President Donald Trump is hoping the conferences who have postponed football for fall 2020 reconsider their decision soon. Trump made an appearance on Fox and Friends on Monday and talked about the upcoming football season as well as the Big Ten Conference making the decision to put the football season on hold until the spring. His comments come one week after making his case to save college football.
“The young children handle it (COVID-19) very well. I want to open the schools. I hope the Big Ten is going to do it,” Trump said via 247Sports. “I’ll tell you what, we’ve got to play football. They put out false rumors, saying ‘I wonder if people are angry that Trump closed football.’ I’m the one that’s fighting for it to open. A lot of it is opened.” Trump also said he got a call from Trevor Lawrence and said, “he called me out of the blue and he said, ‘we want to play football.’”
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Last week, Trump spoke to Clay Travis of Fox sports said the country needs college football. “I mean, they’re physically in extraordinary shape,” Trump stated. “So, they’re not going to have a problem (with the virus). You’re not going to see people – could there be, could it happen? But I doubt it. You’re not going to see people dying. And many people get it, and they have… like kids they get it they have the sniffles. Young kids, almost none, have a serious problem with it.”
Trump’s comments on Monday comes after Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields starting a petition for the conference to play football this fall instead of the spring. So far, the petition has over 300,000 signatures. The push for the Big Ten to play this fall is there, but it’s unlikely a change will be made due to the concern of the COIVD-19 pandemic.
“Cases are spiking. Deaths, not only in our country but our states where our schools are located,” Warren said on Big Ten Network. “All the decisions we make during my tenure here in the Big Ten will always put our student-athletes in the center. We believe collectively there’s too much uncertainty at this point and time to encourage our athletes to participate in fall sports.”
The Big Ten Conference is not the only conference to postpone fall sports. The Pac-12 made the same move shortly after the Big Ten, making it two of Power Five conferences who will not play football or fall sports this year. However, the SEC, ACC and Big 12 are looking to start the football season next month.
