“The implications are huge economically.”

Small college towns:  Shutting down college football is going to kill our businesses, financially speaking.

ESPN/FOX:  Hold our beers.

The postponement of much of the college football season could disrupt the flow of more than $1 billion from advertisers to the television networks that count on a slate of game broadcasts every fall.

The return of the college game — a reliable ratings draw — might have helped the TV industry salvage a year of declining revenues resulting from pandemic-related cancellations and production delays. Now that the Big Ten and the Pacific-12 conferences, two of college football’s five powerhouse leagues, have pushed back their seasons amid concerns about the coronavirus, media companies are preparing for more pain…

Last season, college football brought in nearly $1.7 billion in spending on television advertising, according to the research firm Kantar…

For Fox last year, college football was responsible for nearly 6 percent of ad spending and nearly 10 percent of all TV ad impressions, or viewer exposure to ads, according to the ad measurement company iSpot.TV. ESPN drew 9.5 percent of its impressions from the sport. ABC, also owned by Disney, racked up 7.5 percent of its impressions thanks to college football.

Yeah, that’s gonna leave a mark.

Mickey makes bank.

You should read this article in its entirety, but, the tl;dr version is expressed in these two graphs:

Two things:  It may be an understatement to call Disney the 800-pound gorilla in the room and it’s not so hard to understand ESPN’s relentlessness in converting college football into a game where national focus replaces regional appeal.  It’s where the money is.

I’ll take “Whatever Mickey Says It Is” for $200, Alex.

Legitimacy questions?  What legitimacy questions?

When asked what constituted a legitimate playoff, CFP executive director Bill Hancock said, “Nobody has asked me that yet.”

But he didn’t say whether he’d asked that.  Or the people who pay him.  I’d be shocked if they haven’t already broached the subject with ESPN, though.  Not in the Casablanca sense, either.

If Disney strokes the check, there will be a college football playoff.  The money would sure be legitimate.

BREAKING: Water is still wet.

You will be shocked, shocked to learn that Mickey has conducted a fan survey that shows fans want Mickey to sell them product.

Georgia lost control of Jake Fromm.

Herbie susses where it all went wrong last year.

Herbstreit called Georgia’s offensive struggles in 2019 a “collective effort,” pointing out that Fromm didn’t have the same level supporting cast around him.

“They didn’t necessarily have the receiver play they had the past two years when he was a freshman and sophomore, they weren’t able to get the ball downfield in this offense, and I think eventually it caught up with them,” Herbstreit said.

“I think they also re-evaluated their offensive coordinator,” he said, referring to James Coley being replaced by Todd Monken as the Bulldogs’ offensive coordinator.

“They’re going in a different direction, which I think maybe will help them moving forward.”

Amazing what this guy gets paid to provide the same kind of analysis you can find in the comments section of this blog on a weekly basis.  Give yourselves a raise, peeps!

Kirk Herbstreit has lost control of Kirk Herbstreit.

This is what backtracking sounds like.

ESPN college football commentator Kirk Herbstreit caught a lot of heavy criticism in March when he made a comment about the future of the 2020 college football season. Herbstreit said on ESPN radio that he would be “shocked” to see a college football and NFL season happen because of the coronavirus pandemic.

And then, the backlash came. Whether it was fans, coaches, athletic directors or more, everyone had their own opinions on Herbstreit’s take. But on a conference call on Monday morning, Herbstreit said his comments weren’t painted entirely accurate.

“It was kind of misconstrued, misrepresented based on what I said in a radio interview and how it was taken by a lot of people,” Herbstreit said. “…I was almost just thinking out loud. It was the day baseball was supposed to start, Opening Day, and we were reminiscing about how sad it is that we weren’t having any baseball. I was like, ‘Hey, man, this thing’s scary. We may not even have football.’ I was kind of thinking out loud at that point.

“…I’m not making any predications. I really wasn’t that night. I was trying to explain how real this pandemic is.”

Just like now he’s trying to explain how real ESPN’s pressure to deliver product is.

