Mostly if a university gets some extra no-strings-attached funding it will set up a new research lab or endow a new chair or build new buildings or perhaps just stick it in the bank or give all the senior administrators a raise.
They could get this windfall money by cutting funding to rowing, but they don't. Is it somehow advantageous to invest sports money back into sports?
I know there's a mandate through Title IX to fund women's sports, and sometimes they have to be pretty creative to find "sports" they can spend enough money on that engage the women students, but that doesn't explain what I'm asking about.
You've been capitalism-pilled. Sometimes it's worth funding things that "aren't worth funding". Not everything needs to return an easily measurable 10% YoY. Investing in the richness of experience for your population or student body or community is a good thing, even if it doesn't always pay itself back in an obvious way. Well-rounded people are happier, more resilient, and yes, more productive.
Don't blow the whole budget on underwater basket-weaving, but investing a bit in enrichment and supporting niches is an important part of life.
I do think it’s inevitable that what are functionally professional sports teams will split from their university namesakes. There’s nothing logically linking the two except that’s how it’s been. A factor that might accelerate the split is that it would expand the talent pool beyond players eligible for college admission.
The problem in the US is that the sports are already glued to the academic institutions, and it would seem impossible for all of them to separate at once.
The evolution of sports in Europe has been very different. The professional teams in Europe are also talent development centres. Man U, Bayern, Barcelona, they all have junior teams that are run by the same organization. They keep in touch with local grassroots teams, and nothing is attached to an academic institution. If you're a serious football player in Europe, you don't go to Cambridge. It's already too late by the time you are thinking of applying to university, which regardless doesn't care at all about athletic performance.
I mean I can completely understand the argument that it makes no sense but it is hard for an outsider to understand what something like Ohio State vs Michigan or Alabama vs Auburn in football means for those communities.
To say it is inevitable they split is just not understanding what these teams mean to the people and communities involved.
There is just something fun and additionally communal about the college sports team that isn't replicated by a professional team.
The biggest feature though is that it makes the teams temporary structures that are always changing because the kids graduate. That is something that would be really hard to replicate in a professional sports league. 3-4 years and then you are kicked out of the league. That doesn't work.
It would also mean the death of most college sports in general and sports like rowing or field hockey might just cease to exist (at the level they're currently played) since they won't have sports like football and basketball paying for them.
I'm not sure it's important that all of the athletes have a "normal" college experience. Just that they leave school prepared to be productive members of society.