And the MAC shall inherit the earth….

Please enjoy once again the college football comment of the year 🏆

College football is actually doing great:

Yes, college football’s kind of a mess. It’s also better than ever. (With a special guest: the guy who made the viral MAC raccoon comment) www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

“You fast-forward 10 years from now, I would expect 60-70% of teams will have their own stadium, if not more,” said Alan Waxman, board co-chair of Bay FC, an NWSL team in the Bay Area that plans to build a practice facility and a stadium. www.wsj.com/sports/socce...

This might be most public money ever allocated for a women's pro sports stadium: The Denver City Council voted Monday to spend an initial $50 million on the land for the site of a 14,500-seat stadium for NWSL team Denver FC. www.denverpost.com/2025/12/22/d...

If you need a last-minute gift, this @herringnba.bsky.social book is a ton of fun.

Just want to note the skyrocketing value of college volleyball

On the lopsided CFP games in the opening round, by WSJ sports columnist Jason Gay 😅 www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

The conundrum as women‘s sports boom: Keep prices low so as not to price out longtime supporters but leave $ on table, OR raise prices to meet market demand and boost critical revenue for the team — and risk fan backlash?

🏐💵 Nebraska isn’t in today’s NCAA vball title match but remains the hottest ticket: 10% of seas-ticket holders resold their tix this yr: $600K of tickets went for $3.2M. 😳 But reselling the whole season pack is forbidden. So those holders’ tix will be revoked for 2026. www.on3.com/teams/nebras...

💰 FIFA released 2026 World Cup prize money amounts, which is relevant to the USWNT. Why? Because it and the USMNT agreed in their current CBA to share all their World Cup prize money:

Smart story by @henrybushnell.bsky.social on why sports tickets are vastly more expensive in the U.S. — even outpacing inflation and for leagues less popular than the Premier League. www.nytimes.com/athletic/690...

This is a lot of fun, especially for AI skeptics. Anthropic’s Claude ran a snack operation in the WSJ newsroom. It gave away a free PlayStation, ordered a live fish and succumbed to Soviet propaganda www.wsj.com/tech/ai/anth...

Something subtle but very strange happened to Miami’s football roster ahead of its season opener against Notre Dame. The game wound up being the most pivotal of the college football season. www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

He lost his job after refusing to promote Enron stock — which, of course, was absolutely the right call.

I see where someone called 2025 the year of the FOIA in college sports. Folks, we're losing recipes. In 2004, The Oregonian's @thatryanwhite.bsky.social FOIA'd what Oregon spent on one football recruiting weekend. The Ducks pioneered the use of private jets, which the NCAA quickly banned:

The upshot: If the USMNT gets to the knockout stage but no further, its prize $ will actually decline (from $13M to $11M) from 2022. That's because the 2026 WC has 48 teams, up from 32 in Qatar 2022. So a team has to go one round farther in 2026 to get into the Round of 16.

💰 FIFA released 2026 World Cup prize money amounts, which is relevant to the USWNT. Why? Because it and the USMNT agreed in their current CBA to share all their World Cup prize money:

When NBA players are on fire, they take longer shots, harder shots, crazier shots—shots they would never be allowed to take if they weren’t on fire. These shots are called heat checks. "The Princess Bride" was Rob Reiner's heat check. @bzcohen.bsky.social www.wsj.com/arts-culture...

Very curious to see what feats the olds get up to at the gym today, after 41-year-old Lindsey Vonn won a ski race on a replaced knee and 44-year-old Philip Rivers started an NFL game

Indiana caps an unbeaten regular season with its first Heisman winner, Fernando Mendoza. Just unreal.

NEW: Behind the scenes of the 24 hours that plunged the Michigan football program into chaos. www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

BREAKING: Lindsey Vonn has done the unprecedented. She won a World Cup ski race at age 41, on a partially replaced knee. www.wsj.com/sports/linds...

