Buzz Bissinger, author of FNL "College Football should be banned"

Bamabuzzard

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You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. Although I continue to be amazed at the amount of "luxuries" we've added to student life over the last few decades, the fact is you are only going to get out of a college education what you put into it, regardless of whatever distractions there are on campus. At some point you have to take responsibility for yourself and get to class, study, and make the grade. Don't blame the colleges for providing you with something to make your life a little less boring while getting an education. I'm sure the students that are wasting their time on university provided distractions would be down on the strip drinking or playing pool all the time (which is what they did when I was in school back in the 70's) if those things weren't there.
I think this has been discussed 'til the cows come home over on the NSF but there are too many kids currently in college who have no business in college. Many agree that our educational system needs improvement and that also includes our colleges. I've seen it within my own graduating class from high school. Too many kids see it and use it as a 4 year safe haven from the real world. They enroll in degrees that the market doesn't have jobs for or they pay so little they can't support themselves. Ultimately moving back in with mom and dad at 24/25 (if they even move out to begin with) or taking out tons of school loans when they are now "serious" about their life and career. That 4 years of waste actually takes about anther 5-10 years to make up when they have to go back, enroll again and start over. Then after leaving college for the second time they are strapped with student loans they'll be paying on for 10-15 years. Or, some never go back, enter society with absolutely no trade or skill to offer and are stuck at a dead end, low end paying job. I won't even get into the environment many of our colleges have turned into that produce the "Occupy Wall Street" type folks. I see nothing wrong with colleges providing/offering "fun stuff" but there is a point with everything where the intent of the idea has been lost and we've gone off course. Colleges will offer just about anything that someone will pay money for. Our educational system needs revamping and that includes our colleges. But that's just my opinion.
 

Al A Bama

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agree with what you guys are saying. Obviously, I don't think any of us think that banning college football is the way to fix things.

But I might also argue, who has decided that it needs fixing? If universities are willing to lose money to field a team, who's to stop them? If a kid puts all his eggs in one basket to try to make it to the NFL, and doesn't make it to the NFL....who's to stop them?
If you are going to ban college football, then ban ALL sports/cheerleading, etc. except intramurals.

Who is going to pay for those very large stadiums that have been built or will be built? Will we even then need a marching band at universities?

Do we all need to be teachers, doctors, lawyers, engineers, scientists, business people, politicians (mostly lawyers and that's a problem), mathematicians, scientists, intellectuals, etc. Some of us need to be FIXIT people: plumbers, electricians, HVAC people, human waste engineers, etc. We need all Americans to be educated people whether you are a doctor, etc. or a plumber, etc. A plumber, electrician, etc. are really like doctors: they diagnose and prescribe solutions to problems.

All college students need to be able to think creatively and critically. All people need to be able to think critically and creatively in their chosen profession so that they can develop new and better ways to do whatever it is that they do. So could a football player be able to study plumbing, etc. at a collegiate level?

So, we need educated people in all professions. Should a football player or basketball player be able to study plumbing, electricity, etc. instead of majoring in education, communication, medicine, law, criminal justice, business, science, mathematics, etc. at the collegiate level. Maybe some football players would acquire a SKILL that they can fall back on after losing all their wealth for stupid investments or just spending as they get it and be able to get a real job with a skill that all people have a need for.

I think that it is true that a vast majority of student-athletes are in reality athletes who attend class without excelling in learning that will positively affect their lives. I think most students (not just athletes) major in raising hell and causing confusion. College time is party time! This happens in high schools also: many teachers can't teach and many students can't learn at the high school level because some students are not there to learn but seem to be there to raise hell and cause confusion. Many of those students do what they do because they can't read, write, communicate effectively, compute accurately, etc.

Either a student should be on campus to focus on excelling at learning higher level thinking skills and at a masters/doctorate level on applying these skills/learning to a specific profession or do the above and have students that study electricity, plumbing, business, science, mathematics, engineering, so they will have a skill that will help them get a job. Many people graduate from college and really have no skills to do much of anything. So, is that useless studying/learning at the collegiate level?

