Lot’s of sports fans love college sports. Some love it more than pro sports, which I do not understand. I mean, when given the choice (especially if watching live, ticket price not being an issue), I would want to see a competitive event between the top players in the sport. How can you enjoy watching minor league or amateur sports more than watching the best of the best compete? And don’t give me the tired old “The college kids aren’t playing for the money. They’re playing or the love of the sport.” It’s time to stop living in the past. This is the NCAA…it’s all about the money from one angle or another.
Let me be clear though, I do watch college sports simply because it’s a sporting event. But I’ll give you an example of something I can’t stand about college sports, and being that we’re in football season, I’ll use football as an example. Do you want to know what stinks about college football? These – 76-0. 72-0. 54-6. 59-13. 77-7. 56-0. 70-7. Those are scores from the games of this past Saturday’s AP Top-25 ranked teams. 20 of the 25 teams played. Seven of them won their games by at least 40 points. What is enjoyable about watching a game with a final score of 76-0? In the history of the NFL, there has been exactly one 70+ point victory and it occurred 73 years ago! In college football, there were three 70-point victories just this weekend!
I hate that there are so many of these mismatched games which, in my opinion, should not even be played. But they are. Why? Money of course. But in the pros, the gap between the best and worst teams in the league is relatively small. Only a few players and a few decisions separate the cream of the crop from the cellar dwellers. This is why it’s rare for a blowout of these proportions to occur and why pro sports are better all-around. But you know what college sport isn’t like that? Golf.
The best part of competitive pro golf is that the difference between the top players and the lower tier players is really only a few strokes per round. In college, it’s not much different. And with the competition being more…well…competitive, this translates to a good spectator sport. So why is college golf not seen anywhere on television?
In this day and age, where there are literally hundreds of television channels available, how is it that a popular sport with good competition taking place on a pretty regular basis, not getting any air time? And when I say not any, I mean almost none! College golf doesn’t even get so much as a mention on sports channels or highlight shows. It’s even an afterthought on the Golf Channel.
The question is, why? It’s a college sport, which many sports fans love. It’s a very competitive sport with, as in the pros, relatively little difference between the top players and the lower tier. So where is the attention? Where are the cameras? Where’s the fanfare? You know, catching some of these players when they’re still in college can begin to create star-power prior to the next big thing hitting the pro links. It seems to work for the college football and basketball players. Just sayin’.
Swing ’til you’re happy!
Ever thought about the production costs for a golf tournament compared to a football match? In golf you have one or several full days of competition with plenty of balls out in a field, that is pretty big. In almost every other sport, you have a couple of hours max (mostly a lot less) in ONE stadium with ONE ball to follow.
One barrier is that most (all?) of the local collegiate contests are either ill-published…or closed to the general public just like High School matches are here. When I played varsity golf in High School, not even parents could attend our matches with other schools as they were held on open-for-play courses like playing in a league. We were just slotted into the queue along with the other paying-foursomes that afternoon.
I just looked-at the Mens Golf team websites for three local colleges here…and not one had any info on how to attend their intercollegiate tournaments.