Ole Miss football coach Lane Kiffin thinks some teams might be ducking out of games they don’t want to play.
The SEC has had four games scheduled for Saturday get canceled because of coronavirus, and Kiffin thinks more might be going on than meets the eye. (RELATED: David Hookstead Is The True King In The North When It Comes To College Football)
Specifically, he seemed to suggest teams might be cooking their books in order to not play games they might lose.
Georgia at Missouri has been postponed due to COVID-19.
The following SEC games will not be played this weekend:
???? #1 Alabama vs LSU
???? #5 Texas A&M vs Tennessee
???? #12 Georgia at Missouri
???? #24 Auburn vs Mississippi State pic.twitter.com/8fG6vuspnN— PFF College (@PFF_College) November 11, 2020
“I guess injuries are counting in those numbers that people can get out of playing. I don’t know. Maybe some people don’t want to play. Maybe their season’s not going good. So who knows,” Kiffin explained when discussing the recent cancelations, according to the Clarion Ledger.
View this post on Instagram
Before you all laugh or mock Kiffin for sounding a shade conspiratorial, I actually had this exact conversation yesterday with two different people. In fact, I literally wrote about the exact thing Kiffin is talking about in October.
Teams have to have a minimum number of players in order to play, and if they think they’re going to be mauled, why wouldn’t they cook their books with contact tracing and injuries?
In fact, @RedditCFB laid out a scenario Wednesday where Indiana could cancel against Ohio State to increase their chances of winning the B1G.
Clearly, this is an idea that is being discussed a lot.
Don’t look now, but because of the Ohio State-Maryland cancelation, Indiana can retain sole possession of first place in the Big Ten East with a win over Michigan State
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) November 11, 2020
Step 1) Indiana beats Michigan State
Step 2) Indiana immediately claims possible COVID issues, cancels the Ohio State game out of “safety precautions”
Step 3) Indiana recovers, beats Maryland, Wisconsin and Purdue
Step 4) Undefeated IU plays Northwestern for the Big Ten CCG
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) November 11, 2020
Step 5) Big Ten continues with plan for cross division games during CCG week
Step 6) IU and NU play for title, Big Ten pits Ohio State against… Iowa? Sure.
Step 7) An Iowa-Ohio State game happens
Step 8) The CFP must pick between #9Windiana or a 5-1 OSU with a loss to Iowa
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) November 11, 2020
Here’s the thing with Kiffin’s thinking and with my own entertainment of the idea, it’s going to be impossible to prove whether or not teams are purposefully ducking out on games.
That means it’ll always just be speculation.
Could college football teams lie about coronavirus and contact tracing to get a game postponed instead of playing without their best players?
The answer seems like a very obvious yes, and there’s nothing to stop them. Has this already happened? https://t.co/w2zzI6WZdp
— David Hookstead (@dhookstead) October 13, 2020
Let us know in the comments if you think teams will lie and cook the books to avoid games. I’m interested to see how many of you might be on my wavelength.