Knoxville Citizen

In this episode were are talking about the Knoxville Police Department getting body cameras, the BOOMING local real estate market and it's future, events happening this weekend, the upcoming College Football Season, Our quarterback and best places to grab a quick bite or grab a drink.

Will There be a College Football Season in Knoxville? - A Realistic Look At first glance this may seem like another attention getting title with no real substance that we have all grown used to in the media. I assure you. It's not. We are going to dive in and take an in depth look at all of the factors, at least all of the factors that we can have influence on the decision of whether our boys in orange will suit up this year or not. A few of the things that we are going to consider as factors and base our option on are: The money - In my opinion everything starts and ends there. If the money wasn't a factor, this is a conversation that probably wouldn't be happening. So, we are going to take a look at how much the Football program brings into the university, the media and the local community. The main question here is how much risk are we willing to take in order to minimize the financial losses this year? COVID-19 - This may seem obvious, because Corona Virus is the main reason this conversation is even happening, but we can't just look at the numbers and how this virus is trending. We have to also look at pubic option and decision makers thoughts and opinions. What do people really think about this virus?  Safety - Is it actually possible to put enough precautions in place to have fans in a stadium? If it's not possible would the season be played without fans? Fans - If a season were to happen, would fans actually go to the games or would most opt to just watch the game at home and would fans refusing to go to the games possibly change the decision to have a season or not?  Now let's take an in depth look at each of these and make an option based decision to play or not. The moneyHave you ever watched one of those movies or television shows where there's a scumbag lawyer giving some poor family an insanely low settlement check from an insurance company in return for the death of a loved one due to some technicality? It always brings up the question of "what is the value of a human life?" It's a question that can not be answered, but depending on your own personal view of the actual risk involved with paying a season and knowingly putting players, coaches and fans in harms way, could the decision makers of these athletic organizations be assigning a value to a human life? That's for you to decide. Personally, I don't believe that's the case, but the moment one athlete, coach or fan passes away due to the contraction of COVID-19 at a sporting event, that opinion could change. Which brings us to the question of the day. How much is at stake and is it worth the risk? According to ESPN, universities have already suffered losses in the hundreds of millions. "If there's no football season, or if football season is interrupted or shortened, there will be a massive fallout," TCU athletic director Jeremiah Donati said. "There would have to be massive cutbacks. Could the department go on? Sure. It would probably look smaller. There would potentially be fewer sports and much less programming." Patrick Rishe, director of the sports business program at Washington University in St. Louis estimates that the 65 Power 5 schools would collectively lose more than $4 billion in football revenues, with at least $1.2 billion of that due to lost ticket revenue. Each Power 5 school would see at least an average loss of $62 million in football revenue, including at least $18.6 million in football ticket sales, he said. Rishe's projections don't include potential losses in media revenue, conference distributions, donations and revenues from corporate partnerships. In addition, it's been said that major media companies could lose up to 800 Million dollars in advertising revenue. Last year https://www.sportico.com/t/espn/ (ESPN)'s family of networks televised 282 games and sold $792.5 million in ads, according to Standard https://www.sportico.com/t/media/ (Media) Index. So, when it