GP1

I'm hoping a Mexican drug cartel sponsors a field just to prove how shameless athletic directors are.

Awesome. Now fans won't have to feel the pride in seeing their team's logo at midfield. Instead, they can be inspired by a Draft Kings logo. It's all so gross.

No way. I didn't even go to those when I still lived in Akron.

Maybe once. After that it's something I'm trying to avoid in this life.

Yaaaaawn.

My ideal game is a completely empty stadium, on a Saturday afternoon, with the exception of me and Mrs. GP1, the luckiest woman in the world. However, I know that isn't good for the program so I can only dream.

It's not the conference. It's much more complicated and beyond the MAC.

It's more. They paid us a lot to get out of the game. Then we seized defeat from the jaws of victory by scheduling a sure loss on the road.

This game is degrading. It's degrading for Akron because of it trades money for humiliation. It's degrading for OSU because they are paying a team just to make money and humiliate them. It's gross. College football is just gross anymore. Think of it like this. Howard Stern used to pay strippers to come in and he would throw balogna slices at their backsides. The women degraded themselves for money. Stern degraded himself by participating in a degrading event. I used to think it was funny. Now I think it's stupid. I used to think games against OSU were good for the program. Now I'm certain they are stupid and a sign the athletic director doesn't know what to do to change the culture of the program.

Probably accurate. I won't spend 10 minutes watching this hoax.

It's a giant stadium with a football field in the middle. There are a lot of them.

I was a skeptic. I agree the university needed to renovate/replace buildings. A lot of the other decisions were just gluttony and lacked an understanding of the changing demographics in Ohio.

As someone who lived through the Six Sigma nightmare that was corporate America 20 years ago, I somewhat agree. I mostly believe these schools offer little educational value to the point they cannot draw a large number of students and parents who want to pay a ton of money for a poor education. I have extremely negative views on schools like this to the point where I'd rather not articulate them.

I think you accurately describe what is going on at a lot of private universities with small endowments. For example, Mt Union has over 200 players on the football team and less than 2,000 total students. It's 10% of their student body and 150 of them have no shot at playing. The 150 players with no shot are $3.75 million in revenue for the school. I would bet at least 25% of their students play sports. Birmingham Southern was into the D3 baseball playoffs when their school went belly up. I have a brother who went to Cap University in Columbus and he has no idea how they stay open. This story is going to become more common.

There were some good teams. My point is the overvaluing of not just the teams.

People in and around NE Ohio overvalue catholic school players and experience. I Coach was a near perfect example of it.

Maybe the older fans, but the kids being recruited next year were probably only one or two years old when App State won that game. It's irrelevant to them. Most care more about nil money than a win almost 20 years ago. I know I'm proud of Akron beating OSU in the 1800s. Seriously, I really don't care.

My thought exactly. The MAC has gotten worse in the past 20 years. These games simply aren't making the league better. The same is true for the ESPN weeknight contract. It's all so obvious and I can't understand why the league can't do better.

Play 1. The University shines up the turd that is the financial statement of the athletic department, but the truth is it is tens of millions of dollars in the red. A couple extra million dollars is not worth the damage these games do to the athletes students alumni fans and general community around Akron.

I don't know about his, but my problem is comparing every situation as if it is the same. The majority of the MAC isn't nearly as bad as we are. Miami can go 1-3 and be fine in the long run. Akron can't. Akron's program is in a horrible state and needs to start winning. Picking up OSU after Kentucky dropping Akron missed a chance at getting a win through smart scheduling. It does nothing to build a winning culture. If it isn't a sign the AD values money over winning, I don't know what is.

I guess a good thing to examine would be how often scheduling incompetency happens. In recent history, how many MAC teams have been given the opportunity to replace a P5 school, with two already on the schedule, and have chosen another P5 school? If so, how many were replaced with Top 5 teams?

All true. Still tall tasks even for good mac programs.

I'm talking about the athletic department. They believe scheduling a sure loss is more important than scheduling a winnable game. Game 1 is my evidence.

I agree. I'm not even that interested in much of college football anymore. Maybe if I was their target audience, degenerate gambler, I might have more interest. At least they get two, two minute warnings so they can add another five minutes into the marathon of watching a game now. It's all so gross. I'm not kidding when I say this.... They aren't trying to win, and those who go to games are having their money stolen from them.

The one step further should be calling for a committee of the G5's most successful alumni of any kind to participate in a committee that would chart a course forward for G5 schools athletic interests. This matter cannot be left open to only G5 athletic directors because, if we know anything, we know they rarely act in the interests of their employers. I'm not even sure they should participate at all. Everything else can wait until the findings of this committee are complete and made public. If that involves inviting P5 schools, then they can cross that bridge after the recommendations are published. There is no current roadmap for anything going on in college football, and that's why it is a mess. G5 schools need a thoughtful roadmap to put themselves on course.