The Bobcat Nation

There's a certain amount of excitement around here (Seattle) since WSU announced they will be playing 1AA Grambling in Seahawk Stadium on 9-17-05. Most of the excitement is generated by the news Grambling's band will be performing during the game. WSU will be paying an extra $250,000 ($750,000 total) to the Tigers to bring the band. I'm confident in saying without the band the game would draw somewhere around 40,000. With the band it's a sellout!

Very impressed with the numbers; can't help but wonder why we get such small payouts from the same school. Anyway...

This from the Spokesman Review was posted on E-Griz some time ago, and has a slightly different perspective about the game, but a good read - I love this quote:

Sterk didn't take a breath Friday between announcing the opponent and touting the Tigers' zillion-member band, which will perform in a special "fifth quarter" after the game. The showmanship of the Grambling drumline is remarkable enough to have inspired Hollywood to make a buck off it – and two years ago when San Jose State imported it to play, the Spartans drew a sellout crowd three times bigger than its normal crowd of 10,000 or so.

"I would be surprised if Qwest Field is not sold out Sept. 17," Sterk said.

If he says so. But if it is, it'll be high school band kids cruising the concourses, wondering what's taking the boring football game so long to get over and the real show to start.

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/tools/st ... p?ID=56319

Cat Grad wrote:Very impressed with the numbers; can't help but wonder why we get such small payouts from the same school. Anyway...

It's all about the band -- nobody cares about the Grambling football team, including most people at their home games.

The band gets 250k out of a 750k payout to play in Seattle, and in answer to Blanchette's column, I assume there's more WAZZU graduates there than the Palouse. Still can't understand why we can't seem to get what the other 1-AA and mid-majors get for the early season controlled scrimmage games

Cat Grad wrote:The band gets 250k out of a 750k payout to play in Seattle, and in answer to Blanchette's column, I assume there's more WAZZU graduates there than the Palouse. Still can't understand why we can't seem to get what the other 1-AA and mid-majors get for the early season controlled scrimmage games

That's the official split that the band gets, but I would guess that the overall draw is based almost exclusively on the band and the atmosphere of the "classics" that are played among the HBCU schools (which is, essentially, just the bands). When they played in San Jose, it was marketed heavily to the black population (I think there was a tie-in to a black scholarship or academic fund) of the area as a way for SJSU to try to get more exposure into that demographic (as well get their attendance above 6,000 for a change). I assume Wazzu is going for a similar marketing angle within the Seattle market.

You would think that schools like Grambling and Southern would be raking in the cash from their various boondoggle classics and bandstorming band/football exhibitions. I'm actually surprised that they haven't been able to convert that cash flow into some better football teams. Of course, some of that cash may well go to the schools themselves, which I understand are always very cash poor. That clearly should be the priority.

I'm questioning why the last time we played WAZZU, our payout was about 150k. This year we get 250k and the going rate to play up is now 500k--even the Fizzlies as excited as they are--are "only" getting 450k to bus to Eugene. To add insult to this, next year we're going to Boulder for 275k. I'm just curious why we're willing to play for so much less, or is it because nobody wants us on the preseason schedule?

Cat Grad wrote:I'm questioning why the last time we played WAZZU, our payout was about 150k. This year we get 250k and the going rate to play up is now 500k--even the Fizzlies as excited as they are--are "only" getting 450k to bus to Eugene. To add insult to this, next year we're going to Boulder for 275k. I'm just curious why we're willing to play for so much less, or is it because nobody wants us on the preseason schedule?

Well, they're afraid of us ... of course.

I know we've usually played pretty well against better teams and that's when our kids usually turn the season around. Remember beating Fresno in Bozo and Hawaii, and no, I'm not old enough to remember the first bowl team that beat several of the current Mountain West teams when we were in their conference before the Fizzlies gave up on playing the PAC-10 teams and caused us to drop down to NAIA. Oh well, guess it doesn't matter why we get less but it's kind of strange.