re: Is College Football In A Death Spiral?

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I think it is declining. Seems like so many teams are getting worse and not better . This kills fan support

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This is an excellent point. It feels like many of the traditionally good programs aren't that good anymore for some reason.

Like way more at once than usual.

Western civilization as a whole is in a death spiral. The impending decline and collapse of sports fandom is simply a symptom of a greater problem.

College football has a good maybe 10 or 15 years left with the concussion issue and the corporate takeover of the sport. It reached it’s zenith 10 or 15 years ago

Saban has an answer for this . . .

Simply stop playing those schools. Let the big boys go at it and shorten the season a bit.

I’d expand it more . . .

You can lose a game or two and still make the playoffs. You can still have a conference championship (drop the game) and have an extended playoff.

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Is College Football In A Death Spiral?

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I can’t connect the dots yet, but I’m 99% sure it has to do with Marty Smith and his ever tightening skinny pants.

Could be the more souls he collects, the tighter his pant legs, and the squeakier his voice?

I think it’s less of a downward spiral as a whole, and more of the fact that the top 5 or so have REALLY separated themselves from the rest.

What also might help is if power 5 teams stop scheduling FCS schools. You don’t have to schedule a top 5 school for every OOC game, but there are a lot of of power 5 schools that could you could play and do a home and home. For example, instead of LSU blowing Northwestern State out of existence yesterday, why not schedule someone like Purdue. Or maybe Indiana. Or maybe Boston College.

There are a lot of games you can schedule. It gives you more interesting matchups, creates new road trips for fans and it gives these lesser teams exposure they may not have otherwise had. If let’s say Purdue had come down to Baton Rouge. Would they have won? Hell no. But their fans would have had a great time. Then the next year, LSU travels there, their fans have a great time and Purdue gets all the exposure for hosting a good team. Maybe they pick up a recruit here or there.

What made college football great to begin with? The pageantry. Now, because every game is on TV and there has been a push to make money on every facet of the game day experience, it has gotten stale.

Also, the offenses. We have determined that if a team gets pushed or gets beat by a non-P5 opponent that they must suck and aren’t worth watching. That in turn leaves what we perceive as very few teams worth watching. It may be that teams are more prone to upsets and we need to change our perception of “everybody sucks.” The game is just different than it was 15 years ago, almost a different sport. I watched Northwestern State slice and dice LSU’s defense down the field for 2 drives last night which would have never happened 10 years ago, no matter how many flaws we had in our scheme or whatever. Quarterbacks are better out of high school and all it takes is one getting hot (no matter their race).

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Last two Clemson Alabama meetings: 1 Alabama arse kicking at the hands of Dabo, and 1 Clemson asskicking at the hands of Saban. You can at least try a little bit harder.

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Oh, this is adorable.

We all know Saban is Dabo’s little bitch.

My thoughts, many unoriginal:

Larger gap between haves and have nots at all levels of play. A FCS team used to be able to hire a decent “P5” coordinator; out of the question now. A USM team used to beat SEC on the regular. Stadium sizes and revenue were much more similar.

On a related note, there is dominance by a handful of teams; most P5, let alone G5, teams have no hope of ever winning a title, especially in the playoff era, which, IMO, made it more difficult.

The sport is no longer appreciated in many parts of the country; it is dead in New England, dying in the northeast, even Penn State is a shell of its former self, and dying rapidly on the west coast, especially in California.

Concussion issue cuts into a loyal portion of the fan base, those that played the game in high school.

Games are often unwatchable and never in doubt. I can count just a handful a games this year that were close and decently played. Others were close but plain ugly.

The games are catered to television, which responds with dreadfully long interruptions.

Attending a football game becomes a weekend affair, expensive, often with many headaches.