NCAA financial reports from which I've taken gameday revenue and divided it by attendance.

2. I'm only going to address the rest by saying, simply, this - Hobbs has been told to eliminate additional deficit spending. You cannot guarantee any increase in attendance. You can talk about "if we fire Ash and hire some great guy, attendance will go up" but you can't cite a number and you can't guarantee increased revenue. The ONLY thing you can guarantee in this scenario is increased cost.

Again, bear in mind - as I have repeatedly stated - RU athletics blew its budget by more than $11 million last year, which necessitated additional, unplanned and budgeted, institutional support. The hole cannot get deeper.

Can you direct me to links for the reports that have a line item for football revenue? All I'm finding are overall athletic department numbers, or football carve-outs in EADA filings, where football revenues are set equal to football expenses (post subsidy number).

I'd like to see the football-specific revenue drop from 2016 to 2017 to 2018 vs. the attendance drop in those years.

Thanks.
 
Can you direct me to links for the reports that have a line item for football revenue? All I'm finding are overall athletic department numbers, or football carve-outs in EADA filings, where football revenues are set equal to football expenses (post subsidy number).

I'd like to see the football-specific revenue drop from 2016 to 2017 to 2018 vs. the attendance drop in those years.

Thanks.

NCAA Financial Reports.

Rutgers published them for every year up until 2017. The practice of publicizing them was discontinued under Pat Hobbs.

I don't have links, I made a practice of saving copies of them on my laptop every year.

The reports are essentially a P&L for the athletic department. First two pages are a departmental level breakdown, the remaining pages are broken out by individual sport.
 
I'm not arguing that we don't have a deficit, and that it isn't large. I'm arguing the $3.3m is well under the basic fluctuation in spending you expect when your budget is as large as ours is for the whole AD. When we put together our budget, revenue and spending, $3.3m in under the error tolerance for the year. Fund raising, ticket sales, unexpected events of some kind will move the needle in unexpected directions more than the $3.3m difference between one staff and another.

I disagree that your $3.3 million number is an expected fluctuation, particularly in the face of likely declining revenues, where the sum of that decline is not yet known.
 
NCAA Financial Reports.

Rutgers published them for every year up until 2017. The practice of publicizing them was discontinued under Pat Hobbs.

I don't have links, I made a practice of saving copies of them on my laptop every year.

The reports are essentially a P&L for the athletic department. First two pages are a departmental level breakdown, the remaining pages are broken out by individual sport.

I think that's the EADA report, with expenses/revenues broken out by sport. But it says clearly on there that the revenue number reported must not be lower than expenses, and the two are exactly the same in both 2016 and 2017 - which leads me to believe it's not a true revenue, but a post-subsidy number.

Did it look like this?
https://oirap.rutgers.edu/reports/Rutgers-NB-EADA-2017-Published-Final.pdf
 
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I disagree that your $3.3 million number is an expected fluctuation, particularly in the face of likely declining revenues, where the sum of that decline is not yet known.
Maybe error tolerance is a better way of phrasing it.

If you assume a new coach reduces that $3.3 by some amount next year (combination of ticket sales/donations above what they will be with Ash) and that the difference will grow over time as the team improves... Well, the only logical conclusion is Hobbs thinks Ash gets the job done, because otherwise it just doesn't make sense to make a huge decision that impacts revenues in an unknown way to save an amount of money that is within the natural variation of your revenues/expenses from year to year.
 
I think that's the EADA report, with expenses/revenues broken out by sport. But it says clearly on there that the revenue number reported must not be lower than expenses, and the two are exactly the same in both 2016 and 2017 - which leads me to believe it's not a true revenue, but a post-subsidy number.

Did it look like this?
https://oirap.rutgers.edu/reports/Rutgers-NB-EADA-2017-Published-Final.pdf

No, that's not it. The NCAA filing is considerably more detailed.

But yes, where revenue and expenses are equal would reflect a post-subsidy balance.
 
No, that's not it. The NCAA filing is considerably more detailed.

But yes, where revenue and expenses are equal would reflect a post-subsidy balance.

Since you have the documents saved, can you post the football specific revenues for 2015, 2016, and 2017 when you get a chance, since it doesn't look like those documents are available online anymore? I apologize if you've done this in another post already, but I couldn't find it through the search feature.
 
Since you have the documents saved, can you post the football specific revenues for 2015, 2016, and 2017 when you get a chance, since it doesn't look like those documents are available online anymore? I apologize if you've done this in another post already, but I couldn't find it through the search feature.

Like I said, I don't have '17. That was the first year that RU stopped publishing the document.

FWIW, they're not required to actually publish them, but they are "public". NJ.com gets them via a FOIA request, I would assume.

It would take me a while to compile football specific numbers for 15 and 16. In 2015 the report format changed from "sport specific" to "line item specific", so there's a page for ticket sales by sport, institution support (direct and indirect) by sport, merchandising, sponsorship, etc.
 
I think that's the EADA report, with expenses/revenues broken out by sport. But it says clearly on there that the revenue number reported must not be lower than expenses, and the two are exactly the same in both 2016 and 2017 - which leads me to believe it's not a true revenue, but a post-subsidy number.

Did it look like this?
https://oirap.rutgers.edu/reports/Rutgers-NB-EADA-2017-Published-Final.pdf
He's referring to this report:

https://www.pdf-archive.com/2017/09/18/2016-ncaa-financial-report/2016-ncaa-financial-report.pdf
 
The additional factor that you may be overlooking is that last year RU athletics reported a $47 million deficit, as per nj.com's numbers.

Now, those numbers are inflated because nj.com counted as deficit spending the roughly $11 million in student fees - which Rutgers considers baseline revenue. So if you back that out, the real deficit number is $36 million.

We have the highest athletics deficit in the nation.

Yes, we're not getting a full share of B1G revenue. And we won't, for another couple of years. Until we do, additional deficit spending is verboten, as per the current president of the university. You can crunch the numbers any way you want to try and talk yourself into the notion that firing Ash and spending more money on a crackerjack coaching staff will help more than it hurts, but the reality of that notion is that it results in additional cost. That is incontrovertible.

Pretty sure that we've determined before that the large deficit year was not last year. I.e., wasn't it for FY 17, which was from the 2016 football season?

I don't think the financials from FY 18 (2017 season) have been released yet so we don't know what the deficit was last year.

It is possible Hobbs has financials from two additional football seasons than has been publicly released.

None of this changes that he either didn't have a way out of this contract when he agreed to it or just thinks Ash is the right guy. Or both.
 
Again, bear in mind - as I have repeatedly stated - RU athletics blew its budget by more than $11 million last year, which necessitated additional, unplanned and budgeted, institutional support. The hole cannot get deeper.

Of course it can. We choose not to make the hole deeper ... and we do so to the long-term detriment of the school and its finances.
 
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