Season-ticket renewals a positive for Hogs
Hunter Yurachek was brutally honest and correct when he told our man Tom Murphy:
“I think we will get a football season. I think that it will start on time. I think it is something that our community and our country desperately needs, for professional and college athletics to start back up again. I feel comfortable. That is how we’re planning here at the University of Arkansas right now.”
The nation is missing its sports, and one does not need to be an accountant to know the Arkansas Razorbacks program needs money.
More than likely it needs it now.
Some really bad decisions by Jeff Long, who preceded Yurachek, left the Razorbacks with a $59 million shadeless expansion it didn’t need, millions of dollars owed to a coach because of poor negotiations by Long who was fired for refusing to fire the coach.
Razorback football attendance has been in a downward trend for several years as far as season-ticket holders go.
It started when Long began scheduling directional schools for the lone game in Little Rock. Longtime fans from Central and southeastern Arkansas got ticked and quit buying tickets.
Even when a SEC opponent was scheduled every third year there would be at least 10,000 empty seats in War Memorial Stadium.
One last thing about Long. It was his right-hand person, Julie Cromer, who hired Chad Morris, and that resulted in a combined 4-20 record over two seasons and the bottom falling out of the Razorback ticket market.
Yurachek, though, was optimistic when the preseason ticket sales drive ended for the 2020 season, and 91% renewed.
That is the start of a new, positive trend.
The problem will be if the season isn’t played.
No one, absolutely no one, knows how long COVID-19 is going to hold us hostage, and no one in a position of authority is taking any chances, not now, not with more than 100,000 deaths worldwide, including almost 19,000 in this country.
There was some hope at the end of last week when New York City had 70 less deaths on Thursday than on Wednesday, but the total number is still astonishing.
Many medical professionals outside of New York are preparing for the virus to peak at the end of this month.
For one thing, it doesn’t like warmth, and secondly, most people are practicing social distancing and should today by watching Easter services over the internet (PLEASE!!!).
If this disaster peaks at the end of April it will take a couple of months to recover.
Right now, the Razorbacks football team is supposed to report June 29 and be ready to practice July 1. Those seem to be the dates that the NCAA is hoping to approve.
However, Joe Castiglione, the athletic director at Oklahoma, has mentioned football might become a spring sport for one season.
That would be tough. It gets cold in January even in the SEC, so there probably wouldn’t be any night games which ESPN would like to avoid.
Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby is talking about a late start — not winter though — and possibly only conference games would be played.
SEC Commissioner Greg
Sankey is saying let’s see what happens.
Which is what we are all going to do anyway.
Still, it was a positive start for the Razorbacks that 91% re-enlisted to the Razorback Foundation and committed to buying season tickets. That’s a start.
Sam Pittman and his staff will earn the respect of those who are taking a wait-and-see attitude about football.
If this football season is played, and it should be, the leadership in football will be as obvious as it was in basketball.