Boy, George Kliavkoff’s presser today was lit. A few tasty morsels:
Man, they don’t make Alliances like they used to.
You… you… you mean, they’re no longer doing it for the kids?
And this shot…
With this chaser…
Between Larry Scott and this guy, the Pac-12 presidents sure can pick ’em, can’t they?
Filed under Pac-12 Football
No worries, Bill. Georgia Tech means never having to say you’re sorry.
Filed under Georgia Tech Football
As far as I can tell, this was offered yesterday by The Athletic’s Iowa beat writer without a trace of snark:
What hellish dystopian nightmare is this? Okay, okay, I exaggerate, but the idea that “SEC fans” (cue the Rob Lowe wearing the NFL cap GIF) are going to be emotionally invested in a Minnesota-Wisconsin match to determine which school gets that coveted 15th spot in the playoffs seems like wishful projection to me. And why should any of us GAS about what Big Ten fans think about the Iron Bowl?
To say that any of that enhances the regular season is like saying publishing the spread enhances the college football experience for gamblers. I mean, in a narrow sense, it does, but none of that is what’s made the sport unique and fueled our passion for it.
I know I continue to scream into the void about this, but it pains me to see the eagerness with which some are ready to dilute the sport’s regular season. Almost as much as it pisses me off to see these lame attempts made to convince us that they’re doing it for our benefit, rather than for the benefit of the bank accounts of our college football overlords.
Filed under BCS/Playoffs
Seth Emerson ($$) is skeptical that Kirby Smart’s public stance on moving the Cocktail Party from its current location is some sort of good cop, bad cop scheme to extort more money out of Jacksonville. Occam’s razor suggests that Smart’s motivation is exactly what he says it is. (“But let’s be clear on why Smart wants the game moved: So he can host recruits at home for his team’s biggest rivalry game.”) That would suggest that Atlanta is as much of a non-starter for Georgia’s coach as leaving the game in Jacksonville is.
But there’s that one pesky thing standing in Kirby Smart’s way.
Whether he will get his way, I remain skeptical. Georgia still makes a lot more money holding the game in Jacksonville because the two schools keep all the ticket revenue, and on an annual basis, that’s fairly similar to what each makes on a home game. If the game were moved to home-and-home, one team each year would be leaving money on the table. (Former athletic director Greg McGarity estimated in 2019 that each school profited by about $3 million during a two-year period for holding it in Jacksonville than if it were on campus sites. So about $15 million per decade is the difference between holding it in Jacksonville versus campus sites.)
So where do things stand? The contract runs through 2023, with the option to extend through 2025, which could happen once the future of SEC scheduling is resolved, probably this fall. In all the debate about that future schedule — nine games versus eight, three permanent opponents versus one — never once did I hear mention that Georgia-Florida could be moving to campus sites, and you’d think that would be something that would come up, given the domino effect it would have on home versus away games every year.
The other thing to watch is whether influential donors in the south Georgia area, particularly the Savannah-Sea Island corridor, have become so happy about winning the ring that they’ve called up Morehead and Brooks and said: “Hey, I know this takes away our most favorite event of the year, the one we build our fall around and an ongoing tradition since 1933, but ah what the hell, give Kirby what he wants. I’ll still write you checks for your $300 million capital campaign.”
Money has been undefeated in Butts-Mehre as long as I can remember. So, yes, I know, Smart is swinging a lot of leverage these days, coming off a national championship, but is that enough to overcome the almighty checkbook? Like Seth, I remain skeptical.
Filed under Georgia Football
You’ll find a pretty good preview of this year’s Florida team here.
Not to mention another review of what a great decade+ of Gator football we’ve been treated to:
Entering 2009, Florida had won two of the last three national championships and ran the table in the regular season with senior Tim Tebow at quarterback. The No. 1 Gators faced No. 2 Alabama in a showdown of undefeated teams at the SEC Championship Game.
That evening in Atlanta saw the birth of one SEC dynasty and the death of another.
Since 2010, Florida is 95-57 (.625) overall with a 58-41 mark in SEC play. The Gators have zero top-five finishes in 13 seasons and haven’t won an SEC title since 2008. The program has reached the conference championship game four more times but has fallen to Nick Saban’s Alabama in each meeting. Meanwhile, Alabama has won six national championships and eight SEC titles as we’ve seen one of the best runs in college football history.
