While I’m on the subject of moving the Cocktail Party out of Jacksonville on a permanent basis, if Mike Griffith is looking for allies in Gainesville, he’d best keep looking. Here’s Billy Napier singing out of the choirbook on that subject.
Napier said there’s a financial benefit to both schools playing in Jacksonville. Florida and Georgia each made more than $4.5 million playing the game in Jacksonville in 2022, which included a $1.25 million appearance fee and $3.3 million in gate fees.
Playing the series home-and-home would net Florida and Georgia just $1.5 million annually, a $3 million shortfall compared to playing in Jacksonville. Each school would make about $3 million playing games at their respective stadiums, but that revenue would have to extend over a two-year period.
“The underlying issue here is the economics, right,” Napier said before a Fightin’ Gator Touchdown Club speaking event on Monday. “It’s very beneficial for both teams to play the game there. So, you know, we’ve got some things to work through there, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
Translation: prepare to pony up, Jacksonville.
Not even Kirby Smart can sway Billy to the dark side.
Napier was asked Monday whether it would benefit recruiting to hold the Florida-Georgia game at The Swamp every other year.
“In-season official visits, you know, how effective are those during the season, given Early Signing Day, the magnitude of the game, the time that’s required that weekend, so, I mean there’s advantages both ways here,” Napier said. “I think, again, we go back to I think there’s some economics behind the bigger picture here from a decision-making standpoint.”
Just a reminder that in college football, the only thing that remains undefeated is the dollar bill.
Get The Picture 
The Crocs have to be in contention for a SEC title for their fair weather fans to sell out the swamp. Of course they want the revenue from Jax.
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CKS ain’t got time for this revenue shit, “always be crootin” drives the Kirby Kopter…GO DAWGS!!
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What better way to recruit than to give tickets to recruits to Jax and point to the empty Gator seats in the 3rd quarter?
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..and that reads like CKS ain’t got time for the fans and their beloved traditions.
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By now Napier knows the fewer games he has at home the better/safer.
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TV wizard Don Ohlmeyer, a far smarter man than me, said it best “The answer to all your questions is: Money.”
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I may be totally out in left field here, if so, you can call me out. But why can’t the home and home cities make up the difference? I don’t know how much revenue home games bring in for Athens or Gainsville, but I think it would be worth looking into.
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Why would Athens/Clarke County subsidize UGAA for a single game every other year? Jacksonville owns the stadium and the city has an overall city budget of $1.5b. The budget section that pays the schools for this game has expenditures totaling $124m. They have a vested interest in keeping the game there because they are driving direct revenue in a facility they own.
ACC has a total proposed budget of $184m for 2024. Fiscally it doesn’t make sense for them to pay the University for game that is not already happening in Athens. Especially since they do not make any direct money on the game like Jacksonville does.
It might be a different story if the game had been a home and home for years and the proposal was to permanently to a neutral site.
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See my quick calculations below. It wouldn’t make sense for them to pay the UGAAA to keep the game in Athens if it had been home and home forever.
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Who exactly in Athens will pay the money? The city? I doubt the additional tax revenue would pay the difference. The merchants, bars and restaurants? Good luck with that.
If 60,000 extra people come to Athens for a home game (students and locals are already there) and every one of them spends $50 in Athens, a number that is probably higher than what people actually spend per capita in Athens on game days. The total additional income to the Athens economy is $3,000,000. The city might get $250,000 in tax revenue and the merchants might realize a margin of around $1,500,000 with expenses having to be paid out of that.
Where does the $4,500,000 come from that goes to Florida and where does the additional $3,000,000 that goes to Georgia come from?
Even if you throw in another $1,000,000 from hotel revenue (1000 rooms @ $1000 for the weekend and I think this number is very overstated) that will generate another $500,000 in margin to the hotel owners you still are way short of money.
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Again, the SEC can solve the recruiting issue according to the Supreme Court decision . They can pass rule to allow it at SEC games.
