The Next Titan Of the Gridiron
November 2004After the Handoff
Corporate Succession--
Though it’s been 43 years since K.S. “Bud” Adams Jr., owner of the Houston Oilers/Tennessee Titans professional football team, has won a championship ring, the Oklahoma- born, Texas-based businessman could never be accused of not trying hard enough, at least not since his arrival in Tennessee. In a league where many owners are content merely to field a respectable team then bask in the NFL’s extraordinary profit margins, Adams has consistently supplied the extra capital necessary to restructure player contracts, deferring millions of dollars in future pay-outs, in order to retain a team with better-than-average odds of winning a Super Bowl. The Titans’ annual ranking as one of the franchises most grossly over the salary cap each off-season serves as proof of Adams’ commitment to winning. For that, Titans fans are grateful.
But just as no player will play for a team forever, nor is Adams’ long directorship of the franchise eternal. Adams turns 82 in January. The same fans who watch a game and speculate as to whom the team’s future quarterback, running back or wide receiver might be would do well to ask the same question when looking towards the owner’s box. What is the plan for succession of team ownership? Just who is the future face of the Titans franchise?
The answer to the last question may lie 85 miles southeast of Nashville on the campus of the University of the South.
THE ADAMS FAMILY
Collecting Native American and western art is Adams’ favorite hobby. The son of a full-blooded Cherokee mother whose uncle was a tribal chief for 27 years, Adams started collecting native artifacts in 1940. In his home alone, Adams has 165 period-specific paintings. A full floor of his Houston offices houses what amounts to a museum of Native American and western art. Adams admits his family isn’t overly passionate about his art collection. By contrast, the family’s interest in his football team is keen. It’s no wonder. Forbes magazine recently valued the Titans franchise, which Adams purchased in 1959 for $25,000, at $620 million.
Modern day tax laws and explosive growth in asset value have made inheriting a professional football team a daunting task for surviving family members. In recent years, several NFL teams have gone on the open market as a result of founding families being unable to afford the exorbitant inheritance taxes necessary to maintain control of the team. That won’t happen with the Titans. Long ago Adams organized his holdings in such a way that they could be handed down to his family without penalty. Adams and his wife, Nancy, are preferred stockholders in the parent company that owns the Titans (along with 15 other companies). Once deceased, their two surviving daughters and one daughter-in-law, currently common stockholders, fully inherit the team. Sources confirm, however, that none of Adams’ daughters have any interest in running the team or serving as the public face of the organization. Those jobs, along with the team’s stock, eventually will fall to Adams’ seven grandchildren.
Of those seven grandchildren, family members agree that three in particular—teenager Tommy Thompson, teenager Barclay C. Adams and 20-year-old Kenneth Stanley Adams IV (Bud’s namesake)—have the most interest in eventually assuming responsibility for the day-to-day operations of the team. Brothers Barclay and Kenneth further stick out from the pack. As a result of their father’s death (Adams’ only son, Ken Adams III, died in an accident involving cattle transportation several years ago), they already own fractions of the team.
A CHILD SHALL LEAD THEM
If having ice in your veins is a requirement of running a football team, then 16-year-old Barclay has what it takes to guide the Titans. On a recent safari trip, the family’s guide nearly had to intervene when Barclay appeared slow to the trigger in a showdown with a charging rhino. With the rhino just 20 feet away, however, Barclay fired, dropping the beast in a heap of armor and horns.
In his bedroom back in Texas, older brother Kenneth has a big cat, 10 feet between the pegs, that he shot during a previous family safari. Based on his status as the eldest of the three aforementioned aspirants, and the fact that he has definitive plans to join the Titans’ staff promptly after college graduation in 2006, Kenneth likely will be the first of Adams’ grandchildren to emerge publicly as a future face of the franchise.
The six-foot-plus, strong-jawed Kenneth hardly looks out of place among the barrel-chested pro football players with whom he often travels. And yet the former high school wide receiver at Culver Military Academy (the school where Bud also lettered) is in fact more renaissance man than stereotypical jock. The same young man who split his time last summer between an African safari and a stint at a friend’s ranch in New Mexico laying pipe to irrigate alfalfa fields says he is leaning toward the pursuit of a degree in English Literature at Sewanee. One of his hobbies is writing poetry.
