at this point I think "that nike money" might be overrated and it might also come with "that phil's bullshit"
Oregon lost Willie T to FSU and while FSU is not broke they are not exactly flush with cash either when it comes to playing with the really big dogs.....hell FSU still kicked over $22 million from the academic side in 2022 and an average of about $15 million for the last 5 years prior
Oregon lost Mario C to Miami......Miami has long had budget issues because they have shitty overall fans and fair weather major donors
Oregon watched their softball coach head to Texas....and yea I know TEXAS, but we all know the softball program was nowhere near what Oregon had rolling and it was not like it was going to cost them massive money to match Texas or that their coach was looking to roll out because of some issues (that I ever saw any evidence of)......Texas just made him a much better offer, promised to at least get him decent facilities, and Oregon said thanks, but no thanks
I know that with Willie T and Mario C there were feelings of "going home", but there was also the "taking over a shit show factors" too
Oregon is one of the last PAC 12 hold outs that tries to run an athletics program that is close to self sustaining and many years back when fill night made the really large donation the first thing Oregon did was start posting up their annual athletics budgets with an explanation of where the money went and why that donation did not just mean free cash forever and ever and that no small donors would ever be needed again and explaining how an endowment and payout from it works
while other PAC 12 programs have gone from being run in a fiscally sound manner to being financial disasters Oregon (and maybe Utah and Oregon State) are some of the last that have not just blown the spending doors off
probably the best thing they can do at this point is put larger buyouts on their coaches to at least collect some cash when they leave