If the Southeastern Conference Won't Act, Then Fans Need To

Let’s be frank: the SEC has totally dropped the ball and exhibits no interest in the fact that multiple schools just got screwed over by Florida.

I have no problem with Florida-LSU not being played in Gainesville. Let’s be honest, the weather in Gainesville wasn’t the issue. It doesn’t matter if it was 90 and sunny on Saturday afternoon. What does matter is that there are disaster areas close to Gainesville, the millions of people and businesses without power, the potential for not having drinkable water, the police and first responders needed elsewhere, and a highway system that will be packed with refugees returning to find out if they have a home left. 

That’s why the game wasn’t played. 

What the rest of the SEC should be taking objection to is the way that Florida pulled a fast one over on both LSU and SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey. 

Outgoing athletic director Jeremy Foley coordinated an obfuscation ploy that completely blindsided the SEC, and made Sankey look like a short-sighted girl who got jilted by her prom date. Not because an act of God made the game into a logistical nightmare, but because Florida is giggling all the way to Atlanta if they pull this off and the cards fall right. 

Florida CB Jalen Tabor was certainly aware of it, judging from his tweets during the Tennessee-Texas A&M game. CBS interviewed Sankey during the UT game, where he admitted the game “has to be played” and that Florida and LSU “need to come together” and make that game happen.

Then he disappeared faster than Where’s Waldo in Tokyo.

All of football knows that Florida was staring down the barrel of a potential beating at the hands of a re-invigorated LSU this weekend. That loss would have sealed Florida’s fate in the SEC East and given LSU a desperately needed SEC win — something Tigers fans know will be essential in the talent-stacked West. But Florida doesn’t want to face LSU’s offense right now (it set a school record for yards in a game against Missouri last week) and certainly not later, when Leonard Fournette rejoins the mix. 

But if this game isn’t played at all? Think of the ramifications. Florida could back-door its way into the SEC Championship game, and LSU could jump one of four current candidates for Atlanta in the West. 

Fact of the matter is that everyone knew for a week that Florida was the likely target zone for Hurricane Matthew. This game could have been moved to a neutral site days ago — Georgia Dome comes to mind — and the proceeds could have remained as they would have for a Gators home game. Or, conversely, as late as Wednesday night the game could have moved to Baton Rouge — where LSU had offered Florida their planes, their buses, lodging, and meals. LSU athletic director Joe Alleva basically begged Florida to come to Baton Rouge and Foley refused. Last year, LSU pulled the same feat off for South Carolina during the catastrophic flooding in Columbia— and gave the Gamecocks the gate. 

Is there a more generous and understanding athletic department than LSU’s? 

Certainly not in Gainesville. 

But by hemming and hawing and stuttering through the first half of the week, Florida made those options impossible, thereby conveniently nullifying both the potential LSU loss and potentially the Vols’ victory over Florida in Neyland two weeks ago. 

All that being said, if Vols fans are irate? Think about what’s going on in Tuscaloosa right now. Or College Station. Or Little Rock. The SEC East might not be as important to Sankey and his flunkies but the West certainly is. No one wants to annoy the seismic temper of the league’s primary cash cow, and Nick Saban is one hundred percent guaranteed to blow his top if this game isn’t played. 

Right now, the rest of the SEC and its fans should be outraged — not because the game ‘could have been played’ in Gainesville, but because that game can be played on November 19 if either LSU or Florida is willing to make the concessions necessary to make that happen. South Alabama and Presbyterian can be paid off and meet each other instead, while LSU and Florida meet in Gainesville. 

And the SEC needs to foot half those payouts, to compensate for the league being hoodwinked by Foley and a cagey Florida, giggling like Wile E. Coyote, Supergenius right before Roadrunner drops a boulder on his head.

So, time to drop the boulder.

There’s no need to be upset that the game wasn’t played yesterday. There’s every need to be upset that the SEC is letting Florida get away with such a transparent ploy to avoid the consequences for SEC losses. It doesn’t matter that UT has the tiebreaker. It doesn’t matter that Florida is almost guaranteed to lose 1–2 more games. What matters is that the SEC and Sankey were standing by silently while all this went down with fingers up their rears instead of exercising their authority over the situation and ensuring fair play for all SEC schools.

Today, there are allegedly negotiations ongoing between LSU and Florida and the SEC to schedule a make up date. I sincerely hope that's true, but in the end it doesn't matter. Greg Sankey has proved himself inept as SEC Commissioner in this matter from day one. Moving forward throughout the athletic year, that's not a good thing.

For ANY school.

So it seems only fair after a week of not hearing from Sankey and the Southeastern Conference about this situation to turn things around and let them hear from us.

If the Southeastern Conference wants fair and equitable treatment for all SEC schools, now’s the time to prove it. And if they don’t want to? They deserve to be inundated with the outrage of fans from every single other school.

SEC Offices (205) 458–3000

SEC Office contact page 

Greg Sankey Linked-In

Greg Sankey Twitter @GregSankey

SEC Network Twitter @SECNetwork

SEC Twitter @SEC

Pass those on to all your friends, from every SEC fan base. Express your displeasure. It doesn’t matter that the point will be moot in the end. What matters is that Florida disrespects the SEC and its opponents so much that they think they can get away with it.

Let’s make sure they don’t.

My Latest Guilty Pleasure

Nota bene: If you're not fond of college sports, this post might not be your cup of tea. However, if you're into smartassery, this is the post for you--

So every afternoon at three, my television automatically tunes into the Paul Finebaum show on the SEC Network. For people who didn't grown up in the America Southeast, fair warning: basketball is second only to football, and our college teams are MUCH more important than the professional ones. Living in Ohio was familiar to me from the beginning, because Ohio might as well be an SEC school judging from its *cough* occasional successes and rabid fan base.  But even Buckeye fanatics have no clue what a Saturday down south is like every fall. 

Football is king. Period. Until March, when basketball takes over for about four weeks. Then it's back to football. 

At  any rate, last year when I was recovering from back...no wait, knee surgery, the SEC Network was about to debut, and ESPN put Paul Finebaum's show on one of their channels for a couple of weeks before the launch. Due to the paucity of entertainment to be found at 3 in the afternoon in Ohio, I started watching the show. 

And I got hooked. 

I knew who Finebaum was, of course. Any child of the South knows about Paul Finebaum--UT grad who worked as a journalist in Alabama, including a call-in radio show that became a staple for any SEC fan once it hit Sirius. The asshat who poisoned the giant, lovely old oak trees at Toomer's Corner at Auburn University called Finebaum to confess his crime. (Talk about hanging yourself! Confessing to that sort of crime on a nationally syndicated radio show? Dumbest move ever!) But having Finebaum on TV? In Ohio? Surely the football gods were on my side! Took me a few months to call in,  but once I'd called once that was all she wrote. Now I call in frequently. Not daily. Hell, some people call in more than once per day and STILL have nothing to say that's worthwhile. And that's what got me hooked. 

Ever hear the word "deadpan"? If Paul Finebaum's face isn't by the definition in the dictionary, it should be. He has mastered deadpan to such a degree that I'm not even sure the man blinks. But none of that matters next to his encyclopedic memory of collegiate sports, and especially the Southeastern Conference. After two decades trapped in the Big Ten swamp in which I currently live, the prospect of daily SEC talk was alluring. 

I never reckoned on the callers though. Or the Twitter wars. I've been blocked repeatedly by some good ol' boy in Alabama for pointing out the illogical nature of calling in to a radio/TV show and saying it's 'unwatchable'. I mean...if it's unwatchable, then stop watching. Stop listening. Stop calling. Stop monitoring Twitter. Just go watch the People's Court or some less challenging programming instead of tuning in every day to a show that bothers you so much. 

 Well, maybe that old coot doesn't like the show, but I sure do. I'm learning a lot--about other programs, other players, other traditions besides the familiar and beloved ones at UT. I enjoy hearing the debates between callers, the sweet, soft voices of Southern ladies that call up just to talk to Paul, the interviews with other journalists as well as coaches and players. And you gotta love a man who, after a couple of weeks commenting on how Ohio State was going to be trashed by Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, turned around the day after and took a plethora of calls from Buckeye fans, eating his crow pie with a dash of Old Bay sprinkled on top and never losing his cool. 

That makes it especially fun when he DOES lose his cool. Words of advice: don't try to challenge Paul Finebaum on anything having to do with Alabama's legendary coach Paul "Bear" Bryant unless you are dealing with facts. Because if you do, he will verbally eviscerate you in a manner that impresses the heck out of me. 

Since verbal evisceration is one of my favorite hobbies. 

Today that same good ol' boy that thinks the show is unwatchable called not once, but twice. Both times, he was lamenting (read: yelling) that Paul Finebaum has changed. He's lost his purpose. He's apushover. He's a mouthpiece regurgitating the ESPN line. *sigh* Finebaum tried to explain the difference between TALK SHOW HOST and COLUMNIST, but that went right over the caller's head. After all, yelling is more fun, especially when you're watching a show that is allegedly unwatchable, right? 

But here's the thing. `The platform that Finebaum provides on his show is designed to embrace callers of all sorts: men and women, young and old, Tennessee and that other school whose name I will not mention. Sports fan and sports fanatic. There's a slew of regular callers that have been associated with Finebaum since his show was a local show in Brimingham. And yet, he is courteous to first time callers. He also doesn't suffer from the delusion that many sportscasters have of thinking that women just don't understand sports and certainly can't comment intelligently upon them.  Sure, he has a stable of cheerleader callers, but in the Finebaum forum they're always entertaining on some level. And when Finebaum turns serious, it's impossible not to respect the man for what he's done and for what he's trying to do. 

So in the end, the choice to have the Paul Finebaum Show on every afternoon for four hours wasn't a difficult one for me. I enjoy listening to whatever might turn up, and no one--not even Paul or his producers--is ever quite sure what that might be. Yes, I've gone back to writing full time, and I'm getting in my eight hours a day every single day. But I have that four hour block every day that take me home again--without the heat and humidity. Paul Finebaum can make me nostalgic for the South, and optimistic for the future. That's no mean feat. Straddling that line between entertainment and education is difficult for any journalist, and the fact that Finebaum can do so with the grace and class he exudes on camera speaks volumes for not only him, but his staff as well. 

So between 3 and 7 pm, Monday through Friday, don't call me, don't come by my house, and don't expect me to Skype unless you want to talk UT offensive lines and the respective values of the spread offense or 3-4 defense. I'll be back home, listening to the voice of the South, and getting mentally ready for football season. 

Thanks, Paul, for bringing me home.