2B
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY OF HARRY KANSAN
THURSDAY, APRIL 5, 2007
60 SECONDS TO GRADUATION
Royals offer affordable fun
Team named No.1 most-affordable pro sports franchise
I attended my first professional baseball game of the season Wednesday - though not my beloved Cardinals (who doesn't struggle after winning the World Series, right?) — and I was reminded what a gift the Kansas City Royals are to this community, particularly to college students.
I grabbed four of my buddies and we headed for the first Buck Night of the season, choosing of course to sit in the $8 Hy-Vee view seats. Hot dogs for a buck? Peanuts for a dollar? A soda for four quarters?
Count me in. I don't care what team is playing.
And if you really want to make it a good time, bring some of your favorite adult beverages along
Cheap seats
These are the 15 pro sports franchises ranked the most affordable in a recent survey by ESPN The Magazine. Also included are the cheapest ticket prices from the teams' Web sites. For comparison's sake, the New York Knicks and Toronto Maple Leafs are the two most expensive franchises.
1. Kansas City Royals $8
2. Buffalo Sabres $16
3. Tampa Bay Devil Rays $8
4. Milwaukee Brewers $5
5. Minnesota Twins $7
6. Buffalo Bills $36
7. Nashville Predators $15
8. Los Angeles Angels $9
9. Oakland Athletics $9
10. Detroit Tigers $5
11. Toronto Blue Jays $9
12. San Antonio Spurs $10
13. Detroit Pistons $10
14. New Orleans Hornets $10
15. Washington Nationals $5
BY JONATHAN KEALING
KANSAN COLUMNIST
KEAING@KANSAN.COM
with you to drink in the parking lot. That's maximizing your dollars.
Source: ESPN The Magazine and team Web
As a St. Louis Cardinals fan, the notion of Buck Night and $8 seats is completely foreign to me. For instance, standing-room only seats sell for a minimum of $13 in the new Busch Stadium. A beer at our year-old stadium will set you back $8.25. Other concessions are equally outrageous.
For college students, a trip to Busch can be a tough experience for the wallet. And while I've anecdotally known that the Royals are one of the cheapest experiences out there, ESPN The Magazine went to the trouble to quantify that cheapness.
According to their analysis (you can check out their methodology by clicking the link in my column online at Kansan.com), the Kansas City Royals come in as the most affordable franchise out of all 122 teams that play in the Big Four pro leagues: NBA, NFL, MLB and NHL. For a college student, this list should be a guide to good weekend getaways and short summer trips.
For basketball fans, for instance, the San Antonio Spurs come in at number 12 among all franchises. San Antonio, Texas, is driveable — though beware of traffic in Austin and Dallas — and is an absolutely outstanding town to visit. Much fun can be had there and even more up the road in Austin, home to Sixth Street and the University
of Texas.
If you've planned in advance, the Spurs make a number of tickets available for $10 a piece. You're probably out of luck on any of the remaining games for this regular season, but next season could be the perfect opportunity.
Incidentally, the Spurs are not the only successful team that is lauded for being an affordable experience for sports fans. The Buffalo Sabres of the NHL are ranked as the overall best franchise by ESPN The Magazine. The Sabres get high marks for their on-ice performance, fan relations, coach and player behavior as well. This should give Royals fans a little bit of hope that remaining affordable won't doom them to baseball's cellar forever.
As for the Cardinals, probably the closest non-Kansas City sports franchise, they come in at 19th overall, but all the way down at 38th for affordability. Not exactly college student friendly.
The next Royals Buck Night is May 5, just days before we all go into over-stress mode with term papers, final exams and other projects that are designed to increase our stress and decrease our sleep.
Do yourself and your body a favor and take advantage of the most affordable professional sports franchise in the United States. There's nothing like a Kansas City Royals game.
Except, that is, for a St. Louis Cardinals game. As long as someone else is paying.
Kealing is a Chesterfield, Mo., senior in journalism and political science.
—Edited by Lisa Tilson
J. A. VICKERS, SR. AND ROBERT F. VICKERS, SR MEMORIAL LECTURE SERIES
athletics calendar
Baseball vs. Texas, 3 p.m.
Hooldow Ballpark
**Soccer** vs. Washburn, 5 p.m.
Jayhawk Complex
TODAY
Baseball vs. Texas, 3 p.m.
