A fun last few weeks of college football
What a time it is to be a sports fan, but in particular, college football.
Let’s recap the biggest events of the last couple of weeks.
First, the rumor was Lincoln Riley was leaving Oklahoma for the head coaching job at LSU. But after the Sooners were defeated by Oklahoma State in Bedlam, he said he wasn’t going to LSU, only to accept the job at USC the very next day.
Two days later, LSU announced the hiring of Brian Kelly from Notre Dame in a big splash hire, and just here recently, Oklahoma has hired Brent Venables as head coach after a long tenure at the defensive coordinator at Clemson.
Mario Cristobal is leaving Oregon for Miami (really?!?) and there have been several other coaching changes, coaches’ contract extensions, folks getting fired, and so on.
The amount of money flowing in the world of college football is simply staggering — $100 million contracts with real estate involved, unlimited use of a university jet, contract incentives. There’s big money to be made!
I’m afraid this is just a taste of what is to come with all of this, and it’s only going to get worse.
What does that mean for the season ticket holder or average fan of the game? Prices are going to keep going up and before too long the average fan may be out of the running to afford any kind of ticket.
In 2000, my freshman year at LSU, Nick Saban was in the first year of a five-year, $6 million contract, which paid about $1.2 million a year. Back then, there was a large outcry that he was getting paid so much money.
Heck now, you’re lucky if $1.2 million will get you a decent coordinator at a Power 5 school.
The College Football Playoff is set.
Alabama is No. 1 after throttling Georgia in the SEC Championship game, followed by No. 2 Michigan, No. 3 Georgia and No. 4 Cincinnati, which got in as a non Power 5 school (more on that in a minute).
Was anyone surprised that Alabama smoked Georgia like they did? I sure wasn’t.
One, I’m not a big believer that Georgia is all that good, but I do think the Bulldogs will beat Michigan and advance to the college football national championship.
And in the title game, Georgia will play Alabama again, as I don’t expect Cincinnati to give the Crimson Tide much of a battle.
In fact, I’ll say the only reason Cincinnati made the cut is because Oklahoma State fell a few inches short of a game-winning touchdown against Baylor in the Big XII title game. Had the Pokes scored and won, I think Oklahoma State would have been the fourth team in.
The College Football Playoff semifinals are on New Year’s Eve.
More bowls!
Bowl season starts on Friday, Dec. 17, with the Bahamas Bowl and Tailgreeter Cure Bowl, and nearly every day after that there are bowl games for the college football fan.
Arkansas is heading to one of my favorite places for the Outback Bowl — Tampa!
The Razorbacks play Penn State at 11 a.m., Jan. 1, 2022, the first game in what should be a very entertaining day of bowl games. Other highlights on New Year’s Day: Oklahoma State and Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl; a very good Utah team and Ohio State in the Rose Bowl; Iowa and Kentucky in the Citrus Bowl; and Ole Miss and Baylor in the Sugar.
My LSU Tigers take on Kansas State in the Texas Bowl on Jan. 4.