Well, I strive on this blog to be 100% right approximately 1% of the time. I’ll have to co-sign this column by Stewart Mandel: it’s looking more and more like I was wrong about the Texas A&M to the SEC rumors (as he also admitted), but it still doesn’t quite make sense to either of us from a rational perspective. Up until literally a few hours ago, it has all looked like completely fan-based chatter. I’m honestly taken aback that it now appears that the SEC university presidents are going to meet on Sunday to discuss an A&M invite and the school’s Board of Regents will follow up with a meeting on Monday. (We’ll address various rumors regarding schools like Florida State, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma and Missouri if necessary if something actually happens next week.) I’ve always understood why Texas A&M fans wanted to go to the SEC and frankly, never disputed that it would be a good move for them. The SEC is absolutely a superior conference to the Big 12 (both competitively and financially) and any Longhorns that think A&M wouldn’t benefit from moving are being disingenuous. That’s the whole reason why that I argued in my last post that it would be UT people more than those from Baylor or Texas Tech that would work to block such a move. I certainly understand the resentment/anger factor, as well. As an Illinois alum, I’m still envious of Michigan’s central connection to the The Big Chill, which is a landmark achievement in the history of white people dancing. Despite some interesting comments from various A&M factions about my loyalties or biases, I personally have nothing against the Aggies at all.
That being said, I share Mandel’s befuddlement about what’s in it for the SEC (although for slightly different reasons). Let me be clear: my opinion has nothing to do about the value of Texas A&M itself. As I’ve stated many times before, Texas A&M is extremely valuable and I could see why the SEC would want them in a vacuum where there is no domino effect on the rest of the college football landscape or there’s a clean slate in terms of TV contracts. However, there’s a fairly good chance that we’ll see significant domino effects if this move occurs and, more importantly, it continues to be unclear to me how the SEC can monetize expansion with the length of its current TV contracts with ESPN and CBS. Dennis Dodd yesterday stated that all conferences have a “look-in” provision that Mike Slive had described, so it’s not as if though that the SEC has some unique terms here where they get to expand at will in a manner that other conferences aren’t able to do. At the very least, it’s not as easy as “expansion = look-in trigger = more $$$”, or else we’d see conferences expand every single time that their own TV contracts fell behind by a little bit. To paraphrase a wise little green dude, that leads to fear, and fear leads to anger, and anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering. To the extent that the SEC can open up its current TV contracts by expanding, every other conference can do it, too. If it’s that “easy”, then the conference with the most incentive to expand is the ACC considering that the deal that they signed last year is looking quite outdated and could get outpaced by the Big East next year if the status quo holds. It’s for those reasons why conferences only have a “look-in” when they expand, but networks have an explicit termination right in the event of conference contraction.
From a long-term perspective, Texas A&M certainly adds a ton of value to the SEC. The Aggies have a rabid fan base and truly bring in the entire state of Texas as a market. The recruiting benefits are also unquestioned. Still, I still haven’t hard anyone explain how the SEC is going to cajole ESPN and CBS to throw more money around when their TV contracts last until the mid-2020s. It’s one thing for those networks to maintain a good working relationship with the SEC, but entirely another to have to throw hundreds of millions of more at contracts that are locked-in for over a decade. Maybe ESPN and CBS could ensure that the SEC schools still get the same per-school share (so the current SEC members end up being revenue neutral), but those two networks, who have dealt with much larger entities like the NFL, aren’t simply going to be pushovers and provide some type of massive financial incentive that would encourage expansion.
I also know that a lot of readers believe that I overemphasize state politics, but I’ll continue to disagree on front. Texas A&M might procedurally be able to get around Texas politicians by approving the move to the SEC on Monday in a year when the legislature is not in session. (And I thought Illinois legislators were lazy! We’ll still take down anyone in blatant corruption, though.) However, as a practical matter, the A&M Board of Regents are going to have to work with these legislators in the long-term, so it’s not as if though they can just ignore them. Besides, if I’m a state legislator, do you think I want to put out more sound bites about crushing budget deficits, ignoring entitlement/pension reform and and failing to cure stagnant job growth? Fuck that shit. I’d be all over talking about college football like white on rice under any possible tangential hook. (The federal guys in Washington certainly do it regularly when they complain about the BCS.) Maybe it’s a moot point and the Aggies know that they have the requisite political support, but that’s to be determined in the maybe-too-late Texas House Higher Education Committee meeting that’s supposed to take place on Tuesday.
Last year, the entire world was convinced that the Pac-16 was a “done deal” on a Friday without any doubt in anyone’s mind, but after a weekend of rampant discussions, it ended up collapsing within a few days. In conference realignment discussions, absolutely nothing is a done deal until you see an announcement with both the inviter and the invitee at a press conference with signed paperwork. This goes double in the case of public universities located in the state of Texas. Also note that Tony Barnhart (about as plugged-in with Mike Slive as anyone) and Mr. SEC seem to intimate that it’s not necessarily full speed ahead from the SEC side with a lot more smoke coming from College Station as opposed to Birmingham.
So, while it looks there’s a good chance that I’m going to be eating some crow with a Texas A&M move to the SEC, let’s just wait to see if we get some Stevie Wonder signed/sealed/delivered action on Monday. After that, we can get back to doing what we do best here: engaging in rampant completely unsubstantiated speculation!
(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)
(Image from Mr SEC)
Buckeyes #1
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Hawks #1 in the Legends.
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Add.
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Try again.
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One more time.
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Add. GBR
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bacon
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add
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Re-add.
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After all of these years the dam might break. Game on!
First?
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A lot can still go wrong here, true. Nevertheless, I think there is a lot more traction this time around rather than last year’s shocker offer from the Pac. I think having the Gov as an alum does/did or will help this happen
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New post, so I’ll repost this here:
OK, the wheels in my head started spinning when I read in one of the articles above the following quote:
“The possibility of being left out if FSU bolts the ACC has the Hurricanes, “scared to death,” said a source.”
So if FSU is taken to complement TAMU in the 14-team SEC, you can be sure that Shalala (who was chancellor at Wisconsin before) would start working the phones in B10 country (if she hasn’t already). I don’t think the B10 would take Miami by itself, but could it be a way to reel in ND and Texas?
Say they do (and Texas gets to bring along Baylor/Rice). You could see pods like this:
NW
Nebraska
Wisconsin
Iowa
Minny
SW
Texas
Baylor
Illinois
Northwestern
SE
ND
Miami
PU
IU
NE
Michigan
OSU
PSU
MSU
Say Texas and OU still continue the RRR & Texas plays all OOC games in Texas. Texas would play 4 conference games outside of Texas, 3 of them in cold-weather states some years (when they visit Miami). That compares with 2.5 conference games outside Texas now (2 in cold weather states. Is an extra 1-2 games outside Texas and/or in cold weather states going to affect Texas recruiting?
Now what about ND’s national schedule?
Well, in this set up, they play Miami and a Texas school every year (as well as USC & Navy every year, and let’s say they rotate between BC & Stanford).
Plus, I think IU would be willing to move their home games against ND to southern/eastern locales half or more of the time.
They’d visit Midwestern schools 3.25 times (though if IU is willing to move their home sites to the south, that’s knocked down to 2.75 times.
Eastern schools 1 time
Western schools .75 times
Southern schools 1 time (1.5 times if IU makes their home games in the south).
That’s Midwest-centric, but where does ND play now?
From this website, from 2011-16, ND will on average play in
MW: 1.67
East: 1.67
West: 1.5
South: .83
It’s a shift, but not a big one. In fact, ND would play more often in the south even if IU doesn’t move their home games (and if IU is willing to move some home games east, the biggest shift is that ND would stop visiting the mountain west (BYU & AF) and visit the plains a bit further east instead (UNL, Iowa, Minny).
So why would Texas go for this (join the B10)? I have to say that I don’t think they would unless
1. OU & OkSt. bolt for the Pac or SEC
2. The Pac is not going to be flexible about the LHN while the B10 is.
Why would that be? Because the Pac is more unbalanced than the B10. If Texas can get away with the LHN, USC would want its own network as well as the Pac essentially has only one superpower right now. The B10 is secure enough and has enough superpowers so the big dogs see value in pooling their resources and gains.
Would ND join, in that case? Touch-and-go, I think. ND may stay independent. However, they won’t be joining a weakened ACC or fly their non revenue sport teams to the west coast as rich2 may want.
Even without ND, would Texas+Baylor+Miami+GTech/Rice work and be worth it?
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Rice and Baylor in a league with Ohio State, Michigan, Wisconsin et al. Yeah, right.
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Rice Baylor
Well, OK, maybe Rice and Baylor if Delany gets desperate.
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Ahem. If you’re looking for a Texas private school, there’s a better option than either of those. And of course, the “Tech Problem” remains.
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True Jake. I forgot SMU. 🙂
Seriously, regarding the “Tech” problem, Texas would not be on the hook this time as it would be TAMU causing the breakup. Still, the OK schools + TTech & Texas to the “desert” division of the Pac is the other major option of Mizzou goes.
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Here was my last reply to this on the other page, edited to skip the corrections:
I think a lot of teams would have an issue with your pods. UT doesn’t want NW and IL annually, ND doesn’t want IN and to lose annual MI and MSU games, the SE pod doesn’t want to be that much stronger than others, IN doesn’t want to lose OSU, etc.
Maybe this:
N – ND, MI, MSU, IL – 2 kings, 1 tradesman, 1 peasant
E – OSU, PSU, IN, PU – 2 kings, 2 peasants
W – NE, WI, IA, MN – 1 king, 2 princes, 1 peasant
S – UT, Miami, Baylor, NW – 1 king, 1 prince, 1 tradesman, 1 peasant
It would require locking OSU/MI and IL/NW, but not much else. People play the local teams for the most part, and every pod has some strength.
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Here’s my reply:
While I can see UofI and NU playing OOC, UM and OSU both need to play 7 home games, and playing each other OOC would mean very few marquee OOC games. Plus, would the respective fanbases stand for their game having no meaning in the B10 standings?
In any case, I see both MSU and Michigan playing ND only 4 times in 6 years even with no expansion once the Big10 goes to 9 conference games.
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I said OSU/MI would have to be locked for a reason. They won’t play OOC. The schedulers will have to deal with it. 33% of the time their pods will be grouped. The other 67% there is a 25% chance that they would be on the rotation, for a total of 17% chance they’d be schedule. That means 50% of the time the standard schedule would be OK. The other 50%, OSU and MI would be locked and they would rotate through the other teams more slowly.
ND will play MI and MSU less in the current scheme, sure, but if they have to go in a pod they either want all national brands (UT, Miami & PSU, for example) or familiar faces from the midwest (MI, MSU, PU). They don’t want or need annual games locked with IN.
If you do pods, they have to be balanced. To do that and preserve rivals is tough.
I think ND would to play UT, Miami, PSU, MI, MSU, PU, OSU, NE and NW in about that order. I don’t think they have as much interest in WI, IA, MN, IL, IN and Baylor. UT would want many of the same teams, plus Baylor. The same for Miami. It’s too many new faces too soon to work out well.
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I would put PU higher simply because they’ve played annually without breaks since the end of WWII while the Michigan and MSU series have had breaks. Something makes ND value their PU series.
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A long post to describe something the would never happen in a million years. Jim Delaney has spent the better part of a year explaining why the Big Ten won’t partake in any Texas-level shenanigans.
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Yoda!
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Texans take football seriously and realize politicians are a joke. Only a stupid pol jacks with football.
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And I was enjoying my inbox being flooded with “Why Angry Aggies Aren’t Enough to Move A&M to the SEC”-labelled messages that contained more and more evidence that angry Aggies actually are enough to move A&M to the SEC…
Seriously though, I’m with Frank (and Mandel) on this one. I did not expect this to happen, especially in August (18 months before the earliest possible start date). Slive said he didn’t want conferenceaggedon and now he’s pulling the pin.
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Frank I agreed with everything you said and was making similar arguments. I’m still most shocked about this from an ESPN perspective if this gets through (and I think it’s going to). I just didn’t think they could get around that easily if at all.
General question: Do you guys think Texas and Texas A&M will keep playing if the Aggies go to the SEC. I’m guessing the series ends which will be sad.
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This is a completely separate issue, but might actually be even more important in the long run: a majority of the Big Ten and Pac-12 ADs have come to a consensus to support a seeded plus-one BCS system:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/collegesports/2015896289_proposal13.html
http://eye-on-collegefootball.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/24156338/31289595
Not sure if the university presidents will agree, yet getting even the ADs of those leagues to consider it is fairly significant.
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4-team playoff is coming.
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Absolutely hate that! I’d rather drop the BCS and go back to poll and bowl than go to a playoff.
And keeping the Rose Bowl out to hold onto the Big Ten vs. PAC-12 isn’t going to work out very often. How often are both the Big Ten and PAC-12 champs not going to be in the top 4 (probably top 4 conference champs).
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??? Actually, it’ll mean that the second-place B10 & Pac teams will play in the Rose Bowl often. The two conferences would not mind at all.
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Tobe clear for those who don’t read the articles, another BCS bowl would be added (probably Cotton) and the top 4 would be seeded for semi-finals in rotating BCS bowls. The Rose would not host semis, but would get to keep B10/P12 and still be a rotating host for the NCG.
What isn’t addressed:
Does the limit of 2 teams become 3 with the 2 extra slots? What happens if the B10 or P12 champs are in the semis? Does the Rose automatically get a replacement from that conference? Is there a cutoff rank? What about the other bowls? Do their tie-ins carryover to a replacement? Is anybody tied to the Cotton? What if the B12 goes away?
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1. I think all tie-ins besides the Rose may go away.
2. An easy way to ensure that the Rose gets to choose a B10 & Pac team is to always give it first choice of teams after the 4 playoff teams are seeded (which would be fair since they never get to host a semifinal).
3. If the B10 and Pac champs both make the playoffs, the Rose would choose the second place teams (really, the teams that it wants) from those 2 conferences.
The B10 and Pac would like this arrangement. Would the SEC complain? Maybe they’d allow 3 teams from a conference (as you predict) to go to a BCS bowl to mollify the southerners.
However, there wouldn’t 2 more slots; still 10 BCS teams.
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I would think the replacement rules would be pretty similar to now except a little looser (still 10 teams in and probably all the automatics still). Only switch might be to let the Rose drop the having to take a non-AQ once.
I am not sure about other tie-ins. They might still be in place when the bowls aren’t national semi-finals.
I wonder why the Cotton would be thrown in the championship rotation though. I think one concession to the existing BCS bowls would be to let them keep the 4 year rotation and let the Cotton be satisfied with moving up.
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Other thought: Would you take the top 4 or top 4 conference champions? If you take the top 4 overall, you’d have 2 from one conference a lot of years (especially the SEC).
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Top 4 overall. It’s ridiculous otherwise. What if 3 of the 4 best teams in the country actually do reside in one conference that year? Why should they be excluded for a conference champ that is ranked #15 (or unranked, which is very possible with all top conferences besides the B12 holding a conference title game now)?
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@Richard – Yeah, I sympathize with the notion of having the top 4 conference champs play each other, but since the BCS has never required the top 2 in the rankings to be in separate conferences for the championship game, then there’s no way they’d impose that rule on the top 4.
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Because we want the regular season to matter. Why should we be declaring someone who can’t be called conference champ the national champ?
Personally, I think it’s already ridicious that we can have one team with a better record beat an opponent, have a better record, and then have to play them in the CCG to be declared conference champ.
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Eric:
So how does the regular season matter if an 8-4 team that wins it’s division wins 3 straight upsets in a row to become national champions?
Why does an NCAA champion have to be a conference champion in football? That isn’t the case with any other NCAA sport.
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Richard,
That 8-4 team wouldn’t make the top 4. They’d get a BCS spot but not in the semis.
I agree that teams that don’t win their conference shouldn’t be eligible for the Football Four. If you aren’t the best in your conference, which was the majority of your schedule, then you don’t deserve it. Go play the BE champ in a BCS bowl and like it.
The top 4 conference champs or independents should make the Football Four. That’s not what will happen, but it’s what should happen.
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9-3, then, Brian.
So Brian, say you have Team A, who goes 12-1, losing in their conference championship game to the other unbeaten team in the land. They are in what is considered the hardest conference in the country (by Sagarin ratings, whatever).
Team B goes 10-3, plays in the third hardest conference in the country, doesn’t end up with the most wins in its conference, but wins it’s conference title game and is the 4th highest conference champ.
Oh, and Team A drubbed Team B 49-7 in an OOC game earlier in the season.
You’re saying that Team B is more deserving of getting a shot at being national champion than Team A.
Why, exactly should Team B winning its conference by whatever silly measure it’s conference sets trump head-to-head results?
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Personally I’m saying that neither the team that lost it’s ccg or the team that was 9-3 deserves a chance for the national title, which is why I oppose an expanded playoff at all. Since we are forced to choose and since I’d rather keep more attention on the regular season and winning your conference, I’d choose putting the 9-3 team in if its a conference champ.
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Eric:
Ironically, you’d make all OOC games meaningless preseason games, then. Not sure how that enhances the value of the regular season.
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Richard,
A 3 loss team would barely make the top 10. That’s why your scenario is so bad. The worst team in the top 4 would be 10-2 at worst. Even in crazy 2007, the top 3 loss team in the final regular season AP poll was #9 UF with LSU and GA ahead of them.
Past BCS years:
2010 – UConn had 4 losses
2008 – VT had 4 losses
2007 – 4 champs had 2 losses
2005 – FSU had 4 losses
2004 – Pitt had 3 losses
2003 – KSU had 3 losses
2002 – FSU had 4 losses
2001 – LSU had 3 losses
2000 – Purdue had 3 losses
1999 – Stanford had 3 losses
1998 – Syracuse had 3 losses
In 13 years, no 3 loss team has come near the top 4 and it won’t happen now either.
The rest of your scenario:
“So Brian, say you have Team A, who goes 12-1, losing in their conference championship game to the other unbeaten team in the land. They are in what is considered the hardest conference in the country (by Sagarin ratings, whatever).
Team B goes 10-3, plays in the third hardest conference in the country, doesn’t end up with the most wins in its conference, but wins it’s conference title game and is the 4th highest conference champ.
Oh, and Team A drubbed Team B 49-7 in an OOC game earlier in the season.
You’re saying that Team B is more deserving of getting a shot at being national champion than Team A.”
Yes, I am. Especially since B would have to be 11-2 at worst to make the Football Four. That means they went 10-2, with 1 loss to 12-1 A, and then won their CCG. If A didn’t win their CCG, they aren’t the best team in their conference according to their own conference. They certainly aren’t NC worthy to me with several other 0 or 1 loss conference champs available.
You asked:
“Why, exactly should Team B winning its conference by whatever silly measure it’s conference sets trump head-to-head results?”
Because A agreed to the rules to determine the best team in the conference. Why should Team A get another shot at the team that beat them in the CCG?
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Uh, Brian, if you take only the top 4 conference winners, they don’t have to be anywhere near the top 4 to make the playoffs. That was my point.
In any case, say 11-2 conference winner Team D already got drubbed by conference winner team C 56-7 in an OOC game. Why shouldn’t 12-1 Team A get another shot at Team C when Team D gets that opportunity?
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I would say, however, that the non-AQs would love your setup. TCU in 2010, Cincy & TCU in 2009, Utah in 2008, Utah in 2004.
Irony: In 2005, #6 ND would have gotten in over #4 OSU (OSU actually beat ND that year in the bowl game).
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C’mon now. Always putting down the Big East…
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Richard,
The BCS has never had a year with 2 conference champs with 3 losses. For your scenario, all but at most 3 of the ACC, BE, B10, B12, P12, SEC, MWC, WAC, CUSA, MAC and SB champs, plus ND, BYU, Army and Navy would all have to have 3 losses. That’s 11 conference champs plus 4 independents, or 15 total teams. How often do you expect at least 12 of those 15 to have 3 losses or more?
Unless that really seems probable, you’re just fear-mongering to make your position sound better.
You’ll get no sympathy from me for a 12-1 team passed over for a 11-2 conference champ (or 10-2 for some conferences and independents).
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And you still have tiebreaks. 2008 OU was 1st in the BCS, Texas 3rd. Both teams 11-1 regular season, Texas beat OU by 10 but lost at Tech (also 11-1) on a last 2nd TD who lost badly at OU. OU won the tiebreak which was the BCS-higher poll and higher computer rankings. Then OU lost to Florida by 10 in the BCS championship game.
Big 8 had one year with the top 3 teams in the country in the final polls (71 or 72).
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bullet,
In these days of limited intersectional games, I’d take the B12’s word for who their best team is and go from there. Especially in a case like 2008 where the issue was conference losses, the conference champ is the only one that should play for the title.
What 2008 showed is that the 2 team limit is fundamentally flawed and should be bumped to 3, perhaps with limited payment and/or the loss of a future at-large bid.
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There is no logical reason to limit it to conference champions. Conference championships are determined only on the basis of conference games. The national championship (or, the participants in a 4-team playoff) should be based on the outcome of all games. There is no inherent reason why the team that was superlative over the 75% of the schedule that was conference games is the same team that was superlative over 100% of the schedule.
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Richard,
Conference races have always been the heart and sole of the season. Non-conference games would still matter to the extent that you have to be one the top 4 conference champions and not just a conference champion which is more difficult with a conference loss.
Again, I don’t like the result, but I like it better than taking teams that don’t win their own conference and calling them national champs (I know this is regularly done in other sports, still don’t like it for college football).
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The SEC (Slive) has been in favor of this for some time, but couldn’t get the B1G or the Pac 10 to back them. I just hope they leave it at a plus one (actually a 4 team playoff to be more percise), and don’t try to create some crazy 16 team playoff or something.
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ACC was also for it. Many of the BE and Big 12 ADs were for it, but their presidents opposed.
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I’ll agree with you again. THAT is the big news of the day. I didn’t think B10 and P12 would go for it this round. I thought it might even be possible the rest of the conferences went for it at some point w/o P12 and B10 as they did with the BCS predecessor.
Maybe the SEC is triggering this for 5 conferences of 14 and an 8 team playoff now or next time.
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I just had a crazy thought. Could the SEC’s making this move and the news that the Pac-12 and B1G are leaning toward a plus-one be related? The SEC was in favor of the plus-one a few years ago so the Pac-12 and B1G give them that for the SEC starting the expansion dominoes falling.
Expansion was going to happen eventually but neither the Pac-12 or B1G had a way to leverage UT and force them to make a decision. The SEC taking A&M sets up the B12 for dismantling but doesn’t force it’s collapse. And that is a benefit to the long term expansion plans of the conferences. If there is no imminent danger to Texas schools, and it may even benefit one Texas school such as Houston, the legislature is much less likely to have a problem with the first move, A&M to the SEC.
The long play here is keeping the B12 weak enough that it cannot survive another defection. When the time is right, say when the B1G’s contract expires, the Pac-12 and B1G make their play for UT.
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I posted this without seeing your post bullet. It sounds like we were thinking along the same line though. The B1G and Pac-12 give this to the SEC for their grabbing A&M.
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Love the 4-team playoff. This is always the type of playoff I thought would win out because it stays within the bowl system. I don’t see why you’d need to get rid of any tie-ins (other than the B12 would probably now want the Cotton): each bowl can still grab the tie-in conference teams when it is not in the playoff rotation.
Also, of course you take the BCS top 4 rather than conference champions. You can’t risk a 3 or 4 loss team making it in (unless somehow their schedule is soooo difficult that it ends up in the top 4). Four teams is probably the best in terms of making sure each team with a legitimate claim makes it while not allowing a non-worthy team in the tournament.
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There is zero risk of a 3 or 4 loss champ in the top 4 champs. There are 11 conference champs and 4 independents, and all but 3 of them would have to lose 3 or more games. The BCS has never had more than 1 AQ champ with 3 losses. It is a strawman argument.
I don’t mind that people disagree on who should be in, but where do you all get this ridiculous notion of 3 loss champs among the top 4 conference champs?
Stop fear-mongering and argue your position by the merits.
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There haven’t been a ton of highly-ranked 3 loss conference champions because (1) there have been very few major conference seasons with 9 games since the BCS started. and (2) there might not be 6 “major conferences” by the time they go to a plus one. One can argue whether the Big East is a major conference as it is.
Speaking of strawmen, why mention the fact that there are 11 conferences? The Sun Belt champ isn’t sniffing a 4-team tournament. If your plan is to take a 2-loss CUSA champ over a 3-loss SEC champ, it’s a flawed plan.
