Clay Travis is convinced the Big Ten’s decision to sideline football players for the season could mean game on in more other ways than one.
“I think the Big Ten’s colossal failures over the past 10 days have made college football more likely,” Travis recently said on his Outkick website. “The Big Ten thought if they canceled than everyone would follow them. Instead, the Big Ten has received far more criticism for canceling from parents and players for playing. I believe there are lawsuits to be filed to allow Big Ten players to play.”
Travis let it be known how he really feels on the subject.
“I feel like I am taking crazy pills,” he said in a video post to Outkick. “The Big Ten came out with a letter from the commissioner which made no sense at all and the only thing I can get to at this point is that they are intentionally lying to all of us about why they decided to shut down the college football season.”
Following a meeting of conference presidents on Aug. 11, the league, citing COVID-19 concerns, announced it was canceling the season for fall 2020 with hopes of playing in the spring, CBSSports.com reported. Just over a week later, league commissioner Kevin Warren defended the conference’s actions in an open letter by citing such factors as rising transmission rates of the virus, concerns about contact tracing and testing supply chains, SI.com reported.
“First, it is entirely unacceptable that 13 Big Ten state institutions, which are taxpayer funded and presidents and chancellors are paid by the taxpayers, it is 100% unacceptable for their not to be a public vote about rather falls sports should happen," Travis said. “We have sunshine laws for a reason with the idea being you can’t have the fix be in and all the decisions be made behind closed doors.”
Travis leaves no doubt about what side of argument he falls on.
“I would support any lawsuit or any investigation into rather the Big Ten fulfilled contractual obligations by not having a vote,” he said. “This is a travesty of college football justice.
Travis said it befuddles him that more hasn’t publicly been made of the situation.
“This is utterly ridiculous that nobody is calling out university presidents for their failure to conduct a vote,” he said. “Right now, the Big Ten is saying we can’t play in the last week of September; we can’t play in October, November, December outdoors, but we can play indoors in January? If you are concerned about student athlete health, there is no way to justify playing indoors in winter when it is actually a lot more dangerous to get infected with something in cold and flu season.”
Travis said he can think of just one scenario that may be motivating some.
“What’s changing other than the election in November,” he said. “There is nothing that makes sense about Big Ten presidents and chancellors decisions. All of it is fundamentally, absolute lunacy.”
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