Let’s cut out the BS
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They can give recruits tickets to the Cocktail Party now. Kirby wants to host official visits that weekend to pay for travel expenses. He can’t do that by NCAA rules.
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I think the whole revenue thing is a factor, but not as big as they make it sound. Neither one of these programs are starving (especially Georgia, who is still rubbing the original two nickels put into the program together). With the additional $$$ flowing in from ESPN, is this really a game changer? But here’s the guess. Kirby wants a path that shows that at least some of this money is spent on a project he wants completed. Yes, he is publicly negotiating on behalf of the University, but he’s internally negotiating for himself. Remember, the man has a degree in finance, where he was an All SEC Academic.
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Billy sounds like a future AD.
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I wonder if he has realized what a total disaster he has stepped into yet?
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Kirby should find some Magill Society members to pony up the $3 million yearly deficit in exchange for sideline passes. Somebody has money to burn.
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Honest question:
How much is the total revenue and profit for UGA football and UGA Athletics as a whole?
Then tell me why $3 million matters in the grand scheme of things?
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Just think how many recruiting staffers you could fund with that $3,000,000.
On a side note, I’m old enough to remember when $3,000,000/year DID matter in the grand scheme of things. . .
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It’s 30% of Kirby’s salary. At an average of $100k per head (which is a number I pulled from thin air), it’s 30 jobs in the athletic department. If all of those jobs are necessary, guess what? We’re going to get higher ticket prices or contribution minimums to make up the difference because rational people don’t cut their margins voluntarily.
I don’t give a damn about the money. I care about the tradition. If this is the hill Kirby is willing to die on, I’m more than happy to become a “natty or bust” fan as a result.
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My point being whether or not UGA makes an extra $3mil is irrelevant. Look at the numbers. Its not as if they are going “oh wait, if we can only make another $3mil or more we can hire more people”. The other point is we have such s h itty home games now. It would be nice to play another big rival at home every other year. But that’s my preference. Jax is a s hole. The stadium sucks. But in the end its what is best for the program to win titles.
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I’ve always had a ball on my UGA/UF trips..no issues with the stadium or my accommodations at Amelia Island. Keep it in Jax..
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Atticus, I don’t go to Jacksonville, and I want the game to stay there. I did order this year just in case it’s the last Cocktail Party, and no, it won’t be the Cocktail Party any longer if the game is home and home. It will be the Florida game or the War for the Oar or whatever. Calling it a Border War or whatever is probably cancelled, too.
I don’t like the home schedule this year, but I’m going to love the home schedule in the future unless the conference screws up scheduling by not having 2 or 3 permanent opponents.
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Kirby (probably)- You can’t put a price on recruiting…
Billy – Hold my beer…
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Regarding recruiting: …Napier said. “I think, again, we go back to I think there’s some economics behind the bigger picture here from a decision-making standpoint.”
Kirby ain’t thinking about no economics, 24 hours a day every day, Kirby is thinking about recruiting.
In Kirby I trust.
GO DAWGS
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What is going to improve on recruiting? Nothing. It’s a red herring that Kirby has shown no data to support his argument for ending the Cocktail Party.
I guess Texas and Oklahoma are just stupid for keeping their game in Dallas after coming into the SEC. After all, it’s about recruiting über alles.
I will not attend the first Florida game in Athens after the end of the Cocktail Party, and my tickets will go unused. I encourage other season ticket holders to do exactly the same thing if they don’t support the permanent move of the game to campus. I will also become a “natty or bust” fan because if Kirby thinks this is the only thing that prevents us from winning the natty every year, that’s the measure by which he’ll be evaluated. SEC champions with no national title? Season is a failure. Make the CFP championship game and lose? Failure.
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I would even encourage our fan base not to order tickets to the first game in Hogtown for the exact same reason.
