FOOTBALL, HUT, HUT, HUT!

(USA TODAY SPORTS, Huff Post, Paul Manzey, Frazer Chronicle)

 

I’ve written a blog for a little more than two years on all sorts of subject matter, from the silly, to the humorous, to the bizarre, but I really can’t recall an issue that many people must have known was coming, there was just way too much money to be made for it to be any different.

 

The post season collegian bowl schedule has been expanding for the past several years, and why not, it’s not really about playing football, it’s about bowling for bucks, and I’m not talking about space bucks either, unless you call more than a quarter billion dollars fun money.

 

Presently the amounts of money that are paid to participating universities and their conferences is pretty astounding, all totaled, the amount approaches an almost embarrassing $291,752,500 in 2012, that’s more than some developing countries in the world have in their entire operating budget.

 

From the east coast to the west, college football bowl games are popping up like the flowers in the spring, when the man said “let’s go bowling,” he wasn’t kidding, in the United Sates, in the 2012 football post season…..in college football there were 44 bowl games to determine…..well, really, I’m not sure what they determined, for me the bowl season kind of got all blurry…..too many games for me.

 

Now there’s talk of the super conferences, with the elite teams breaking off from the N.C.A.A. as quickly as the 2014 season. I’m not so sure that’s such a good idea….I might just be a bit naive, but I was under the impression that college athletes, both young men, and women went to college to gain an education, I don’t know, maybe my thinking is to colonial for today’s world.

 

Yes, yes, I know all about study tables, tutors, and co-ed help programs for student-athletes…..but those help programs were instituted because the man, or women athlete is using a large portion of their time to develop an athlete skill to help a sports team win, place, or show.

 

But today, I’m thinking some of these help programs are being taken advantage of, while others are probably being down-right abused. The oversight, and the regulating of these programs is supposed to be administered by a student affairs director especially for athletes, it’s their only job, and they are usually answerable to one of the Athletic Directors assistants, who coordinates with a specific coach in a particular sport.

 

In many cases, there are abuses, some cheating, and down-right criminal activity, usually with one of your friendly booster club, or alumni member lurking around, spreading his seedy stealth activity around many an American campus of higher learning!

 

Now I must warn you, what comes next is…..well, ludicrous, laughable, and…..”come on, are you kidding me.” Yes today there is a move afoot for our institutions of higher learning to forge an agreement one with the other…..if you happen to be the right institution, and play in the proper conference, to form a, as I mentioned, a Super Conference with elite teams which would presumably be administered by many of the same people who cheat at the worst, and at the best are admitted rules breakers…..COME ON!

 

It’s true, I read it in an article today in the U.S.A. it’s gotta be true, they actually pay their reporting journalists. I think guys like me, the unpaid hoard dig deeper to grab a story-line, and to understand what they are writing about…..at least I do.

 

CINDERFELLA

College football isn’t about the money…..right, wrongo-bongo, college football is, and has been about money and ratings for at least the last four decades…..maybe longer. The marquee conferences, the elite schools depend on conference wins, television revenue and sponsor dollars for their very survival. It begins with spring practice and carries on throughout the regular season, all efforts trained towards rankings, and post season bowl appearances.

 

The elite college football conferences in no particular order:

Southeastern, (SEC)

Big 12

Big 10

Atlantic Coast

Pac 12

Of these five listed super conferences, over the past 20 years, these conferences and one of their representatives have had a lock on the national championship of college football, unless you call a perfect record of national champions not dominating.

 

There is almost no way that a lesser conference, called mid-conferences can compete at the level of the top conferences in the country. Some really good mid-conference football teams compete during their portion of non-conference with the big boys from bigger conferences, and rule their conference games, but down at the end of the line, when it comes to picking the elite teams for bowl games, all of these mid-conference football squads wait and wait and finally get picked for some of the lesser bowls.

 

In bowl games, major bowls with big paydays, these smaller schools, in conferences that lack the lime light of the SEC, or the Big 12 are relegated to MAACO Las Vegas Bowl, or the Motor Head Bowl in Detroit, Michigan.

 

After the dust clears, the cleats are washed and put away, and the last suture is tied off on some poor offensive linemen’s knees, after all the money is counted, and the final top 25 ratings have been established by the Football Writers Association of America, there aren’t any Cinderella’s in college football, things are way slanted towards the elites.

 

INFRANCTIONS GALORE

Everybody has heard about rules infractions in college sports, even grandma Jane who only watches soap dramas all day long on television, there’s so many every year, you’d have to live on the far side of the moon to escape notice.