SOURCES: The #NWSL board has voted to approve a new star player fund—internally called "High Impact Player"—to allow teams to spend up to $1M over the cap with a much smaller cap hit for players who meet criteria. Crucially: A change affecting the cap requires NWSLPA consultation. On @espn.com:

This would be big: The NFL's proposed professional flag football league would have men's and women's teams, v @frontofficesports.bsky.social. Women's and men's teams having one platform (e.g. the Olympics, tennis majors) can bode well for women. frontofficesports.com/nfl-owners-v...

So glad to see the dogged Pop-Tarts Bowl reporting of my college buddy Ken Sugiura getting rightful attention on @shutdownfullcast.bsky.social: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/s...

American ski star Lindsey Vonn, in a press conference from Switzerland, is answering a few questions in fluent German. Not a common skill among U.S. sports stars

This is a funny headline but also reflects genuine shock in a German football world that has long been very very male

“Es ist eine frau!” read the headline on Sky Deutschland. ”It’s a woman!” Former @nwslsoccer.com executive Tatjana Haenni will become the first female CEO of a German Bundesliga club after being appointed by RB Leipzig. www.nytimes.com/athletic/687...

“I just believe in keeping people fresh and healthy. The better people feel physically, the better they feel mentally, too.” - Indiana football Coach Curt Cignetti, on practicing less than the NCAA allows www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

Words to live by

Of the push to expand the College Football Playoff, a former Ohio State athletic director said: “We’re putting (players) into harm’s way for one more game, one more television appearance, one more grand day of revenue. And it’s never enough.” www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

Welcome to Hour 4 of the 3-hour College Football Playoff selection show

The last time Indiana played in the Rose Bowl, in the 1967 season, the game’s MVP was O.J. Simpson

I wrote this Sept. 12, before Notre Dame’s second loss. It ended up being right on. The Irish missed the playoff despite ending the season on a 10-game win streak. www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

The last time Indiana won an outright Big Ten title, 1945, the leading rusher was George Taliaferro. The next spring, he was the first Black player to be drafted by an NFL team.

I’ve never heard a player shout out his team for being “process-oriented” during a postgame interview

Looks like we‘re going to have a Heisman winner who’s active on LinkedIn

A Dr Pepper contest paying for a student to go to dental school is about as American as it gets

Everyone hated the BCS computers. Now, they‘re starting to look pretty good. A compelling read from @rodger.bsky.social www.theringer.com/2021/12/03/c...

Following a chat with a former lawmaker after a round of golf, Trump decided to pardon a sports executive in the middle of one of his Justice Department's big battles against the ticketing and concert industry, where prices for fans have skyrocketed in recent years. www.wsj.com/politics/pol...

“We’re putting (football players) into harm’s way for one more game, one more television appearance, one more grand day of revenue. And it’s never enough.” How the Big Ten transformed into an ever-expanding money machine. www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

The USWNT brand is strong. On the day of the 2026 men's World Cup draw, in the middle of NYC not far from where the final will be held, US Soccer sponsor Bank of America singles out one player to feature: Mallory Swanson.

NEW: For most of its century of history, the Big Ten Conference has positioned itself as a moral custodian of college football. Now, it’s a money machine. www.wsj.com/sports/footb...

The USWNT brand is strong. On the day of the 2026 men's World Cup draw, in the middle of NYC not far from where the final will be held, US Soccer sponsor Bank of America singles out one player to feature: Mallory Swanson.

The next move by Crumbl Cookie CEO, after rallying fans to keep the BYU football coach in Provo? Launching a site to charm the CFP selection committee into picking the Cougars: www.cfplovebomb.com

Another Bear (after BYU's Bachmeier) and a Moose have entered the college football chat, via Michigan signing day: mgoblue.com/sports/footb...

Happy college football signing day. Remembering the days when coaches huddled around fax machines to confirm players' commitments: www.wsj.com/articles/SB1...

For context, athletes in major-college sports now receive about 22% of their schools’ athletic revenue.