Adams understandably revels in the thought of his grandchildren someday assuming the reins of the franchise. Of Kenneth, Adams says he is “interested in talking about things most boys his age don’t want to talk about. That’s why I’m excited about him.” As an example, Adams tells of an exhibition game in Monterey, Mexico, last year when Kenneth engaged a prominent Mexican senator in conversation about why the politician had recently announced his decision to step down from office. “No kid had ever asked him that,” Adams relates almost incredulously.
A straight-shooter who doesn’t dance around a reporter’s questions, Kenneth exhibits some of the same swashbuckling flair of his colorful grandfather. Asked what qualifies him to run a football team, Kenneth replies without hesitation: he’s had the unique benefit of watching his grandfather steer the team through the years, making decisions “both good and bad.”
“I’ve been part of it since I can remember,” he adds. “It’s something unique to my situation. I’ve watched as my grandfather has undergone adversity and handled it. Those lessons are unique and beneficial.”
PASSING THE MANTLE
It’s going to be a long time before Kenneth or any of Adams’ grandchildren are ready to take the helm of the Titans. From navigating the pitfalls of the salary cap to brokering contract negotiations, overseeing scouting and marketing and dealing with issues related to the stadium, there is much to learn about overseeing the operations of a pro football team. Like a Cherokee chief making plans for his succession should he die in battle before the young prince is ready to assume a leadership role, Adams tells Business Tennessee that he plans to have his cousin, John A. Barrett, partner in the Houston law firm of Fulbright & Jaworski, serve as regent running the team in an interim fashion should he die before his grandchildren are fully mature business people. Fifteen years Adams’ junior, Barrett formerly served as partner in charge of the 900-attorney firm’s London office and its international practice. Recently installed by Adams as president of publicly traded Adams Resources & Energy, Barrett has steadily been familiarizing himself with all of the businesses in Adams’ empire. “He’ll be the one to hold everything together,” says Adams, “until the young fellas come up and spring out of the shoots.” This revelation runs counter to past media reports that assumed Adams would leave his son-in-law, Tommy Smith, to run the team after his death.
How will Adams’ grandchildren be prepared in the interim? When Adams brokered an arena lease earlier this year and announced the revival of the Nashville Kats arena football franchise, he put in place the perfect business incubator to prepare Kenneth and other family members to one day run the Titans. (Adams’ niece Kristina, a Harvard student, was recently one of only 26 selected out of 2,600 applicants as an NFL intern). Since the NFL purchased 49% of the arena league some years ago, several NFL owners, including Adams, have purchased the rights to arena teams in part as a way to groom future on-field talent. But those owners also have viewed the arena league as a place to groom off-the-field executive talent in roles where they can’t make million-dollar mistakes.
There is precedent for such a setup. New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson is grooming his granddaughter, Rita Benson LeBlanc, 28, in various executive positions with his arena team, the VooDoo. LeBlanc won AFL Executive of the Year last year, and Benson has been open about his plan to use his AFL organization as a training ground for LeBlanc’s succession, the topic of a September 2004 article in Biz New Orleansmagazine.
Of his granddaughter, Benson said, “She knows what it takes to run the day-to-day operations of a franchise, so I think with her starting as early as she did and her interest in it, certainly gives her a slight edge. She has as good a grip on this business as anyone.”
Interviewed this past summer while in the midst of lease negotiations with Nashville’s arena operators, Adams was mum regarding speculation he would use the arena team to groom his grandchildren. It was not an unexpected response given Adams’ desire to complete negotiations on an arena lease while keeping his cards close to the vest. But make no mistake, Adams’ purchase of the Kats—a $4 million investment that experts say is bound to lose money operationally—is all about erecting the framework for the emergence of his grandchildren as future business titans of the gridiron.
Equipment--
LOSING THEIR SHIRT?
by Alex Kwak
During St. Joseph’s undefeated regular season last year, one fan was doubtful. Jesse Lee wasn’t worried about whether the team would reach the finals (St. Joe’s reached Elite Eight), but rather whether the Hawks would remember him after such a successful year.
Lee is the founder of 30-year-old Knoxville-based sporting apparel manufacturer Sports Belle, which makes uniforms for men and women’s high school and college teams for a variety of sports. St. Joe’s, one of 37 Division I men’s hoops programs wearing Lee’s product, has donned Sports Belle gear for eight seasons.
