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Speaker 1: The Big Ten canceled its fall football season on August eleventh,

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty, and reversed course just five weeks later. They

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Speaker 1: were in an indefensible position.

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Speaker 2: They were losing players, their reputation was taking an absolute beating,

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Speaker 2: so they came to the conclusion.

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Speaker 1: They claimed unanimously that they are avowed back. However pure

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Speaker 1: the intentions, this move created a firestorm. In Part one,

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Speaker 1: we took a look back at how the Big Ten

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Speaker 1: fumbled its most important decision and eventually recovered. Today on

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Speaker 1: Big New Kickoff, Herban tells us what it means to

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Speaker 1: have the Big Ten back. Now we look ahead, What

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Speaker 1: if anything did college football learn and can it be

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Speaker 1: better because of it? From the Soliburbal This is a

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Speaker 1: special production. So now, what what did we learn? Dan?

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Speaker 1: What did we learn after the twenty twenty season? Any thoughts? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: a number of thoughts that there was an incredibly strong

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Speaker 1: will from a lot of people to have a season

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Speaker 1: and to in good faith enact precautions that would lead

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Speaker 1: us as a college football community to watching and participating

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Speaker 1: in a college football season that ultimately, college football is

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Speaker 1: a as we talked about on Part one, an even

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Speaker 1: more splintered sport in a way that is unlike any

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Speaker 1: other major sport that we had ever anticipated, and we

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Speaker 1: already knew it was, and just that it was. God,

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Speaker 1: what did we learn that we never as a community

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Speaker 1: of college football fans want to deal with a pandemic

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Speaker 1: for one pandemic reasons and to having to argue about

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Speaker 1: things that very few of us actually know about reasons.

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Speaker 1: David Jones was a little bit more pessimistic.

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Speaker 2: We still don't have nil, man, are you kidding? They

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Speaker 2: don't even see what's happening. They don't need to see

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Speaker 2: what's out there and what's going to happen. It's inevitable. No,

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Speaker 2: they haven't learned a damn thing.

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Speaker 1: So he's talking about the NCAA, he's talking about college

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Speaker 1: football as a whole. Maybe not from the perspective of fans,

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Speaker 1: but I think it's a valid point, and I think

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Speaker 1: we need to unpack it if we're really truly going

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Speaker 1: to dissect what we learned from the twenty twenty odd

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Speaker 1: COVID season. One of the main topics that keeps coming

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Speaker 1: up in all the discussions that we've had is this

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Speaker 1: lack of leadership, right, the lack of leadership. Here's Nicole.

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Speaker 3: We always knew that college sports were super decentralized and

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Speaker 3: that decisions were made on a campus level, conference level,

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Speaker 3: but it was really really apparent how little leadership there

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Speaker 3: was from the NCAA and that there was a lot

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Speaker 3: of decision making that wasn't consistent across the board, wasn't coherent,

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Speaker 3: wasn't coordinated, And I think that means whatever the next

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Speaker 3: major crisis is, you're still going to be really unprepared

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Speaker 3: for it, especially if it's something that you do need.

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Speaker 3: The best decision making, the best processes looking back on

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Speaker 3: last year would have been the same for everyone, right,

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Speaker 3: and not having individual individual decisions and not having people

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Speaker 3: essentially saying like my medical group is better than yours,

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Speaker 3: or yours is overreacting and mine isn't. Doctors have second opinions,

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Speaker 3: third opinions all the time. It would have been a

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Speaker 3: lot better for the sport and for athletes and coaches

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Speaker 3: and everyone to have uniform rules and uniform policies. And

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Speaker 3: that didn't happen, And so that part isn't fixed and

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Speaker 3: isn't going to be fixed.

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Speaker 1: So though we focus most of Part one on the

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Speaker 1: awkward decision making, of the conferences, namely the Big Ten.

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Speaker 1: It all does come back to the NC DOUBLEA, doesn't It.

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Speaker 1: It all comes back to the fact that the NC

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Speaker 1: DOUBLEA back in twenty fifteen gave the Power five a

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Speaker 1: little bit more autonomy. They wanted to be part of football.

