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Topic:  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!

Topic:  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 2:48:35 PM 
Bobcat1996 wrote:

You and others can consistently complain about Boals and the bad situation the basketball program is in. However, when I bring up the huge blunders and mistakes the former AD made, then I知 ridiculed.


No, you're ridiculed for how you do it, the fact that you do it every 4 minutes, and the sexism.


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Ohio69
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 4:13:06 PM 


Folks, Ohio University is so far behind us bobcatattackers think $200K - $300K is a big deal.

Meanwhile Miami Ohio is making headlines with millions in annual new committments ready for NIL and etc. Miami plans to spend millions more annually. Again, millions.

And here we are saying things like we need to reduce the head coaches salary from $700K to $500K because... what again? He hasn't won enough since the sweet 16.... or we need $200K to pay one more player to be here per year?

Good grief. Good luck to us Ohio basketball fans....









Can somebody hit a pull up jumper for me?.....

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Bobcat1996
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 6:51:20 PM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Bobcat1996 wrote:

You and others can consistently complain about Boals and the bad situation the basketball program is in. However, when I bring up the huge blunders and mistakes the former AD made, then I知 ridiculed.


No, you're ridiculed for how you do it, the fact that you do it every 4 minutes, and the sexism.




Wrong BLOS! Not every four minutes.Check my posts. And I stand by my statements. The former AD made huge blunders. I personally don稚 care if she is female or not, but she ran off many good male employees. You call it what you want. If McDavis or Nellis were still in charge these blunders would not have happened. Several posters on this website enjoyed Russ the radio guy and she was the reason he left. Ask him what he thinks about the former AD? I have mentioned many others but some posters on this forum have there head in the sand and fail to recognize these huge mistakes. I知 not giving her a pass on the blunders she made.
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 8:38:24 PM 
Ohio69 wrote:
Folks, Ohio University is so far behind us bobcatattackers think $200K - $300K is a big deal.
Meanwhile Miami Ohio is making headlines with millions in annual new committments ready for NIL and etc. Miami plans to spend millions more annually. Again, millions.

And here we are saying things like we need to reduce the head coaches salary from $700K to $500K because... what again? He hasn't won enough since the sweet 16.... or we need $200K to pay one more player to be here per year?

Good grief. Good luck to us Ohio basketball fans....




200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.

Last Edited: 4/7/2026 9:15:40 PM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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SBH
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 9:02:12 PM 
Bobcat1996 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Bobcat1996 wrote:

You and others can consistently complain about Boals and the bad situation the basketball program is in. However, when I bring up the huge blunders and mistakes the former AD made, then I知 ridiculed.


No, you're ridiculed for how you do it, the fact that you do it every 4 minutes, and the sexism.




Wrong BLOS! Not every four minutes.Check my posts. And I stand by my statements. The former AD made huge blunders. I personally don稚 care if she is female or not, but she ran off many good male employees. You call it what you want. If McDavis or Nellis were still in charge these blunders would not have happened. Several posters on this website enjoyed Russ the radio guy and she was the reason he left. Ask him what he thinks about the former AD? I have mentioned many others but some posters on this forum have there head in the sand and fail to recognize these huge mistakes. I知 not giving her a pass on the blunders she made.


Letting Russ Eisenstein leave was a huge blunder? Our former ticket manager, who was considered a loose canon by many in the department? Huge blunder? Letting Timmy A. short circuit his career with a dead end move? Her blunder? Please.

Last Edited: 4/7/2026 9:05:19 PM by SBH
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/7/2026 9:09:43 PM 
M.D.W.S.T wrote:

This of course presumes that anyone wants to play for one of the least paid coaches in college basketball and that person can actually sell them on playing here.


The salaries I suggested are in line with what coaches in the MAC get paid until they have success. Sendoroff coached for 13 years at Kent before his most recent extension put his base salary over 500k. Tod K at Toledo just got above $500k himself. Steele's salary was $300k this year. BG's coach is at $415k. The Michigan schools pay between ~$370k and $450k. Ball State pays $350k.

Why do we have to be paying somebody $700k to sell players on playing in Athens? And won't more money to give them make the job easier not harder?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- One, you actually have to find a better coach and sell him on making far less than his predecessor because your new view is, I'm gonna pay you less, so we can pay players more.


If we're interviewing coaches whose number one priority isn't budget to attract players, we're interviewing the wrong people. We spend a truly ridiculous percentage of our operating budget on a single employee's salary. It's a remnant of a model that's gone and isn't coming back. No competent GM will allow it going forward, and no potential coach who understands what it takes to actually win is going to insist on spending ~24% of the budget on themselves.

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Two, this new guy actually needs to find, and recruit better players. We've talked about it ad nauseum, but the actual recruiting aspect of the job isn't being done well enough. Budgetary restrictions, I don't know. But it's not currently working. And we don't know that it will improve under a guy with less of a resume and less regional ties than Boals. Or that the money for that even exists.


I'm not actually sure what point you're making here beyond just saying that maybe the next coach won't be good. That's possible, you're right. But I'm not sure what the point is? That we should hang onto Boals and pay him for past results?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Three, you have to hope our small pool money doesn't follow Boals out the door.


I don't understand why this matters. Boals isn't working out. The results -- barring a massive turnaround next season -- haven't been there. We should just embrace bad results because we're afraid of what the next dude might do?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Four, you have to hope a young, unproven coach can handle the job of managing multiple six-figure egos, when he himself is barely making more.


You want to make the case that Boals has managed the egos on his team well over the last couple of seasons? He's making 6x what Simmons makes, right? Does that automatically make him Phil Jackson, or did he just tell a stranger at breakfast the other day that his captain needs to go to therapy and whine about his budget?

NBA coaches -- and plenty of college coaches these days -- have to manage players who make way more money than them. Feels like a huge reach to act like we have no choice but to pay our coach 6x any player for some vague psychological ego management reasons.

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

That's a lot of hope. That's a lot of assuming players are driven only by cash. And maybe they are. But that's a lot for a low paid coach to deal with in addition to maintaining OU's historical, successful relevance in the MAC.


What I don't really follow is what you're actually suggesting as an alternative. I'm outlining a way to easily free up another 200-300k in revenue share money. Your proposal is what? Status quo and hope things get better?

I just do not understand how anybody can rationally look at introduction of revenue share for players and think that a 200% increase in the number of people getting paid doesn't require a shift in how that money's allocated.

This is a business. At some point, we gotta start acting like it, right?

Last Edited: 4/7/2026 9:13:26 PM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Ohio69
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 9:02:07 AM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





Can somebody hit a pull up jumper for me?.....

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FJC31
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 9:42:59 AM 
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)







Akron and UMass ($1.3) were the high spenders this past season. MAC schools on average are spending a minimum of $400K. In other threads it was concluded we were between around/slightly over $800K in spending.

We retained our best player -- like him or not for flexing, he's a beast and with Gillespie leaving he's likely the best big in the MAC.

We just landed a 19ppg mid-major player, we're in on a Northwestern and Davidson transfer, and supposedly have a 6'9 Serbian player incoming.

I'm still perplexed by the narrative we're struggling financially to build an adequate program.

Greer, the Davidson kid, isn't visiting in the first place if the money isn't there.
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 9:52:07 AM 
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





This is a false premise. My suggesting we be smarter about spending the money we have doesn't mean that we shouldn't also increase revenue. I get it -- you want us to have more money than we do. Id like that, too. In the meantime though, let's manage the budget we have like adults and not run a small "company" that operates at a loss in a way that pays the CEO 25% of the operating budget.


Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.

Last Edited: 4/8/2026 10:15:10 AM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 10:25:06 AM 
FJC31 wrote:


Akron and UMass ($1.3) were the high spenders this past season. MAC schools on average are spending a minimum of $400K. In other threads it was concluded we were between around/slightly over $800K in spending.

We retained our best player -- like him or not for flexing, he's a beast and with Gillespie leaving he's likely the best big in the MAC.

We just landed a 19ppg mid-major player, we're in on a Northwestern and Davidson transfer, and supposedly have a 6'9 Serbian player incoming.

I'm still perplexed by the narrative we're struggling financially to build an adequate program.

Greer, the Davidson kid, isn't visiting in the first place if the money isn't there.


It's a convenient excuse and a convenient way to get hand wavey about the program. It's not a coincidence that the posters that were most pro-Boals a year ago have now pivoted to "we don't have enough money to compete". Boals himself is whining about it.

The budget doesn't seem bad to me. But it seems like we haven't been spending our well. Hopeful this off-season marks a seachange there.

Last Edited: 4/8/2026 10:26:29 AM by Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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QuantCat
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 11:45:02 AM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





This is a false premise. My suggesting we be smarter about spending the money we have doesn't mean that we shouldn't also increase revenue. I get it -- you want us to have more money than we do. Id like that, too. In the meantime though, let's manage the budget we have like adults and not run a small "company" that operates at a loss in a way that pays the CEO 25% of the operating budget.


Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.

This is a very valid train of thought, no logical or sound business would allocate that amount of funds to their CEO if operating at a loss. My counter to the argument is that college athletics is a fantasy land business model and is very far from an efficient business.

The core objective of the Ohio athletics department is to be competitive within the conference and win MAC championships. The other objective is to serve as the "front porch" of the university, and attract students and in a lot of ways serve as an advertising budget for the university. MAC athletic departments according to the financials all technically run at around even, but the books count millions of dollars in institutional subsidies and in some cases student fees as "revenue". Whether true or not, MAC schools view this operating loss as a necessity to keep the university known and continue to attract students. There is real data to support this. Loyola and George Mason both saw massive spikes in applications following deep tournament runs, but for the majority the math isn't so easy. Even Miami this year likely saw an uptick in admissions applications along with massive revenue spikes from basketball because of their success.

So why can't we pay a coach $300K and allocate the savings to the player budget? Because a coach in college basketball is the single most important entity in a program year in and year out. A bad coach can sink a program completely (even faster than a bad CEO) and a good coach can elevate a program and outperform the resources they are given (again, faster than a good CEO). To get a good coach, you have to pay a competitive rate. Given the recent Miami fan thread, why would a power school assistant leave a $750K salary for a $300K head coaching role when they might have opportunities at other schools for more money and overall team funding. If you are paying below market rate, you are going to get a below market result.

In a traditional business, paying 25% of the operating budget to one employee is insane, but the business model of college athletics is insane. To remain competitive in the landscape, you can't punt on the most important person in the program. You can't spend 10% of the operating budget on a coach when every peer institution in the conference is at 25%+ and expect to get a quality coach and then be competitive year in and year out. If anything, the portal era makes the job of coaches harder, as they now have to rebuild the roster every single year, and the response to this by a lot of programs has been to adjust their coaching staffs to replace a traditional coaching slot with a GM.

Ultimately, to circle back to your original point: your logic is perfectly sound for a normal company. But the reality of the college athletics model is that if your objective is to stay competitive in the conference, you simply have to keep up with the market spending. The moment you stray from that and try to run the athletic department like a rational, traditional business, you quickly fall behind your peers. It makes total sense in the corporate world, but college athletics just isn't that.
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Ohio69
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 12:35:34 PM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.


Fair enough. You make some good points. I assume we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. It seems the ncaa basketball business world was very interested in our coach after our sweet 16. Either for head coach or top assistant coach positions. And we paid him an extra 20% or so to stick around. I don't think that's a big deal. But, I'm beating a dead horse now.

Did ya'll see the Campbell head coach leave for Louisville assistant job after one year due to Campbell not supporting basketball financially. Its a whole new world out there.




Can somebody hit a pull up jumper for me?.....

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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 12:45:07 PM 
QuantCat wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





This is a false premise. My suggesting we be smarter about spending the money we have doesn't mean that we shouldn't also increase revenue. I get it -- you want us to have more money than we do. Id like that, too. In the meantime though, let's manage the budget we have like adults and not run a small "company" that operates at a loss in a way that pays the CEO 25% of the operating budget.


Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.

This is a very valid train of thought, no logical or sound business would allocate that amount of funds to their CEO if operating at a loss. My counter to the argument is that college athletics is a fantasy land business model and is very far from an efficient business.

The core objective of the Ohio athletics department is to be competitive within the conference and win MAC championships. The other objective is to serve as the "front porch" of the university, and attract students and in a lot of ways serve as an advertising budget for the university. MAC athletic departments according to the financials all technically run at around even, but the books count millions of dollars in institutional subsidies and in some cases student fees as "revenue". Whether true or not, MAC schools view this operating loss as a necessity to keep the university known and continue to attract students. There is real data to support this. Loyola and George Mason both saw massive spikes in applications following deep tournament runs, but for the majority the math isn't so easy. Even Miami this year likely saw an uptick in admissions applications along with massive revenue spikes from basketball because of their success.

So why can't we pay a coach $300K and allocate the savings to the player budget? Because a coach in college basketball is the single most important entity in a program year in and year out. A bad coach can sink a program completely (even faster than a bad CEO) and a good coach can elevate a program and outperform the resources they are given (again, faster than a good CEO). To get a good coach, you have to pay a competitive rate. Given the recent Miami fan thread, why would a power school assistant leave a $750K salary for a $300K head coaching role when they might have opportunities at other schools for more money and overall team funding. If you are paying below market rate, you are going to get a below market result.

