Minnesota Gopher Football: Big Ten Media Days Primer

B1G media days kick off this morning for what is always an entertaining event. E!SPN's B1G blog will be live-blogging, so follow along. Also there's Twitter so do that too or instead. Either or. The coaches kick things off with Pat Fitzgerald and his fancy haircut, eventually leading to the coach Gopher fans care about in our beloved leader Jerry Kill at 2:00pm (full 2-day schedule here). BTN pres Mark Silverman will brag about how great and how freaking rich the BTN is at 245, the guy who's president of the Tournament of Roses gets 15 minutes to reassure everybody that they're still committed to the B1G despite this whole crazy new-fangled playoff thingy that's coming.

Benevolent overlord Commish Jim Delaney then finishes it off at 3:15 where he'll get to brag about how much more freaking rich the B1G is than all other conferences (and oh by the way still gets to renegotiate their TV deal again in a few years), and then the floor will open up to reveal a giant money pit full of gold, silver and the heads of all of those who dared oppose him. Of course, he'll also mention that despite the conference's/empire's vast wealth and power they'll still be forced to go to D3 if/when the Ed O'Bannon lawsuit favors the plaintiffs because there's no way we can divide up all this money and share any with the players. He'll talk about how great realignment is and how competitive and balanced and WELL-NAMED the divisions will be while glossing over the fact adding Rutgers already looks like a really, really bad idea (I don't know the guy, but I've got two kidneys and he needs one, so I figured...). And hey for the record- they're not even the program we added with the bankrupt athletic department! Hooray expansion!

Overall, should be a pretty fun day. In all seriousness I'm looking forward to anything Coach Kill will have to say, Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz trying to avoid questions about his contract, and what Delaney will say about Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby's rather bold proclamation that D1 football needs to be blown up so the five major conferences can govern themselves. Is Bowlsby right? Yup, he is, and it's probably coming eventually, but instead of going the tactful, thoughful route like the other commish's, Bowlsby just went all-Texas-like and got aggressive and went for it. So we'll see how Delaney dances around that nice little landmine.

Tomorrow it's the players turn, as the Gophers are sending Ra'Shede Hageman, Brock Vereen, and Donnell Kirkwood to answer questions and represent the program. As always, it will be a fun-filled and action-packed two days, so stay tuned. It's B1G media days!