College football's biggest issues, future and what to make of Deion: Fan survey results (2024)

College football fans aren’t as restless with the state of the sport as some might believe. Unless we’re talking about conference realignment.

As for belief? New Wisconsin coach Luke Fickell has it from the masses. Colorado’s Deion Sanders? Less so.

And we have good news for conferences and schools that want to keep pushing televised games on more and more apps and subscription services.

We opened up our annual survey of The Athletic’s college football subscribers, and 5,444 of you completed it, offering up some surprising data on a variety of topics. We posed a dozen questions, along with some opportunities for explanation, and we heard you.

Here’s what the people have to say about the state of college football in 2023.

(Note: Some responses are lightly edited for length and clarity.)

What is your attitude toward the future of college football?

1: very concerned to 10: very excited

The three most popular answers were eight (16.9 percent), seven (15.3 percent) and 10 (12.1 percent).

So for all the concern about the future of college football, our subscribers remain excited about what lies ahead. Of all respondents, 20.6 percent chose an answer between one and three.

In total, 53.1 percent of respondents chose an answer between seven and 10.

“College football is always and will always be my first choice for what to watch on a Saturday. Just brings back so many nostalgic memories as a kid watching college football on Saturdays with my dad,” wrote Mark N., an Ole Miss fan.

Some fans were honest about their rating: Their answers were based solely on the outlook of their favorite teams. But in general, positive feedback far outweighed the negative.

“All around great product. Would like more roster stability in the transfer portal era though,” wrote Naseeb S., a Michigan State fan who selected nine.

John F., a Wake Forest fan, voted seven.

“I’m ecstatic for the next 10-15 years but concerned realignment will leave Wake on the outside looking in with Vandy, Northwestern, Kansas State, Oregon State, etc. I’ll still watch the super conferences religiously,” he wrote.

Many of those who selected one to four complained about the sport’s pursuit of money. So did Wisconsin fan Ben S., but he voted eight.

“Excited about expanded playoffs. Happy for the athletes getting paid. Don’t like the universities chasing money at all costs,” he wrote.

What do you think is the biggest issue facing college football?

• Conference realignment: 27.1 percent
• Managing name, image and likeness: 24.4 percent
• Managing rosters/transfer portal: 20.7 percent
• Lack of parity: 18.5 percent
• Other: 9.3 percent

No real consensus emerged. Fans agree all four are big issues, and conference realignment earned the most votes.

“The Big Ten and SEC have turned the entire sport into a proxy turf war,” wrote Andy R., a Ball State and Notre Dame fan. “I don’t think anyone outside those leagues, once they reach their final Voltron forms, has any particular reason to follow the sport. Feels like an issue!”

Lack of parity is not a new problem in the sport, and I’m curious if the move to a 12-team playoff has given people hope that could be changing.

For the 9.3 percent of respondents who said “other,” write-in candidates included greed, health concerns such as brain injuries, all of the above, the bowl system, whiny coaches, gambling and becoming too much like the NFL.

“A lot of my friends who are casual CFB fans don’t even really bother with the regular season because, ‘It’ll just be Alabama, Georgia, and Ohio State anyways,’” wrote Zach S., a Texas fan.

Jeremy D., a fan of Michigan State and Grand Valley State, voted for conference realignment.

“College football is a game of regional spite, tradition, and rivalry,” he wrote. “Conferences stretching coast to coast sucks.”

Cole S., an Oklahoma State fan, identified roster management and the transfer portal.

“If you don’t know who will be on your roster next year, why invest the thousands in season tickets? Everything changes constantly,” he wrote. “No loyalty to the players.”

How do you feel about Texas and Oklahoma joining the SEC and USC and UCLA joining the Big Ten?

1: I hate it to 10: I love it

Surprise! People hate it!

The most popular answer was one, collecting nearly twice as many votes as any other response. It earned 24 percent of the vote, ahead of five with 13.5 percent of the vote.

Overall, 43 percent of respondents voted for responses between one and three, while 22.2 percent of respondents voted for responses between eight and 10.

How does your enjoyment of consuming college football now compare to 10 years ago?

1: I enjoy it much less to 10: I enjoy it much more.

I wasn’t sure what to expect here.

What we got? A near perfect bell curve of fans whose enjoyment has seemingly been unaffected by a wild past decade across the sport.

Nearly half of respondents — 45.4 percent — voted for responses four through six. That essentially means their enjoyment has been unchanged. Just 8.1 percent of respondents voted for one or two. On the other end of the spectrum, nine percent of respondents voted 10, including William B., a Utah fan, who had some airtight logic for why his enjoyment in 2023 is far more than in 2013.

“I was three years old,” he wrote.

Said LJ G., a Notre Dame fan: “It’s still the best regular season in all of sports.”

Fans have complaints, of course, but the numbers don’t lie.

“I will always love this sport. There is no more exciting sports product in the country. However, I think the move from the BCS to the Playoff and now to the expanded playoff has fundamentally shifted the idea of success,” wrote Dimitri V., a Michigan fan. “It used to be a really successful season for Ohio State to win the Rose Bowl. Even for a school like Penn State that went 11-2 last year and lost to two teams in the Playoff, it seems much of that is viewed through the lens of not being good enough to make the Playoff.”

