EMU Athletics in a Death Spiral?
EMU faculty and students urge school to drop out of D-I football. Bet we'll be seeing a lot more of this. https://t.co/1K7OmYinL4
— John U. Bacon (@Johnubacon) April 25, 2016
So at least some students and faculty are suggesting that a good way to contribute to solving budget problems at EMU is to drop from D-1 to D-2 (skipping 1-AA entirely).
This would obviously be a pretty big change for the athletic department. And they have sports that aren't disasters. But, of course, football drives the train, and EMU's football program has been a flaming garbage pile for 30 years.
I can attest that the D-2 program here in Duluth, UMD (D-1 in hockey only, obviously) gets as much or more attention in a town with no major teams of its own than EMU does in A2 or Ypsi. They, at least, have a fanbase and a consistent radio broadcast and even a local tv broadcast of home games.
So perhaps it's time. But maybe there are alternate options. Dropping football would certainly be a big step, without gutting the rest of the department, right?
Honestly the Michigan restuarants I miss the most are in Ypsi. Sidetracks, Maiz, and Aubrees are awesome.
Middle aged people don't realize that Ann Arbor has become so gentrified and pricey that more or less all the local color has either moved to Ypsi or Detroit, become overpriced and establishment, or simply closed down.
I love Ann Arbor, but a lot of the alternative appeal it had even 10 years ago is now in Ypsi.
It's been decidely bourgeois for a long, long time.It's just that the radicals of yesteryear are old and either have moved away, passed on to Hippie Heaven, or are far less radical than they used to be.
Eh. Townies have always been bourgeois, that is for sure... the old Garrison Keilor line was that Ann Arbor is a place where people seriously discuss socialism but only in the finest restaurants and that is as true as ever. But the difference now is that the student population has caught up. Apartments that were student ghetto in my day are now priced at $2 per square foot, which is about on par with apartments in the nicer parts of Chicago. My cousin's roommate at UM uses a laundry service. Things have definitely changed.
Ann Arbor's restaurants and culture still blow Ypsi out of the water any day of the week. And it's not even close.
well yeah, nobody is arguing that. But Ann Arbor is also a place that is increasingly too expensive for independent businesses to exist whereas Ypsi's nicer parts are taking in a lot of refugees who can no longer afford the rents, both residents and potential business owners.
It's a depressing state of affairs when even a chain like Five Guys can't stay in open in downtown Ann Arbor because the rents on State Street are amongst the highest in the entire company.
April 26th, 2016 at 10:52 AM ^
I think it's just a matter of preference. Ypsi has a funkiness that was priced out of Ann Arbor. So while AA's restaurant scene is polished and its musical acts more high profile, a puppet theater space in the heart of downtown or a kombucha bar are things not found in Ann Arbor anymore. Which is fine. Now Ypsi gets to shine, replacing downtown State Street as the weird Bohemian sibling to Ann Arbor's upscale scene. I just think people like Tater need to be more open-mined and see what Ypsi has to offer.
I haven't understood why they have football for a long time. It's so expensive.
http://mgoblog.com/diaries/why-does-eastern-michigan-play-d-1-athletics
Pretty impressive list of guys who played at the next level including Pat Sheridan, Chris Hoiles, and Bob Welch. When I played HS baseball in the area (decades ago) I recall EMU as a very respectable destination. Would be a shame to not keep the baseball program at D1 level.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/schools/index.cgi?key_school=9dc98f6a
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13 future Major League players were on the team that year for EMU.
In 1970 EMU did win the NAIA National Championship and current New York Mets Manager Terry Collins was on that team.
Former Coach Ron Oestrike was legendary.......
Minnesota is an oddity. Big state, but 1 D-1 level program. Each Dakota has 2 D-1 level programs, though those schools take in a lot of Minnesota students, of course.
To your point though --- being the only game in a TV market does matter. A LOT. I was in San Angelo, Texas about a year ago. 150K-person town surrounded by 100 miles of tumbleweed in each direction. But San Angelo does have a University. Angelo State University, D-2 school --- they would get the top billing on the local TV sports report. Because they were the only game in town.