While the team’s success was good for business, Lee worried aloud to ESPN.com and The New York Times in March that the school would not re-up with his company after a deluge of free offers from apparel giants Nike, Reebok and Adidas.
Lee’s worries can be put to rest, temporarily. Tim Curran, SJU’s director of athletic marketing, confirms that the school agreed to re-sign in July. “Sports Belle’s deal is a good deal for us,” Curran says.
While Curran says he is pleased to continue a partnership with Sports Belle, the deal—just one year after eight years of partnership—may mean that St. Joe’s is keeping its options open.
Design and Consulting--
PLENTY OF GREENS
Cookville Native drives into Top 10
by Alex Kwak
Kevin Tucker designs golf courses for a living. Jealous?
“I should pay my clients to work for them,” Tucker says. “It’s that cool.” Though Tucker says he does not have a trademark style, he certainly has creativity. Look no further than Golf Digest’s top-ranked Louisiana course: Koasati Pines, located north of Lake Charles at the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana’s Grand Casino.
With something unseen on a course without the word “miniature” in front of it, two holes at Koasati have split fairways for multiple routes to the greens. This innovative approach nabbed Tucker’s own favorite course the No. 7 slot nationally onGolf Digest’s top 10 upscale, daily fee courses for 2003.
“That was a total surprise,” says the Cookeville-born and Nashville-based Tucker of the Koasati’s ranking. “It sure hasn’t hurt business,” he adds with a warm, proud smile.
Wetland-presence caused the casino to scale down to 18 holes from the planned 27, but there was more than enough room for the lengthiest course in Louisiana and a little imagination.
“They basically said: ‘You take the land. Do whatever you need to do with it and don’t worry about any development around it. We want to build the best golf course we can.’” Tucker says. “That doesn’t happen very often.”
Budget and land are the biggest concerns for the Kevin Tucker Design Group when the firm starts a project.
“[The land] has everything to do with how the golf course is developed. You always want to analyze the site and let it tell you what to do rather than trying to force something on the site.” Tucker says. “There’s never one project that’s quite like the others.”
Unlike other golf aficionados however, Tucker also has a place in his heart for sand.
“It probably all started in a sandbox when I was a little kid,” he says. “I loved sculpting sand and just making things. I always had a love for growing grass. As a youngster, I maintained the baseball fields for our local parks and recreation department.”
After falling in love with football in high school, Tucker played for Middle Tennessee State before transferring to Mississippi State to get a degree in landscape architecture. He then moved to Ft. Lauderdale to work for a land-planning company where he got his feet wet with master plans for new communities that often included golf courses.
Next up was a job in Jackson, Miss., where he marketed golf course architectural services.
“Lo and behold somebody said: ‘Okay, let’s do one,’” Tucker says of his first solo act. “I probably told a little white lie—I really hadn’t done one [before]. But I knew how to do it. So that’s how I got started.”
Tucker started his company in Nashville in 1976 and grew it into a multidisciplinary firm of architects, engineers, planners and surveyors. Then in 1990 he decided to do golf courses exclusively, and he and his four staffers have continued to do just golf courses ever since.
More than 50 new or renovated courses later (mostly in Southeastern states), Tucker couldn’t be happier. He’s lived some of his dreams with Koasati, working with golfing greats Hal Sutton and “Terrible Tommy” Bolt on their signature courses, and he has even had the luxury of working in Honolulu and Jamaica.
So what’s the drawback? Travel.
Tucker’s job keeps him on the road and away from his wife of 23 years and his three children, ages 15 through 23. But it doesn’t prevent him from squeezing in a round.
“I play every chance I get, which isn’t as often as I would like, but I make a lot of people feel good when I play golf,” Tucker says, referring unabashedly to his 18-handicap. “I’m a golf ambassador: the reason I’m out here to play with them is to make them feel good.”
YOUR NAME HERE
What company name will next adorn Titans stadium
by Drew Ruble
It’s been two years since the Tennessee Titans dissolved their 15-year, $30 million stadium naming rights agreement with bankrupted Adelphia Business Communications. Team officials say the process of finding a replacement is ongoing. They aren’t naming any names.
Much has changed since the late 1990s when ego-driven corporate types freely exercised shareholder dollars to plaster their company name in big letters on athletic venues. These days, while the market for naming rights agreements has by no means dried up, such agreements are brokered using far more strict criteria, none of which particularly favor the Titans.
