I Love College Football!

• Tobias Fünke

  

  College football is the greatest sport around. No question about it.
• krambman

  

  Sykotyk;943214 wrote:In the NFL, I can only really watch my Browns play, or a playoff/Super Bowl game. With college, I could watch two 0-6 Sun Belt teams on Tuesday night and be intrigued.

  This. Although I would substitute Cowboys for Browns.
• Dr Winston O'Boogie

  

  I hear a lot of people say that the worst college game is better than the NFL. How do you reconcile this with the fact that the NFL's ratings are way, way higher than college?
• FatHobbit

  

  Dr Winston O'Boogie;943444 wrote:I hear a lot of people say that the worst college game is better than the NFL. How do you reconcile this with the fact that the NFL's ratings are way, way higher than college?

  Personal preference maybe? I also would prefer to watch college over NFL, but I like the NFL and I would be just as happy watching a high school football game.
• krambman

  

  Dr Winston O'Boogie;943444 wrote:I hear a lot of people say that the worst college game is better than the NFL. How do you reconcile this with the fact that the NFL's ratings are way, way higher than college?

  Your logic here would be the same as asking "Some people say that baseball is their favorite sport. How do you reconcile this with the fact that football has more fans?"
• Sykotyk

  

  Because individual NFL teams have bigger television viewership followings than the 120 I-A schools (not counting the 600 other non I-A schools that have fans attend games on Saturday to drag down viewership totals). Also, they have their allegiances to their college teams that may be just as strong as the tie to NFL, per capita. The NFL teams are generally in major cities only which gives a huge individual advantage compared to college that generally has teams outside major markets (even if some of their fans come from those markets).
  
  NFL drew 67,509 per game last year. 17,282,225 for the year.
  
  That's an average of 1,080,144 fans attending per weekend (no byes).
  
  Meanwhile, the NCAA had 37,678,722 for an average of 46,632 per game, just in Division I-FBS. Division I-FCS had 6,031,800 for an average of 9,425 per game. Division II had 2,987,493 for an average of 3,630 per game. And Division III had 2,379,873 for an average of 1,973 per game. There was also 593,007 fans attended for an average of 8,472 teams that were currently in reclassification and weren't counted in any of the four levels.
  
  That's 639 NCAA teams (we still haven't gotten into the additional NAIA teams) played 3,547 games for a total of 49,670,895 attendance with an average of 14,004 for every game at every level.
  
  If every team (but one, obviously) were to play in one week, that would be 319 games 4,467,276 per week. Over four times the attendance of the NFL in any given week.
  
  It's just the fan bases are so fractured. The viewership on TV for a college game, no matter how big just can't command the attention that one solitary NFL game can. In addition to the fact in the NFL a particular game may have an affect on your team's own season that it might gain interest. A huge matchup between Stanford and Oregon may draw flies from, say, Cleveland or Atlanta. In addition to the need to have a desire to watch it, you'd need the time to watch it. If you are a college fan, there's a chance you'll be at one of those 318 other games and may not then have time to devote to watching that game.
  
  In the NFL, all games are on in two viewing windows with a 'marquee' game that night, and another the following night. The ratings for the NFL are for an accumulative total of all games played in that time slot on that network.
  
  Throw in the fact that Saturday is not the best day for television viewership in generally. The interesting aspect is the NFL used to play on any day. They realized, as a TV commodity, they could start moving all games to Sunday to placate the TV contracts where they'd be wanted. The colleges wouldn't move their games because each team had complete control over their schedule and all of their money came from tickets. Of which, Saturday is by far the best day to sell tickets.
  
  Besides, H.S. has over 15,000 schools and if all played on one weekend and all averaged only 500 fans per game, that would still be 3,750,000 fans per weekend. That's bigger than the NFL. But, even more stratified than college. TV is impossible for high school. There's also no 'market' for fanbases other than the school district the team is representing.
  
  In the NFL, a fan in Toledo actually feels a connection to either Detroit or Cleveland. But, even though in college there's the Ohio State/Michigan duopoly, those same fans could still go attend a Toledo or Bowling Green game. Or, maybe drive up for an Eastern Michigan game, etc. In high school, it gets even worse. Between all the public and private schools in and immediately around Toledo there is no interest in what's going on in a city even fifty miles away that a televised game has little market. And that usually results in a one-off Thursday game or a tape-delay Friday game. But, surely impossible to try and televised any and all games as there is a) not even channels and b) not enough individual fans in each fan base to make the broadcast worthwhile.
• Dr Winston O'Boogie

  

  Sykotyk;944456 wrote:Because individual NFL teams have bigger television viewership followings than the 120 I-A schools (not counting the 600 other non I-A schools that have fans attend games on Saturday to drag down viewership totals). Also, they have their allegiances to their college teams that may be just as strong as the tie to NFL, per capita. The NFL teams are generally in major cities only which gives a huge individual advantage compared to college that generally has teams outside major markets (even if some of their fans come from those markets).
  
