The question to me is when is the breaking point for smaller programs like GT to when it isn't feasible anymore? Is it when the TV contracts get renewed for less $? Attendance goes down even more?
I think this kind of talk is somewhat uninformed. Using "breaking point" language suggests that GT football is under some kind of enormous pressure or strain and is really struggling to keep it together. But that's not true.
In the grand scheme of American college football – which covers hundreds of Div. I, Div. II, Div. III, junior college, and NAIA teams – GT is in the very top echelon. Even in the ACC – which has won two of the past three national championships – GT is in the top 5 or 8 programs in recent years. While we are all frustrated to be behind UGA in football, we're pretty far ahead of most P5 programs, and miles ahead of the typical G5 program, and light years ahead of everyone else.
For all the hand-wringing about Alabama and Clemson's apparent endless dominance at the very very top... well, in the past 30 years people have argued that a new dynasty dominated by USC... or Miami... or Nebraska... or Notre Dame... was upon us. But all of those programs had success and then struggled to stay on top, cycled through coaches, had embarrassing losses, etc.
At heart college football is an endeavor which is *overwhelmingly* controlled not by the support staff, or the donors, or the administrators, but by 85 boys and about 15 men. And the guy at the top of *that* chain – the head coach – is by far the single most important factor in whether teams do well or not. Bama was remarkably consistent and excellent for decades under Bear. The coaches that followed had some good years (including Stallings' NC) but no one came close to him. Until Saban came along! He will not coach there forever.
Some of us are old enough to remember when Bobby Bowden was a football god among men. FSU finished in the Top 5 for 14 years in a row. (To put that in perspective, in 12 years at Alabama, Saban has finished in the Top 5, 8 times. He has more national championships than Bowden because he's coaching in the playoff era.) Then he started to get too old, and FSU became a shell of its former self. Look where they are today. I will be both sad and happy when that happens to Saban and Alabama. Sad because something so amazing and beautiful has finally met its fate on this mortal coil; happy of course because that's one less obstacle for Tech to get through to get a NC.
None of this means the current business model will continue indefinitely (I hope it doesn't – I hope we stop paying coaches so much – I hope we stop building such amazing facilities) but when that happens it will happen to everyone, because it's been the power of television to harness enormous audiences for even minor football games that has driven the creation of all the sports networks, and hence all the money. At some point we'll reach the saturation point where audiences don't want more football (we may be there already), and salaries and donations will start to plateau. I look forward to that day!
