by Mark Schwartz

Created on: June 26, 2009   Last Updated: June 30, 2009

Many arguments come to mind when discussing college football versus pro football. The argument here is popularity, but even that has many facets. Popularity can be measured in viewership, attendance, merchandise sales, fan passion, and many other areas. Some of these are hard to measure, forming a debate for another time. Others give insight into college football's popularity.

One area where college football clearly has pro football beat is the actual attendance of the games themselves. Larger stadiums, more games, and more affordable seats all help account for this. College football games are usually attached to the home stadium of a particular school, so students and alumni from that school build an almost automatic fan base to insure high attendance (at least in the major conferences). The fact that most games are on Saturdays also makes it easier for people to attend, and in fact many love to tailgate and make a day of it. Pro football tickets, comparatively, are usually more expensive and harder to get. The other side of the attendance issue that both hurts and helps pro football is that all the games are televised, and most people can purchase satellite packages so they can watch any game they want. This makes the actual attendance of the game less important for many, as it is not the only way to see a particular game.

Another area where college football has a clear edge is in the rivalries. College football rivalries are unparalleled in sports. Most casual fans who wouldn't be interested in football otherwise will watch (and passionately root for) their team during the rivalry game. Geography helps fuel many rivalriesthe closest major school to a particular college is often its rival. This insures that people from both schools will attend games, and likely be around before and after the game for trash-talking and other fun activities that heighten the experience. Also, college football rivalries are almost always once-a-year events. They have either been scheduled years ahead of time or are always the same time each year. This heightens the drama, because there are no ties (at least not anymore), no second chances, and no excuses when the game is done. The finality of bragging rights for an entire year makes the rivalry special. In pro football, by contrast, the rivalry inside a division is currently scheduled to happen twice a year, diluting the impact of the game, and the geographic closeness isn't there to help insure fans from both teams. There

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