In the recent uproar about fan attendance at Vaught-Hemingway stadium, there have been many different voiced opinions about what should be done to get the attendance numbers up. When I read Romero Miller’s plea to the Rebel fan base, as well as Todd Wade’s response to that plea, one thought stuck in my mind; no, it wasn’t that Miller and Wade are hoping for more than is possible, or that the students at Ole Miss would not do anything to change what they have been doing for the last 20 years. The thought I had was the easy solution—sell beer in the stadium. But wait, easy solution, or complicated process?
Problem 1: NCAA.
For one reason or another, everyone who follows college sports has this underlying hatred for the NCAA. The NCAA is known for making rules and regulations that seem to take away from college sports in one way or another. The power-happy organization has long banned the sale of alcohol in a stadium on campus of any member school. This presents the first obstacle in my theory to increase attendance. Just last year, the NCAA allowed beer commercials to be aired during the broadcast of college football games. Many people were under the assumption that the NCAA would NEVER allow that to happen. I view this as a sign of what’s to come. Sooner or later, the NCAA will have no other option than to allow beer sales in stadiums, so why not start now?
Problem 2: Lafayette County.
Another flaw in my theory is the Lafayette county beer sales law. I won’t get into this too deeply in fear of straying away from the subject at hand, but this would obviously put a cramp in what would clearly be the solution to our problem.
Problem 3: University of Mississippi.
The final and probably biggest problem with my theory is that the University would “get bad PR”—here we go again. Again, in fear of straying from the subject at hand, I will not go into great detail. As we all know, in the recent months, the University’s officials have done everything possible to give a better image to the school. (Cough, cough, Colonel Reb, FDWL). From the faculty and staff’s perspective, yeah, maybe being one of the first NCAA schools to sell beer at the stadium would give the University of Mississippi a bad image. Are you freaking kidding me? We ARE Ole Miss. We know how to party and have a good time. No matter what you take away from us or what you prohibit, we will always be commonly known as the party school. I suppose seeing my professors drinking in the Grove doesn’t hurt my case either.
Say that we COULD get through these three problems.
The majority of fans, students and adults alike, either don’t show up for the game or leave the game early for one of three reasons: 1) To sit in the Grove and drink; 2) To sit in the Grove and socialize with the people who are drinking; or 3) Because they have already drunk too much to sit in the sun any longer.
Put multiple beer vendors in the stadium, and these three reasons to leave are immediately eliminated. Solutions: 1) Grab a beer and socialize with your friends while watching the game and being loud. 2) If you don’t drink, socialize and be loud with the people that usually leave at halftime to drink. 3) If you are too drunk to sit in the sun any longer, now you at least have the option to throw another one back to cool yourself off—while being loud, of course.
It’s obvious. If beer was sold at the Vaught, more people would come support the team that badly needs support, and people would stay until the game was over. In addition to fan support, the school would receive thousands and thousands of dollars more in profit every Saturday. If, by some miracle from heaven, we could get through the NCAA, Lafayette county, and the University itself, we could change the way Ole Miss fans view football. The in-stadium experience would change, and more fans would come.
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