The only good thing about the end of summer is that it’s the beginning of the college footÂball season. Once more college football is delivering thrills and surprises, with the rankings changing dramatically on a weekly basis, teams appearing out of nowhere to vie for the no. 1 ranking, and underÂdogs ceremoniously (college football is nothing if not ceremonious) knocking off highly favored teams. I love just about everything about the game, from the on-field heroics to the off-field pageantry.
But I make the qualification: just about everything about the game. I don’t love everything. There’s plenty to be cynical about when ostensibly amateur players get recruited as if they were professionals. Even a straight arrow like Ohio State coach Jim Tressel turns out to have run a fairly smarmy program. Yet it’s not primarily the financially shady elements that make me ambivalent about my favorite sport. It’s the sometimes dangerous levels of violence….