I’ve recently had a string of losing lots of money betting on squirrel races hiring the expensive whores paying bills that I didn’t even know I had to pay, which got me to thinking, “where does everyone get their money?” and more importantly, “what do people do when they’re poor?”Everyone knows there are programs out there that have lots of cash to pay players spending money like Tennessee, Florida, USC, Texas, Ohio State among others, but on the other end of the spectrum, there are schools that don’t even realize they have football programs like Kentucky, Michigan State, Temple, South Carolina (oh yeah, I went there).

Mississippi State University’s Football Training Facilities

So, what do these schools do? Well, let’s take a look shall we?

1. Try to save money by keeping names off the backs of the jerseys – Sure, this is an easy cost cutting measure, since once a player is kicked off the team for doing drugs or killing someone else, you can just give the jersey directly to the next felon student athlete.

2. Don’t pay the football players – I know this is shocking, but some schools actually think it’s a good idea not to pay their football players. They generally come up with lame excuses such as “moral integrity” “values” and other crap. Translation: “we suck.”

3. Replace the marching band with an iPod – This one is pretty smart actually. I mean, what would be better than having a thousand songs at your disposal? Tennessee’s iPod really only needs to be 4 megs though, just enough space to fit Rocky Top, and put it in a loop. There might not be enough batteries in the thing to last through 2,000 cycles however.

4. Going to away games via rickshaw – One of the bigger expenses any team has to endure is that of going to away games. Teams generally pay for a charter bus, or for games that are really far away, some teams even charter planes. This, as you may have guessed can get mighty expensive. By taking rickshaws, schools can dramatically cut down on travel costs. Sure, it might take a little longer, and by the end, some immigrant who moved to the US for a better life is dead, but the savings are fabulous.

There you have it. If you are the athletics director at a major university that doesn’t give a crap about their football program, feel free to use any or all of these cost-cutting measures. Which, btw, if Verne Lundquist is reading this, is pronounced “meh-shurr” not “may-shure”