Georgia Football Pays Ludacris $65,000 For Spring Game Performance

New Georgia football coach Kirby Smart wanted to fill Sanford Stadium for this year’s spring game. To that end hip-hop “star” Ludacris performed in front of the 93,000-plus people who attended, with a total tab of $65,000.

Ludacris’ compensation package, via the contract rider obtained by the Macon Telegraph, included the following:

-Food: including organic creamy peanut butter, organic jelly, a very specific dinner for “at least 10 people” and a box of Fruit Roll-Ups
– Towels
– Six large white t-shirts
– Toothpaste and a rechargeable Crest Spin toothbrush
– Batteries
– Liquor
– Box of condoms
– Incense
– Lotion
– An iron and ironing board

There are things I’ve left out, in the interest of relative brevity. But Ludacris clearly wanted he and his entourage to be well-fed, hydrated, clean and otherwise comfortable before and after he took the stage. Trust me when I say many of the items on the list, even beyond what I’ve included, invite questions that seem to only have bizarre answers. All of it for a 15-minute performance. Nice work, if you can get it.

The powers that be at Georgia were apparently convinced they needed a musical act at “G-Day”, agreeing to a contract with Ludacris just two days before the spring game last Saturday. So the rapper knew he could make whatever demands he wanted, reasonable or otherwise, and in the interest of making the 2016 spring game a big event the university took the bait. If nothing else, we now have an answer to the question, “What ever happened to Ludacris?”

I’m not sure what Georgia’s compensation to Ludacris says about college athletics as a whole. But I do know spring games are glorified practices, and they’re being forced down our throats as televised events that carry some sort of greater importance.