Category: College Football

Fear the Turtle: The Big Ten Invites Maryland with Rutgers on Deck

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Football, Sports535 Comments

From the moment that the Big Ten announced its intentions to expand three years ago, my attention immediately focused upon “What would be best for the Big Ten Network?” as what would be most critical.  When I kept seeing the media speak about rivalries, geography and on-the-field competitiveness as opposed to the BTN, I wrote the “Big Ten Expansion Index” post as a business-focused response that brought a lot of new readers to this blog (including many that are still commenting here today) since it came to the then-provocative conclusion that it was Texas (not Notre Dame) that would be the conference’s top target.

One of those readers ended up determining the Big Ten’s way of thinking better than anyone.  Back in April 2010, when massive conference realignment was still in the speculative stage and nothing had actually occurred, a reader named Patrick, who is long-time television industry veteran, sent in an analysis of how much various Big Ten expansion candidates would be worth to the Big Ten Network.  He went beyond simply looking at market sizes and cable subscriber fees and took into account fan intensity (which translates into the ability to charge higher cable subscriber fees in specific markets), national TV value and advertising rates.  In no surprise, Texas finished at #1.  However, look at who were the next three highest ranked schools after the Longhorns:

CANDIDATES TOTAL ADDED REVENUE ESTIMATE
 
Texas $101,369,004
Rutgers    WITH NYC $67,798,609
Nebraska $54,487,990
Maryland $50,818,889

Well, on the heels of the Big Ten inviting Nebraska a couple of years ago, Maryland has agreed to join the conference and Rutgers will likely be announced as a new member on Tuesday.  As a result, it turns out that we can proclaim Patrick as the Nate Silver* of Big Ten expansion.  As you can see from that post, most of my takeaways from Patrick’s analysis at the time were more Armageddon-like (particularly with respect to Notre Dame) and completely wrong (as I had assumed that the ACC wasn’t poachable), but his calculations did convince me that Nebraska, in spite of its small market, was going to be a lock for a Big Ten invite over anyone else (and that turned out to be correct several months later) since that Rutgers number was (and still is) much more speculative and it was crystal clear that the Cornhuskers would be more valuable than the other standard candidates mentioned at the time such as Missouri and Pitt.

(*Speaking of Nate Silver, it’s interesting to look back upon this piece that he wrote about conference realignment last year in the New York Times.  The data inputs that he used might be a bit flawed compared to the polls that he leveraged for the 2012 Presidential election, but it shows at least the argument as to why the Big Ten would look to add Rutgers.)

Essentially, the Big Ten executed a two-pronged strategy with its expansion: get a marquee football program at the national level (Nebraska) as a headliner and add top academic flagships at the regional level (Maryland and likely Rutgers) for depth.  As much as fans want every expansion move to be as sexy as adding Nebraska, the reality is that pretty much all of the conference realignment moves in the power conferences were about depth as opposed to headlining.  Texas A&M being added by the SEC was probably the best pure football move from a fan perspective in the last three years outside of the Big Ten expanding with Nebraska, but even then, the draw of the Aggies was predominantly about the SEC getting into the state of Texas for TV purposes (as they will likely have their own conference network coming together sooner rather than later).

The notion of a “Midwestern conference” is over for the Big Ten just as the notion of a tight Southern-based conference has long been over for the ACC ever since it decided to add Boston College (along with Miami and Virginia Tech) in 2003.  As Teddy Greenstein noted in the Chicago Tribune, the addition of Rutgers and Maryland is a long-term play for Jim Delany and the Big Ten driven by demographics.  Arguably, the Big Ten has been in the worst position of any of the power conferences when looking at long-term population trends, as the SEC, Pac-12, Big 12 and ACC all have large presences in fast growing Southern and/or Western states.  The additions of the states of Maryland and New Jersey mitigate that a bit while still not going completely expanding with geographic outliers.  It also doesn’t hurt that these are both recruiting rich states (at least by Northern standards) for football and basketball.  For the Big Ten fans that bemoan the loss of “Midwesterness”, the demographic makeup of the league was legitimately something that had to change regardless of the presence of the Big Ten Network or TV dollars.  Maryland and Rutgers may not be very exciting additions in 2014, but they’ll be extremely important for the long-term health of the Big Ten in 2024 and beyond.

