Too much time on their hands

Nebraska’s Attorney General has issued a letter to Big Ten Commissioner Kevin Warren warning that the conference appears to be non-compliant with the Nebraska Nonprofit Corporation Act.

The letter sets a 9/21 deadline for the conference to prove cancellation followed B1G bylaws. pic.twitter.com/ppBvIgsOOW

— Sports Law Lust🎙 (@SportsLawLust) September 11, 2020

Apparently after all these years, it’s just now come to the attention of the Attorney General of the State of Nebraska that the Big Ten “is operating and conducting business within the State of Nebraska without being registered and/or failing to maintain registration to conduct business within the State of Nebraska.”  Obviously, the man has had a lot on his plate.

What follows in the letter is a long list of requested documents to be furnished by the 21st and a threat of civil penalties for failure to comply. Shit, it’s none of my business, but if I were Kevin Warren, I would be awfully tempted to channel my inner Delany and threaten to terminate Nebraska’s Big Ten membership by the same date. That would sure solve the problem.

It’s amazing they think this is going to work.  What a clusterfuck.

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Your Daily Gator is confident.

You will be shocked, shocked to learn that all three of the analysts at Swamp247 are predicting Florida wins the East, although one of them does pick Georgia to prevail at the Cocktail Party.

Run the damned ball, Monken.

Monken full house power run -⁦@ProfessorSEC⁩ breaking some plays from Coach Monken’s OC dayshttps://t.co/RU8heE8KTq

— DawgStats (@Dawg_Stats) September 11, 2020

Funny, but that doesn’t look very Air Raid-ish to me.

“We’re always going to be an RBU team.”

James Cook is rarin’ to go.

For the first time in his three years at Georgia, Cook is expected to play a more integral role than he has so far.

Although Cook comes in with 72 carries for 472 yards and 24 career catches for 221 yards, he has never really had the chance to show what he could do as a featured tailback.

Under new offensive coordinator Todd Monken, who has stressed the need to get the ball to best his playmakers in space, that’s expected to change.

“It’s easy to be excited, just getting out there,” Cook said. “We’re learning different things, and out there doing the best we can.”

When he spoke to the media two weeks ago, Monken said he’s been impressed.

“Zamir has had a tremendous off-season,” Monken said. “But so, has James Cook.”

I hope that’s right, but I worry that Cook will turn out to be this year’s version of “we’re gonna involve the tight ends in the offense more”.  Prove me wrong, Monken.

We’re all sensitive people.

Jimmy Hyams clues us in on what has Master Mays’ lawyer’s panties in a wad.

But I also know some of the circumstances surrounding Mays’ decision to leave.

For one, Georgia coaches told Cade Mays if he signed with the Bulldogs, Georgia would recruit his younger brother, Cooper, so they could play together in college.

But a source said Georgia quit recruiting Cooper. who eventually signed with Tennessee.

Secondly, Georgia bounced Mays around from one spot to the other on the offensive line, which was apparently unsettling to Mays.

A Georgia assistant later apologized to Mays for the way he was treated, a source said.

Assuming for the sake of argument this is all true (yeah, I know), if all it takes for a transfer waiver to be granted is for a coach to change his mind about routine stuff like that, every player in the country would be free to transfer every year.

That’s some toxic environment ‘ya got there, Jimmy.

Cheap politics and the Big Ten

Ryan Day wants to play.

Ohio St. HC Ryan Day: pic.twitter.com/8tfDwM9XpM

— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) September 10, 2020

Meanwhile, President Trump’s Big Ten outreach program seems to have run into resistance in the wrong places.

Holloway, who took over as Rutgers’ president in July after serving as provost at Northwestern, said he isn’t enamored with Trump’s involvement.

“I mean, it’s just cheap politics,” he told NJ Advance Media. “I want that person to be paying attention to matters of national security and national importance. This does not rise to that level — not for a half-second. And even if it was a president that I was completely in love with that was doing this, I’d still think it would be cheap politics.”

The problem is that neither of the two is wrong.  Classic impasse.

In for a penny…

I don’t know how they’re gonna do it, but they’re gonna do it, evidently.

It looks as if Georgia fans are going to get to tailgate before home football games after all. But there will be a catch.

Pending final approval, the plan is that tailgating on the UGA campus will be limited to those people holding tickets for the games, people familiar with planning discussions told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the capacity of Sanford Stadium is being reduced for social-distancing purposes to 20 to 25% – or no more than about 23,000 spectators. Reserved campus parking will be available to all ticket-holders. Fans will have to present their bar-coded tickets for digital scan to be admitted to designated parking areas.

Once parked, spectators will be free to tailgate in those designated areas. However, there will be limitations beyond that:

• Non-ticketed guests will not be permitted.
• Social-distancing guidelines regarding crowd sizes must be observed
• There will be time limits. UGA’s parking lots, open at 7 a.m. on normal gameday Saturdays, won’t be opened until a few hours before kickoff.

As always, the devil’s in the details, but “non-ticketed guests will not be permitted” is gonna be a complete bitch to enforce.  I also can’t wait to see how hapless staff attempting to enforce social distancing guidelines are treated by fans who, for whatever reason, don’t care about them.  At least it’s outdoors.

Towers goes on to note that if this policy is formalized, Georgia will definitely be an outlier in the conference.  Sure hope Butts-Mehre knows what it’s doing here.

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UPDATE:

“If you have an outdoor stadium and fans wear face coverings and are six feet apart and are careful about common areas and restrooms, the risk could be mitigated significantly,” says Sankar Swaminathan, chief of the infectious diseases department at the Utah School of Medicine and a member of the Pac-12’s COVID-19 advisory panel. “I think given the right circumstances, that would be managed, but it would require a great deal of discipline and enforcement.”

Yeah, good luck with that, y’all.

Gus bust?

You know, I’ve long subscribed to a contrarian view of how Auburn’s season will go:  the Tigers are almost always better when they’re not taken seriously in the preseason and vice versa.

Pat Forde’s got a different working theory.

Here’s a weird trend: The season after Auburn beats Alabama, there is a notable regression. In 2011, after winning the national title the previous season, the Tigers went 8–5. In 2014, after playing for the national title the previous season, the Tigers went 8–5. In 2018, after winning the 10 games and the SEC West the previous season, the Tigers went—you guessed it—8–5. While quarterback Bo Nix is back this season and should take a step forward in his play, there are major personnel losses to deal with in addition to the usual brutal schedule.

I’ll see where that goes this season.  I’d like to think he’s right, though, because it’s a great two-fer — ‘Bama loses in one season and Auburn’s meh in the next.

Fore!

Shot.

Jeremy Pruitt: "Every time I've played golf with Kirby Smart, he's the only guy who always finds his ball in the woods. Always."

— David Ubben (@davidubben) September 10, 2020

Chaser.

For the record – I don’t play golf with 25+ handicap golfers

— Coach Kirby Smart (@KirbySmartUGA) September 11, 2020

Sounds like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.