William Chipps, senior editor of Chicago-based IEG Sponsorship report, says a local connection is nearly imperative to the modern day naming rights agreement. Rare is the deal these days, says Chipps, where a company like Pennsylvania-based Adelphia will choose to market its brand on an out of town venue. Thus, New York-based M&T Bank’s recent decision to hoist its name on the football stadium in Baltimore makes sense given the company’s recent purchase of Baltimore-based Allfirst Financial. Similarly, Philadelphia-based Lincoln Financial’s recent decision to place its name on the city of brotherly love’s new football stadium is a strategic move given that the city’s two other sports venues already boast the names of Lincoln’s chief local banking competitors.
Confined to a pool of local prospects, the Titans find slim pickings. Industry giants HCA, CareMark and CCA are big enough to dive into the naming rights game but none of those companies market their brand. Gaylord Entertainment Co., embroiled in a lawsuit over a current naming rights agreement with the Nashville Predators hockey club, isn’t likely to venture into the naming rights arena ever again.
As a Birmingham, Ala.-based company, AmSouth Bancorp also is not a match. In fact, AmSouth’s exclusive financial relationship with the Titans bars the team from pursuing naming rights with other banking entities such as First Tennessee. Car maker Nissan, which recently moved its Pathfinder production to the Nashville satellite city of Smyrna, is similarly off limits due to the team’s exclusive relationship with Toyota.
Despite the many obstacles, here are six companies with local ties that could benefit by partnering with the Titans on Coliseum naming rights.
Fifth Third Bank—the Cincinnati-based bank recently acquired Williamson County-based Franklin Financial and is blitzing the Nashville market, hoping to expand its brand across region. Though seemingly blocked by AmSouth’s exclusive banking relationship with the Titans, Fifth Third makes this list because AmSouth is rumored as the next takeover target in the banking world—and Fifth Third is most often mentioned as a likely buyer. The bank already has shown a willingness to play the naming rights game as evidenced by Fifth Third Field in Dayton, Ohio, home of the Dayton Dragons minor league baseball club.
Direct General Corp.—Naming rights are essentially a strategic marketing expenditure. Nashville-based Direct General has a product in auto insurance for high-risk drivers that needs national promotion. Such a move would also differentiate DG from its competitors, which include Allstate and Progressive. DG had a stellar first quarter in 2004 with revenue up 62% to $111.6 million. Though probably still too small now, continued growth could make DG the most snug fit of all local companies to partner with the Titans.
Tractor Supply Co.—The explosive growth of this Brentwood-based farm equipment retailer and the strong connection with rural folks upon which it relies would make the sponsorship of a football team in the South a sensible brand exploitation avenue for TSC.
Asurion—Perhaps the best fit currently. The company, which relocated to Nashville last year, sells cell phone insurance, roadside assistance services and other programs to 14 million wireless customers. Revenue in 2002 topped $250 million. Placing its name where a potential Super Bowl team plays could help Asurion battle competitor AAA.
Gibson Guitar Corp.—with plans to become a $3 billion company, the Nashville-based instrument maker might view stadium naming rights as a worthwhile avenue for greater brand exposure. Sports sponsorship is already firmly on the company’s radar. Earlier this year, Gibson sponsored the pinnacle event of the summer Polo season in London, England, a match between an English team and a Gibson-sponsored Chilean team.
Central Parking—the Nashville-based global parking behemoth is certainly big enough to handle a $2 million to $3 million annual naming rights agreement. The greatest beneficiary of downtown parking rates at Titans games might even consider paying for naming rights a financial wash.
Income and Taxes--
THE TAKE-HOME PAY STATE
Tennessee’s lack of an income tax attracts more than business
by Drew Ruble
When the National Football League releases its schedule each summer, Tennessee Titans fans eagerly check to see which teams will be visiting the Music City. Astute Titans players, by contrast, eagerly look to see where they’ll be playing away games, calculating the tax burden the schedule will have on their pocketbook.
Take Titans offensive lineman Brad Hopkins. The team’s highest paid player, Hopkins makes $4.5 million annually, or $281,250 per game. For the eight home games in Nashville he is paid $2.25 million. That’s un-taxed income since Tennessee, like Texas, Florida and Washington, are non-income tax states. In addition, the Titans annually play inter-division foes the Jacksonville Jaguars in Florida and the Houston Texans in Texas. Those two road games also are untaxed. For the other six games, Hopkins pays a personal income tax to the state in which he performs.
