Football archives
Rarely do football and politics collide, but when it comes to the high-stakes world of the post-season College Bowl Games, politicians have been known to try to get their share of the limelight. With Democrats controlling Congress, and Fox owning the television rights to four of the five biggest bowl games after a year of surprise victories and ranking upsets, the urge to "get Rupert" by changing how Bowl Games do business with colleges may be irresistible.
And it may end up doing the sport some good.
Unlike every other collegiate sport, big-time college football is the only athletic endeavor sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association that does not have an official championship or series of sanctioned play-offs. Major college football instead has a system of bowl games, dating back to 1902 when the Pasadena Tournament of Roses decided to stage a football game to accompany their annual New Year's Day parade.
Today, there are 27 Bowls hosted everywhere from San Diego to Toronto. Each has arranged an agreement to invite teams from various conferences and each has a pre-determined cash payout to the participating schools, ranging from the hundreds of thousands of dollars to over $15 million. And after all those games, the national champion is settled by a poll, a computer - or when the system works - a game between the two best teams, called the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) Title.
So where do the politics come in? Well, every pols a "homer" - rooting for, if not flat-out protecting the home team. It's one of the duties of public office. That's why, when Brigham Young University was denied a spot in one of the four high-paying BCS games five years ago, Utah Senator Orrin Hatch held hearings in the Judiciary Committee. Hatch complained that the system limited access to the big-money bowls and was discriminatory against schools, like his home-state Cougars or Utah Utes. Although Hatch was ridiculed, he affected change, and caused the BCS to add a title game and open up access to deserving teams from the smaller conferences.
The current system which rewards universities based on reputation and resumes can have a real impact on students. When Texas head coach Mack Brown successfully lobbied to get the human pollsters to move his Longhorns ahead of the California Golden Bears and into a high-priced BCS game in 2004, the Pac Ten lost $5 million. Since the conference distributes bowl revenues evenly, that means that the University of California system alone was out $1 million and that's not accounting for all the Rose Bowl merchandise they would have sold. That's real money the colleges don't receive.
While it is doubtful that the Senate Judiciary Committee has any power - other than jawboning - over college football, Congress can control the purse strings of the organizations that help run the system. Bowl organizing committees, like the Pasadena Tournament of Roses, are not-for-profit groups and many have set up foundations to receive and distribute their bowl proceeds in their communities. Meanwhile the bowls milk every company from Citigroup to Chik-fil-A for sponsorship money. Take away the tax exemptions and suddenly, all those sponsorship dollars would probably dry up. Yes, if Congress wanted to force real change into College Football, they indeed have the power - the power of the purse-string.
Not surprising, bowl game organizers are some of the most vehement opponents of a playoff system because it would effective render them impotent. A football-oriented club for local elites - these committees are a cross between a Chamber of Commerce, Visitor's Bureau and Rotary Club - touting the benefits of their existence to include, "rewarding experiences" for those unpaid student-athletes: 'The gates of Alcatraz open once again as the Diamond Walnut San Francisco Bowl tours its teams through this historic monument of American justice. At the Hawaii Bowl, players get to ... witness a true Hawaiian ritualistic luau at night.'"
And if you think that the Bowl games' fiduciary responsibility lies in promoting the public good - a key component in determining whether their activities are indeed charitable - think again! The BCS selection procedures are quite clear. Invitations to the game may be modified to take into consideration, "whether alternative pairings may have greater or lesser appeal to college football fans as measured by expected ticket sales for the bowls and by expected television interest, and the consequent financial impact on Fox and the bowls." Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. thank you!
Now, you'd think that Senators like Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer might advocate change in how the bowl system works and its organized because it would result in a more equitable distribution of revenues for California schools that never make the BCS - Cal Berkeley and UCLA. But let me suggest another, more subversive reason, to prompt this Congress to act: Messing with the BCS means messing with Fox and its owner, Democrats' arch-nemesis Rupert Murdoch! If Move-on.org ever figured that out, I am sure the liberal activist group would become a college football playoff's number-one fan!
The impossible happened this weekend in college football when a hapless Stanford University led by a first-year coach and a backup quarterback, seized Troy and brought down the number one team in the country, the invincible University of Southern California.
To Vegas, a Trojan win was more inevitable than the presidency of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. USC was a 41-point favorite over the Cardinal. But, alas for us USC fans, the impossible happened and we lost 24-23. Yes, only by one point but in football, as politics, one point matters.
With each national poll that is released, Clinton's nomination and election to become president of the United States appears inevitable. With all apologies to Fidel Castro, she is looking invincible with or without Barack Obama by her side if you listen to the political pundits. And that's why Clinton risks the same tragedy as my USC Trojans.