In a traditional business, paying 25% of the operating budget to one employee is insane, but the business model of college athletics is insane. To remain competitive in the landscape, you can't punt on the most important person in the program. You can't spend 10% of the operating budget on a coach when every peer institution in the conference is at 25%+ and expect to get a quality coach and then be competitive year in and year out. If anything, the portal era makes the job of coaches harder, as they now have to rebuild the roster every single year, and the response to this by a lot of programs has been to adjust their coaching staffs to replace a traditional coaching slot with a GM.

Ultimately, to circle back to your original point: your logic is perfectly sound for a normal company. But the reality of the college athletics model is that if your objective is to stay competitive in the conference, you simply have to keep up with the market spending. The moment you stray from that and try to run the athletic department like a rational, traditional business, you quickly fall behind your peers. It makes total sense in the corporate world, but college athletics just isn't that.


Do you have numbers supporting that everybody in the conference pays 25% of operating budget on their coach? I haven't dug deep on basketball budgets in the test of the conference, but if you consider that Boals it's one of the 2 or 3 highest paid coaches in the league, I have trouble seeing how he's not at least a bit of an outlier. What market are we keeping up with? The MAC? Mid major schools that also have D1 football? Do we have to keep up with folks who fund via private donations we can't match?

I get the broader point, but don't actually find it particularly compelling. Especially in an era of revenue share. It seems completely nonsensical to me that the introduction of revenue share and suddenly having a massive new cost -- the players themselves -- has no bearing on how we allocate money going forward. Barring the top line revenue allocation increasing by ~25%, I just can't see how the money works otherwise.

In terms of the "front porch" theory -- Boals is 8 years in. Surely there's a way to measure the investment, right? Is paying $700k for a basketball coach paying off?

Too much of this basically seems to boil down to people insisting we have to pay a basketball coach $700k because we previously decided to pay a basketball coach $700k. I don't understand how we measure the success of doing so, and I don't understand why we watch schools in our conference pay coaches less and then beat up on us and decide that's okay.
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 12:47:40 PM 
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.


Fair enough. You make some good points. I assume we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. It seems the ncaa basketball business world was very interested in our coach after our sweet 16. Either for head coach or top assistant coach positions. And we paid him an extra 20% or so to stick around. I don't think that's a big deal. But, I'm beating a dead horse now.

Did ya'll see the Campbell head coach leave for Louisville assistant job after one year due to Campbell not supporting basketball financially. Its a whole new world out there.






To be clear, I think it was fine to give Boals a raise after his early success.

But all this time later, he hasn't delivered on the increased investment. And given the obvious advantage of being able to allocate more money to the player pool, a coach at the "entry level" rate MAC schools consistently pay is a better use of money than paying a premium for an NCAA tournament win 6 years ago.
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QuantCat
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 3:09:41 PM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
QuantCat wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





This is a false premise. My suggesting we be smarter about spending the money we have doesn't mean that we shouldn't also increase revenue. I get it -- you want us to have more money than we do. Id like that, too. In the meantime though, let's manage the budget we have like adults and not run a small "company" that operates at a loss in a way that pays the CEO 25% of the operating budget.


Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.

This is a very valid train of thought, no logical or sound business would allocate that amount of funds to their CEO if operating at a loss. My counter to the argument is that college athletics is a fantasy land business model and is very far from an efficient business.

The core objective of the Ohio athletics department is to be competitive within the conference and win MAC championships. The other objective is to serve as the "front porch" of the university, and attract students and in a lot of ways serve as an advertising budget for the university. MAC athletic departments according to the financials all technically run at around even, but the books count millions of dollars in institutional subsidies and in some cases student fees as "revenue". Whether true or not, MAC schools view this operating loss as a necessity to keep the university known and continue to attract students. There is real data to support this. Loyola and George Mason both saw massive spikes in applications following deep tournament runs, but for the majority the math isn't so easy. Even Miami this year likely saw an uptick in admissions applications along with massive revenue spikes from basketball because of their success.

So why can't we pay a coach $300K and allocate the savings to the player budget? Because a coach in college basketball is the single most important entity in a program year in and year out. A bad coach can sink a program completely (even faster than a bad CEO) and a good coach can elevate a program and outperform the resources they are given (again, faster than a good CEO). To get a good coach, you have to pay a competitive rate. Given the recent Miami fan thread, why would a power school assistant leave a $750K salary for a $300K head coaching role when they might have opportunities at other schools for more money and overall team funding. If you are paying below market rate, you are going to get a below market result.

In a traditional business, paying 25% of the operating budget to one employee is insane, but the business model of college athletics is insane. To remain competitive in the landscape, you can't punt on the most important person in the program. You can't spend 10% of the operating budget on a coach when every peer institution in the conference is at 25%+ and expect to get a quality coach and then be competitive year in and year out. If anything, the portal era makes the job of coaches harder, as they now have to rebuild the roster every single year, and the response to this by a lot of programs has been to adjust their coaching staffs to replace a traditional coaching slot with a GM.

Ultimately, to circle back to your original point: your logic is perfectly sound for a normal company. But the reality of the college athletics model is that if your objective is to stay competitive in the conference, you simply have to keep up with the market spending. The moment you stray from that and try to run the athletic department like a rational, traditional business, you quickly fall behind your peers. It makes total sense in the corporate world, but college athletics just isn't that.


Do you have numbers supporting that everybody in the conference pays 25% of operating budget on their coach? I haven't dug deep on basketball budgets in the test of the conference, but if you consider that Boals it's one of the 2 or 3 highest paid coaches in the league, I have trouble seeing how he's not at least a bit of an outlier. What market are we keeping up with? The MAC? Mid major schools that also have D1 football? Do we have to keep up with folks who fund via private donations we can't match?

I get the broader point, but don't actually find it particularly compelling. Especially in an era of revenue share. It seems completely nonsensical to me that the introduction of revenue share and suddenly having a massive new cost -- the players themselves -- has no bearing on how we allocate money going forward. Barring the top line revenue allocation increasing by ~25%, I just can't see how the money works otherwise.

In terms of the "front porch" theory -- Boals is 8 years in. Surely there's a way to measure the investment, right? Is paying $700k for a basketball coach paying off?

Too much of this basically seems to boil down to people insisting we have to pay a basketball coach $700k because we previously decided to pay a basketball coach $700k. I don't understand how we measure the success of doing so, and I don't understand why we watch schools in our conference pay coaches less and then beat up on us and decide that's okay.