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I’ve said it before. Kirby isn’t and has never been a Georgia fan. Yes, he is an alumnus and loves the school. He has as much as said that because of his father’s job as a high school coach. Probably the first time he stepped in the stadium in Jacksonville was on the field as a player (and most of his experience there as a player sucked except 1997). It isn’t special to him in the way it is to those of us who saw 4th and Dumb, Appleby to Washington, Belue to Scott, Herschel over the top, 4 whole days, The Celebration, Malcolm Mitchell, and Jarvis Jones.
The Cocktail Party is part of the fabric of Georgia football … the site is part of that.
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The value of the goodwill associated with the Cocktail Party dwarfs the difference of the year to year revenues, anyway.
If you want to know the value that the Cocktail Party has, then all you have to do is look at the first schedules that CBS put out every year. I think it was four games that they’d have penciled in long before the season started. They were the night game, Army-Navy, the Friday after Thanksgiving game, and the Cocktail Party. There was only one Saturday game that was guaranteed to be in the week’s prime slot every season, and it was because the game’s played in Jacksonville.
We’d be foolish to give that up. Kirby is thinking about the present and not the future, which is what you’d expect. As a long term proposition, there’s no comparison between losing that weekend of on campus visits or losing the Cocktail Party.
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Why does CBS schedule make any difference? EVERY game is on TV, and CBS doesn’t have the game anymore. What value of good will?
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Every game is not pimped the same…and yeah, we know CBS is going away..ABC will be all over this game too…
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Don’t get me wrong. I love the tradition. But our home schedule sucks. It has for several years. Unless we go to 9 SEC games, this game is eventually gone.
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Atticus, just say you want the game in your season ticket package every other year because you don’t want to travel to Florida. That’s ok and a reasonable point of view. Accept that others feel differently including people like me who don’t go to Jacksonville either.
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Our home schedule sucks because of who we schedule outside of the SEC. Being in the SEC East our only game with any real compelling interest is Tennessee. South Carolina may be interesting every few visits and KY sometimes makes some noise but outside of Auburn every other year, our home schedule is always going to be pretty weak. The two or three out of conference glorified high school teams we play each year aren’t going to be replaced by Ohio State or USC. Adding Florida to the home schedule every other year isn’t going to move the needle much on the overall suck meter of our home schedules.
College football is great in large part because of traditions. Georgia/Florida in Jacksonville is a great tradition. Getting rid of that game cheapens college football.
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Beating a crappy Florida team at home isn’t going to improve it much. At least some get to enjoy the beach as it is.
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Because CBS had the SEC contract for the last 20 or so years. “Goodwill” in this context refers to the value that a company has over and above what the black and white numbers tell you. They are intangibles that are difficult to quantify.
Think about it like this, would you be willing to give up UGA if it meant better recruiting? What about the hedges, the “Power G”, the chapel bell, Larry Munson clips, or any of the other things that make Georgia football what we love.
Some things are bigger than even success on the field. For me, the Cocktail Party is one of those things. Your mileage may vary, but I think anyone would agree that if you start giving up traditions that are at the core of a program then pretty soon you’ll be left with something that is entirely different than what made you love the school and the team in the first place. At that point you may as well watch the NFL.
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I’ll add to your point of view. If Kirby puts us in Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas or anywhere else for a neutral site game after he gets his way in moving the Cocktail Party to campus permanently, he was totally disingenuous about this topic. I guarantee you he’ll be burning some bridges with the high school coaches in Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia if this ever happens.
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Kirby’s self professed love of other neutral site games leads me to believe he is full of shit about the game in Jacksonville.
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JC, I really do think a lot of this saber rattling is Georgia as the “bad cop” with Florida as “good cop” in negotiations with Jacksonville. I just don’t think Kirby really cares. He wins either way. The program gets more money if the game stays in Jacksonville (as a Terry graduate, he knows finance & economics). He gets his official visit weekend every other year if the game moves.
Bottom line is he wins either way.
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I’ve wondered the same thing myself re: Kirby as the “bad cop”, and think that’s probably what’s going on. It certainly makes sense if you’re looking to negotiate the best deal possible in Jacksonville.
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Maybe clemson and fsu should play there too…🤣
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