“Ch-Ch-Changes. Turn and face the strange.” – David Bowie

I do not know what the statute of limitations are on potential trespassing charges are, but I will admit I was among the throng of navy-clad football fans who ended up on Pat Dye’s well-manicured field after Auburn football’s harrowing four-overtime victory over Texas A&M a couple of weekends ago.

Many college football purists bemoaned storming the field after a victory over a quality, but hardly overwhelming, team. They are probably right. This will not go down as one of the great moments in Auburn football history.

Truthfully, the only reasons I ended up on the field were because our seats were only a few rows up from field level, and I had a seven-year-old in tow who may have tried to rip down the goalposts by herself if I had not gone with her.

Ending the night on the field after her first Auburn football game will always be a special memory for my daughter as well as my wife, father, and myself who accompanied her. Others can quibble about what constitutes a win worthy of rushing the field.

Besides, many of those same college-athletics purists have bigger issues to worry about nowadays. Some have declared they are done with college sports.

It’s all about business and greed with athletes these days, they say. Athletes are only looking to sign up and play for the college with athletic boosters willing to pay the most money for their services through NIL – short for name, image and likeness.

They also say there is no loyalty anymore as players can enter the transfer portal at the drop of a hat without penalty. It is not rare for a team to have a few players who have played for three different colleges through their four-to-five-year college careers.

I have to admit the purists are not wrong with many of their criticisms. University of Georgia quarterback Carson Beck turned heads this offseason after his purchase of a Lamborghini, seemingly due to NIL money he has collected.

A recent Sports Illustrated article pointed out that at least some Georgia fans are correlating Beck’s higher interception total this season with his attention possibly drifting more toward exotic cars instead of the principles of his opponent’s cover-two defense.

There is also something to be said for athletes entering a program, buying into a team concept, honing their skill behind the scenes with little playing time, and waiting their turn for upperclassmen – who followed a similar path – to graduate.

Now a spoiled athlete can walk out and join another team if a coach even looks at him or her sideways and will not have to worry about sitting out the next season, as the rules required in earlier times. This can create a sense of entitlement that will ultimately hurt the athlete who will just run away whenever adversity strikes.

All that can be true, but there is another side to the story that can also be true. To say many college athletes were not already paid under the table by less-than-scrupulous athletics boosters at nearly every major program in the country would be equivalent to sticking your head in the sand.

While it may be surprising to us the money some players can now make, at least the system is much more in the open than it was in the past.

Moreover, looser transfer rules also allow a player to move on from a bad decision after falling for a sales pitch from a silver-tongued coach at a program with flashy recruiting tactics. The decisions I made at 16 and 17 years of age often were not my wisest, and I imagine the same can be true for high-profile athletes.

Players who are excelling at smaller programs can also make the jump to premier programs and test their skills against the best of the best much more easily in the current system. Roster management is more of a challenge for college coaches now, but they are also paid handsomely to deal with the headache.

For those of you who have given up on college athletics and refuse to watch anymore, I get it and respect it. For me, a lot of the pros and cons of the new way of doing things end up being a wash.

That just leaves me with the question, is it still fun to watch college sports? After walking around the verdant playing surface at Jordan-Hare Stadium on a chilly night with a few thousand friends, the answer is still yes.