Fair pushback on the 25% figure. That number was already floating around in the thread and I assumed if it were true, other MAC schools were probably in a similar range. Pulling the actual data tells an interesting story that largely supports the broader point regardless.

Using FY25 operating budgets via Extra Points' MFRS data and publicly reported coaching compensation, here's where every MAC program actually sits:

1. UMass - 29.0% ($1,830,000 / $6,314,236)
2. Kent State - 23.7% ($675,000 / $2,843,843)
3. Akron - 20.9% ($850,000 / $4,065,757)
4. Toledo - 18.5% ($586,000 / $3,167,166)
5. Ohio - 17.9% ($725,000 / $4,057,526)
6. Western Michigan - 17.5% ($420,000 / $2,398,421)
7. Ball State - 16.9% ($435,000 / $2,572,793)
8. Eastern Michigan - 16.6% ($400,000 / $2,410,498)
9. Central Michigan - 16.5% ($420,000 / $2,549,635)
10. Bowling Green - 16.5% ($467,250 / $2,838,564)
11. Miami (OH) - 10.5% ($306,000 / $2,901,957)
12. Northern Illinois* - 10.0% ($350,000 / $3,501,500)
13. Buffalo - 9.6% ($435,000 / $4,538,362)

* Even though NIU is leaving the MAC, I still choose to include them because the data is from a time where they were in the conference.

With the exception of Miami, which I'll address separately, the bottom half of this list is made up of programs that have struggled to compete consistently in recent years. Spending less on your coach and losing isn't a model worth pointing to.

There's a pretty clear pattern in the top half too. Kent State, Akron, and Toledo are all spending a higher percentage of their budget on their coach than Ohio and have been more competitive. Ohio at 17.9% is mid-pack, not an outlier.

Boals is confirmed as one of the top 3 highest paid coaches in the conference by raw dollars, and likely drops to fourth if Steele signs the extension Rothstein reported. But raw dollars only tell part of the story. Ohio has one of the larger operating budgets in the conference, which means that salary represents just 17.9% of the overall budget, squarely mid-pack. There are two sides to this spectrum and both matter.

On the schools paying less and beating us, that's a fair point and I'll take it fully. Kent State and Toledo are both spending less in raw dollars on their coach and operating on smaller overall budgets, and both have outperformed us. These numbers don't capture NIL and revenue share, which are now significant variables, but even before you factor that in we are getting outperformed by programs with less to work with. That's the most legitimate criticism in this entire thread and there's no way to spin it.

On what market we are keeping up with and how we fund it, the MAC is the peer group and that's where the comparison starts and ends for me. But that's the harder question and I don't think there's a clean answer. We know schools like Western Michigan, Miami, and Akron are benefiting from significant financial support from individual donors. These aren't institutional investments in the traditional sense, they are private donor pipelines that most programs simply don't have access to. Ohio doesn't have that and it's really difficult to manufacture. The honest reality is that competing with programs that have that kind of private money flowing in is a different problem than just figuring out what percentage of the operating budget goes to the coach. You can optimize every line item on the budget and still be at a structural disadvantage if the guy next door has a benefactor writing checks that don't show up in any MFRS report.

On whether the investment is paying off, it depends on the window you're looking at. In 2021 the answer was clearly yes. The two to three years after that produced solid teams with legitimate MAC contention. The last two seasons are a different story and I don't think anyone would argue otherwise. My point is not that Jeff Boals specifically is worth that figure. It's that whoever coaches Ohio at a competitive level is probably going to command something in that range based on where the market sits. You can't separate the salary discussion from the job itself.

On Miami, their 10.5% is a genuine outlier and the context matters. Steele was fired by Xavier in 2022 with years remaining on his contract. Xavier almost certainly owed him a significant buyout, which would have financially subsidized the early years of his Miami deal while he was earning just $300K. Miami didn't pioneer a new model of paying coaches less. They identified a Big East caliber coach who likely had the financial cushion of a recent buyout to take below market money and pounced on it. That's a very specific set of circumstances that isn't replicable on demand. Per Jon Rothstein, Miami has since offered Steele an extension that would make him one of the highest paid coaches in the conference. That number will spike and reflect what retaining a coach of his caliber actually costs.

On the front porch theory, to be clear I'm not here defending it as sound policy. I'm pointing out that it's how university administration typically justifies the cost of athletics. They are essentially chasing a dream season. Those seasons are incredibly rare, but all it takes is one run, even something like what Miami did this year, and there are real downstream impacts on applications, donor support, and the broader institutional bottom line. The problem is that chasing that outcome is often a pipe dream, and most programs spend years subsidizing the attempt without ever getting there.

Sources
Operating Budgets: FY25 MFRS data via Extra Points - https://www.extrapointsmb.com/p/here-s-what-it-costs-to-m...

Coaching Salaries: Pulled from publicly available records and reported figures in news articles. Figures reflect the most recently available compensation data for each coach through the 2025-26 season. In many cases these represent the closest available public figure, and actual compensation is likely higher once bonus and incentive structures are factored in.
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OhioCatFan
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 3:44:40 PM 
Very thorough look at the situation. I really appreciate the depth of your analysis. You certainly gave yourself an appropriate screename, QuantCat!

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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 3:47:07 PM 
M.D.W.S.T wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:


We absolutely should pay the next coach less. But that's because you can get better results from that money by spending it on players, instead. Boals made ~$700k the last couple of years.

What would you rather have: a $700k coach with $600k to spend on players, or a $400k coach with $900k to spend on players?


This of course presumes that anyone wants to play for one of the least paid coaches in college basketball and that person can actually sell them on playing here.

I'm with you man. We're aligned on 90% of this situation. But this is just too simplistic of a view. I don't for a second think its as easy as fire this guy, money pool holds, now you have free money to spend on all these better players.

- One, you actually have to find a better coach and sell him on making far less than his predecessor because your new view is, I'm gonna pay you less, so we can pay players more.
- Two, this new guy actually needs to find, and recruit better players. We've talked about it ad nauseum, but the actual recruiting aspect of the job isn't being done well enough. Budgetary restrictions, I don't know. But it's not currently working. And we don't know that it will improve under a guy with less of a resume and less regional ties than Boals. Or that the money for that even exists.
- Three, you have to hope our small pool money doesn't follow Boals out the door.
- Four, you have to hope a young, unproven coach can handle the job of managing multiple six-figure egos, when he himself is barely making more.

That's a lot of hope. That's a lot of assuming players are driven only by cash. And maybe they are. But that's a lot for a low paid coach to deal with in addition to maintaining OU's historical, successful relevance in the MAC.


