Despite being optimistic about conference-only play, Chris and Mya Hinton still have concerns. So, with two sons currently in college football programs — Myles at Stanford and sophomore defensive lineman Chris Jr. at Michigan — the Hintons have chosen to be vocal.
Tuesday night, Chris and Mya appeared on HBO’s Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel and expressed their grievances about the approach the NCAA and college football programs have taken to reintroduce players to campus and practices.
“As a parent of a student athlete, actually, it pissed me off,” Chris said on Real Sports.
“… Why can’t there be some kind of universal procedures, protocol, for integrating our sons back to campus?”
This comes after the Hintons appealed to the NCAA, expressing their concerns. They said they received a dismissive response back, and the most frustrating part is the lack of input from players and their parents that the NCAA has allowed.
“The players, who probably have as much to lose as anybody, had no voice, were voiceless,” Chris said. “And as parents, we felt the same as the kids — we were voiceless.”
In an attempt to have parents’ voices heard, Chris and Mya founded the Facebook group College Football Parents 24/7. There, parents could express the concerns many of them shared.
What it all comes down to is simple, safety:
“We just want it to be done right and safely,” Chris told The Daily last week. “We want our sons to be safe, as any other parent would want.”
While the Hintons have expressed they felt Michigan has handled COVID-19 well in the past, their tone and demeanor on Tuesday night’s program told a different story. They were upset, they were scared and there wasn’t much sense of optimism coming from them.
And while their primary concern is about safety, their frustration is kindled by what they see as the reasoning behind bringing the students back — money.
College football generates billions of dollars a year, and their two sons’ programs generate over 200 million dollars a year combined. For Chris and Mya, that money isn’t worth risking their children’s health, especially when the universities aren’t even willing to let their own staff on campus.
“The optics of that is alarming,” Chris said. “What does it say about your concern about our kids, our sons?”
And while the Ivy League and other smaller leagues have canceled their fall season for the sake of player safety, larger leagues have not followed suit.
“This is ridiculous,” Chris said. “They’re not even hiding the fact that it’s all about revenue. It’s about revenue. And it’s about the money.”
With both their sons currently on campus for voluntary workouts, the Hintons fear the worst is yet to come if the NCAA and college programs themselves don’t critically review and alter their current approach.
“Just based on statistics somebody — somebody’s kid’s gonna die,” Chris said. “And so the numbers are screaming ‘pump the brakes.’ ”