What if Bud Selig ran college football?
Posted: Sun Jul 14, 2002 5:49 pmWhatasteve went off on a nice rant on the Burger Wars list about how unappealing Bud Selig has made baseball for the average fan. That got me thinking: what would college football be like if Big Bad Bud ran our game?
° The rich would get richer. Just as the New York Yankees (a.k.a. "The Evil Empire") are allowed to shamelessly buy whatever players they want, Notre Dame would be allowed to ignore all rules pertaining to roster size, recruiting violations (it could be argued they ignore those anyway) or department financial expenses. When they do their annual nosedive against Michigan or USC or someone, the Irish -- already the only team with a weekly national TV contract -- would be allowed to scan the nation for the finest high school seniors, sign them immediately and install them in that week's lineup. Selig would offer up some sort of babble at a hastily called press conference calling it "prudent player development" and advise other schools to do the same, as long as the other schools all operate within the rules that Notre Dame is allowed to bypass.
Keep in mind that the NCAA closely monitors the smallest details to allow smaller-budget programs to compete with the big boys. (For instance, pick up a football media guide from any school in the country: the front and back covers can be in color, but the rest of the book has to be printed in black and white. There are still schools like Tennessee, Florida State, Texas and of course Notre Dame that print media guides big enough to weigh down a hot air balloon, but if Notre Dame decided to print the entire thing in color, the cost would be astronomical, and would result in a product with which smaller schools simply could not compete. And like it or not, those little things do make an impression on recruits -- the lifeblood of any program.) The same goes for all information mailed out to recruits. There are very specific restrictions. If Selig was running our game, big-money schools would be able to win recruiting battles with a lot of these "extras" that often go unnoticed.
° Conferences would be stacked so that the top 10 so-called "marquee" teams (Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Oklahoma, Ohio State, Nebraska, Tennessee, Texas, UCLA and USC) would all be in separate conferences. To hell with storied rivalries - Big Bud would align things so that each of those teams would have clear sailing to a conference championship each and every year. Sure, there would be the occasional year that a team like LSU would string together a few upsets and challenge for a conference title. But the conference title games would be set up to best accomodate the conference big boys (Selig would site the need for east coast viewers, or some such insanity) and the games would be sponsored by corporations heavily linked to the favored schools. (Nebraska's conference title game would be played, coincidentally, in Lincoln every year, and would be called the Cornhusker Tires (or something) Conference Championship game. Everything in the place would be red and white, and the Husker band would be allowed to play at any time during the game; the opposing band would be allowed to play only after everyone had left the stadium, so they'd basically be seranading the guys sweeping up the hot dog wrappers.
And again, Notre Dame would be exempt from conference play, as it is now, because that might upset the school's "We're Above Everyone" mystique.
° After watching Selig's middle-finger salute to the baseball fans last week when he allowed an exhibition game to end in a tie, there's no telling what other epic rulings he might come up with if he governed college football. Pre-game studio shows like ESPN's College Football GameDay would be shot the night before games to allow the Corsos, Herbstreits and Fowlers of the world to get their tee times when they want them. To hell with the fans who gladly would camp out all night on campus just for the right to jump up and down with a painted face and a hand-held sign -- on the off-chance they might get on TV, bleeding their passion for their team -- Selig knows all sports are about is the the money generated from television dollars, so as long as the folks at ESPN, FOX, etc. are happy, who cares what the actual fans want?
° Dud Selig deftly mixes his "baseball is going broke" sob story with self-congratulatory press conferences at which he touts the global reach of baseball, and he demonstrates that by announcing another corporate sell-out, like re-naming an event (the "Century 21 Home Run Derby?" Corporate sponsorship for an exhibition event? Classy!) Selig would even stoop to selling corporate naming rights for the bowl games and the Heisman Trophy.
Wait a minute -- maybe he already has his hands in college football, since they've already done that.
° Just as there's no such thing as an important afternoon baseball game (sorry, Cubs fans), all college football games with at least one participating team in the top 100 automatically would be played at night -- in pursuit of better TV dollars, of course.
° And of course, any effort to curb use of steroids or any other performance-enhancing drugs that might have serious ramifications on a player's health would be shoved aside so Selig could offer some mopey-faced reassurance that an exhibition game wouldn't end in a tie again.