With respect to those TV dollars, as I stated in my post on Saturday, I unequivocally believe that Maryland can deliver the Washington, DC/Baltimore region for the Big Ten Network (and when I say “deliver”, I mean basic carriage at a high “Big Ten footprint” subscriber rate as opposed to the sports tier and/or lower out-of-footprint rate).  That’s why this expansion hinged upon Maryland accepting since they are considered to be a sure thing business-wise.  The real all-in bet for Jim Delany and the Big Ten, though, is with the addition of Rutgers.  Judging by the media commentary and Twitter reactions, there is a healthy skepticism out there about whether Rutgers has the ability to deliver the New York City market, which I agree with at a certain level and have pointed out on this blog numerous times.  This is definitely not a slam dunk by any means.

However, I also don’t believe the Big Ten is naive enough to think that it is just about Rutgers alone delivering that market.  Instead, the conference is likely banking on the immediate geographic presence of Rutgers combined with the large number of other Big Ten alums living in the New York City metro region (particularly from Penn State, Michigan and newly-added Maryland) to gain just enough traction to make it viable.  If you have read Malcolm Gladwell’s “The Tipping Point”, the Big Ten is betting that the network effect of Rutgers being added to all of the existing Big Ten alums in the Tri-State area will have a greater impact than Rutgers alone (or Rutgers combined with the various past and present members of the Big East).  I’m not saying that this will definitely work – this is big-time risk for a conference that isn’t known for big-time risks.  The main point is that this move is not just about what Rutgers alone can deliver in the New York City market, but rather what Rutgers plus all of the other Big Ten fans in that region can deliver just enough there.  No one in the Big Ten is expecting New York sports fans to follow college football like people in Birmingham – the percentage of fans that need to be interested in college sports in that market for the conference to garner the value it needs there is much lower than anywhere else.

Some other thoughts:

