Surprisingly little action in college football game

Don Estep is Publisher Emeritus of The News Journal.

A referee cost me the crown. A Pac-Ten official made an incorrect call on a Clemson touchdown that cost me the championship of our pickum’ college bowl playoffs. He called offensive interference on a Clemson score when the replay showed it was defensive interference.

I jumped for joy when the T.D. was scored because I knew I had won the crown. John Stansberry and I had gone to the final game tied with 32 out of 40 correct picks.

The tie-breaker would be the one closest to the final total point production. John had 65 and I had 70.

The total before that touchdown was 67 which meant I needed one more point to win. I could taste victory. Then the anguish.

John is always at the top in our contests. In victory he brought us a dozen doughnuts today when he picked up his winnings. Our staff liked that because they knew they would be left with nothing if I had won. Congratulations John!

College championship football and basketball games are not much more than a reason to run a billion commercials. The games take forever to play.

Monday night the time outs ran three minutes. So after the first quarter, which lasted over an hour, I put a stopwatch on the playing time in the second quarter.

I like to watch football but what many football fans don’t realize is how little action there is in a college football game.

However, what action there is, is good. And if you watch on TV you can see most plays twice.

Last night the total action in the second quarter, that is, from the time the ball is snapped until the whistle is blown, was 4 minutes and 52 seconds. It took an hour for that to happen.

In other words there could be more action in a half of a college basketball game than there is in an entire college football game.

There is 40 seconds given between plays in football to snap the ball. About half of that time is spent by the quarterback looking over to the bench to get the next play.

Most of the time in a football game is consumed in huddles, walking to the line of scrimmage and then consulting with the coach on the sideline. A play lasts from about five seconds to ten seconds.

If you have ever attended a college game that is televised you know that time outs seem to last forever because of the TV people. You wait and wait for it to end.

Some of this could be corrected if the rules would change to make time between plays shortened to 30 seconds. Nothing we can do about the TV time outs. The TV people own the sport.

It took four hours to play the college championship game Monday night, a work night. Don’t they usually play college games on Saturdays? Take a hint people some have to go to work the next day.