Should 4 Alabama stars skip bowl game? Kirk Herbstreit hates the idea
Alabama made the College Football Playoff every season from 2014-18. With the Crimson Tide losing to Auburn, UA’s second loss of 2019, the streak appears to be all but officially over, meaning we’re in uncharted territory as far as how Alabama will handle a non-Playoff bowl game.
Since Alabama’s Sugar Bowl appearance post-2013 season, it has become much more common for star players to sit out non-Playoff bowl games. Early Sunday morning (after midnight ET), Adam Kramer of Bleacher Report shared his opinion that if he were Jerry Jeudy, Henry Ruggs III, DeVonta Smith or Najee Harris, he would not play another down of college football. Kirk Herbstreit was not a fan of Kramer’s thinking.
“Since when is determining to play or not play in your bowl game just about what the NFL needs to see?!?” Herbstreit wrote in his quote-tweet reply. “The NFL has known about these guys and their abilities for years. You play to go COMPETE in another game with your boys. And if you decide it’s not worth it..you skip.”
Alabama won’t find out its bowl until after the conference championship games (like everyone else), but this will definitely be a story to watch as any NFL-bound players on the Crimson Tide have a decision to make.
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Since when is determining to play or not play in your bowl game just about what the NFL needs to see?!? The NFL has known about these guys and their abilities for years. You play to go COMPETE in another game with your boys. And if you decide it’s not worth it..you skip. https://t.co/6PpG7Xreye
— Kirk Herbstreit (@KirkHerbstreit) December 1, 2019
who knows at this point, but I’d think that saban is already urging them to play the bowl game… I’d assume the conversation is something along the line of, “if you don’t play and we lose 2 in a row, it’s on you.”
am I being unfair?
For the record, he’s actually said in the past that he doesn’t “want them to play if it’s better for them not too” — he wants whats best for his players and lets them decide what is most important to them. Even Tua said this publicly after his surgery.
I wouldn’t want them to risk their futures but the fact still remains that you can get hurt playing football and by extension would you tell the non starters not to play in the upcoming bowl game so they don’t get hurt and risk their futures also? You’d never had any bowl games… It’s tackle football… you can get hurt — hey I know lets play all bowl games with flags and ban tackling! Greed kills…
all the more reason to do away with the bowl system and implement a real play off system.
I don’t like it either, but If you are them would you put millions at risk for a bowl game that doesn’t mean anything? Traditionally teams in this situation don’t show up anyway.
Seeing that list though, and adding Tua to it, it is difficult to see how Bama gets better next year. Then again, if Saban and his staff go back to fundamentals, focus on defense and grinding teams down, who knows. Georgia is showing how far a great defense can carry a terrible offense.
Same for Auburn
I don’t like it but I wouldn’t play if I was any of them. No point in taking such a huge risk for a game that probably only Saban cares about.
I agree 100 percent and if I am brutally honest I wouldn’t risk that sort of cash if my team was playing for the title. Eventually someone will sit out a playoff game. That is an issue with the current system.
I hate how bowl games no longer matter to people. Go play your last game for the team that gave you a good experience and a chance to go pro. I hate how when teams don’t make the CFP, they give up and don’t try in their bowl games.
It is the nature of the beast sadly. They quit mattering back in the 90’s when they came up with the bowl alliance or whatever. Honestly I miss the old days when 3 or 4 bowls would have “Championship Implications”.
The current system runs the risk of not only making the bowls irrelevant, but the championship games as well. A team can loose their division and be rewarded with what amounts to a first round BYE while the winner has to go play what is a defacto playoff game at the conference championship. This year it is meaningless, but what if LSU had a loss…they’d get an extra game against #4 as a reward for beating Bama at home.
I am pretty much alone on this, but I don’t like the playofff nor anything that has happened since the mid 90’s. If you want to have a playoff, fine. Have a real one like the NFL. Conference champions with the best record are rewarded with a BYE, and the field is big enough you don’t have teams with an argument being left out.
But realize one day someone is going to pull an Oakland Raiders and win it all after going 6-5.
You’re not alone. Remember when New Year’s Day was awesome for CFB fans? No more.
Furthermore, with the transfer portal as it is you are sort of just turning College Football into the NFL Development league. Many elite players are simply looking at where they can go to impress the scouts and if they don’t get enough reps, they move on. Team loyalty ain’t what it used to be.
Then you see these coaches, staff, and the rest of these programs just printing money off of what the players are doing out there and they are supposed to risk millions for meaningless games?
It sucks as a fan, but I get it. Fact is, freak injuries happen and there is a lot of cash for these kids at play here. Many of these kids aren’t coming out of rich homes. This is their shot. I’ll be brutally honest, I’m not sure that once I had that sort of cash on the line I’d do anything to put it at risk to include playing in the meaningful playoff games.