Selig, you're right: you screwed up the All-Star game in Milwaukee. Get over it. Admit that you're an idiot who made a stupid decision, and move on to the important issues facing your game. Just stay a long way away from college football.
° The rich would get richer. Just as the New York Yankees (a.k.a. "The Evil Empire") are allowed to shamelessly buy whatever players they want, Notre Dame would be allowed to ignore all rules pertaining to roster size, recruiting violations (it could be argued they ignore those anyway) or department financial expenses. When they do their annual nosedive against Michigan or USC or someone, the Irish -- already the only team with a weekly national TV contract -- would be allowed to scan the nation for the finest high school seniors, sign them immediately and install them in that week's lineup. Selig would offer up some sort of babble at a hastily called press conference calling it "prudent player development" and advise other schools to do the same, as long as the other schools all operate within the rules that Notre Dame is allowed to bypass.
Keep in mind that the NCAA closely monitors the smallest details to allow smaller-budget programs to compete with the big boys. (For instance, pick up a football media guide from any school in the country: the front and back covers can be in color, but the rest of the book has to be printed in black and white. There are still schools like Tennessee, Florida State, Texas and of course Notre Dame that print media guides big enough to weigh down a hot air balloon, but if Notre Dame decided to print the entire thing in color, the cost would be astronomical, and would result in a product with which smaller schools simply could not compete. And like it or not, those little things do make an impression on recruits -- the lifeblood of any program.) The same goes for all information mailed out to recruits. There are very specific restrictions. If Selig was running our game, big-money schools would be able to win recruiting battles with a lot of these "extras" that often go unnoticed.
° Conferences would be stacked so that the top 10 so-called "marquee" teams (Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Oklahoma, Ohio State, Nebraska, Tennessee, Texas, UCLA and USC) would all be in separate conferences. To hell with storied rivalries - Big Bud would align things so that each of those teams would have clear sailing to a conference championship each and every year. Sure, there would be the occasional year that a team like LSU would string together a few upsets and challenge for a conference title. But the conference title games would be set up to best accomodate the conference big boys (Selig would site the need for east coast viewers, or some such insanity) and the games would be sponsored by corporations heavily linked to the favored schools. (Nebraska's conference title game would be played, coincidentally, in Lincoln every year, and would be called the Cornhusker Tires (or something) Conference Championship game. Everything in the place would be red and white, and the Husker band would be allowed to play at any time during the game; the opposing band would be allowed to play only after everyone had left the stadium, so they'd basically be seranading the guys sweeping up the hot dog wrappers.
And again, Notre Dame would be exempt from conference play, as it is now, because that might upset the school's "We're Above Everyone" mystique.
° After watching Selig's middle-finger salute to the baseball fans last week when he allowed an exhibition game to end in a tie, there's no telling what other epic rulings he might come up with if he governed college football. Pre-game studio shows like ESPN's College Football GameDay would be shot the night before games to allow the Corsos, Herbstreits and Fowlers of the world to get their tee times when they want them. To hell with the fans who gladly would camp out all night on campus just for the right to jump up and down with a painted face and a hand-held sign -- on the off-chance they might get on TV, bleeding their passion for their team -- Selig knows all sports are about is the the money generated from television dollars, so as long as the folks at ESPN, FOX, etc. are happy, who cares what the actual fans want?
° Dud Selig deftly mixes his "baseball is going broke" sob story with self-congratulatory press conferences at which he touts the global reach of baseball, and he demonstrates that by announcing another corporate sell-out, like re-naming an event (the "Century 21 Home Run Derby?" Corporate sponsorship for an exhibition event? Classy!) Selig would even stoop to selling corporate naming rights for the bowl games and the Heisman Trophy.
Wait a minute -- maybe he already has his hands in college football, since they've already done that.
° Just as there's no such thing as an important afternoon baseball game (sorry, Cubs fans), all college football games with at least one participating team in the top 100 automatically would be played at night -- in pursuit of better TV dollars, of course.
° And of course, any effort to curb use of steroids or any other performance-enhancing drugs that might have serious ramifications on a player's health would be shoved aside so Selig could offer some mopey-faced reassurance that an exhibition game wouldn't end in a tie again.
Selig, you're right: you screwed up the All-Star game in Milwaukee. Get over it. Admit that you're an idiot who made a stupid decision, and move on to the important issues facing your game. Just stay a long way away from college football.