Entire College Football Conference Threatens to Cancel Season

With coronavirus continuing to bombard America with bad news, there are some very real concerns among sports fans that this fall could be like no season we’ve ever seen before.

MLB, NBA, NHL, MLS, and NASCAR have all resumed some sort of season at this point, but with some very legitimate fears that at least one of these leagues will be canceled prematurely.

Now with fall football still out on the horizon, there are emerging worries that we may not get on the gridiron this year at all.

A group of Pac-12 football players from multiple schools penned a letter in The Players’ Tribune threatening to opt out of fall camp and game participation unless their demands for fair treatment, safety regulations and concerns over racial justice for college athletes are met by the conference.

The letter is signed by Players of the Pac-12 and uses the hashtag #WeAreUnited to explain the group’s concerns, saying, “Because NCAA sports exploit college athletes physically, economically and academically, and also disproportionately harm Black college athletes, #WeAreUnited.”

A number of players, including Oregon offensive lineman Penei Sewell, also sent tweets of the letter and hashtag on Sunday.

College athletics have frequently been scrutinized for the lack of financial benefit to the players, (at least in relativity to the money that their work generates), so compounding this disparity with added risk seems to be a risky move for the NCAA.