I dont think its realistic to expect a better coach for less money. I dont even think its wise or realistic to expect an equivalent coach.

But this is exactly why I suggested, seriously, in another thread that we need to hire a GM. Preferably someone with NBA experience that is used to projecting players. Used to scouting foreign players. Used to analyzing payroll cost versus expected returns in wins/losses. This is foreign concept to most college guys but old hat to NBA guys.

But that assumed the admin will be willing to fund/hire that position. Good luck with that. If they did, the concept is pay the coach rock bottom and then use remaining savings to invest in GM/scouting + player salaries.

The problem I see coming is, we will cut the coach salary and refuse to increase overall budget or any new GM positions and we will slide further into basketball obscurity. Because the admin doesnt care.
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 3:48:38 PM 
Ohio69 wrote:
Folks, Ohio University is so far behind us bobcatattackers think $200K - $300K is a big deal.

Good grief. Good luck to us Ohio basketball fans....


QFT
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OhioCatFan
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 3:57:13 PM 
GraffZ06 wrote:
Ohio69 wrote:
Folks, Ohio University is so far behind us bobcatattackers think $200K - $300K is a big deal.

Good grief. Good luck to us Ohio basketball fans....


QFT


At first I thought you were making some obscure reference to "quantum field theory," but then I looked it up and discovered it's an internet abbreviation meaning, "quoted for truth." I suspect that I'm not the only one on here not familiar with that abbreviation, so I decided to post the results of my extensive 30-second research here as a public service.

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"It is better to be an optimist and be proven a fool than to be a pessimist and be proven right."

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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 4:04:00 PM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

This is a business. At some point, we gotta start acting like it, right?


Oh we are. They've made that loud and clear. Show me your P&Ls not your W&Ls. Its why they only care about football. Its the only money maker. I just disagree with how they reinvest said revenue streams.

Option 1) Fund football. Schedule 1-2 buy games and hope to win 7-9 games to make a bowl game but still be nationally irrelevant. Fund remaining sports. Win some championships. End up in the red financially. This is basically auto off the table. Its a business after all.

Option 2) Fund football. Schedule 1-2 buy games and hope to win 7-9 games to make a bowl game but still be nationally irrelevant. Cut/eliminate/minimize funding to remaining sports. Win zero championships. End up in the black financially. This is the path we are choosing.

Option 3) Fund but reduce football funding. Schedule 4 buy games every year to maximize revenue. Win 0-6 games. Still be nationally irrelevant. Reinvest football revenue into other sports. Win more than some championships. End up in yhe black financially. This is the path I'm proposing we SHOULD take.


Not because I dont understand that its a business or that football drives the bus. Because I think the goal of any athletic team or department should be to put yourself in the best position to win the most championships as possible. We aren't doing that. We're bowing to the altar of football and saying "whatever good luck to you" to everything else.
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Athens
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 9:26:54 PM 
QuantCat wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
QuantCat wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
Ohio69 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
200-300k is 10% of our operating budget. If we have people in charge that are dumb enough to think that doesn't matter to a business, then maybe it's best they follow your lead and rollover and die because some other people have more money to spend.


I think basketball bobcatattackers are having the wrong conversation. It matters because your 10% figure is too high. $200-$300K should be far less than 10% of the operating budget. The operating budget is falling behind. If Ohio wants to win the coach should be paid what Boals is getting paid. If Ohio wants to win the NIL budget needs to increase. MAC teams need to keep up with the Miami. Most on here think Akron has $1 million every year for NIL. Unless we are spending more for basketball we are in for some long years as OU basketball fans.

(Or, maybe I'm wrong and the university is coming up with more funds as SBH posted he's heard. Would be nice to know.)





This is a false premise. My suggesting we be smarter about spending the money we have doesn't mean that we shouldn't also increase revenue. I get it -- you want us to have more money than we do. Id like that, too. In the meantime though, let's manage the budget we have like adults and not run a small "company" that operates at a loss in a way that pays the CEO 25% of the operating budget.


Were this a business, no board in the world would approve a CEO pay package that high for a company this small.

This is a very valid train of thought, no logical or sound business would allocate that amount of funds to their CEO if operating at a loss. My counter to the argument is that college athletics is a fantasy land business model and is very far from an efficient business.

The core objective of the Ohio athletics department is to be competitive within the conference and win MAC championships. The other objective is to serve as the "front porch" of the university, and attract students and in a lot of ways serve as an advertising budget for the university. MAC athletic departments according to the financials all technically run at around even, but the books count millions of dollars in institutional subsidies and in some cases student fees as "revenue". Whether true or not, MAC schools view this operating loss as a necessity to keep the university known and continue to attract students. There is real data to support this. Loyola and George Mason both saw massive spikes in applications following deep tournament runs, but for the majority the math isn't so easy. Even Miami this year likely saw an uptick in admissions applications along with massive revenue spikes from basketball because of their success.

So why can't we pay a coach $300K and allocate the savings to the player budget? Because a coach in college basketball is the single most important entity in a program year in and year out. A bad coach can sink a program completely (even faster than a bad CEO) and a good coach can elevate a program and outperform the resources they are given (again, faster than a good CEO). To get a good coach, you have to pay a competitive rate. Given the recent Miami fan thread, why would a power school assistant leave a $750K salary for a $300K head coaching role when they might have opportunities at other schools for more money and overall team funding. If you are paying below market rate, you are going to get a below market result.

In a traditional business, paying 25% of the operating budget to one employee is insane, but the business model of college athletics is insane. To remain competitive in the landscape, you can't punt on the most important person in the program. You can't spend 10% of the operating budget on a coach when every peer institution in the conference is at 25%+ and expect to get a quality coach and then be competitive year in and year out. If anything, the portal era makes the job of coaches harder, as they now have to rebuild the roster every single year, and the response to this by a lot of programs has been to adjust their coaching staffs to replace a traditional coaching slot with a GM.

Ultimately, to circle back to your original point: your logic is perfectly sound for a normal company. But the reality of the college athletics model is that if your objective is to stay competitive in the conference, you simply have to keep up with the market spending. The moment you stray from that and try to run the athletic department like a rational, traditional business, you quickly fall behind your peers. It makes total sense in the corporate world, but college athletics just isn't that.


Do you have numbers supporting that everybody in the conference pays 25% of operating budget on their coach? I haven't dug deep on basketball budgets in the test of the conference, but if you consider that Boals it's one of the 2 or 3 highest paid coaches in the league, I have trouble seeing how he's not at least a bit of an outlier. What market are we keeping up with? The MAC? Mid major schools that also have D1 football? Do we have to keep up with folks who fund via private donations we can't match?

