Stunning figures coming out of the University of Tennessee, which announced that they would be adding 10% to the cost of football tickets in 2025…in order to help pay players.
It didn’t shock me, but I still took the time to read it twice.
The announcement from the University of Tennessee athletic director last week that the Volunteers would be adding a 10% surcharge to football tickets in 2025 to offset the expense of revenue sharing, necessary to attract and keep the kind of talent necessary to compete on a national basis.
And here it is: “As the collegiate model changes, we have to remain flexible,” said Athletic Director Danny White of the upcharge, which includes a 4.5% increase on top of the 10% talent fee. “We have to continue leading the way. That connection between resources and competitiveness has never been tighter. Only now we have the ability to share these resources with our athletes. We can generate revenue that will go directly to our players. This will give our teams the best chance to be successful and bring championships home to Rocky Top.”
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So, you’re asking, 10% on top of what?
So the average ticket price to see a University of Tennessee home game at Neyland Stadium (which holds 110,000, give or take) is about $550 dollars per seat (StubHub), based on the posted cost of tickets for the October 12 home game with the University of Florida. And tickets, individually, range from $350 for upper deck end zone seats, to as much as $2,045 dollars to sit anywhere in the lower bowl between the ten yard lines. The source is StubHub, of course, because you just can’t buy those tickets from the athletic ticket office. And StubHub is making theirs, be assured. But it is proportionate.
According to published athletic department pricing, the average face value of Tennessee tickets doubled this past year…the cheapest being $35 for horrible seats in the upper deck, to an average of $305 dollars for average seats in the lower bowl.
And more sobering news. It’s coming to a university near you…that pays for nearly every other sport on campus based on what they make from football. And can you think of one, and a surcharge to help ensure that the golden goose is kept in peak health – what it would mean to you?
Seriously, there’s so much that can be written about this that it would take a book, not a page, to detail it all. But just a few points……
One, at what point do you say you can’t do it anymore…that you can’t pay $550 dollars a game for a seat between the 20s to enjoy the experience. This is on top of you already paying $200 a month for satellite TV at home, where you could watch it for much less. Of course, the networks have already paid their millions for the rights to broadcast the game, and they’re passing it along to you.
Two, at what point do you realize a simple retail principle. Supply and demand is one thing…but there comes a point where you simply punish the customer, until you can’t punish him anymore.
Three, a depression can come quickly, like a bolt of lightning. Look at the great stock market crash in 1929, an impact that lasted for a generation. Ohio Stadium, itself, sat half empty because people coveted food, and rent, over football. And it can happen again, because the least of the fan base now has to plan financially – save up – in order to make college football a part of their family budget. I’ve seen families of five at Big Ten stadiums, parent and kids, who could not possibly justify paying $500 a seat to watch college football – if it comes to that.
Four, you can expect an even bigger gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’…because schools like Youngstown State charge $20 for a football ticket, if they can get that. I’ve been there for a Saturday home game and saw fewer than 10,000 people…much fewer. And even if Akron does play Ohio State in Columbus, who wants to pay that much to see anything but the best versus the best? You can make the argument about the value of the experience, but doesn’t football count as part of the experience? I’d want to see Ohio State play Michigan every week if I were paying $500. For the sake of resources and competitiveness, as Danny White said, how in the world would schools like Youngstown even afford to compete…because they’re only competitive, even now, against schools like themselves?
Five, this may be generational, but it’s increasingly obvious that elite athletes don’t attend college anymore with a priority on education, at least not the kind who play at Ohio State and Michigan – Tennessee and Texas. Because none of the revenue generated by Power Five athletic programs is openly distributed in order to bring down the cost of tuition and board for a kid from Proctorville or West Liberty, whose dream is to become an engineer, a dentist, or an educator – people we need to prioritize if we’re going to continue to flourish as a culture and country.
Veteran columnist Sonny Fulks writes OHSAA and Ohio State sports for Press Pros Magazine.com.
Notice again the words of Danny White: “We can generate revenue that will go directly to our players. This will give our teams the best chance to be successful and bring championships home to Rocky Top.”
Championships, that is…and nothing about math and English teachers, occupational therapists, and those who build bridges. They’re on their own.
Years ago I did an interview with Troy native Randy Walker, during his tenure as head football coach at Northwestern. At that time, the top price of a football ticket to watch Big Ten football was about $50, face value. So I asked Walker if when he started he thought he’d ever coach long enough to see it cost that much to watch college football?
“No,” he said. “But that’s not my business. Someone else handles the money.
“But I will say,” he added, speaking tongue in cheek. “I hope I don’t live to see it cost more than $50.”
He didn’t. Randy Walker died a year later, in 2006, of a heart attack…never dreaming of what he’s missed.
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