  • As much as a lot of people have pointed out the “cultural differences” and geographic distances between Maryland and the rest of the Big Ten, this is a fairly mild change on those fronts by conference realignment standards.  In terms of being a large research institution with excellent academics, Maryland fits in very well with the Big Ten as a school.  At the same time, Maryland won’t exactly be sticking out like a sore thumb in the league, especially with Rutgers being added at the same time and Penn State being in a contiguous state.  This is nowhere near the cultural and geographic differences between West Virginia and the rest of the Big 12 or the current-football-setup-that’s-about-to-change in the Big East.
  • Despite my belief that Maryland would have been foolish to turn down an invite from the Big Ten, I still continue to think that the ACC is stronger than people give it credit for.  The fact that Maryland is leaving doesn’t mean that it’s going to spark an exodus from the ACC overall, particularly with respect to never ending speculation that Florida State and Clemson would consider jumping to the Big 12.  There are two key differences between the Maryland situation and the Florida State/Clemson scenario: (1) outside of money, Maryland is moving to conference that it still fits into as an overall institution without insane geography issues, whereas FSU and Clemson have no real connections at all to the Big 12 and (2) when looking at the money, Maryland is going to receive a LOT LOT LOT more of an increase in TV rights fees by moving to the Big Ten than FSU and Clemson would receive in the Big 12.  Pete Thamel from Sports Illustrated pointed out that the Big Ten is anticipating $30 million to $35 million per school per year in just TV money when it enters into a new deal in 2017… and this appears to be a low end estimate that assumes that there won’t be full BTN carriage in markets covered by Maryland and Rutgers.  (If the Big Ten Network can get a full in-market rate in the NYC and DC markets, then those numbers are going to go up even further.)  The current ACC contract with ESPN that runs through 2027 will pay out an average of $17.1 million per school per year, which means that Maryland is looking at a 100% increase in TV rights money as a conservative estimate.  Contrast this with Florida State and Clemson, where they’d be looking at a bump up to $20 million per school per year in the Big 12’s national TV deals plus whatever they’d be able to garner for third tier TV rights locally.  That’s not an insignificant amount of money, but likely not enough considering that there would be much worse cultural and geographic headaches compared to the Maryland move that will yield far more revenue for the Terps.  Therefore, my semi-educated guess is that the ACC doesn’t lose anyone else in the near-term.
  • Assuming that what I just said about the ACC only losing Maryland holds true, I continue to firmly believe that UConn is going to end up as the Terrapins’ replacement.  From a pure football and even overall athletic department perspective, Louisville is probably the better choice for the ACC, but the league is still one that considers institutional fit and academic profile as being extremely important factors in expansion.  Connecticut is in alignment with the ACC on such factors in a way that Louisville isn’t and, when looking at the ACC’s long-term vision, the Huskies match what the league is looking for in terms of getting into the Northeast as much as possible.  The network effects that apply to Maryland/Rutgers/Penn State for the Big Ten can also apply to UConn/Syracuse/Pitt/Boston College (albeit that’s effectively going back to the old Big East).
  • That leaves Louisville likely praying for the Big 12 to get antsy.  Chip Brown of Orangebloods has stated that the Big 12 isn’t looking to move off of 10 teams for now and I tend to believe him in the short-term.  However, as much as we parse objective TV revenue and demographic data in conference realignment, there’s also a subjective psychological element of “bigger means better” that has been permeating throughout the land.  So, let’s say that it’s about a 60% chance that the Big 12 doesn’t expand within the next few years and a 40% chance that it goes up to 12 (with Louisville being the top target, BYU likely getting consideration, and schools like Cincinnati and USF begging to get in).  That’s up from a 90/10 split prior to the latest Big Ten expansion news, so we’ll have to keep an eye on the Big 12.  (As I’ve noted earlier, I still don’t buy any ACC schools moving to the Big 12.  If anything, it wouldn’t shock me if Texas goes independent and strikes a Notre Dame-type deal with the ACC by the end of this decade.)

The crazy thing is that we’ve only touched the surface here, as the likely defections of Rutgers and Connecticut will leave the Big East searching for new members once again (or maybe preventing Boise State and San Diego State from heading back to the Mountain West or the Catholic non-football members from splitting).  Assuming that Rutgers announces that it’s accepting an invitation to the Big Ten tomorrow, I’ll have more on what the Big East can and/or should do at this point along with the trickle down effect on all of the other conferences.

Until then, welcome to the Big Ten, Maryland!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

(Image from Testudo Times)

Maryland Accepts Invitation to the Big Ten: Open Thread

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Sports320 Comments

The University of Maryland Board of Regents has accepted an invitation to join the Big Ten.  Rutgers might be soon to follow.  I’ll have some further thoughts later today, but for now, here is an open thread to discuss the latest conference realignment news.

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

(Image from University of Maryland)

Call Me Maybe: Maryland and Rutgers Talking to the Big Ten

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Sports587 Comments

What started off as a few rumors on random local radio shows earlier this week has turned into full-blown national news: the Big Ten is speaking with Maryland and Rutgers and could be expanding as soon as next week.

As Dan Wetzel pointed on in his column on the latest news, this isn’t a no-brainer move for the Big Ten on the level of adding Nebraska (or schools such as Notre Dame or Texas).  However, I believe that it ultimately makes sense overall (especially the addition of Maryland).  The timing of the move is a bit curious just as I was surprised by the timing of the SEC adding Texas A&M (and subsequently Missouri) last year, but the additions of Maryland and Rutgers fit what Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany stated was one of the long-term objectives of the conference’s original expansion exploration announced three years ago: making sure that the Big Ten keeps up with the changing demographics of the United States for next several decades. There is only going to be so much growth in the Big Ten’s base of the Midwest (although the “decline” of the region is often overstated by many non-Midwesterners that often just think of the classic Rust Belt images in Michigan and Ohio while ignoring the fact that the Chicago, Minneapolis and Indianapolis areas have more diverse economies and are growing well population-wise), so that can affect the long-term attractiveness of the conference’s members in recruiting all types of students, whether athletes or valedictorians.