Though merely the legitimate collection of income tax, the collection is commonly referred to as the “jock tax” because it targets athletes (and entertainers) whose “business trips” are easier for state revenue collectors to track than for instance those of a corporate executive.
“Remember, our Tennessee pros pay taxes most anytime they play a road game. Your average traveling businessman, airline pilot or salesman rarely, if ever, has to pay state taxes for business they do in other states,” says Kyle Rote Jr., former pro soccer star turned CEO of Athletic Resource Management, a 20-year-old Memphis-based firm representing some of the biggest names in the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball.
Adding insult to injury, many cities, including Philadelphia and Cincinnati, levy on out-of-state athletes their own municipal jock taxes in addition to those imposed by the states.
At an average income tax rate of 7.5%, Hopkins would pay over $126,000 in annual income taxes on the $1.68 million in salary he is paid for the six road games he plays in. Comparatively speaking, a similarly paid lineman playing for a team in an income tax state could pay as high as $337,500 in personal tax if his team never played a road game in Tennessee, Florida, Texas or Washington.
How states administer jock taxes varies widely. Since pro football players play 16 regular season games, some states tax 1/16 of a player’s salary. Others take into account the four pre-season games and tax 1/20 of an athlete’s salary. Some states base the tax on “duty days,” or the number of days an athlete works in their state or city. From beginning to end, the NFL season lasts 17 weeks, or 119 days, given a bye week. Since players generally enter a city on a Saturday, play on a Sunday and leave after the game, many states charge a tax equal to 1/58 of an athlete’s salary. Some states, counting preseason and playoffs, view the season as 140 days long, therefore tax 1/70 of a salary. Some count training camp.
For obvious reasons, then, Tennessee is a good place to be a professional athlete (or a coach or trainer, who also fall under the same tax rules). Likewise, out-of-state players enjoy their tax holiday status while performing in Tennessee. Sports agents say a professional athlete can’t control what team will draft them. They can, however, control where they later sign as free agents. The chance to work predominantly in a non-income tax state can be a major factor in that decision. Is it any wonder heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson chose Tennessee as his boxing battleground in 2002? Or that former Titans running back Eddie George recently elected to run the ball in Texas after his time in Tennessee ran out?
The debate over an income tax in Tennessee is full of high emotion on both sides. But supporters beware. Instituting an income tax would eliminate a competitive advantage enjoyed by the state’s professional sports teams. And for rabid sports fans, that could serve to foster yet more public disdain for what is an already unpopular proposal.
Management--
BEAR MARKETING
Heisley’s savvy moves have gotten the Grizzlies off to a roaring start
by Drew Ruble
Necessity is the mother of invention. It’s a maxim to which Memphis Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley surely can relate. Competing in the smallest population and television market in the 30-team National Basketball Association (NBA), Heisley has had little choice but to be highly creative in seeking out ever new and innovative revenue streams to bolster his basketball investment.
A turnaround specialist by trade, Heisley is no stranger to out-of-the-box thinking. His investment firm, Chicago-based Heico Companies LLC, has specialized in resuscitating distressed businesses since forming in 1979. Currently Heico runs more than 30 companies, does $1.5 billion in annual sales and garners $250 million in yearly profits.
Heisley’s most creative idea as Grizzlies owner never even came to fruition. In a proposal that clearly foreshadows the future of professional sports sponsorship in America, Heisley lobbied league officials to permit him to sell the actual team name of his proposed Memphis franchise to FedEx Corporation. Had Heisley been successful in convincing his fellow NBA owners and league commissioner David Stern that a corporate name could be attached to a team, Grizzlies president of business operations Andy Dolich describes as “good” the chances the Memphis team would have been renamed the “Express.” Adds Dolich, “History says let’s see what happens in the future in terms of team naming rights.”
Another unusual idea Heisley floated on uncharted waters did make landfall. The team recently sold naming rights to the FedEx Forum’s attached parking garage to a consortium of Memphis-area Ford automobile dealers. It is by all accounts an historic first in sports marketing. Now the Ford Parking Garage bears concourses identified as Expedition, Explorer and Mustang among other models. Easier to remember than concourses A, B or C, yes?
