When the theme of a postponement or primary cancellation of the season returns to school football circles, the important thing everyone asks is who takes the first step.
For perfectly understandable reasons, no one in the large-scale football draw needs to pass it alone in this painting. So it was notable when the news came about Tuesday night in the Albuquerque Journal that New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham sent a letter to the leaders of the University of New Mexico and the state of New Mexico calling for the postponement of the football season.
In the letter, Lujan Grisham cited the accumulation of COVID-19 cases among others over the age of 20 to 39 and said that “it is essential that you postpone school sports at this time of increasing danger.”
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In either school, the letter is more of a request than a decree and no resolution will be taken immediately. Lujan Grisham exercised his authority to postpone the best school sports this fall until 2021, however, the extent to which he can do the same to force New Mexico and the state of New Mexico not to play is more confusing due to the degrees of government of each school. an institution.
According to a user familiar with the situation, who spoke with USA TODAY Sports on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the discussions, anyone would prefer to stick to the consensus that will arise from decisions made in the Power Five. Level.
Although New Mexico is in the west of the mountain and the state of New Mexico is an indefinite state, it is highly likely that the rest of the Bowl Branch will line up after the SEC, Big 12, Big Ten, ACC, and Pac 12 have lined up. We decide when they can start. season – a resolution that looms at the end of the month or very early in August.
But the other situation that might happen is for other states to align themselves and start taking steps to postpone school football or pressure universities to do so. In other words, the importance of Lujan Grisham’s application can count on whether New Mexico is or if other governors are beginning to echo calls for the school football season to move to 2021.
The state of New Mexico is not vital enough in the college athletics scene to take down dominoes. We’ve already noticed that FCS meetings, such as the Ivy League and Patriot League, cancel autumn sports and other leagues without football delaying or canceling their fall sports schedule, but the money incentives for Power Five leagues are very different.
If New Mexico and the state of New Mexico didn’t play, the rest of school football would go without them. But at some point, it’s quite possible that there’s a critical mass of states that’s simply not suitable for playing school football in the fall.
It is not known whether Lujan Grisham can or will force schools to postpone the football season. But keep in mind that she is the first vital political voice to participate in a verbal exchange in which no one sought to speak first.