This Sutton Impact assignment has been a bit confusing to me on exactly what we needed to do. The Mark Cuban example just showed how Sutton appreciated and respected a lot of things that Mark Cuban did, and I am going to do the same for a man that I met this summer.
Barry Alvarez has been the face of the Wisconsin Badgers athletic department since the early 90s and continues to play a crucial part in the world of college athletics. He set the standard of how Big 10 schools should recruit, act, and carry themselves. Academics is one of the biggest parts of Wisconsin tradition now, and they take pride in graduating their players.
Next is he is taking an aggressive approach to how the NCAA should change, and is helping collegiate athletes get treated better. He is on board with full scholarships covering the cost of expenses for school, and is hoping that everything will start changing to give the larger conferences more power.
He is now the AD at Wisconsin, and on top of his responsibilities to the school, and Big 10 conference, he is on a committee that will choose the 4 BCS playoff teams this coming season. Not just everybody can do the jobs that he is asked to do. College football is a billion dollar industry, and making sure the right teams are playing for the national championship is crucial in the amount of revenue which will be gained.
Coach Alvarez is all about tradition, and that is how many college athletic programs can sustain their high level of competition. College athletics is all about being successful, keeping the boosters happy, and being able to maintain a high level of competition. The schools that get in trouble tend to have NCAA sanctions, or a patch of a few years that causes huge problems. The power house colleges don't allow themselves to get in trouble, and Barry Alvarez has gone his whole career doing everything the right way, and has built an empire in Madison Wisconsin.
Meeting with Coach Alvarez was an amazing experience, and he is literally a living legend on the campus. He hasn't coached in about 10 years, but everybody still refers to him as coach and he knows everybody at the stadium. Security guards, grounds crew, anybody and everybody respects him and he gives it right back. The infrastructure at Wisconsin is strong, and everybody feels important there even if they aren't directly involved in athletics.
The biggest aspect he talked about is making sure the boosters are happy. Money drives everything, and Wisconsin wouldn't be where they are now if they didn't have the support of the alumni, and large amount of corporate donations, specifically Kohl's. The boosters make everything happen, and want to be able to say they contributed to a national championship run, or a teams success. The job of an AD is to make sure the right people are in the right positions to succeed, and the supporters feel that they have actually contributed to the better of the team.
College athletics is all about public relations and making sure the fans are in the stands. The colleges that do it right, have the 100,000 capacity stadiums, and still sell out every game because the people respect the program. I know first hand that Nebraska had a few bad years, but the fans still would fill the stadium because it is tradition. Professional sports doesn't have that aspect of the business, and tend to not have long lasting traditions. Tradition is a huge selling point, marketing pitch, and a way to gather excitement around the program.
Metting Coach Alvarez was a great experience for me, and let me meet one of my idols. He does everything the right way, is respected throughout his profession, and even took time out of his busy day to talk to me for over an hour. I'm interested to see what everybody is going to do for this assignment. It was one of the more difficult ones since Sutton seemed to change his format weekly.
First and for most, it is always cool meeting one of your idols. How was the experience for you? What did you learn from him?
ReplyDeleteHe seemed to provide you with a lot of insight to what goes on with the job and with in college sports outside of his coaching duties. It is crazy how much it has turned into a business and more than coaching and that the coaching duties are not their only responsibility.
There is not much better than having people be advocates for your sport and what it stands for whether it is at the national level, on the campus, or just within the office. Advocates for the game are what build the sport to bigger and better things.