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Speaker 1: They didn't necessarily want to govern, at least to the

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Speaker 1: extent that Nicole describes how the Power five goes about

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Speaker 1: its business. And it took I think an episode like this,

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Speaker 1: as we've seen with the pandemic, to really highlight some

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Speaker 1: of the inefficiencies of that going it alone and not having,

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Speaker 1: as David told me, a grand poobah of college football

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Speaker 1: who could help with oversight and help issue protocols and

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Speaker 1: common rules all throughout the sport. This is a circumstance

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Speaker 1: in which that really came to light. Definitely another topic

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Speaker 1: on that same point.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we learned that it is a lot

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Speaker 3: more of a minefield than we thought. I think in

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Speaker 3: most years, we know that they're in meetings that they

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Speaker 3: care about all these four some championships and you know,

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Speaker 3: signs and compliance and various things. Right, you're trying to

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Speaker 3: get coaches to be civil with each other. Athletic directors

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Speaker 3: to get along, you know, all of those things. But

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Speaker 3: I don't think anyone really ever thought too much about

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Speaker 3: the meetings that they were having with their chancellors and

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Speaker 3: presidents all the time, as we did during this process,

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Speaker 3: because all of the decisions like to when you start

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Speaker 3: a season, like to how long a season's going to be,

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Speaker 3: and how the format is going to be has to

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Speaker 3: be made at that level. So we're so used to

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Speaker 3: thinking about athletic directors controlling how college football works, but

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Speaker 3: these decisions had to be made at such a high level.

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Speaker 3: And one thing that I think was really missing from

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Speaker 3: the Big Ten conversation is that Kevin Warren could not

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Speaker 3: have made those decisions by himself, and a lot of

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Speaker 3: the blame was falling on him squarely because the presidents

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Speaker 3: and chancellors didn't address it, didn't talk to anyone. They

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Speaker 3: didn't you know, everyone tried to foil their emails. They

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Speaker 3: were using that separate portal. Right. There was not really

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Speaker 3: the accountability for the people who actually voted and who

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Speaker 3: actually did something until that lawsuit from the Nebraska players

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Speaker 3: got the final vote.

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Speaker 1: So the lawsuit that she's referring to was one from

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Speaker 1: Nebraska players trying to figure out exactly what went on, because,

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Speaker 1: as we said in Part one, there was just so

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Speaker 1: much consternation over the process. Who decided that there was

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Speaker 1: not going to be a season. We didn't find out

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Speaker 1: until that Foyer request, in fact, that there were three

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Speaker 1: schools within the Big Ten who decided they wanted to play,

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Speaker 1: while the other ones decided that they would vote to

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Speaker 1: suspend the season. I guess my lingering question after hearing

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Speaker 1: all this is whether or not it's going to make

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Speaker 1: the sport any better? And I'd like to be here

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Speaker 1: on this show talking about how we learned so much

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Speaker 1: from this and how come the twenty twenty one season

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Speaker 1: we're all going to be better for it. I'd like

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Speaker 1: for there to be a bright side that we can

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Speaker 1: point to. Hopefully the bright side is that people aren't

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Speaker 1: sick that we don't have all these protocol in place,

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Speaker 1: that we don't need the protocols in place because the

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Speaker 1: situation is better. But I kind of feel like the

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Speaker 1: politics here of conference decision making, of the real power

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Speaker 1: brokers kind of operating in separate silos, is not something

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Speaker 1: that's going to go away. We can tell ourselves that

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Speaker 1: because there was so much of a firestorm around the

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Speaker 1: circumstance that they're going to find a better way to

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Speaker 1: do it in another time of crisis. I just don't

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Speaker 1: know if I honestly believe that. No, And I mean

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Speaker 1: it comes back to the actual layout of the sport

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Speaker 1: and the fact that these aren't sports organizations. These are

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Speaker 1: universities with chancellors and presidents and deans and students and

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Speaker 1: faculty and athletic directors and coaches and other sports and

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Speaker 1: Title nine considerations. And this isn't anything that the Denver

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Speaker 1: Nuggets have to deal with. It's nothing that the Carolina

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Speaker 1: Panthers have to deal with. The players are unionized in

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Speaker 1: other sports of this size of college football size. College

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Speaker 1: football kept growing, and yes, the power structure remained so

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Speaker 1: separate and disjointed that we are always going to have

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Speaker 1: this problem until something is addressed. Which is why you

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Speaker 1: have Nebraska players speaking out and Ryan Day speaking out

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Speaker 1: and Bob Bowlsby speaking out and there being no uniform

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Speaker 1: strategy across the sport because the sport was never brought together.

