Valpo has much work to do...

[vudad]

True to a point, however, I wouldn't mind us testing the waters to find out rather than settling for a 15 year loser because of a fear that we can't do better. Mediocrity is not acceptable in many parts of the university, why in athletics should it be? I'm not saying we need the soccer coach from IU, ND or anywhere else (though an assistant from one of these places might jump at a chance to try it here), what I am saying is that we need a coach who gets the most out of what he has - and at VU that is clearly not happening. At least not in some sports.

[valporun]

I see your point vudad, but it would be nice if the NCAA allowed full disclosure of injuries so we could all know what some of the teams are looking at for fielding a team around injuries to key players. If injuries are not the problem, then its the coach or the players, and if the coach isn't doing anything to get the kids to change how they play or change his philosophy...then its time for the coach to resign or accept the pink slip he is due. True, its not likely most of the coaches will ever be fired, but many of the coaches at lower levels don't want to coach at the D-I level because of the politics we bicker back and forth about here ever few minutes or days. At most non-D-I schools the coach, whether the head coach or assistant coach might have another job within the athletic department or be asked to teach in the physical education department or another department. They would rather have a guarantee of having a job teaching, and just coach athletes who want to participate in the sport and enjoy the benefits it can add to their education. Sadly, at Valpo, because of our athletic association..we hope to be more like the UCLAs, Stanfords, Texas, Georgias, and Floridas who can compete at such high levels because the coaches could lose their job at any time..and its usually the job that pays their bills while on the road...do you think Homer Drew would go out on recruiting trips if he couldn't supplement some this recruiting he does with money he makes in his contract? Maybe he doesn't have that as a stipulation, but if he did..it might change how he can recruit cause the money he's making isn't at the level of Jim Laranaga, Mark Turgeon or Mark Few...he's making about as much as baseball player who is being paid league minimum...sure he doesn't have young kids anymore, and maybe his wife doesn't need all the extravagences that some coaches wives want to enjoy, but she at least supports what he does and will sacrifice wants for dreams, otherwise she might have told Homer that if he came back to coaching there could be a rift at home?

[vudad]

valporun, you lost me a bit, but I appreciate the dialogue. Strangely therapeutic. Back to my original point for the thread... if we are commting to raising the bar in ALL sports at VU, and the conference move indicates that we may be, should we not look at giving our athletes the best chance to succeed? In my mind, putting the right leaders in place of each program is the logical place to start.

[valporun]

While the leadership is a good place to start..it would help if all of our teams had the proper facilities. The conference was more for the sake of the excellence of the athletes in the classroom. The travel is a killer when you're having to bus or fly many hours to get to a game somewhere. This became the main focus of the coaches, athetes and athletic advisors. Some athletes weren't provded an extension on class work if it was due the morning after the team would return and the bus didn't get the players back until 2-3AM. Its a simple matter of the travel affected alot of performances, not exclusively basketball, soccer or baseball, but all sports.
Sometimes it takes knowing how the travel affected things as an athlete in the program, rather than just looking at the results that Ryan and Andy provide online or you read in the local newspaper.

[valpo89]

valporun said:

he's making about as much as baseball player who is being paid league minimum...

If Homer were paid the MLB minimum, it would be a tremendous raise. Isn't it in the $300's?

And I don't think his 35-plus years with Mrs. Drew has had anything to do with how much money he makes or hasn't made.

[rlh]

'89....you''re getting as cynical as me....No HOmer isn't making the MLB minimum....and he doesn't have a tremendous recruiting budget...he raises a lot of those funds on his own for hte program, as do some of the other coaches...the problem with many of our sports is they don't have even 3 full scholarships....most of them have to divide them up among several players....it makes it very difficult. Hopefully with the move up, this will be one of the areas that will change...

[valporun]

Thanks rlh, I was hoping you'd help with the inside info you know. I was just using the MLB minimum to show others what it is(approximately) that Homer does make and how he might have to use some of that for the sake of going out to recruit. I didn't mean to bring his wife into this, it just seemed like something a non coach's wife might think when it comes to him going back to work after retirement. In this case, he went back because of Scott, and she probably did support that, especially as late as the decision was made, cause Scott did leave in August..not much time to evaluate coaches looking for jobs.

[valpotentate]

valpo89 said:

valporun said:

he's making about as much as baseball player who is being paid league minimum...

If Homer were paid the MLB minimum, it would be a tremendous raise. Isn't it in the $300's?

And I don't think his 35-plus years with Mrs. Drew has had anything to do with how much money he makes or hasn't made.

Although it's not out of line, I do believe that Homer was making more than anyone else at the University, including the President, at least while I was there. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

[valpo89]

Can't confirm or deny, but I believe that's probably true. And I believe it's probably well deserved. Homer is still underpaid by Division I standards.

[vu72]

Can't confirm or deny either. My guess is there are a few people making more than the President including Homer, The Dean of the Law School and probably the Dean of Business and Engineering also.

[valpotentate]

I tried to do a little research on this, but the Chronicle of Higher Education's database requires a log-in (calling Jester!). It does allow you to view president's salaries and the salaries of the four-highest paid staff members (not sure if that includes athletics). I did run across this interesting tidbit from a 2001 article though:

Last year, the average salary for coaches of women's teams in Division I was $38,191, while coaches of men's teams earned an average of $61,534. Assistant coaches of women's teams earned on average $18,623, while their counterparts on men's teams earned $30,584....

