A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/...orge-will/

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/...orge-will/

Ok, so the writer was funny at times.

We can make fun of him if we like, I suppose, but I would guess that he is likely more informed than most of the rest of us.

A lot of what he said has been said elsewhere, though I think he conveyed his perspective pretty well.

One thing that interested me was that he used Clemson and Miami as his example, not Clemson and FSU. I wonder why that was.

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/...orge-will/

I think the essay is well done. George Will is himself a sports fan from way back. He calls out college football, fact by fact, as a money circus. Which it is. Consumers are nuts for the game and spend money on it. Suppliers at every stage want their cut.

I like the way he quotes Kevin Warren's marketing clichés and just lets it all parody itself.

There is an implied question there about values. I like how he doesn't push an answer, or even push the question. He just holds up a mirror.

George Will is a really smart guy, but you can tell how new he is to Realignment, or even the past 20 years of CFB. He still thinks Miami is Elite.

(09-30-2022 05:10 PM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

X2 that was a whole lot of nothing.

(10-01-2022 12:08 PM)Kyle Mack Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:10 PM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

X2 that was a whole lot of nothing.

I wouldn't call it nothing. I subscribed to him, I don't remember the last time I had to look up multiple words in one article.

“We’re trying to build a university our football team can be proud of.”

That is an absolutely fabulous line.

One of the very few things I agree with George Will.

Every year I’m gravitating more to the NFL, MLB and NBA. College sports is a money hungry machine and although the professional leagues are the same at least they don’t keep the “student-athlete” and “rivalries” charade. I remember how into it I was when the ACC raided the Big East in 2003 and caused a domino effect. It’s how I found this board in the first place. Same when the Big XII was raided in 2010-11 and the ACC and Big East in 2011. The realignment moves of 2021-22 were meh to me even though those moves were bigger than anything we’ve seen before. They literally consolidated two power leagues until tv money runs out in the next decade or two.

At some point the P2 will become the P1 when tv money starts drying out. The Purdues, Iowas, Mississippi States and Arkansas of the world will be left out and I absolutely won’t feel sorry for them just as I don’t feel sorry for the likes of Texas Tech, Oregon State and Syracuse today.

(10-01-2022 12:08 PM)bryanw1995 Wrote:  George Will is a really smart guy, but you can tell how new he is to Realignment, or even the past 20 years of CFB. He still thinks Miami is Elite.

He’s a boomer so he remembers those Miami teams from the 80’s, 90’s and early 00’s. It’s those younger millennials born after 1990 who only know Miami as a mediocre ACC team.

(10-01-2022 12:18 PM)bryanw1995 Wrote:  

(10-01-2022 12:08 PM)Kyle Mack Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:10 PM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

X2 that was a whole lot of nothing.

I wouldn't call it nothing. I subscribed to him, I don't remember the last time I had to look up multiple words in one article.

There was nothing new, interesting, different, unique, in that article. Will is a baseball guy IIRC. Pretty much everyone who posts here knows more about College football than Will.

Will lost me 35 years ago with his support of what would be a Patrician regime. It lacked "The Pursuit of Virtue, and Other Tory Notions"! He fancies himself to be what he is not, another William F. Buckley.

George Will is pompous, effete and brilliant.

Would that Bill Dazzle could be a "poor man's George Will."

lol---I thought he was dead.

(09-30-2022 05:10 PM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

I’ve always been very disturbed that there are 99 year olds on TikTok. I think that anybody 19 or older who goes on TikTok should be required to register as a sex offender.

(10-01-2022 04:25 PM)Poster Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:10 PM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  

(09-30-2022 05:05 PM)BeatWestern! Wrote:  A column by George F. Will on conference realignment and the direction of college football, published this week in the Washington Post:

He's got the right middle initial, I'll say that much for him :)

Having skimmed Will's opinion piece, I'm now gonna call my 99-year old grandfather to get his two cents on TikTok

I’ve always been very disturbed that there are 99 year olds on TikTok. I think that anybody 19 or older who goes on TikTok should be required to register as a sex offender.

Dude, at 99 he's not offending anything except his own imagination and ego!

(10-01-2022 12:08 PM)bryanw1995 Wrote:  George Will is a really smart guy, but you can tell how new he is to Realignment, or even the past 20 years of CFB. He still thinks Miami is Elite.

He's a Princeton/Oxford guy. I expect he likes the Ivy League approach just fine.

The Ivy model has a lot to recommend it. Prep for an NFL career is not one. You have to be OK with that.

.

Terrific commentary. Will makes a lot of good points here. He's considered a conservative (with a small "c"), but the views he expresses here are widely shared among many, if not most professors at American universities and liberal arts colleges. Sometimes being conservative with a small "c" is consistent with being broadly liberal in certain respects (as opposed to illiberal, or in the sense of "liberal democracy" and "the liberal arts"), and identifying with the evolution of Western thought from the Renaissance through the European Enlightenment (which was a major influence on the American Founding Fathers).

.

(10-02-2022 01:19 AM)Gitanole Wrote:  

(10-01-2022 12:08 PM)bryanw1995 Wrote:  George Will is a really smart guy, but you can tell how new he is to Realignment, or even the past 20 years of CFB. He still thinks Miami is Elite.

He's a Princeton/Oxford guy. I expect he likes the Ivy League approach just fine.

The Ivy model has a lot to recommend it. Prep for an NFL career is not one. You have to be OK with that.

Right on. Exactly.