We have officially reached the point in the cluttered removal of the 2020 college football season where presidential intervention has emerged. There has been sniping, politicking and subterfuge, but the 2020 season ran into a new Rubicon when a final slate effort to save the sport came from the White House.
Play College Football!He tweeted to his audience of nearly 85 million followers. “Data-reactid =” 30 “> On Monday afternoon, President Donald Trump took to Twitter to continue removing his base.”Play College Football!He tweeted in front of his audience of almost 85 million followers.
#WeWantToPlay Player Movement Spearheaded by Clemson Quarterback Trevor Lawrence. Trump quote-tweeted the graphic de Lawrence-leading player group set out Sunday night. Trump added: “These student-athletes have worked too hard to cancel their season.” “Data-reactid =” 31 “> Earlier in the day, he tweeted in support of the #WeWantToPlay Player Movement Spearheaded by Clemson Quarterback Trevor Lawrence. Trump quote-tweeted the graphic de Lawrence-leading player group set out Sunday night. Trump added: “These student-athletes have worked too hard to cancel their season.”
This is not Trump’s first trip into college football. He has appeared on three games in the last three months of the 2019 season, played in cheers in New Orleans at the College Football Playoff title game and attended two other marquee matchups – LSU vs. Alabama and Army vs. Navy.
Those were political positions. Shows he is in favor of saving college football amid this spectacle of uncertainty seems to follow a similar theme.
Trump’s views were not exactly hot tasks. But his cry for university sports to play like football buttons on the brink of closure amid the COVID-19 pandemic signaled a new moment for the sport – the potential crossroads of the lightning rod of presidential politics in decisions which are expected to explode this week.
“The tweets are important for making people happy [around college sports] pause know how important Congress is for the future of intercollegiate athletics, ”said a source from the sector familiar with conference policy. “In the red states, his followers are even more important.”
President Donald Trump talks to reporters before leaving Morristown Municipal Airport on August 9, 2020. Trump was returning to Washington after spending the weekend at Trump National Golf Club. (AP)
Up to this point, Trump’s role in college football was a ceremonial one. He would perform at games, bathe in the warm cheers of friendly crowds and then return to his regular schedule. Trump grew up in New York and joined Penn. While he is a football fan and had a USFL team, there is no distinct track record of following college football.
The biggest impact Trump’s game performances had was the accidental logistical headache. (That included thousands trapped in torrential rainstorms for the title game between Alabama and Georgia in Atlanta two years ago.)
It is unknown if Trump has plans to overwhelm college football leaders with tweets like he has done with the NFL in the past. He proved a disruptive force in that league in the very saga of former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneeling before the national anthem.
Trump politicized Kaepernick, intimidated the owners of the billionaire teams that run the league and, in general, publicly criticized the NFL as a way to galvanize its base.
“Will this change in his followers who are collaborating with university presidents to not cancel football?” said the source of the sector. ‘It’s a potentially big problem for him with an election coming up to potentially say he’s saved college football. As he continues to act and say, ‘College football should be played in the fall,’ he has an election problem. ‘
As we have seen in this generation, political interference can have a major impact on the college sports landscape.
Think back to Virginia Tech that rode in the early 2000s on the wave of political support to squeeze Syracuse out of the ACC. Or remember the dueling policies of the reorganization a decade ago, when politicians were tearing each other apart as new boundaries were drawn on the conference landscape. (West Virginia surpassed Louisville for a spot in the Big 12 in 2011, which is the best thing that happened to Louisville once it received an ACC invitation in 2012.)
Also remember that a major obstacle for the Pac-12 attracting Oklahoma and Texas back in 2010 was the fact that it was necessary to create both Oklahoma State and Texas Tech along with them. For a while this decade, coverage of college football required lobbying contacts.
Will it be like this again? No one is sure. But Trump’s re-election campaign needs some fuel in the battlefield states that happen to be Big Ten hotbeds – Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin. The longer the league waits to make a decision, the more likely it is to emerge as a Trump goal grows.
The subject made its way to the White House media review on Monday, where press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told the composite media about Trump: “He would very much like to see college football continue its sport safely. As he mentioned in that tweet. Many of these university athletes are working their whole lives to get four years … they are working their whole lives for the moment and he would like them to have a chance to live out their dreams. ”
All boards point to several major conferences closing this week around college football. There is confusion among players, uncertainty of the coaches and varied opinions of fans.
While the decisions will be made in the coming days, we will find out if college football will get the same presidential control that the NFL previously did from Trump’s White House.
