'26 VA OL Darius Gray

#227
#227
85SugarVol said:
Ergen is a billionaire alum, but is he a billionaire booster?
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I have no clue what he donates personally. Besides, that's not what was inferred. Everyone on that list has donated large sums of money over the years to the university. The 'money issues' is one of the more ignorant takes I have seen on the message boards in awhile, and that's really saying something.
 
#229
#229
BelievetheHeup2022 said:
I have no clue what he donates personally. Besides, that's not what was inferred. Everyone on that list has donated large sums of money over the years to the university. The 'money issues' is one of the more ignorant takes I have seen on the message boards in awhile, and that's really saying something.
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I never said anything about money issues. Just that it seems like Tennessee doesn't have that guy who has a ton of money who is willing to overpay for certain football players like Larry Ellison at Michigan and Cody Campbell at Texas Tech. Spyre is a well run operation and Tennessee has a fairly strong donor base, but we are just going to miss on some elite players because we operate within a budget while other teams have people pouring in donations to snag as many elite players as possible before rev share/ further limitations emerge in the NIL era. Is Tennessee's operation sustainable? Absolutely, but I just don't see Tennessee paying what other teams are willing to pay Gray since they just committed multiple millions of dollars to David Sanders, and hundreds of thousands to our guard transfers and our elite tackles in this class. Like if we want to talk basketball donations, I'll meet you in the basketball forum. If we want to talk donations to the business school, medical center, and the stadium, we can talk in the Off Topic thread. But this is the football recruiting forum, and I'm just inferring based on things that I've read. I see articles about Phil Knight and Cody Campbell "committing large sums of money to boost the NIL fund" but I've never seen one about a Tennessee fan doing the same ya know. Are they just working in the shadows?
 
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#230
#230
Weezer said:
I have heard that Ergen gives to the University, but not to the AD. I don't know if that's a fact, but it is something I've heard.
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He’s given millions to the University. That is a known, known.

I have no idea if he’s given to the AD. A known, unknown. Hence the question.
 
#231
#231
BelievetheHeup2022 said:
I have no clue what he donates personally. Besides, that's not what was inferred. Everyone on that list has donated large sums of money over the years to the university. The 'money issues' is one of the more ignorant takes I have seen on the message boards in awhile, and that's really saying something.
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University vs Athletics seems a relevant distinction, in this case.

And the implication was that they were all Athletic donors.
 
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#233
#233
Heupel's Offseason Beard said:
I never said anything about money issues. Just that it seems like Tennessee doesn't have that guy who has a ton of money who is willing to overpay for certain football players like Larry Ellison at Michigan and Cody Campbell at Texas Tech. Spyre is a well run operation and Tennessee has a fairly strong donor base, but we are just going to miss on some elite players because we operate within a budget while other teams have people pouring in donations to snag as many elite players as possible before rev share/ further limitations emerge in the NIL era. Is Tennessee's operation sustainable? Absolutely, but I just don't see Tennessee paying what other teams are willing to pay Gray since they just committed multiple millions of dollars to David Sanders, and hundreds of thousands to our guard transfers and our elite tackles in this class. Like if we want to talk basketball donations, I'll meet you in the basketball forum. If we want to talk donations to the business school, medical center, and the stadium, we can talk in the Off Topic thread. But this is the football recruiting forum, and I'm just inferring based on things that I've read. I see articles about Phil Knight and Cody Campbell "committing large sums of money to boost the NIL fund" but I've never seen one about a Tennessee fan doing the same ya know. Are they just working in the shadows?
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Not trying to be mean here, but your research isn't the be all end all. What you have seen or heard is irrelevant to where Tennessee currently stands financially. Even all of these bizarre top 10 NIL lists that continue to pop up with their eyebrow raising metrics has Tennessee as a top 10 ten in the nation in generating NIL money. Your comment was, you wish Tennessee had more billionaire 'fans'. Off the top of my head, I listed 6 or 7 along with a couple of guys close to a billion that have or are currently donating to the athletic program. You named a few big money donors from different universities, now name the other billionaires from those same schools that also donate to that same school. Tennessee doesn't take a backseat to anyone when it comes to support to our athletic department. Even in the down times when the university was poorly ran before Boyd, Plowman, and Danny White took the helm, Tennessee still had donors meeting with the BOT to right the ship. Ergen, Haslam, Anderson, and Thompson's names came up regularly at the time. I highly doubt they took a lesser role now that the ship is humming. You also keep mentioning we need to catch up with Georgia. Maybe in football, but our NIL is in as good if not better than Georgia's currently is. You and others forget to factor in, Tennessee is paying to keep all of the sports a float (everything school) while others are funneling big money into one sport at the expense of others. How did Georgia and Ohio State do in basketball, baseball, etc? I'm sure people would be ecstatic if we went back to the 2000s where our sports programs where the drizzling sh!ts while all of the money was being funded to football. I'm not saying one way is the right way or wrong way, just your take regarding Tennesse's financial situation is completely unfounded. There are way more pieces of the puzzle that you are leaving out.
 
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