FROM SEC MEDIA DAYS: Commissioner Greg Sankey Optimistic Amid College Football’s Shifting Landscape
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ATLANTA — It is safe to say Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey is an optimist.
In the current state of college football, pundits and critics point to the so-called deficiencies in the sport such as revenue sharing, name image and likeness payments, the transfer portal and the sheer inequity in talent throughout the game.
Yet, Sankey does not believe the system is beyond repair. At the opening remarks at SEC Media Days in Atlanta, the commissioner said he does not believe college football is doomed.
“From my perspective, college athletics is not broken,” Sankey said to the assembled media Monday morning.
“College athletics is not broken. It is under stress. It is strained. The answers we seek are tied into the complexities that have been referenced over time.”
Sankey, the SEC commissioner since 2015, does not think the answer to college football’s challenges will be solved by talk radio hosts or podcasters or even the judicial branch of the government..
“I went back and read my remarks from this podium others over the last few years, and pretty consistently I’ve identified the challenges ahead with some of the decisions that we have to make,” Sankey said.
“I don’t think the answers come from courtrooms completely. They don’t come from commentators or commentary. They don’t come from those outside sudden experts with their newest idea.”
He does know a group of people who have the experience and expertise to keep college football going forward in the future.
“Those of us in higher education embedded in college athletics know the intricacies of what’s in front of us, and we all have to continue to adapt and have adapted as we seek to provide life-impacting opportunities and lifelong memories for young people across our nation.”
Sankey knows the accomplishments of the SEC in the past and truly believes it can only grow in the years to come.
“If you watch the college football landscape change across the Southeastern Conference, we remain both proud ofwhat we achieved and excited about our future,” Sankey said.
“That future is not something we wait for. It is something we seek to shape. We look forward to the year ahead with new opportunities, with new challenges, with certainly a set of new frustrations, with new faces, new results, and new hope.”
The Southeastern Conference and college football in general are in the right hands.
Steve Barnes
Steve Barnes joins The Rebel Walk staff as a senior writer and brings a trifecta of journalistic experience. As a writer, he has covered college sports for Rivals.com, Football.com and SaturdayDownSouth.com as well as served as a beat writer for various traditional newspapers.
He has been a broadcaster for arena football and several national tournament events for the National Junior College Athletic Association as well as hosting various shows on radio.
A former sports information director at Albany (Ga.) State University and an assistant at Troy and West Florida, he has helped host many NCAA conference, regional and national events, including serving five years on the media committee of the NCAA Division II World Series.
Barnes, a native of Pensacola, Fla., attended Ole Miss in 1983-84, where his first journalism teacher was David Kellum. The duo has come a long way since that time.
He will bring a proven journalistic track record, along with a knack for finding the out-of-the-ordinary story angles to The Rebel Walk.
Barnes continues to reside in Pensacola a mere ten minutes from the beach because he does have taste and a brain.
