NT Daily: UNT Athletics Department is more than $63.19 million in debt as of the end of 2017

[ipd054]

As far as athletic debt, sure.

If you take the $75million Apogee cost and put it on a 25 year payback you should be reducing the amount owed by about $2.8 million a year.   Apogee is 6 years old and we have retired about $11.5million in debt on the structure....  Seems like we are right on pace or a bit ahead.  (these numbers do not include the IPF, tennis complex, soccer and track complex that have all been built since Apogee...)

Wow the Athletic department is doing an amazing job retiring debt and continuing to build....

[PlummMeanGreen]

In Wren We Truly Trust!  

(Don’t lose this guy—he’s a gamer)!👍

[meangreenlax]

Swing and a miss at gotcha journalism. Capital expenditures/debt =/= operating expenses/debt. 

I'm more interested in the operations side of things:

Quote

In 2015 UNT athletics did not lose any money and brought in $43,447 more than it spent, and in 2016 the department lost $867,549. In 2017 the department lost approximately $4.2 million. The athletics deficit increased by 386 percent from 2016 to 2017.

Anyone know what this is about? I'd like to dig a little deeper but that would require the NT Daily to include a graph or chart of sorts. Did the bond payments start in 2017 or something?

Edited December 6, 2018 by meangreenlax

[Rudy]

NT daily gotta NT daily. It's what they do. 

[Wag Tag]

[Mrs. Esterhouse]

I'm not making any comment on the validity of the NT Daily's reporting (in this article or any others) but Wren might need to have a chat with his CFO, especially if he suggested the reporter talk to her specifically. 

 

Wren Baker‏Verified account @wrenbaker 2h2 hours ago

More

Replying to @wrenbaker @ntdaily

This article is misleading & was written without visiting with the athletic department CFO (as suggested) who would have helped you understand so you could write something accurate & factual. We value student journalism & are always willing to help you get the story correct. #GMG

North Texas Daily‏ @ntdaily 26m26 minutes ago

Hi Wren, after initially interviewing you, the reporters sought someone who might have more information on the situation. However, your CFO Stacy Martin was contacted but declined to give an interview.

 

 

[NorthTexan95]

1 minute ago, Mrs. Esterhouse said:

I'm not making any comment on the validity of the NT Daily's reporting (in this article or any others) but Wren might need to have a chat with his CFO, especially if he suggested the reporter talk to her specifically. 

 

Wren Baker‏Verified account @wrenbaker 2h2 hours ago

More

Replying to @wrenbaker @ntdaily

This article is misleading & was written without visiting with the athletic department CFO (as suggested) who would have helped you understand so you could write something accurate & factual. We value student journalism & are always willing to help you get the story correct. #GMG

North Texas Daily‏ @ntdaily 26m26 minutes ago

Hi Wren, after initially interviewing you, the reporters sought someone who might have more information on the situation. However, your CFO Stacy Martin was contacted but declined to give an interview.

 

 

How do we know Stacy Martin actually declined an interview?  We already know the NT Daily either lied or are incompetent.  Why should we believe them about this?  

[Mrs. Esterhouse]

3 minutes ago, NorthTexan95 said:

How do we know Stacy Martin actually declined an interview?  We already know the NT Daily either lied or are incompetent.  Why should we believe them about this?  

That's an excellent question and a solid possibility. If she didn't decline the interview, I hope Wren makes sure to call them out on their lie. He's done a really good of responding to this article already. 

[MeanGreenTexan]

Just now, Mrs. Esterhouse said:

That's an excellent question and a solid possibility. If she didn't decline the interview, I hope Wren makes sure to call them out on their lie. He's done a really good of responding to this article already. 

"Declined to give an interview" is a pretty pointed response.  There isn't a way to mis-interpret that.   

Surely they're not saying that, but instead she didn't call them back prior to publishing or some other scenario?

[drex]

As I havae said so many times before, the most terrifying thing is to be interviewed by the Daily.  

[untcampbell]

1 hour ago, meangreenlax said:

Swing and a miss at gotcha journalism. Capital expenditures/debt =/= operating expenses/debt. 

I'm more interested in the operations side of things:

Anyone know what this is about? I'd like to dig a little deeper but that would require the NT Daily to include a graph or chart of sorts. Did the bond payments start in 2017 or something?

#NewDenton (and that is a good thing).

GMG

[NorthTexan95]

16 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

"Declined to give an interview" is a pretty pointed response.  There isn't a way to mis-interpret that.   

Surely they're not saying that, but instead she didn't call them back prior to publishing or some other scenario?

There is always a way to misinterpret.  Think about this from UNT's side.  Why would Martin decline an interview that her boss told the reporter to have?  As you said, perhaps she was just unavailable before the NT Daily wanted to publish the article.  Did the author mention Baker's direction to interview her?  Did they go back to Baker to make sure they had access to interview Martin?  I'm thinking the reporter wasn't very inspired to speak with Martin as it would only serve to produce fact that would remove the "blockbuster" vibe from the article. 

