We Can Have College Football And Up To 30,000 Fans In The Stadium This Season.....Gene Smith Says So
Alright so Ohio State's athletic director, Gene Smith, is having a teleconference right now with reporters and in my opinion, he's dropping some optimistically detailed responses to questions that people have been asking without getting answers for a while now. And I know what you're all going to say: who cares about Ohio? Well let me tell you who cares: the entire college football world. Be jealous of the Buckeyes all you want, but they pull more weight than any other school in the entire country when it comes to the game that you're all so worried about if we're going to have or not. This isn't West Virginia or the California schools tossing in their two cents. This is THE Ohio State University. Right there alongside Alabama, Notre Dame, and I guess Texas. What this dude is saying right now matters...
So what's he saying?
- We need 6 weeks to get ready for a season. But could that be 5 or even 4 weeks if we needed it to be? Yup.
- The Buckeyes are coming back to campus on June 8th....10 athletes at a time in the workout facility, but we're moving, baby!! Organized team activities June 30th.
- He is "hopeful" that all 12 games will get to be played,
- The schedules will need to be sured up by July to see who's playing and who's not. Hoping for a national solution, but would need to be ready for a conference / individual school basis
- Players will not be wearing masks while they play.....thank God, that was a dumb idea
And now for my favorite one: he said that he's becoming not only more and more optimisitc (not 100% yet) that there will be football this Fall, he said Ohio State has a plan that can be implemented to get perhaps 30,000 fans into the stadium, too.
BOOOOM!! I know that 20-30K at Ohio State might look like 5-10K at other stadiums due to space, but the point remains the same. One of the most powerful athletic directors in the country thinks we're playing football and thinks fans can be there to watch us do it. This is great news.
Now my next question, as a frequent flyer in Ohio Stadium, is how will these 30,000 be decided? Has to be the donors, right? Well let me tell you a little something about the correlation between donors, age, and risk for dying from covid-19.....it's pretty positive. I'm interested to see if schools let students in, people that donate the most money, or maybe some sort of random drawing? Lots of questions still, but at least Gene Smith's answers were pretty positive.
** I do find it a little funny that on the same exact day Gene Smith says let's get 20,000-30,000 people in the stadium, Jim Harbaugh says Michigan is good with playing in front of nobody.
Jimmy, I'm not sure your "fans" were going to come out and watch another 3rd place finish in the divison, anyways.