To be sure, it also doesn’t hurt to have a massive amount of potential television revenue tacked on from the Big Ten Network getting onto basic cable in the Washington/Baltimore and New York City media markets.  This is certainly where Maryland clearly adds financial value to the conference: there is no doubt in my mind that the Terrapins have enough pull to get the BTN into homes in their home state plus DC (and probably Northern Virginia on top of that).  While I agree with Wetzel that Washington is a pro sports town, it’s more of a place like Chicago (another pro sports city) where, with the addition of Maryland, there will be enough of a critical mass of Big Ten grads for the conference to claim that market for TV purposes.  Plus, while there has been so much focus on football in conference realignment because that’s what the national TV networks such as ESPN and Fox are throwing out massive contracts for, basketball is actually fairly important to the BTN specifically in terms of leverage against cable operators for basic carriage.  As a result, Maryland’s strong basketball program and fan base are key factors here despite some struggles on football field for the past few years.

The risk for the Big Ten is more with the addition of Rutgers.  Obviously, there’s enormous potential value in having a large public institution that plays directly in the New York City metro area.  That market has been the Holy Grail for several difference conferences, but that’s because it has been so tough to crack.  In sheer numbers, the NYC area has a large number of Big Ten grads along with legions of Rutgers alums, but percentage-wise, there is nowhere near the market penetration that Illinois and Northwestern plus the other Big Ten schools provide for the Chicago market or USC and UCLA plus the other Pac-12 schools provide for the Los Angeles market.  As a result, I tend to agree more with Wetzel’s line of thinking with respect to Rutgers more than Maryland.

What the Big Ten is banking on is that the combination of Rutgers, Penn State, Maryland and Michigan (along with bringing in marquee schools such as Ohio State and Nebraska into town) is going to drive interest for the casual sports fan in New York and New Jersey.  Jim Delany and the powers that be in the Big Ten must have finally gotten comfortable with the belief that this combo is going to work or else they wouldn’t be pulling the trigger on the move.  This is a conference that doesn’t take chances with its membership ranks because it doesn’t need to.

As a pure football move, Maryland and Rutgers won’t move the meter like Nebraska, but I’d say that from a market value perspective, this is a better expansion than the ACC with Syracuse and Pitt (the non-football addition of Notre Dame is a different comparison) and the Pac-12 with Utah and Colorado.  The SEC got the best combo of on-the-field football value and off-the-field market with Texas A&M (while Missouri, which has a good market itself, got the benefit of being school #14 for a league that needed another school that wouldn’t take away revenue).

Some other thoughts:

  • There have been few non-ACC people that have argued about the strength of the ACC off-the-field more than I have over the past couple of years, so that’s why I was very hesitant to jump full-bore on Maryland to the Big Ten rumors that started earlier this week.  This was a move that myself and many other conference realignment aficionados had long thought was possible and looked good on paper, but questioned how willing Maryland was going to be in leaving a stable conference that it founded.
  • The $50 million exit fee that the ACC instituted back in September when Notre Dame joined as a non-football member is certainly a deterrent for Maryland to leave, but we have learned in conference realignment that no one has ever turned down a conference upgrade because of an exit fee.  These types of exit penalties inevitably get negotiated down to lower figures.  At the same time, it’s doubtful that Maryland (whose athletic department is about as solvent as Greece) will have to pay that exit fee out-of-pocket.  The Big Ten might front some of that money and deduct an amount from Maryland’s conference earnings for several years.  (This is what the Big 12 is doing with West Virginia.)  So, $50 million might sound like a lot, but the reality is (1) that number will likely end up being much lower and (2) someone other than Maryland itself is probably going to be paying a lot of that in the beginning.
  • What I didn’t ever buy was the popular fan-based thought that Maryland wouldn’t join the Big Ten because it was a “basketball school”.  Please take a look at the top 5 of both the AP and coaches polls this week for evidence about how asinine of a position that is when looking at conference decisions.  At the same time, unless you’re a legit basketball blue blood (Duke, UNC, Kentucky, Indiana, Kansas and UCLA), the best way to have a top tier basketball program in the modern era is to have a massive amount of football revenue to pay for it.  Florida, Ohio State and Texas have shown the way on this front over the past several years and the trend is only going to increase further with the latest moves in conference realignment.  To paraphrase what Jim Calhoun stated a couple of years ago, the best decision for your school’s athletic department is whatever is the best decision is for your school’s football program.
  • Speaking of Jim Calhoun, the athletic department that he largely brought to prominence at UConn will likely end up being the largest beneficiary out of the Big Ten’s expansion outside of Maryland and Rutgers themselves.  UConn is unequivocally next in line to get an invite into the ACC, so if Maryland really does end up leaving one spot open there, it’s there for the taking by the Huskies.  The only way that UConn doesn’t end up in the ACC at this point is if the Big Ten pulls an even greater surprise and takes two ACC schools, in which case I could see that conference staying at 12 all-sports members.
  • On the flip side, Louisville is probably the school most damaged by this Big Ten expansion.  When looking purely at the Cardinals athletic department, there is no doubt that it belongs in a power conference.  However, the academic requirements of the Big Ten and ACC have always meant that they would never seriously consider Louisville, while the SEC has never had much incentive to add that school since it already has that state covered by the University of Kentucky.  Louisville essentially has to hope that the Big 12 is going to get skittish with this latest move by the Big Ten and that they can’t stand pat at 10 members.  From a personal standpoint, I believe that Louisville deserves better because that athletic department has truly done everything right over the past few years.

All in all, Maryland and Rutgers going to the Big Ten is a solid off-the-field move for the conference in the long-term even if it won’t be sexy on-the-field (outside of lacrosse) in the short-term.  For the rest of the college sports world, conference realignment chaos is back in effect.

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

(Image from WBAL)

Thanksgiving Adult Table and Kids Table: A New College Football Playoff and Bowl System FAQ

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, Sports246 Comments

The sports world has been throwing me some curve balls over the past week, with my Bears and Illini combining for only 3 fields goals worth of offense, the Lakers trying to tell the public with a straight face that Mike D’Antoni is a “better fit” as a coach for their team than Phil Jackson, and the Marlins just handing over half of their team to the Blue Jays after fleecing Florida’s citizens out of public funds to build a brand new ballpark.  Let’s try to digest what has actually occurred with the new college football playoff system by answering some frequently asked questions:

(1) What exactly is the new playoff and top tier bowl format? – For someone like me that constantly dives into the minutiae of these details, this seems like a basic question, but it’s apparent to me after reading a lot of questions from people out there that the powers that be haven’t really done a good job of explaining how the new postseason format is going to work very clearly to the public.

What we know is that there will be 6 top tier bowls, with 3 of them being “contract bowls” with contractual tie-ins (Rose Bowl with the Big Ten and Pac-12, Sugar Bowl with the SEC and Big 12, and Orange Bowl with the ACC and SEC/Big Ten/Notre Dame) and the other 3 being “host bowls” (likely the Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl and Chick-Fil-A Bowl) that provide “access” slots (the equivalent of at-large bids in today’s BCS system).  The major new news is that the FBS conferences just announced that one of those access slots will be allocated to the highest ranked champion of the conferences that do not have a tie-in with a contract bowl (the Big East, Mountain West, Conference USA, Sun Belt and MAC, who are generally referred to in the media as the “Gang of Five” and I call the “G5” here).  Over the past month, the powers that be had considered adding a 7th bowl that would match up the top G5 champ against a team from the Big 12 or Pac-12, but the feedback from the marketplace was that such game would not be worth very much.  Thus, the compromise was to incorporate that G5 access into the 6-bowl rotation.

