Whether it was an honest attempt at a self-evaluation process or was simply done for the love of the game, the newly-extended head coach of the Colorado Buffaloes, Deion Sanders, declared his dreams of a Spring exhibition game. Unfortunately, those dreams were promptly snuffed out by the NCAA oversight committee.
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The Syracuse Orange answered Coach Prime’s call, but both programs have now seen their requests for a legislative relief waiver be denied. As the committee continues to bar teams from participating in springtime contests, some analysts are beginning to call them out, arguing that the prevention of competition is nothing short of “an absolute travesty.”
During the latest installment of the weekly college football podcast, The Ruffino & Joe Show, the founder of the AYS Sports Network, declared that,
“An absolute travesty has entered the sport and I don’t see enough people talking about it.”
While Sanders maintains that he was simply hoping to maintain the competitive spirit of the FBS, the NCAA has a clearly defined stance on the matter. Additionally, other programs are hoping to do away with springtime contests altogether, citing depth charts and film concerns as their main reasons for doing so.
In an attempt to help audience members understand the logic behind the NCAA’s ruling, Ruffino’s co-host and A to Z sports analyst, Joe DeLeone, highlighted that
“For anyone who just saw the headline, they decided to squash it because it provided a ‘competitive and recruiting advantage that no other institutions are permitted to do.’ …I think that’s kind of a BS excuse.”
In highlighting that athletic directors associated with programs such as Georgia, Oregon State, and Miami all voted against the idea, DeLeone certainly suggests that personal bias is playing into the committee’s decision. Ruffino wasn’t buying it, arguing that the NCAA’s logic doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.
“What competitive advantage? …You get to see two teams that you may play, Miami, your AD is a part of it, you’ll see them open it up in Spring with a new quarterback. The competitive advantage, it goes for you. Why does the NCAA need a committee? It is the whitest person thing that I have ever heard of.”
Suffice to say, neither analyst, much like their contemporaries, saw little to no appeal in the NCAA’s ability to still influence the game in a modern, NIL era.
NCAA Committee oversteps once again
In the wake of Sanders’s attempt to further impact the sport, the oversight committee did attest that it was willing to discuss the notion of “joint spring practices in the future.” Nevertheless, its attempt at safeguarding particular programs, once again, paints the NCAA in a bad light.
Despite having a rich history of questionable decisions, the committee’s most recent ruling stands in a different context than the ones made prior. In a time where teams are effectively buying championship rosters, making the college landscape seem unrecognizable at times, the prevention of healthy and honest competition does nothing but further damage the integrity of the sport.
Sanders’s main concern, along with many others, is that “The way the trend is going is, you never know if this is going to be the last spring game.” That sentiment is reflected in fanbases who believe the game of football is more transactional in nature than ever before.
The coaching legend of college football himself, Nick Saban, said as much after parting ways with Alabama. With the main focus of players now being “How much are you going to pay me?” many believe that the once-honest game has become corrupted by cash.
So long as the committees, teams, and players alike are more interested in protecting their bottom line than they are in providing a quality product on the field, both participation and viewership will continue to struggle. Moves such as this by the NCAA only further the idea that the game of football is advancing in the wrong direction.
Until teams are encouraged to put their best foot forward at all times, that will likely continue to be the case.
