When Missouri decided to leave the Big 12 for the Southeastern Conference, the payoff figured to be, well, the payoff. Mountains of money from the SEC Network promised to change MU’s lifestyle.
In keeping with the once popular analogy that Mizzou was divorcing the Big 12, the Tigers surely were going to splurge on the athletic equivalent of hair plugs, a red Corvette and a surgically enhanced secretary/girlfriend.
The SEC money arrived, but the lifestyle hasn’t changed much. Since joining the SEC, Missouri hasn’t spent aggressively — at one point it had the lowest-paid football, men’s basketball and baseball coaches in the league — except for building Memorial Stadium’s south end zone facility and a new softball stadium. MU now pays its basketball coach, Cuonzo Martin, fair market price, but until his recent raise, football coach Barry Odom wasn’t making much more than some SEC coordinators. The MU athletic department reported a $4.5 million deficit in the 2016-17 school year despite receiving more than $34 million in the SEC’s media rights deal.
One of Missouri’s biggest financial problems has been sagging attendance in men’s basketball and football. There were some unforeseeable circumstances at MU in both sports — a three-year free fall in hoops and a controversial protest in football — to go along with a national trend of decreasing attendance.
To its credit, the Missouri athletic department is actively trying to improve its situation. Last week, it announced a new campaign with the lofty goal of increasing membership in the Tiger Scholarship Fund from 7,000 to 18,039. This week, it hinted on social media that lower football student ticket prices are coming. MU is wisely trying to build a grass-roots base beyond its old dependable fans.
