The landscape of college football is changing into something we barely recognize, and this is not a recent phenomenon. Remember when conferences first began evolving and growing? It really was 30 years ago as the SEC made its first play for cash in the pursuit of TV revenue for football, of course, with little thought given to other college sports or the financial well-being of non-profit institutes for higher education.

Little point in screaming into the wind today, the longest day of the 2023 calendar year. The future of the sport is going to be like the imaginary Akufo League, and that’s somewhat a turn off for us as “fans” and alumni of multiple schools that play college football. The college-sports model is akin to the English Football League, in the sense there should be more community engagement rather than profiteering.

But businesses are businesses, and in the end, college campuses are in the business of education. What really strikes us as sad is the media’s role in this mess: instead of calling out the sport for its ruinous excesses, journalists have looked to profit off the college-sport model themselves. We’re not just talking about ESPN, either, which has been horribly complicit in all of these disasters. Local media is too blame, too, in all ways.

We always done our best to balance the proper media narratives with our passion for sports and fandom of specific schools we attended: If you know our staff well, you might know we have attended a lot of colleges in the last 30 years. We have covered those schools here in a sports sense without bias or favoritism, other than a focus perhaps on regional conferences we grew up watching (the Pac-8/10/12 and the B1G, of course).

In fact, we have several alma maters in both those leagues, so that’s where our journalistic interest resides, for better or for worse. In examining MNCs and Heisman winners, we’ve taken away hardware from our favorite conferences and we’ve given honors to them as well—including our alma maters. Overall, we’ve tried to remain honest for the integrity of the sport, pointing out corruption where it’s been obvious.

Our point today? It’s the longest day of the year, but it does mean we’re now in the homestretch of the offseason. We’re barely two months away from kickoff in Ireland for Navy and Notre Dame, the first game on the schedule for August 26. Why play in Ireland? Money. Why start the season with a “Week Zero”? Money. It’s a love/hate relationship we all have with this sport, and in the end, something’s gotta give.

Will it be the fans leaving first? That’s up to us all.