Dayton’s NIL Math

I never put a pencil to it until now. Rumor is Dayton6th has $1.5 million to work with. Some of that is supposed to be helping women’s basketball, but that’s peanuts. And they have merchandise for some of the other sports’ players, but I haven’t heard anyone getting cash. So I’m just going to work under the premise it’s all going to men’s basketball and you can easily shave off $10,000 here and there for other programs. And finally I don’t think $1.5 million is enough to compete - and I’ll get to a discussion of how to get that to $2.5 million next year.

So 13 men’s scholarship COULD breakdown as follows:

1. $50,000
2. $50,000
3. $50,000
4. $50,000
5. $75,000
6. $75,000
7. $75,000
8. $75,000
9. $100,000
10. $100,000
11. $200,000
12. $200,000
13. $500,000

That’s $1.6 million. You can play around with the numbers up or down, but this gives you a very easy visual of what $1.6 mill might buy.

I think we are all seeing what is coming into focus with the competitive landscape of NIL. At this point I think everyone is coming to the realization the rich not only hit richer but they can poach anyone they want from the rest of use. And no one seems to have a solution to any of this and if they did, Lord knows how many years it will take to get buy in from so many stakeholders, roll it out, make changes, re-launch and the biggest kicker…police whatever the rules will be, especially after the free-for-all years.

I think UD would be smart to come to the hard realization that they have to do whatever they can to get the NIL annual budget to $3 million basically immediately - meaning next year at this time. Everything has to be on the table. One would assume Dayton6th has already hit the big rollers in town and associated with the university up and I doubt they will just double their commitment. And we have heard from a lot of fans they just aren’t going to contribute. Season ticket, seat fees, COVID year contribution, arena contributions, etc. It’s a big amount many are already paying…for entertainment.

Someone posted this in another thread, sorry I couldn’t find it to give credit - so speak up if you are that person. They said UD has to consider cutting programs in athletics so some can survive. As a business person this ran very, very true. No one wants to have to make “layoff” type decisions, but to survive companies have to do it all the time.

I don’t have any numbers, but here is the concept. UD needs to find a way to cut $1.5 million out of the department, and I’ll tell you why, but first look at how you do that.

Biggest expenses in a program are scholarships, coaching staff salaries and travel. You eliminate some sports and you will also be able to run the department with less academic advisors, strength-conditioning staff, athletic trainers, facility staff, administrators and less communications staff.

Without knowing numbers…here is a guess at what that might look like. And again, nobody likes this might have to happen.

Cut
Men’s Cross Country
Women’s Cross Country
Women’s Track
Men’s Tennis
Women’s Tennis
Men’s Golf
Women’s Golf
Women’s Rowing

That leaves the following which you have to overlay Title IX, but assume it’s ok for discussion purposes:

Football (Already non-scholarship)
Men’s Soccer
Women’s Soccer
Baseball
Softball
Volleyball (I know that’s 12 scholarships)
Men’s Basketball
Women’s Basketball

So you cut $1.5 million out of the department — and maybe even more — which would be great. But the University can’t pay players. So you need to convert those saving into something that gets to Dayton6th. Here is how you do that.

16 home men’s basketball games. 13,000 tickets sold. 208,000 tickets a season. I’m not suggesting ticket prices go up…so just wait for it before you start screaming. And I don’t know what tickets cost for men’s basketball and with no games now - there isn’t anything on the ticket page to help. But if the athletic department cuts $1.5 million or more, they don’t need all the funds from MBB all ticket sales to run the department/fund these other sports.

So $8 from every ticket (208,000 for the season) would be $1.6 million. So if your tickets are $50 each…they are still $50 but they are itemized so there is a Dayton6th “surcharge” on every ticket sold of $8. The itemized receipt will show $42 for the event and $8 Dayton6th surcharge. You do not pay a dime more, but it allows for revenue to flow to Dayton6th.

This is a concept - because I know none of the numbers. But there are business owners, company presidents and board of directors every day in American making this kind of a decision to keep their entity alive and competitive. Nobody likes it, but to survive it has to be done. And I could find nothing in my search of NIL info that would prohibit a ticket surcharge to fund a collective. I believe UD needs to do something along these lines immediately. To remain relevant in MBB they have to get to the Big East. To get to the Big East they have to land elite players. To land elite players they have to have big bucks. And the fastest way to double or triple the NIL is to pick up half of that with a ticket surcharge without adding costs to the fan base. So that means you have to cut programs to cut the athletic department’s budget. When Title IX came to pass, colleges cut men’s sports programs to divert budget money to women's sports. Wrestling was one sport that lost a lot. There were others.

The bottom line question is, “Can you live without rowing, golf, tennis, cross country and track if it means UD will have a Top 25 men’s basketball team?”

The other sports I “kept” were sports that have performed at a pretty high level in the conference consistently in the recent years. And, if needed there might have to be some cuts to one or two of these. And I would also overlay the major Sports in the Big East and where we think we can be competitive. That’s the ultimate point of all of this. Get to the Big East by being very good in men’s basketball.

Now Dayton6th might be on the verge of signing a Jerry Jones or FedEx kind of deal. In that case, this is a moot discussion. If not, UD/Dayton6th need to get a plan that can be implemented very, very quickly because the NIL marketplace is moving extremely fast. I also think there is room for NIL deals of $500 to $1000 per month for the school year’s 9 months for all scholarship athletes in the remaining programs except maybe football if the NIL fund can get to $3 to $4 million. That would help the entire university become a bigger player in the Big East.