Dozens of people cited gambling on the games, now legal in 34 states and Washington D.C., as one reason why they enjoy it more than 10 years ago. Most who selected lower numbers cited the game being more nakedly about money.

Andy R., a Ball State and Notre Dame fan, selected four.

“The sport is still my favorite, but part of the joy of it was the understanding that any single regular-season outcome could flip the entire season on its head and that, if any power conference team caught lightning in a bottle, regardless of talent deficits, it had a real chance to win it all,” he wrote. “Neither of those things are true anymore.”

Do you find it difficult or too expensive to access the games you want to watch?

No: 78.2 percent
Yes: 21.8 percent

In the past five years, more and more games have moved onto streaming-only subscription networks like Peaco*ck or ESPN+. Finding games is no longer as simple as paying a cable bill and flipping channels.

But if there’s a breaking point out there, conferences and schools are nowhere close to hitting it, according to our subscribers.

“Compared to pay-per-view games when I was a kid, this is fine,” wrote Evan J., a Tennessee fan.

“I have plenty of streaming services and can find everything I need, though it is a hassle to flip from, for example, ESPN+ back to YouTube TV. But then once I’m back on YouTube TV, I have access to multiple games without having to leave the app,” wrote Joe N., a Michigan and Kansas fan.

Jared V., a Nebraska fan, kept it simple: “I am willing to access just about any platform that has college football.”

Some fans also pointed out that for all of college football’s move behind paywalls, it’s still cheaper than the NFL’s Sunday Ticket, which costs around $500 a year. Clemson fan Alan S. also noted, charitably, that Pac-12 fans have gotten the worst of these moves in recent years.

Kevin D., a Notre Dame fan, though, is among the viewers who are fed up.

“I pay $187/month for the best possible cable and internet package, $15 for the Disney bundle including ESPN+, $5 for Peaco*ck so I can watch the one ND game that they relegate to streaming every year, and I still find myself unable to watch certain games that are on regional networks (namely Big 12 and Pac-12),” he wrote. “This is silly. I could buy season tickets to all 3 of the FCS schools in my state (Brown, Bryant, and Rhode Island) for the same price I pay for this crap every month.”

Some fans took the question to be about the price of attending games rather than viewing them on television, so there were quite a few complaints about the rising costs of tickets in stadiums that are generally getting more expensive, more technologically savvy and smaller.

Should players get a share of conference television revenue?

Yes: 61.2 percent
No: 38.8 percent

Would you like to see players become employees of their universities?

No: 65.5 percent
Yes: 34.6 percent

I asked these questions strategically, and the response came in as I thought it might. Most respondents think players should get some of the television money, but don’t like the idea of them being employees.

In essence, they’re the same thing. In reality, they are not. The details get complex, and so would sorting through where to draw that line, which brings with it countless hurdles.

Schools would have to completely blow up their budgets and build them back from the foundation. Making players employees would bring with it Title IX concerns and the possibility of sports being cut from athletic departments. Is there another way to get football players a slice of the TV money? Could it go through a collective?

Last week, I reported that seven of the biggest collectives in college sports are working toward getting players a share of the television revenue but are stopping short of making them employees.

What is the ideal size of the College Football Playoff?

Eight teams: 37.6 percent
Twelve teams: 37.5 percent
More than 12: 13.3 percent
Four teams: 8.1 percent
Two teams: 3.5 percent

For most fans, it seems bigger is better. The Playoff expands with the 2024 season, and 88.4 percent of fans support that move.

The next step is more of a debate. Personally, the current conference set up would make an eight-team playoff my preference, but fans were separated by just eight total votes in the debate between eight and 12.

“Give the bubble teams more to play for and not make the conference championships screw a talented team over,” wrote Tim W., an Ohio State and Wyoming fan who voted for eight teams.

Louisville fan Jonathan B. wants 12, though: “Good mix of teams and conferences to allow for upsets and participation but best teams will likely still win.”

Notre Dame and Texas fan Jared W. sounded skeptical of the decision-making surrounding the Playoff.

“If the goal of the CFP is to establish the best team in the country, then four is sufficient,” he said. “If the goal is to placate the fan bases that college football needs to drive ratings, then it’s probably 8.”

Spoken like a fan of teams with no problem accessing the Playoff field.

Florida fan Chris made a compelling case for four teams.

“Every week of the regular season is (or should be, anyway) a playoff,” he wrote. “An expanded field renders the regular season essentially meaningless. Obviously, traditional/conference rivalries will still be important, gotta win those, but if you can’t win enough over the course of the regular season to be ranked in the top 4, you shouldn’t have a chance to win a natty.”

I was surprised to see so many fans wanted a playoff with more than 12 teams. There were even a few fans advocating for the late Mike Leach’s infamous 64-team plan.

