what comes next for college football?

[aubiefifty 18,231]

montgomeryadvertiser.com

 

AUBURN MAILBAG: Does anyone actually know what comes next for college football?

 

10-12 minutes

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AUBURN — The next phase of the NCAA’s extended football preseason begins Friday. Teams can now require up to 20 hours of mandatory athletic activities per week, which can include weight training and conditioning, meetings and, most significantly, on-field walk-throughs that include the use of a football.

The question still left unanswered, though, is what they’re preparing for. Are they preparing to start the season as originally scheduled on Sept. 5? Sometime later, maybe in October? Or will surging COVID-19 cases throughout the country make attempting to play college football this fall an exercise in futility?

MORE:How much money is a college football season worth to Auburn athletics?

The SEC doesn't plan to answer that question until next week. And even then, that answer might not be final; a lot can change over the next weeks and months. For now, all we can do is to continue to do what we have been doing since March — wait.

Let’s try to pass the time with another edition of the Auburn Mailbag.

Here we go:

Will the towel the quarterback uses in a center’s waistline now be a Sani-Cloth?

— James (@JGrice84)

It should be. Players should also probably wear something similar to the full-face visor that the helmet manufacturer Schutt introduced last month. Maybe grounds crews can rig the sprinkler system to spray hand sanitizer, too. Literally anything we can do to make football happen, keep the athletes and coaches safe, and slow the spread of COVID-19, right?

Who do you expect Auburn to replace Alcorn State on the schedule with?

— Nick (@newengland_AU), Tim (@CanaansCrossing)

No one. I may end up being wrong about this, but I don’t think Auburn will be playing football on Sept. 5. From what I’ve heard, the school hasn’t yet begun looking for a replacement opponent — it’s waiting to see what the SEC decides next week. It would probably have a pretty hard time finding an opponent anyway, given that seven of 23 Division I conferences have either gone conference-only or moved their seasons to the spring. And if the SEC chooses to move to a shortened season that is either conference-only or conference plus-one or -two, the Alcorn State game may be a moot point.

Do you think the shortened season will hurt or help the entertainment of the games, considering players will be less likely to get injured or worn down by season’s end?

— James (@JGrice84)

Oh, this season has the potential to be incredibly captivating, though “players possibly being less worn down because they’ve played fewer games” might not even crack the top 10 of reasons why. For starters, the season being shortened from 12 games to 8-10 games would also A) make each game matter more and eliminate cupcakes from the schedule. And Gus Malzahn’s “he’s a game-time decision” dance won’t hold a candle to waiting to hear the results of each week’s batch of COVID-19 tests that, in an instant, could dramatically shift a team’s chances of winning or losing. Imagine heading into Arkansas week thinking the Tigers are going to bludgeon the Razorbacks in the Chad Morris Revenge Game only to find out on Thursday that multiple starters won’t be able to play not only that week, but also the next week, too, because of the required quarantines for positive tests and contact tracing. That's utter chaos, and it's going to be a very real possibility this season.

Has there been much talk on how all this will affect the basketball season?

— Jonathan (@friddjm)

Not that I’ve heard. There really isn’t much need to talk about winter and spring sports when there is still so much uncertainty surrounding fall sports. Bruce Pearl and his coaching staff are now allowed to hold mandatory summer workouts that include up to four hours a week of on-court practices, so Auburn is progressing toward the season as usual. But as for how COVID-19 might affect that season, the NCAA and SEC surely won’t cross that bridge until they have to. Football is still forefront on everyone’s mind right now, as it should be.

MORE:Identifying the potential strengths, weaknesses of a new-look Auburn basketball team

What changes have been announced on how media will cover sports this year? Will access be restricted? Will media members have to test and contact trace like a school’s athletic staff?

— @AuburnElvis

I honestly have no idea. Auburn’s communications staff probably doesn’t either, at least still not concretely. First and foremost, the SEC needs to decide whether games will be played, and when. Media access is a secondary concern. But I can’t imagine it will be anything close to what reporters are accustomed to, which, at Auburn, is weekly in-person press conferences and postgame availability inside a small room adjacent to the home locker room. My guess is that it will be something like what the MLB is doing, which is allowing reporters into the press box (with health checks and masks) but conducting all interviews on Zoom in order to reduce exposure for players and coaches.

What are the plans for fans attending games this fall, assuming there is a season?

— Terry (@terryringram)

Auburn has not made any public announcements regarding this topic, and I don’t expect it to for a while. The first half of this Mailbag might sound like one long broken record, but there’s really no use in Auburn taking a definitive stance on attendance when the SEC hasn’t yet determined when or if games will be played. Auburn has surely discussed different limited-capacity scenarios behind the scenes, but it will likely wait as long as it possibly can before making a call. A lot will depend on state guidelines, too, which remain fluid.

If football season is canceled/moved to the spring, which players do you think would go ahead and declare for the NFL Draft, if any?

— Carter (@CarterHempstead)

I do think this is something that could happen with elite prospects, in small numbers, if Power 5 conferences end up not playing until the spring and the NFL doesn’t move the draft off the usual late-April date. But I can’t picture it happening at Auburn, which doesn’t have a surefire 2021 first-round pick on the roster like it with Derrick Brown last season. Wide receiver Seth Williams is probably the closest thing to that, but he strikes me as the type of kid that just loves playing football and would do it regardless of whether the games took place in October or February. It helps, in this hypothetical scenario, that the Tigers’ most elite-level draft prospects — Bo Nix and Owen Pappoe — aren’t draft-eligible until 2022.

You’ve asked us what nonconference games we would like to see in football. As a reporter, what schools/venues would you like to visit?

— Jacob (@JFleming84)

I love this topic so much I wrote an entire story about it May. I’m excited about some of the trips Auburn has on future schedule, specifically Penn State (the Auburn of the Big Ten) and UCLA (any excuse to go to the Rose Bowl), but there are plenty of great options out there. My personal top five:

1. Troy — Yeah, it’s only a day trip right down the road, but I want this one to happen (even though it probably never will).
2. Michigan — Mostly for the Big House, but I’ve heard great things about Ann Arbor
3. Texas — Sources indicate everything is bigger there. Plus, I want to see for myself whether the Longhorns are back or not.
4. Colorado — Perhaps the most beautiful college campus in the country. Boulder is a great town, too.
5. Oregon — The first two meetings between these programs have been classics. Why not take it from neutral sites back to campus? Autzen Stadium seems like it would be an awesome place to watch a game.

What would be the most hilarious way for Alabama to lose and result in an accompanying rule change?

— @PabloEscobarner

It’s going to be hard to beat having the sequence that led to Anders Carlson's last-second, first-half field goal — which proved to be the final margin in Auburn’s 48-45 Iron Bowl win — outlawed just a few months after it happened. The real winner would be widening the uprights or eliminating field goals altogether, given the Crimson Tide’s history of struggles there, but not even Nick Saban has that much clout.

[auburn4ever 1,266]

I think a good many players will forgo their senior year. And if they can, some might leave after their soph year if they've been in school for 3 years.