2020 Macadoodle's Mailbag: 22nd Edition

GD: Okay, first off, Michigan is playing football this year. Period. End of story. Don't care what the president said or why he said it. No way in hell Michigan isn't playing football.

That out of the way, here's what Mark Schlissel said: “If there is no on-campus instruction then there won’t be intercollegiate athletics, at least for Michigan,”

That's a lot different than if all students aren't on campus they aren't playing. He said if there is "no on campus instruction" they aren't playing. And I agree. If no classes are being held on campus then they're not having sports. But some classes are going to be held on campus. Everybody's going to open campus to some degree and at least have a hybrid model. Some classes will be online, yes. But some will be in person. And students are going to have the option to come back to campus. None of these places are going to go full University of Phoenix because they'll lose a ton of enrollment and money and sports won't be played and the college experience as we know it will be completely changed. They're going to have some students on campus. Which means they're going to play football. So I don't even think it's worth talking about the ripple effect because the event that is the premise of it isn't even happening.

GD: I would assume it's the usual summer conditioning and such. There was also an extension of the eight hours a week of virtual meetings and instruction. And then it won't surprise me at all if the players are organizing their own activities at least by position. The linemen are getting together and doing walk throughs, the quarterbacks are meeting with the receivers and throwing, etc. That happens all the time on every campus. The coaches aren't there and aren't running it but it's happening. Once these kids get back to campus in a week and a half, it's going to be more or less the normal summer activities in smaller groups.

GD: The SEC and the Big Ten are miles ahead of everyone in terms of TV contracts. Here are the numbers from last year:

I'd assume this year's numbers look somewhat similar. It's virtually impossible to find a Big Ten or SEC game that isn't televised and readily available to anyone with a working knowledge of technology. The Big 12 gets the third most money, but there are some games that are on pay-per-view or digital only platforms. I'm not as familiar with the ACC and PAC 12 contracts.

I was talking to someone last week and they told me that there are some schools where the TV money is the biggest source of revenue and some where ticket sales are the biggest source of revenue. But you can see by the numbers above, even if crowds are reduced for a year, these schools are going to be able to get by assuming the TV money is still paid out. Let's say you have 25% capacity in your stadiums, yeah, you're losing a lot of revenue, but you're probably still making more than $50 million off the combination of tickets and TV money. They'll get by. Not forever, but for the short term.

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