By Chris Marler
The people running college football seem to care the least about college football. That’s become more and more transparently clear over the years.
Let’s start with the exponential increase in bad decisions and overreactive implementations that no one asked for. The 24 team playoff, weird transfer portal calendar issues, and running clock are all pretty good examples. Those were never things that the consumers of the product asked for, but it was something that the people in charge of the product certainly put in place for the sake of dollar signs and revenue.
That’s fine. I’ve waived a white flag on most issues with the sport because I know two things: my complaining is not going to change the minds of the decision makers and I’m still going to watch college football regardless. I may not like it as much, and it may not be as incredible as the nostalgia filled years of my youth when I watched it, but I will still watch it.
That’s like the one untarnished thing left in the sport. The NIL payments, annually massively overhauled rosters forcing fans to learn the last names of one year mercenaries from the portal, and endless commercials suck. But, at least I know every Saturday I’m going to turn on my television and be able to watch college football. For a 40 year old who grew up in the Jefferson Pilot and regional coverage era, I remember freaking out when ESPN2 debuted because it meant there was an increased chance that we wouldn’t have to drive to a sports bar with an eight year old (me) and hope we could find a game on pay per view. Or even worse pay $40 for ESPN Gameplan so you could watch whatever non-conference game was on in September.
At least we can watch the games. You just might need a multiview or multiple TVs to do it.
That’s especially the case on opening weekend. One of the best weekends of the year for college football junkies who’ve waited eight months to get their fix. Opening weekend is awesome because you get at least one big Power Four game on Thursday, several games on Friday, a whole day on Saturday, two more on Sunday, and one final night game on Monday to cap off the first week of a new season. It’s electric. Five straight days of college football. It’s like an all you can eat buffet of my favorite things (besides food).
Not this year, though. In the past, the Sunday part of that equation was often a night game. Miami and LSU in 2018 is a good example. Last year we got two, with South Carolina-Virginia Tech in the afternoon and Miami-Notre Dame that night. This year we get two games again. Ole Miss and Louisville face off in a neutral site non-conference game and Notre Dame heads to Lambeau Field to play Wisconsin.
At the same damn time. It’s not that I don’t like quoting Future lyrics. It’s just that I don’t want them to apply to the TV time slots for the only two games of the day. The only two! Why?!
I’ll tell you why. Because the people running the sport don’t care about the sport. And, this is just the latest example. End of rant.
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