COLUMBUS, Ohio — The convergence of college football team allegiances and anxiety about the coronavirus pandemic has spawned an increasingly ridiculous batch of conspiracy theories.
Kirk Herbstreit spiked the football Tuesday night. Spiked it so hard it bounced back up, hit him in the face and forced a most modern of apologies via selfie video.
During the lead-in to ESPN’s reveal of the College Football Playoff rankings, Herbstreit suggested Michigan would use its recent COVID-19 cases as an excuse to lay off The Game against Ohio State on Dec. 12. Not in the name of player safety, but because the Wolverines are cowards.
“I still think Michigan will wave the white flag and not play this week,” said Herbstreit, the former Buckeyes quarterback. “Is that fair? Michigan could opt out and keep Ohio State out of the Big Ten championship. That doesn’t make sense to me.”
Herbstreit said college football coaches have told him teams are using COVID-19 as an excuse to ditch games they know they will lose. He gave no examples and named no sources. (It should be noted Clemson coach Dabo Swinney, who coaches Herbstreit’s sons, set a new low in audacious stupidity by saying Florida State used Clemson’s COVID-19 carelesness as an excuse — as opposed to a legitmiate medical reason — to cancel their game.)
ESPN host Rece Davis gave Herbstreit a chance to backtrack. Herbstreit did not do so in full until a two-minute video he posted to Twitter later in the evening.
“I had no business at all saying that,” Herbstreit said. “I have no evidence of that. It was completely unfair to the University of Michigan, to Jim Harbaugh, to his players and coaches.
“Typically I try to remain positive and upbeat, and I think sometimes we all have our breaking points. With so much negativity surrounding the sport, that’s sometimes a pressure point for me.”
Suggesting the very integrity of the game is compromised sure combats that negativity.
Herbstreit did admit to Davis he does not know the extent of Michigan’s coronavirus situation. The Wolverines held only virtual meetings Monday and Tuesday “out of an abundance of caution,” per the program. One report said only one of Monday’s presumptive positives was confirmed to be COVID-19.
Herbstreit’s allegation was the sort of thing that you expect to see on a message board or via the intellectual cesspool of social media anonymity, not from a respected member of the college football media. (If he has evidence of those accusations, ESPN employs a couple of dozen investigative journalists who would certainly love to see it.)
Even if what Herbstreit has heard from coaches at large is true, to apply that motive to Michigan at this point both a) assumes facts not in evidence about the extent of their COVID-19 cases and b) contradicts the known character of Jim Harbaugh.
Say what you will about Harbaugh’s shortcomings as a coach — and I have — the guy is so competitive he’s incendiary. So let’s add that conspiracy theory to the others swirling around the Ohio State fan base and burn them all.
• Maryland did not callously bail on playing Ohio State due to a few COVID-19 cases because it was scared. It did the same thing the Buckeyes did a few weeks later and made a prudent call to try to stem a problem it worried might be growing.
If you criticized the former, did you also criticize the latter?
• No one is conspiring to keep Ohio State out of the Big Ten championship game or the College Football Playoff. Follow the money.
Few teams in the country are as reliable a television draw as the Buckeyes. The Big Ten wants its best team in Indianapolis, it wants it to win there, and it wants it to go to the playoff and win there too. You think ESPN wants an Alabama-Cincinnati playoff, or even a rematch of the Crimson Tide and Texas A&M?
This season is exactly what it was destined to be all along — a mess. A sometimes inspiring, often frustrating, always tenuous mess. Protocols and practice will help teams get through it, but so will something they cannot control at all — luck.
Ohio State may yet have the rug pulled out from under it because of the pandemic while other teams play on. There’s your villain — bad luck. You don’t need to manufacture another one.
New Ohio State face masks for sale: Here’s where you can buy Ohio State-themed face coverings for coronavirus protection. A 3-pack is available on Fanatics for $29.99.
Fanatics has released Ohio State Buckeyes Adult Face Coverings. This 3-pack of adult masks, retails for $29.99.
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