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Speaker 1: It's a series of essentially many fiefdoms trying to come

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Speaker 1: together and organize to play football. But there are a

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Speaker 1: lot of people in each of these fiefdoms, So it

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Speaker 1: became more and more apparent and confusing by the day

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Speaker 1: as to how we're going to actually corral everybody and you.

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Speaker 1: And in a normal year, that's sort of a feature

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Speaker 1: of the sport, not a bug, because there's chaos, it's wild,

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Speaker 1: and there are upsets, and every stadium is different, and

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Speaker 1: there's different time zones involved, and there's traditions that are

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Speaker 1: just crazy to different across the sport. But in a

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Speaker 1: time when it would behoove the sport to have everybody

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Speaker 1: on the same page, we're talking about a book of pages,

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Speaker 1: not a single page at all. One of the questions

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Speaker 1: you asked Nicole about that I thought was so interesting.

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Speaker 1: Could an output of the twenty twenty season be that

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Speaker 1: the Power five decides once and for all, it's going

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Speaker 1: to break apart from the nc DOUBLEA. It's going to

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Speaker 1: start its own super league of sorts, and it's just

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Speaker 1: not going to deal with the NCUBA anymore. And she

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Speaker 1: brought up a really good point. It's not that they

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Speaker 1: don't want to, it's that they don't want to leave

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Speaker 1: the money on the table from the NCAA basketball tournament.

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Speaker 1: There's like a billion dollars tied up in the basketball tournament.

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Speaker 1: To walk away from that money would be foolish. And

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Speaker 1: so until something changes with the economics, at least on

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Speaker 1: the basketball side, it does not seem likely that that's

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Speaker 1: a realistic possibility, despite the fact that I feel like

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Speaker 1: we talk about it every single summer. Right, you're almost

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Speaker 1: what are you doubling tripling something crazy the number of

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Speaker 1: teams that are eligible for the NCAA tournament. So you're

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Speaker 1: going from having to convince I forget the number of

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Speaker 1: Power five schools in Notre Dame or FBS schools, which

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Speaker 1: is about one hundred and thirty Power five schools, and

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Speaker 1: Notre Dame is about what sixty four sixty five something

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Speaker 1: in that range, So that's difficult enough to lay out

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Speaker 1: something new, and then you're doubling or tripling that number

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Speaker 1: to go to three hundred and something. It becomes I mean,

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Speaker 1: it's hurting cats, right. All of the cats are very

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Speaker 1: strongly willed and running in different direction. So no, Nicole's

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Speaker 1: point is that it seems like the one that's that's

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Speaker 1: the most correct. The general takeaway here from both David

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Speaker 1: and Nicole was that nobody's learned much of anything, and

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Speaker 1: that's fine. There are some things though that college football

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Speaker 1: learned along with the rest of us.

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Speaker 3: I think that, like many companies and businesses, the ability

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Speaker 3: to just hop on a zoom meeting and say that

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Speaker 3: that is, you know, the highest level of whatever the

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Speaker 3: organization is, and that you can make decisions that way.

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Speaker 3: You don't have to have in person meetings, Like I

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Speaker 3: think that is something that these conferences will take from that. Right,

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Speaker 3: Like they can convene in an emergency meeting via zoom,

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Speaker 3: they can make big decisions that they need to not

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Speaker 3: in person and not at their annual meetings or whatever,

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Speaker 3: you know, past processes. I think that people of utters

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Speaker 3: of the value of having a medical advisory group. I

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Speaker 3: think that was like one of the first steps everybody made.

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Speaker 3: I would imagine that some sort of on call advisory

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Speaker 3: group is a great idea, like something to take out

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Speaker 3: of this, right, you know, for whatever the medical issue is.

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Speaker 3: And then you could add specialists and I think referring

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Speaker 3: to them and trying to understand issues that we didn't

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Speaker 3: know anything about, like I was thinking about, like I

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Speaker 3: didn't have immunologists in my address book a year ago, right,

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Speaker 3: like everyone has gotten more well versed in it because

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Speaker 3: you find your expert to summarize.

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Speaker 1: They learned to use zoom. Dan. I'm pretty sure the

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Speaker 1: Playoff committee still traveled and met in person because Bill

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Speaker 1: Hancock still well unconvinced that zoom can be a thing.

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Speaker 1: This mini series brought to you by Zoom, No, not

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Speaker 1: at all. The final point that we got from our

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Speaker 1: two person panel maybe the most obvious of all from

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Speaker 1: our friend David Jones.

