Bowl Game CEOs: College Football's Big Winners

One Game, Four Hours, and Six Figures

  • Chris Graythen / Getty Images

    The opening festivities of the Allstate Sugar Bowl are seen at the Louisana Superdome on January 1, 2010 in New Orleans, Louisiana

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    It's the same way in the corporate world, but that doesn't make it fair, nor answer the fundamental question: what do the CEOs do? Cavalli described his responsibilities in a list of 35 bullet-points, which included tasks like soliciting sponsors, negotiating contracts with sponsors and television partners, managing bowl week volunteers, and arranging the half-time entertainment. He noted that his organization had only two full-time employees, so the bulk of the logistical work fell on him.

    In response to TIME's interview requests, several organizations issued statements through their communications offices. "Looking at the Sugar Bowl side-by-side with Habitat for Humanity may not offer the best comparison," writes John Sudsbury, spokesman for the Sugar Bowl, "although both have provided service to New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina — Habitat at the micro level and the Sugar Bowl at the macro level. College athletics, and in particular college football, are big business where competition is keen and multi-million dollar athletic budgets, television contracts and administrators/coaches salaries are the norm. Like it or not, this is the world we compete in every day."

    To justify salaries, Sudsbury, and other bowl executives, all cite studies that quantify the economic impact of their respect games. A study prepared by a University of New Orleans economist, for example, found that the 2010 Sugar Bowl generated $137 million in economic impact for the city. But for years, economists have been questioning the real monetary value of sports. In the case of the Sugar Bowl, for example, many football fans are replacing tourists and conventioneers who would normally be in New Orleans — if the Sugar Bowl wasn't squeezing them out.

    More importantly, if Hoolahan earned, say, $150,000 instead of $650,000, would that $137 million change? Would fewer football-crazy fans of Ohio State, which will play Arkansas in the Jan. 4 Sugar Bowl, travel to New Orleans and spend less money? "Lower executive salaries wouldn't change the economic impact one iota," says one prominent sports consultant who has seen bowl executives work firsthand, and has working relationships with several CEOs. "The idea that it would is laughable."

    The bowls insist that their executive directors work year-round. They say the CEOs have to negotiate sponsorship, marketing, and merchandising deals. And some bowl organizations are responsible for more than one event — Junker, for example, also runs the Insight Bowl; and the Sugar Bowl runs several satellite events like college basketball, lacrosse, and volleyball tournaments, among others, in conjunction with the big game. Are they worth the money, then? "They are way overpaid, absolutely," says the consultant. "What they are doing over the course of the year is minimal."

    College football may never see its longed-for playoff. But if the game wants to regain some integrity, stakeholders can take one simple step. The suits who run the bowls, like the rest of higher education in America, can take a pay cut.

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