News and notes

Amelia Island is beautiful. Mrs. ATL_eagle and I spent a long weekend there last December and will be back this year the same weekend as the ACC Championship in nearby Jacksonville. Although we’ll be there for business, we might still go to the game. I think BC will have a hard time selling all of its ticket allotment.

While many of the ACC writers were also in Amelia, the Boston papers were MIA. Here are some articles of note from the past week.

The AJC’s Tony Barnhart writes about the nuances and challenges of the oncoming divisional play. I get the ESPN Gameplan; According to Tony’s other report, it looks like I’ll have a lot of ACC football from which to chose.

The AJC also had an interesting piece on the steps college coaches take to keep their athletes out of trouble. BC fans have numerous complaints about Tom O’Brien, but for the most part his guys stay out of trouble.

Jon Solomon of The State seemed to have the most comprehensive coverage from Amelia Island. His reports included this piece on the workings of instant replay.

Jon also had the latest on the flag controversy in South Carolina. As long as the flag is an issue, Greenville will not host the ACC Baseball tournament. This only increases the chances of playing the games at Fenway Park.

Fortunately it looks like the push for five years of playing time is losing steam. I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking, watching and reading about college sports, but I would like them to maintain some semblance of amateurism and academia. Extending playing time beyond four years would have been just another step towards official minor league status.