Minnesota-Duluth: same dynamic, no doubt.
If EMU could somehow relocate to Traverse City, Michigan --- they would be a lot more viable. Instead, they're stuck somewhere around 25th on the Southeast Michigan sports radar totem pole.
I guess it comes down to whether or not you see EMU as peers with WMU and CMU or Oakland and UDM. Honestly I think EMU would be fine in dropping football and joining the horizon league in all other sports.
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April 26th, 2016 at 11:11 AM ^
Well I was thinking more like commuter schools UD-Mercy and Oakland U, which are D1 athletics but no football.
I wouldn't say UM-Dearborn simply because UM-Dearborn's athletics are NAIA and not NCAA.
I don't believe you are allowed, for example, to stay in the MAC for all sports *except* football, but I don't know for sure. EMU does reasonably well in the MAC (again, except for football) and likes its status as a MAC school (putting it with peers WMU, CMU, Bowling Green, etc), but I don't know if playing as an FCS school for football only is an option.
It would be ideal - join the Missouri Valley or Pioneer for football, stay in the MAC for the rest. Dayton does this - they're in the Pioneer for football and the Atlantic-10 for all other sports.
Regardless, this is coming to a head. EMU, like all schools except for a few handfuls (e.g., Michigan; Stanford; Harvard) is coming up against yet another budget crunch and spending $10-$15 million a year on football is not sustainable.
I think you're right about the conference rules tie-up. But I think, given the climate and the scrutiny on the many mid-major conference schools for which this is a problem, that we're going to see some of these rules begin to be changed because they simply aren't realistic. You can't point at what a school like EMU has been doing with football since the beginning of time and say "well, if they want to stay in the conference for volleyball..."
Georgetown is D1 in basketball but I don't believe the rest of their sports are. At least when I was in college (25 years ago) the rest of their teams were D3. It might have changed though.
From what I've read, Georgetown is in the Patriot League in football (FCS) and D-1 in everything else the NCAA sponsors.
A lot of the "directionals" are very successful at 1-AA football. Northern Iowa, Eastern Illinois, Eastern Kentucky, Eastern Washington etc. all compete at a level I expect EMU would be able to. The stadium is way too big and I don't know if there is a precedent for shrinking a stadium, but I think competing in the MVFC or a similar league would be a good idea.
"The study points to an increase in the total full time equivalent athletic staff from 64 in 2006-07 to 85 in 2015-16, doubling staff salaries from $3.2 million to $6.4 million... During that same time period, the report indicates EMU's entire faculty increased by just 15.78 full-time equivalent personnel."
So EMU added *more* athletic department jobs, at a high-salary, to serve perhaps 500 students, than EMU did faculty to serve 20,000 students.
That is not right.
Sounds like a page from the Brandon playbook.
Been stumping on this for awhile and glad to see it's getting traction. I hated paying for EMU athletics when my wife was in grad school there.
http://mgoblog.com/mgoboard/otish-power-5-schools-and-others-charging-s…
(Note: in that thread, I way underestimated the current deficit.)
April 25th, 2016 at 11:49 PM ^
I'm an alumnus of both schools and am in EMU's Engineering Management program. I’d be disappointed if they dropped football or went to D2. They belong in the MAC.
Seems to me that Eastern has made a few clear blunders. They can’t and shouldn’t try to compete head to head with Michigan and MSU for fans on Saturday afternoons. As mentioned, EMU always has been a commuter school and the campus has a tendency to clear out on weekends. If they continue on with the football program they should just accept those facts and build a different sort of program.
Be the Anti-Michigan.
Make most or all of the home games at night, preferably on Thursday or Friday when undergrads are still on campus.
Make the night games a big party.
Exploit the lower competition for TV viewers and fans on those nights. (get on TV not on streaming services!)
Culture an identity as an outsider team with a radical or alternative philosophy (be fun to watch even if not winning!)
Schedule home games as much as possible on away dates for Michigan Football in order to draw more cross-over fans.
As others have mentioned, EMU is a fantastic school with much more going for it than many Michigan fans / alumni probably realize.