  NFL drew 67,509 per game last year. 17,282,225 for the year.
  
  That's an average of 1,080,144 fans attending per weekend (no byes).
  
  Meanwhile, the NCAA had 37,678,722 for an average of 46,632 per game, just in Division I-FBS. Division I-FCS had 6,031,800 for an average of 9,425 per game. Division II had 2,987,493 for an average of 3,630 per game. And Division III had 2,379,873 for an average of 1,973 per game. There was also 593,007 fans attended for an average of 8,472 teams that were currently in reclassification and weren't counted in any of the four levels.
  
  That's 639 NCAA teams (we still haven't gotten into the additional NAIA teams) played 3,547 games for a total of 49,670,895 attendance with an average of 14,004 for every game at every level.
  
  If every team (but one, obviously) were to play in one week, that would be 319 games 4,467,276 per week. Over four times the attendance of the NFL in any given week.
  
  It's just the fan bases are so fractured. The viewership on TV for a college game, no matter how big just can't command the attention that one solitary NFL game can. In addition to the fact in the NFL a particular game may have an affect on your team's own season that it might gain interest. A huge matchup between Stanford and Oregon may draw flies from, say, Cleveland or Atlanta. In addition to the need to have a desire to watch it, you'd need the time to watch it. If you are a college fan, there's a chance you'll be at one of those 318 other games and may not then have time to devote to watching that game.
  
  In the NFL, all games are on in two viewing windows with a 'marquee' game that night, and another the following night. The ratings for the NFL are for an accumulative total of all games played in that time slot on that network.
  
  Throw in the fact that Saturday is not the best day for television viewership in generally. The interesting aspect is the NFL used to play on any day. They realized, as a TV commodity, they could start moving all games to Sunday to placate the TV contracts where they'd be wanted. The colleges wouldn't move their games because each team had complete control over their schedule and all of their money came from tickets. Of which, Saturday is by far the best day to sell tickets.
  
  Besides, H.S. has over 15,000 schools and if all played on one weekend and all averaged only 500 fans per game, that would still be 3,750,000 fans per weekend. That's bigger than the NFL. But, even more stratified than college. TV is impossible for high school. There's also no 'market' for fanbases other than the school district the team is representing.
  
  In the NFL, a fan in Toledo actually feels a connection to either Detroit or Cleveland. But, even though in college there's the Ohio State/Michigan duopoly, those same fans could still go attend a Toledo or Bowling Green game. Or, maybe drive up for an Eastern Michigan game, etc. In high school, it gets even worse. Between all the public and private schools in and immediately around Toledo there is no interest in what's going on in a city even fifty miles away that a televised game has little market. And that usually results in a one-off Thursday game or a tape-delay Friday game. But, surely impossible to try and televised any and all games as there is a) not even channels and b) not enough individual fans in each fan base to make the broadcast worthwhile.

  I think this is a very good explanation to my question.
• Al Bundy

  Dr Winston O'Boogie;943444 wrote:I hear a lot of people say that the worst college game is better than the NFL. How do you reconcile this with the fact that the NFL's ratings are way, way higher than college?

  Although it is growing in popularity, college football still tends to be more regional than the NFL. College football isn't that big in the northeast. When you lose a huge population area, it hurts the ratings.
• krambman

  

  Al Bundy;944654 wrote:Although it is growing in popularity, college football still tends to be more regional than the NFL. College football isn't that big in the northeast. When you lose a huge population area, it hurts the ratings.

  Also, major colleges tend to be located in smaller towns, not major metropolitan areas like pro teams. Pro football is bigger in the coasts, and college football is probably bigger in the Midwest and in the south, except in metropolitan areas that are home to pro football teams. Those metropolitan areas contain a majority of the population in the states their located so they will have larger fan bases. Also, as sykotyk pointed out, there are far more college teams to divide fans interest than there are in the NFL.
  
  You also need to take into account that if you have basic cable you can only watch five NFL games a week, and only two of those are broadcast nationally. If you have basic cable you will have the ability to watch upwards of a dozen college games in a Saturday, and if you have digital cable that number goes up. Because of this, individual games are going to have lower ratings.
• BigAppleBuckeye

  

  In summary:
  
  When the New York Giants lose, I am pissed for a day, maybe 2. I am even somewhat over that DeSean Jackson punt return from last year.
  
  When OSU loses, I am pissed indefinitely. I still have night sweats sometimes thinking of OSU-Florida. I found myself on Youtube earlier trying to find out if USC really did get into the end zone on that early 4th and goal.
• vball10set

  BigAppleBuckeye;945947 wrote: ... I still have night sweats sometimes thinking of OSU-Florida.

  I don't think I'll ever entirely get over that
• krambman

  

  krambman;942007 wrote:I've said it before, and I'll say it again . . .
  
  . . . I LOVE college football!

  This!