According to this article, VT is not getting a lot of bang for its buck.
Full disclosure: the author of the article admits that the chart is a bit misleading because of the way schools report their finances.
I found it interesting that VT is on the underperforming side of that chart. I've always heard that we outperform schools that spend much more than we do and we SHOULD be performing at the level of a school like NC State, and not larger schools. I'm sure the chart would look much better if it stopped at 2012, but I was under the impression that 2012-present was the norm for a school like ours. Does this surprise anyone else?
Other highlights:
-It makes me grin to see UVA so far in the wrong direction
-Boise St. is even farther up the chart then I would have predicted.
-Alabama and OSU being in the red is probably a perfect example of the flaws of this chart. Not sure anyone can ask for more success than what those two schools have experienced.
Comments
I've seen this before, but I'm guessing that VT will be on an upswing with the new coaches on staff.
Also, I'm guessing that all those teams near the line, including VT, are within the margin of error.
*Looks at chart, see's "Va Tech", cringes and shakes head, closes article*
To me, the issues mentioned in how schools report their expenses essentially invalidates this whole analysis. Setting that aside though, the other problem I see with this analysis is the author's implication that there should be a causation relationship between expenses and on-field success rather than just noting it as a correlation. It seems as if this author would have you believe that every $1 spent by a football program should lead to more wins. And sure, some expenses (such as paying big money for a good coach) are made with the intent of trying to increase on-field success, but a lot of expenses have zero to do with increasing on-field success and everything to do with revenue generation. For example, if you spend $25M expanding your football stadium, you're doing that because it will lead to additional ticket revenue, not because you think you'll win more games due to extra seats in your stadium. If one wants to really evaluate how much bang for the buck each program is getting, we would need an algorithm that measures expenses vs a combination of on-field success plus revenue.
p.s. One random aside that some might be interested in knowing-- the data the author used to measure on-field success is from the Massey ratings which were developed by Kenneth Massey. Massey got his MS in Mathematics from Virginia Tech.
I doubt it eliminates one time expenses like the cost of the new practice facility or the huge bonus Foster got.