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Speaker 2: College football it needs fans. I did the Indiana game

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Speaker 2: in Bloomington and flew out there and I'm looking around

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Speaker 2: at this place like this is so stupid.

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Speaker 1: It's just stupid, stupid without fans. So we didn't go

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Speaker 1: to any games this year. No fans were in some stadiums,

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Speaker 1: not in others. What was the viewing experience, Like, did

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Speaker 1: it affect the product for you? Yeah? Absolutely, And it

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Speaker 1: affected the product not as much when I would watch

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Speaker 1: a game that I remember Boston College didn't have fans, right,

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Speaker 1: there were one of the schools that had the cardboard

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Speaker 1: cutouts and they played in empty stadiums for their home games.

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Speaker 1: That I didn't do too much for me. I know

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Speaker 1: ESPN and Fox piped in some sound. It was when

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Speaker 1: there were stadiums and conferences that I don't know if

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Speaker 1: they were micd up for TV a certain way, or

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Speaker 1: that they had such a crazy number of people relative

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Speaker 1: to other schools who didn't. But I remember I've talked

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Speaker 1: about this before on the show the Iowa State Oklahoma game,

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Speaker 1: which was a tight game at the very end, a

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Speaker 1: back and forth game, big plays, big swings, and the

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Speaker 1: crowd was into it, and it shocked me. It shocked

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Speaker 1: me to have that little island of an experience having

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Speaker 1: the energy in the stadium be transferred to my living room,

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Speaker 1: because by that point I had seen so many games

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Speaker 1: without it that I had sort of gotten used to

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Speaker 1: it that it kind of felt like a baseball game

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Speaker 1: of a bad team in late August or something like

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Speaker 1: that that I had gotten used to, like just the

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Speaker 1: murmury crowd sounds. And then when it was very apparent

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Speaker 1: that there was energy in a stadium, it really made

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Speaker 1: me sit up on my couch.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And one of the other things that we'll get into

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Speaker 1: was the broadcasting component of the twenty twenty season, which

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Speaker 1: was different. Certainly, the fans not being there, not being

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Speaker 1: as present was very much a factor for those of

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Speaker 1: us who were watching at home. It certainly was not

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Speaker 1: a normal season by any stretch of the imagination. I

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Speaker 1: think at first it didn't bother me at first, going

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Speaker 1: into the season, thinking well, we're going to have games,

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Speaker 1: fans won't be there. What difference does it make. I

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Speaker 1: think David is right college football maybe more so than

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Speaker 1: any other sport, to not have that fan presence, it

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Speaker 1: really does make a mark. It is something that you notice,

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Speaker 1: even when you're watching from home. It's part of the

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Speaker 1: environment that you just come to expect when you football

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Speaker 1: a game on a Saturday, and it felt like a

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Speaker 1: pretty big void turning on CBS, turning on ABC and

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Speaker 1: not having that fandom there to the fullest extent. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's cliche at this point, but sports are what they

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Speaker 1: are because of environment, and even sports where you're not allowed,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's hush tones at Augusta National or the

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Speaker 1: US Open and Tennis whatever, that there is something about

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Speaker 1: the environment of people watching and knowing that the players

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Speaker 1: feel the pressure of all of those eyes or all

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Speaker 1: of that sound when they're in the red zone or

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Speaker 1: trying to mount a goal line stand and they have

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Speaker 1: the weight of the student section behind them, and you

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Speaker 1: know that there are a bunch of Tennessee fans, or

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Speaker 1: USC fans or Texas Tech fans that are drunk out

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Speaker 1: of their minds for a noon kickoff. Without that, it's

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Speaker 1: not what we want, right, not what we're used to.

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Speaker 1: It's not what we want. It's not what we consider

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Speaker 1: to be the actual appeal of the sport, which once

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Speaker 1: again is the culture of college football. It's it's not

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Speaker 1: the football. The football is the center part of it,

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Speaker 1: but it's what the football brings out in us. Is

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Speaker 1: why we've been doing this show for years. It's why

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Speaker 1: we stay up until two in the morning watching a

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Speaker 1: Washington State col game. It's why we know will watch

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Speaker 1: a ridiculous NC State Virginia Tech game on a Thursday

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Speaker 1: night with almost no stakes, because there is something that

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Speaker 1: draws us in about the experience of college football, not

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Speaker 1: just whatever happens between you know, the sidelines and the

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Speaker 1: end zones. You know what I think I learned above

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Speaker 1: all else. Hmm, there's no way to prepare for a pandemic,

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Speaker 1: not in the sports world. No, I almost can't blame

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Speaker 1: guys like Kevin Warren for trying to do the right thing.