Also, assuming that the BCS rankings would be used to determine whether an independent makes it into the top 4 for a playoff, how can you justify putting a #4 BCS Notre Dame into the tournament but leave out a #3 BCS Michigan who beat Notre Dame in non-conference but didn’t end up winning the B10 championship? If you use the BCS ranking for choosing which conference champions get in, and you’re willing to use the BCS for choosing which independents get in, then just use the BCS rankings period, no ban on non-champions.
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First, I’m allowing for the possibility of good teams in bad (or weaker) conferences. 12-0 Boise in the MWC would deserve a shot. 12-0 Houston in CUSA would, too. I’d take a 1 loss non-AQ champ over an AQ non-champ, too. I’d take a 2 loss AQ champ over a 1 loss non-champ.
I never said conferences should use the BCS as a tiebreaker. If they do, that’s their problem. I don’t believe you can be the best team in the nation and not win your conference. It’s tautological for me.
Moral of the story: Win your conference
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So Michigan can’t be the best team in the country if it doesn’t win the B10, but ND can be the best team in the country even though it loses to Michigan. How is that tautological?
Also, you realize the incentives of your plan, don’t you? Texas could join the WAC and make the playoffs every year.
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As for 9 game schedules, the P10 never had a 3 loss champion in the 6 seasons so far (twice had 2 losses).
The B12 CG had more upsets than most, and only had a 3 loss winner twice (1996 UT, 2003 KSU) in 15 years. The SEC CG produced one (2001 LSU) in 19 years.
So while 9 game schedules and CCG can lead to more losses, it will be a strange confluence of events that leads to many 3 loss league champs in the same year (plus ND and BYU).
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I didn’t say a conference should use the BCS to determine their champion either. But even under your plan, you have to have some way to choose which of the 11 conference champions (and ND and Navy and Army and BYU) get into the 4-team tournament. If it’s not going to be the BCS, what are you going to use? Pure number of losses? That’s ridiculously arbitrary. Selection committee?
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Richard,
“So Michigan can’t be the best team in the country if it doesn’t win the B10, but ND can be the best team in the country even though it loses to Michigan.”
Exactly. Just like MI could be the best team in the country despite losing to ND. Nice to see you understand If you aren’t the best team in your subset, you can’t be the best of the whole set.
And yes, I realize teams could try to join bad conferences. However, they’d sacrifice a lot of money to do it. How many schools would say it’s worth it? And how many teams could do it without others just filling up that conference, too?
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Regarding the number of 3-loss champions, keep in mind that the P10 has never played a 9-game schedule along with a championship game. Nor has the B10 ever played a championship game. The chance of a 3-loss conference champion goes up exponentially because the championship game allows for a weak division champion to win the whole thing.
And of course, it is exceedingly easy for Notre Dame and BYU to both be out of the running. Also of course, it’s exceedingly easy for a CUSA or MWC champion to end up with only two losses overall. But noone wants them in the 4-team tournament.
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Brian:
That’s only true if the selection criteria for determining winners of both the subsets and whole set are the same. If the selection criteria for, say, subsets of marbles is “size” but the selection criteria for the whole set of marbles is “weight”, then you most definitely could have a marble that finishes first among the whole set while not finishing first in a subset.
As Adam pointed out, the selection criteria for national champion is naturally different for that of determining a conference champ, as one does (and should) take in to account OOC games while the other doesn’t (shouldn’t).
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What you’re saying, in other words, Brian, (when you use that subset example) is that because the ND-Michigan game has no bearing on the B10 title, it should also have no bearing on the national title. I’m sorry, but that logic is too stupid for me to accept.
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jcfreder,
I wouldn’t use the current BCS standings system, no. An improved version, maybe. A committee would be nice in theory, but who can you choose that doesn’t have a dog in the fight? It’s a little easier to do the hoops bracket because so many teams get in, the bubble isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things. Choosing #4 versus #5 would be a lot of pressure. That’s the advantage of computers.
I’d prefer a set of advanced computer polls all designed to consider different things (stats, scores, locations, weather, injuries, styles of play, etc) and weight them differently, too. I’d prefer the human element to be restricted since everyone carries so much inherent bias.
In your example above, I justify letting in #4 ND but not #3 MI (who beat ND) because MI didn’t win their conference. I’d ask how did MI stay #3, since they must have lost the CCG (no 2 loss team would be #3). The only way MI only drops to #3 for losing the CCG is if the winner is #1. That means the undefeated B10 champ is already in the Football Four, and nobody deserves a chance at a rematch for the NC.
2008 SEC CG – #2 UF beats #1 AL 31-20
AL drops to #4 in the AP poll
2009 SEC CG – #2 AL beats #1 UF 32-13
UF drops to #5 in the AP poll
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jcfreder,
I admitted that 9 games will increase losses, and so will the CCG on occasion. You need to provide some evidence if you’re going to claim that the odds of 3 loss champions goes up exponentially, though. Run some numbers based on past conference winning percentages and how often the 9th game will lead to an extra loss (remember to reduce the odds of losing OOC). Then figure out how often the winner had 2 losses already. Combine that with CCG odds of an upset, and give me some results. Until you have some approximation of that, you’re fear-mongering.
With 8 game schedules, it happened 3 times in 34 seasons combined for the B12 and SEC with a CG. It has never happened in the just 6 years of a 9 game P10 schedule (too small of a sample to tell us much).
It’s easy for plenty of teams to be out of the running. The key is they all have to be out of the running at the same time.
If you’re asking me to choose between a 2 loss conference champ and a 1 loss conference non-champ, it’s no contest. There is no situation under which I would choose the non-champ. For them to still be highly ranked, then the team that beat them in the CCG is in the top 4 already. Nobody deserves 2 teams in the Football Four.
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Richard,
No, it’s not. It’s only true to you if the criteria are exactly the same. The conferences could use the whole season to determine their champion. That’s up to them. The Football Four doesn’t in any way dictate how they determine their champions. Once the conference picks a method, it’s stuck with the results. If MI is upset that it didn’t get in, it should discuss the procedure for determining the B10 champion with the other schools.
The selection criteria isn’t naturally different, it is different by convention. Every conference could use BCS standings as their first choice rather than a late tiebreaker. They choose not to do so.
I’m saying that the postseason shouldn’t care if that game impacted the race for the B10 title. It definitely has bearing on the national title race, though, as every loss generally lowers a teams ranking. Your example requires the B10 to have an undefeated champion already in the top 4. Why would MI deserve a second chance to beat them in the postseason versus another conference champion?
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Fear-mongering is a poor choice of words. I’m not saying that the sky is falling if you take only conference champions; I’m merely saying that it’s a better system if you allow non-champions because there is a decent chance that you end up with dogs as champions with a 9-game schedule and the CCG.
And I don’t need to get out a calculator to show that the odds of a 3-loss champion are significantly greater in leagues that have adopted CCGs. It was difficult for the B10 champ under the old system to have 3 losses, because they took the #1 record out of 11 (actually they didn’t even do that, they used the stupid tiebreaker where a team got to go to the rose bowl if they hadn’t been there last). Now they’ll be adding a game and putting in a CCG. Putting the best of 6 vs. the best of 6. (and in which the non-conference losses don’t count.)
You said that it happened 3 of 34 times in the B12 and SEC (with 8-game schedules, mind you, not the tougher 9-game). I see you left out the ACC. They’ve had a 3-loss champ two out of 6 years and a 2-loss champ every other season, with only an 8-game schedule.
So thats 5 of 40. 12.5% with only an 8 game schedule. Now go to 9 games, blow up the B12 and BE, ending up with maybe only 4 or 5 superconferences.
Under your system, I think Texas has no choice to be an independant, so it can avoid the onerous conference gauntlet and go to the tourney every year even if it has 2 losses.
But in any event, your system is simply not going to be adopted. No major sport in the US limits participation to conference or division champions, not even the current BCS. If they go to a plus-one, you’ll be able to have 2 teams from the same conference get in, which makes sense seeing as sometimes the SEC has 2 of the best 4 teams in the country.
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jcfreder,
The fear-mongering is all the supposed examples of elite non-champs being left out in favor of 3 or 4 loss champs, and saying the odds of 3 loss champs goes up exponentially. Exponential growth is a very specific thing, like cells dividing repeatedly (2, 4, 8, 16, etc):
x(t) = a * b^(t/T)
and it grows very fast once it kicks up. I said the odds of a 3 loss champ would increase, but you need to back up an assertion of exponential growth.
I didn’t check the ACC for two main reasons. First, they have the fewest CCGs. Second, I was tired of doing research.
Everybody agrees 9 games will lead to more losses, but how many more for the conference champ? Most of those extra losses will go to the middle and bottom teams.
I did a quick check with the B10 and P10 since 1993 (stopped P10 in 2005). Combined, the conference winners averaged 7.2-0.8, or a 0.900 winning percentage. That means the extra game is going to cost the conference winner a loss once every 10 years on average. The P10 numbers since going to 9 games back that up with the winners averaging 8-1, or 0.889. The extra game shouldn’t be a big factor compared to now.
The CCG adds a top opponent to the schedule, though, so there will be upsets leading to a champ with more losses. The question is how many 3 loss teams make the CCG. For the SEC, it’s 7 of 38 or 18.4%. For the B12, it’s 9/30 or 30%. For the ACC, it’s 6/12 or 50%. Let’s assume the SEC is the lower bound and the ACC the upper bound, and call it 30% overall.
Assuming a CCG is a toss-up, 15% of the time a 3 loss team will win or 1 in 6 years.
So if there are 3 loss CCG champs 15% of the time, and 4 conferences have them, that makes a 60% chance of 1 but less than a 7% chance of 2 (once every 15 years) and less than a 1% chance of 3. That still leaves the BE, B12, MWC, ND and BYU as likely sources of a 0-2 loss champ to replace the 1 3 loss champ. I don’t see this as a major problem.
The thing to remember with superconferences is that having a lot of teams also means that 1 or 2 should be really good and not have 3 losses.
If you read carefully, I said from the start that my plan wouldn’t happen. That doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s a better plan.
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Brian,
Why shouldn’t Michigan get another shot? To use another example, say Texas played OSU and OSU got whupped. Texas is undefeated and wins their conference. OSU wins their conference as well. By your logic, OSU shouldn’t be given another shot either.
Ultimately, it comes down to who you think deserves to go in to a (4 team) playoff. You seem to think that only league champions should go in, regardless of how good they actually have been (compared to certain other non-league champions). I happen to think that the 4 best teams (by their results over a season) should get in, regardless of what conference they are in.
To use a thought experiment, say that conferences were determined randomly. You could end up with the 4 strongest teams in one conference. You think that excluding 3 of those 4 for less deserving teams is OK. I don’t.
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Richard,
Why should MI get another shot? They lost their last game to the undefeated B10 champ. The B10 champ has just proven they are the better team, why should they have to prove it again a few weeks later? Why shouldn’t the SEC, ACC, P12, B12 or BE champs, for example, get a shot at the B10 champ instead? They most likely haven’t played the B10 champ yet and have proven they are the best team in their conference.
In your example, I’d expect the loss to hurt OSU in the rankings. If the SEC, P12 and ACC champs are all 12-1 or 13-0, they do deserve a shot more than that hypothetical OSU team. I’d love to have a no replay rule for the BCS, too. Once #1 is in, nobody they beat already should get in. The same in descending order with 2, 3 and 4.
Of course it comes down to who you think should go. I thought that’s what we were discussing. I never said otherwise. I also admitted my idea would never be put into place.
I think only league champs should get in because there are a lot of them, and they have shown they are the best of a group of teams. Due to the lack of intersectional games, there is no good way to know how one conference compares to another. Maybe 6-2 in the SEC with a tough schedule was as good as 9-0 in the P12. Who knows? But if the SEC decides that A is better than B, why should B get another chance to beat A? Let the champs from other conferences take a shot.
The problem is that there is no way to know which 4 teams are the best. Because of that, I’ll take an 11-2 champ over a 12-1 non-champ. Your position assumes that the BCS rankings are very accurate, and mine is less dependent on opinion polls and crippled computer models.
I thought this was already a thought experiment. Random conferences are nonsensical. But even if they existed, I’d stay with champs. The other 3 teams had a chance to beat #1 and didn’t do it. I see no reason to let them try again.
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There is generally too much nonsense in this conversation for me to follow it closely, but it makes no sense for the league to allow non-conference games to factor into the league standings. The schools get to choose their non-conference opposition — that would only encourage an (even faster) race to the bottom to pick your non-conference opponents.
Winning your conference championship and winning the national championship are two different animals. Every school belongs to two conferences: their conference and the Football Bowl Subdivision. Each conference has its own set of standings and championship qualifications which are particular and appropriate to that competition. Linking the two is the big mistake.
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And now for something completely different:
“Penn State Players All Worried They’re Going To Be The One Who Accidentally Kills Joe Paterno”
http://www.onionsportsnetwork.com/articles/penn-state-players-all-worried-theyre-going-to-be,21120/
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I needed a good laugh. Thanks.
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After a year and a half following FtT, this is the first time I laughed out loud. You must not be a lawyer! 🙂
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Nice article, Frank. The only way I can see this working for the SEC is if they’re already sure their look-in will get them more money.
i also don’t think Slive will be looking at another Big 12 team for the 14th member. If he can sneak away with one ACC team that can be replaced, he can avoid setting in motion dominos that would strengthen the B1G and the Pac 12.
If FSU were to go SEC, the ACC could quickly pick up Syracuse, Pitt, or even Louisville to take their place.
Really don’t know what this means for B1G expansion. Not many good options left. As Gordon Gekko said to Bud Fox you’ve got a dog with fleas (Mizzou) and a dog with different fleas (Rutgers).
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Maryland would ideally prefer to go to the Big Ten as part of a bloc with Virginia, UNC and Duke, but if that isn’t in the cards, it would enter the mix, since its academics are better than Missouri’s and its athletics better than Rutgers’. And if the SEC takes an ACC team as part of its expansion, further diminishing its football brand (what little it has), there’s the impetus you need.
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What about NC politics? Could UNC leave NCSU behind? I honestly don’t know; if anyone has any insights, that would be great.
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UNC and NC State are part of the same school system and thus share a Board of Regents who would have to sign off on any move. The BoR would probably (if begrudgingly) approve a separation if the schools pledged to continue to play each other OOC, but only if both schools signed off on the deal, meaning the schools have veto power over each others movements.
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This works for the SEC regardless of their media contracts. When you have a chance to land a big fish, you do it. Had Notre Dame asked to join the SEC, they would have taken the Irish, too.
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the only reason “the entire world” was convinced that the pac 16 was a done deal was because Chip Brown, the texas athletic department mouth piece, was given full throttle access on sportscenter every hour on the hour for the nation to see. If it wasn’t for Chip Brown, not ONE person following this would have thought it was a done deal. As if Mike Slive was going to let the 2 flagship institutions in one of the biggest media regions in the country just waltz to the west. That’s why he came to A&M in the first place. Their school is a better fit for the SEC, and the SEC wants no part of Texas trying to control their conference.
You have a lot of truths in your post, and a lot of bullshit. Make no mistake about it, when A&M makes it official, those TV deals are going to be re-done.
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Dear JoePa,
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Frank,
Good post but i don’t think you are taking into account that a few of the Texas Reps. you mention are looking at running for statewide or national office next year. With one of our own having a good shot at winning the Republican nomination (Perry) there will be plenty of Ags at the polls they can’t afford to upset. Also, the unique funding system for Texas schools any threat to TAMU and PUF funding will also threaten UT for any practical general fund issues (which is a consistantly decreasing % of our budget). A second point would be most of the concerns you mention don’t apply to Texas politics. Last, since the governor would have to call them into session for any hearing to have legal consequences before Jan 2013 any resolution they may come to will be forgotten by that time in favor of the issue du jour.
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Just checking in (after a year+ away)…
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Me too. Expansion’s like crack and Frank’s the candy man.
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I just wish he wrote more often: his non-expansion stuff is great too.
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The reason why A&M is leaving is basically this: They are tired of dealing with Big Brother Bevo the Bull(y), and they see a way to escape their demands like Arkansas & Nebraska did, and Missouri would in a Nano-second. UT is a school like Notre Dame that believes that they are entitled to special and unique treatment, and wants schools around them that will essentially enable their behavior (See Baylor and Ok. State). What is frightening from the perspective of the Big XII teams, is no one knows UT like the Aggies (They were essentially joined at the hip), and even they reached the Point Of No Return when it comes to dealing with UT. Assuming A&M is gone, what does this mean for the Big XII (Talk about an oxymoron)? They could add Houston (They would be elated to join a BCS Conference), or maybe even TCU (Although they were another school screwed over by Bevo). But sooner or later OU, Kansas, or maybe even Texas Tech (Remember they said no to putting their game on the Longhorn Network), are going to get up and leave. One possibility could be Kansas taking their basketball team straight to the Big 10. If the Big 10 could get a Kansas and maybe even Oklahoma for football, they could return Michigan (And Michigan St) to the East, and be a real competitor for the SEC as the best Conference.
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Geaux Tigers!
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So who joins w/Texas A&M if this happens?
Florida St.?
Missouri?
Va Tech?
West Virginia?
Louisville?
Why do this if it is not a major add??? Does anyone get you excited other than Florida St.? Missouri is TV sets and Va Tech seems to have shot them down already. WVU and Lville seem to add little from a markets standpoint. I get that the SEC can ask anyone… but is there anyone worth adding?
It would be funny if they added East Carolina or someone like that. The ultimate snub. “The SEC is so good we can MAKE a program into something.”
Anyway… just when you think expansion talk is over… it comes dragging you back in…
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Not Louisville. I don’t see the appeal (to the SEC) of Missouri either. VT would be an interesting choice as they have roots as a military academy similar to A&M.
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They don’t need to ‘get you excited’ they need to make you money! Coming from someone in tv, everyone should calm down about tv sets. They are important, but having butts in chairs paying attention to commercials is more important.
NYC doesn’t care about college football as much as Alabama, and Alabama earns $50 million a year more than Rutgers.
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TV sets are important when you have a subscriber fee for your network.
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. . .which the SEC doesn’t. I expect the SEC to go grab name brands (so certainly FSU).
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But the B10 does. I never mentioned the SEC. I was questioning his basic premise that TV sets don’t matter that much, and he didn’t mention the SEC either.
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Pat was responding to someone talking about SEC expansion, so I assume he was talking about the SEC’s situation as well.
In any case, his general point holds: Half or more of revenue for all conferences still comes from national first tier/second tier rights, and those are driven by brands/advertising.
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I’ve been saying this for over a year. Rutgers isn’t a draw, they’re nothing. You might as well ask Columbia or Yale to join.
Notre Dame is the prize. They’ll deliver the East Coast for you, and hell, most of the nation. We might cherry pick a Big East team (Syracuse?), but all the Big East talk is mostly designed to get Notre Dame to panic and join the Big Ten.
But the question is, is ND the 14th member, or the 16th member? I remember some talk last year about Notre Dame joining the Big Ten, but only if they were the 12th and final member. When Texas came into play everything changed, but we ended up with Nebraska and the sky didn’t fall down on ND’s head.
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As long as Notre Dame believes it’s bigger than the game (sort of the Texas syndrome), it has no desire to enter an all-sports conference. And ND is rapidly losing its luster as a brand, which has largely diminished to old urban ethnic Catholics. For the Big Ten to be disproportionately focused on Notre Dame when it has other alternatives would be counterproductive.
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People forget, The SEC doesn’t need to get markets, they need to get ratings. The Big Ten is the only conference out there that needs markets because of the BTN. If the SEC can fill slots with more premier games, they can get more money from CBS and ESPN. The Big Ten is really the only conference that “markets ” really come in to play when thinking about expansion.
I have no facts to back this up, but I do have programming here in So Cal. SEC football is always aired out here were 20% to 30% of Big Ten football is pushed to ESPN3 or on the BTN. And out here with the Rose Bowl tie in, one would think the Big Ten would get a higher billing so the Pac 12 can keep up on the compitition.
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I appreciate your MICHIGAN/BIG CHILL reference but I don’t think the image of white people dancing to Motown in a refurbished plantation in the heart of SEC country is what Delany has in mind for a Big Ten marketing strategy.
Oklahoma
Missouri
Texas
Notre Dame
It’s doable if we bend like the willow and not like the oak.
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I could never see the likes or ND or UT subordinating their not so small egos to the Big 10 or anyone else. UT is the Jeff George of Colleges…. They harm everything they touch: SWC, Big 12, Nebraska, Arkansas, TCU, SMU, & A&M (If I am in Waco, Texas or Ames, Iowa I am not feeling happy tonight, bacause I know I may be next).
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@David Brown – “UT is the Jeff George of Colleges”
I don’t know if I totally agree with that, but anyone that uses Jeff George as a proxy for disaster gets a +1 from me.
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I certainly wouldn’t agree about the SWC. It was the Oilers, Cowboys, OU & UGA (breaking the NCAA TV monopoly), Arkansas (jumping ship), TCU/SMU/A&M (paying players) that sunk the SWC. And maybe a little Tom Osborne and Nebraska for losing to Miami in the Orange Bowl and giving them an MNC and license to recruit top players from Texas (took a little while, but I knew I could figure out a way to throw UNL in there). Texas (and A&M) trying to make it work was the only thing that held it together for so long.
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Don’t think OU will be able to leave OkSt. behind.
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http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/story/2011-08-12/super-sizing-mass-expansion-of-top-conferences-on-horizon
The SEC will stop at 14.
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I can tell you that if A&M leaves they will become my favorite college team (Except for my Nitts of course (Since UNL is on the PSU annual schedule I can’t like them)). Like list: 1: Yankees. 2: Nitts. 3: Steelers. 4: Penguins. 5: Islanders. 5a: Aggies. Dislike list: 1: Cowboys. 1a: UT. 2: Ohio St. 3: Ravens. 4: Red Sox. 5: Mets.
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You’re not a real Penn State fan if Michigan isn’t on your dislike list.
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Agree! IMO a minimum of 2a.
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I never said I don’t dislike UM (Notice what I said regarding the Huskers). But you can’t put everyone on a top 5 list. I certainly do not like the Bengals, Browns, Eagles, NY Rangers, Flyers, ND, Iowa, Pitt Panthers, Blue Jays, Orioles & Rays either. But if you put a finite number out there you have to stick to it. Besides, UM is not on the schedule, and since they are not as relevant to the current team as before, they are not as disliked (Sort of like Baltimore: Hated them with a passion in the late 90s….. Today, they are an afterthought).
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It hasn’t been fan chatter until the past few hours. You just were not even attempting to listen. Just about every comment you’ve ever made about A&M has been wrong. You relied on Peter Bean and other Texas sources and they made you look foolish. You wonder why Aggies question your bias when you were ignoring any and all A&M input? Really? Even now you won’t give up on the Texas Legislature pull. Dan Branch and the HEC committee will not stop this and in fact, he has commented to Aggies today, that he believes the move with STRENGTHEN the state universities. Last you point to Tony Barnhart. First, he doesn’t discount the move instead he says it is more like 90% probable. Second, he is just about the only one not seeing smoke. What the hell do you call the SEC President’s meeting on Sunday?
Even now, when clearly 100% wrong, you repeat your flawed logic. I’m certain the SEC will monetize this expansion and it will do so almost immediately. I think you know it to but just are not ready to admit it. The SEC is the 2nd most valuable sports entity in the US after the NFL. That value gives them real leverage and allows the conference to negotiate from a position of unparalleled strength. The SEC with the Texas market isn’t like any other conference. Texas A&M insiders have discussed numbers approaching conference payout amounts of $40M in the first year of the move.
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The logic Frank used was sound. It turned out to be wrong, but if you are going to be making future predictions, you base them on how you think contracts are structured and on history. Both suggested this wouldn’t happen. That it now appears to be happening does not mean expecting it not to happen was any kind of bias or even that it was not the most rational expectation. It means we were wrong about a few the weight we put on a few things and/or assumptions we made.
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Actually, MLB and the Big 10 are both more valuable properties than the SEC.
However, regarding you main point, I do have to agree with you that Frank has certainly over emphasized Texas politics recently. It was a legitimate issue when the legislature was still in session, but once they adjourned for two years they became a non-issue. Sure they can hold hearings and blast the Aggies in public rallies but so what? By the time they are back in session (2013) it will be too late to do anything (threatening the school’s funding would be pointless at that point). And the idea that Perry’s presidential run would make him likely to call the legislature into session made no sense at all.
That said, Frank’s points about the TV contracts was better thought out.
(For the record, I always maintained that the Aggies would only be added if they were paired with a “national” brand like Oklahoma or FSU. We should know soon if I will have to issue a mea culpa for that prediction).
