# Why is sport in the USA connected with colleges? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 23, 2014, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754 "2014-04-23T08:13:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/41 "2014-04-23T21:14:40Z")
But times are changing in sports. At the high school level for example, more and more of the top kids in soccer, baseball, and basketball, have private leagues now which kids are told to NOT play for their high schools. Other sports like gold, tennis, gymnastics, and swimming also have their private leagues. Football, has a new enemy and that is the scare over concussions and traumatic brain injuries. Insurance costs are going up and fewer kids are going out for football. I can see soon this will force schools to drop football and it will switch to club teams. At the college level their will be a bigger drive to unionize players and pay them. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/42 "2014-04-23T21:38:03Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > The first part of that statement is completely wrong. There are three times as many [4-year private colleges](http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908742.html) as public ones. While true, it’s also notable that those fewer public schools enroll over 50% more students than the public schools. It gets more confusing when you mix in for profit colleges (none of which have sports teams as far as I know). The biggest is University of Phoenix which is fully 10% of all private enrollment but I don’t know if it’s included in the data in the link above. The largest traditional private university is 1/10th that size. By far the biggest private schools by enrollment are the for profit institutions like U of Phoenix, Devry, Kaplan, and Walden. I’m not sure how best to break down the numbers between traditional private universities and the online, for profit brethren. > **[List of the largest United States colleges and universities by enrollment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_United_States_colleges_and_universities_by_enrollment)** > > This is a list of the largest United States colleges and universities by enrollment for colleges and universities in the United States. > What this list includes: > What this list does not include: ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/43 "2014-04-23T21:42:46Z")
I should add this to our UK friends, the cost for putting your kid into a sport get very expensive and added onto that the high cost of college and you will see why the big push for sports at the lower level is to get your kid an athletic scholarship. That will often pay ones first 4 years of college and the fact one played on a college team on your resume looks good on an a job application later on for a coaching job. Then, throw into that - the women. Years ago athletic scholarships were mostly all given to men. But that changed in the 70’s with title 9 which says a school had to give as many athletic scholarships to women as men. So if a school gives out 50 scholarships for the football team, they must give out 50 to the women. Which in turn has created a boom in womens sports at the youth level and more competition for womens athletic scholarships. In fact in some colleges they have had to drop some mens sports programs and add womens but thats because football takes up so many scholarship slots. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2014, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/44 "2014-04-23T21:50:09Z")
If your from the UK check out this link: [http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/elisha\_gabb\_818987.html](http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/elisha_gabb_818987.html) It is of a woman from the UK (London) who has a scholarship to play tennis for the University of Missouri. Or this woman Link: [http://www.hawkeyesports.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/morven\_mcculloch\_771077.html](http://www.hawkeyesports.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/morven_mcculloch_771077.html) who is from Scotland who plays at the University of Iowa. Or this woman LINK: [http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-soccer/mtt/rachel\_hignett\_854829.html](http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-soccer/mtt/rachel_hignett_854829.html) who is from Wales who plays college soccer. Now I ask you, if these women had remained in the UK, would they have had this opportunity? So in fact, American college athletic scholarships also benefit non-Americans. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/45 "2014-04-24T00:20:52Z")
> [@Si\_Amigo](#): > > It’s a self perpetuating local ritual to be involved in your local high school teams sports. Many of the people who go are former team members and can somewhat relive their youth and feel attached to the pageantry that goes along with the games. Other participated in other activities associated with the school; the team, the band, the cheerleaders, the home coming dance and other social events like pep raleys. Local merchants get involved and sponsor activities like car washes and candy/flower sales. It’s an American thing, part of the social fabric and we don’t expect the Brits to “get it”. 😃 People have mentioned this before but again, I just don’t “get” being interested in a high school as an adult (outside of a philanthrophic interest in promoting education) that you do not work at and your children are not attending. I sort of get feeling a bit “Good Old Days”-ey when you’re in the first year or two of university when things are different and you have to be a grown up (and might still know a few people at your old high school), but beyond that - I guess it’s just one of those American cultural things that doesn’t translate well elsewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/46 "2014-04-24T00:54:12Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > People have mentioned this before but again, I just don’t “get” being interested in a high school as an adult (outside of a philanthrophic interest in promoting education) that you do not work at and your children are not attending. > > I sort of get feeling a bit “Good Old Days”-ey when you’re in the first year or two of university when things are different and you have to be a grown up (and might still know a few people at your old high school), but beyond that - I guess it’s just one of those American cultural things that doesn’t translate well elsewhere. I’ve seen people become loyal to a high school when its the only one in town and its a town pride thing. Its big in Texas where some high schools can have over 3000 students and have attendance at football games as high as some colleges. ---
**Author:** ![seodoa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@seodoa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seodoa)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/47 "2014-04-24T01:50:27Z")
I’d just like to add that the United States is not necessarily unique in its enthusiasm for at least high school sports. One look at Japanese television during the high school baseball season will prove that. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/48 "2014-04-24T01:58:37Z")