USC never thought they could lose to Stanford. In the week before the game, the coaches went home early. In their pre-game walk to the Stadium, players and coaches looked more focused on having fun than on playing football. And when it came time to put the pads on, the coaches now admit that they never considered that Stanford might win when choosing which plays to call.
In a word, my friends, that's hubris. And hubris, as my Spot-on colleague Mike Spinney pointed out yesterday, is the Democratic Party's greatest enemy right now.
With the war in Iraq being unpopular and Congressional Republicans seeking to offend just about anyone from Latinos to sick children, Democrats must think that both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue will be handed to them on a silver platter right now. For Clinton and for the party as a whole such a cocksure mentality can only spell trouble. They'd do well to take a look at their party's recent history here in California. After sweeping Statewide elections in 2002, the Democrats governed from the far left and their actions - and arrogance - led to the recall of Governor Gray Davis.
When Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger limped out of the 2005 Special Election like a wounded puppy, Democrats turned far left again, nominating ultra-liberal tax-and-spender Phil Angelides over the more moderate Steve Westly. If you're taking notes, Schwarzenegger's still with us. Angelides couldn't get arrested.
On Saturday night against Stanford, USC played like they had a big lead even when they didn't because the coaches were so sure that if they played their game instead of playing to the circumstances of the game they were in they would have the lead. And playing with the lead is exactly what the Clinton for President campaign is doing today.
In national polling, Hillary Clinton leads her rivals for the democratic nomination by twofold. It's not unlike the 41-point Vegas spread for USC over Stanford. So, if presidential politics were a football game, she would have two choices: Run up the score or sit on the lead. The risk of trying to run up the score is that you might make mistakes and give your opponents hope. The risk of sitting on a lead too early is that it may get chipped away until it is too close and when you need it you no longer are running at full speed.
Metaphorically, it seems that Clinton has chosen to sit on her lead. She is running as the frontrunner, eschewing town hall meetings, Q&A's and is moving towards more scripted events. That kind of remoteness indicates a big of arrogance, doesn't it? And that's dangerous. If it doesn't hurt Hillary in the primaries, it could trip her up in a general election where she suddenly has to campaign again as if it mattered.
They said that a Stanford loss to USC was inevitable just as some are predicting a second Clinton Presidency will be. But if Hillary runs her campaign with the same hubris as Pete Carroll coached the Trojans last week, she may not have an opportunity to redeem herself in the last seven games of the season.
The University of Southern California has a proud tradition of excellence on the football field and this year has returned to its glory days under six years of the tutelage of Head Coach Pete Carroll. But not all trophies in the Athletic Department’s Heritage Hall are without tarnish.
Six Heisman Trophies - awarded to the best player each year in college football - are on display in the USC Trojan trophy cases. I assume USC Athletic Director Mike Garrett’s trophy (which would be the seventh statue) is in his office but the one trophy you’d think would be missing is, in fact, front and center in the display case. Yes, USC still celebrates the football career of O.J. Simpson - he who has been accused of double-murderer, found liable for the death of his ex-wife and her boyfriend, accused of stealing Direct TV and now facing eight felony counts in Las Vegas, Nevada.
USC gives all of its Heisman Trophy winners the same treatment. Their number is retired, their trophy and jersey are displayed in the trophy case at Heritage Hall, the university's sprawling athletic center. Trophy winners' numbers are also on large display in the peristyle end of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.
I have to wonder how football coach Carroll - who had nothing to do with USC’s Student Body Right heyday of the 1960’s and 70’s - feels when he walks by O.J.’s jersey on the way into the office each day past Simpson's #32 jersey and Heisman Trophy. USC has taken a very diplomatic approach to handling Simpson. The school recognizes that Orenthal James Simpson attended USC and played football - quite well - before going off, like most Heisman winners, to a career in the National Football League. But Simpson is not invited to any official university events. The school embraces his accomplishments on the field while separating themselves from his actions off of the field.
But is that a lesson Carroll truly wants to send to his players? Play good football and you’ll be heralded no matter what happens off the field? Because it seems that is the message being sent to USC players by the coaches and administration. Or, perhaps more accurately, that's the message the players receive.
In recent years, Trojan football players have been arrested for or accused of soliciting a prostitute, spousal battery, sexual assault, plain old assault, gun possession, drug possession, steroid use and more. The list goes on and on and, of course, includes O.J.'s acquittal for for murdering his wife, Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.
Some of my fellow USC boosters say Simpson is being recognized for accomplishments that are thirty, nigh, forty years in the past and that it's possible to separated by decades from his triumph on the field from his horrible behavior off the field. But being a football player at USC is a little bit like being a cardinal in the Vatican. USC has long tradition for winning football games; playing there as a college student is an accomplishment, a ticket for many to the NFL. The untalented, the modest, don't make it. But no one should be so arrogant as to think that because of their talent on the field, society will excuse anything they do off of it. But if Heritage Hall celebrates O.J. Simpson the football player while looking away from O.J. Simpson the man, that is where we - unfortunately - end up.
