Are you ready for some Saturday NFL Football? Ready to see the big boys to lace it up and step on the field on four days each week? Thursday Night Football, Sunday NFL games and Monday Night Football might soon be joined by Saturdays filled with Packers, 49ers and Buccaneers instead of Gators, Buckeyes and Tigers.
“It Doesn’t Look Good.”
The Power 5 conferences have scheduled an emergency conference call later this week to discuss the cancellation of all fall sports. The MAC has already canceled football and one Power 5 athletic director told ESPN, “It doesn’t look good”.
In the interim the NFL is in the midst of emergency negotiations to prepare for broadcast and streaming rights should this come to pass. What is a loss for College Football is a win for the NFL, but only if the NFL can pull off a season.
I follow the NFL closely but I am a casual fan of the college game. While there is a small part of me that is saddened by this development. A much larger part can barely contain my excitement.
The Cost
I feel bad for the college athletes. A senior year may mean the difference between finally getting playing time to establish a career possibility or missing out on that chance completely.
While I do feel sorry for those seniors I am excited as a fan of the pros. Football four days each week is a fun thought. I am not certain how a lost season of college ball will affect the pros in the long run. The loss of the college game is a major win for NFL fans, but only if the season happens.
How does this affect officiating? Will this impact certain teams negatively in the long run? There are so many ways this impacts NFL teams.
The Draft
Imagine being positioned to draft Trevor Lawrence next year. Now imagine Lawrence stays at Clemson to play one more year after the lost season. Imagine all of the better college players opting to stay in college one more season. Now flash forward to the draft. At best there will be far fewer top grade players available and those that are available hadn’t played in a year and they ALL missed a full season.
If the NFL moves a few games to Saturday each week that would mean that each market would jump from six games available to each market each week to a possible nine games out of 16 each full week. On weeks with scheduled byes 3/4 of the NFL games could be available in each market without NFL Sunday Ticket.
There is so much difficult news these days. It seems like there is bad news everywhere you look. Take the good news when you can find it. Are you ready for Saturday NFL football? Right now this might just end up being one of the most epic NFL seasons ever. At least that is what it looks like in the Cheap Seats.