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Of course its entirely possible I’ll have to issue an apology for this post so we’ll have to see what happens.
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frug, you’re going to have to explain to me how you figure that the B1G is a more valuable property than the SEC when it comes to the televising of football games?
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FranktheAg didn’t say football property, he said sports entity, and while the SEC’s football package is moderately more attractive than the Big 10’s, the Big 10’s massive advantage in basketball value more than makes up the difference.
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He’s probably talking about overall, not just football. FrankTheAg did say “sports entity”, not “football entity”, and the B10 brings in more sports revenue per school overall than the SEC does.
In any case, FrankTheAg is exaggerating a bit. Considering that Forbes estimates the least valuable NBA franchise (the Bucks) at $258M while they put the value of the top college football team (Longhorns) at $119M and top college basketball team (UNC) at $26M, I think it’s safe to say that the NBA is third most valuable behind the NFL and MLB. The NBA also gets $930M yearly in TV money ($31M per team), which is still slightly more than any college.
Oh, and even the lowest NHL team (the Coyotes) is valued by Forbes at $134M.
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Tony Barnhart is the most respected and knowledgeable college reporter in the SE. His opinions are worth listening to.
One part that makes this hard to believe is that so little has changed since last summer when the same players made the decision to stay. The only things that changed were that ESPN did the LHN instead of UT doing it themselves and the Big 12 got even more money than they expected on their 2nd tier rights (and the latter is a positive for staying). I don’t think angry Aggies are driving this. Something has changed Loftin’s and Byrne’s minds and I’ll be interested to see their reasons after the exit fees get settled. I think they are reasonable people making what in my mind seems like a bad decision. Now anything they say before the fees get settled is just bluster in case there is a lawsuit.
Did the Aggies dislike the fact that they aren’t going to get a disproportionate share of the exit fees? Did they dislike that TV appearance fees are going to be shared more equally? Are they so desperate for money they jump to the SEC in the hope of getting more money now instead of waiting until 2015? Did a marketing professor convince them they needed to try differentiation to try to quit being 2nd fiddle or a psychology professor suggest differentiation to get rid of their inferiority complex and obsession with UT? Did CBS promise the SEC tons of money too late in the summer of 2011? Are they afraid the SEC goes to 16 without them limiting their choices? What else?
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bullet,
What changed in 1 year is the TAMU fanbase, and how they have changed. 1 year ago the TAMU administration thought the SEC folks were a minority. This past year they have come to realize they are the majority because short of burning Loftin and Byrne in effigy, they have made their displeasure known that they were unhappy with the result last june. The LHN is just good cover to make the move. I think it is safe to say that their fanbase is not like any other in college football. 😉 I do think Loftin and Byrne see something in the numbers that you and I are not privy too, but I will give TAMU the credit for having a unique fanbase. 🙂
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That it also comes at a time when the Texas legislature is off and you have an A&M ex in the governor’s mansion made this a perfect storm for an Aggie move.
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Duffman what changed in the last year is Pac-12 solidifying and Texas not having a place to go. Without the threat of Texas bolting and imploding the conference, Tech and Baylor stay in a BCS conference. This keeps Texas politics at bay. A&M made the right move waiting a year as a move last year in the middle of all the realignment would have certainly made it more difficult as a move then would have imploded the conference. Now not so much. Remember the key to the whole political equation is finding places for Baylor and Tech in a BCS conference. As long as this happens, there will be no issues.
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Whether the B12 survives or not will hinge on whether Mizzou stays or goes. Would Texas and OU be content with what is essentially a glorified SWC?
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I think it was pretty clear last year as well.
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Your UT bias is showing through pretty heavily there. A&M has a lot to gain by going to the SEC. Conference stability seems pretty high on the list with more money not far behind.
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Who are you replying to? Who said TAMU didn’t have a lot to gain? Who is biased? I don’t see anyone in this thread of the discussion that said any of that.
This post is so busy you really should address a bias accusation like that by name.
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His response refers to Bullets post a bit up (and slightly to the left). As does mine below.
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m (Ag),
I still don’t see where he said TAMU didn’t have a lot to gain. He asked why this year but not last year and ran through several possible factors.
Does TAMU have more to gain this year than last year? If not, then what changed wasn’t the gain but the impetus to leave and that’s what he was asking about.
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He said-
“I don’t think angry Aggies are driving this. Something has changed Loftin’s and Byrne’s minds and I’ll be interested to see their reasons after the exit fees get settled. I think they are reasonable people making what in my mind seems like a bad decision.”
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I just take that to mean he thinks they’ll lose more than they gain, be it in athletic success, recruiting, academic reputation, rivalries or something else. Clearly there are benefits to TAMU joining the SEC. You must admit that there are also some (non-financial) costs involved.
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m(Ag)
I’m biased because I disagree? That’s typical Aggie thinking.
If you read my post I said “in my mind.” I am willing to see there are possibilities for differences of opinion.
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from Bullet:
“m(Ag)
I’m biased because I disagree? That’s typical Aggie thinking.
If you read my post I said ‘in my mind.’ I am willing to see there are possibilities for differences of opinion.”
You’re getting me confused with RedDenver; I never called you biased. All I said in my own post was that I disagreed with you.
That said, I will say that the phrase “typical Aggie thinking” does indicate some bias.
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Sorry m(ag)-I’ve always found you and the other Aggies normally on this board very reasonable. I did confuse you with another poster. But you have to admit the new Aggies on this board with their attacks on Frank aren’t doing A&M proud. That continued nonsense really triggered my response.
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I certainly agree that when a school makes a dramatic move, it brings out the fans who talk more out of passion than rationality. The last few days I’ve seen a surge in ‘passionate’ posters from both our schools around the internet (and you know both our schools normally have plenty). I also seem to remember a huge surge in Nebraska fans last summer who came to this board to thoroughly disparage your school when their move to the Big Ten became official. I congratulated them on their move, even while I tried to correct some of their factual errors.
When you enter into a new relationship, I think it’s human nature to disparage the previous one. It just helps ease the transition, emotionally. I think the Big 12 is an OK conference, but it would be frustrating to remain there when I believe the SEC is a better one. (for that matter, so is the Big Ten and Pac 12).
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Actually its seems like the UT posters have been unusually quiet, although I haven’t visited the Aggie sites, so I can’t say what’s been going on there.
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I thoroughly disagree that this isn’t a good move for A&M.
About what changed, I did read a report from some ‘insider’ who said that officials at A&M were completely unprepared for conference realignment last summer. Which I have to say disappoints me, because once the Big Ten stated they were examining expansion they should have started thoroughly exploring various possibilities themselves.
When it was reported that the Longhorns were negotiating to go to the Pac-16 (and by the way, they were negotiating for A&M too!), A&M’s administrators were surprised and quickly tried to do there own research. They decided that the SEC looked better that the PAC 16, but they certainly hadn’t the time to thoroughly study the issue. When the Longhorns backed down, they were content to stay put for the time being. Now that they’ve had a full year to do their own proper studies, they believe the SEC is the better long term option for the school.
Again, this is just what I read from someone else who claims to have knowledge, but it certainly seems to fit the facts. A&M officials never gave the impression that they were prepared for everything that happened in a few short weeks (was it even that long)?
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I don’t know about all the rest of your answer, but I agree that this seems like a good move for TAMU. I reserve the right to change my mind if the politicians punish them later, but I think they can fail to win division titles in the SEC just as well as in the B12 and get paid better for it. They also won’t have big brother looming over them.
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It remains to be seen whether they will be paid better. It seems almost certain that if nothing changed, they will be making more money in the Big 12 in 2015 when the ESPN contract renews.
The question is how much the SEC can get out of CBS and ESPN for expanding.
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This certainly makes more sense than the LHN being the sole trigger. I think Byrne and Loftin are rational and don’t make decisions based on hatred of UT.
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Don’t count out the political/legal wrangling putting the breaks on the A&M escape to the SEC just yet.
A&M is woefully under-represented in the Texas legislature & positions of power around the state. Why? Because most politicians are lawyers. Baylor – law school. Texas Tech – law school. Texas – law school. A&M – no law school.
The politicians are fuming right now. They are super-pissed that A&M usurped the authority of the legislative committee by doing the end run around he Tuesday meeting.
This ain’t over folks……
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A&M has been begging for an unneeded law school (UH, TSU and private South Texas are 90 miles away in Houston as well as Texas and private Baylor about 90 miles away in different directions) for precisely this reason.
Baylor sympathizers will be unhappy. Tech probably will. The question is whether UT will try to stop it. If all 3 do, it will be stopped. Baylor alone is irrelevant. Not sure about Tech and Baylor-they had a unique alignment of power 17 years ago. But I have no idea how Texas will react.
I think its bad for all the Texas schools long run, even UTSA and Texas St. Differentiation doesn’t offset loss of recruits to SEC schools and I think that hits A&M worst of all. I think Dodds probably agrees. But is it worth fighting? There could be at least 4 lines of thinking:
1) A very Texan philosophy of not trying to force someone to do something they don’t want to do-stay in a conference when they want to leave;
2) A pragmatic approach-don’t set a precedent. Let A&M choose its own course and UT has a better chance of being allowed to chart its own course (this also applies to topics other than sports and has been a huge issue for UT on admissions and tuition);
3) Keep as many friends as possible. Perry and the people he listens to are trying to wreck research at the state universities (its a philosophic view that teaching is everything and research is mostly worthless). UT has had to rally alumni to stop his destruction. The Senate and House don’t view universities as important as they did 30 and 40 years ago. The universities need to all work together to avoid being gutted in these tight budget times.
4) They may just be tired of all the whining and belly-aching and temper tantrums. Nebraska left, but they still can’t get rid of Bill Byrne. Don’t let the door….
My gut feeling is that UT lets it go and Tech and Baylor fight it for fear of what might happen next. It could get nasty and the outcome uncertain. I do think moving up the regents meeting is a real poke in the eye to the legislature and hurts their cause. They must be taking political lessons from Chancellor Pearlman. Probably the first question asked is, “Why did you move your August 22 meeting up to August 15 just after we announced the hearing on August 16?”
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Well, bullet. we certainly know that Texas and Baylor tried to stop this deal first with politics and then with an ineffective legal strategy. Neither worked. I guess you had it wrong. UT hardly let it go. They propped up Baylor and Ken Starr as the bogeyman but they were 100% opposed to A&M leaving but failed to stop it.
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First, A&M hasn’t gotten out yet. The Big 12 is better with them than without, so of course, noone wants them to go.
I don’t see any indication there has been a significant political effort. Ken Starr making a speech doesn’t constitute a coordinated effort. What I was wrong about was that Tech and Baylor would fight it.
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Frank,
I just don’t understand how you can’t see that Slive already has a very good understanding of how the renegotiations will go once aTm and whoever is added (the guy is a lawyer and ex-judge). The SEC presidents aren’t going to just add teams and risk igniting the expansion race for equal or less payout per school than what they already are getting. Slive would’ve had to already received assurances from CBS or ESPN, or both that they would be able to get more money per school by expanding, especially considering the timing. One rumor that I have heard is that the assurances came from CBS, but that is just a rumor. I’m not even going to say what the rumor was on the amount of the raise for per school payout other than to say that even I can’t believe that it would be that much. Also don’t be shocked if the SEC expands to 16 teams (if they wait a little while after going to 14 teams), that they renegotiate again for the 15th & 16th teams.
Look, the tv networks (especially CBS) know what the SEC is worth and wants to keep them happy. Drawing the Texas tv market viewership away from the Big 12 and ABC (and Florida viewership from the ACC if FSU is the 14th team, or pulling in the DC viewership if VT is the 14th team) is enough incentive to up the contract enough to get the per school payout back to or above the Pac 12 and B1G.
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@Bamatab – I’m not questioning Slive’s negotiation skills, but no matter what, the leverage still lies with the networks from a pure contractual standpoint. Being worried about making the SEC mad is one thing if your contract is going to be up in 2014 and you’re worried they’ll start their own new network pronto. It’s a lot different with a contract that’s up in 2024. Sure, CBS and ESPN will come back to the table in good faith, but are they going to be throwing out some of the very high numbers that you’ve alluded to (I’ve seen some rumors of $40 million per school)? My guess is that CBS and ESPN want to keep the SEC happy, but not *that* happy.
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What if Slive has realized the cash that could come from a SEC-NET and isn’t all too concerned about negotiations going badly. Maybe they will partner with CBS to lauch and freeze ESPN out / or the other way around since ESPN seems to be into making new specialty networks in the state of Texas.
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I am with Bamatab (and other posters below) in thinking that the SEC will have assurances of more money it this happens.
Here’s why: ESPiN is playing a game of Monopoly with the other networks. A&M is Park Place to the Boardwalk that they just got with the Longhorn Network and ESPiN is going to build hotels. This, btw, is just an extension of FtT’s logic from last year. ESPiN paid a lot of money to keep the BXII together basically to prevent Fox/Pac12Network from getting Park Place, Boardwalk and a couple of other nice properties.
Now, ESPiN will pay a lot of money to pick up another piece of the BXII and to pick up properties from the east as well.
The more ESPiN has in inventory the better. Thus, the long-term contract is a PLUS, not a negative.
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I seriously doubt Slive would be doing this if he wasn’t damn near certain he get a new TV deal. As you noted before no one will ever vote to take a paycut and Slive knows it.
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ESPN is bidding against themselves and hurting their other contracts (potential interference lawsuit by B12 or ACC-maybe no real basis, but a real nuisance). They have no incentive to significantly raise their bid. They get A&M on the 2nd tier in the SEC and lose them on the 1st tier in the Big 12. Maybe they tick off the Big 12 who is renewing in 2015. With an ACC school, they just lose them on the first and third tiers. They already have them on all tiers. Only CBS has an incentive and they can’t increase their number of games. They can only get better ratings. The SEC championship game is around $15 million. Isn’t that part of the CBS $50 million a year? Its just hard to see the numbers of $17.9 million/school/year going up significantly going from 12 to 14. Adding teams doesn’t make the SEC more valuable to everyone. It might even make things less valuable for ESPN.
Remember, ESPN was part of the secret group that shot down superconferences last summer. They didn’t want to renegotiate all their contracts.
I have seen comments supposedly from insiders that the SEC hasn’t approached the TV partners yet. And the TV people won’t tell you what its worth until you tell them who you have. And we haven’t really heard much about #14.
I’m now convinced that the Slive and A&M are trying to make this happen. There are still a lot of hurdles to cross.
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ESPiN shot down the Pac-16 to prevent FOX/Pac-16 Network from getting the inventory of the Texas-based teams. ESPiN paid a lot of money to keep that from happening, paid $300 million to get Texas and will pay a lot of money to add A&M to ESPiN’s inventory (via the SEC).
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This is what a lot of people are missing about the LHN. ESPN viewed overpaying Texas by ~$200M as a way to keep the B12 together and prevent the super conference movement. With a super conference movement comes bigger conference networks that will want to cut out the middle man (ESPN).
Now ESPN was too clever by half (or IMHO 2/3s) because their LHN deal really turned off the rest of the B12. Other teams could accept always being behind in money – but those with options can’t accept being buried. And ESPN, while it can never hope to break even on the LHN, was hoping to make up something by broadcasting a second Longhorn game and high school sports.
So, who has options? A&M obviously. Missouri possibly (but prefers B1G to SEC).
Oddly, Oklahoma has problems. Their main problem is that their alumni and future recruits live in Texas. They can’t leave the B12 without potentially pissing off Texas residents, losing Texas recruits, and losing Texas TV coverage. This is the reason OU has openly said they’ll follow UT in whatever it does – not because they need UT, but because they need the state of Texas. Their secondary problem is OSU.
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Regarding the Texas legislature, on January 20, 2013 former Aggie Yell Leader Rick Perry will at minimum still the governor of Texas and perhaps might have become the most powerful man in the world. Either way think TAMU will be OK politically.
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Hi, Frank. You and I batted these questions around on twitter quite a bit on Tuesday. I’m not here to say I told you so. Promise.
However, I still think you’re underestimating Slive when it comes to TV contracts. At least one national college football writer (forgive me for not recalling who – I’ve read roughly 37 articles today – but it was someone significant and I meant to bookmark it to mention to you) intimated that there were strong indications that modifying the TV deals was likely if the SEC added teams of real value. I also think it’s highly unlikely that Slive makes this move (or that SEC schools sign on) if they haven’t already obtained some pretty strong indications from CBS and ESPN that some sort of mutually beneficial amendments to the deals can be made.
I honestly can’t see a reason why they networks wouldn’t modify in this scenario. Their motivation is not merely maintaining a good relationship with the SEC. The networks carry SEC football because it makes them money. Adding a team like A&M and the Texas market (and possibly an east coast team with a significant TV audience) is a financial win for the networks, not just the conference. Even if they modify to pay the SEC more, they’ll do so under the same logic that they always negotiate deals: we pay you more because we can make even more than we’re paying you.
On the political front, you’re not wrong that there likely will be a bit of a show before it’s all said and done. However, this story has been building for a week in Texas, and legislators have not rushed to take sides. It’s been surprisingly quiet, in fact, and even the calling of this completely powerless committee hearing next week stirred absolutely no one to make a single public comment opposing A&M’s move.
There are also a few other relevant factors that may keep legislators at bay. First, the legislature made a point in this year’s session (they were in session this year, they just adjourned a few weeks ago) of encouraging state universities to get creative in exploring ways to advance their brands and generate revenue streams outside of the tax base and tuition and fees. With that as a strong piece of the legislature’s message to state institutions, they’ll be hard pressed to make too much noise about A&M doing exactly that.
Even more interestingly, the Texas House Higher Education Committee — the one that called the special session next week — is chaired by Representative Dan Branch of Dallas. Following a committee hearing on February 23 in which the Longhorn Network was discussed, Branch made the following statements:
“I do not think this Legislature ought to penalize people that are going on and being successful in maximizing their assets and getting a higher return and finding revenues that are not a tax base.”
“I certainly will do everything I can to make sure that people who take care of their institutions and raise them up and bring in more revenues and create value that somehow that wouldn’t be a detriment as they go through the appropriations process.”
It’s going to be politically dicey for Branch and the legislature to ultimately create too much interference for A&M in light of their recent positions on these matters.
Finally, consider the fact that this stands to have a net positive effect for Texas universities by allowing a school like U of H, TCU, or SMU to back-fill A&M’s spot in the Big 12. Suddenly the state has an additional university in a BCS conference alongside A&M considerably expanding the national footprint of Texas universities by virtue of its participation in the SEC. Never mind that every conference home game in College Station will generate millions in local and state tax revenues from out of state fans – the potential for multiple Texas schools to benefit from the conference shuffle is significant.
Again, there is no doubt that UT is going to exercise their full weight to try to foil this thing, and if they can’t do that, they’ll do their best to make it as bloody an exit as possible. That’s the real political threat, and they certainly have considerable influence. Unfortunately for them, they’ve also alienated more than just A&M with their Longhorn Network agenda. Even in trying to invite Texas Tech into that land of lollipops, they offended the Tech administration by offering them cash to air their game on the LHN. Certainly Tech and Baylor folks aren’t thrilled with A&M’s escape east, but they’re also not eager to line up behind UT and take orders. The net effect is likely to be a mostly dispassionate response from anyone but the staunchest of UT supporters, statewide and in the legislature.
I agree with you, Frank, that this deal isn’t done until it’s done. It’s close, but it’s not done. God help us all if it doesn’t happen, as the level of spite and infighting likely to happen in the resulting Big 12 would be unprecedented (and that’s saying something for folks who endured the Pony Excess era of the SWC). However, my last clarification is this: what you’re watching happen this weekend is not the result of a situation that has gone from unlikely to likely in the last day or two. This has been in the works for some time now. Slive and A&M President Bowen Loftin just managed to do the impossible – actually get something done without all of us knowing about it ten minutes after they began talking.
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I don’t see how another Texas university benefits the Big 12. A&M will almost certainly be replaced by someone out of state.
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had a similar thought. but, other than Nebraska, the rest of the BXII has never challenged Texas’ right to dictate what happens in the conference. As noted elsewhere, “Co-Commissioner” DeLoss Dodd has a list of 20 schools ready to be added as A&M’s replacement. I feel confident, Texas will add another texas-based school to the BXII.
if the other 8 schools were to vote Texas down on adding Texas’ choice, the BXII dies that day.
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Texas does what’s in their financial best interest like everyone else. Adding a Texas school doesn’t help. Even if you accept that Texas can dictate, there’s no financial reason for adding a Texas school. Its not recruiting since you already have 3 Texas schools. The only reason for adding a Texas school would be if UT and TT wanted to help UH and somehow secure the recruiting area better from the SEC. And there’s some bad blood so I don’t know if that’s likely they want to help UH.
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thank you. appreciate the long and thoughtful post. and 100% agree with your take on the money side of this.
Slive and the SEC won’t do this without the money being assured and ESPiN/CBS will pay the money. They paid $300 million just for Texas. They did this not because Texas is worth it; but because it is more inventory for ESPiN. A&M has similar worth, particularly when added to the SEC. Think about it this way: FL vs. A&M is more interesting and will get better ratings than FL vs. Florida Atlantic (or whatever cupcake is on FL’s schedule). So, give every school another $4 million and pony up $480 (just to make the math easy).
And, btw, the length of the current contract between ESPiN and the SEC is a positive. If ESPiN is adding A&M (and other teams) to their inventory, ESPiN does not want to have to bid on that inventory anytime soon. That inventory is now locked up for a good long time.
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A couple of other quick notes with some relevance…
The “end run” to have Regents meet before the special legislative committee meeting is absolutely not an effort to escape the legislature’s authority – it’s an attempt to escape potential meaningless posturing that could slow down the process indirectly. The committee has no power to do anything but talk with the legislature is not in session, and the legislature has no power to tell A&M what it can and cannot do with respect to conference affiliation. A few legislators may rant and rave for a while, but ultimately they know this to be true and recognize A&M didn’t do anything the legislative committee didn’t do first. In the end, I simply don’t believe enough legislators will be motivated enough to make A&M “pay” in any way politically in the years to come. That wouldn’t play well for long, as Texas voters would see through it as detrimental to a state institution.
Baylor and Texas Tech likely will measure their words and strategies carefully, as they’re going to want as much freedom as possible to make decisions for themselves in the years to come. The same is true for Texas, though they seem to have absolutely no belief that their actions might have any consequences, so I doubt this will give them much pause. Nonetheless, I think this is yet another reason it will be difficult to build a meaningful and passionate quorum opposing A&M’s move. Liberty is a big deal to Texans, and not many are going to want to have to be reminded that they opposed A&M making its own choice when they want the freedom to make their own choices.
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Baylor is a private school and doesn’t answer to the state legislature. And athletically they’ve got no options and noone cares what they do. They’ll fight this.
Tech may have very limited athletic options. They’re filler and will have to tag along with A&M or UT as #14 or #16. Although they do have non-athletic issues where they will want freedom. I made the same point above regarding UT before reading your post. Contrary to your opinion, Texas seems the least likely to fight it (although I have no idea how likely or unlikely that is).
And politicians tend to have big egos. That’s far more important than political philosophy.
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What if the SEC takes Texas A&M, then what?
Oklahoma is the clear next choice based on revenue, but are they tied to OSU? Would the SEC go after Missouri or Texas Tech and just systematically dismantle the Big 12?
After kicking around some AD revenues today, a few things jumped out, out of the schools NOT in the top 3 conferences, Texas is a gold mine. Notre Dame and Oklahoma are 2 & 3, then A&M and Duke are 4 & 5. Then UNC, OSU, Va Tech, WV, Syracuse, and BC. FSU Missouri, Kansas, Texas Tech, the U are all about 5-10 million behind the UNC group.
Let / encourage / nudge the SEC to take A&M and Florida State, or A&M and Virginia Tech…. shaking up the ACC. The Big 12 implodes sending Oklahoma, OSU, Texas Tech and Kansas to the Pac West. SEC decides to move to 16 quickly and grabs FSU / Va Tech then 1 of Clemson / Miami / West Virginia / Louisville.
ACC shattered, major conferences going to 16, BIG TEN has been negotiating with and setting up UNC / Duke / Boston College and Notre Dame. ND finally sees the need to join when the big players all go superconference. All good acedemics, big basketball and hockey improvement. Not crazy out of footprint, broad national appeal for what they do. Huge year round ratings for the Big Ten Network. Big Ten – ACC challenge all the time…. Wis, Minn, MSU, Mich, OSU, ND, BC and PSU for Hockey?
All opinion of course, this would be a huge steal for the BTN.