“I played D3 football many years ago in the 90s, and we had a 16-team playoff,” Arizona State fan Royce G. wrote. “It worked very well, we had teams from every region of the country (not just the south), and I feel it made the regular season super important because if you were a good team, you had a chance to make it. Plus, in a 16-team playoff, you will get some of the fun upset potential of the basketball tourney, though probably to a lesser degree.”

To me, Oklahoma fan Kellen K. made the best case for a playoff with more than 12 teams.

“An expanded playoff means more games for me to watch,” he wrote.

Which first-year Power 5 coach is most likely to succeed at his new school?

Luke Fickell, Wisconsin: 49.1 percent
Matt Rhule, Nebraska: 16.2 percent
Hugh Freeze, Auburn: 13.3 percent
Deion Sanders, Colorado: 6.5 percent
Jeff Brohm, Louisville: 6.5 percent

The theme seems clear: If fans have seen a coach be a winner, they believe that winning will carry over. All of the top five vote getters had big success at other college programs before taking new jobs this offseason.

The next highest vote-getter was Arizona State’s Kenny Dillingham, with 2.9 percent of the vote. Purdue’s Ryan Walters, a first-time head coach who was Illinois’ defensive coordinator, earned the fewest votes, with 0.8 percent of the vote, or 43 total votes, two fewer than Mississippi State’s Zach Arnett, the defensive coordinator promoted from within after Leach’s death.

Which first-year Power 5 head coach is least likely to succeed at his new school?

Deion Sanders, Colorado: 20.7 percent
Brent Key, Georgia Tech: 14 percent
Troy Taylor, Stanford: 12.2 percent
Zach Arnett, Mississippi State: 11.2 percent
Hugh Freeze, Auburn: 9.4 percent
Scott Satterfield, Cincinnati: 9.3 percent
Matt Rhule, Nebraska: 8.7 percent

There was no runaway in this category. Fans’ skepticism was much more evenly distributed than their optimism, and I suspect Key, Taylor and Arnett were penalized for fan unfamiliarity more than for their coaching ability.

Fickell and Brohm were separated by just three votes — 102 for Brohm (1.9 percent) and 99 for Fickell (1.9 percent) — as the lowest vote-getters.

And Walters may have the fewest votes for most likely to succeed, but he earned just 6.5 percent of the vote in the least likely to succeed.

Are you rooting for Deion Sanders to succeed or fail at Colorado?

Succeed: 63.8 percent
Fail: 36.2 percent

No coach in the sport is more polarizing. I’ve written about him a lot this offseason (and will write more once the games kick off), and every time I do, there’s a deluge of anti-Deion comments on social media and in our comments section. However, on the variety of YouTube channels that cover the program, most comments speak of Deion like a deity.

I was curious what our subscribers actually felt. And it turns out the vast majority are rooting for him to succeed in Boulder.

“Deion is good for the sport, and it’s even better he went to a stinker of a program like Colorado to turn around,” Georgia fan Blake H. wrote.

Wrote Florida fan Spencer M.: “Deion, while brash and outspoken, is good for the sport. He gives fans a look into how things really are. He’s honest, if not at times harsh. But he isn’t saying anything in public that most or all college football coaches have said in private to their fellow coaches or in team meetings. At the very least, he has brought a lot of eyes to programs that many had not even considered watching before.”

“Prime brings eyeballs, which is only good for college football,” Oregon fan Max. H. wrote. “Also, it would be cool to see him resurrect an old powerhouse that people believed was dead forever.”

But people are also just entertained by him and want him around.

“I love him. I love characters in college football, and with Mike Leach dying too young, we don’t have many (or any) interesting personalities in college football. If a grumpy Nick Saban qualifies as a ‘personality’ in college football, we’re in a sad state,” wrote Oklahoma fan Joe F. “Count me on Team Prime.”

Some who were rooting against him were rooting against what his roster-flipping methods might mean for the sport.

“I liked him before I saw how he treated the existing Colorado players,” wrote Alton M., a Pitt fan.

“I don’t want the complete roster overhaul to be the new template,” wrote Ryan H., a Virginia Tech and William & Mary fan.

TCU fan Michael M. agreed: “Because if his model is successful, it will be a net negative for the sport of college football.”

Who is your pick to win the national title in the 2023 season?

Georgia: 38.7 percent
Alabama: 15.4 percent
Michigan: 10.8 percent
Ohio State: 10.1 percent
LSU: 7.9 percent
USC: 4.1 percent

Respondents didn’t get too creative with their national title picks, leaning toward the Dawgs to achieve college football’s first three-peat since Army in 1944-46 and Minnesota in 1934-36. (And you thought college football lacked parity these days.)

Michigan’s two-year dominance of Ohio State seemed to have an influence on voters, but USC’s defensive failings last season under Lincoln Riley didn’t discourage the 4.1 percent of voters taking the Trojans to break through.

Our poll allowed fans to vote for one of a dozen teams, plus “other,” which garnered 6.1 percent of votes. The next-highest vote-getter? Penn State, at 1.9 percent.

(Photo of Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy: Aaron J. Thornton / Getty Images)