Not so Fast! College Gameday must change it's ways...
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by Ryno
In a month’s time, Saturday mornings are to be transformed into the LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION spectacle that is ESPN’s College Gameday. It is a show that consumes college campuses from coast to coast in addition to would be football know-it-all’s (like us) who rest comfortably on our couches waiting for the games to begin. What started as a simple, half hour preview show filmed in the friendly confines of Bristol has evolved in a 50+ man event including lighting and makeup teams, set designers, camera crews, and of course…security. Millions will watch as the popular team of Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit interact with each other and the fans and boldly make their predictions about the week’s games in addition to creating the storylines that the country will follow for games to come.
However, in all the showmanship and hoopla that surrounds the production of this show, has the focus been taken away from the games themselves and the strategy that engulfs them? It is nice to know that Will Ferrell is a Southern Cal alumnus and passionately follows the Trojan team every week but what kind of alignments can we expect the team to show in order to stop UCLA’s running game? It is somewhat interesting to have Colt McCoy drive us around Austin and show us his favorite Bar-B-Que restaurants, but I would be more interested in a breakdown of how he intends to attack the A&M defense. Is it truly too much to ask to dedicate at least a fifteen to twenty minute segment of the show strictly to “chalk talk” without Corso’s whistling noises to serve as an illustration of a go-route? Clearly, either we have dumbed down or the shows producers have assessed the majority of it’s viewers as simpletons.
A polite suggestion to the powers that be: Feed Us Information! We watch the show hoping to learn something that will aid us in conversation with our friends and family. We tune into the show to sound smarter when we argue with an opposing fan and to impress the people at our local sports bar. Give us something other than a “Yo!” once in awhile and you’ll only serve to educate, enhance and increase the masses that tune in every Saturday morning at 10:00 am EST.