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Speaker 1: Maybe It wasn't the smoothest of rollouts, but it was

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Speaker 1: the worst year to be a first year commissioner, without

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Speaker 1: a doubt, in the last what one hundred years, the worst.

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Speaker 1: It was a really awkward circumstance anyway you try to

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Speaker 1: play it, and so I feel for him genuinely that

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Speaker 1: he was put in that situation. I feel for a

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Speaker 1: lot of these conference commissioners and administrators around college football.

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Speaker 1: They were all put in a very, very difficult situation.

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Speaker 1: At times it seemed obvious that they shouldn't play. Other

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Speaker 1: people would argue that while they should have all along.

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Speaker 1: There are many, many different viewpoints on the matter, but

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Speaker 1: no doubt, it was a very tough spot to be

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Speaker 1: in for all of those individuals. I don't know if

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Speaker 1: it's the kind of thing that you could write a

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Speaker 1: playbook on moving forward, because every circumstance is going to

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Speaker 1: be different. God forbid this should happen again, or something

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Speaker 1: like it should happen again. I just don't know if

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Speaker 1: there's anything that you can do to really prepare yourself

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Speaker 1: and come out of this saying this is something that

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Speaker 1: we learned. There are other aspects of the sport that

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Speaker 1: we're going to try to unpack here over the next

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Speaker 1: couple weeks broadcasting, I think we learned a lot about broadcasting,

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Speaker 1: the way that coaches manage teams, the way that they

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Speaker 1: recruit to those teams. I think we learned a lot

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Speaker 1: about how that can be done in times of crisis,

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Speaker 1: and maybe how it can be done more efficiently moving forward.

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Speaker 1: But at least as it stands with respect to conference

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Speaker 1: decision making, to the power brokers in the sport of

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Speaker 1: college football, the moneymen that really drive this thing forward,

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Speaker 1: I think we're right back where we started. I don't

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Speaker 1: know what to think about what the sport is going

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Speaker 1: to look like moving forward, but in terms of crisis

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Speaker 1: acting and decision making and getting ducks in a row,

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Speaker 1: there's no reason to believe it'll go any smoother. There's

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Speaker 1: reason to believe that certain mistakes won't be remade. But

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Speaker 1: you know, going into January February, nobody anticipated, even if

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Speaker 1: they knew about what was happening with the pandemic and

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Speaker 1: people getting sick in Asia, nobody was prepared to say,

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Speaker 1: I need to start making decisions for thousands upon thousands

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Speaker 1: of people under twenty two or whatever, and that this

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Speaker 1: is going to affect my legacy, this is going to

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Speaker 1: affect how we as a sport operate. There was nobody

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Speaker 1: who really could have possibly imagined. And so what's the

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Speaker 1: next big world event that affects sports? I honestly don't know.

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Speaker 1: I have no idea. If it's going to be a pandemic,

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Speaker 1: I have no idea. If it's going to be war.

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Speaker 1: You know, I have no idea. But I do have

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Speaker 1: a pretty good concept that college football, which is one

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Speaker 1: of the least important elements of all of this, is

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Speaker 1: probably going to do a poor job of communicating with

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Speaker 1: each other about what the best steps are going to

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Speaker 1: be as we move forward. Now, the next question is

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Speaker 1: what does college football look like this fall? Do we

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Speaker 1: have a normal season? Do we have stadiums at full capacity?

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Speaker 1: I talked to David about that. I said, what's Beaver

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Speaker 1: Stadium look like come September? His estimate and no one

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Speaker 1: knows for sure, was seventy percent. Will have seventy percent

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Speaker 1: of Beaver Stadium full. It'll be a much more normal

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Speaker 1: college football atmosphere on game day. It may not still

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Speaker 1: get to one hundred percent, but seventy percent, given where

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Speaker 1: we came from, is going to feel much more like

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Speaker 1: we're used to. Yeah, obviously, the number of people who

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Speaker 1: have been vaccinated, the number of people who have had

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Speaker 1: COVID nineteen and are I guess not fearful of getting

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Speaker 1: it again. You know, I can't speak for any I

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Speaker 1: have not had COVID nineteen. I have been vaccinated. I

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Speaker 1: do feel a certain amount of excitement about doing things

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Speaker 1: in large groups in public once again, be it shows, concerts,

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Speaker 1: you know, stand up comedy, and live sporting events. I

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Speaker 1: am excited to get back to a live sporting event now.

