Keith Strudler: Change In College Football

Perhaps the single most common word used during this whole Covid era has been change. Like how industry is changing, and schools are changing. And not just now, but long after Covid is under control, whenever that may be. So the world is changing at light speed despite the fact that pretty much every day right now feels exactly the same.

So, it shouldn’t be surprising that people are talking about change coming to big time college sports, one of perhaps the most enduring cultural institutions of our nation’s history. Say what you want about college football, but you can’t knock its endurance. Granted, Rutgers may not play Princeton anymore like they did in the 1800’s, but they do both still attract a crowd every Saturday afternoon.

Of course, that’s less likely to happen this fall, given obvious issues of convening large crowds in relatively small spaces – Trump rallies excluded, of course. So college football, if it’s played this fall, will assuredly be played in somewhat empty stadiums. But that seismic shift isn’t the only, or perhaps even the most striking coming to major college revenue sports this fall. Instead, it’s more likely to be the issue of race and agency of the athletes who compete at the highest levels. And it’s an issue, or conversation, or movement depending on your perspective, that’s likely to have a significant impact on not only how college football looks this fall, but potentially in every fall thereafter.

To even the most casual observers of college football, the sport is a highly professionalized business venture where teams comprised of a majority of black athletes play for a largely white audience under the tutelage of almost exclusively white head football coaches that get paid in some cases tons of money. And, as you know, these athletes – black, white, and otherwise – receive a full scholarship for their efforts, a scholarship for which they are largely at the whims of NCAA rules and a highly regulated practice and game schedule.

This model has held firm for decades for a long list of reasons – some specific to college football, and others far more endemic to society at large. At the very least, it’s quite difficult to change the power and racial dynamic to an institution where labor has both a finite time to play and strong incentive to follow the rules – namely because it’s the only real pathway to both the pros and a potential college degree.

That may have changed in recent days, highlighted both by a list of demands crafted by black football players at the University of Texas and harsh critiques given by players at Oklahoma State – two programs near the pinnacle of popularity and profitability. Texas athletes have demanded, among other things, that upper administration dedicate a percentage of athletic funds to Black Lives Matter, rename buildings named after Texans who supported segregation, and, most controversially, discontinue the use of The Eyes of Texas as a school song, a song with a storied racist past. Having grown up in Texas, I can tell you this song is also firmly cemented in the psyche of generations of Texans. Regardless, these are lines, and it’s now in the hands of the UT President – and I imagine the Governor at some point. And players have said they will not participate in recruiting and other team activities until these demands are met. At Oklahoma State, running back Chuba Hubbard publicly criticized his coach Mike Gundy for posting a photo of himself wearing a t-shirt of the far-right wing media organization One America News, which among many other things has recently attacked the Black Lives Matter Movement. And this not Gundy’s trip across the line. To that end, Gundy has apologized and tried to regain his posture with the team, and I suppose only time will tell how it all works out.

There’s not a real ending here, because, well, the story’s really just taking off. Kind of like Coronavirus. We’re two innings into a double header. But I’ll say this. People have been talking about college sports, race, and power for the better part of my lifetime. For longer than I can remember, people have asked when college athletes, especially black athletes who make up the majority of the revenue generating behemoth, will be empowered to get what they deserve – both in respect and a share of the business they’ve built. Perhaps it’s naïve, but I’m starting to think that moment starts now, when along with college football, the whole world seems to be taking a good look at itself. Perhaps when it comes to race and college football, like the rest of the world, now is the time for change.

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