During that run, Florida quickly burned through three head coaches. Will Muschamp, Jim McElwain, and Dan Mullen each had some early success with double-digit win seasons in Gainesville before things began to fall apart after their first two years.
It’s been fun, Florida.
Like I said, the rest is a look at what Napier brings to the table and what he has to work with. My overall impression is that if Napier winds up having to count on team depth to win this season, the Gators are in some trouble.
Filed under Gators, Gators...
It takes some real cojones to predict a team that finished 2021 first in the conference in offensive yards per play, third in the conference in points per game, has its starting quarterback and offensive coordinator returning and possesses the best tight end room in conference history is going to finish this season looking ahead at the dust kicked up by Billy Napier’s offense.
Filed under Georgia Football, Media Punditry/Foibles
If Eli Drinkwitz ever ends his coaching career, he may have a future in standup comedy. His Tennessee schtick is strong.
“I thought you were going to introduce my record,” the Missouri coach told Jim Rome when appeared on the show. “But with the latest allegations against Tennessee, let’s hold up on what my record is because I expect them to vacate some wins and that’s gonna help my record a little bit.”
Drinkwitz, who has a career record of 11-12 in two seasons at Missouri, is 0-2 against the Vols. In fact, he has been outscored 97-36 in those games.
But he certainly gets points for style.
In the 51-page NOA it is alleged, among other things, Pruitt’s wife, Casey, paid $15,000 for rent and car payments for a Tennessee player and his mother. Under NCAA rules, Casey Pruitt is considered a Tennessee booster.
“Me personally,” Drinkwitz quipped, “I got to question my wife’s commitment to winning. I don’t know how much she’s committed if she’s not engaging in some of these things. I didn’t know that was fair play.”
Rim shot! Eli Drinkwitz, ladies and gentlemen! He’ll be here all season! Try the veal, and don’t forget to tip your server.
Filed under Because Nothing Sucks Like A Big Orange
Check out the big brains in Big Ten country ($$):
“The money in television has gotten so big that it definitely plays a factor in who you look at and who you consider,” said Big Ten special football adviser Barry Alvarez, former Hall of Fame coach and longtime athletics director at Wisconsin. “I’d say it’s a considerable factor.”
Thanks for sharing that, Barry. Watching college football for the last twenty years, I’d have never guessed that if you hadn’t admitted it.
“The clear message to me is that geography and tradition don’t mean near as much as some other things, TV probably being at the front of that list,” said Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz, the dean of college football coaches. “That’s just the way college has gone. Penn State joined the Big Ten back in the ’90s, probably because of football, and I’d just speculate Nebraska the same way and then further expansion. So, the game has changed a lot, and the environments have changed a lot, and things that are driving the directions of college football have changed.
“I think it makes a lot of sense, other than geography. It just doesn’t make sense there.”
It’s like these guys have been in a coma for decades and are just now waking up to observe the outside world.
College football doesn’t deserve the people running the business side of it. Not that deserve’s got anything to do with it.
Filed under Big Ten Football, It's Just Bidness
At Georgia Tech, it’s a way of life.
Athletic director Todd Stansbury expected Collins to need time to make the transition from the successful tenure of former coach Paul Johnson and his option offense; that’s why he gave him a seven-year contract, one to two years longer than the typical deal given to a new coach. For better or worse, Collins may well be validating his boss’ perspective.
Stansbury has reiterated his faith in Collins. In November, in the days leading to Tech’s season-ending 45-0 loss to Georgia, he said of Collins that “I have my man.” In an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in May, Stansbury expounded on his endorsement, saying that “he’s my guy because I’m seeing the building blocks of what needs to be done ultimately to get the wins that we need to get.”
On the other hand, it also could be that this is a project not going well – a perspective shared by a growing segment of the fan base – and that this season will provide the final conclusive evidence.
“It’s a tough question to answer,” Jones said of how far along Tech has come going into Collins’ fourth season. “Obviously, the results haven’t been there in the past few years, and I think they’re still a team trying to find their footing.”
I’m hoping the Jackets find their way to winning four games this season — stay with me here for a sec — because it would be hilarious to watch Coach 404 and Stansbury tie themselves in knots explaining to the Tech faithful how that’s enough progress to bring Geoff back for another season. Go get ’em, big guy!
Filed under Georgia Tech Football
… was making the ACC and Pac-12 commissioners believe Kevin Warren shared common cause with them. Suckers.
Filed under ACC Football, BCS/Playoffs, Big Ten Football, Pac-12 Football
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