WSU introduces 48-hour ticket-purchasing option

Good morning, Cougar fans. Hopefully you all had an enjoyable time celebrating our nation's birth. We procured fireworks from Alabama last week, so there was definitely a good show on our street. Now that the holiday is over, let's try and get back to more important things, like talking about the upcoming football season. On Wednesday, WSU announced a few ticket packages for 2015. Among them was a new option that gives some choosing power back to the fans.

In addition to the standard Crimson mini-plan (tickets for Portland State, Oregon State and Arizona State), and Gray mini-plan (Wyoming, Stanford and Colorado), fans can now sign up for a new option, called the 48-Hour Pack. Here is the key part of the new option:

With the 48-Hour Pack, fans can purchase an open-ended, three-game mini-plan, choosing from the six Cougar home games in 2015. When the Pac-12 Conference announces each game time, normally 12 days prior to kickoff, mini-plan holders will have a 48-hour window to claim a ticket for that game.

This seems to be a significant indicator that WSU has listened to the scores of complaints from fans about the start times of home games, particularly the seeming preponderance of late starts. For fans who do like the night games, this also seems to be a good deal. Using 2014 as an example, fans of earlier starts could have chosen the Portland State, USC and Arizona games, all of which started at 5 p.m. or earlier. If, on the other hand, you prefer the later starts, you could have chosen tickets to Portland State (a 5 p.m. start seems to be right on the edge of both windows), Oregon, Cal or Washington.

While this appears to be a big step forward, there are a few issues I see. First, since the Apple Cup is its own beast, I'm not sure if that game would be included in the three-game packages during the years it's in Pullman. Also, if you don't like the late starts, you would have had to wait quite a while last season to pull the trigger and hope that two of the last three games started in the afternoon.

If you do prefer the 48-Hour Pack, you will have to pay a bit more. The Crimson and Gray plans cost $135 per package, while the 48-Hour Pack costs $165. All in all, I think this is a big improvement. WSU fans who have stayed away for whatever reason now have one less excuse to do so. As far as single game tickets, they can be purchased on July 20 if you're a season ticket holder or CAF member. If you aren't, tickets will be available on Aug. 3.

Let us know what you think of the new plan.

Football

Branding in college football: Identity goes beyond just uniforms and logos | SI.com
Mike Leach’s Cougars chuck the ball even more than his Texas Tech teams did. In Leach’s three seasons in Pullman, the Cougars have averaged 58 passing attempts a game.

USF stays in-house to fill coaching vacancy | CollegeFootballTalk
Gilbertson joined the Bulls last summer and had been working as an offensive grad assistant. He played quarterback for Washington State, from where he received his degree in 2013 after his playing career ended in 2012.

Professional bettors backing Auburn, BYU; fading on Mizzou for 2015 - CBSSports.com
Remember last week when I said to get in early on BYU (+6) at home against Boise State, and Auburn (+6.5) at Arkansas? Apparently there were several Las Vegas sharps thinking the same thing.

Summer Fun with College Athletes

Utah cornerback allegedly robbed man at knifepoint - CBSSports.com
It sounded like a great idea when I came up with it!

Beer

A cut in excise taxes would help boost the makers of craft beers | The Seattle Times
Small breweries are big business in Washington. In 2014, the state had 256 craft breweries, the second-highest total in the country. That’s up from 136 in 2011, according to the Brewers Association.

Non-Sports

‘I Don’t Believe in God, but I Believe in Lithium’ - The New York Times
I believed I had special powers, the report noted; I knew ‘‘when the end of the world was coming due to toxic substances’’ and felt that I was the only one who could stop it.