Why the college football season will DEFINITELY go ahead

Earlier on Saturday Fox Sports’ writer Joel Klatt tweeted: “The college football season will 100% go ahead…. Fans will be in the stands at some capacity in most of the stadiums….The season will likely start on time”.

Of course, everybody jumped on this like Klatt’s words were gospel, and he had to basically write a tweet back to Reddit’s CFB board saying: ‘These are just ‘thoughts'”.

It didn’t take time for Clay Travis to snipe at all the other sportswriters, effectively saying that it was bad news for other college football writers that the season wouldn’t go ahead.

Someone forgot to say to him: Why would college football reporters not want a season to go ahead, bearing in mind college football is their livelihood?

Anyway, that [add swear word here] of a political/college football commentator aside, here’s why we think college football will definitely go ahead.

 

EVERYONE NEEDS TO BE SHOWN THE MONEY

The schools need the money. If they don’t play don’t think that ESPN and Fox are going to instantly pony up the year’s worth of money on their contracts. They’ve been losing money hand over fist from advertisers because of the lack of major sports on TV, and 400 Last Dances ain’t gonna save things. ESPN has put out a report that college sports might lose $4 billion if there’s no college football. This will lead to countless other programs getting smashed, and all hell breaking loose. Also, if they come back and even if they are allowed to have their stadiums half or a third full, that will guarantee some more dough.

There will also be pressure from the universities on the states to make sure this happens, because college football is so important to their branding, and therefore enrollment. After all, it’s no coincidence that attendance at the University of Alabama increased as Nick Saban’s teams kept on winning. Schools will also want kids to get onto campus, instead of commuting, because that gives them more boarding money, too.

The states need the money. Whether you’re Texas or Florida and  you need the money to help with the sales tax coffers, you make a lot of incidental money from college football, be it taxes on tickets to sales of football gear to beer sales etc etc. That’s a big reason why governors will push for there to be sport. You can expect every state to say that they will allow professional and college sports by the end of June. It would be financial idiocy if they don’t. Ohio State has already said that they envisage a time when they can put 20 – 50,000 in the seats, therefore ‘guaranteeing’ social distancing. We will see how that will work – as well as the added measures to stop the massive tailgate parties around the stadiums.

The TV networks need the money. The TV networks need the money back from the ad revenues as well as some increased subscription revenue.  The TV networks will no doubt be lobbying everyone from President Trump to the Easter Bunny asking them to push for a college football return.

THE SEASON WILL START ON TIME…BECAUSE WEATHER 

A full season when the weather is at its harshest is not going to work for college football teams. The B1G will absolutely not play in the winter, it seems. The warmer weather – which also reduces the chance of a COVID-19 re-run that will almost certainly coincide with flu season.

….AND THE RECRUITING WILL GET HAMMERED, TOO

Also, a movement to January takes out the December and February signing day windows, which will change the pattern of recruiting etc, and that will stretch resources and time. That’s going to affect high schools. Frankly, the start to the season will make life a lot easier for them. And for high school football players, too.

Don’t think that schools (and high schools) will be pushing the states as well as the conferences to make this happen.

BE PREPARED FOR….

A truncated season where teams will only be allowed to play in-conference schools and Power-5 schools. That means that teams will be allowed to play Notre Dame.

THE CAVEAT IS…

COVID-19, COVID-19, COVID-19.

We don’t know what’s going to happen with the universities and their opening policies (South Carolina’s cancelling fall break and stopping in-person instruction at Thanksgiving break in an effort to get away before flu season, but then again there are other schools who may not open up at all if their state doesn’t bode it as being free).