Penny Thoughts: COVID-19 and Sports in America

One of the things I am most grateful for in my life is that for the last twenty-five years, more than one-third of my life, I have lived in “football heaven”, that is to say, Alabama! It is as if the angels said to God, “Hey, he loves football and he has done a fairly good job of being faithful…can’t we just let him live in Alabama for the remainder of his life?”

This is after I have lived in nine different states and four different countries on three different continents. So, now you know what football season means to me every year when July rolls around.

Nevertheless, among the myriad nuisances and bothersome aggravations COVID-19 has visited upon us is the fact that our lifestyles and practices will inevitably be altered. I addressed some of that detritus in last week’s column.

Now, however COVID-19 has invaded my sacred nirvana. In all the world, of all the activities, of all the events COVID-19 could disrupt it has now assaulted my most sacred Eden – football in Alabama! And, though I am grievously offended, I fully realize that even this hallowed paradise is going to undergo adjustments which will forever change it.

Whether those changes will be good or ill will depend on how we receive and adapt to them.

First, it might be prudent to review the possibilities, as I see them, which may emerge.

1. Football at the high school and middle school levels might be cancelled altogether for the 2020 season. At the very least, they might be abbreviated with the number of games cut back. Perhaps high schools will play only district games, then go to the playoffs. It might even be that away games could have a maximum mileage a team may travel.
2. Ultimately, it would seem that the levels of athletic participation in middle schools and high schools will be dictated by the school district’s or the institution’s commitment to an educational/curricular approach. It might be difficult to justify a football program or any extra-curricular activity if the learning system delivery vehicle is on-line with students not even in traditional classrooms or lecture halls. But please note that this last point is fodder for another column promised for the not-to-distant future.
3. Limiting the football season might concurrently limit band, majorette, and cheerleader activities in both amounts of performances and travel distances with travel being eliminated altogether.
4. College football will walk a delicate balance depending on the level a college plays, NCAA Division I, II, or III, or NAIA. Continuance of college football programs could impact an entire institution’s budget, with some colleges eliminating football, at least for a period of time.
5. The most impactful modifications, in my view, will come in the NCAA Division I level, more vividly in the Power Five Conferences – the SEC, the ACC, the Big 12, the Big 10, and the PAC 12.

Without a doubt, SEC Universities will be closely reviewing their football programs and their revenues. So for the sake of argument, let’s focus on what may happen to college football as we know it, and let’s concentrate on the SEC as the proverbial “canary in the mine”, if you will.

We can look at the financial impact football has on an institution and the cities they occupy and we will use Auburn and Alabama as examples.  Forbes Magazine ranked the “Top 25 Most Valuable Football Programs in America” using the financial data from 2017. Auburn ranked #8 and Alabama ranked #4. Two of the top 10 in America are right here in Alabama!  That tells us something.

Looking at the Forbes data, Auburn posted a football revenue of $112 million with a profit of $61 million. Alabama’s football revenue was $127 million with a profit of $59 million. Obviously those numbers are staggering but think of the revenues of the cities of Auburn or Tuscaloosa on game day. The restaurants, the hotels, motels, gas stations, and the host of other vendors patronized by game day attendees with their revenues being estimated in the millions also.

Now, what happens if there are no football games in Auburn or Tuscaloosa? What else is there to sustain the vendors on game day? This is yet another reverberation of COVID-19. The revenues produced by major college football are significant not only to the institutions but to the communities in which they are located.

While there may continue to be television broadcast revenues, local vendors will undoubtedly suffer. Still, with the total economy taking serious hits, broadcast contracts may be reduced. After all, broadcast revenues depend upon sponsor revenues, which could take some serious hits since everyday patrons of products may not have the finances to purchase products they did before COVID-19.

By extension, then, if there are less revenues for SEC football, budgets will have to be adjusted accordingly.

Taking all of this into consideration, I propose a kind of solution here for SEC university schools. Each school will play a nine game schedule, six from their division and three from the opposite division. The two schools which qualify for the SEC Championship Game would be allowed that tenth game.

This model would be followed by each Power Five Conference – a nine game schedule with an exemption for those teams which qualify for their respective conference championship game.

All of this leads to a new playoff structure with 32 teams being seeded into the bracket. The playoffs would entail a total of 31 games with the two teams advancing to the Championship having played either a 14 or 15 game schedule depending on if their conference held a championship game. The traditional bowls would host the 31 playoff games and the Championship Game would be held on Thanksgiving Weekend.

Details and specifics including selection of which bowls host which games, broadcast rights, travel expenses and other attendant activities still need to be established, but, at the very least, here is a template from which discussions can begin.

Understanding that the permanence of “change” governs all of what we do, this over all plan and its accompanying observations regarding the COVID-19 effect on sport, aggressively faces the inevitability of a new day in sports not only in Alabama, but in America as well. WASH YOUR HANDS and KEEP YOUR DISTANCE!