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Speaker 1: I understand that a lot of people are going to

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Speaker 1: be still even if they're eating out at a local

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Speaker 1: Chinese restaurant or Mexican restaurant or whatever, there's still going

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Speaker 1: to be a little bit trepidacious about Is that that's

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Speaker 1: a good word, right, Ty, It's not bad. I think

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Speaker 1: that's pretty good. About going back and doing all things

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Speaker 1: that you know, really living it up at a college

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Speaker 1: football game involved tailgating, you know, going to the game,

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Speaker 1: hanging out, going to a you know, traveling to a

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Speaker 1: town and going out to the bars the night before

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Speaker 1: or whatever. There's going to be a number of people

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Speaker 1: who are still, wait and see in that regard, but

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Speaker 1: I think overwhelmingly, especially as we enter into the summer

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Speaker 1: and you know, more and more events open up and

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Speaker 1: you see people at con or some things, if people

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Speaker 1: are feeling less and less worried about going back to

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Speaker 1: whatever their normal life was before. I think by the

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Speaker 1: end of the season, I think people are going to

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Speaker 1: be especially excited to be at these games. I think

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Speaker 1: there's going to be a giant burden off a lot

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Speaker 1: of people's shoulder. That's the way I view things. I

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Speaker 1: think Dave is right. It's not going to be feel

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Speaker 1: fully one hundred percent back to normal, whatever that is,

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Speaker 1: but I think it overwhelmingly is going to be a

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Speaker 1: familiar college football universe by late October, by about Halloween,

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Speaker 1: I think in some sense it'll be a tale of

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Speaker 1: two cities. And this is another point that he made

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Speaker 1: to me in our interview, which people can see in

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Speaker 1: its entirety out at verballers dot Com, as they can

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Speaker 1: with your interview with Nicole. There are kind of two

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Speaker 1: classes of fans that may emerge now on the hopefully

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Speaker 1: actside of this pandemic. First Off, you're going to have

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Speaker 1: people who just don't want to be in groups anymore.

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Speaker 1: People who have grown comfortable being at home, working at home.

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Speaker 1: They may feel some sense of anxiety going out there

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Speaker 1: and being amongst the people, being among one hundred thousand

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Speaker 1: others watching a college football game. I think that point

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Speaker 1: of view is understandable. It may not be guided by

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Speaker 1: science at this point if you've got the shots, and

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Speaker 1: who knows, but everyone's entitled to their own opinion on

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Speaker 1: the matter. The second group, I think, could be just

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Speaker 1: wildly repressed and they just are dying to get out

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Speaker 1: there and revel in whatever they can be at college

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Speaker 1: football or concerts or just going to the local neighborhood bar,

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Speaker 1: solid verbal live shows. Sure, of course, I am very

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Speaker 1: curious to see which of those two sides wins out.

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Speaker 1: My expectation is that it's going to be the latter,

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Speaker 1: and we're going to see a lot of people out there.

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Speaker 1: Desire for tickets. Demand for tickets could be at a

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Speaker 1: very interesting point come September, when the season's about ready

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Speaker 1: to start. I think that there will be no shortage

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Speaker 1: of college football fans and want to get out there

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Speaker 1: and be in the stadium, be in the parking lot,

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Speaker 1: to tailgate with family and friends. That is as much

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Speaker 1: a part of college football and the fabric that we

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Speaker 1: know of college football as anything. I would expect that again.

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Speaker 1: Now that we've hopefully gotten to a point where it's

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Speaker 1: safer to do these activities, people aren't going to be

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Speaker 1: at all gunshy about doing it. They're going to be

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Speaker 1: out there doing what they've always done and loved. I

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Speaker 1: live literally five minutes from a power football stadium. I

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Speaker 1: am going to try everything I can to go to

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Speaker 1: a game. Thanks again for listening to our special production,

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Speaker 1: So now what don't forget? You can listen to full

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Speaker 1: interviews with Nicole and David over on our patreon at

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00:23:44,359 --> 00:23:48,600
Speaker 1: verballers dot com. Join us next week for a different topic,

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00:23:49,200 --> 00:23:52,800
Speaker 1: but the same obvious question. So now what