I get the broader point, but don't actually find it particularly compelling. Especially in an era of revenue share. It seems completely nonsensical to me that the introduction of revenue share and suddenly having a massive new cost -- the players themselves -- has no bearing on how we allocate money going forward. Barring the top line revenue allocation increasing by ~25%, I just can't see how the money works otherwise.

In terms of the "front porch" theory -- Boals is 8 years in. Surely there's a way to measure the investment, right? Is paying $700k for a basketball coach paying off?

Too much of this basically seems to boil down to people insisting we have to pay a basketball coach $700k because we previously decided to pay a basketball coach $700k. I don't understand how we measure the success of doing so, and I don't understand why we watch schools in our conference pay coaches less and then beat up on us and decide that's okay.

Fair pushback on the 25% figure. That number was already floating around in the thread and I assumed if it were true, other MAC schools were probably in a similar range. Pulling the actual data tells an interesting story that largely supports the broader point regardless.

Using FY25 operating budgets via Extra Points' MFRS data and publicly reported coaching compensation, here's where every MAC program actually sits:

1. UMass - 29.0% ($1,830,000 / $6,314,236)
2. Kent State - 23.7% ($675,000 / $2,843,843)
3. Akron - 20.9% ($850,000 / $4,065,757)
4. Toledo - 18.5% ($586,000 / $3,167,166)
5. Ohio - 17.9% ($725,000 / $4,057,526)
6. Western Michigan - 17.5% ($420,000 / $2,398,421)
7. Ball State - 16.9% ($435,000 / $2,572,793)
8. Eastern Michigan - 16.6% ($400,000 / $2,410,498)
9. Central Michigan - 16.5% ($420,000 / $2,549,635)
10. Bowling Green - 16.5% ($467,250 / $2,838,564)
11. Miami (OH) - 10.5% ($306,000 / $2,901,957)
12. Northern Illinois* - 10.0% ($350,000 / $3,501,500)
13. Buffalo - 9.6% ($435,000 / $4,538,362)

* Even though NIU is leaving the MAC, I still choose to include them because the data is from a time where they were in the conference.

With the exception of Miami, which I'll address separately, the bottom half of this list is made up of programs that have struggled to compete consistently in recent years. Spending less on your coach and losing isn't a model worth pointing to.

There's a pretty clear pattern in the top half too. Kent State, Akron, and Toledo are all spending a higher percentage of their budget on their coach than Ohio and have been more competitive. Ohio at 17.9% is mid-pack, not an outlier.

Boals is confirmed as one of the top 3 highest paid coaches in the conference by raw dollars, and likely drops to fourth if Steele signs the extension Rothstein reported. But raw dollars only tell part of the story. Ohio has one of the larger operating budgets in the conference, which means that salary represents just 17.9% of the overall budget, squarely mid-pack. There are two sides to this spectrum and both matter.

On the schools paying less and beating us, that's a fair point and I'll take it fully. Kent State and Toledo are both spending less in raw dollars on their coach and operating on smaller overall budgets, and both have outperformed us. These numbers don't capture NIL and revenue share, which are now significant variables, but even before you factor that in we are getting outperformed by programs with less to work with. That's the most legitimate criticism in this entire thread and there's no way to spin it.

On what market we are keeping up with and how we fund it, the MAC is the peer group and that's where the comparison starts and ends for me. But that's the harder question and I don't think there's a clean answer. We know schools like Western Michigan, Miami, and Akron are benefiting from significant financial support from individual donors. These aren't institutional investments in the traditional sense, they are private donor pipelines that most programs simply don't have access to. Ohio doesn't have that and it's really difficult to manufacture. The honest reality is that competing with programs that have that kind of private money flowing in is a different problem than just figuring out what percentage of the operating budget goes to the coach. You can optimize every line item on the budget and still be at a structural disadvantage if the guy next door has a benefactor writing checks that don't show up in any MFRS report.

On whether the investment is paying off, it depends on the window you're looking at. In 2021 the answer was clearly yes. The two to three years after that produced solid teams with legitimate MAC contention. The last two seasons are a different story and I don't think anyone would argue otherwise. My point is not that Jeff Boals specifically is worth that figure. It's that whoever coaches Ohio at a competitive level is probably going to command something in that range based on where the market sits. You can't separate the salary discussion from the job itself.

On Miami, their 10.5% is a genuine outlier and the context matters. Steele was fired by Xavier in 2022 with years remaining on his contract. Xavier almost certainly owed him a significant buyout, which would have financially subsidized the early years of his Miami deal while he was earning just $300K. Miami didn't pioneer a new model of paying coaches less. They identified a Big East caliber coach who likely had the financial cushion of a recent buyout to take below market money and pounced on it. That's a very specific set of circumstances that isn't replicable on demand. Per Jon Rothstein, Miami has since offered Steele an extension that would make him one of the highest paid coaches in the conference. That number will spike and reflect what retaining a coach of his caliber actually costs.

On the front porch theory, to be clear I'm not here defending it as sound policy. I'm pointing out that it's how university administration typically justifies the cost of athletics. They are essentially chasing a dream season. Those seasons are incredibly rare, but all it takes is one run, even something like what Miami did this year, and there are real downstream impacts on applications, donor support, and the broader institutional bottom line. The problem is that chasing that outcome is often a pipe dream, and most programs spend years subsidizing the attempt without ever getting there.

Sources
Operating Budgets: FY25 MFRS data via Extra Points - https://www.extrapointsmb.com/p/here-s-what-it-costs-to-m...

Coaching Salaries: Pulled from publicly available records and reported figures in news articles. Figures reflect the most recently available compensation data for each coach through the 2025-26 season. In many cases these represent the closest available public figure, and actual compensation is likely higher once bonus and incentive structures are factored in.


Relative to the budget then Boals is not paid too much. He's also a veteran coach and not a new guy under 40 which typically impacts pay.

Good work BTW.

Last Edited: 4/8/2026 9:48:03 PM by Athens

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Athens
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/8/2026 10:08:33 PM 
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:
M.D.W.S.T wrote:

This of course presumes that anyone wants to play for one of the least paid coaches in college basketball and that person can actually sell them on playing here.


The salaries I suggested are in line with what coaches in the MAC get paid until they have success. Sendoroff coached for 13 years at Kent before his most recent extension put his base salary over 500k. Tod K at Toledo just got above $500k himself. Steele's salary was $300k this year. BG's coach is at $415k. The Michigan schools pay between ~$370k and $450k. Ball State pays $350k.

Why do we have to be paying somebody $700k to sell players on playing in Athens? And won't more money to give them make the job easier not harder?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- One, you actually have to find a better coach and sell him on making far less than his predecessor because your new view is, I'm gonna pay you less, so we can pay players more.