 

These bright, articulate athletic directors, school presidents, and the not so bright and articulate football coaches have hit on an idea to relieve the N.C.A.A. of much of its football programming, these people insist that they can do a better job of organizing an elite number of football conferences to compete on a higher level then now is being played.

 

These bright men, these guardians of higher education, these sheriffs of inter-collegian football activity know that they have the good of the game and the student athletes uppermost in their collective minds. Are you serious, exactly what tidbit of history is going to make the average football fan trusting of these leaders of higher learning and athletic competition?

 

 

I’ve watched football for a long time, I remember a football coach tackling a player that was running down the sidelines for a game winning touchdown. I’ve read about all sorts of medical infractions, judgment infractions, and most importantly, an infraction in character. There is no excuse for any of these acts, whether a weak moment, a case of judgment, or a mistake.

 

No matter the reason, or because of the reason, these jokers either leave their institution or get fired, not to worry for these people…..they get rehired in much less time than it takes the N.C.A.A. to launch an investigation. So even though they have broken N.C.A.A. rules and regulations, they stand to be rehired, usually with a boost in pay…..now, how sweet is that?

 

What do Southern Methodist University, Arizona State, Auburn, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and Texas A&M have in common…..if you guessed that they were all colleges it doesn’t count, although you’d be right. What they all have in common is that they all share in scandalous activity wrought by their athletic departments.

 

These schools athletic departments and coaching staffs have all acted in a detrimental and embarrassing manner while leading their schools athletic departments. Although it’s never admitted, in each case of a sports coaching staff pulling shenanigans, and playing fast and loose with the rules…..the athletic department, and the AD should be pointed out and fired along with the entire coaching staff.

 

In 2010 the Big 12 committed 39 football infractions, the SEC, 32, the Pac 10, 26, Big 10, 19, the ACC 17, the Big East, 9. It seems obvious to me that there has been a dearth of policing from anybody, let alone an athletic director, or his coaches.

 

Between 1987 and 2010 there have been 72 major infractions by 56 of the current FBS, (Football Bowl Subdivision), programs that number 120 schools. Included in this number is a staggering 44 of the current 67 automatic-qualifying BCS, (Bowl Championship Series), a staggering 65.7% from six of the power conferences.

 

I used to play sports to win, I don’t recall a time, or a game that I wanted so bad that I considered cheating, or playing outside the rules of the game. A favorable outcome simply wouldn’t have meant the same as even a hard fought loss…..and I had many. But at the end of the day, I walked off the field knowing that I had given the best accounting of myself that was possible.

 

THE PRESSURE TO WIN IS GREAT, AND GETTING GREATER

I’m not sure that an honest coach can make it today in college football at almost any level without some sort of an edge that was gained through a dishonest act. Now hold on right there, I am not setting myself up as an (honest as the day is long) kind of guy. I have done my share of dirty deeds, trying to create an edge, my lack of talent dictated this, but that was as a player.

 

With regards to coaching or managing sports teams, I never tried to have the score altered through infringement of the rules, or by using illegal players, or tactics to eek out a win! Wins were important, I have over 450 of those babies, but I’m proud of each and every one, and I feel sure that my former players feel the same way. We played, when winning was absolutely the only gratification that we got, well, maybe the occasional roadie.

 

 

 

Now the pressure to win, to fill the bleachers, to be rated in the top 10, and to pave the way for more recruits through appearances on national T.V. has tremendous pressure laid at the head coaches feel, and of course the pressure trickles down the line to the coaching staff, the physical trainer, the team trainer as well as the doctors that administer medical attention to the squad.

 

Used to be, if you cheated, the N.C.A.A. would throw down the gauntlet, and rip your butt off the air, that’s right, denying schools the ability to play games on television, before 1987 was like the death knell. Of course now, with the enormous money that A.B.C., N.B.C. E.S.P.N. and Fox is willing to lie on the table, keeping teams off the television airways is not even considered.

 

So the hammer of authority seems destined to be held by some mythical, ordained position that, as yet hasn’t even been discussed. I’ve even read where some college people have talked about the NFL supplementing college budgets, kind of like a feeder program, or a minor league for the National Football League. Intriguing but not very realistic, it’s the way the NFL stocks their teams with new players already…..and it doesn’t cost them any money.

 

What’s going to happen with the gang of the 150 and the collection of the super duper conferences where these teams will be toiling…..I have no idea…..and worst, I could care less. These fools that play out their life’s dreams by cajoling either athletes, coaches, or an athletic department to cheat…..mores’ the pity, by the time these bozos get done restructuring the game…..maybe the game will have lost some of its quaintness. Hut, Hut, Hut!

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!