Now, I can understand the argument that the man’s troubles today have nothing to do with his on-the-field performance during the Johnson Administration. I can understand why, during the racially charged early 1990s in Los Angeles, USC decided to postpone making a decision about how to handle Simpson’s legacy until after his trail.
But, as a supporter and alumnus of the University of Southern California, I have to say that Simpson’s antics are getting embarrassing. Having listened to the tape from the Las Vegas hotel room robbery where Simpson allegedly tried to steal his own memorabilia, I will likely blush in embarrassment as I walk into the Coliseum on Saturday.
Hopefully, if the charges against Simpson stick, he'll be convicted this time and USC will be able to replace his jersey with a newly retired number in the off season. I'm thinking it'll be the number 10 jersey that belongs to this year's Heisman Trophy candidate - and likely winner - Trojan quarterback John David Booty.
Even though the Universities of Connecticut and Rhode Island square off in one of college football’s first games of the 2006 season this Thursday, the real battle between these neighboring states is between political extremists and the measure of success will be whom can inflict the greatest damage to their political party.
Some political observers are starting to draw comparisons between the Senatorial primaries of Connecticut’s Joe Lieberman and Rhode Island’s Lincoln Chafee.
Earlier this month, the Senator from Connecticut was defeated in the Democratic Party by anti-war liberal Ned Lamont.
On September 12, Rhode Island’s Republican Senator, Lincoln Chafee faces a stiff primary challenge by Stephen Laffey, a right-wing conservative upset over Chafee’s positions on tax cuts, environmental policies and gay marriage, among many things.
Unlike Lieberman - a Democrat incumbent running in a heavily Democratic state - Chaffee is being challenged in a State where Republican voters make up only 70,000 of the 430,000 voters.
Yet this is a closed primary* - only Republicans will be choosing between Chafee and Laffey. If the race were in Texas, Lincoln Chafee would be looking for a job right now - but there remains a good chance that Rhode Island Republicans will be as pragmatic as those in California who chose not to challenge the vehemently centrist Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006.
But while the media will draw comparisons between Chafee and Lieberman in the next two weeks, there is one “X-factor” that they will not mention…
The third estate is not rooting against Chafee like they did against Lieberman. You’ll see less national attention on this race - less of a boost for Laffey than Lamont. And that’s where the parallels between Lincoln Chafee and Joe Lieberman fall apart.
* Clarification: Reader Bill Brittingham writes in to correct me: "the Rhode Island Republican primary isn’t closed. Independents can vote too. That, apparently, is what Chafee is counting on – not the pragmatism of the Republican base." Agreed that both should be factored in--along with the media not rushing in to support Laffey like they did for Lamont.
When George Bush traveled to Austria and Hungary this week, it was easy for many Americans to ask which was the greater national embarrassment—our President or our World Cup team?
Given that the President didn't even bother to watch the American squad's game against Ghana in neighboring Germany—or even visit with them—and he was just one country over, it's be pretty easy to claim that, indeed, soccer's Team USA would take the "national embarrassment" title outright.
However, since we Americans don't care so much about "football" and our boys did put up a valiant effort against Italy, you can't say that all was for naught on the pitches of Germany—but if the United States ever hopes to compete in international soccer, some major changes are needed.
1. Focus on the Future. Landon Donovan is known in Europe because he could not cut in the Bundesliga. Team Captain Claudio Reyna is playing off his reputation as the best player…in college…at the University of Virginia in the 1990's. While established players who are perhaps past their prime got the starting spots in most games, newcomer Bobby Convey sat on the bench for most of the critical third game against Ghana even though he had been one of the standout players of the Cup for the USA.
2. Out the "I" back in Team. This may sound unconventional, but in losing effots against the Czech Republic and Ghana, the American players appeared more eager to be "part of the system" than they were in being the best they could be. We saw against Italy that Donovan could make long runs from mid-field making players miss left and right, but too often when it came time to take a shot on goal, Landon and others would make a pass too many. Our players should go out there and perform to the best of their abilities--and the team should be built around those abilities rather than trying to force our best players to play a style they do not excel at.
3. Don't settle for mediocrity. In a sport where some teams will play for a tie, the USA went into the World Cup hoping to make it out of the first round, only to face Brazil and lose. With expectations like that, how can we expect excellence. When the World Cup goes to South Africa in 2010, America should expect to—and play to—win the tournament. Maybe then the "disappointing" result will be a quarterfinal.
The first step on America's four year journey: Fire Bruce Arena. We have the resources now to go out and recruit the best coaches in the World. Let's do it and send the message that we're serious about soccer—or at least 10% of us are.
