Until Saturday Newsletter 🏈 | This is The Athletic’s college football newsletter. Sign up here to receive Until Saturday directly in your inbox.
Today in college football news, the last 20 minutes of “Rogue One” hit even harder now. We’re on to “New Hope.”
Sports Are Politics: CFB next after MLB?
Earlier this week, Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred announced Pete Rose (along with others) is now eligible for the Baseball Hall of Fame, ending a 36-year ban against the late Rose for betting on baseball during his career.
Why the sudden change? From Ken Rosenthal’s story:
“Did Rose’s death soften Manfred? Was the case presented to the commissioner by Rose’s lawyer and daughter singularly moving? Doubtful on both counts, considering Manfred’s resistance to reinstating Rose in the past. Only after Trump entered the picture did the commissioner do an about-face.”
Weeks prior, Manfred had met with the president, and the commissioner has since acknowledged Rose’s eligibility was a topic. Trump has publicly favored Rose. We’ll now wait several years to see whether Rose actually enters the HOF, but Manfred has washed his hands of the decision by passing it along to various committees. (The word “committee” appears 14 times in that explainer, which makes me feel like I’m reading about the NCAA.)
What’s this have to do with college football? Well, a few weeks ago, Trump also met with Nick Saban and learned of the former Alabama coach’s issues with modern CFB. Just as with MLB, things appear to have moved rapidly since that initial meeting, though Saban is now downplaying the “presidential commission” seemingly being formed in response.
Whatever it is Trump might want to change about college sports, I’m guessing this will go very differently than it did with MLB. Main reason: Manfred was a single pressure point. If there’s one decision-making guy, and you can make that guy decide he doesn’t want to put up a fight, then that part of the fight’s over. But college football has thousands of pressure points, and plenty of the biggest ones don’t like each other. I’m not sure how that works neurologically.
Even getting the NCAA to go along with something doesn’t establish it as any kind of universal law. The NCAA gets rocked in court all the time, and might (still) be days away from its biggest amateurism surrender ever.
Who knows what this “commission” stuff will amount to, but if I had to place a bet, it’d probably be on these commissioners taking a look at what they can actually change, declaring a small victory in a side quest and then telling Congress to figure out the big stuff — something Congress has yet to make any progress on doing.
Quick Snaps
🏝️ No. 1 recruit Jackson Cantwell, a Missouri OT whose parents were both Olympic shot putters, committed to Miami over some bigger (and/or nearer) programs.
🐯 We now know the season’s first Saturday night main event: For the first time ever, the LSU Death Valley Tigers and Clemson Death Valley Tigers will meet in one of their respective Death Valleys. In Clemson, they’ll debate which Death Valley is the real Death Valley, and then they’ll redo the debate next year in Baton Rouge.
Advertisement
📆 “A new proposal circulating among coaches aims to expand spring practice into NFL-style organized team activities (OTAs), in response to the increase in spring transfers and roster turnover, along with the possibility that college football moves to a single transfer portal window.”
🎭 This week in “Belichick: The Golden Bachelor”:
- Bill Belichick claimed Jordon Hudson “doesn’t have anything to do with UNC football.” (She’s definitely had something to do with it in the recent past, but OK.)
- Oh right, the Tar Heels are likely to field a football team this season. Belichick’s 30-strong portal class, explained by a Power 4 staffer: “They are taking a lot of kids that haven’t played. When we talk about that No. 9 portal class … it’s 100 percent a volume-based ranking.”
The Bottom: Why is UMass in FBS?
That’s a pretty rude question, sure. But pretty frequently, I wonder about programs like Akron, Kent State and New Mexico. Wouldn’t you rather try to make the FCS playoffs — like former FBS program Idaho has accomplished three years in a row — than scrape toward maybe one bowl game per decade?
This week, Matt Baker explores the plight of the Minutemen, who have quite objectively been FBS’ worst team since moving up in 2012. Their average score during that time has been a 16.7-point loss, by far the ugliest mark. They’ve won 26 games across those 13 seasons. Georgia recently won 29 across two.
Matt looks into the aftermath of UMass’ botched rush to FBS. The Minutemen had been a decent team at the second level, winning 1998’s I-AA title, but when they ramped up their competition, they had nowhere near the internal investment of JMU or winning culture of Appalachian State. And then for a long time, nothing got any better, whether we’re talking about meager coaching salaries or the stadium with no more visual appeal than the average high school’s.
