SEC kicks around alcohol sales on campuses

Greg Sankey, commissioner of the SEC, confirmed there were talks at last week’s spring meeting about the sale of alcohol on campuses.

Currently, sales are against SEC rules, but there are exceptions in place and more are coming.

The big question is when will it be allowed at football games? Sankey said conversations will continue, and football games obviously attract the largest crowds.

This is not a matter of will the rule be changed, but when.

All those people in The Grove at Ole Miss are not having iced tea in those Solo cups. Many fans who tailgate at all 14 schools are imbibing. Whether you agree with it or not, it is happening.

It is natural for the athletic directors to look at that and see lost revenue for their programs.

When it happens, there will be rules to discourage people from drinking too much, such as a limit on how many a person can buy at a time and last call probably will be before the fourth quarter begins.

Inside stadium sales are coming. That’s the reality.

For the second year in a row, ESPN has presented its opinion of the top 100 most famous athletes in the world. It is based on a formula that combines endorsements with social media following and Internet search popularity to create the ESPN World Fame 100 rankings.

A few observations: Christiano Ronaldo was No. 1 for the second consecutive year, and three of the top 10 were professional soccer players. That’s more than any other sport, proving once again that it is the world’s favorite pastime.

It doesn’t compare to our definition of football in the good ol’ USA, although the first NFL player to show up on the list was Tom Brady at No. 21.

No. 2 on the list was LeBron James, who has 34.4 million Twitter followers. The reason that is mentioned is about five years ago James started following your trusty scribe on Twitter. Obviously, James has someone handling social media for him, and they were looking for raw numbers, not my opinion on what is going on in the SEC.

No. 8 was Kevin Durant, and Stephen Curry was No. 11.

The first golfer on the list was Phil Mickelson at No. 5, and the second golfer on the list was Tiger Woods at No. 10.

Ronda Rousey came in at No. 16, and Jordan Spieth was No. 17.

It wasn’t surprising Floyd Mayweather didn’t make the list because he’s not very likable, but Manny Pacquiao was No. 59.

Aaron Rodgers came in at No. 56, but he’s one of the most private athletes in the world. Then there’s that much reported feud with his family. No Facebook or Instagram accounts could be found for him, and he makes just $8 million from endorsements.

It is an interesting formula and an equally interesting list, and like most lists in sports it is open for debate.

For months the same question has been coming in about a policy at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. “Why have we started writing the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.”

Adding Fayetteville is not new, just more like the sports department has been told to be uniform with the rest of the newspaper.

Adding one word — Fayetteville — to stories and columns was made a policy shortly after the newspaper war ended and this newspaper became the only statewide newspaper of record.

Another reason has been developed for adding Fayetteville for clarification. This newspaper is now read around the world on the Internet.

That’s pretty much the sum total of why the sports section now reads like the rest of the newspaper.