[NorthTexasWeLove]

28 minutes ago, NorthTexan95 said:

There is always a way to misinterpret.  Think about this from UNT's side.  Why would Martin decline an interview that her boss told the reporter to have?  As you said, perhaps she was just unavailable before the NT Daily wanted to publish the article.  Did the author mention Baker's direction to interview her?  Did they go back to Baker to make sure they had access to interview Martin?  I'm thinking the reporter wasn't very inspired to speak with Martin as it would only serve to produce fact that would remove the "blockbuster" vibe from the article. 

journalists do not want fact and logic in the theme of their writing. It undermines their goal.

[meangreenlax]

11 minutes ago, drex said:

As I havae said so many times before, the most terrifying thing is to be interviewed by the Daily.  

Made the mistake of letting them interview me for a article back a couple of years ago, and they totally twisted my comments into something very anti-faculty. I got a couple emails from my department because of it. Don't talk to the Daily because the reporters are extremely immature and always trying to cause shit.

[Philip Ferguson]

2 hours ago, Cerebus said:

It's the serviced debt on the stadium.

Every day we should thank God for Wren Baker!

[Jason Howeth]

This thread is right up your alley, @Christopher Walker

[xyresic]

This is the same paper that got their funding cut by student government because they no showed for their presentation - then proceeded to blame the school for being out to get them 🙄

 

[UNTFan23]

12 minutes ago, xyresic said:

This is the same paper that got their funding cut by student government because they no showed for their presentation - then proceeded to blame the school for being out to get them 🙄

 

That's interesting to hear. That sounds like a huge fail on the part of the editor (or whatever leadership is responsible for being present for such a hearing).

[wardly]

fake news

 

[wardly]

7 minutes ago, wardly said:

fake news

 

As a Democrat I always wanted to say that,

[Greenrex]

Okay, I give up. What the hell is a newspaper?

[Christopher Walker]

56 minutes ago, Jason Howeth said:

This thread is right up your alley, @Christopher Walker

I actually spent ten minutes and wrote something out, but I'm like "ugh, naw."

[Matt from A700]

Why are they still trying to attack the Athletic Department? Didn't they get their new Visual Arts building??

[UNTDoubleAlum]

While I do agree with (likely) almost all of you that this article has some issues, I do think it can serve as a useful starting point for a conversation into what colleges pay into athletics. 

There’s no getting around paying good money for good facilities. Facilities that players want to play in, facilities that alumni want to come to. If colleges want to spend on better facilities, with a plan to pay them off, it doesn’t vex me much. 

But even as a big UNT fan, even as a big Football fan, it is often hard to defend a coach’s salary against an actual educator, which is presumably what college is about. 

The thing is, if you want to change the system, trying to burn it down at UNT isn’t the answer. The system that UNT struggles to compete in, having a good, sustainable sports program, isn’t a system that UNT built.

If you think that universities spend too much money on sports (which hey, I’ll even often agree with), you gotta go fight Texas, and Alabama, and every other huge school with that decided to pay their coach multiple millions of dollars, whose boosters and admin know that pouring huge amounts of money into a program will often earn and sustain success. The market was set long before tried to get a seat at the big boy table. If  Nick Saban wasn’t paid 11 million dollars (2017), Seth Littrell wouldn’t command 1 million dollars. 

Like most bad things in college Football (the money, the inequity in potential, the haves and the have-nots) you have to start tearing down at the problem at the top. 

 

 

 

Edited December 6, 2018 by UNTDoubleAlum

[NorthTexasWeLove]

5 minutes ago, UNTDoubleAlum said:

While I do agree with (likely) almost all of you that this article has some issues, I do think it can serve as a useful starting point for a conversation into what colleges pay into athletics. 

There’s no getting around paying good money for good facilities. Facilities that players want to play in, facilities that alumni want to come to. If colleges want to spend on better facilities, with a plan to pay them off, it doesn’t vex me much. 

But even as a big UNT fan, even as a big Football fan, it is often hard to defend a coach’s salary against an actual educator, which is presumably what college is about. 

The thing is, if you want to change the system, trying to burn it down at UNT isn’t the answer. The system that UNT struggles to compete in, having a good, sustainable sports program, isn’t a system that UNT built.

If you think that universities spend too much money on sports (which hey, I’ll even often agree with), you gotta go fight Texas, and Alabama, and every other huge school with that decided to pay their coach multiple millions of dollars, whose boosters and admin know that pouring huge amounts of money into a program will often earn and sustain success. The market was set long before tried to get a seat at the big boy table. If  Nick Saban wasn’t paid 11 million dollars (2017), Seth Littrell wouldn’t command 1 million dollars. 

Like most bad things in college Football (the money, the inequity in potential, the haves and the have-nots) you have to start tearing down at the problem at the top. 

 

 

 

Very well stated. If UNT has its sights on competing then pull out all of the stops and compete. If they are fed up with drowning while trying to sporadically come up for air then go to FCS. UNT has struggled for so long because they tried to play a middle ground and that can't be done. But the system is flawed and not even close to a level playing field.