“I’ve talked to a ton of people who are actual decisionmakers in the college game — can’t speak about the NFL — but in the college game. I think what they’ve done is they built 3-4 contingency plans,” Herbstreit said. “Based on what happens with this virus and what Dr. (Anthony) Facui and others recommend, the President, these governors. I think, ‘Okay, everything’s okay, status quo, show up on campus in July, two-a-days, regular season, here we go.’ That’s the first contingency. And then they built it all the way back — the second, the third, the fourth — all the way back to a willingness to start in late February or March, turning it into a spring sport and playing in March, April, May, and playing postseason in June, which I think (would be) a last-ditch effort.

“Which proves how willing the administrators are with the NCAA, the conference commissioners, ADs and presidents, to have a college football season. They’re going to do everything they can, if it comes to that extreme, to be able to potentially have a 2020 season.”

And broadcasts, Herbie.  Don’t forget the broadcasts.

Unique, alright

Six months ago, who could have seen this coming?  (Hell, six weeks ago, for that matter.)

On Monday came the announcement from the PGA Tour that its major championships would be rescheduled to this fall due to the ongoing COVID-19 (novel coronavirus) pandemic. That included The Masters, now set to be played November 9-15. That change brought an interesting proposal from ESPN commentator and former basketball coach Dan Dakich.

Dakich floated the idea of ESPN’s College Gameday coming to Augusta to College GameDay host Kirk Herbstreit and he appears to be all in.

“Love this!!” Herbstreit responded, tagging College GameDay producer Lee Fitting as a potential programming nudge.

That could make for an interesting atmosphere, as Georgia is scheduled to host SEC rival Tennessee that weekend if the 2020 college football season goes unaltered. With CBS having television rights to both the Masters and the SEC on CBS game of the week, that could result in the Dawgs and Volunteers playing in Athens at night as the CBS broadcast. It is a truly unique scenario that might never happen again…

“Might”?  Gawd, let’s hope not.  I don’t think I could take another pandemic meltdown like the one we’re going through, interesting atmosphere or otherwise.

Although it does make you wonder who Mickey would get as the GameDay guest picker…

The price you pay your broadcast partner

This is not a pretty picture.

As you can imagine, there is a lot of flopping around concerning solutions to stem the decline, most of them tired, like better wi-fi.  There are also duh suggestions, like winning and beefing up home schedules (great, if you’re a P5 athletic director who can cut deals with your peers; not so great if you’re working at, say, a MAC school).

One big problem is structural.

TV ratings continue to soar because it is increasingly easier to stay home. College football is the nation’s second-most popular sport. But its attractiveness as a live event is slipping.

Mickey’s money is so good, it reduces the pressure on schools to find a long term attendance fix.

Speaking of ESPN, here’s the other problem:

We already know the attendance drop has reached the highest level. The seven games run by the College Football Playoff posted a record low in cumulative attendance following the 2019 season. That marked the halfway point of the 12-year CFP contract with ESPN.

Not to mention, the CFP has contributed to making it a playoff-or-bust discussion in the country. Check those Tuesday nights in November when ESPN has made appointment viewing out of the weekly CFP Rankings.

“If you watch college football in this day and age, the only teams people are talking about is the six teams that can make the College Football Playoff,” Dykes said. “If you’re not one of those six teams, you lose interest in your team a little bit.”

That’s the price you pay for letting a network nationalize the appeal of your product.  Wi-fi won’t do a damned thing about that.

Change of plans

Not the G-Day we were expecting…

Georgia's G-Day spring game at 2 p.m. on April 18 will be available on SEC Network+ digitally. The SEC Network will show G-Day as part of "whip-around" coverage with Florida (1 p.m.) and Alabama (2 p.m.) on that day.

— Marc Weiszer (@marcweiszer) March 2, 2020

Sounds like it doesn’t mean more to Mickey.  Not my problem, though, as I plan on doing my part to help recruiting attending.

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UPDATE:  Apparently, every SEC spring game, with the exceptions of Auburn and LSU (both on ESPN2), will only be available in their entirety on SEC Network+ digitally.  Helluva broadcast partner you got there, Mr. Sankey.

ESPN, all things to all men

If you didn’t like the FPI number Mickey’s stat department tagged Georgia with, stick around for Mark Schlabach’s Way-Too-Early rankings, where he places the Dawgs fourth.