Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Why Should SEC Fans Want a College Football Playoff?

I keep hearing that we should want it but not many good reason why we should want it. After hearing Tim Brando and various sports radio people talk about how we are cheated for days they still have not answered these questions.

(1) What proof is there that people will be riveted to a playoff. In my State we have schools that come from a great (what was known as Division II) College Football tradition. I have noted that their local media nor it appears local fans of those Colleges are riveted by their College Playoff System

(2)What about the health of the Players. We need another week to get another bye week. Not to add more games!! Did anyone notice that LSU looked like a walking MASH unit going into that Arkansas game? Did anyone notice that the LSU team that played a little bit over a month later looked like a new team? College players in DIV I are getting bigger and hitting harder. We are spending countless dollars to make sure that happens. I keep hearing about the poor College player. Who will stick up for the poor college player when he gets a serious injury because he has gone beyond his breaking point.

(3) If we have a Playoff what happens to our Nationwide contract with CBS? What makes up for all that money that is lost in TV revenues. It seems to me that this situation is leading up to where CBS and other networks might just go Regional and pick up many other games during the regular season. How does this help us? How does this help recruiting? How does this help exposure for our schools? How many millions of Dollars of lost advertising to exposure our school to the average student will be lost? Why is LSU, Auburn, South Carolina, etc just being shown in the South and not to the nation as a whole a good thing? What does this do to our various Licensing revenue. What is the projected bottom line of loss revenue if the above scenario occurs?

(4) I keep hearing the complaint is all about the money. Well yes it sort of is. Who pays for the light bill at Tiger Stadium? Who pays for all that top notch medical care these kids get? WHO pays for the fuel in the Jet airplane so our Coaches can go recruit? WHO pays for the flights of all our Sports teams. The LSU Athletic Department is not supported for the most part by taxpayer dollars. Most SEC schools sports programs are self supporting all by the magic of College football. That is the whole department from Football to Baseball to Women's Softball to a possible new Hockey league. If we lose out on all this TV revenue and BOWL money what programs will be cut when we have a bad year? Shall we go the our state legislatures and ask them to make up the difference? How popular will that be? How popular with it be with other schools in the state that now have to compete for precious dollars? Why do we want to even open up that political can of worms? How is this good for College Sports as a whole?

(5) Many of these Bowls are Southern States. Louisiana has three bowls. In New Orleans the economic impact of their two bowls this year was 550 million Dollars!!!! At some point should this be considered?. Shall we just jeopardise that all for some Playoff game system that will have it's own controversy and almost no one will care about one month later? How many lost jobs and much needed economic input of Dollars into our Southern Cities and States is it ok to write off for a playoff system? Does it matter? I am just speaking as SEC fan. For those in other Bowl area parts of the country this applies to you too.

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