Geez, can’t I get anything right. Back in post #10 I wrote: \> But most universities in the U.K. are not new I meant: \> But most universities in the U.K. are not old I guess most people could guess from what I said later in that post what I meant. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/49 "2014-04-24T01:59:41Z")
> [@seodoa](#): > > I’d just like to add that the United States is not necessarily unique in its enthusiasm for at least high school sports. One look at Japanese television during the high school baseball season will prove that. If you didn’t know already, the very fact that they are playing baseball at all should have alerted you to the fact that many features of post-WWII Japanese culture are based on direct and deliberate imitation of features of American culture. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/50 "2014-04-24T02:07:56Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > If your from the UK check out this link: [http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/elisha\_gabb\_818987.html](http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/elisha_gabb_818987.html) It is of a woman from the UK (London) who has a scholarship to play tennis for the University of Missouri. Or this woman Link: [http://www.hawkeyesports.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/morven\_mcculloch\_771077.html](http://www.hawkeyesports.com/sports/w-tennis/mtt/morven_mcculloch_771077.html) who is from Scotland who plays at the University of Iowa. Or this woman LINK: > [http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-soccer/mtt/rachel\_hignett\_854829.html](http://www.mutigers.com/sports/w-soccer/mtt/rachel_hignett_854829.html) who is from Wales who plays college soccer. > > Now I ask you, if these women had remained in the UK, would they have had this opportunity? > > So in fact, American college athletic scholarships also benefit non-Americans. No, but they were reasonably academically proficient they would probably still have managed to go to university in the UK, or elsewhere in the EU if they wanted, without bankrupting themselves or their families, or saddling themselves with debts anywhere close to the size of those that American students without scholarships have to take on. ---
**Author:** ![Darryl\_Lict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7cd45c/32.png) [@Darryl\_Lict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darryl_Lict)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/51 "2014-04-24T02:10:46Z")
> [@Donnerwetter](#): > > What are the options for talented young basketball players, football players and baseball players who are absolutely and positively not interested in academics, not even [underwater basket weaving](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater_basket_weaving), and who just want to get their professional playing careers started on the highest level as soon as possible? Basketball players are starting to play in [Europe](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/sports/ncaabasketball/23prospect.html), with one guy even skipping his senior year in high school. ---
**Author:** ![seodoa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@seodoa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seodoa)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/52 "2014-04-24T02:16:17Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > If you didn’t know already, the very fact that they are playing baseball at all should have alerted you to the fact that many features of post-WWII Japanese culture are based on direct and deliberate imitation of features of American culture. Baseball was introduced to Japan during the Meiji Era (late 19th century), far before the occupation. Throughout its early history university-sponsored student baseball teams centered in Tokyo were by far the most popular. This didn’t change until the 1950s when corporate-sponsored professional teams began to overtake the academic league. Baseball itself is unarguably an import from the United States, but I think it is incredibly unfair and dismissive to say that Japan’s baseball culture is “deliberate imitation.” In many ways Japan’s baseball culture has evolved separately and from that seen in the United States. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/53 "2014-04-24T02:21:09Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > I should add this to our UK friends, the cost for putting your kid into a sport get very expensive and added onto that the high cost of college and you will see why the big push for sports at the lower level is to get your kid an athletic scholarship. That will often pay ones first 4 years of college and the fact one played on a college team on your resume looks good on an a job application later on for a coaching job. > > Then, throw into that - the women. Years ago athletic scholarships were mostly all given to men. But that changed in the 70’s with title 9 which says a school had to give as many athletic scholarships to women as men. So if a school gives out 50 scholarships for the football team, they must give out 50 to the women. Which in turn has created a boom in womens sports at the youth level and more competition for womens athletic scholarships. In fact in some colleges they have had to drop some mens sports programs and add womens but thats because football takes up so many scholarship slots. Now please explain why any of this is good for _universities_, which are supposed to be institutes of _learning_ where would-be _intellectuals_ and _scholars_ can improve their _minds_, not sports training camps for potential professional jocks (male or female), and certainly not degree mills for handing out pieces of paper that will allow jocks to pretend that they have had a real education. Sports training is all well and good, and perhaps (like higher education) it deserves to be supported by public money, but it is not the business universities are supposed to be in (and not the one they _are_ in anywhere but America). ---
**Author:** ![sunstone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunstone/32/3372_2.png) [@sunstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunstone)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/54 "2014-04-24T02:27:21Z")
As a dissenting voice, I want to say that Stanford is a top notch university in the USA, nearly always placing in the top 10 in terms of academics/research…and it is often in the top tier of ratings for football and basketball. As far as I know, even though there are sports scholarships, all students must first pass muster on high school academics, SAT scores and activities or unusual contributions in their high school years. They are a hot bed of high achieving graduates, who not only contribute to the school financially, but are often avid sports fans for Stanford. (Even the large number of “nerds” in the alumni) So sports can be found in all levels of university academic institutions in the USA. While my two sons didn’t play sports, they are both fans of the Stanford football teams. For our non US members, Stanford is a large highly rated private university located in the Bay Area of California. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/55 "2014-04-24T02:33:13Z")
