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Georgia sports media professor explains why college football bubble makes sense
By Adam Spencer
Published:
Now that students are returning to college campuses across the country, there are clusters of COVID-19 popping up.
North Carolina decided to move students out and go to online-only classes, as have a couple of other schools. Meanwhile, Tuscaloosa just ordered bars to shut down for 2 weeks.
It’s starting to seem like bubbles are the only way sports are going to work during a pandemic, and Georgia sports media professor Vicki Micahelis said the optics of having football players on campus taking online-only classes wouldn’t be so bad if other students are also taking online-only classes:
UGA Sports Media Professor @VickiMichaelis on the optics of playing college football if there are no in-person classes: "If the football players have the same access to online learning that the students do, I’m in favor of putting them in a bubble and doing that.”
— Paul Finebaum (@finebaum) August 24, 2020
Many have said it would open legal liability issues about athletes being employees if they take online-only classes while regular students attend in-person.
However, Michaelis seems to think it would be OK if a natural bubble environment was created by having all students take online-only classes. We’ll see if that helps at places like North Carolina moving forward.
Adam is a daily fantasy sports (DFS) and sports betting expert. A 2012 graduate of the University of Missouri, Adam now covers all 14 SEC football teams. He is the director of DFS, evergreen and newsletter content across all Saturday Football brands.