If we're interviewing coaches whose number one priority isn't budget to attract players, we're interviewing the wrong people. We spend a truly ridiculous percentage of our operating budget on a single employee's salary. It's a remnant of a model that's gone and isn't coming back. No competent GM will allow it going forward, and no potential coach who understands what it takes to actually win is going to insist on spending ~24% of the budget on themselves.

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Two, this new guy actually needs to find, and recruit better players. We've talked about it ad nauseum, but the actual recruiting aspect of the job isn't being done well enough. Budgetary restrictions, I don't know. But it's not currently working. And we don't know that it will improve under a guy with less of a resume and less regional ties than Boals. Or that the money for that even exists.


I'm not actually sure what point you're making here beyond just saying that maybe the next coach won't be good. That's possible, you're right. But I'm not sure what the point is? That we should hang onto Boals and pay him for past results?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Three, you have to hope our small pool money doesn't follow Boals out the door.


I don't understand why this matters. Boals isn't working out. The results -- barring a massive turnaround next season -- haven't been there. We should just embrace bad results because we're afraid of what the next dude might do?

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

- Four, you have to hope a young, unproven coach can handle the job of managing multiple six-figure egos, when he himself is barely making more.


You want to make the case that Boals has managed the egos on his team well over the last couple of seasons? He's making 6x what Simmons makes, right? Does that automatically make him Phil Jackson, or did he just tell a stranger at breakfast the other day that his captain needs to go to therapy and whine about his budget?

NBA coaches -- and plenty of college coaches these days -- have to manage players who make way more money than them. Feels like a huge reach to act like we have no choice but to pay our coach 6x any player for some vague psychological ego management reasons.

M.D.W.S.T wrote:

That's a lot of hope. That's a lot of assuming players are driven only by cash. And maybe they are. But that's a lot for a low paid coach to deal with in addition to maintaining OU's historical, successful relevance in the MAC.


What I don't really follow is what you're actually suggesting as an alternative. I'm outlining a way to easily free up another 200-300k in revenue share money. Your proposal is what? Status quo and hope things get better?

I just do not understand how anybody can rationally look at introduction of revenue share for players and think that a 200% increase in the number of people getting paid doesn't require a shift in how that money's allocated.

This is a business. At some point, we gotta start acting like it, right?


What are the permissible sources for revenue sharing? Can you guess what is allowable and what isn't?

Donor Contributions
Basketball Budget
Marketing Dollars
Student Fees
Bond Issuance
Commerial Loans
University Reserves
Journalism School Budget
President's Salary
Athletic Director's Salary

The answer is any of the above is allowable. The university no problem can cough up the additional 300k for Boals rev share budget. Its just they don't want to do so and want Boals to overachieve on the budget he has first before signing off on more. Unfortunately for Boals his program peaked just before NIL and rev share became a thing so his program has lost momentum while a coach like Travis Steele got to Miami just at the right time.

Most Memorable Bobcat Events Attended
2010 97-83 win over Georgetown in NCAA 1st round
2012 45-13 victory over ULM in the Independence Bowl
2015 34-3 drubbing of Fiami @ Peden with 25,086 fans
2023 10-7 near shutout of Iowa State @ Solich Field
2025 17-10 defeat of WVU @ Peden in front of 26,740

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M.D.W.S.T
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Member Since: 12/23/2021
Post Count: 3,680

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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/9/2026 9:51:28 AM 
GraffZ06 wrote:
M.D.W.S.T wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:


We absolutely should pay the next coach less. But that's because you can get better results from that money by spending it on players, instead. Boals made ~$700k the last couple of years.

What would you rather have: a $700k coach with $600k to spend on players, or a $400k coach with $900k to spend on players?


This of course presumes that anyone wants to play for one of the least paid coaches in college basketball and that person can actually sell them on playing here.

I'm with you man. We're aligned on 90% of this situation. But this is just too simplistic of a view. I don't for a second think its as easy as fire this guy, money pool holds, now you have free money to spend on all these better players.

- One, you actually have to find a better coach and sell him on making far less than his predecessor because your new view is, I'm gonna pay you less, so we can pay players more.
- Two, this new guy actually needs to find, and recruit better players. We've talked about it ad nauseum, but the actual recruiting aspect of the job isn't being done well enough. Budgetary restrictions, I don't know. But it's not currently working. And we don't know that it will improve under a guy with less of a resume and less regional ties than Boals. Or that the money for that even exists.
- Three, you have to hope our small pool money doesn't follow Boals out the door.
- Four, you have to hope a young, unproven coach can handle the job of managing multiple six-figure egos, when he himself is barely making more.

That's a lot of hope. That's a lot of assuming players are driven only by cash. And maybe they are. But that's a lot for a low paid coach to deal with in addition to maintaining OU's historical, successful relevance in the MAC.


I dont think its realistic to expect a better coach for less money. I dont even think its wise or realistic to expect an equivalent coach.

But this is exactly why I suggested, seriously, in another thread that we need to hire a GM. Preferably someone with NBA experience that is used to projecting players. Used to scouting foreign players. Used to analyzing payroll cost versus expected returns in wins/losses. This is foreign concept to most college guys but old hat to NBA guys.

But that assumed the admin will be willing to fund/hire that position. Good luck with that. If they did, the concept is pay the coach rock bottom and then use remaining savings to invest in GM/scouting + player salaries.

The problem I see coming is, we will cut the coach salary and refuse to increase overall budget or any new GM positions and we will slide further into basketball obscurity. Because the admin doesnt care.


This is a better explanation of my general thoughts.

Boals: $600K
Stuff: $200K
Players: $700K
---------------
Budget: $1.5M

I just fundamentally disagree that eliminating Boals off the line item is in any way as simplistic as being displayed in this thread. This isn't even about Boals. This is about saying publicly we are no longer paying coaches to come here. We're taking who ever will take us.

35 Year Old Cleatus Macfarland: $300K
Stuff: $200K
Players: $700K
---------------
FREE MONEY



No.


I mean, just look at whats going on at WMU. All the money in the world. Can't keep anyone. They rent a few players. Those players all leave. I'm not saying Boals is Mike Kryzweski, I'm not even saying we need to keep him, but he's a name in Ohio. He's a name to alumni. He's a name in basketball circles. If not him, we need another name. We need a coach with results. But nobody wants to pay for it. So we'll end up with a Khalil Fennel. Who in the world is Khalil Fennell? Just the next guy to get fired after they rent a roster full of goobers at $100K each to win 10 games.