That is the price fans pay for enjoying the current level of competition in the sport.
You’re not the only one — I believe strongly that the entire game is being ruined by the obsession with the playoffs.
I’m thinking that the game has maybe five more years before it starts a free-fall because of lack of interest: fewer telecasts; bowl games going away one-by-one and a handful of power teams getting even richer and more dominant.
A number of schools will lose their football programs because they’ll no longer be able to financially support them.
Conference championships have already been diminished and will continue to be until no one cares about them at all. LSU and UGA will play in a few days for a playoff berth rather than the conf. champ. that it’s supposed to be for.
I could go one and on but the game is being ruined because of the insane obsession with the National Championship.
We need a “like” button.
I would add that we crowned conference champions for years without a championship game. LSU ran the table and we stumbled vs a bad team. I don’t have a problem crowning them champion based on the results of the season…like it was for most of the history of the sport. Give them a deserved week off and let the one loss teams go at it. Let Georgia, Utah, Baylor, and Oklahoma duke it out. Remember, the conferences only came up with the game in the first place because it was a money windfall for them.
If we are going to have a playoff, go all in. Get rid of the conf. championship games, expand the field to a larger number with the major “bowls” hosting the playoff games.
If you want to keep the little guy bowls around do it with something akin to the NIT in basketball where they at least mean something and allow up and coming teams to showcase their talents on a larger stage than they would typically get.
Or go back to the way it was pre Bowl Alliance. But this business of trying to hold on to tradition AND do the playoff thing is stupid.
Tell the kids on the winning team that conference championship games don’t mean anything when they receive those diamond and gold SEC Championship rings emblazoned with their teams initials…
Wasn’t long ago I believe it was Saban quoted that it’s harder to win an SEC championship than a national championship…
@bamaman234 this I do agree with. Money, Greed is what ruins the game. Why bowl games at all? Money…. greed… If you don’t make the CFP it really doesn’t matter what you do…
Who wants to watch a bunch of future NFL millionaires risk their future playing in a meaningless bowl anyway? At least, that’s what we heard last year against Texas…let the kids who’ll be back next year get the reps if it ain’t for a chance at a natty, I say. Who cares about 5th loser in the final polls
Move the Bowl games to September. Eliminate for “cupcake” game.
Oh I like this. Scheduling nightmare though. But shedule the games based on previous season results and traditional conference tie ins. 12 games…9 in your conference, one for an OOC rival (Florida-FSU, etc), one of your choosing, and one “bowl matchup” during the season based on prior season’s results and traditional bowl conference alignment.
Never happen, but would be cool and would help ensure the top teams play someone.
Some of these early matchups are getting good anyway. Auburn Oregon for example.
Certainly a way to make bowl games meaningful.
What about the scholarship they signed does that mean anything. It means you play and dress every game you are physically able. How about holding these entitled oversized children to their end of the bargain.
Business decision. For a top draft pick even paying back the entire scholarship would be worth it. The dollar amounts involved are just too high.
When college football became big business, this was the logical outcome.
If you chose to skip the bowl game for the draft you should be forced to pay back that scholarship back to the school as you did not fulfill your obligations to the program. Try doing that at your job knowing you are moving on and tell your boss its a business decision that I come in late or miss work. This is not a trait that employers on the other side of football would tolerate. So sick and tired of athletes both college and pro thinking just because they play a game fulfilling obligations is beneath them.
These aren’t employees and these players make major programs tons of money. Nobody likes that some players skip bowl games, but it is the players right. They played while they are in school. That’s enough. The semester has ended by the time they play their bowl game.
Finally…something we agree on!
Your purplekats looked scary good this past weekend, congrats. I may need to walk back my confident like our chances speech ):
Another BIG reason they ought to go to a 16 team playoff and eliminate the bowls. No one cares about them anymore. If you think that is too many games, eliminate the games against teams like New Mexico State, Western Carolina, Murray State, etc. No one cares about those games either. I gave up my Georgia season tickets long ago because of crap home games like those. I’d rather spend the money to pay for Jacksonville and SEC Championship game tickets. I’m not the only one. Look at the empty seats all across the country.
I thought Saban will do anything to win. Doesn’t care about his players. I believe I read mercenary somewhere.
He will…was no reason to send Devonta Smith back out after being injured for the 3rd time in the game last weekend…legacy is everything
That is intellectually dishonest. If the medical staff clears him, the kid wants to play, the team needs him, you go back in.
I hear you. Sometimes you gotta follow your instinct on whats best for the individual over team aspirations…Kirby held Cager out against Auburn in the second half, but he was cleared to play if he wanted to, that’s all I’m going to say about that…
Life is like a box of chocolates?