Heisley’s penchant for the road less traveled is perhaps best exemplified by his decision to take the arena naming rights money up front in a lump sum rather than accept $4.5 million annually for 20 years from sponsor FedEx. Like a Powerball winner flush with $52.5 million in capital, Heisley promptly paid down debt on his investment in the team, improved his asset value and almost instantaneously made the debt-ridden team a solid financial proposition. He set to building the best on-the-court product he could create at a pace faster than otherwise plausible without resorting to fiscally unsound business practices. He wooed the premiere architect of basketball teams in the world, NBA icon Jerry West, from a 45-year relationship with the Los Angeles Lakers. Heisley then granted West the financial flexibility he would need to be aggressive in building a playoff caliber team, which West quickly did.
Ever tinkering, Heisley recently has moved forward with the creation from scratch of a new regional television sports network that the Grizzlies will own. The network will offer sports fans in the MidSouth an alternative to the current Atlanta-centric cable sports networks that dominate the Tennessee market. A $10 million startup, it also will enable Heisley to maximize the team’s television revenues now and in the future.
Heisley has proven to be a revolutionary thinker in the world of sports business and branding. Some might go so far as to describe him as crazy like a fox. One thing is certain. Among NBA owners, Heisley is not your average bear.
Event Marketing
OFF THE BEATEN PATH
One billionaire is thinking outside the racetrack
by Drew Ruble
The never dull O. Bruton Smith is as confidant today as he was six years ago that a college football game can be staged on the infield of his Bristol Motor Speedway racetrack. Given the North Carolina billionaire’s inexhaustible bankroll, it’s hard to doubt his word, even when his top Tennessee employee says the window for the feat Smith proposes has for all intents and purposes closed.
Smith first broached the idea back in 1998. To transpire literally on the Tennessee-Virginia line in one of the five largest facilities in the world in terms of permanent seating, the proposed event would have shattered the attendance record at a college football game, silencing the record-holding University of Michigan. Discussions took place with the University of Tennessee and Virginia Tech University, a willing participant. But, alas, a game never materialized. A key sticking point reportedly was the UT athletic department’s reluctance to play a tough late season opponent in a “home” game 90 miles away from the safe confines of Knoxville’s Neyland Stadium.
Smith’s idea toiled in the deep freeze until last January when at a NASCAR press conference, he made national news with a stunning offer. Into the heated debate over how the Bowl Championship Series, college football’s controversial methodology for selecting a national champion, had failed to name an unanimous champion in 2004, Smith floated a bold proposal. He would give the University of Southern California (USC) and the University of Oklahoma $20 million each to play head-to-head on a football field he would configure at Bristol. NCAA president Miles Brand never responded to the offer. Inter-viewed this past summer, Smith says it’s still on the table for future championship games. “I’m guessing universities could use $20 million, don’t you?” Smith told Business Tennessee.
The Guinness Book world record for attendance at a “football” game is 199,854 at a soccer match between Uruguay and Brazil in 1950. A Speedway football game, be it a UT game or national championship game, could attract 160,000 fans and have an enormous economic impact on the area. Speedway general manager Jeff Byrd agrees a game would be a dream come true. But for logistical reasons, Byrd says hosting a football game amounts to a great idea whose time has passed.
First, prepping the Bristol Motor Speedway for a football game would entail clearing away permanent infrastructure on the infield, including a small hospital, and later, re-building anew. It would also entail moving a 125-foot television tower and scoreboard perched smack dab in the middle of the track. Weighing hundreds of tons, the tower did not exist back in 1998 when talks with UT first occurred. The cost of clearing the infield and installing a field is estimated at $1 million.
Though cost isn’t an insurmountable obstacle in this case, time could be. Bristol’s main race, the Sharpie 500, is run each year in late August. Therefore, demolition for a football game couldn’t start until early September. Byrd says demolition and field preparation is a two-month task. Thus, the earliest date a football game could be played is late October. Football programs seldom schedule tough non-conference games late in the season when the effect of a loss is more detrimental to a team’s bid for a national championship. Also, many late season dates with conference rivals are set in stone.
There are other issues. Regarding a UT game, the university is reluctant to inconvenience season ticket holders and major donors by moving a game to Bristol. Regarding a national championship game, the NCAA would first have to switch to a playoff format, then turn its back on sunny destinations to choose Bristol in January as the setting for its centerpiece event.
Nevertheless, a man can dream. And when that man is O. Bruton Smith, it ain’t over till the billionaire says so.
