It seems like every year we run up against some much smaller, much poorer school in a recruiting battle, and they win it because they have some insane pool of NIL money, and the explanation is always, "Sammy Huntington Thigpen, who founded a successful string of pig knuckle-based fast food restaurants that dominate every small town in New Mexico, Arizona, and west Texas, is an alum, he's worth $27 billion, and there's nothing in the world he loves more than women's college softball." We're one of the largest colleges in the world. We don't have any weird billionaire alums with a deep psychological need to pour money into sports in a desperate effort to distract themselves from the fact that they're estranged from all of their children and ex-wives?
I think it’s more like they are desperate to make their schools relevant in something. UF alums don’t have that worry, and hence no crazy alums stepping up to piss their money down the drain, a la SC last year, or A&M in football, Miami to this point in football etc. OU in softball is about the only successful model with NIL, they are the exception.
We have alums way wealthier than him actually. Herbert Wertheim is worth something like 5 billion, heaven only knows what Chris Malachowsky is worth (cofounder of NVDIA). I remember a few years ago we had a woman who was heir to some energy fortune in NC who was also a billionaire alum, don’t know what became of her. But the common theme is that they give back to academics, not athletics. Wertheim has given 10’s of millions, especially to engineering, Chris gave 50 million towards AI at UF (it’s an amazing partnership with NVDIA if you read around on it), I don’t know what Al Warrington’s net worth was, but he gave over 100 million total to the business school, even Morgan gave a million to the law school. And by the way, if you look at just about all the top public schools, they are wired similarly. You don’t hear about some massive NIL donation at UM, UNC, UCLA, Cal, GT etc, but you hear often about academic gifts. It’s just the boat we’re in now. We don’t need to make our identity through sports and our alums act accordingly.
If this dominant pitcher can get you to Omaha in softball, she is going to be lonely since the WCWS is played in Oklahoma City.
Still waiting on Canady's decision, but I honestly think we've got a good shot. Where will NiJaree Canady land in college softball transfer portal?
What's going on at texas tech to warrant speculation of canady going there? Are there coaching changes or something else going on I just haven't noticed?
They hired a very successful coach from Louisiana Rajun' Cajuns, Gerry Glasco, and he's gotten a bunch of quality transfers to go there with him. Plus, it's reported that a wealthy alumni has made a ton of NIL money available. Softball - Texas Tech Red Raiders
