Big Ten Conference and other baseball programs at northern schools could be playing summer instead of spring schedules within five years. That’s the opinion of Gophers coach John Anderson who told Sports Headliners during an interview that economics and lack of parity with southern schools is frustrating to Big Ten and other coaches.
Like most college sports, baseball typically doesn’t even come close to paying its way and the nosedive of the American economy has added to the funding challenge. Northern schools sometimes are at an economic disadvantage against more prosperous southern baseball schools. Always there’s a competitive disadvantage because of weather. While southern schools can practice and play almost without concern about weather conditions, programs like Minnesota, or Michigan, have to fret over cold and precipitation even in May.
A better plan, Anderson suggests, is to have different schedules and college champions for southern and northern schools. Let southern schools keep the present schedule that begins in February and ends in June for those who can advance to the College World Series. Anderson talks about northern schools starting later and determining a champion in the summer.
Anderson said, “…I think people start looking at it and say, ‘Why are we spending this kind of money to try to compete in a sport, or in a championship climate, that you don’t have any hope? I think people are starting to look seriously at that. …”
Gophers athletic director Joel Maturi told Sports Headliners that the Minnesota baseball program operates at a deficit of about $900,000. He thinks a move toward an August-October schedule, one that coincides better with the academic year, could be the future for programs like Minnesota’s.
Anderson’s team is on a Texas road trip that began last week and will cost about $45,000. It’s a classic example of the money and time northern schools must invest to strive for competitiveness. “We’ll be on the road for 10-11 days,” Anderson said. “We’re playing eight games in 10 days. It’s a grueling schedule. It taxes your pitching staff. You hope the weather cooperates so you can get it all in. That’s the unknown. You could have rain. What if you go down there and you only play half of your games? Is it really worth your while?”
Anderson mentioned that summer leagues in the north, like the Northwoods League with teams in Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin, use college players and are successful economic models for the Gophers and other Big Ten schools as they look at summer baseball. “Some of those owners are making close to a million dollars a summer,” he said.
Anderson said Big Ten programs are being stretched to spend the money to compete with the top baseball schools throughout the country, with heavy expenditures for travel and facilities. “Look at our program. We have three different facilities we play in, an outdoor facility on campus, we have an indoor football facility we practice in and we use the Metrodome,” Anderson said. “You’re constantly moving from one place to the other. You’re going on the road. You’re going into the Metrodome. You’re going outdoors. …”
Anderson said coaches don’t want to see more schools give up baseball, places like Northern Iowa which is calling it quits, with an opportunity to save $400,000 per year. Instead, he’s thinking about summer baseball with “lower overhead,” favorable weather and the possibility of more than doubling home attendance for his Gophers to 2,000 or more per game.