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As a Penn State fan this would be an ideal situation. The reality of the matter is it will not happen. The only way you force ND into the Big 10, is they become limited in who they play (They are already adding UT, the U, NW to the schedule, so it will not be Tulsa on the schedule like last year). However, BC would be an ideal school for the Big 10. Not just their Hockey program for the Big 10 Network, but their academics, and the NE market as well.
As for UT, What I see happening is UT will hold things together, and will be successful at it. Why is that? There will always be pissant schools who are willing to be enablers for Bevo, just so they can get BCS Conference money. Baylor, K-State, Iowa State, Oklahoma State (Unless OU could take them west with them), and possible future members of the Longhorn Conference such as Houston, SMU, Rice & UTEP come to mind. (Does anyone think the UTEP Miners would say no to putting their home game with UT on the Longhorn Channel for a chance to be in the BCS?). Even if OU, Texas Tech, KU, and Missouri left it would not matter, all they would need would be about 3 Big time schools on their schedule to make it work (ND, A&M, and OU?) might be enough.
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BC is hardly “ideal” for the BIG………cultural fit people, cultural fit………..
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BC seems like a better fit culturally to a PSU fan than it does to a NE fan. PSU, MI and NW would get along fine with BC.
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Michigan & Northwestern would get along fine with UNC & Duke as well.
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Yes, they probably would. MI has more of an eastern feel to me than mid-atlantic, but maybe that’s changed lately.
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The funny thing about “AD revenues” is that the top 10 is rounded out by 2 Big East schools and then 2 former Big East schools. And then you have Miami at #10. So 1/2 the non top 3 was the Big East in 2002. And they couldn’t figure out a way to stick together? Nice work by Mike Tranghese.
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Can you get UNC without NCSU? That’s the key question.
If SEC takes FSU, Miami is ripe for the picking. Would getting the U help get ND?
You could come up with a NYC strategy with ND, Duke, and the U (and PSU & Michigan). Risky, though, with no local school.
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So, any rumors on B1G reaction? BigPurpleCat (or whatever his name) from the Northwestern board suggested B1G is interested in A&M stand alone. By proxy, this would be FOX trying to prevent the ESPiN monopoly of the best texas teams.
Any rumors or thoughts?
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Sorry: mean to start a new thread:
So, any rumors on B1G reaction? BigPurpleCat (or whatever his name) from the Northwestern board suggested B1G is interested in A&M stand alone. By proxy, this would be FOX trying to prevent the ESPiN monopoly of the best texas teams.
Any rumors or thoughts?
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A&M is either going to the SEC or is staying in the Big 12. I don’t think that going to the B1G is even an option in their mind right now.
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That was certainly my thought when PurpleCat threw out the idea of A&M as a stand-alone addition to the B1G. But wondered what, if anything, were rumors about a B1G reaction.
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The B10 should follow Beebe’s lead and offer USC, UF, UT and AL. Maybe the Cowboys and Steelers would join for football only, with the Lakers and Celtics for hoops.
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I have never heard that rumor, but it does not mean it is not true. If A&M does not go to the SEC, then expect it to put in for an application to PAC12. The Aggies will not stay in the Big12. Too much bad blood now.
It would be interesting if the Aggies were denied entry in the SEC, and it decided to gain entry into the PAC12; and whether Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, and Oklahoma decided to break free of Texas’ sphere of influence.
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Btw, what happened to the “Oklahoma to SEC” rumors? Thought this was a package deal (A&M + OK)? That would certainly be better for ESPiN’s inventory. OK is somewhat hard to lever into a new space; no natural fit. Too south for B1G; too elite for MWC; too east for Pac-12.
By contrast, Florida State is an easy natural fit with the SEC/ACC and even Big East.
So, for ESPiN to end up with OK, getting A&M + OK as a package to the SEC may be the best way to get the OK “property.”
Anyway, I have not read enough, but where did the Flordia State rumors start?
Just curious.
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I think that OU is in a “wait & see” mode right now. Actually, they are in a pretty good position if you think about it. Once they see what the fallout is from aTm going east, they can then let the SEC and Pac 12 make their sales pitches to them. Once they’ve heard both sides best pitches (which I’d bet is already going on actually), and once they know the fallout of aTm leaving the Big 12, then they can make up their mind whether staying in the Big 12, going to the SEC, or going to the Pac 12 is best for their longterm well being.
As I stated in the last topic page, the Pac 12 doesn’t have very many options when it comes to expansion. There aren’t very many “good” football schools left west of the Mississippi. If UT’s LHN takes them off of the table for the Pac 12, then OU is really a must have for them in order to get a good enough “football power” to justify expanding.
When it comes to OU’s decision, I think it will come down how OU feels in regards to being hitched to OK ST. If the Big 12 implodes after aTm goes east, then OU might feel it can justify leaving OK ST and go East. But I would be very shocked if the SEC would take OK ST, so if OU feels they have to take OK ST wherever they go, OU will go west if the Big 12 is no longer a viable option in their sight. The SEC still has enough options left in the east to not feel it has to take OU.
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excellent points; OK can wait; no need to rush (with, I guess, the only thought is that SEC might stop (at least for awhile) at 14 so the window closes for at least awhile).
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OU was most committed to keeping the B12 together last summer. I’ve seen several commentators suggest that they will NOT go to the SEC. But I also saw one report that said every school except OU had put out a statement that they were committed to the Big 12.
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If things end up with 16-team superconferences when the music stops then I’d expect the Big Ten to add Pitt, Rutgers and Missouri — in part because they’re all American Association of Universities schools and the Big Ten school presidents would be reluctant to add any schools (except Notre Dame) that weren’t in the AAU.
Note that Nebraska just lost its AAU membership: http://espn.go.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/26078/nebraska-loses-aau-status
Notre Dame would be the likely 16th team once they saw that superconferences were inevitable.
The Big Ten would just have to live with the shame of only having 14 out of 16 schools in the AAU.
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Syracuse voluntarily gave up their AAU membership shortly after Nebraska; I don’t think either has been in decline. The AAU is still powerful as a name and bloc, but their way of measuring a university’s production may not be as valuable in future years as it once was.
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If you looked at research numbers, Syracuse was clearly not doing research at the same level as the major research universities any more, so, yes, relative to their peers, Syracuse was in decline in research. UNL (IMHO) was far less cut-and-dry.
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Maybe ESPN has realized that all the money they paid to keep the big12 together last year was not worth it. I assume they can get out of that contract if A&M leaves.
Four 16 team super conferences makes a tremendous amount of sense for a lot of people, especailly if you are a TV exec, TV viewer, or alum of one of the chosen 48. Maybe ESPN has decided that trying to stop something that makes so much sense is not a good investment in the long run. Sort of like trying to bail the Greeks out, you find yourself having to ante up more and more frequently to protect your past irrationality.
the 4×16 gives you an eight team playoff. Really about the max that is reasonable for a number of logistical reasons. The conferences keep their conference championship games. Rose bowl is preserved. SEC gets a plum by playing the remnant conference in the Sugar Bowl, which they probably deserve as the top confererence. And if you force UT, ND and the U intot he remnant conference, it might not bee that imbalanced.
The B1G needs to add four eastern teams. The west division would be: UNL, Iowa, MN Wisc, NW, UI, PU and IU. East: UM, MSU, OSU, PSU, MD, UVa, UNC, Duke. Note the preservations of natural rivalries. A 4 team pod would work very well from a rivalry standpoint, our pod of UI, NW, IU and PU would be too weak from a football standpoint though. The real key for the B1G is to add the right teams that are cultural fits. The 4×16 configuration could be stable for some time, and I would really hate to have to live with UT or ND.
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Of course if you add two in West & two in East you can just as easily split along the Illinois/Indiana border.
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Agree, but the key is you need to take two. If you needed just one, maybe Mizzou. Taking two, I guess it would be two of Mizzou, Oklahoma and Kanas. Just not sure that is as helpful from a demographic standpoint as MD, UVa, and UNC – not to mention the academics which I think will be a bigger issue after being burned my UNL with the AAU. Also, I think the PAC (or the remnant conference) needs Oklahoma for football balance.
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@John. You make a very interesting point about ESPiN’s money. As you point out, if A&M goes to SEC, ESPiN has out-options with the new BXII tv deal. They already have TX; maybe during this “alignment round,” they prod the downfall of the BXII.
Maybe that is how ESPiN can “afford” to pay the SEC another $960 million for their tv rights through 2024 with 14 teams (again, just making the math easy).
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@John. You make a very interesting point about ESPiN’s money. As you point out, if A&M goes to SEC, ESPiN has out-options with the new BXII tv deal. They already have TX; maybe during this “alignment round,” they prod the downfall of the BXII.
Maybe that is how ESPiN can “afford” to pay the SEC another $960 million for their tv rights through 2024 with 14 teams (again, just making the math easy).
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There are incredible forces at work within Texas state politics, but people falsely believe that its to keep the B12-2 together. The politics are to keep Baylor and Tech in a BCS conference. When Tech and Baylor were on the outside looking at the MWC or some other conference is when the cries were loudest. Either one of these schools going to a non-BCS conference will lead to much lower enrollments and more economic troubles in those respective communities, Waco and Lubbock. If they remain in a BCS conference, it will not matter. The problem is Texas is too large a player and any move by it will lead to the entire conference imploding – thus they can’t move. A&M doesn’t bring that amount of heft so it can move and not implode the conference. Now for ESPN wanting to tear up the contract…that’s an absolute possibility which might bring Fox back into the picture. Either way it will be an interesting week.
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Hangtime, you took the words right out of my mouth. I articulated very similar thoughts last night at BON after I had an epiphany and saw the error of my thinking over the past several months.
Before I get to that, I do want to clear up a misperception some on this thread have repeated: the belief that Texas legislators are “powerless” to act when they are not in session, as is the case now. This should be Politics 101, but having the ability to vote on and pass laws is just one of a plethora of ways legislators have to wield influence. Just because the Legislature isn’t in session right now doesn’t neuter the ability of its members to thwart an A&M move to the SEC if that’s what they chose to do.
Just look at realignment history of you don’t believe me. Legislative pressure came into the mix in both of the past two decades’ realignment scrambles in February 1994 and June 2010. In neither case was the Texas Legislature in session, yet in both cases, pro-Baylor and pro-Tech forces were able to ensure that their particular schools’ needs were met.
But just because legislators continue to wield considerable influence doesn’t mean that they will wield all of their potential influence in this particular case.
Which brings us to the current talk of A&M moving to the SEC. Like Frank, it’s appearing increasingly likely that I will be wrong, and, like Frank, a large part of my being wrong lies with my miscalculation of the political calculus involved.
My mistake has been a very simple one: an assumption that the pro-Baylor and the pro-Tech forces within Texas state government would view a unilateral departure by either Texas or A&M with an equal amount of concern that such a departure would lead to the death of the conference and likely relegation to non-BCS conferences.
But clearly that is not the case. While I maintain, as you seem to indicate from your sources, that Baylor and Tech would continue to view a unilateral departure of Texas in such a light, the unilateral departure of A&M isn’t nearly as threatening to their status as BCS conference members. As a result, we’re not witnessing the marshaling of legislative resources to prevent an A&M departure that I had erroneously assumed.
Now don’t get me wrong — A&M’s departure does weaken the conference. It doesn’t destroy it as a Texas departure would, but it does weaken it, so it does serve UT’s best interest to see if some token legislative roadblocks could easily impede A&M’s move. (From what I’m hearing from my Texas sources, though, there’s been a whole lot of nothing in that regard so far.) But if A&M were not to be easily deterred, I am now of the belief that pro-Baylor and pro-Tech forces would see this as not being the opportune time to deploy whatever nuclear options they might have in their arsenals. And without Baylor and Tech seeing a need to go all-out legislatively to stop A&M, there’s little incentive for UT to go all-out to stop A&M either.
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And just for fun: one completely random conspiracy theory which I in no way believe but the thought did cross my mind: A&M and Texas are playing a well-coordinated good cop/bad cop routine so that both schools can get what they want. Now that begs the question of what UT’s end goal would actually be, but a good conspiracy doesn’t need to tie up all the loose ends, no?
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Texas wants 1) control of a conference, and 2) the ability to go independent in football if absolutely necessary.
I don’t see Texas inviting BYU to the Big 12, but Texas inviting Houston to the Big 12 makes a lot more sense than Texas having to go independent in football and park its other sports in the Big East or worse (i.e. Conference USA, Sun Belt, WAC, or Southland.)
The massive egos in college sports all want their own conference to control:
1. Texas controls the Big 12
2. Notre Dame controls the Big East
3. BYU controls the WCC
The only big ego that has no control of a conference is USC.
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I don’t see the rest of the conference going along with UH especially the northern schools. I see the northern schools fighting for a more independent school in the vain of ND, Boise State, or BYU. A 10 team realignment could like the following:
South:
TT
UT
Baylor
OU
OSU
North
ISU
K-State
Kansas
Mizzu
–new northern school
BYU might be interested in that the conference would work with their scheduling and already has a very religious school, Baylor. Also, this will be the only conference that will not have a problem with BYU having its own network.
Also, for those of you jonesing for ND to join the B10. I think their is a better chance of them joining some form of the B12-3 because ultimately this conference is setting up to be the “eat what you kill” conference in terms of media. Will see what happens this week.
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Neither BYU nor ND is going to sign up to play ISU, KSU, KU and Baylor in football every year, and divisions don’t work below 12 schools because you can’t play a CCG.
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If the odds of ND joining the B10 is 1% (or less), then the odds of ND joining the B12-3 is .0000000000000000001% (or less).
I’m not completely sold that BYU would pass up joining a major conference. But the others are right that there are good reasons for them not to do so.
If I were the B12, I’d at least strongly consider inviting BYU.
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HH, trust me I have been pondering that angle for about 6 months right now. It has to be a Texas thing, that would not be picked up on my Indiana radar – Much like high school basketball eludes Texas radar.
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Hopkins:
That was kind of my point with my question yesterday. Whether there is actual colusion or not, there may be concurrent goals.
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Rick Perry, former Aggie yell leader and current Texas governor, declared his candicacy for president today. This puts Texas A&M on a short timeline to get into the conference of their choice before their political cover vanishes. If Perry has his eyes clearly on the next rung of his political career, he may not be as beholden to in-state political allies with ties to Baylor. Plus this enables a group of four universities (Texas, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State) that may use the opening A&M has created to make their own escape west together and supersize the PAC12 to sixteen teams. A PAC16 eastern division of AZ, AZ St, Utah, Colo, UT, Texas Tech, OK St and OK would seem pretty workable… Anyways, that’s my conspiracy theory.
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That leaves Baylor and most or all of the four northern Big 12 schools in limbo. They then have to hope the ACC and/or Big East are sufficiently decimated that they need them as a western flank, or that an agreement would be made to promote the Mountain West to BCS status were it to take them in.
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The above was a reply to the scenario of Texas, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Okie State heading to a Pac-16.
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@Hopkins Horn
I wouldn’t go so far as to say “well-Coordinated” but I think A&M moving first does get UT’s ultimate goal…and that is Independence or the only major university in a Mid-major type conference. The LHN contract and the actions so far by it/espn can only lead to one spot, which is no one wants to be in the Big 12…which is Independence for UT that they couldn’t have gotten if they said “hey were going independent”.
There will be some schools that have no choice and will see UT’s crumbs as mana, like Baylor or Houston. Others will see it as serfdom to UT’s dukedom, and want to leave.
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For some reason I had always assumed that the Tech/Baylor forces were latched onto Texas mainly simply because of the power of Texas as the strongest of the national power schools, and the school that would always be in a BCS conference simply by its presence. A&M never had that kind of value, so I assumed the Tech/Baylor forces would be willing to hold save their energy to prevent a Texas independence push. As long as Texas was/is signaling an intent to remain in the Big 12, I haven’t seen any likely backlash against an A&M move.
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Your post reminds me of an historical footnote. The most credible story of what happened in 1994 was in a story in the San Antonio paper. Lt. Gov. Bullock (along with Speaker Laney and others) called UT and A&M officials into his office and informed them they were going to the Big 12 with Baylor and Tech. UT understood. A&M said, “No, we are going to the SEC.” A&M was made to understand.
This wouldn’t be the first time A&M wanted to go to the SEC.
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The Baylor poster way up the thread said his Baylor contacts said they would not fight. Like you, Baylor was a school I was certain would fight.
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@bullet
Baylor will only fight if they get left out of a BCS conference. Baylor just approved a $400 MM operating budget for the coming year. Further up thread I discussed Baylor’s and probably Tech’s big fear, enrollment loss. Now if you think about that operating budget and what would happen with loss in enrollment modeled you start to understand how critical it is for both these schools to remain in a BCS conference. That $10MM payment UT is getting from ESPN each year is probably 1/10 the possible loss of conference affiliation is worth to each school. Seeing that you should understand the kind of weapons both schools will unleash if anything threatens the BCS conference affiliation. Back to my point about not unleashing its weapons.
Read the statements both from Ken Starr in today’s Waco Tribune Hearld and Ian McCaw’s, Baylor’s AD, issued yesterday.
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=98171
http://www.baylorbears.com/genrel/081211aaa.html
They both talk about traditional rivalries, commitment to the B12-2, and other platitudes. However, you will notice what’s not there, there are no calls to action. There is no call to talk to your reps, no write to other papers, no discussion about this severely weakening Baylor or the surrounding economy. Now juxtapose these statements with last year’s where they talk about damage to the Waco economy, Baylor itself, and to get involved and stay involved.
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=75443
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=75510
In effect, we now are seeing a token defense to keep A&M. Baylor feels that A&M leaving will not blow up the conference and therefore is not going to deploy its arsenal to keep A&M which probably makes the conference less stable anyway given the little brother-big brother dynamic between the institutions. Thus, whatever Rep Branch’s committee meeting is going to talk about on Tuesday sure won’t be pushed by Baylor.
Really the only school that will lose with A&M leaving to head for the SEC is UT and therefore I think any pressure for A&M to stay will be coming from that direction.
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@bullet
Baylor will only fight if they get left out of a BCS conference. Baylor just approved a $400 MM operating budget for the coming year. Further up thread I discussed Baylor’s and probably Tech’s big fear, enrollment loss. Now if you think about that operating budget and what would happen with loss in enrollment modeled you start to understand how critical it is for both these schools to remain in a BCS conference. That $10MM payment UT is getting from ESPN each year is probably 1/10 the possible loss of conference affiliation is worth to each school. Seeing that you should understand the kind of weapons both schools will unleash if anything threatens the BCS conference affiliation. Back to my point about not unleashing its weapons.
Read the statements both from Ken Starr in today’s Waco Tribune Hearld and Ian McCaw’s, Baylor’s AD, issued yesterday.
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=98171
http://www.baylorbears.com/genrel/081211aaa.html
They both talk about traditional rivalries, commitment to the B12-2, and other platitudes. However, you will notice what’s not there, there are no calls to action. There is no call to talk to your reps, no write to other papers, no discussion about this severely weakening Baylor or the surrounding economy. Now juxtapose these statements with last year’s where they talk about damage to the Waco economy, Baylor itself, and to get involved and stay involved.
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=75443
http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=75510
In effect, we now are seeing a token defense to keep A&M. Baylor feels that A&M leaving will not blow up the conference and therefore is not going to deploy its arsenal to keep A&M which probably makes the conference less stable anyway given the little brother-big brother dynamic between the institutions. Thus, whatever Rep Branch’s committee meeting is going to talk about on Tuesday sure won’t be pushed by Baylor.
Really the only school that will lose with A&M leaving to head for the SEC is UT and therefore I think any pressure for A&M to stay will be coming from that direction.
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This is silly on so many levels……….
You talk about cultural fit, after just mentioning NC, Duke, and Va. Sillly
And you think Illinois, Indiana, Purdue, Minnesota, Nebraska, Iowa, and Wisconsin will vote to add all eastern teams? Silly.
Or that NC, Duke, and VA. will leave the ACC? Silly.
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Looking backward of course you are right. If you make the asumption that I have laid out, that the 4×16 configuration creates value, the question becomes how do you best fill out a 16 team B1G in a way that adds maximally to BTN revenue and remains in some sense a coherent conference with enough shared values that it defines the brand. You are not going to get to 16 by adding midwest land grant colleges ranked in the US News top 75.
A corollary to this assumption is that as stronger surrounding (football) conferences (SEC and B1G) get to 16 they will do so at the ACC’s expense, the old ACC will not be an option for UNC, Duke and UVa. They would have a choice, B1G, SEC or ACC/BigEast/Big12 remnant. I think under this assumption, they would choose B1G in a heartbeat.
So I think the logic is sound. Using Occam’s razor, if the result is silly, it must be in the assumption. Which is 4×16 is a stable value creating configuration that cannot be resisted in the long run. Old William was a pretty bright guy, this might be silly.
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Wisconsin might not mind adding eastern teams if that means they get to play in the west.
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ESPN didn’t really put out any money. They just didn’t cut. And that contract runs out in 4 years.
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Pods can work, but you have to balance them. You can’t have IL, NW, PU and IN in one while OSU, PSU, MI and MSU are in another.
I think the IN schools would have issues with your divisions, losing games with OSU and MI especially.
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A better, more equitable Big Ten pod system would switch the Michigan and Indiana schools, so you would have Penn State, Ohio State, Purdue and Indiana in one pod and Michigan State, Michigan, Wisconsin and Northwestern in another. (The westernmost pod would be Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Nebraska.)
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You wrote: “it’s not as easy as “expansion = look-in trigger = more $$$”, or else we’d see conferences expand every single time that their own TV contracts fell behind by a little bit.”
Aren’t you missing something here? The reasons conferences can’t just just expand every day are obvious. First, the only way they get more money is if the expansion target is a desirable one. Adding the whole state of Texas to the SEC makes the SEC a significantly more valuable property. Adding Florida A&M does not. A “look-in” is what it literally says: “taking a look.” It does not mean more money unless the expansion actually adds value.
And of course, expansion is two-way street. It needs to be good for the expanding conference, but it also needs to be good for the school, too. The ACC could certainly sweeten its TV deal by adding Penn State. But even a sweetened ACC TV deal wouldn’t be better for Penn State than just remaining where they are.
So the reason you don’t see expansion every day is that there just aren’t that many possibilities where both the institution and the conference stand significantly to benefit.
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I suspect the prime catalyst for Mike Slive and the SEC to make this move is Larry Scott and the Pac 12.
Over the past 14 months or so, Scott tried to create the first 16-team super conference and failed. He then put together an oustanding media package and set up the groundwork for a Pac 12 Network that will include a national channel coupled with six regional/state channels. Scott has publicly said he expects there to be further realignment in college football and given past history, there’s not much doubt he’d be a major change agent in that process.
Slive and the SEC’s perception of the matter may be strategic. If they’ve become convinced that 16-team super conferences coupled with a post-season college playoff are the wave of the future, then the timing of the move to accept Texas A&M plus at least one more team into the conference makes sense. The SEC could wait, but perhaps the conference leadership has decided its time to forge the future now or else be left in the wake of a Pac 16 Conference (or a Big 16 Conference with Jim Delany at the helm).
I can see the SEC stopping at 14 for now as part of the famous two-step conference expansion strategy that’s been discussed on this blog many times. But I have little doubt they’ve identified the desired programs that will get them to 16. Whatever happens is going to be the main driver dictating how much momentum is behind what may be the next round of conference expansion.
I also suspect that because all these issues were touched on last year and that all the interested parties are all pretty well-versed in pros and cons, etc. of any move, decisions on going foward regarding conference realiignment will be made much more expeditiously than last summer. That in itself carries its own momentum. We saw last year, for example, how the Big Ten felt compelled to move up its time table and invite Nebraska to the confernce given all the turmoil in the Big XII. Now we’re reading about Texas A&M moving up its regents meeting and the possibility of a meeting of the SEC presidents on Sunday. The bottom line is this–things may fall in place on a much faster timetable than people expect.
Obviously, there’s lots happening behind the scenes we don’t know. but I think we can be pretty sure that Slive, Scott and Delany in concert with the networks are the major change agents here. Obviously, the university presidents have a big say in this, but I suspect the Pac 12 and Big 10 presidents have alreadly laid out what they want to see happen to their conference commissioners.
We’ll see, but this may be another “Guns of August” scenario, except instead of the beginning of World War I, it’ll be the beginning of a major realignment in collegiate athletics.
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I think Slive understands that the BIG has no expansion response that will work. Adding Rutgers and MO is doable and would make sense, but the Presidents and fans probably aren’t ready for it after just adding Nebraska. And it would obviously be a less than exciting response anyway. All the TX, OK, NC, Duke, VA, MD to the BIG talk is nonsense, and he knows it.