A 4-team playoff will be played within the confines of those 6 bowls, meaning that 2 bowls will be designated as semifinal sites each year and the other 4 bowls are “normal” bowl games.  In a year when a contract bowl is designated as a semifinal, the champions from each conference that it has tie-ins with are guaranteed a spot in one of the host bowls if such conference champ is not a semifinalist.  For example, if the playoff were in effect last year and the Rose Bowl was a semifinal site, Wisconsin, as the Big Ten champion that did not make it to the semifinal, would have an automatic slot in one of the host bowls.  On the flip side, when a contract bowl is not a semifinal, it is guaranteed to have teams from its tie-in conferences no matter where they are ranked.  So, in another example, if the playoff were in effect this year where the Rose Bowl is not a semifinal site and Oregon is the Pac-12 champion and finishes in the top 4, the Rose Bowl would take another Pac-12 team to replace Oregon whether such team is ranked #5 or #50.

The 4-team playoff field will be determined by a selection committee, presumably with at least one representative from each FBS conference.  That selection committee will also determine who receives the at-large host bowl slots and which G5 conference champ is the highest ranked.

(2) How will the revenue be split? – Some of it is very clear while other parts of it is up in the air.  While every conference expects an increase in revenue on an absolute basis, a chosen few are going to receive the lion’s share of the gains.  The contract conferences (Big Ten, Pac-12, SEC, Big 12 and ACC) will retain the media revenue from their respective contract bowls in the years that such bowls are not hosting semifinals.  The Rose Bowl signed a TV contract with ESPN worth $80 million per year.  The Sugar Bowl is believed to be making the same $80 million figure under an ESPN deal finalized today while the Orange Bowl is estimated to be worth $60 million per year.  This means that all of the contract conferences are expected to make $40 million each in the years that their respective contract bowls are “normal” non-semifinal bowl games.  The G5 doesn’t touch this money.

A separate pot that includes the national championship game, semifinals and host bowls has a tentative deal on the table from ESPN worth approximately $475 million to $500 million per year.  This is where the revenue distribution issue gets a bit murkier.  The FBS commissioners have said that a portion of that pot will distributed in the form of fixed annual payments to the various FBS conferences and independents, while another portion will be allocated based upon who actually attains bids to the semifinals and host bowls.  It is unclear how those portions will be split up.  The current understanding regarding the fixed annual payments is that the contract conferences will take the bulk of that money on top of their contract bowl revenue in equal shares among those 5 leagues, with a CBSSports.com report that it would be an overall 80%/20% split with G5 conferences compared to the current 85%/15% split in the current BCS system (although that “give” by the contract conferences is a quite misleading since that doesn’t include contract bowl revenue that the power leagues keep 100% of in the new system yet was shared in the current BCS system, so the net effect is essentially nothing in terms of overall percentage splits).

(3) Is the Big East a winner or loser in all of this? – I’ll give the lawyerly answer here: it depends.  The new G5 access slot to a host bowl has been positioned by a lot of people in the media as a “win” for the Big East*, but whether it’s truly a win is different for each of the members of that conference.

(* Regardless of what anyone thinks about how much the Big East will be worth in the TV and bowl marketplaces going forward, a massive amount of credit has to be given to the league’s new commissioner Mike Aresco for completely managing the media in all aspects on this playoff issue along with the recent Notre Dame defection.  If this announcement were made during John Marinatto’s tenure as Big East commissioner, the news stories would be talking about how the Big East is dead with the loss of an auto-bid as opposed to being anything close to a winner.)

The Big East is really the entity that is most affected by the changes in the postseason system since it went from being an AQ league where its champion was guaranteed a spot in a BCS bowl (the equivalent of a contract conference in the new format) to one where its champ is pooled in with the champs from the other G5 leagues to fight for one spot (the equivalent of a non-AQ conference in the current format).  From that vantage point, it’s very difficult to call the old members of the Big East (Louisville, UConn, Rutgers, Cincinnati and South Florida) as “winners” since this is a clear downgrade.  Even if they make more money in absolute dollars in the new system, they will be behind the power conference teams that they were once grouped with on a relative basis in terms of revenue and access.  The old members of the Big East in the negotiations with the powers that be in the playoff negotiations were basically in the position of Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back, where Darth Vader told him, “I am altering the deal.  Pray that I don’t alter it any further.”  As a result, the best that you could say for the old members of the Big East was that it could have been worse, where the power conferences might not have provided any dedicated bowl slot to the G5 at all.