So now what? Is there any reason to believe anything will ever change? Maybe, actually, and it relates to (Mark Morrison voice) a return to the MAC:
“Instead of entering the MAC with one of the smallest budgets, the Minutemen will rejoin with a financial advantage. Head coach Joe Harasymiak will be among the MAC’s highest-paid coaches (average salary over five years: about $1.4 million). … UMass’ NIL budget — $2 million this season, $3 million next — is more than six times what it was in 2024 and expected to be tops in the MAC.”
To be a member of FBS is to announce your ambitions are significant and your standards are high. You’ve insisted on having your name appear each week on the primary scoreboard webpage. There’s a dissonance, then, when you’ve seemed content to spend a decade filling the ticker with evidence of your own reliably timed downfalls.
Advertisement
If you’re going to play big-time football, you have to invest. Better late than never, and TBH, all it takes is one winning season to suddenly make it feel like all your problems will never again be as big as they have been. That feeling can even become self-fulfilling.
Matt’s story is here, with plenty more details, including: What exactly are UMass fans getting out of this?
Let’s pluck a morsel from Stewart Mandel’s mailbag, and then I’ll see you next week:
Mandel’s Mailbag
What would be considered a successful season for Florida State after last year’s disaster? What would put Mike Norvell’s seat in jeopardy? — Esteban G., Jacksonville, Fla.
Get to a bowl game. This isn’t the old days, when it might take you three or four years of new recruiting classes to turn a 2-10 program into a 7-5 program. Everyone now is always one great portal class from a quick turnaround, and Norvell’s class of 23 transfers is ranked No. 6 on 247Sports. (Fair warning: Last year’s was ranked No. 7, and you saw how that turned out.)
At the same time, no one should expect to go from 3-9 to 11-2 overnight, as Indiana did last year. It was an extreme outlier. (The Hoosiers also had a new coach.) Even at a brand-name school like Florida State, you’d hope the fan base can accept a more realistic year-over-year goal of just getting back to .500.
The Noles made some clear upgrades on the offensive line with Ole Miss’ Micah Pettus and Wake Forest’s Luke Pettibon. Former USC receiver Duce Robinson was a big-time recruit in 2023 but got somewhat lost in the shuffle there. He’ll likely get more opportunities at FSU. Nebraska edge James Williams was a big get on the D-line. One of the biggest additions may be Houston cornerback Jeremiah Wilson, who came in after spring camp.
My biggest concern for FSU is at quarterback. A year after Norvell’s baffling decision to go all in on the underachieving DJ Uiagalelei, he chose another guy he’s seen up close in the ACC: ex-Boston College starter Tommy Castellanos. He’s a talented dual-threat guy who had his moments over the past two years. Bill O’Brien benched him before BC’s stretch run last season, at which point he immediately left the team. I’m not convinced he’ll be FSU’s savior.
And then there’s the guy who will be calling plays for him: Gus Malzahn. Interesting OC choice by Norvell, who will be giving up play calling this year. I’m not for or against the hire, but I wonder if Malzahn’s reputation as an offensive genius has stretched a bit beyond its peak. His past two UCF units were ranked in the top 20 nationally in yards per play, thanks in large part to stud running back R.J. Harvey. Quarterback play, on the other hand, was not anything special.
But again, if this crew can string together six or seven wins, great. It’s a nice bridge to 2026. If, on the other hand, it’s something like 4-8, FSU boosters might be passing the hat to afford Norvell’s $60 million-plus buyout.
More from Stew’s mailbag on the portal, realignment and so forth.
This news was originally published on this post .
About the author
Brazil are a dysfunctional mess. Good luck, Carlo Ancelotti
Say what you want about Ednaldo Rodrigues, the beleaguered head of Brazil’s beleaguered football federation; the man knows his way around a soundbite.“This is more than a strategic move,” he said this week after finally reeling in Carlo Ancelotti, his own white whale. “It’s a declaration to the world that we are determined to get back to the top. The best coach in history is now in charge of the best national team on the planet. Together, we will write new, glorious chapters in the story of Brazilian football.”AdvertisementThere is a lot to unpack there. You could use a hundred adjectives to describe Rodrigues’ pursuit of Ancelotti, which lasted two and a half years and managed to feel even longer; “strategic” would not be one of them. Then there are the galactic quantities of hubris that underpin the penultimate sentence. […]
Brazil are a dysfunctional mess. Good luck, Carlo Ancelotti
Say what you want about Ednaldo Rodrigues, the beleaguered head of Brazil’s beleaguered football federation; the man knows his way around a soundbite.“This is more than a strategic move,” he said this week after finally reeling in Carlo Ancelotti, his own white whale. “It’s a declaration to the world that we are determined to get back to the top. The best coach in history is now in charge of the best national team on the planet. Together, we will write new, glorious chapters in the story of Brazilian football.”AdvertisementThere is a lot to unpack there. You could use a hundred adjectives to describe Rodrigues’ pursuit of Ancelotti, which lasted two and a half years and managed to feel even longer; “strategic” would not be one of them. Then there are the galactic quantities of hubris that underpin the penultimate sentence. […]
Tottenham are 17th with a positive goal difference. Is this unique?
Try telling any Tottenham Hotspur supporter that their club has enjoyed a positive Premier League campaign and they’ll doubtless think you’re winding them up. But it is, in one sense, positively true.Despite lying in 17th, and being fortunate that the bottom three clubs have been completely hopeless, Tottenham have a positive goal difference of +4. It’s a higher goal difference than Brighton & Hove Albion, who are eight places higher in the table and have won 17 more points. It seems statistically unlikely that Tottenham have scored more than they’ve conceded and yet have lost nearly twice as many matches as they’ve won — 20 to 11.AdvertisementIs this simply statistical trivia? Or does it say something about Ange Postecoglou’s side?As you’d expect, the relationship between goal difference and points is fairly solid. Liverpool have won the most points and recorded […]
Tottenham are 17th with a positive goal difference. Is this unique?
Try telling any Tottenham Hotspur supporter that their club has enjoyed a positive Premier League campaign and they’ll doubtless think you’re winding them up. But it is, in one sense, positively true.Despite lying in 17th, and being fortunate that the bottom three clubs have been completely hopeless, Tottenham have a positive goal difference of +4. It’s a higher goal difference than Brighton & Hove Albion, who are eight places higher in the table and have won 17 more points. It seems statistically unlikely that Tottenham have scored more than they’ve conceded and yet have lost nearly twice as many matches as they’ve won — 20 to 11.AdvertisementIs this simply statistical trivia? Or does it say something about Ange Postecoglou’s side?As you’d expect, the relationship between goal difference and points is fairly solid. Liverpool have won the most points and recorded […]
Phil Giles’ decade at Brentford: ‘He makes the most complex job in the world look simple’
On the first floor of the Robert Rowan Performance Centre at Brentford’s training ground, there is a sparsely-decorated office connected to that of Thomas Frank by a door in the middle of a shared wall.Frank, Brentford’s head coach since October 2018, has a whiteboard and a high table with stools in his office, where he discusses tactics with his staff.AdvertisementThere is nothing remarkable about the other room.It has a wooden desk in the corner, plus a small table with chairs dotted around it. Sometimes, books lie on the table. There are no pictures on the walls of Brentford’s recent achievements, which include winning the 2021 Championship play-off final to return the west London club to the top flight of English football for the first time since the late 1940s.The only feature is a huge window, which allows the sole occupant […]
Phil Giles’ decade at Brentford: ‘He makes the most complex job in the world look simple’
On the first floor of the Robert Rowan Performance Centre at Brentford’s training ground, there is a sparsely-decorated office connected to that of Thomas Frank by a door in the middle of a shared wall.Frank, Brentford’s head coach since October 2018, has a whiteboard and a high table with stools in his office, where he discusses tactics with his staff.AdvertisementThere is nothing remarkable about the other room.It has a wooden desk in the corner, plus a small table with chairs dotted around it. Sometimes, books lie on the table. There are no pictures on the walls of Brentford’s recent achievements, which include winning the 2021 Championship play-off final to return the west London club to the top flight of English football for the first time since the late 1940s.The only feature is a huge window, which allows the sole occupant […]
Related
Brazil are a dysfunctional mess. Good luck, Carlo Ancelotti
Say what you want about Ednaldo Rodrigues, the beleaguered head of Brazil’s beleaguered football federation; the man knows his way around a soundbite.“This is more than a strategic move,” he said this week after finally reeling in Carlo Ancelotti, his own white whale. “It’s a declaration to the world that we are determined to get back to the top. The best coach in history is now in charge of the best national team on the planet. Together, we will write new, glorious chapters in the story of Brazilian football.”AdvertisementThere is a lot to unpack there. You could use a hundred adjectives to describe Rodrigues’ pursuit of Ancelotti, which lasted two and a half years and managed to feel even longer; “strategic” would not be one of them. Then there are the galactic quantities of hubris that underpin the penultimate sentence. […]
Brazil are a dysfunctional mess. Good luck, Carlo Ancelotti
Say what you want about Ednaldo Rodrigues, the beleaguered head of Brazil’s beleaguered football federation; the man knows his way around a soundbite.“This is more than a strategic move,” he said this week after finally reeling in Carlo Ancelotti, his own white whale. “It’s a declaration to the world that we are determined to get back to the top. The best coach in history is now in charge of the best national team on the planet. Together, we will write new, glorious chapters in the story of Brazilian football.”AdvertisementThere is a lot to unpack there. You could use a hundred adjectives to describe Rodrigues’ pursuit of Ancelotti, which lasted two and a half years and managed to feel even longer; “strategic” would not be one of them. Then there are the galactic quantities of hubris that underpin the penultimate sentence. […]
Tottenham are 17th with a positive goal difference. Is this unique?
Try telling any Tottenham Hotspur supporter that their club has enjoyed a positive Premier League campaign and they’ll doubtless think you’re winding them up. But it is, in one sense, positively true.Despite lying in 17th, and being fortunate that the bottom three clubs have been completely hopeless, Tottenham have a positive goal difference of +4. It’s a higher goal difference than Brighton & Hove Albion, who are eight places higher in the table and have won 17 more points. It seems statistically unlikely that Tottenham have scored more than they’ve conceded and yet have lost nearly twice as many matches as they’ve won — 20 to 11.AdvertisementIs this simply statistical trivia? Or does it say something about Ange Postecoglou’s side?As you’d expect, the relationship between goal difference and points is fairly solid. Liverpool have won the most points and recorded […]
Tottenham are 17th with a positive goal difference. Is this unique?
Try telling any Tottenham Hotspur supporter that their club has enjoyed a positive Premier League campaign and they’ll doubtless think you’re winding them up. But it is, in one sense, positively true.Despite lying in 17th, and being fortunate that the bottom three clubs have been completely hopeless, Tottenham have a positive goal difference of +4. It’s a higher goal difference than Brighton & Hove Albion, who are eight places higher in the table and have won 17 more points. It seems statistically unlikely that Tottenham have scored more than they’ve conceded and yet have lost nearly twice as many matches as they’ve won — 20 to 11.AdvertisementIs this simply statistical trivia? Or does it say something about Ange Postecoglou’s side?As you’d expect, the relationship between goal difference and points is fairly solid. Liverpool have won the most points and recorded […]
Phil Giles’ decade at Brentford: ‘He makes the most complex job in the world look simple’
On the first floor of the Robert Rowan Performance Centre at Brentford’s training ground, there is a sparsely-decorated office connected to that of Thomas Frank by a door in the middle of a shared wall.Frank, Brentford’s head coach since October 2018, has a whiteboard and a high table with stools in his office, where he discusses tactics with his staff.AdvertisementThere is nothing remarkable about the other room.It has a wooden desk in the corner, plus a small table with chairs dotted around it. Sometimes, books lie on the table. There are no pictures on the walls of Brentford’s recent achievements, which include winning the 2021 Championship play-off final to return the west London club to the top flight of English football for the first time since the late 1940s.The only feature is a huge window, which allows the sole occupant […]
Phil Giles’ decade at Brentford: ‘He makes the most complex job in the world look simple’
On the first floor of the Robert Rowan Performance Centre at Brentford’s training ground, there is a sparsely-decorated office connected to that of Thomas Frank by a door in the middle of a shared wall.Frank, Brentford’s head coach since October 2018, has a whiteboard and a high table with stools in his office, where he discusses tactics with his staff.AdvertisementThere is nothing remarkable about the other room.It has a wooden desk in the corner, plus a small table with chairs dotted around it. Sometimes, books lie on the table. There are no pictures on the walls of Brentford’s recent achievements, which include winning the 2021 Championship play-off final to return the west London club to the top flight of English football for the first time since the late 1940s.The only feature is a huge window, which allows the sole occupant […]
Be the first to leave a comment