It’s all about ruling the world, IMO.
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“All the TX, OK, NC, Duke, VA, MD to the BIG talk is nonsense, and he (Slive) knows it.” Say it again, brother, say it louder. This is not Stratego.
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As long as Texas has the potential to go independent, there’s less motivation for ND to do anything.
Seems like that will be the case, with Texas staying in the Big 12 until it falls apart. Given that, the B1G’s moves seem limited – there are a lot of options, but few great ones.
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We know why a conference would go to 12 (to get a championship game)
We know why a 12-team conference would go to 14 (if you can land a slam-dunk team like TAMU)
So why would a league go to 16? Just to get to get 4 4-team pod symmetry? The money probably won’t be there to go from 14 to 16. (Although Oklahoma is a semi-slam dunk that might only be available in a 16-team scenario)
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Agree with all of this Cutter. I think last year Scott took the initiative and people were moving faster than they were comfortable with. Now the pencils have been worked. Another great point is that Scott, Slive and Delany have more in common with getting this done rationally than they do competitvelyas rivals, althought that element is no doubt present to a lesser degree. Particularly Delany and Slive. If the answer is 16, how does Slive get there w/o A&M. The B1G and SEC need to emerge as the top two conferences, the PAC needs to emerge as an intact entity, and the Remnant conference needs to be roughly as strong in football as the PAC to have a balanced seeding in Sugar and Rose Bowls.
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ooooh, a Naming Contest. Okay, board: NAME THAT FOURTH CONFERENCE!
Drwillini offers: The Remnant Conference. LOL
I’ll offer: Conference All Over The Country
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The What’s Left League (conference slogan: “Thank God we’re still BCS”)
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You do have a good point that these 3 really won’t compete for teams much. Basically for the Pac 12 its just vs. the SEC for A&M and OU and vs. the B10 for UT. For the SEC and B10 Missouri is the only school that both might want and be able to get (UT and UNC won’t go to the SEC).
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For those who remember me from last year, I again spoke with my contact in the Baylor administration on Thursday. Apparently there was a lot of rumors and scuttle coming out of the Big 12 BOD meeting last week. My contact thought that the BOD would kick A&M something extra (and may still) to keep them, but thought they would eventually jump. However, he did not believe A&M leaving would blow up the league as long as Texas stayed. If B12 minus 3 still has Texas and was still intact Baylor and Tech would not fight A&M leaving.
When the analysis was done last year Baylor forecasted enrollment dropping precipitously due to losing the B12 (between 15% – 30%) and going to a non-BCS conference. The same forecasts I’m sure would hold for Tech. The football revenues are important but the enrollments more so for both Tech and Baylor. As long as Baylor and Tech remain in a BCS conference, even if that conference is one smaller without A&M, then its good for both schools. In fact, the loss of A&M may help the B12-3 stay together as either another Texas school could be included or an invitation could go out somewhere else. Remember it wasn’t Arkansas leaving the SWC that killed it, it was Texas. As long as Texas is onboard to keep the conference together than there is no political fight to keep A&M from moving.
BTW, what’s better for Texas than being an independent? Texas being able to schedule and act like an independent while being associated with a BCS conference.
This is my lay of the land as of the moment.
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Question for my Illini brothers:
Will you be spending more time with conference realignment “stratego” this weekend or watching our boys in the PGA?
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Frank,
you gotta pay more attention to the duffman! 🙂
Word is you were sourcing fat ketch for your previous blogs while I was sourcing the guy that designed the artwork you used in this one. 😉
I said this to you near the beginning of the blog and I will paraphrase it here again because I am too overwhelmed to go back and look for it. it went something like this….
If the B1G is to come out on top of realignment, we must anticipate what the SEC will actually do rather than what we would like them to do. The day we plan on what we would like them to do is the day we have already lost!
I stick by this as my guiding principle today. If we say no way to Cincinnati, Louisville, and West Virginia in the B1G, it is safe to say that any discussion of these teams in the SEC is moot as well. While I have proposed that the ACC could implode the same way the B12 has, I have always considered that the SEC might get at least 1 academic jewel in the fight. To say that this is impossible is to be blinded by personal views. Realignment is about football money and research money! Georgetown is a great school, but without a football brand and big research dollars, they will not enter the realignment discussion.
I could be wrong, but early on in this blog, we all agreed that the 2 Texas schools should wind up anywhere but the SEC, yet here we are on the verge of it happening. I for one will only believe it when I see Loftin and Slive in the photo op press conference, but I will say this is one time it was good to be an IU basketball fan. I was in Indy this spring sitting with some other IU fans for the NCAA championship game between Notre Dame and TAMU. I came away from that game with the impression that the fan base was already SEC bound, and it was only a matter of time. Say what you will about thinking like a college president, but to ignore the majority of your fanbase (and big donors) is probably the quickest way to finding yourself out of a job. Loftin and Byrne have quietly been revamping sports at TAMU, and the NCAA championship was a vision of things to come.
TAMU is now a serious competitor in the Directors Cup, and with their money and fanbase could easily become a serious contender in the SEC football world. When I did the research on the “underperforming” football schools of all time on FtT, TAMU was at the top of my list. yet during this time they were shackled as the “little brother” of the mighty longhorns. Over the past year of realignment discussion it has become more obvious of what a future TAMU unshackled might become. If I as a humble blogger could see this, I am fairly sure the administration and big donors at TAMU could see this as well.
Tomorrow, this may all blow up, and TAMU might be back in the B12 fold, but today they are at the podium in the national press, and they have entered a place they have not been. I have a feeling this is the point of no return.
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IMO A&M has been underperforming because of coaching, not talent.
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bullet,
My research on TAMU that I posted on here ages ago confirmed that. Going back to Dana Bible and others, TAMU has had great coaches they have failed to keep, and kept coaches they never should have hired. I would counter with Florida until Charlie Pell became their coach. Without Pell, there would be no Spurrier or Meyer. If TAMU gets the gateway coach – which Sherman may be – then the coach that follows will be the future of TAMU.
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Frank, any idea whether the Big Ten has looked into adding Florida State and Miami? I get that research is important, but with Nebraska losing AAU, that can’t be the be-all end-all of enlargement of the Big Ten at this point. Florida State and Miami are both strong research universities, probably on par with Nebraska (especially with the removal of their AAU), and that in my opinion is the only way to 14 right now other than Notre Dame + 1.
The Big Ten can’t take Missouri/Rutgers or Maryland/Rutgers at this point. I think we need a slam dunk to go to 14 and that means some school from the list of Notre Dame/Florida State/Miami. Maybe it’s just wishful thinking on my part, but I’d love to know whether Florida State/Miami would entertain the thought of joining the Big Ten together.
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The other thing is, is that you can just move Wisconsin to the “Northwest” division if you do grab a combination like FSU/Miami in order to maintain competitive balance.
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I have heard speculation about B1G and the U, but I’m not buying it. To me what will define the big post-expansion is what drives the BTN revenue machine, and that is lots of nationwide alumni and graduate programs that generate research dollars and more alumni that cross pollinate with other conference schools. Not sure either of these schools offer that. Ironically, I think UF does.
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Re: Big 10 adding FSU and UMiami (Zeek)
And on and on it goes
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new ESPN link
http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=6858985&categoryid=2378529
TAMU to SEC, probable official announcement monday after SEC meeting this weekend, and BoR meeting on monday.
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here is same thing
http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story/_/id/6857085/texas-system-board-regents-calls-special-meeting-monday-discuss-conference-alignment
with a different link
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But why should we have to wait to engage in rampant speculation? Here’s my scenario. The private schools get tired of dealing with the politics that the big state schools bring and decide to form their own conference. The current FBS conference privates (including TCU), plus Notre Dame and BYU, create this:
West
USC
Stanford
BYU
TCU
Baylor
Vanderbilt
East
Northwestern
Notre Dame
Syracuse
Boston College
Duke
Miami
Non-football
Georgetown
Villanova
St. John’s
ND gets protected rivalries with USC and Stanford, and the league would have to stick to eight conference games so the Irish could keep playing Michigan, MSU and Navy every year. Doesn’t leave them a whole lot of flexibility, but they get a national schedule. For basketball, you play each of your fourteen conference opponents once, and four of them twice, including some protected rivalries. I thought about including Gonzaga to give the conference a presence in the Pacific NW, but I could go either way on that one. Also, I left out Wake Forest, because really, now.
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Jake – add Tulane, SMU & Rice to the West, move Vandy to East, add Wake Forest to the East and you have a deal for the first 16-team Super/private/exclusive Club/conference.
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12’s a good number, and I’m not sure those four bring enough to be worthwhile. But either way, this is going to be a VERY exclusive club. Imagine if that group formed its own version of the CIC.
As for Vandy in the West, I didn’t want to split ND and Northwestern, or have ND and USC in the same division, as that seemed unbalanced. So, Vandy it is.
I’m also still working on a name for this thing. The National Athletic Concerence? The Parochial Conference? Suggestions are welcome.
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Re: name for proposed private school conference (Jake)
How about: the “Unlikely conference”: UC
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The Country Club?
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southern version of the Ivy league – good academics, without the national football attention
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Not sure why my last post went up there, but such are the mysteries of WordPress comment sections. And while we’re talking about Aggies and white people dancing:
And yes, I would have posted that even if EDSBS hadn’t put it up yesterday. I’m from Texas; it’s canonical.
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The Big-10 infatuation with ND or the Carolinas is clouding their judgement about Mizzou. How can the Big-10 waste a lifetime of John Hughes movies, solid Mid-West values, and allow the Slive and the SEC to snake away Mizzou. Mizzou is AAU, hard working, and not very athletic but could probably be paired up with Maryland. Mizzou is a that awesome friend everybody takes for granted! That’s a home run. Not ND grand slam, but something worth plenty at 14 teams. Plus, the Tigs and Terps definitely add something to the basketball. Moreover, the Big-10 can stop at 14 and wait until they are stomach punched by ND again after NBC signs another dumb Olympic size mistake with the Irish.
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Don’t see the SEC going for Missouri, but if the Big Ten has to expand again, I agree they are toward the top of who I want (other than maybe Kansas). I’d rather keep the Big Ten primarily Midwest focused so we go to 16 eventually, at least most of the conference will remain there.
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I think Slive and the SEC go to 16 teams:
A&M, already in the pocket
FSU, the state of Florida is big enough for two quality teams
West Virginia, because they just feel like an SEC program and the SEC can’t convince any other ACC teams.
Missouri, because the Big-10 will allow it and Mizzou will not have any choice.
Slive talked about paradigm shift and I think the Big East turning down ESPN’s offer was it. The SEC could see in a couple of years where they are fourth in media money and more importantly for their Olympic sports, fourth in exposure. The SEC knows from recent history it is better to be taking risks rather than letting events pass you by. Those non-revenue sports can become revenue sports with enough exposure.
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Doh! I forgot to mention the main reason for going to 16. The SEC needs a conference network and now really want regional networks the Pac just negotiated and the only way to force ESPN and CBS to renegotiate is to be able to have enough rights to make valuable for ESPN and CBS to renegotiate. An increase of 25% of rights should be enough to force ESPN’s hand and probably CBS. Slive needs to be able to say, “I’ll go to Fox with these rights.” Splitting them won’t be pretty, but hey, conference networks and regional networks are the only way to keep pace.
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I also agree, this isn’t done in the ways of expasion for the Big Ten. Even their new logo looks like the G is set up to make a 6.
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Todd – A&M and Florida State are basically SEC schools that aren’t in the conference. I agree that the B1G should be looking for B1G-like schools that just don’t happen to be members.
I’d go with Mizzou and Pitt. They would be stand-up doubles much like Arkansas and South Carolina were for the SEC in the 90s. It took some time for them to assimilate, but both were happy and grateful to be in the SEC. But last season, South Carolina made it to the SEC CG for the first time and Arkansas played in its first BCS bowl game.
Mizzou and Pitt are competitive, but not championship caliber – just like the Hogs and the ‘cocks back in the early 90s. Twenty years ago, TV money wasn’t nearly the consideration it is today, but with Mizzou you pick up a new state with two big cities primed for BTN carriage. Pitt is a great school, good tradition, and the right thing to do.
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Alan, I’d agree with you if the Big Ten was where the SEC was. But I think we all know that the Big Ten is still another power school away from being able to match the SEC. The SEC already had Florida/Alabama/Tenn./Georgia/LSU (maybe replace Tenn. with Auburn looking forward); they needed to fill out the middle of the conference, so SC/Ark. made a whole lot of sense as well as getting the SEC CCG.
The Big Ten is aleady at 12, but I think the Big Ten is still yet another power school away (i.e. Notre Dame but that doesn’t look to happen any time in the next 5 years unless they have a series of losing seasons).
The Big Ten needed Penn State and Nebraska to help fill out the top of the conference since it was OSU/Michigan and the little 8, but I still think the Big Ten needs one more of those kinds of additions. The other thing is that going to 14 is so different from going to 12 in which the CCG helps satisfy the move from 1/10th to 1/12th shares of the pie.
In going to 14, the two schools had better be able to satisfy their two shares worth. Missouri and Pitt can’t do that. They might have been able to take the Big Ten to 12 if you include CCG money (and remove two schools…), but I don’t see how they get the Big Ten to 14 if you already value the next Big Ten contract at near $30M per school.
Texas A&M can do that for the SEC because of the size of the Texas TV markets and what that will do for recruiting for schools like Alabama that don’t really hit Texas as hard as they could if they were in a division with A&M.
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zeek,
I think you are wrong. The SEC has one traditional king (AL) on par with the B10’s 4 (OSU, MI, PSU, NE), with TN, GA, AU and LSU trailing them. What the B10 needs are those next level teams to strengthen the middle, and WI is in that role now and both MSU and IA are trying to get there regularly. The B10 suffers from the kings not all being near their peaks and the middle and bottom of the conference falling short. If NW would win a bowl, and IL would meet their potential, that would help. PU keeping their ACL’s intact will help too.
Solid mid-pack addition would be just fine competitively. The problem that they rarely pay for themselves. MO might work, but Pitt doesn’t bring new TVs which makes it hard to justify.
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What happened to UF? In any case, I’d put UF, UGa, & LSU alongside ‘Bama as “kings” now. All 4 of them (as well as AU) brought in more football revenue than Michigan or tOSU.
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UF is a modern king, but not a traditional/historical one. I meant to include them on that list of SEC schools trailing the kings.
I stand by my points. The B10 needs the kings to play like kings and the middle to man up. NW is much better than their national reputation because the only game many people see is NW losing a bowl. IL has flashes of brilliance and then Zooks themselves the next year. MSU seems to be growing out of that under Dantonio, but I’m waiting to see them follow up 2010 with a solid season. IA is only good if they have no expectations. WI seems to have finally gotten past that problem.
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UGA can’t claim king status based on a few great years under Richt.
FL has 7 SECCG titles and 3 NC since 1992.
AL has 3 SECCG titles and 2 NC since 1992.
LSU has 3 SECCG titles and 2 NC since 1992.
TN has 2 SECCG titles in 5 appearances and 1 NC since 1992.
AU has 2 SECCG titles in 4 appearances and 1 NC since 1992.
GA has 2 SECCG titles in 3 appearances and 0 NC since 1992.
GA is 6th in the recent history of its conference, and is on a string of off years. They are WI or maybe IA right now.
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Brian – neither Wiscy nor Iowa have a 1980 NC and final #2 ranking as recently as 2007, like UGA. I don’t know if either Wiscy or Iowa have 12 conference championships though, like UGA.
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My list of “kings” (not in order):
Michigan
Ohio State
Nebraska
Penn State
Florida State
Miami
Florida
Alabama
LSU
Tennessee
USC
Texas
OU
Notre Dame
Almost kings:
Georgia
Auburn
Right behind them (not in order):
Va. Tech
Wisconsin
Oregon
Washington
Iowa
Clemson
Texas A&M
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Alan,
#2 finishes don’t mean much more to me compared to #3-10 except that you for sure won a good bowl game and are a media darling. Doing it once in 19 years isn’t king material by itself. The last 3 seasons have taken the luster off of 2007.
GA has 7 AP top 10 finishes since 1992 (including 2 #10s), WI has 5 and Iowa 4 (both with no #10s). Both WI and IA have 12 conference titles as well, and IA has 1 NC. I don’t see GA’s NC in 1980 as really any more or less relevant than IA’s 1958 title.
WI is on a high right now, like GA was in 2002-2005 or 2007 (we’ll see how long it lasts), while GA has been on a down slide.
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Michael,
I assume you are talking about modern day kings, not traditional ones.
That said, I think you have to downgrade Miami. They’ve been down too long to stay on your list (out of final AP top 25 4 of last 5 years, #19 in 2009, #17 in 2005, not top 10 since 2003). TN is also sliding off the list, along with FSU (the downside of listing modern kings is that they can silide off the list with several bad years in a row). In the 2000’s, FSU wasn’t a AP top 10 finisher except for 2000 (TN not since 2001). The good news for you is that Fisher seems to have FSU coming back to prominence while TN is still several years away.
Some references for final AP top 10s since 2000:
OSU, OU – 8 out of 11
USC, UT – 7
LSU – 6
FL, GA, VT – 5
Miami, IA, AL, OR – 4
AU, WI, TCU, BSU, probably several others – 3
I think you give Auburn too much credit for last year, with 4 out of 11 years out of the top 25. UW can’t be in that next tier after 1 bowl game in 8 years. Clemson and TAMU have no results to justify inclusion either (1 top 20 each in 11 years).
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Brian,
A king to me is a program that is simply legendary and highly relevant to this day. It may have traditions that date back to 1803, when Michigan first started collecting its victory totals, or those traditions may not really go back even before color television, like Miami. But it’s a program that is always relevant.
“King” status, as far as I’m concerned, has to be subjective. Michigan has won 1 national title in the past 62 years, but no one would question whether they’re one of college football’s kings. Miami, FSU, and, to a lesser degree, Florida, trail Michigan, Penn State, Tennessee, OU, Texas, etc. in total victories by hundreds of games, but they combine for 10 of the past 27 national championshps. They’re kings.
I think of the really old-line programs kind of like the Rockefellers and Carnegies. They’re families of generational wealth whose riches will continue into perpetuity.But programs who came on relatively recently are more like Bill Gates. 100 years from now, the Gates name will be another name of generational wealth. Right now, no one thinks of him that way, but we might as well. Ten national titles and 7 Heismans collective, Hall of Fame coaches like Bobby Bowden, Steve Spurrier, and Urban Meyer, all in the middle of one of the two most fertile recruiting grounds in the nation–that’s generational wealth, even if they didn’t really hit the scene until the 80’s and 90’s, much like Gates.
Having said all that, I’ll admit LSU was in my gray area. I gave them the nod because they’ve won titles in multiple decades, including two in the past seven years. As for the subjective quality, LSU is pretty famous for their Saturday night games and for their past two coaches’ antics. They’re probably not a ratings draw by themselves the way a Florida or USC would be, but they’re close enough. Some say Tennessee should be questioned. I think that’s nonsense. They’ll recover eventually.
I don’t think I gave Auburn too much credit. They’ve had three seasons in the past 18 years with no losses: ’93, ’04, ’10. They’re about as close to a king status as one can be without being one.
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Michael,
You have to also look at the surrounding years. AU was undefeated 3 times, but they also lost 5 or more games 7 times since 1992. They only have 5 10 win seasons in that period. They were 13-12 the 2 season before last year.
MI has been down lately, and still has 6 10 win seasons over that period and lost 5 only the 3 RichRod years. They also have 2 undefeated years and 1 NC during that period.
I agree that being a king is subjective, but there are objective data you can use to support it. The problem for Miami and FSU is that when you don’t have a long history, it doesn’t take long to forget your past. FSU seems to be back to being nationally competitive, but Miami has to show that. Miami is only relevant when they’re good, even to their own fans. VT has been dominating the ACC for 5 years and was never in the hunt for a national title since Vick left. FSU and Miami have to prove they can win their conference first, and then prove they can compete nationally, to be relevant again in my opinion.
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richard, 2 issues with your “kings” list
#1 standard bell curve would indicate a max of 12 “kings” or 10% of 120 team totals – tho I would argue the number be half of that, or a number closer to 6
Michigan – true king
Ohio State – true king to lesser king (others had your glory early on)
Nebraska – true king to lesser king (factoring the forgotten years)
Penn State – true king to lesser king (JoPa factor)
Florida State – near king (?? post Bowden)
Miami – near king to second son (lived fast, died young)
Florida – near king (SEC has the round table)
Alabama – true king
LSU – near king (SEC has the round table)
Tennessee – near king (SEC has the round table)
USC – true king
Texas – true king to lesser king (UT has numbers, but Sooners have the history)
OU – true king (way to go Ohio University)
Notre Dame – true king
Almost kings:
Georgia – near king
Auburn – near king
Right behind them (not in order):
Va. Tech – possible future king
Wisconsin – possible future king
Oregon – ????
Washington – ????
Iowa – ????
Clemson – ????
Texas A&M – ????
#2 This is America, not Europe, we have no kings here, we have “brands” 😉
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edit: for some odd reason it bolded UT, but I had the TX school as a near king not a true king
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Duffman,
I will, of course, call you crazy for not counting OSU as a true king.
#5 in total wins
#5 in total winning percentage
7 national titles with 3 different coaches (real ones, not the crap that AL fans count)
34 B10 titles
7 Heisman trophies, including only 2-time winner
6 HOF coaches, with 1 on the way (4 in a row and Tressel will make 5)
The Ten Year War
The Game
What else would they need to be a king?
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brian,
It is splitting hairs, and I did the same thing with Nebraska if you noticed. Nebraska had the big 20 – 30 year gap, and tOSU gained their steam in more modern times. Michigan has been there since the beginning, but tOSU’s king status was gained by the loss of early king status of Minnesota and Chicago. As you are well aware I have had tOSU listed as a “brand” in every post I have made on here, so I am not saying they are not worthy in the big picture. The only thing I am pointing out is the lack of the early history. If the gophers had maintained their early success, today the UM folks would hate them more than you guys right now.
Basically it was like pick a part of the country and pick only 1 team
Northeast = ND
Midwest = UM
South = BAMA
West = OU
Coast = U$C
if this makes it easier to see what I was doing
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duffman,
NE fans can defend their own team.
As for lack of early success, how far back are you going?
OSU won at least 3 B10 titles in every decade since the 40s, and also won 3 in the 10s and 2 in the 30s. I guess you could call the 20s and early 30s a down period. Still, from 1913 (when OSU joined the B10) through 1941 (start of the war, which screwed up many teams) OSU was #14 in winning percentage, behind powers like Duquesne, Dartmouth and Washington & Jefferson.
Chicago’s last B10 title was in 1924, and 4 of their 7 came before OSU joined in 1913. MN had a run from ’33-’41. IL was great in the 10s. I just don’t give much credence to that very early part of CFB because the game has changed so much since then (forward pass, integration, platoons, rule changes, polls, etc).
Well, there is no reason to assume each part of the country had 1 king, nor that each region could only have one king. ND is also midwestern like MI. The early northeast king(s) were some combination of Army, Pitt, Duquesne, Dartmouth, maybe even BC and the other Ivies.
OSU has been a power since the mid-30s. I would think that is long enough.
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brian,
The gophers were “golden” from the beginning of football till WWII
16 B1G championships in roughly 40 years means they have a B1G about every other year. As I said in an earlier post, the gophers biggest opponent were WW I and WW II. From 1900 to WW I coach Williams brought 7 championships home to Minnesota. After the war it took the gophers about a decade to recover. Coach Bierman would lead the gophers to a dominance of the B1G that would only be abated by WW II.
During this time (1900 – 1941) the Buckeyes had only 5 B1G titles (2 were in the WW I years). Again, as stated in a previous thread, pre WW II it was Minnesota, and post WW II it has been Ohio State. Michigan (granted with fewer MNC’s post WW II) was able to exert a football presence both pre WW II and post WWII. As stated above, I am not negating the football ability of the Buckeyes in modern times, just saying that history can not be re written to the benefit of Ohio State and the exclusion of Minnesota.