The intense demands of the job may cause others to leave the field to raise families, says Becky S. Madden, head coach of Valparaiso University's women's volleyball team. The early-morning and late-night practices and the heavy travel for games and recruiting take a toll, she says. Still, Ms. Madden is not ready to write off discrimination as a factor.

Like other universities, she says, Valparaiso has a "good-old-boy" system made up of alumni from as far back as the 1940's who are now university employees, and who don't see the need to hire women.

"Coaching women's sports, you need to understand the emotional side of what women go through, to be a role model," Ms. Madden says.

William Steinbrecher, Valparaiso's athletics director, denies that an old-boy network controls hiring and says Ms. Madden is not in any position to evaluate if one exists. He says the university has a goal of hiring more female and minority head coaches, but the applicant pool is just too small.

When Valparaiso hired its women's basketball coach roughly eight years ago, Mr. Steinbrecher says, no women applied. When the job opens again, he says, the university will try hard to find a woman.

But the candidate must be qualified for the job, he says. "We're not going to take a woman who's not as good as one of the other applicants just to take a woman. We'd hope that it would be a woman. We'd hope it'd be an African-American, Spanish-speaking coach. That's a triple minority right there."

[vudad]

Steinbrecher's final quote is reason alone to be thankful he retired! There is a difference between thinking something and actually saying it - an important skill for an AD. Let's hope LaBarbera is more tactful, more forward thinking, more proactive, and more willing to lead us to higher places. Rationalize all you want, but VU can do better than it has done if it were willing to make a few tough decisions for the sake of the athlete's experience. Loyalty to coaches may be a romantic ideal, but what about loyalty to student athletes? Coach will find another job but the player will never get the four years eligbility back.

[sigpicrusader]

With regard to raising the bar in our sports programs, I can tell you with a great deal of certainty that it does not effect the basketball team in terms of repsect and recognition amongst recruits. Kids here in Minnesota think highly of VU and coaches who are regularaly in D-1 circles talk to their kids about the abilities, (positively) of Coach Drew. Even nationally among the marginal kids who's talent is probably major to high-major, there has been a good "buzz" about VU for the past 15 years or so. The reason kids go elsewhere is because of the conference affiliation. People will talk about TV exposure, etc., but the bottom line is kids, or at least most of them, want to compete against quality opposition.

Now, with regard to other VU sports, I played tennis for Daugherty more than 15 years ago and he is a class act. he's a good caoch with a good philosophy and he has won recently. (Wasn't it two years ago or so that the men won the conference title?). I am also the boys varsity soccer coach at my employer HS. I had a five-year starter graduate this past weekend. I phoned Mis Mrak regarding this player, who was a two-time all-state kid with a great academic record and strong leadership skills. Anyway, Mrak was abrasive and crude as if I was wasting his time. He didn't give my kid a second look. The kid is now going to play for Columbia University in NYC. He would have seriously looked at VU.

Now I have a player who has recently been asked to train with the US under-17 national team. He's going to wait a year. I have a great relationship with the kid, and even though he is getting letters from many big-time programs, (including Indiana), he wants to stay small, (I think Marquette is his favorite right now). He wanted to know about VU, but I told him not to bother because I wouldn't want him playing for "that kind of coach".

Back to tennis. We had only one scholarship for all 12 of us at the time, (I was a walk-on). I was lucky in that I got $$$ from the University elsewhere. But what about those that can't? And we could compete with virtually anyone on our schedule in the bottom singles ranks, but we couldn't compete at the top level at the top of the singles ranks because the top kids were paid in full to go to school and our kids were those that couldn't...they were 3,4 and 5 singles players that had to play up. More money means better athletes, which means winning which means increased revenue...

[jester]

valpotentate said:

Although it's not out of line, I do believe that Homer was making more than anyone else at the University, including the President, at least while I was there. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

Sorry it took me a couple of days to get to this; I've been busy and away from my computer for a while. As you might know, all nonprofit organizations, including all universitiies, are required to file IRS Form 990 each year. In some ways it's similar to the 1040 that normal people file, but part of the 990 shows the salaries of all officers of the organization, plus the salaries of the 5 highest paid employees. It is available to the public through guidestar.org, although you have to register at the site to get the info. When you do, what you see is a scanned copy of the actual documents submitted by the organization. The most recent year available is 2004. That's all by explanation of how I know this information.

I'm not going to publish anyone's salary on an open board like this. Even though it's accessible to anyone who wants to get it, I think people deserve more privacy than that. I will say this, though: in 2004 Homer Drew earned less than President Harre, and actually slightly less than the Dean of the Law School. However, it's also worth noting that Homer received more than 4 times as much "benefits and deferred compensation" as did the L.S. Dean, so his total compensation was higher. In total compensation he trailed President Harre, but was higher than anyone else at the university. I don't know how Homer's salary compared with coaches in peer institutions, but some of you who are willing to do the data mining could find out. The figures on the 990 refer only to compensation received from the university, of course, so a coach's TV or radio shows, shoe contracts, summer camps, etc. won't show there. (I'm not suggesting that Homer rakes in the money from these sources, but some coaches do.)