> [@seodoa](#): > > Baseball was introduced to Japan during the Meiji Era (late 19th century), far before the occupation. Throughout its early history university-sponsored student baseball teams centered in Tokyo were by far the most popular. This didn’t change until the 1950s when corporate-sponsored professional teams began to overtake the academic league. > > Baseball itself is unarguably an import from the United States, but I think it is incredibly unfair and dismissive to say that Japan’s baseball culture is “deliberate imitation.” In many ways Japan’s baseball culture has evolved separately and from that seen in the United States. Are you aware of what triggered the Meiji era? > [@](#): > > [The policy of isolation lasted for more than 200 years. In 1844, William II of the Netherlands sent a message, urging Japan to open its doors. This was rejected by the Japanese.[78] On July 8, 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry of the United States Navy with four warships—the Mississippi, Plymouth, Saratoga, and Susquehanna—steamed into the bay in Yokohama and displayed the threatening power of his ships’ cannons during a Christian burial which the Japanese observed. He requested that Japan open to trade with the West. These ships became known as the kurofune, the Black Ships. > > The following year at the Convention of Kanagawa on March 31, 1854, Perry returned with seven ships and demanded that the shōgun sign the Treaty of Peace and Amity, establishing formal diplomatic relations between Japan and the United States.]([History of Japan - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_history#End_of_seclusion)) An American demonstration of American’s overwhelming military superiority over what had been a proud warrior culture, that is what. Something that was merely driven home more forcefully in WWII. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/56 "2014-04-24T02:33:57Z")
This episode of the Backstory podcast goes into the history of college sports. – [http://backstoryradio.org/shows/turf-war-a-history-of-college-sports/](http://backstoryradio.org/shows/turf-war-a-history-of-college-sports/) ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/57 "2014-04-24T02:42:52Z")
One of things mentioned in the podcast is that the first organized college athletics resulted from attempt to give wealthy, spoiled rich kids an outlet for there aggression other than (1) going into town, getting drunk and raising hell or (2) vandalizing the college, and assaulting and occasionally murdering faculty members. The effect of organized sports was to create an intense loyalty between the participants and their colleges and early on it became a key way for colleges to get finding from alumni. They got addicted to that, particularly state universities that are not considered to be among the academic elite. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/58 "2014-04-24T02:45:09Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > People have mentioned this before but again, I just don’t “get” being interested in a high school as an adult (outside of a philanthrophic interest in promoting education) that you do not work at and your children are not attending. > > I sort of get feeling a bit “Good Old Days”-ey when you’re in the first year or two of university when things are different and you have to be a grown up (and might still know a few people at your old high school), but beyond that - I guess it’s just one of those American cultural things that doesn’t translate well elsewhere. It doesn’t even translate well to some parts of the US. I’m not really sure why- maybe it’s the number of professional teams in the area \* or the number of high schools but high school sports are not a big deal in the NYC area. People will donate money, speak at career days and that sort of thing for the high school they or their children attended- but go to the games? Not unless a kid they are close to is on the team. \*why would I ever follow a high school or college baseball team when I have two major league and two minor league teams just in NYC? The same goes for other sports. ---
**Author:** ![seodoa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@seodoa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seodoa)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/59 "2014-04-24T02:52:25Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > Are you aware of what triggered the Meiji era? > > An American demonstration of American’s overwhelming military superiority over what had been a proud warrior culture, that is what. Something that was merely driven home more forcefully in WWII. So… you are saying because America forced Japan to end its policy of self-imposed isolation, everything Japan has achieved and everything about Japanese culture is a direct copy of the United States? That’s a non sequitur if I’ve ever seen one. American intervention may have triggered the social unrest and rebellions which would later result in the Meiji Restoration, but it does not then follow that the cultural changes were a result of “deliberate imitation” of the United States. That statement not only completely dismisses Japanese culture, but it dismisses the massive contributions Europe made to Japan during Japan’s modernization. This is becoming a hijack, I’m going to bring it back in by reasserting the fact that Japan was treating baseball as a collegiate/varsity sport before it was being practiced popularly as one in the United States. During those years baseball in the United States was dominated by semi-professional and professional baseball clubs. Were the Japanese deliberately imitating the US model, they would have done the same. I think it’s safe to assert that Japan’s academic sport tradition is a unique cultural development. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754/60 "2014-04-24T03:14:57Z")
> [@doreen](#): > > \*why would I ever follow a high school or college baseball team when I have two major league and two minor league teams just in NYC? The same goes for other sports. I see a clear inverse correlation between the importance of college and high school and the presence of a major league baseball team in that city before 1950. Maybe 1960. Even the small professional football and basketball leagues before 1960 were concentrated in those same cities plus a few others in the northeast. If colleges were your top quality sport then investing your emotions in them make sense. One possible argument against this: Triple A and lower minor baseball leagues were everywhere and they didn’t become mere farm teams of the majors until after the 1930s. Their fan bases were large and enthusiastic. While a few were very good, though, in general they were inferior to the majors and their best players normally left for a higher league in a few years at most (again with notable exceptions). The same is true for players at a college but those fans root more for the school than for the players and the school’s image is timeless. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-sport-in-the-usa-connected-with-colleges/686754.md?page=4)