On Notre Dame, they have a base in Chicago, but they have been the defacto east coast team since the beginning. Be it the void they filled by the B1G not having a NY/MA/PA/MD member back in the beginning. Or filling the void once Harvard / Yale / other IVY faded into the sunset of college football days of old. The point is ND is more east coast than IN or B1G, hence I defined them as east coast
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duffman,
OSU didn’t join the B10 until 1913. Only 1 of MN’s pre-WWI titles came against OSU. As I said, they went on a run again from 1933-1941. During that run, who had the second most B10 titles? OSU with 1.5
I never said MN wasn’t good in the early years. I questioned why OSU wasn’t a true king on your list. You said it was a lack of early success. I’m just arguing that OSU was the third best B10 team pre-WWII, it’s not like the big down time of NE (a team you gave the same status). I’d add that WWII and beyond is the past 70 years. At some point you have to draw a line for when a school needed to be dominant, and I’d say 70 years is a pretty good sample size. Offensive linemen were legal receivers 70 years ago and teams were segregated. That wasn’t the same game.
ND is in Indiana. They are a midwestern school with eastern ties and fans. Just because the east coast media fell in love with them doesn’t make them eastern.
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Duffman. UT does have the numbers, 2nd all time in wins, 3rd in winning %, 4 national titles (it would be a lot more if we counted the way Alabama and Tennessee do-and admittedly is fewer than OU). Another # 59-41-5 vs. the Sooners. All of this realignment armageddon talk revolves primarily around 2 schools, neither of which is OU.
Now OU is certainly a true brand. But to say UT is not, you would have to be living in the pre-Darrell Royal era.
Per NCAA record book-top winning %
1. Michigan
2. Notre Dame
3. Texas
4. Ohio St.
5. Oklahoma
6. Boise St. (but only 42 seasons)
7. Alabama
8. USC
9. Nebraska
10. Tennessee
11. Penn St.
12. Florida St. (but only 63 seasons)
13. Georgia
14. LSU
15. Miami (FL)
16. Florida
17. Auburn
18. South Florida (13 seasons)
19. Miami
20. Arizona St.
I would put UGA at the top of the SEC near brands. Tennessee, except for the 90s Fullmer/Spurrier battles, has been pretty mediocre since Bob Neyland left. They are still normally solid, unlike Minnesota, but not a team that’s always in the mix for the top. LSU I would put 3rd among that group. They have 2 recent national titles, but they were BAD for most of the 80s and 90s. And we aren’t talking 5-6 and 6-5 like UGA in the 5 year Goff era. Auburn is clearly 4th among that group, but still roughly at the same level.
And for a change, I will have to agree with Brian. Its pretty hard to leave out Ohio St.
You value extended success. I think the unprecedented success FSU and Miami had starting in the mid-80s makes them a brand. They could lose it like MN and quicker than a Michigan, but they are there. Everyone talks about them even after 7-5 and 8-4 seasons. And in reality, with the Florida recruiting base, they will always recover.
IMO there are 12 major brands. Just maybe you could put Penn St. and the 3 Florida schools on a lesser tier (I wouldn’t), but the top 8 are hard to separate (the top 9 on the list above less Boise). There’s no way to limit it to 6.
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Another interesting stat in 2010 NCAA record book-most consecutive non-losing seasons-dominated by the major brands:
1 PSU 49
2 UNL 42
2 ND 42
4 Mich 40
4 Texas 40
6 AL 38
7 FSU 33
8 FL 30
9 OU 29
9 Texas 29
9 BC 29
Texas is in there twice and only Boston College among the non-brands is there. USC and Ohio St. are tied for 19th-25th with 21 straight seasons. Miami FL isn’t in the list (only shows the 26 streaks with 20 seasons or more).
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Correction-Ohio St. also has a 23 year streak, so their longest streak is the 18th longest.
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While I’m on the same page in the NCAA records book, 2 of the 23 longest played rivalries will come to an end this year, although along with OU-OK St are among the 3 most lop-sided on the list-UNL-KS #3 with 117 games and #19 UNL-Ia St with 105 through 2011. One other game on that list Baylor-TCU was the 2nd most played back in 1996, but has dropped to 18th since the breakup of the SWC. It is the most even on the list-49-49-7.
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Just for fun, longest active streaks of years without a losing season (BCS conference):
Florida 24
Ohio State 22 (0 if you count 0-1 in 2010)
Texas Tech 18 (14 if you count sanctions)
Virginia Tech 18
Boston College 12
Oklahoma 12
LSU 11
USC 10 (5 if you count 0-1 in 2005)
WVU 9
Wisconsin 9
South Carolina 7
Missouri 6
Oregon 6
Penn State 6
Oklahoma State 5
Northwestern 4
Connecticut 4
Iowa 4
Alabama 4 (3 if you count sanctions)
(TCU is at 6, Utah at 8)
Teams at risk this year:
Boston College- seems headed in the wrong direction, get VT and Miami in crossover
USC- sanctions are going to start hurting
WVU- crazy coaching situation, could be good, could be really bad
I’m tempted to add LSU, more because of the schedule than anything else. It’s entirely possible that LSU could play 4 BCS bowl game opponents: 2 from the SEC, Oregon, and WVU. I don’t know if the Mad Hatter has enough perfect bounces on fake field goals or 13 men on the field penalties left in him.
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@M,
You left out the longest one:
Florida State: 34 seasons
The last time FSU had a losing season was Bobby Bowden’s first year, the year after my parents graduated from FSU. They’re now retired. So the football team was awful and essentially irrelevant when they were in college and they have been above average to excellent since.
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bullet,
again not saying, nor have I ever said that UTexas was not a brand (or king), but winning early on against bad teams and padding the wins in the SWC is not the same as Alabama playing in the SEC, or Michigan playing in the B1G. When you stack up the hardware next to OU, UTexas is the next step down.
Look at Duke in basketball
Sure those wins in the ACC are great but pulling 140 wins of your total from the SoCon (87 against davidson alone) goes a long way to padding the stats. Mushroomgod may find another team but Butler is IU’s davidson equivalent and they have only played each other 48 times with IU winning about 3 out of 4 as a rough average. They have lots of games against ND and UK, but nobody would claim they were the basketball equivalent of Davidson. All time wins must always be placed in context to the teams they got those wins from.
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The SWC was arguably the best conference in the late 70s and early 80s. With the Cowboys down, SMU was the best professional team in Dallas. The SWC also dominated the 30s when SMU, TCU and A&M all won MNCs from 1935-1939. By Alabama standards using any poll that has ever existed (we don’t claim it) UT won a title in 41. SMU and TCU were serious national players in the late 40s and 50s. UT had OU every year and Arkansas. UT and Arkansas were #2 and #3 in winning % in the 60s. In the 60s and 70s the Big 10 was Ohio St., Michigan and the 8 drawves.
And when the SWC was weak in the late 80s and early 90s, UT had one of its worst stretches in its history and didn’t rack up too many wins.
And as for the SEC, they were only playing 5 or 6 conference games and racking up wins outside the conference until the 70s. They didn’t go to 8 conference games until expansion to 12. Most of the SEC schools ooc was really weak. While Texas historically played one of the toughest ooc schedules prior to the formation of the Big 12.
And as for Duke, Duff, you are old enough to remember that Davidson basketball was very good in the 60s. Don’t really know about before that time.
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@bullet:
“Most of the SEC schools ooc was really weak.”
Was?
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But Pitt is in a state the B1G already has covered. Rutgers, Syracuse or Maryland make more sense. Mizzou’s a solid addition. And they’re readily available, which is a plus.
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Guys, the B10 isn’t going to expand (and dilute conference rivalries) just for the sake of expansion, no matter what the SEC does. No disrespect to Pitt & Mizzou, but those 2 aren’t going to enhance the B10 in any way.
I can see justifications for Texas, ND, UNC, Duke, UVa, Maryland, & Miami (heck, even OU, since we’ve already taken UNL, though OkSt. is harder to justify), since all those schools enhance the B10 in important ways (academically, football, other sports, recruiting + growing population). That isn’t true for Mizzou or Pitt.
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Nothing wrong with doubles. In fact, stringing a few hits produces big innings and then hit a three run dinger … Earl Weaver style.
Larry Scott turned Utah and Colorado into a feast for a king. Great schools, but nobody is going to mistake them for Texas or Notre Dame. Perhaps the lesson of the Pac expansion is there is more value in the Utah’s, Colorado’s, Missouri’s and Maryland’s of the world. Football is on only 4 months of the year, and the conference network need programs for the other 8 months.
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P10 a “feast” because getting they were getting to 12. There is no feast for a B14 by adding Pitt and Mizzou. They are teams you think about once you land ND or Texas and need to get to an even number. Maaaaaaaybe Mizzou gets consideration if the B10 thinks the SEC is going to take them.
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I respectfully disagree. Perhaps Mizzou and Maryland don’t pull their weight football-wise, but basketball, they can offer up these matches during a season: Tigers-Spartans, Tigers-Buckeyes, Tigers-Fighting Illini, Terps-etc. Mizzou football can surprise people too. These two teams can serve up hours of quality basketball games for the Big Ten Network.
They also open at least 4.3 million homes to a higher subscriber fee. I think the rate for Big-10 states was 70 cents so if you add 30 cents in ad rates for a $1/subscriber to make the math easier those two teams probably pull in over $48M. The Tigers and Terps would be pulling their weight and come first and second tier renewal negotiation, the added captive states do seem to make great difference.
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Basketball, unfortunately, contributes only a fraction of the revenues of football. Now, that isn’t so true with UNC & Duke (and KU & UK), but there are literally only 4 basketball programs in the country who can add even as much value as an average BCS football program.
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http://businessofcollegesports.com/2011/05/18/duke-louisville-and-unc-are-college-basketballs-financial-heavyweights/
Richard,
You have to include UL in your list. They are the only team to rival Duke for revenue. UK is #7 and KU #11. AZ, Syracuse and WI all beat UK, while IN, OSU, and MSU are before KU. Not in reputation, but in revenue. Duke beat KU by over $10M last year, and #3 UNC was still over $6M behind.
Duke’s MBB revenue is still fairly low compared to AQ FB teams, but ahead of IL for example.
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I don’t think that many people are clamoring for Mizzouri-Michigan State or Mizzouri-Ohio State in basketball. And at any rate how dare you exclude Mizzouri-Wisconsin!!!!!!! 🙂
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Brian:
I guess I should narrow my list down to 2 (UNC & Duke, which may explain why Delany was rumored to hanker after them), as those 2 are the only bball programs that generate football-level money for themselves and also football-level money for their league & opponents (in terms of drawing TV eyeballs and selling tickets).
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Richard,
That works, too. UL and UK in the same conference might match that, though, or at least come fairly close.
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A big part of their benefit was how undervalued the P10 was before Scott.
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True, Brian. I’d add a third factor: the P12 just got very lucky. They are currently being overpaid.
In any event, generaly speaking, adding schools similar to Colorado and Utah to get to 14 or 16 is not going to move the needle.
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Todd, the infatuation is not with “the Carolinas”; I doubt we’ll be seeing Clemson’s purple and orange in the Big Ten mix anytime soon. It’s more based on the growth of the middle Atlantic region from the Baltimore-Washington corridor at the north to North Carolina (Research Triangle, Triad) at the south. It’s booming with population, affluence and research. Given the economic struggles of the American interior, it makes sense as an area for the Big Ten to covet as a healthy complement to its current base.
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I was imprecise about the geography but it is still an infatuation since the schools in North Carolina and Virginia have not shown any inclination to leave the ACC so there is little chance the ACC will disintegrate. Thus, it is unrealistic for the Big-10 to pine for the Tar Heels, Blue Devils and Cavaliers. This is an example of unreciprocated attention. It’s wasted energy…and amusing for bystanders and a little embarrassing and uncomfortable for friends.
I feel the ‘decline’ of the Midwest is overstated. It’s not a decline (except Detroit), but not expanding as rapid as the South. The Midwest still leads the South in the vast majority of economic and social data….except in BCS bowls. Which would you rather lead in?
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Wait until the SEC raids off some combination of FSU/VTech/Clemson.
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Forget Va. Tech: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/hokies-journal/post/virginia-tech-administration-has-no-interest-in-joining-sec/2011/08/12/gIQAzoZmBJ_blog.html
They’re pretty darn firm about not being interested in anywhere but the ACC.
Unfortunately, the same type of sentiments don’t seem to come out of Tallahassee. It’s a bummer. I’ve always liked the Seminoles in the ACC. Now that I’m living in NC, I love them in this league. Oh well. I guess 20 years’ history in a league is pretty meaningless when one considers Colorado left schools it had been playing for almost 60 and Nebraska, over 100, in some cases.
Let’s beef up the oversigning and NCAA probation, Seminoles, and act as though affiliation with some of the nation’s most respected universities is worthless.
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According to Sporting News, the SEC doesn’t want FSU anyway. They want a new state from number 14.
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@Brian: Good. I hope Sporting News is right.
There aren’t a lot of options for new southern states that don’t already have a school in the SEC, though.
Oklahoma? Probably uninterested, and requires both OU and Ok. State.
Missouri? They’d be an odd fit. If Kentucky’s population is 20% Midwestern in nature (along the Ohio River, especially) while the rest is as southern as Alabama, then Missouri is probably more along 80-20, Midwestern-to Southern. I don’t rule them out, though.
Kansas? Maybe there are some southern accents in Kansas, but that by no means makes Kansas a “southern” state, and I don’t think mediocre football tradition is what the SEC is looking for, anyway. No chance the SEC is interested.
Virginia? Both ACC schools are already ruled out.
West Virginia? They fit just fine culturally, but WVU would kind of be on an island, geographically, compared to the rest of the league. Their state’s population is very small with very, very low growth and very little wealth, comparable to Mississippi. They’re like Nebraska, except without the deep tradition, nationwide fanbase, and widespread TV appeal.
North Carolina? NC State might relish the opportunity to stand out from the shadow of UNC. They might be an interesting option. Then again, NCSU is a charter member of the ACC and would be a tough one to pry away. UNC, Wake, and Duke would reject based on ACC loyalty.
This leads me back to the best options within the SEC’s current footprint. FSU is far and away the most attractive one out there. No, they don’t add a new state, but they add a heck of a lot of viewers nationally.
After A&M, I think their realisticwish list goes:
1) FSU
2) NC State
3) Clemson
4) Missouri
5) West Virginia
6) Louisville
If options 1-4 all reject, I doubt it’s worth adding A&M. The other new team wouldn’t be worth it.
I guess we should all just stay tuned…
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Michael,
I agree that adding a state limits the viable choices.
Already SEC: FL, GA, SC, AL, MS, TN, KY, LA, AR
Other AQ schools there: FSU, Miami, USF, GT, Clemson, UL
Miami and GT wouldn’t go anyway, I don’t think. The others would probably at least consider it.
Other southern(ish) states: NC, VA, WV (more like KY than southern), TX, OK, maybe MO
AQ schools there: UNC, Duke, NCSU, WF, VT, UVA, WV, UT, TT, Baylor, TCU, OU, OkSU
No chance – UNC, Duke, WF, UVA, UT, Baylor, TCU, OkSU
Said no – VT
Unlikely – NCSU, TT, OU
Possible – WV, MO
I don’t think OU is interested, and they may not be able to drop OkSU. I doubt the SEC wants TT and I really doubt TT wants the SEC without UT. It’s hard to believe NCSU would leave UNC.
As for WV, it would be by far the smallest state in the SEC with less than 1.9M people, but MS supports 2 SEC schools with 3.0M. WV fans also spill over into the surrounding states somewhat, getting parts of PA, VA and MD. It would be a good fit culturally and is good in hoops which is a plus, but the academics are a little weak. WV borders KY, so they aren’t that much of an outlier despite UK being 330 miles away from WVU. It’s a huge increase in travel for WV though.
MO is more midwestern than southern to me, and their academic aspirations make the SEC seem less likely. It has a decent population but nobody seems excited about adding them. I think MO would prefer to keep their old Big 8 ties if possible. Also, MO is another western team which would force realigning the divisions and I don’t think the SEC wants that.
Like you, I think they have to consider doubling up in a state. My guess at their preferences:
1. NCSU
2. FSU
3. Clemson
4. WV
5. UL
If they all say no, I think the deal is dead.
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Of that list, I think the cutoff is somewhere between Clemson (who’s said “no”) and WVU. I don’t think they’ll bother with Louisville.
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Heard a reporter on a sports show on Sirius XM say he had talked to several SEC ADs and that the SEC wasn’t looking at ACC schools for #14.
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@Brian:
That was a really good analysis.
I think the two schools the SEC will try the hardest for are FSU and NC State. FSU is very attractive because it adds the biggest national brand within an SEC or a state surrounding the SEC (excluding Ohio, Oklahoma, and Texas). No further explanation needed.
NC State would fit fairly well culturally. There are certainly not nearly as many casual State fans UNC fans, but the one they have are pretty rabid. They do travel very well to bowl games and don’t leave empty seats in their modest-sized (by SEC standards) stadium. There’s even a little bit of Texas A&M in them, so to speak, being a large land-grant school whose academic strengths mirrors A&M’s–except that its resentment towards UNC is much more of an understandable Michigan-Michigan State dynamic, not a hatred that would drive them to actively seek a new conference, but I digress. NC State also offers a new, growing state in a wealthy local market.
Would State want to leave? I don’t know. It’d be awfully weird around here to have three major universities with major college sports within a half-hour drive–and suddenly have them in separate leagues. These three universities work together cooperatively all the time on all kinds of projects. Call me crazy, but breaking bonds in something so emotionally-driven as college athletics, especially without the benefit of the warning signs that A&M fans have put out for years, could definitely plant some seeds of bitterness into those professional relationships among the universities. In other words, there could be unforeseen, non-athletics consequences of breaking up the schools in the Triangle. Yes, there would definitely be a fight if State showed interest in leaving.
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@bullet,
If that’s true, then it means either:
A) They’re looking at Big East schools in the South (WVU, L’ville, USF, TCU)
or
B) They’re looking at Big 12 schools who don’t require a second or third team to tag along.
It doesn’t add up to me. The SEC wants to go to 14, not 16, if it decides to add A&M. Texas Tech wants to stick with Texas. Baylor’s unappealing. Missouri thinks Big 12 schools aren’t up to snuff academically–what would it do in the SEC? And while the Big East schools would say yes before Slive could get the words out of his mouth, to use some FtT lingo, they’re not exactly home runs. They’re not even stand up doubles. They’re more like getting hit by the pitch. Is that what the SEC wants?
Short of Oklahoma, the SEC has GOT to get an ACC school to pair with A&M.
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MIchael,
Since the SEC probably hasn’t really sat down and started to think about this too seriously yet, perhaps they’re still on this phase of the list:
1. UT
2. ND
3. OU
Slive also genuinely doesn’t seem to want to cause too much damage, so maybe he wants to leave the ACC alone for the good of the game. That, or he knows all the good choices would say no or cause an internal struggle for the SEC.
You’d think he wants an eastern school to keep the divisions, so maybe he is focused on WV and UL. He could get almost any non-AQ, but the SEC doesn’t add a non-AQ. I say almost any because even the SEC can’t match the deep pockets of Uncle Sam for Army and Navy, and they don’t really need more exposure.
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@Michael & Brian
Your scenarios all make sense.
The scary one from the standpoint of a Big 12 fan is that they are thinking OU and OU is listening.
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bullet,
OU doesn’t want the SEC. They’ll go P12 before SEC.
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Brian
I think you’re right, but OU has been noticeably silent and we all have been wrong before.
Losing A&M is bad, but survivable. Losing OU or UT and the league, if it survives at all, is at MWC level.
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Barry Tramel is not OU’s Chip Brown, but does probably reflect feelings within the school.
http://newsok.com/berry-tramel-ou-wants-no-part-of-the-sec/article/3594510
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NCSU’s probably going to be hard to pry away from UNC since they share the same governors. Likely the B10 would have to take UNC for the SEC to take NCSU.
Agree that OSU (especially with OkSt tied to it) is must more likely to end up in the Pac than the SEC if the B12 falls apart.
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Do we actually know that the B10 is infatuated with UNC, Duke, Maryland or Virginia? Not that I don’t think they’d be good additions.
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Well, the Big Ten president is a UNC grad (played basketball there, too), so he knows the region. He likely feels that as a bloc, retaining their three traditional rivals while creating new ones, those schools’ collective value would be more than adding each of them individually. All are peer institutions with Big Ten members and would add quite a bit to the CIC consortium. They are in a region that will likely be among the most buffeted from a recession, thanks to the federal government (for Maryland and Virginia) and the Research Triangle (for UNC and Duke). Athletically, all four are usually among the top 30 in the Sears Cup or whatever it’s called these days; right now, Maryland, UVa and UNC are in the middle of the pack in football, but all three would get a boost from changing brands. (Look what it’s done for South Carolina.) Duke isn’t much in football, to be sure, but Big Ten membership could make it competitive in a Northwesternish sort of way. Right now, the ACC seems fairly united, but if a few of its members were picked off by the SEC and it appeared the future is 16-team conferences, these four would probably be fairly easy to get, if the alternative was a low-revenue league.
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The problem is the ACC is unlikely to ever be THAT low revenue of a league. The SEC can only pull away so many members, and the ACC can always add Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Rutgers, etc.
You do list a bunch of good reasons to take a look at these ACC schools. I just don’t think where Jim Delaney played basketball is one of them. Nobody would be using that as a factor if he played at Louisville.
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“to North Carolina (Research Triangle, Triad) at the south. It’s booming with population, affluence and research.”
@Vincent,
Your description is quite accurate. I’ve lived here for two months, and I’ve never seen so many luxury vehicles outside of downtown Chicago. (Never been to NYC or LA.) They’re everywhere. There is some serious growth around here (Raleigh had one of the top 3 population growth rates for the decade, at over 40%) and serious cash, too.
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From Espn’s Doug Gottlieb Twitter:
GottliebShow http://twitter.com/#!/GottliebShow
High ranking source at Texas A&M confirms, going to SEC.Clemson,FSU,Missouri likely to join.
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I don’t think I buy the A&M source about those other schools and am guessing speculation was interpreted as fact. There has been no other information suggesting 4 teams to the SEC now.
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And another thing, is the SEC really going to invite two more teams with Tiger mascots. 🙂
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Eric – with a 16 team SEC, they could them set up a 4-team Tiger paw-d.
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The Bulldogs will vainly try to keep up in the SEC mascot arms race (who could join Georgia and Miss State? Fresno State? The Citadel? Yale?)
Taking out Clemson and FSU would seriously further weaken the ACC football brand, and could encourage a Big Ten raid, although without N.C. State going to the SEC, the Big Ten would probably have to substitute State for Duke in a bloc with UNC, UVa and Maryland to make it palatable to NC politicians and to win the valuable property that is Chapel Hill.
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vincent,
if they get the yale bulldogs, you know the princeton tigers are next! 😉
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lol. Maybe the worst team would have to be called kitties the next year.
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I seriously doubt its these 4 schools. Taking Clemson instead of VTech & taking Mizzou makes no sense unless the SEC is hellbent on getting to 16 schools (which doesn’t seem to be the case) and VA politics is keeping VTech in.
From the B10’s perspective, though, the SEC going to 16 would be terrific as it means the B10 can pick off some combination of ACC schools (and maybe entice ND?) at their leisure.
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Richard,
VT has said it doesn’t want to go anywhere. The SEC can’t force them to go.
MO has also said they aren’t going to the SEC.
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MO would be crazy not to consider the SEC. No guarantee the B10 or P12 ever comes calling.
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Unless cultural fit, academics and rivalries mean something to them, then yes they’d be crazy to turn the SEC down.
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I said “consider.” And at any rate, in a few years there may very well not be any conference available to MO that gives them cultural fit, academics and rivalries.
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They have the B12 and B10 right now as fits. I’m not saying the B10 is looking to add them, just that it would be a fit for MO. If KU goes with them, then the P12 would work, too. Otherwise, they should try to keep the B12 afloat with UT and OU.
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As much as Missouri bad mouthed some of the Big 12 members on their academics, its hard to imagine them going to the SEC.
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Virginia politics played a role in placing Tech into the ACC, but it would have no role in its going out to a wealthier conference. The fear in 2003 was that if Tech wasn’t included in the ACC expansion mix, the Big East was going to crumble as a football conference, leaving Tech without a home. Tech and UVa, which over the years have usually been in different conferences, really aren’t joined at the hip in a way comparable to NCSU and UNC, Okie State and OU, or K-State and KU.
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Added
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Take it FWIW…
http://ohiostate.247sports.com/Board/120/Deep-in-the-Heart-of-Texas-Alignment-heating-up-3633355/1
In case this is a link you can’t access, the gist of it is that someone who claims to have an in with someone in the UT AD office is saying that ND and UT to the B1G is heating up. Take it with a grain (or more) of salt.
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This is either untrue or a bluff by UT admin.
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I read the piece. No way B10 takes Oklahoma St. unless Texas mandates it, and even then not 100% guarantee.
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texas isn’t mandating shit to the b10.
we don’t play that.
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that said.
that would be pretty intense and damn hard to win.
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Probably means nothing, but I have been wondering what ND has been waiting for to announce plans on where they will play hockey. As a Western Michigan alum I would like them to go to the new National conference as WMU would go with them. The delay has started me wondering if there is something in the works with the Big Ten.
It would be fun to see Texas, Oklahoma, ND and with maybe Boston College join. The B1G could have 8 hockey schools and ND gets another Catholic school as a partner.
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I can’t fathom for the life of me why the SEC would want to invite Mizzou. That’d be like the B1G going after Kansas State or the ACC going after Purdue.
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I can’t fathom for the life of me why the SEC would want to invite Mizzou.
One word, Badgerholic. Branson.
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Touche Vincent…touche
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I wonder if the Gatlinburg, TN politicans will force Tennesse to block Missouri’s admission. There is only room for one redneck playground in the SEC and that’s Dollywood.
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vincent, I CAN NOT STOP LAUGHING!!!!
certainly a top post on this blog today! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
course, being an old guy, branson is my Vegas.
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I might be wrong, in fact, I’m 90% sure I’m wrong, but I keep getting this thought in my head that we are going to see in the future the demise of the Big 12 and Big East as we know it. (TOTAL CONSPIRACY)
What if…
Let’s assume that Texas has been wanting to go Ind. for some time now and the Big Ten was made aware of it. (Possibly in discussions during the 3 meetings Ohio State and Texas met) I’m sure the university pressidents and AD’s were at all 3 of those games.
Let’s also assume that Delaney and Slive really don’t hate each other and are putting on a show more like Bo and Woody did. This woul;d make everyone possitive that each move their conference made was out of spiteb for the other. (Expecially Big Ten fans)
And lets say, that both, the Big Ten and the SEC were in this together and they want to see 4 major conferences.
Why would they want to do it and how to get there?
Right now, there are 120 universities playing in the FBS division, out of those 120 schools, there’s a few handfull of programs that draw in better than average ratings. The rest, not so much. Even in the Big Ten and SEC, there are programs that just can’t get the ratings that their top programs can get but since they are already in the conference, they get to come along for the ride.
Now look at the Big 12 and the Big East. The Big 12 still has Iowa State, Missouri, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Texas A&M and Bylor. (Keeping Texas out as the idea is they want to go Ind.)
The Big East has West Virginia, Pitt, Cinn, Conn, Louisville, Rutgers, South Fl and Syracuse.
Let’s say the SEC and the Big Ten have already put the pcs. on the board and have decided what Universities they are going to go after and what universities they want to leave for their other counterpart conferences.(The Pac 12 and the ACC)
The SEC grabs Texas A&M and follows with West Virginia.
The BT grabs Rutgers and Syracuse.
Then the SEC grabs Texas Tech and Missouri.
The BT grabs Conn and Kansas.
This allowing the PAC 12 to sweep up Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Iowa State and Kansas Sate.
The ACC to sweep up Pitt, Cinn, Louisville and South Florida.
Why would the SEC and the Big Ten leave some powers on the board like that, To allow for conferece coverage. The ACC is already mixed in between the SEC and the BT where the Pac 12 is out of the picture nationally compared to the other 3 conf because of time zones. This also draws some more bigger name schools towards the Pac 12 to help with their rating and they need it due to the large area they cover compared to population. (I also see the Big Ten protecting them because their history with each other as I see the SEC doing so for the ACC)
Now we have 4 super conferences with alot on the table to offer. Copmpared to the conferences that play clean up with the extra pieces, there is very little they offer regarding National appeal.
The 4 super conferences break free from the the current FBS division and create a new division while forcing the NCAA to allow a new format for their conferences. (Mostly because they will own college football ratings and the cash coming in will be greater then anyone has ever seen.
This would allow a 4 team playoff without the dreaded interfearance of the non AQ leages and the money wopuld be greater than the current BCS system we have now AND! the current bowl tie ins between these 4 conferences would stay intact. (there would be some tweaking for any Big 12 and Big East tie ins with any of the 4 conf. but all in all, much better football in the end.)
Could it happen? I doubt it, just a conspiracy that I wanted to get out there….but think of the possibilities.
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I forgat to include in this that UT could be in on this to help it happen while getting assurances that they will be in the mix of scheduling of the top programs so they stay more relevant then ND.
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Why would the Pac take K-Stae and I-State as a pair?!? They wouldn’t.
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james in SoCal,
a) welcome, we need more voices from the west coast
b) I will go one step further (you would have to go back to last year and my predator vs prey post on here) and say the ACC is just as vulnerable, if not more because of borders. The B12 had teams that all 3 predators could use (B1G, PAC, SEC) but the BE fears only the B1G. The ACC has the 2 power football conferences that could both eat parts of them. I think you are looking at the BIG 3 + a “scraps” conference with the best leftovers of the B12 / ACC / BE.
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James, why would you place the Big 12 and Big East as equal for Big Ten/SEC raids and not include the ACC, which has several properties both conferences would covet more than they would most Big East members, in the mix?
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If the report regarding A&M, FSU, Clemson and Mizzou is correct it could lead to the perfect (dystopian) storm for Texas. Assume that the two OK and KS schools cannot be split from each other; assume also that Texas will be widely blamed and villified for imploding the Big 12 and because of that, UT will be unable politically to walk away from TTech and Baylor. What happens next?
(1) The two OK and KS petition, en bloc, to join the Pac 12. They would join CO, Utah and the two AZ schools in one division, the original Pac 8 would comprise the other. The Pac 16 would gain one national football powerhouse and one of the most storied college basketball programs ever (I know, basketball isn;t supposed to matter …).
(2) The SEC now has extended its tentacles into the Midwest and the Southwest. This would force to B1G to respond. Since Texas can’t go without its two sisters, the B1G goes east and offers membership to Rutgers/MD/Pitt and says to ND, “Its’ now or never.” Faced being left out, ND will have to consider joining the B1G or the “what’s left” conference cobbled together from the ACC and BEast. The B1G would certainly want Texas. but not at the price of TTech and Baylor.
(3) Texas, even if it got Houston/Rice/SMU/TCU in the fold, is unable to reconstitute SWC 2.0.
As Bill Simmons might say, the lesson as always: karma is a bitch.
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If Karma’s a bitch, then Boston College should be left out of the musical chairs for bailing on the Big East after promising not to do so.
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Hard to see the Pac and B10 leaving Texas on the table. Specifically, the Pac taking the KS schools if Texas shows any interest at all makes no sense.
And for the last time, the B10 isn’t taking BE schools to entice ND. If that could work, the B10 would already be at 16.
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First off, congratulations to Texas A&M from this Longhorn. It is the best move they could make, given their fans’ overwhelming sentiments, and the time is now right.
It is also quite exciting to learn that at a minimum, we almost certainly will get a starter 4-team playoff from the next round of BCS negotiations. Should 4×16 super conferences emerge, that’s effectively an 8-team playoff. Should we have more conferences, a 4-school Plus One will inevitably evolve over time into a larger one with at least another round. Incorporating the bowls into the playoffs will also insure the overall bowl system survives. Win, win, win all the way around.
There are incredible forces at work within Texas state politics, but people falsely believe that its to keep the B12-2 together. The politics are to keep Baylor and Tech in a BCS conference.
Exactly. There have been a lot of false assumptions floating around here being used to frame expansion scenarios. And now those false contructs are collapsing.
While UT to a P16 or B1G can’t be ruled out, it might be wise to listen to UT AD Dodds’ own words instead of self-serving conspiracy theories and simpleton scapegoat fantasies. He’s pretty much told or telegraphed us beforehand what he wants to do. In 2008 UT proposed forming a B12 network, voted down 1-11. He later approached aTm to partner in a Lone Star Network, aTm declined the offer. Only then did UT pursue a LHN by itself.
When expansion talk exploded 1.5 years ago, UT said it preferred to keep the B12 together but if the situation changed too much they might have to join another conference. Options were pursued but ultimately UT chose to stay in the B12. Now Dodds says that he’d prefer to keep the B12, does not favor independence, but may have to look at other options if the landscape shifts too much. Said what he’s hinted at before, that if the B12 can’t remain viable UT’s first choice may be to create a new super conference with Notre Dame. If the SEC goes to 16, with the B1G following, it might be wise to think UT may then move in the direction they’ve said they would.
My guess is it all depends on if the SEC goes past 14 and if the ACC can stay together. If the SEC stops at 14, it is not certain that the B1G and P12 will do anything. In that case the B12-2-1 likely taps BYU and becomes the B12-2-1+1, ACC nabs a BEast school, and the BEast holds or taps a CUSA friend or two. Would not be shocked to see this hold for several years.
However, if the SEC does goes to 16 (whether quickly or behind the scenes) the feeding frenzy begins. Does the ACC hold together and rebuild, or does the B1G pretty much get its pick? Plenty of buzz for a while that Miami is nervous, so they could be a target or a potential anchor of a UT/OU/ND super conference. Same for GTech. The more that peel away, the better the odds that the B1G can lure 2 or more from MD/VA/NC/Duke. Some sort of merge of much of the remaining B12-x and ACC is possible, but the CIC temptation will be strong. The problem for the P12 and B1G in luring Texas and the heart of the ACC is that they only have 4 slots to offer. There are lots of benefits to having several regional partners, including the travel issues in all sports. Clear reasons why UT may prefer to keep TTech, Baylor, OU, Okie St, Kansas, and maybe even another Texas school in whatever conference the Horns end up in. So while TCU and UHou might not bring in new markets and thus not of much value to the current B12, when aTm and maybe the Oklahoma schools are gone they may become legit replacement candidates, for example.
What can the P12 do in a race to 16? If they can’t get UT, do they hold their uplifted noses and settle for the Okie schools and some combo of KS/MO/TTech/UHou? Do they go for a northeast quad of say Rutgers/Syr/UConn/Pitt (if the B1G go for ACC schools.) Perhaps instead of via pure conference expansion, done as a partnership with what’s left of the BEast in football, including a joint P12-BEast network? If none of those work and we see 3 other 16-school super conferences, do they partner with 4 other ‘independent’ schools in football only to fill out a 4×16 BCS setup?
Back to Texas politics. If UT does have a P16 endgame, then I could see attempts to force aTm to take with them to the SEC one of TTech or Baylor (or even Okie State if a UT/TTech/Baylor/OU move is an option.) Wouldn’t count on that happening, however. A UT/OU/ND+ super conference might provide the most BCS homes for Texas schools. Might consider alternate solutions, for example say UT does want to go to the B1G with ND, OU, and TTech. Might see an agreement between aTm, the SEC, UT, and the B1G to include in the BCS (or whatever replaces it) a 5th conference of leftovers that would provide safe haven for schools like Baylor, SMU, UHou, and TCU. Or alternatively an agreement to expand the BCS and a clear slot for qualifying teams from a non-BCS conference. Not saying any of that is likely, but don’t rule out right now unconventional solutions/compromises.
Of course politics could also end up having little effect on expansion. As I stated last year, once the Texas governor’s race was complete (11/10) and the TX legislature finished their session (6/11) any expansion becomes less messy. No important bills that could be killed/held hostage by grandstanding legislators. However, there are plenty of ways an unwise or sloppy move by a school can be punished with long lasting repercussions. The Aggies and other schools just have to weigh the costs/benefits and gamble accordingly. (BTW, any talk of national elections impacting aTm’s move is pretty much laughable. Though 4×16 pulling away from the NCAA might be a different matter.)
There’s not much I’d completely rule out right now.
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I need to ensure I have spell check insurance…
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playoffs now, how do you get the BOLD type in your post?
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Duffman,
You can use standard html tags to do it like this: bold BOLD
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In case you don’t know, the standard tags are to start bolding and to end it (remove the quotes I put in).
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Sorry, it keeps trying to interpret the tags.
You can use the old html tags (b) to start and (/b) to end, or the more recent (strong) and (/strong). Similarly, you use i or em for italics.
Replace the opening parentheses with a less than sign and the closing parentheses with a greater than sign.
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brian,
test
I am so old I still think binary 😉
or maybe that was morse code 🙂
or maybe smoke signals
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There you go. Now you can add to your resume that you can code HTML.
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somehow having fortran or cobol would diminish my value.
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Duffman
I think at one time I put Fortran, LISP and Pascal on my resume. Wonder if any of those are still used?
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bullet,
Fortran is still going because it is so good at crunching numbers, but it isn’t nearly as popular as it used to be, obviously. Pascal is much less common, but I know there are still some legacy uses of it if nothing else. It used to be used for teaching a lot, but they moved on to Java and such.
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Bullet:
I don’t think the AI guys will ever get tired of LISP (it, rather Scheme, was the teaching language dejour at my CS department when I went to school). Of course, it’s never found favor outside of AI.
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If I’m not mistaken, the Google search algorithm, MapReduce, is written in LISP.
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Re: possibilities (Playoffs Now)
First I’ve read of a possible PAC 12 – northeast conference (with Pitt, RU, UConn, SU)
PAC 12 plus could market the conference to all of Europe as well as Asia.
Perhaps the Northeast schools could maintain a PO Box address in CA to preserve the PAC name.
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SETI is back up. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2011/08/seti-institute-allen-telescope-array-to-go-back-online-in-september.html
Unlimited marketing potential.
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So Frank, does A&Ms move revive the possibility of texas to the Big Ten, with or without the Longhorn Sports NEtwork?
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Rumors say yes, especially if they can talk ND into it, but rumors say a lot of things.
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Not sure if anyone else has posted this, but the NY Times has an article up about this.
Key points:
– “there was a 30 to 40 percent chance that the presidents could vote against Texas A&M’s membership.”
– “We realize if we do this, we have to have the 14th,” the SEC official said. “No name has been thrown out. This thing is much slower out of the chute than the media and blogs have made it.”
– “The official said that three weeks ago, Texas A&M’s president, R. Bowen Loftin, called the SEC commissioner, Mike Slive, and said the Aggies regretted not joining the league last summer. Two weeks ago, Slive and the SEC counsel met with Texas A&M officials. The SEC requested that Texas A&M figure out the legal viability of leaving the Big 12 contract they signed last year.
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What would be hilarious is if the SEC says “no” to TAMU.
The ratings for the Texas-TAMU game would be tremendous, though.
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If the SEC turns down the Aggies the reactions of the other Big XII schools will great. Can you imagine the taunts that will be thrown around games, to say nothing of the signs?
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If the SEC turns down TAMU because they can’t renegotiate their contracts, then the SEC was really dumb to sign such long contracts. Did they think there’d never be any more conference shakeups?
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Well, the more likely reason, if they turn down TAMU, is that they weren’t able to pry away a good enough 14th school.
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I know there have been some denials (and some non-denial-denials out there) but I find it hard to believe that the SEC won;t be able to pull the trigger on a quality 14th.
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jcfreder:
If they don’t want to destroy the ACC (and thinking about it more, they have good reason not to; not just getting sued but also letting the B10 in to the south and allowing a superconference to form in SEC territory from the remnants of the ACC and B12), their good options are limited.
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But it won’t be destroying the ACC to take one team. Even if they somehow took three (which is extremely unlikely), the result wouldn’t be a B12-ACC superconference; it’d be a couple BE teams moving to the ACC.
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jcfreder:
Not sure about that at all. Maybe if the one ACC team the SEC took was Clemson (or GTech, which they wouldn’t want). If they take FSU, Miami would be looking to jump to the B10 (or maybe even a Texas-led conference) first chance it gets. I think the only chance they get VTech or NCSU is if the ACC breaks up with portions going to the B10 and SEC.
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It could be worse. Missouri just got ignored. Noone cared.
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It will be interesting to see what the B10 does if this comes to pass. Vincent is in love with MD – I don’t think MD offers much. NC/Duke do, so maybe MD has to be part of that. I think the B10 will just stand pat for a while and see how things shake out. There is no reason for them to match the SEC or the P10 in further expansion.
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True. Can you pull off
UNC/Duke/UVa/ND?
UNC/Duke/UVa/Miami?
UNC/Duke/ND/Miami?
UNC/Duke/ND/BC?
Duke/ND/BC/Miami? (holy private school Batman! Would you even want that?)
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No. No. No. No. Hell no.
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in defense of vincent,
MD or not, I think he is pointing out that the ACC may not be made out of solid concrete, but concrete blocks. Take out a block or two, and the dam breaks. MD because it offers new markets, has football upgrade options, is a state school without an instate twin or rival, academics, and decent not football sports would be a block to take rather than leave behind like WF or Miami.
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/chi-delany-report-that-big-ten-favors-plusone-playoff-is-erroneous-20110813,0,1664625.story
The B10 will do nothing according to Delany. He also denies yesterday’s report about B10 ADs favoring a plus 1.
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Uh, no, he said they’ve “closed down active expansion”, which could mean that they are not seeking out new members (but that doesn’t mean they would not respond to schools coming to them).
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I should say “mean that they are not seeking out new members _for_now_.”
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SH,
MD offers a decent population, especially with spillover into DC and northern VA. It also offers PSU an old rival and fellow eastern school. MD has good academics and decent sports. Like any new state, MD also adds congress-critters to get money for the CIC
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isn’t it possible that the ACC goes after the BEast schools of Rutgers, Syracuse, and Pitt first and maybe others to get to a 14 or 16 team conference…and if so, does anybody think those schools would decline and wait for a B1G invite?
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They wouldn’t decline or wait. They’d take the ACC invitation. If the Big Ten comes calling later looking to pair someone with Notre Dame, they’d immediately jump to the Big Ten. Such is the way of conference expansion.
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They’d take the time to mention it to the B10 and say they have to decide soon. They’d much rather move once than twice. That just makes the intermediate conference look bad, and they did you the favor of offering a step up. Down the road they could accept the B10, but they wouldn’t want to do it in the same year.
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thus making the 2 stage B1G expansion successful in forcing ND’s hand and getting the Irish and the NYC market……..I think the Delany is gonna get the Domers in South Bend, Domers in Syracuse and Rutgers, for the NYC market. I think Mizzou will be left in the cold!
Sidenote, I see Boise State being left in the cold Mountain West as what’s left of the Big 12 will court others.
is this a strong possibility???
Love the thread, guys!
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If Missouri would actually go to the SEC, the happiest people should be those at Big 10 Headquarters . It could lead to either UT or more likely ND ending up in the Big 10. The Texas scenario would be more obvious. If OU, along with Ok. State and the Kansas schools head to the Pac, it would be curtains for the Big XII, and it would be the Big 10 or independence for UT (Probably taking along Tech). Here is the ND scenario: Florida State and Clemson leave for the SEC, and the Big 10 takes Maryland and BC.That means there are four openings in the ACC. Which would likely be filled by some combination of USF, Louisville, West Virginia, Pitt, UConn, Syracuse & Rutgers. You could figure TCU heading to the Big XIi (Replacing Missouri), that essentially ends the Big East Football Conference. The threat to ND is if this occurs, then the Big 10 could put the screws to ND, by giving them a take it or leave it offer. Come to the Big 10 with (Most likely Pitt), or we just might grab UNC and NCST instead.
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BC’s value is being wildly overrated. It really hasn’t had much impact on the ACC (perhaps it would have in concert with Syracuse, but we’ll never know), and it’s a relatively small institution that doesn’t get much attention in pro-oriented Boston. It’s a Catholic version of Wake Forest, and merely because it’s in Boston, it shouldn’t be viewed in the same breath as Maryland or Rutgers.
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The Big Ten doesn’t invite, A school must request to be part of the leage. Just like Nebraska had to do.
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My money is mainly on the Big Ten waiting for 2014. The Big Ten’s contracts come up in 2016 along with the 9 game schedule, so I think they want to see how the current format plays out before making a move if one is necessary at that time.
And regardless of what schools get taken off the table, there is always going to be the Notre Dame expansion option to get to 14.
Considering that the Big Ten didn’t get a bump up from Nebraska’s addition, it’s hard to see why they would go for another 2 schools until we’re closer to the contract negotiations.
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Timing may be important. Some schools may only be available for a period of time, like NE last year. If an important school is weighing its options, the B10 has to strike then. If they want more midpack teams, then they can probably wait. However, it’s always easier to expand when everyone is doing it rather than when the scene is calm.
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Exactly. Strike when the iron is hot. You’ll make up the cash in the next round of negotiations.
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If I’m any Big 12 outside the state of Texas, I would veto any recommendation from UT, TT, or Baylor to invite Houston as a replacement. Houston as a replacement is not in the conference’s best interests. It’s only in the Texas schools’ best interests. Check that… it’s only in the Texas legislature’s best interests.
The non-Texas schools know that what’s best for the conference, and therefore, what’s most likely to give themselves hope for the league’s survival, is to replace A&M with only with a school that gives them the most negotiating power to maintain/improve its TV deals. There’s just no way that that school is Houston.
Rather, with some common sense, they should realize the best single option out there is BYU. Seriously. And as far as creating appealing matchups for television, TCU is a much better bet than UH. Forget potential–it’s a perennial top ten program right now.
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They’ve already said they would stay at 9 for now. BYU isn’t going to drop independence before it even starts to join a floundering conference. They already get the benefits of scheduling UT without the downside of ISU, KSU and Baylor. Staying at 9 means more TV time for the bottom schools and even the second tier like OkSU and MO. Their TV deal will be cut some, but TAMU was going to get $20M. How much more will it be cut?
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@Brian,
You’ve got a good point that BYU might very well prefer independence over the Big 12. Who could blame them, anyway, given the conference’s instability?
I kinda doubt, though, they’d have much problem with playing ISU, KSU, & Baylor. Those schools are still more interesting than the San Jose State-types that are their schedule right now, and they’d still get two kings on their schedule annually (OU, UT) plus other good ones, provided no others leave.
I still don’t see why the non-Texas schools would allow Houston in. It’s not their job to appease the Texas legislature. For that matter, they don’t even have to appease Texas, considering that neither the Big Ten nor Pac-12 would take them and their network. Where else would UT go? Independence in football and the Big East for other sports? That’s worse off than their current conference.
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Michael,
BYU can get more home games against those WAC type teams, plus their local fans know them. Take Utah State as an example. They’re local and BYU plays them in the next 5 seasons with 4 games at home.
Their current schedules take them all over the country, but focus on the west where they have more fans and more church members. They still have 5 AQ schools this year (I’m including TCU) and 7 home games.
They get exposure in OR, CA, UT, TX, FL, MS, ID, NM and HI.
Why trade that for ISU and KSU? Those are small states with even fewer LDS members, and the least attractive schools of all the AQs.
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Texas recruiting (which all the B12 schools north of Texas depend on now) would be the only reason.
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Despite the common refrain the UT rules the conference, the conference just raised the shared % of conference revenues from around 50% to around 75%. That sounds like something the have-nots (previously 5 of 12, now 5 of 10), TT,BU,ISU,KSU,OSU, would want, maybe joined by have-no-suitors MU.
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While I could imagine BYU turning down the Big East, I don’t see them turning down the Big 12. It’s still a major upgrade that will gain them more exposure than it will lose.
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. . .unless BYU judges that the B12 won’t last more than a decade, in which case it makes a lot of sense for them to remain independent.
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BYU would get fewer ESPN games than they have now, and get crappy FSN coverage instead. For that, they get regionalized to the plains. How does that help the LDS spread their message, which is the whole point of BYU sports?
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Frank: Perhaps I’ve missed it, but I’ve never seen where anyone has actually seen the SEC TV contract and compared it to others. To assume that the SEC, as arguably the most powerful confernce in the country, has a contract that is identical on critical terms such as expansion to the terms that appear in other conference TV contracts is, to my mind, a rather suspect assumption. I do some oil and gas work in my practice, and while the basic construct of an O&G lease never changes, key terms do vary greatly depending upon how attractive the prospect happens to be.
To assume that the SEC didn’t negotiate a more favorable contract than C-USA or any other conference is, to my way of thinking, not very likely. I have to believe that Slive wouldn’t have pursued expansion this year, or last, unless he was confident that he would be able to turn this expansion into a benefit for existing SEC members.
On the political angle, state politics didn’t kill this deal last year, and they won’t kill it this year. Everyone keeps looking back to 1994, but that set of facts will never be repeated. Bob Bullock is dead (so is Ann Richards, for that matter, but she was irrelevant), Pete Laney is retired, the current governor is an Aggie, and the chairman of the Senate Appropriatoins Committee is from Bryan/College Station. With the Legislature not meeting again until January of 2013, the prospect of going before Dan Branch’s committee isn’t going to intimidate A&M. Furthermore, Dan Beebe gave A&M the perfect counter argument to any concern they might raise about A&M leaving the Big XII when he said that Houston was a viable replacement. Certain members of the Houston delegation in the Legislature will be all over this, and only to happy to see A&M go to the SEC if it frees up a space in a AQ BCS conference for UofH.