Hoglund Ballpark
Track at Texas Relays, all day, Austin, Texas
Track at Texas Relays, all day, Austin, Texas
Track at Texas Relays, all day, Austin, Texas
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
Rowing vs. Kansas State, 10
a.m. Burcham Park
Baseball vs. Texas, 1 p.m.
Hoglund Ballpark
Softball at Texas, 1 p.m.
Austin, Texas
Tennis at Missouri, 1 p.m.
Columbia, Mo.
SUNDAY
Softball at Texas, 1 p.m Austin, Texas
**Women's golf at Susie Maxwell Berning Classic, all day, Norman, Okla.**
》 REMEMBRANCE
Friends, family celebrate coach's life
BY MARY FOSTER ASSOCIATED PRESS
To his very last day, Eddie Robinson was always battling something.
There was the institutional racism that surrounded him, the piddling football budget he and his coaching staff subsisted on at predominantly black Grambling State and, ultimately, the Alzheimer's disease that took his life at age 88.
"Hed been fighting that battle for a long time." said former Grambling quarterback and Super Bowl MVP Doug Williams. "It was one of the many he fought in his lifetime."
Grambling head coach Eddie Robinson died from the sidelines during his last game in Grambling, La. in 1997. Robinson died Tuesday night after being hospitalized for Alzheimer's.
ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO
Robinson died Tuesday night, not long after being admitted to Lincoln General Hospital in Ruston, La., Williams said.
He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease shortly after he retired in 1997 and had been in and out of a nursing home during the past year.
And so ended the life of a beloved football coach who put a small school in remote northern Louisiana on the map and turned it into a virtual farm team for the NFL during a career that spanned 57 years.
Robinson built a football powerhouse with a worldwide reputation, all the while struggling to get past years of segregation and discrimination against blacks.
"Today we mourn the loss of a great Louisiana and a true American hero," Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco said. "Coach Eddie Robinson became the most successful college coach of all time and one of the greatest civil rights pioneers in our history. ... Coach Robinson elevated a small town program to national prominence and tore down barriers
His success at Grambling no doubt made him the first easily recognizable black coach in any sport.
to achieve an equal playing field for athletes of all races."
Robinson won 408 games, the most ever for any coach at the time of his retirement in 1997. He sent hundreds of players to the NFL and other
"Everybody wanted to play at Grambling," Jackson State coach Rick Comegy said. "He'd done such a fantastic job. He was on national
players", NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said. "He always focused on coaching his players to be better men as well as better football players."
Playing at Grambling became a goal of young black men as Robinson's fame grew.
KATHLEEN BLANCO Louisiana governor
"Today we mourn the loss of a great Louisianan and a true American hero."
"We will be forever grateful for the more than 200 young men he developed at Grambling who starred in the NFL and those who later coached the next generation of NFL
leagues, and the majority of them were clutching college degrees when they left.
Robinson's career spanned 11 presidents, several wars and the civil rights movement. Though hesteams
TV, you know, and that was the first time I ever seen a black college football team on TV growing up."
Until John Gagliardi of St. Johns, Minn., topped the victory mark four years ago, Robinson was the winningest coach in all of college football.
struggled during his final years, nis overall record of excellence is what will be remembered: 408-165-15.
In 1995, Robinson oversaw a rare
loosing season — 5-6. That was followed by a 3-8 year, and there was an NCAA investigation on recruiting violations and four players were arrested for rape.
Suddenly there were calls for Robinson to go. Fans said hed lost touch with the modern game and the young players.
Robinson's teams had only eight losing seasons and won 17 Seutwestern Athletic Conference titles and nine national black college championships. He was inducted into every hall of fame for which he was eligible, and received honorary degrees from several universities, including Yale.
As pressure mounted for him to step aside, even then-Gov. Mike Foster campaigned to give him one last season so he could try to go out a winner. But that final season again produced a 3-8 record.
Robinson began his storied career at Grambling with no paid assistants, no groundkeepers, no trainers and little in the way of equipment. He lined the field himself and fixed lunchmeat sandwiches for road trips because the players could not eat in the "white only" restaurants of the South.
Somehow, he never seemed bitter when recalling these experiences.
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