re: The new clock rules in college football didn't shorten the games by much

So a 7% reduction in plays but 0% reduction in length of broadcast.

I think the bigger issue is the excessive reviews. It's just too much.

quote:

---

3 minutes of viewing time equals roughly 5-8 plays total

---

Makes a big impact in an amateur sport where a handful of plays is often the difference

quote:

---

7 game sample with average of 63.3 plays per game and average duration of 3 hours and 24 minutes

Last season (896 games), average of 68.7 plays per game and average duration of 3 hours and 27 minutes

---

Are those numbers per game, or per team per game? I’m going to assume teams average more than 31-34 offensive plays per game and think that’s per team. So, while a small sample size, 5.4 offensive plays per team equals 10.8 total offensive plays per game. That’s not nothing. Especially when solely sacrificed for more advertising revenue. College football is slowly but surely trying to copy the NFL model, yet somehow the powers that be haven’t figured out it’s an inferior product. Producing the same product with inferior players, inferior coaches, 6 times the amount of teams (just in FCS), 32 more players per team to water it down even further, and much less practice time, will inevitably lead to inferior play and an overall inferior product.

College football thrived because it was a completely different product than the NFL. Trying to make it the same, just worse, seems so in-your-face stupid that I can’t believe it’s actually happening. When teams can lose 3 games and still win the national championship, fans will quit tuning into regular season games not featuring “their” teams at an increasingly higher rate.

Combine that with conferences losing divisions and the conference championship games pitting the 2 teams with the best records, and it won’t be long until Alabama and Georgia or Bama and LSU or Ohio State and Michigan are playing 3 times in the same season. Who cares who wins in October, I’ll wait till they play again in December or January when it really matters. Gone are the days like last season when LSU and Bama fans lived and died on every play of that game in November. Or LSU and Florida State fans will a week from today exactly. It will only be about the cumulative result of a season, individual games won’t matter. The NFL can get away with it because they have the best players in the world coached by the best coaches in the world with unlimited practice time. College can’t compete with that.

For example, LSU opens next year against USC, a team that’s somehow been a “rival” the past 20 years despite having not played in 40 years. Awesome. Except the stakes for that game will be very little relative to any other season prior they might have matched up. Haven’t played in 40 years and will probably wind up palsying 3-4 times in the next 10. And somehow LSU and Michigan have NEVER played in their 100+ years of being top 10-12 overall programs. Wouldn’t be shocking if they met up 2-3 times in the next decade. People supporting the drastic conference re-alignment and expanded playoffs like to make fun of those who “cry” over the lost annual rivalries of Bama/Tennesse or Georgia/Auburn, LSU/Florida. I think the bigger problem will be powerhouses who may have only matched up once every couple of decades will soon start playing semi-regularly in the playoffs. Just like the NFL. Only with inferior play. As an LSU fan last year, I was glad the opening game loss didn’t end our season. Just like the loser of next week’s game will feel the same. But, careful what we wish for.