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Getting into TX is a benefit. Adding a team like TAMU or FSU is a benefit. Even if the SEC gets bumped just enough to break even financially, they benefit from this. What Frank and others are fighting is the notion that the SEC will come out of this with $40M per school in TV money. Nobody disputes that the SEC will get some more money, but how big of a raise they get is definitely up for debate.
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Going from 12 to 14 loses a lot in tradition and rivalries, which translates into ticket sales. And TV revenues are around 20% of their revenues.
The SEC is not going to expand to just break even.
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One does wonder why the SEC would have signed such a loooooooong contract with no renegotation rights even though we are in a period of conference instability.
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Well, when they signed their long-ass contract, they probably weren’t expecting Conference Armageddon to be right around the corner. There weren’t hints of conference instability, the BTN was just getting started, and there didn’t seem impetus by anyone to expand.
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Richard – really?? Even if they didn’t see this coming, this is why you don’t sign 20-year contracts — the unforseen happens more often than you think. Very shortsighted move by the SEC if they truly are locked in at the same $$$ for that long.
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Frank’s previous post about current instability in television content is probably something conference commissioners are well aware of. Maybe they recognize this fact and believe they better cash in while sports programming is over-valued.
It’s a gamble to be sure, but not an unreasonable one.
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Why does everyone assume this is a conspiracy with 9,000 moving pieces behind the scenes?
The most likely scenario is that, last year, Texas A&M and others did not have the stomach to cause the conference breakdown dominoes to start to fall. The Pac-12 and possible SEC expansion never happened. Everyone walked away (other than a handful of changes).
Now.. a year later… Texas A&M is pissed off and willing to make the move. There is less risk that Tech and Baylor get left behind because now it will be Texas’s problem. If Texas decides to go independent, now they are abandoning Tech and Baylor. If Texas goes independent while A&M is around, it’s a shared problem.
The worst case scenario is that the SEC says… “no, we can’t do it without a 14th and nobody can agree on a 14th, or, simply, we are not ready to expand.” But what’s the downside for A&M? Now they are a loose cannon that needs to be dealt with because the SEC can always decide that they ARE ready to expand/make a move. And who knows when/if the Pac 12 or B1G might invite them later on. Suddenly, they become the hot commodity. Not a bad place to be.
Or the SEC says “fine.” And A&M wins.
To me… it is little more than A&M looking around and deciding that there is not nearly enough downside to not explore this seriously. Conversely, the SEC has to look at it to see if there is enough upside to do it today vs. some time in the future. If today is it, this move can be made.
No need to assume that this is part of a grand plan to do anything other than solve the issue of what to do with A&M.
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Because it’s more fun?
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vincent still wins with the branson comment, but that one is up there 😉
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Anyone who’s a fan of a playoff has to be a big proponent of the A&M to the SEC angle because of what it means for college football to have the big time conference going to 14+ teams and eventually setting up for a playoff scenario between those leagues.
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And all right minded people see the decay of what makes college football great. Being more like the NFL is not a good thing for CFB.
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There’s one other assumption that I think needs to be reconsidered: that ESPN does not want super conferences. That appears to have been the case last summer, but that in no way means it’s still true. Perhaps they just weren’t ready for the unknown and have had time to figure it out since then.
But personally I believe, with no real evidence, that ESPN has made one major move which may change their stance: the LHN. What if ESPN wants UT to go independent so they can snag up all those 1st and 2nd tier rights? There’s nothing that says UT even has to be in favor of this, but just that ESPN has positioned themselves for that possibility. If the B12-x does not get the kind of contract they want in a few years, that may be the point when UT jumps ship and ESPN has the leverage to do just that.
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I believe, and it is only my belief, that ESPN’s concern is NOT necessarily super-conferences (or at least, not as much as something else). I believe ESPN is concerned with FOX’s growing hold in college football. Who helped to start the BTN? FOX. Who is helping the PAC 12 with their network? FOX. If Texas and Oklahoma had joined the PAC 12, who would have their 3rd tier rights? FOX. So ESPN rushed in and saved the Big 12 and, low and behold, now ESPN has Texas’ third tier rights with the Longhorn Network. Much of this, in my opinion, is the FOX vs. the ESPN-hound for market share.
And now they are whispering in Texas’ ear: it would be great to have Notre Dame involved in this. And what did we hear Texas’ AD say? Notre Dame would be a good option to fill out the conference. That is also what we heard from the Big 10 last year when FOX was whispering in Jim Delaney’s ear: Texas and Notre Dame would be great in this conference. Why would Texas go the the Big 10? Or Notre Dame to the Big 12? Who comes up with this stuff? Networks who want to increase their ratings, that’s who. And the conference commissioners and ADs have a vested interest to listen; after all, FOX does own 49 percent of the BigTen Network and what is good for FOX should be good for me. And the B1G did add Nebraska.
Well, now ESPN has Texas’ 3rd tier rights; FOX has the PAC 12 and the B1G. And ESPN and FOX have paid a lot for those rights.
And the SEC is not happy; because it is left out. And the SEC is locked into a contract that cannot benefit from this fight. Even the Big East is going to benefit from this fight, but not the SEC. So how does the SEC use this to their advantage? Add Texas A&M and threaten ESPN with going to FOX for third tier rights if they don’t open up the contract and renegotiate now. What do you think ESPN is gonna do? Anything they can to fight off FOX.
Granted, all of the other things often talked about on this board (conference money, academics, politics, etc.) also have their place and the schools are looking for as much money as the TV industry. But I just wonder if this aspect of the FOX vs the ESPN-hound is getting way over-looked?
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Don’t forget that CBS has a cable sports channel and works with the Turner family for hoops. They could compete with ESPN to get the rest of the SEC’s rights.
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I don’t think ESPN would have sunk so many resources into the Longhorn Network unless they thought that they’d be broadcasting Texas-Oklahoma on it someday. This isn’t about volleyball games or “cultural programming.” This is about getting a foot in the door.
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The PAC chose not to have Fox, or any other partners in the P12N. Fox and ESPN joined together in a joint bid for the PAC 12 primary contract. Not sure how that is limiting Fox’s CFB access.
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Good analysis, but remember that ESPN & Fox actually both ganged up to get the Pac’s first tier rights (the Pac actually owns its own third tier rights). Why did they gain up? To keep out NBC/Comcast. It’s a network fight, but not between ESPN & Fox.
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Or, perhaps, not only between Fox and ESPN.
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It is sort of semantics but what the PAC holds isn’t 3rd tier. More like junior 1st tier partner, along with espn and fox. They kept aprox one third of FB Nd BB and will have first selection twice and second five times next FB season. Plus they will know the order through the season before setting the schedule.
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Don’t forget, Comcast wants to be a dog in this fight too.
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Anybody want to comment on how quiet the B1G and PAC are right now?
Delany I can see to some extent, but why is nobody tracking Larry Scott travel this weekend like we did last year? I think at one time we had his flight plans?
anyone?
anyone?
Beuller?
Beuller?
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/chi-delany-report-that-big-ten-favors-plusone-playoff-is-erroneous-20110813,0,1664625.story
I linked to it elsewhere, but Delany has said the B10 isn’t expanding right now.
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“Right now” is different from, say, “tomorrow”.
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Letter to the TAMU faithful,
http://www.aggienetwork.com/Posts/ViewPost.aspx?postId=TzRfJ65X%2bGo%3d
anybody post this yet?
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Just to rehash where we stand:
1. ESPN says the SEC wants TAMU, Clemson, FSU and MO
2. VT, Clemson, FSU and MO have all denied any interest in the SEC
3. The B12 has said it could stay at 9
4. UT has said it doesn’t want to be independent
5. The B10 has said it isn’t looking to expand right now (http://www.bcinterruption.com/2011/8/13/2361425/ncaa-conference-realignment-rumors-no-big-ten-expansion-syracuse-rutgers-pittsburgh-uconn)
So why is it that almost every article on the topic assumes the schools and conferences are all lying? Yes, circumstances could change, but all these schools know that TAMU to the SEC is highly possible.
Who would be the 14th team if you take all the schools at their word? What viable candidates haven’t said no publicly?
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Did FSU deny interest? I thought they just said they hadn’t started down that path.
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http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/story/2011-08-13/sec-presidents-will-not-meet-sunday-texas-am-florida-state-oklahoma-bob-stoops
According to SN sources:
1. SEC presidents won’t meet Sunday
2. There has been no discussion about possible 14th schools
3. There is no way they go past 14 schools
4. MO and OU aren’t interested
5. The B12 does have a conference call today to update everyone on TAMU
6. TAMU leaving wouldn’t affect the other 9 B12 schools
7. The SEC doesn’t want 2 teams in any more states (non FSU, GT, Clemson), but UK might not oppose UL
8. BYU wants to stay independent
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Perhaps the schools Gottlieb has named as schools # 14, 15, and 16 (FSU, Clemson, and Missouri) are actually options A, B, and C just for school #14: Ask FSU first. If they get a “no,” ask the orange & purple tigers, then the black & gold tigers.
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I assumed it was just a list of likely candidates. However, those are just the obvious suspects and it’s not clear to me there has been any discussion by the SEC of actual likely targets.
Unfortunately for the SEC, those 3 have all said no preemptively.
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Do you expect them to say yes and run the risk of ultimately looking as foolish as Missouri did last spring? They can always later say “the environment changed” (and no, I don’t mean global warming) or something to that effect. Take these comments with the largest grain of salt you can find.
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They could have given non-denial denials (like the SEC with TAMU), but they didn’t. That doesn’t mean they couldn’t change their minds, but it is more negative than usual.
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Actually, only Va. Tech has preemptively said no. ” ‘Virginia Tech is exceedingly pleased with our membership in the ACC. It is the perfect conference for us,’ university spokesman Larry Hincker said in a statement after consulting with Virginia Tech President Charles Steger. ‘The university administration has no interest in any discussion concerning affiliation with any conference other than the ACC.’… ‘We always wanted to be in the ACC,’ Weaver said. ‘Now we’re there. Why would we want to go somewhere else when we finally have what we want?’ “–Washington Post
I’d say that’s a firm no, as in, “It doesn’t matter who offers us membership. We’ll say no.”
Contrast that with Clemson, FSU, & Mizzou. All they’ve said is that they’ve had no contact with the SEC. FSU said they’d be surprised if they were contacted. In no way does that mean they’d say no.
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If the SEC is going to pry a school from the Big East, West Virginia makes a heckuva lot more sense than Louisville. More widespread fan support, a state flagship (OK, not a top-tier flagship, but one just the same), and it would give the SEC peripheral coverage in Pittsburgh, Baltimore and Washington, whose markets include the northern and eastern tips of West Virginia.
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I presume the thought would be to bolster basketball and add a major rivalry for KY. UL hoops makes ridiculous money, much more than UK ($25.9M to $16.8M). UL has also demonstrated a commitment to FB.
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what you guys are forgetting is the population of West Virginia would be the lowest in the conference. Even Arkansas is about 10 slots higher in population. If you are adding eyeballs, and you are a top conference, why go for the bottom of the barrel?
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http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/story/2011-08-13/report-longhorn-network-has-zero-carriers-in-state-of-texas
It amuses me that all of this is about the LHN and it still doesn’t have any carriers yet with 2 weeks until launch. If a network launches and nobody carries it, does it still make programming?
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Evidently the politicians had their affect: the BoR meeting this Monday will now only be about “beginning serious discussions with the SEC.”
http://www.dallasnews.com/sports/college-sports/texas-aggies/20110813-update-texas-am-may-not-be-pulling-sec-trigger-on-monday.ece
I’m guessing the SEC called off its Sunday meeting to wait for A&M gets through this political hurdle.
Oh, and the political hearing will also be about pushing Houston or SMU as candidates to replace A&M.
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That’s all the meeting was going to be about. They have to give someone the authority to pursue negotiations before anything serious could ever happen. Then they can sit down with Slive and unofficially ask if they would be accepted if they applied.
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I read a couple months ago that the Pres was given authority last winter. David Sandhop (aggie websider publisher) I believe said that. If that is the case the BOR could be meeting to ratify (or not) a move the pres has already made. “Pending regents approval” is the phrase used here. http://www.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/6270202/31293612
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I’ll believe that if they announce a deal on Monday. Otherwise, he has no power to do anything without the BOR giving it to him and then he can negotiate.
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And once UT makes it clear that UH aren’t just no but are “hell no” alternatives, then what?
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I say the conference is already done. If we heard that fast about the SEC meeting being canceled, it’s because they wanted us to hear about it that fast. A&M is giving the others time to figure out their situation before blowing up the conference. Baylor and the like would prefer to go about that process without rampant media speculation.
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Duffman posted the link above by the Aggie foundation group to contact representatives. Clearly the Aggie administration thinks it may become a problem.
The delay could also be related to the Big 12 contract issues that apparently the SEC asked A&M to work out. Or it could be because Slive didn’t have the votes yet.
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Dallas Morning News
UPDATE: Maybe Texas A&M will not be pulling the trigger on an SEC move Monday like people expected and media reported. State Rep. Dan Branch (R-Dallas) seems reassured that A&M officials will wait until his special hearing of the Texas House Committee on Higher Education. After using the term “highly inappropriate” to multiple news outlets today regarding A&M movement to the SEC, Branch took a different approach with Morning News Statehouse reporter Robert Garrett. “I’m pleased to hear from A&M officials that the board meeting [Monday] is about beginning serious discussions with the SEC and not about finalizing or completing the acceptance of such a bid,” Garrett said. “I don’t think it would be wise to pre-empt an opportunity for legislators to ask them questions.
“I’m trying to keep an open mind. If a bid is extended, that makes sense for A&M — that doesn’t have undue consequences on the other Texas schools — I’m keeping an open mind. I don’t have any predisposition. My only predisposition is to have something that is a value-added opportunity for the state of Texas.” He added that he would like to see discussion of an emerging Texas tier-one institution to the Big 12 if A&M leaves and specifically mentioned Houston and SMU.
UPDATE: A&M’s Association of Former Students is calling on its members to “engage their elected officials and ask them to consider Texas A&M’s need to do what is right and best for our school and our future.”
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As I posted earlier, trying to beat the hearing to the punch was a clear poke in the eye to the legislators (none of the Aggie posters seemed to think it was an issue). Branch clearly poked them back very hard.
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I wonder if the change in their agenda meets the legal requirements for the open meetings act.
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Mr SEC thinks it’s likely that the SEC will reject A&M. “we simply do not believe that the SEC will OK a 13-school existence (without knowing that a 14th school will closely follow). The trick to voting A&M down, of course, would be doing so gently enough so that the Aggies would want to come back in the future when the college football landscape shifts in a major way or when the SEC can take its time to find a 14th school that truly fits.”
http://www.mrsec.com/2011/08/the-sec-and-texas-am-are-up-against-the-clock/
I think Mr SEC has got it wrong. Surely the SEC can accept A&M now and delay the start date to 2013 (or even 2014). That will give them plenty of time to arrange a 14th team. Obviously A&M won’t like playing another two (or three) seasons in the Big 12, but it will reduce the exit penalty and give the SEC lots of time to find the perfect partner.
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Looks like Mr. SEC was right.
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Not football related, but a stage collapsed in Indy and killed 4 people and injured another 40, please keep them in your prayers.
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http://www.big12sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=10410&ATCLID=205242781
I didn’t see this linked here already. It’s the official B12 BoD Report after their conference call today.
A few tidbits:
“The Board strongly conveyed to Texas A&M its unanimous desire that it remain a Big 12 member, and acknowledged its value to the Conference.”
Really? Now you tell TAMU how great it is after the alleged Beebe comments? I’m sure they believe you.
“The other nine members reaffirmed their long term, unconditional and unequivocal commitments made to each other and the Conference last summer. Although the Board hopes Texas A&M remains in the Conference, the Board is prepared to aggressively move forward to explore expansion opportunities.”
Didn’t they all make these sorts of commitments last summer, including TAMU? And does anyone believe UT is unconditionally and unequivocally committed for the long term to the other 8 teams?
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brian,
they want to expand the brand, but they lose the footprints in Colorado and Nebraska!!!
funny stuff! 😉
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I think UT is as committed to them as they are to it.
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http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/football/ncaa/08/13/sec.presidents.ap/index.html?sct=cf_t2_a3
Odds of #14 being FSU are about 0. Odds of it being any ACC team are also near 0. Most likely candidates are WV and UL, with UL as the favorite unless UK strongly objects.
I’ll just through this out there – would the SEC offer UC to get a toehold in Ohio? New market, closer to UK than WV is, and that’s about it for redeeming features.
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A lot of these expansion reports make no sense. Its about the $. UH to Big 12 makes no sense from that standpoint. UL to the SEC doesn’t make much more sense. WVU maybe, but UL no. I don’t think UK would be concerned about UL, but who else would want them? Fb drives the bus and UL just expanded their stadium to 55k, still smaller than any SEC school except Vandy. To justify going to 14, you need some contribution in $ from both schools.
I also don’t believe the SEC is particularly concerned about breaking up another conference. I don’t see that as being anywhere on Slive’s list of priorities. Maybe keeping UNC from the Big 10 is on his list, but concern for other conferences has never been anything he has expressed.
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Slive isn’t getting North Carolina into the SEC to begin with, so why would he be worried about it going into the Big Ten?
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I can see the SEC being afraid of destroying the ACC (which, IMHO, crumbles if a football power is taken away) because of lawsuits (and maybe of letting the Big10 in to the south). ESPN didn’t sue last time because the B12 survived, but if the ACC crumbles, ESPN would just have had a favorable TV contract taken away from it.
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richard,
I might counter with cost savings and the Big 2 (B1G / SEC)
If the ACC was raided, and their top 6 were spread among the B1G and SEC, then they would save money there, and shift money to the SEC to battle the B1G / FOX head to head. ESPN knows they are not getting the B1G, so they default and support the SEC as a football conference, and support a reformed BE + ACC as a basketball only conference that offers some football teams a possible AQ slot at the end of the season.
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They could try to get a toehold in Ohio but have yoy ever been there? That is a Buckeye State with a few straglers for Cinn, Toledo, Ohio and Akron and then you have a small handfull that are Michigan fans because they want to be different. Cinn would alway be the underdog to OSU. I think the SEC would see more potential in West Virginia as it has the most possibility to grow.
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I grew up there and am an OSU grad, so yes I’ve been there. UC doesn’t have a big fan base, but the SEC would still get Cincinnati as a market. More importantly, they could thumb their nose at the B10 by invading. i don’t really think it would happen, but it would be amusing.
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Cincy is not the SEC radar, and it wouldn’t be thumbing their nose at the B10. Would the SEC care if the B10 “stole” Memphis?
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Thanks to Kentucky (on the other side of the Ohio River), the SEC gets its share of attention in Cincinnati. You can make an argument for Louisville based on its basketball $, but its football brand is still lackluster, and Cincinnati is below Louisville in both sports.
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UK and IU have better market share in Louisville than UL does, ask folks that live there
UK and tOSU have Cincinnati in the same way, with a pro element as well
just an observation
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I don’t see the SEC trying a northern state. Any state that can at least argue its southern is fair game, but Pitt and Cinci are out because Ohio and Pennsylvania just can’t be called southern.
The SEC’s identity as a southern conference just benefits it too much. People combine southern pride with conference pride. If you add a northern school you creating a biin balancece in that and that’s risks going forward. West Virginia oLouisvillele would be a lot safer as both can at least make an argument for being southern.
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If the conspiracy theories are fun… how about this…
Texas A&M threatening to leave could be a huge benefit to Texas the state. If there is some way where it ends up that Houston and SMU end up in the Big 12 as a means to placate Texas A&M.
You could end up with these divisions:
North: Oklahoma, Oklahoma St., Missouri, Kansas, Kansas St., and Iowa St.
South: Texas, Texas A&M,Texas Tech, Baylor, Houston, and SMU
What’s in it for the Big 12? It steps away from conference implosion. It gets its conference game back. It placates Texas–a reason for Texas to not go independent. With 12 teams, more bowl game tie-ins. More bowl games = more happy universities and maybe more money. For Iowa St and Baylor, better from a competitive standpoint than taking on Boise St. and BYU.
What’s in it for Texas the University? I don’t see this weakening their conference power one bit. They now get conference games against Houston and SMU. Maybe they get those games on the LHN. Not exactly a tough road to get to the CCG. Beat A&M and Tech and you are in. Plus, if this version of the Big 12 takes off… there is a much more solid Big 12 for them to leave behind someday to got independent.
What’s in it for Texas A&M? 5 guaranteed games against in-state teams. Houston and SMU are decent, but not roadblocks by any stretch. Certainly a better path than having to play LSU, Arkansas, etc. If they can beat Texas and win the division–conference championship game. Maybe Texas makes the H.S. game concessions for the LHN. if Texas were to go independent, Texas A&M would get to be the big dog and not be stuck in a conference that is on life support.
What’s in it for the State of Texas? They get Houston to be part of the BCS riches… and an infusion of revenue. Plus, having Texas play Houston and SMU every year cannot hurt any of the schools. Think Texas @ Houston wouldn’t have greater attendance? How about TV revenue. If this can do for Houston or SMU what the Big East did for Cincinnati, now you’ve got more legitimate schools at the table. If those schools can keep more of the Texas players at home, they can be much more competitive.
What about the diminished revenue for the other North schools? Well… they are already hitched to Texas/Oklahoma and there is nothing they can do about it. I am sure Oklahoma’s share can be protected. The rest of the schools have little bargaining power. Where are they gonna go? The Big 10 is not taking Missouri alone. The SEC is not taking Missouri alone. And Missouri is not likely to cause the next conference break down. Is the Big East really a solution for any of the schools? Kansas and Kansas St. going to break apart to join the Big East? Not sure that it an increase in stability or revenue. Iowa St.? Don’t get foolish… you just shift from the 10th best team in the conference in everything to the 12th best team in the conference in everything. If the only other option is Texas A&M leaving…. and then being one step away from having your future negotiated by the whims of Texas… well, they’d probably have to go along with it.
In five years, nobody would look at Houston and SMU as C-USA schools. They would just be the equivalent of what USF is. Now… if the 16-team superconferences become an issue… there are 6 (7 with TCU) Texas schools that need to be protected. If 2-3 are left out, there is a reason for Texas the State to become interested in what happens. Texas the State has a nice share of Congressional reps to have a reason to take a look at what is happening.
So, in a sense, such a scenario would make it less likely for the 16-team superconferences to get started. If the Big East ends up with UCF somehow. Now you have 2 Florida schools and 2 Texas schools with a very real interest in keeping its place at the big table. Quite a bit different than when it is Utah, Idaho, and Iowa that is at risk of losing the $$$.
If ESPN cares about preventing superconferences, then such a plan would likely help them too. Can the Big 12 turn its back on ESPN, who kept them together? Of course. But would they?
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Anybody ever hear of the demise of the SWC and the reasons for it?
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History tends to repeat itself.
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Yes! But not so fast. It took 80 years for the original SWC of UT,A&M,OU,OkSt., Baylor and Arkansas to be replaced by UT,A&M,OU,OkSt, Baylor and TT.
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Everyone would get a lot less money. Why would non-Texas schools agree when they can just vote no? It’s not like UH and SMU add any value, and people will still think of them as CUSA schools in 20 years just like USF.
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You consider USF a C-USA school?
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I don’t think of them as AQ. UC has the same problem.
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Sometimes you make more money by building a bigger pie.
If Texas goes independent someday, what happens to the Big 12? That is a future that the northern schools need to take a look at.
All the Big 10 riches can’t help Illinois field a hockey team. And it can’t give them a good football team either. Knowing that there place at the table is secure has some value to help get them to turn it around.
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My favorite conspiracy theory is Slive, Delaney and Scott trying to divide up the universe. Slive take’s A&M to force UT and ND’s hand. UT goes to Pac 12, OU Pac 12 or SEC, ND to Big 10. FSU goes to SEC and ACC and Big 12 get gutted. There are not 4, but 3 superconferences. And then they spend the rest into oblivion by paying the “full” cost of attending the university and raising the sports sponsorship requirements for Division I. The 48 schools of the Big 3 win nearly every NCAA championship and drive a lot of schools to Division II or III or at least dropping football. Big 3 then also get a larger share of the NCAA bb money.