Tuesday, November 12, 2019
It's Time for Football!!
Carson Wentz-Eagles
In virtually
every nook and cranny in North America, it is time for football. The
Canadian Football League is in playoff mode, American colleges are
nearing the end of their seasons, and the National Football League is
at the halfway point in its season.
This coming
weekend, the Edmonton Eskimos travel to Montreal to play the
Alouettes in the semi-final game in the East. The winner will play
the Tiger Cats in Hamilton to determine the challenger for the Grey
Cup. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers will travel west to Calgary to play
the Stampeders to play in the other semi-final. The winner of that
game will take on the Saskatchewan Roughriders in Regina. The Grey
Cup is in Calgary this year, at McMahon Stadium on November 24th.
Wear your best woolies for that one!
In somewhat
shocking fashion, the Baltimore Ravens stunned the New England
Patriots last Sunday night. It was the first loss of the season for
the Pats, and Tom Brady. It will be interesting to see how New
England will respond to the loss. Brady is now 42 years old, quite
remarkable for a pivot in the NFL. He has proven himself to be the
greatest QB in the history of the game, surpassing Joe Montana in
that regard.
But the most
popular games of football are taking place in the stadia of the
colleges and universities of the NCAA. There are more than 250
institutions that take part in football at the Division One level in
the United States. It is certainly big business. Alumni come out to
the games in droves to support their schools. Typical venues will
seat between 50 and a 100 thousand fans to cheer for their beloved
institutions.
Millions of
other fans watch their favourite teams on television. The schools
benefit from this with the revenue from the television networks. I
have discovered that most of the fans for certain schools did not
even attend the school. For example, many of the Ohio State Buckeye
fans in this area live in Ohio, so they consequently cheer for the
team. There are Notre Dame fans scattered throughout the nation who
have never laid eyes on the school.
The object
of the exercise for American College football is to emerge, at the
end of the season, as one of the four top teams in the nation. Those
teams play off to determine the finalists for the NCAA. There are big
bags of money that go to the teams at that level. That money goes to
the schools, and their sports programs. None of it, I write with a
slightly jaundiced eye, goes to the players. Currently, the top teams
are: Alabama, Louisiana, (LSU), Ohio State, Clemson, Penn State,
Florida, Georgia, and Oregon.
That has
been a bone of contention for many years. It has been studied by the
NCAA, and they have decided that some of the funding received by the
schools will go to the individual players. This would include some of
the revenue from contracts with shoe manufacturers, and other
organizations that use the players to drive their sales. Players are
supposed to see some of the benefits in 2021. It will be interesting
to see how carefully they open this Pandora's Box.
Schools are
really careful about how players currently stay within the guidelines
of being on athletic scholarships. Several years ago, I asked the
coach of the local university baseball team if I might have one of
their Canadian players to dinner. He was from Peterborough, and I
thought he might like a home-cooked meal. Absolutely not, the coach
indicated. Against the NCAA rules to offer such a thing to a player.
I was a bit surprised, but understood the situation.
Get out your
old school scarves, and cheer loudly for your team!!!
James Hurst
November 4,
2019
# posted by James Hurst @ 11:16 AM 
