Beaver Stadium Proposal:
- Thread starter PSUFTG2
- Start date
Has corporate sponsorship ever been explored? How about some Saudi $$? The Emirates at Beaver Stadium!
So if PSU was not making major renovations to its football facilities and Beaver Stadium, where is the money it saved? There is incentive to find it because it should make a nice down payment on future projects. While you're looking, you might also want to compile a list of other schools that undertook major construction projects on football facilities ante-2011.
Good idea, but not going to make a major dent. Most lucrative naming rights deal for a college stadium was the original between USC and United Airlines that yielded $4.3mm p.a. (since revised; terms undisclosed) for the LA Memorial Coliseum.
I’m a car guy so I’ll compare it to that. It’s like car maintenance. It’s a lot cheaper to perform routine maintenance on a car (fluids, filters, occasional minor part replacements like spark plugs) than it is to ignore it and have to pay for a major repair or engine replacement years later. Fluids are cheaper than metal. Same thing here. The maintenance and minor upgrades were ignored for years, so here we are. You can compare it all you want to other schools, but that’s the reality and now the price tag is much larger than it could have been.
Yup, that's what aTm did with the renovation of Kyle Field; replaced plugs, changed oil, and filters. Same with USC at the Coliseum.
But what I really like is how you arbitrarily choose 2011 as the tipping point. Both of the projects above were done after 2011. PSU could have started work on Beaver Stadium after 2011. Indeed, it commenced the aborted Athletic Facilities Master Plan in late 2015. When unveiled the plan in 2017, Beaver Stadium (along with the BJC) were at the end of the queue, dates to be determined. But I guess it's easier to blame the dead guy for this mess.
Is that really why you believe PSU alumni donate at a lower rate? IMO the two big reasons are (1) alumni feel disenfranchised post-scandal and (2) we don't trust PSU to spend our money responsibly
I think all of these factors probably weigh in.
If so much of that expense was due to earthquake mitigation, what is driving the cost for Beaver Stadium?
The tipping point was long before 2011. We just started to publicly hear about it in 2012 when BO’B arrived and announced how outdated all the facilities were. Up until then, everybody just stuck their heads in the sand and pretended everything was rainbows and unicorns. Some continue to pretend with that mentality.
You have a quote from O'Brien on that?
And this discussion focuses on Beaver Stadium, not on football training facilities, which $105mm already spent should have taken care of.
Thank you Barry for your article.
I found the part below particularly interesting, as it suggests there is no clear tangible outline of the benefits of this renovation. In 2001 adding more seats was clearly understood to add more revenue.
I found the part below particularly interesting, as it suggests there is no clear tangible outline of the benefits of this renovation. In 2001 adding more seats was clearly understood to add more revenue.
- There is no bang for the buck. Whereas the 2001 renovation added 12,000 seats to the stadium, as far as I can tell the $700 million project will add none. Instead it will focus on increasing revenues with premium amenities, but my own research suggests that these projections are overly optimistic. Even if true, these highly speculative estimates would be insufficient to prevent ICA falling deeper into debt.
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Fair enough, O’Brien did specify the training facilities and the weight room was the first to be renovated.
What’s your solution? It’s easy to criticize but more challenging to come up with a solution. What’s yours? You seem to have a ton of time to post on here every day, so surely you have come up with a reasonable solution?
While I agree with you on the financial impact of the $700 million proposal, and I agree that it seems unreasonable, I will ask you what I just asked another poster criticizing the proposal. What is your solution? I didn’t see your ideas for compromise in the article? What’s your solution for making the necessary improvements to the stadium? Do you think the stadium needs improvement? What is the solution for the long, unorganized, frustrating lines to get concessions or to use the bathrooms? Is their structural improvements that need to be made for safety? How do you propose that’s done in a more affordable manor? Where do you think PSU should turn to obtain the necessary funds to do so?
I'm not paid to come up with a solution. Pat Kraft is. Is his proposal the best? I don't know. I haven't seen it. I haven't seen a cost-benefit analysis. I haven't seen a presentation of alternatives. And from what I gather neither have most members of PSU's BoT who have to vote on it this coming Tuesday.
I really do. I'm sure there's some that feel like that, but again I think our older alumni were fine operating at bare bones and hoping we could put a decent team together every few years while donating little or none before 2011.
After all, it was "college football" with "student athletes" that should just suck up the outdated facilities because they got a free ride.
What happened to all of those people that donated all that money to TSM?
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so Penn state will be number 1!!!! of course seems like this may not be a good number1.
I don't see a problem. Won't the dedicated fan base just step up and contribute to eliminating the debt? You know that's what the BoT is thinking
Any plans for fracking in the vicinity of the stadium? Maybe PSU could sell mineral rights to help finance the cost.
Any plans for fracking in the vicinity of the stadium? Maybe PSU could sell mineral rights to help finance the cost.
Ethically sourced?
Screw ethics, Bob, we're talking real cash money here.Ethically sourced?
I'm glad we can respectfully disagree
And rich people who were on the Vichy-era BOT like "Cocaine Bear" Dambly and "People Who Look Like You" Frazier should be digging deep in their pockets for that $700 million
I wonder if some of it is the fact that the Beav sits on limestone that may/does have caverns underneath. I'd always heard that was one reason for the Erector Set design--the ground might not be able to hold a concrete design like some of the other stadia mentioned.
You cannot fix seats, build a new press box and construct more premium club area for $100m. This is not 1990. Now I do think they could do what is needed and add premium setting opportunities for 350 to 400 million. I would let the east side go.
I was talking with someone today who is involved with the process and 'rules of the road' for naming rights at PSU, including the field and stadium. Current valuation from outside consulting analysis is $5mm p.a. for the field, and between $5mm to $7mm p.a. for the stadium.
Both are being considered; however, with no frontrunner to take the deal at this point apparently.
Which is why you do a cost-benefit analysis on alternatives. Bets on whether one is presented? Bets on whether it has even been done?
Give me $100mm and I can get us a National Championship in three years - by hiring Urban Meyer.
What can go wrong?Give me $100mm and I can get us a National Championship in three years - by hiring Urban Meyer.
What can go wrong?
And kicking kickers during practice, screwing Florida coeds, etc, etc, etc…..
Only way even Urban or Saban could win a NC at Penn State would be if they convinced folks to fund a NIL war chest to buy recruits and transfers.Give me $100mm and I can get us a National Championship in three years - by hiring Urban Meyer.
What can go wrong?
It’s easier to throw stones if you choose to ignore LaVon Chisley.
He's a worse person than Dabo by a wide margin.Give me $100mm and I can get us a National Championship in three years - by hiring Urban Meyer.
Immediate contender. Plus exciting/unpredictable news cycle. Let’s goooooo!
But Franklin is a worse person than either of them by a wider margin because Franklin doesn’t deliver enough of the wins that we deserve.
Ethics have no place in “college” football.
F*ck us.
Bets on it being approved as presented? That would be 1000%
$5m - $7m? That's all? Goes to show how toxic the BOT has made the Penn State brand. Especially with the fiasco in February about naming Paterno Field, and the old guard acting like someone said Voldemort. This is a clown show and the clowns are driving a 52' tractor trailer loaded with nitroglycerin.
LOL. 'Welcome to Blaise Alexander Hyundai of State College Field at Beaver Stadium...'