You can't hire me and expect results. You want coaches to WANT to come here. You want Ohio University to be some place someone WANTS to be. Even if they were recently let go from a P5, you want coaches to think THIS is a good place to rebound.

People are really talking about their desire to just be a 2 year stop on a 35 year old coaches resume? Good lord I hate that.
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Member Since: 7/30/2010
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  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/9/2026 9:52:31 AM 
QuantCat wrote:

Fair pushback on the 25% figure. That number was already floating around in the thread and I assumed if it were true, other MAC schools were probably in a similar range. Pulling the actual data tells an interesting story that largely supports the broader point regardless.


To be clear, the 25% number actually came from me. The latest basketball budget I found was the 2023 audited numbers (https://ohioauditor.gov/auditsearch/Reports/2024/Ohio_Uni... ) that showed the 2023 operating budget at $2.94m. That's the baseline budget number I've been using just because I hadn't seen anything more recent.

QuantCat wrote:

Using FY25 operating budgets via Extra Points' MFRS data and publicly reported coaching compensation, here's where every MAC program actually sits:

1. UMass - 29.0% ($1,830,000 / $6,314,236)
2. Kent State - 23.7% ($675,000 / $2,843,843)
3. Akron - 20.9% ($850,000 / $4,065,757)
4. Toledo - 18.5% ($586,000 / $3,167,166)
5. Ohio - 17.9% ($725,000 / $4,057,526)
6. Western Michigan - 17.5% ($420,000 / $2,398,421)
7. Ball State - 16.9% ($435,000 / $2,572,793)
8. Eastern Michigan - 16.6% ($400,000 / $2,410,498)
9. Central Michigan - 16.5% ($420,000 / $2,549,635)
10. Bowling Green - 16.5% ($467,250 / $2,838,564)
11. Miami (OH) - 10.5% ($306,000 / $2,901,957)
12. Northern Illinois* - 10.0% ($350,000 / $3,501,500)
13. Buffalo - 9.6% ($435,000 / $4,538,362)


Pretty notable that from 2023 to 2025 our operating budget increased substantially.

QuantCat wrote:

There's a pretty clear pattern in the top half too. Kent State, Akron, and Toledo are all spending a higher percentage of their budget on their coach than Ohio and have been more competitive. Ohio at 17.9% is mid-pack, not an outlier.

Boals is confirmed as one of the top 3 highest paid coaches in the conference by raw dollars, and likely drops to fourth if Steele signs the extension Rothstein reported. But raw dollars only tell part of the story. Ohio has one of the larger operating budgets in the conference, which means that salary represents just 17.9% of the overall budget, squarely mid-pack. There are two sides to this spectrum and both matter.


I also think it's worth noting that both Tod Kowalczyk (Toledo) and Rob Senderoff (Kent) just got raises after long tenures. Kowalczyk was at ~400k (base of $330k + marketing kickers)) and Senderoff had a base of $350k with marketing kickers). Groce's initial salary at Akron was similar. Both worked for a decade for pay much lower than Boals' salary, and both have pretty consistently beaten Boals.

I know 2017 dollars aren't apples-to-apples with 2026 dollars. But with Boals it feels a lot like we're paying for past success right now.

QuantCat wrote:

On what market we are keeping up with and how we fund it, the MAC is the peer group and that's where the comparison starts and ends for me. But that's the harder question and I don't think there's a clean answer. We know schools like Western Michigan, Miami, and Akron are benefiting from significant financial support from individual donors. These aren't institutional investments in the traditional sense, they are private donor pipelines that most programs simply don't have access to. Ohio doesn't have that and it's really difficult to manufacture. The honest reality is that competing with programs that have that kind of private money flowing in is a different problem than just figuring out what percentage of the operating budget goes to the coach. You can optimize every line item on the budget and still be at a structural disadvantage if the guy next door has a benefactor writing checks that don't show up in any MFRS report.


Agree with this completely. I think defining the 'market' is a massively complex undertaking on its own, and to do so well requires data that we don't have access to.

QuantCat wrote:

On whether the investment is paying off, it depends on the window you're looking at. In 2021 the answer was clearly yes. The two to three years after that produced solid teams with legitimate MAC contention. The last two seasons are a different story and I don't think anyone would argue otherwise. My point is not that Jeff Boals specifically is worth that figure. It's that whoever coaches Ohio at a competitive level is probably going to command something in that range based on where the market sits. You can't separate the salary discussion from the job itself.


I wasn't super clear, but the 'investment' I was asking about was the 'front porch' theory investment. I have heard that case made a few times (and understand you're not necessarily sold on the approach), and it just feels to me that if part of why an institution feels they need to make their basketball coach their highest paid employee is the visibility it creates for the university, you should be able to measure that reasonably well.

QuantCat wrote:

On Miami, their 10.5% is a genuine outlier and the context matters. Steele was fired by Xavier in 2022 with years remaining on his contract. Xavier almost certainly owed him a significant buyout, which would have financially subsidized the early years of his Miami deal while he was earning just $300K. Miami didn't pioneer a new model of paying coaches less. They identified a Big East caliber coach who likely had the financial cushion of a recent buyout to take below market money and pounced on it. That's a very specific set of circumstances that isn't replicable on demand. Per Jon Rothstein, Miami has since offered Steele an extension that would make him one of the highest paid coaches in the conference. That number will spike and reflect what retaining a coach of his caliber actually costs.


I think it's fair to point out that Steele specifically may have accepted the role for less than he would have otherwise because of his Xavier money. But it's worth noting that what Miami was paying him is not particularly out of line with what new coaches in the MAC make. It's in line with Tod K/Senderoff's contracts until recent raises, and it's in line with more than half the league at current state.

And that's ultimately the point I'm making here. The rest of the league has had success hiring coaches for far less than what we pay Jeff Boals. Some of those coaches have, with success, negotiated new deals that bring them in line (or above) Boals' salary.

But when/if we hire a replacement for Boals, given the actual data, it's hard to understand why the salary needs to start at the current level. That doesn't seem to be the approach the rest of the league takes -- even those programs with more resources than us.
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Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Member Since: 7/30/2010
Post Count: 4,655

Status: Offline
  Message Not Read  RE: Fire Jeff Boals!
   Posted: 4/9/2026 9:54:13 AM 
GraffZ06 wrote:
Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

This is a business. At some point, we gotta start acting like it, right?


Oh we are. They've made that loud and clear. Show me your P&Ls not your W&Ls. Its why they only care about football. Its the only money maker. I just disagree with how they reinvest said revenue streams.


You keep saying this. I don't think the numbers support it. From 2023 to 2025 our basketball operating budget increased by more than 33%. They're putting more money into basketball, and the revenue share numbers we see floating around are quite competitive.
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