Too many athletes (football/basketball) in colleges move on to pro sports sign multi-million $ contracts, can't write a sentence/paragraph/etc. They eventually lose all the wealth that they accumulated in those contracts and end up on skid-row (whatever that is). So, education in general needs to change. It is really hard to rally around an English class. Build a ladder to Heaven and talk to Coach Bryant. He'll tell you the same thing.

I honestly don't know what I'd do without the Alabama Crimson Tide dominating at what they do best. What would the people of Alabama or west Georgia do without a Saturday football game? Would there be more people in prison since they would not have something constructive to do throughout the week (reading/listening to or watching something related to Alabama football) or on Saturday: the BIG game and all its ramifications?

How many people would go out of business because there is no college football?

These are just some thoughts and some not thought out logically. I do agree with many things that Buzz talked about.
 

We_are_Bama

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I certainly don't think that college football, or for that matter, any college sports should be banned, but I have always wondered how in the world the athletes pursue a degree plus a sport simultaneously. My first quarter of community college back in the fall of 1992 kicked my tail pretty good. And that was with nothing else going on in my life at the time. And not a very heavy course load to boot.
 

kyallie

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I certainly don't think that college football, or for that matter, any college sports should be banned, but I have always wondered how in the world the athletes pursue a degree plus a sport simultaneously. My first quarter of community college back in the fall of 1992 kicked my tail pretty good. And that was with nothing else going on in my life at the time. And not a very heavy course load to boot.
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CrimsonProf

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I'm going to risk banishment by saying - once and for all - that the anti-elitism against an established writer who wrote the most important book about high school football (ever!) and is a world-renowned journalist is just immature.

I know there are hundreds of hacks out there. Some of them even work for ESPN and Sports Illustrated, but holy Moses, y'all. Give it a rest - it makes us all looks petulant and childish. Deal with the man's argument but lose the "pointy-headed elitist" schtick.
 
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CrimsonProf

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Exactly, and the NCAA and the SEC, will monitor the student athletes' mandated academic progress. Witness the rule going into effect, for incoming freshmen. 40% of the latest class would not qualify. CNS runs a tight ship. If an athlete want to excel, or just "get by" academically it's his choice. The fact this Bissinger premise is being discussed nationally, is good for Buzz. Period! Alabama football is going nowhere except up.....in excellence.
..........
 
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KrAzY3

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I'm going to risk banishment by saying - once and for all - that the anti-elitism against an established writer who wrote the most important book about high school football (ever!) and is a world-renowned journalist is just immature.

I know there are hundreds of hacks out there. Some of them even work for ESPN and Sports Illustrated, but holy Moses, y'all. Give it a rest - it makes us all looks petulant and childish. Deal with the man's argument but lose the "pointy-headed elitist" schtick.
Buzz Bissinger said:
But I still think you have the fundamental problem of sports...It's all about winning.
:p_eyes:
 
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CrimsonProf

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I'm pretty sure he meant "problem" in the sense that the desire to win causes programs like UAB to spend gobs of money on a program that would only be successful competing against similar schools. He doesn't necessarily have a "problem" with those teams who consistently reside in the top 20 or so, because they are, at least, self-sufficient and not a money drain on the school's general budget.
 

TommyMac

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Coach Wimp Sanderson said it best when asked how many college athletes actually got an education,......"All of them that wanted to."
 
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crimsonaudio

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I'm going to risk banishment by saying - once and for all - that the anti-elitism against an established writer who wrote the most important book about high school football (ever!) and is a world-renowned journalist is just immature.

I know there are hundreds of hacks out there. Some of them even work for ESPN and Sports Illustrated, but holy Moses, y'all. Give it a rest - it makes us all looks petulant and childish. Deal with the man's argument but lose the "pointy-headed elitist" schtick.
So, calling out his silly arguments - as has happened in this very thread - is immature? He's made up his mind about something and twisted / ignored many facts in order to try to make reality fit his desired conclusion and we're supposed to be awestruck that the guy 'wrote the most important book about high school football (ever!)' and ignore the fact that he's simply wrong about much of it?

And please, 'risk banishment'? The only way you risk banishment by posting stuff like this via the implication that the mods walk around here banning anyone who thinks differently than we do.

Finally, leave the politics out of your posts on the FB board.
 

