#SFatPauley: The Numbers on New Pauley's Student Seating Don't Jibe

A lot of work went into this. I’ve been fiddling with the spreadsheet and appreciate that you’ve made it available to us.

Were fact and reason the touchstone, the students would never have been moved. But, fact and reason do not seem to be the determining factors.

What remains to be seen is whether the students take any action to attempt to reverse the decision. I’m afraid that if they do not, the seats will be lost, forever.

How long do you think it will take to erase that short term gain by losses in donations from nonenfranchised students after they graduate? Never mind lost revenue from a less competitive home court. We need to forward this analysis to Morgan. They will ignore it of course, but that doesn"t make the info any less valid.

This is awesome work, tasser. It’s not surprising that this info, including the conclusions and raw data, comes out on BN. Meanwhile nothing like this is ever presented by Morgan. Just crickets over there. Their level of incompetence is truly astounding and embarassing, and is driving the downfall of what was once the best all-around athletic program in the country. So damned sad.

This analysis needs tons of exposure. Please share this with any U.C.L.A. fans you know.

I’m sure this has already made its way to Morgan Center.

That can never be measured, of course. But look at the other side – how much good will is there to be gained by returning the rightful student seats to their rightful owners? Morgan Center could reap an incalculable amount of good will (which would manifest itself in future donations) by saying that it has decided to forego the extra revenue that it would earn by selling the student section seats at premium prices and making them available for free to the students, as in the days of Coach and his teams.

But no. That won’t happen. These guys are a lttle too short-sighted.

how will these donation seat levels equate to the Wooden Fund donations levels (e.g. Booster, All Star, etc.). There was some vague remark when the Pauley Campaign started that there would be changes. Now I wonder what are the changes? Do you still get priority seating for both football and basketball? Will there be separated donations for the two sports? What other benefits will cost more?

It seems to me Dan Guerrero and the fools in the Morgan center can do nothing right. They have taken the position that no matter how bad a product they put on the field/court we the fans/students/alumni will subsidize it by purchasing tickets and apparel.

We the fans/students/alumni are stuck between boycotting games and thereby depriving ourselves. Or, showing indirect support by attending games.

We’re FUCT and they’re the ones sticking it to us.

The thing I think they don’t understand, is that they’re not going to get that many people to make donations at the levels needed to buy that many seats. Many to most of these tickets will probably be bought on a game by game basis with no donation and possibly by ticket brokers and then resold for their profit. It’s bad enough that students are being moved, for all the previously stated reasons, but the fact that those tickets will very likely benefit brokers is even more disgusting.

Fantastic work. Thank you. Rec’d, and appreciated. Your work gives us a chance to explore various scenarios for how this plays out, financially.

Along these lines, I created a revised version of your spreadsheet. Essentially, I added a “percentage of seats sold” column, and calculated new values for Season Tickets, Total WF, and TOTAL for each of the three seating plans (Current, Original, Ideal).

These new columns are placed to the right of the current columns. So, unless you have an enormous monitor, there is some horizontal scrolling involved.

The idea is to compare alternative scenarios to the simple-minded (and ridiculously optimistic) “every seat is sold” scenario. It’s not difficult to imagine drastically different scenarios, such as an A) Enthusiasm Is Killed scenario (current plan) and an B) Enthusiasm Is Ignited scenario (Ideal plan). I firmly believe that there is a symbiotic relationship between student enthusiasm, team play, team success, and subsequent public enthusiasm.

Of course, all scenarios pertain to a single season. Of even greater importance, I feel, are the long-term consequences of enthusiasm—such as the quality of team play, the sizes of future donations, and so on. But, we’ll save that analysis for another day.

Anyway, the idea of the revised spreadsheet is for people to imagine different “Percentage Sold” scenarios for each section, and see what the numbers show. As a first, test case, I set all the percentages to 50%, and checked that my values were exactly half of yours. It’s not ideal, but you’ll have to save different versions of the spreadsheet to save alternative scenarios.

If you would like, and if you or somebody will tell me how to upload a spreadsheet to BN, I’ll be happy to do so.

These tickets are priced out of the ballpark for most people. I haven’t figured out the inflation aspect of thibngs, but two seats in the olden days did not require spending an enormous portion of my young-alum-new-in-the-work-force person. I don’t see how anyone can afford these tickets.

I now go to high school football games on Friday nights. It’s $2.00 to park (and no, they won’t let you in for $1.00 if you promise to leave by halftime) and $5.00 for the game. Plant High has great hotdogs for a buck. Those games are loud and super exciting because they’re played on campus and the students get in for free. I wonder if Morgan Center notices that.

Even if I lived in LA, this discussion would be purely academic to me, because at this pricing level, Mrs. Fox 71 would never in a million years go along with an expenditure like they’re contemplating. How many people do you know who will buy the $17,000 seats? “Yeah, honey, I just spent half my annual income on basketball tickets, and I got some nice magic beans with the other half.”

Students, you’re going to get four years of chances to see Bruin basketball before Morgan Center prices make it totally impossible. it’s time to band together and figure out a way to convince Morgan Center to change its mind. I would think a recall of the current leaders of the Den, and then an absolute boycott of anything that will put money in the Morgan Center coffers. You might also try picketing sporting events to see how many walk-up people will cross a picket line. Be ready to hand out leaflets (although the list of grievances is getting too long to put on one sheet of paper.

Or you can regale your grandchildren with tales of your good old days when you were banished from Pauley. It’s really up to you. BN has furnished all the ammo you need. Some students have stepped up already (Seth Chandler being the most visible.) i don’t see anythng else we can do for you.

If money is what motivates the institution, let’s put pressure on its funding.

To whom it may concern:

Absolutely not. Nothing. Nada. Not one penny while Morgan Center is lying to and abusing past, present and future students over the issue of student seating at Pauley Pavilion. Morgan Center has even gone as far as to censor and ban critics of the policy on its Facebook page. In my case, I was banned not because I was “intimidating” as one flunky charged, but because my arguments were too effective.

This is just the beginning, guys. I am not alone. Marc Dellins and his team have motivated me to get organized. I will be networking with other UCLA alums. We aren’t going to give up until students are restored to their rightful place on the sideline.

Drop a line to Marc for the details.

Sincerely,

Seth Chandler
B.A English
UCLA 1981