Alabama vs. Texas A&M Coverage is Becoming Exhausting

Chris Marler is a writer for FanSided partner BroJackson.com. For more great content, head on over to Bro Jackson and check out Chris’ work.

Good news everyone: there are only 44 days left until college football finally kicks off. That’s only a month and a half more of feverishly thumbing through preseason magazines while waiting  in line at Publix wishing it was game day. That’s only seven more Saturdays filled with football emptiness while you teeter-totter on a channel surfing destination between the Crossfit games and Women’s Trick Shot Pool  on the ESPN family of networks. So close.

However, maybe the real countdown should be 58 days because that’s how many more days college football fans will have to endure before Alabama and Texas A&M finally play each other. I don’t mean endure as if everyone is eagerly and anxiously awaiting this year’s version of the “Game of the Century.” It’s not like college football fans across the country are tally marking each day passed with excitement like an Advent Calendar.

I mean there are only 58 more days of enduring the constant media attention this game and these teams have received this offseason. There’s light at the end of the overhyped tunnel built by ESPN and other bored national news outlets. Make no mistake, this is another Tim Tebow, keep-fanning-the-flames, situation.

Granted I know it is difficult to creatively conjure up an exciting segment on College Football Live in July. But, like a bottle of Fireball to a pledge during rush week we as fans have been nearly waterboarded with lackluster stories and redundant highlights of these two programs.

Sadly, I say that as an unhealthily obsessed Alabama fan.

I used to love flipping on ESPN and seeing a highlight of my beloved team to help get me through the football-lacking lull of summer. And, I love seeing “NCAAF” as a topic on the streaming bottom line when I know the date on the calendar is closer to a solstice than a Saturday tailgate. However, this has turned into a media atrocity like I’ve never seen.

“College Football Live” has slowly anchored itself into nothing more than a 30-minute blowjob for the two contenders from the SEC West. Each day the main focus of content is which hypothetical team or situation can dethrone Alabama, and how can we continue the slow progression of transforming Johnny Manziel into a real life Truman Show?

The combination of Johnny Football and the Alabama dynasty has created some hyper-focused media transformer that would deservingly be named “Megayawn.” Comprised of nothing more than crystal footballs and drunken tweets from College Station this thing has become more 24/7 than a “Law & Order” marathon on USA or a goddam Waffle House. At this point I’m almost surprised ESPN hasn’t invited Manziel and AJ McCarron to do an hour-long special of nothing more than arm wrestling and dick measuring because that’s about how mindless it’s become.

I don’t want to take away from the achievements of any individual or program, and I’m not trying to say that a Johnny Football diary via social media isn’t compelling to the national sports audience. Winning a Heisman trophy as a freshman or boasting 3 BCS titles in the timespan of an Olympiad deserve praise and attention. However, maybe let’s share some of the spotlight with other worthwhile student-athletes and stories from outside of just a conference division.

Here’s to hoping the next 58 days blows by. And, here’s also to praying that Manziel doesn’t meet Yasiel Puig in the next 58 days because ESPN as we know it would spontaneously combust.