re: The Experts Are Wrong About Players Generating Revenue

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So from around 1989 through 1999, with a brief three year respite between 1995-1997, LSU sucked, they had no season ticket holders, and no one showed up?

I got news for you, there were MANY die-hards that filled that stadium. There weren't 80K in there, but they showed up. They showed up faithfully all the way up until the last season of the Curley Hallman Era.

You're eithre purposefully ignorant of that time period of LSU Football, or too young to have lived through it. Because otherwise, you'd have never made your statement.

Oh, & BTW-South Carolina had back-to-back 1-10 seasons before Lou Holtz took over. They averaged 80K+ in attendance in those years. Don't let that get in the way of your well-thought out, reasonable opinion

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LSU and South Carolina have the good fortune of being nationally ranked teams in the SEC where football is religion. The SEC brand is also what made the lucrative TV contact possible. 6 of the Top 10 and 9 of the top 25 in attendance are from the SEC. It's not a coincidence of those 9, that 8 of them have played in the SEC Championship game since 2004 and 6 of them have played in the SEC Championship game 2 times or more.

It's also not a coincidence that the 3 NOT in the top 25 in attendance, Ole Miss, Mississippi State and Vanderbilt, are only 3 teams that have never played in the SEC Championship game. That's 3 football programs that have been around between 115 and 120 years. Florida State has been around since 1947 but they crack the top 20. Miami has has had a program since 1926 and has 5 national championships in the past 27 season but they are ranked about 50th. It takes more than tradition to create fan interest.