To most high school football players, the idea of attending a college and playing the sport they love is a dream come true. From the first time they step on the field as freshman players in high school to the entire recruiting process, these individuals mature from teenagers to young men.  This still doesn’t take away their love of the game or the reasoning behind their decision to attend a certain school. For some of these recruits, it’s about geography. They either want to remain close to home or get as far away as possible depending on their situation. For other recruits, it’s all about joining a football program they dreamed of suiting up for as children. And for others, it’s a calculated decision based on what program gives them the best opportunity to turn pro when all is said and done.  Not a single recruit looks at his options and bases his decision on whether a football program will actually be around by the time he’s done playing for that school. Unfortunately for members of the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) football team, there is no longer going to be a program following the 2014 season.  School president Ray Watts met with players and staff members on Tuesday to tell them that the football program was being cancelled. This is the first time that a major college football program has shut down since Pacific in 1995.  In a statement released by the university following the decision, Watts had this to say.  The fiscal realities we face — both from an operating and a capital investment standpoint — are starker than ever and demand that we take decisive action for the greater good of the athletic department and UAB,” Watts said in a statement released by the university. “As we look at the evolving landscape of NCAA football, we see expenses only continuing to increase. When considering a model that best protects the financial future and prominence of the athletic department, football is simply not sustainable.  I am not going to sit here in my office and show ignorance by asking when amateur athletics became about money and “capital investment.” This happened a long time ago around the college football world. It dates back decades, long before most of us were around. It’s a double standard that needs to be placed on the front burner in coming years, especially considering student-athletes see very little of the revenue an athletic department brings in.  A recent study by Business of College Sports suggests that the University of Alabama spent more on the salary of head football coach Nick Saban than on every aspect of student-athlete aid, including scholarships, back in 2013.  The idea of multi-millionaires coaching young adults who are attempting to scrape by makes very little sense from fairness standpoint. And when something like what just happened at UAB goes down, it’s the student-athletes that are impacted the most by the finances of college sports. Finances that they are not privy to as amateur athletes.  Administrators at UAB, including the school president, point to an operating budget of the athletic program ($30 million annually) that simply couldn’t support the cost of the football program itself. A cost administrators conclude would have been an additional $49 million for the football program over the next five years. Looking at this solely through a business lens, the decision makes perfect sense. UAB football simply wasn’t financially solvent moving forward. At least at its current pace (more on that later).
A look at the recent decision to eliminate the UAB college football program and how corporate ideology has played a role in amateur athletics in the modern world.