KrAzY3

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I'm pretty sure he meant "problem" in the sense that the desire to win causes programs like UAB to spend gobs of money on a program that would only be successful competing against similar schools. He doesn't necessarily have a "problem" with those teams who consistently reside in the top 20 or so, because they are, at least, self-sufficient and not a money drain on the school's general budget.
The only reason I'm inclined to believe you at all, is that he'd often say one thing, then contradict it shortly afterwards. That's why, the valid points he did make usually stood in contrast to something else he just said. Whether he lives in one of those fanciful realities in which reality is in a state of flux, or he's just horribly inconsistent I do not know.

What I do know, is he said sports. He didn't say amateur sports. He didn't say college football, he said sports. And, I can assure you that an "established writer" should know better than to speak in such generalities unless he actually meant it.
 

CrimsonProf

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So, calling out his silly arguments - as has happened in this very thread - is immature? He's made up his mind about something and twisted / ignored many facts in order to try to make reality fit his desired conclusion and we're supposed to be awestruck that the guy 'wrote the most important book about high school football (ever!)' and ignore the fact that he's simply wrong about much of it?

And please, 'risk banishment'? The only way you risk banishment by posting stuff like this via the implication that the mods walk around here banning anyone who thinks differently than we do.

Finally, leave the politics out of your posts on the FB board.
I think a cursory glance at this thread makes it apparent that plenty of people were willing to dismiss him out of hand. The post above that I quoted and responded to (though deleted since it was written in haste) is one exhibit.

Never asked anyone to be awestruck - only to recognize that the guy has spent an entire career writing about sports. It's not like Tom Friedman came down of his perch at the New York Times to talk about it.
 

MattinBama

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I'm pretty sure he meant "problem" in the sense that the desire to win causes programs like UAB to spend gobs of money on a program that would only be successful competing against similar schools. He doesn't necessarily have a "problem" with those teams who consistently reside in the top 20 or so, because they are, at least, self-sufficient and not a money drain on the school's general budget.
He does necessarily have a "problem" with those teams who consistently reside in the top 20 or so, because as he said "football & other college sports are a distraction to college education."

I don't care if the guy wrote every book in the history of mankind about college football, if he says something stupid I'm going to call his ideas stupid.
 
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CrimsonProf

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He does necessarily have a "problem" with those teams who consistently reside in the top 20 or so, because as he said "football & other college sports are a distraction to college education."

I don't care if the guy wrote every book in the history of mankind about college football, if he says something stupid I'm going to call his ideas stupid.
So you're saying that football and other college sports aren't a distraction to college education?
 

MattinBama

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So you're saying that football and other college sports aren't a distraction to college education?
Yes, I will say that. I'd say that they are a part of college education/experience and have pretty much always been but that doesn't change the fact that you are misrepresenting what he's saying by saying he doesn't have a problem with the top 20 programs.
 

CrimsonProf

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Yes, I will say that. I'd say that they are a part of college education/experience and have pretty much always been but that doesn't change the fact that you are misrepresenting what he's saying by saying he doesn't have a problem with the top 20 programs.
Respectfully, you're wrong. The truth is that most our student-athletes aren't putting in the work of being a serious student. I'll take that bargain because of the money and prestige it brings my university, but Bissinger is right that it is causing lots of problems for other schools.

I realize he has a problem with the whole thing (and while I disagree, I don't blame him) - I think we have to acknowledge that while he may be wrong about the perennial powers, he has a very strong argument in many instances.
 

Dallas4Bama

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Yes, I will say that. I'd say that they are a part of college education/experience and have pretty much always been but that doesn't change the fact that you are misrepresenting what he's saying by saying he doesn't have a problem with the top 20 programs.
Oh come on. Prof was wrong when he said the guy didn't have problems with the top 20, but that doesn't mean you have to say something dumb to make your point. To say that football isn't a distraction in ludicrous. Heck, you'd be better off to argue that its a distraction for adults also so college students shouldn't be singled out.

It's a proven fact that work productivity and attendance of employees goes down on Fridays before big games. Heck there are people on here who take off for national signing day. When I was at The University of Alabama I sat in the class room on Fridays in half empty rooms. It's a proven fact that attendance lags on Fridays before a game. Students take off and road trip to games or party and get ready for Gameday when the games are at home. Prof was wrong but you are making a ridiculous argument.
 

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