Wednesday's Clicks: Pieces Starting To Connect For Fall Puzzle

Tuesday was an active day in college sports with decisions that could affect the football season.

It will be a few weeks before we have a clear picture of what the college football season will look like during the COVID-19 pandemic.

But pieces of the puzzle started to snap together on Tuesday.

NCAA president Mark Emmert said his organization won't mandate a certain date for the return to college sports.

"Normally, there's an agreed-upon start date for every sport, every season," Emmert told ESPN's Heather Dinich, "but under these circumstances, now that's all been derailed by the pandemic. It won't be the conferences that can do that either. It will be the local and state health officials that say whether or not you can open and play football with fans.

"We already saw the Oregon governor offering her views on what's likely to happen in September. The Pac-12 can say, 'Gee, we'd all like to open up on this date,' but whether or not you can is going to be ultimately up to the state and local health officials and the campus itself making a decision whether or not they want to go forward."

How conferences are approaching the future is also becoming a little clearer.

• Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey said that a final decision in his conference may not have to be made until mid-July.

• The Mid-American Conference is eliminating postseason tournaments in several sports, and limiting them in others.

• The California State University system will have mainly online classes in the fall.

Expect some changes in the fan experience as well. Rutgers announced on Wednesday that tickets would be mobile-only this season.

And Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said "we're not going to be filling stadiums in the fall."

So, get ready. The puzzle is just now coming together.

Quarterbacks available

Iowa will have a quarterback battle when practice finally does open. Spencer Petras and Alex Padilla would have been in camp for the spring, with Deuce Hogan joining the competition in the summer.

But there was no spring practice, and it's unknown how much summer workout time there will be.

It's a problem for a lot of programs around the country looking to replace starters. A look at some of the QBs available in the transfer portal:

Baseball's issues

How other leagues try to restart their season might play a role in what happens at the college level.

A look at some of the problems facing the start of the Major League Baseball season: