College Football Off-field Issues, Week 4

Off-field issues is a weekly look at things happening off the field that will at some point affect what we see on the field.

North Carolina suspension-gate continues – Still, much of North Carolina's team is uncertain about their status. At least some closure came for a couple of the players: defensive backs Kendric Burney and Deunta Williams. They are out six and four weeks when, presumably they will return as long as restitution has been paid. For the rest, the status is still uncertain though the Tar Heels hope to get their players back by the October 9 game against Clemson that sets up as a season defining showdown assuming they can get past Rutgers this week (and Rutgers, while winning twice, has looked awful).

Colorado is in fact joining the Pac-10 in 2011 – Less than a month ago, Pac-10 commish Larry Scott said it was less than 50-50 that Colorado would join the Pac-10 in 2011. Luckily for the league that wants to get moving on its championship game and divisional alignment, the Big 12 really didn't want Colorado for that season either. That is the only reason I can think of for significantly lowering Colorado's exit fee through negotiations and leaving that fee at three million dollars less than Nebraska. Now, the Big 12 can play its full round-robin schedule (nine game in an 11 team league doesn't work very well since there is an odd number of game meaning someone has to play one extra or one fewer game) while the Pac-10 doesn't have to figure out what to do with its own nine game conference schedule with 11 teams.

The Mark Dantonio heart-attack – Michigan St. coach Mark Dantonio suffered a heart attack after the game winning fake field goal call against Notre Dame. Many have speculated why whether is be stress or something else, but most have agreed that there is a stress issue in college football. The problem is that there is no way to fix it. To coach at this level is a highly stressful and time consuming endeavor. Between the recruiting and the game planning, there is really no break in the schedule save for many a week or two between spring practice and preseason preparations. Hopefully the Dantonio issue and Urban Meyer's health issues last season gets coaches to realize they are running themselves into the ground. Also, kudos to Oklahoma St. coach Mike Gundy who realized the stress of the way he was doing things was too much (Gundy was both head coach and offensive coordinator) and hired a new offensive coordinator. He said he did it not because he wanted to as a coach, but to add years to his life.