On the other hand, the new Big East members (Temple, Central Florida, Houston, SMU, Memphis, San Diego State and Navy) are definitely winners.  They have received an upgrade in top bowl access (albeit not a great of an upgrade as they might have originally anticipated) and will take home multitudes more revenue compared to the current BCS system.  There’s really very little downside for any of them, if only because they could only go up from where they are in the BCS landscape.

In theory, the Big East is in the best position to win this G5 bowl access slot year-to-year since it is the strongest conference of that group from top to bottom.  That being said, I believe that theory only holds true where the Big East champ has the same record as any of the other G5 champs.  The danger for the Big East is not necessarily other conferences passing them by, but simply when another team from one of those conferences has a hot year.  For example, a 1-loss Louisiana Tech team is 1 spot ahead of 1-losss Rutgers and only 1 spot behind 1-loss Louisville in this week’s BCS rankings… and that’s while playing in a WAC league that will no longer be in existence when the new playoff starts in 2014.  That seems to indicate that a 1-loss Louisiana Tech team would definitely jump 2-loss Louisville and Rutgers teams if the new system were in place today (and it’s already virtually dead even with all of them having the same records).  At the same time, even though the Big East conference games will provide its league members with stronger strength of schedule rankings compared to the conferences games in the other G5 leagues, that can be mitigated by the fact that other G5 teams are more willing to take one-and-done guarantee games on the road with power conference teams.  Using Louisiana Tech as an example again, they have stronger BCS computer numbers than both Louisville and Rutgers this year based on playing one excellent SEC team (Texas A&M) and two craptacular Big Ten (Illinois – ugh) and ACC (Virginia) teams in road one-and-done games.  As a result, Big East teams can’t get very comfortable at all about thinking that this G5 slot is always going to go to their league.  That might be true when all records are equal, but if the Big East champ has a worse record than one of the other G5 champs, then it’s a major risk.

(4) What other winners and losers are there? – The other G5 conferences are overall winners since they have managed to obtain better access and revenue compared to the current system despite generally having weaker leagues on the field due to defections with conference realignment.  Of course, lest that you believe that the power conferences have been charitable, the Big Ten and SEC are definitely large winners, as well.  In part of the announcements this week, the champions from the SEC and Big Ten will always play in one of the host bowls if they are not semifinalists instead of the Orange Bowl (which those leagues have a secondary tie-in with shared with Notre Dame).  So, instead of, say, a #5-ranked SEC champ heading to the Orange Bowl when the Sugar Bowl is hosting a semifinal (thereby freeing up a host bowl slot for someone else), that SEC champ will go to one of the host bowls and the Orange Bowl can take another SEC team on top of that.  Jim Delany and Mike Slive definitely pulled a fast one there, particularly when the media seems to intimate that this was some type of concession.

(5) What happens to independents, particularly Notre Dame and BYU? – Independents (excluding Navy who will be joining the Big East in 2015, these currently consist of Notre Dame, BYU and Army and will include conference-less Idaho and New Mexico State next year) do not have any prescribed access to the semifinals and host bowls outside of ranking high enough for the selection committee to choose them for those slots.  However, Notre Dame has a contractual tie-in with the Orange Bowl, so host bowl access would have been gravy to them, anyway.

Most speculation about the impact on independents has centered around whether the new G5 bowl slot will spur BYU to join the Big East.  As I’ve stated in other blog posts, I don’t believe that BYU will end up in the Big East because its interests are much more about providing maximum TV exposure for the football program and the LDS church as a whole, which is exactly what they get now as an independent with an ESPN contract, as opposed to making the most TV money possible.  Now, I do believe that the bowl access situation will give BYU and LDS leaders (never forget that they are intertwined here) something else to chew on, but if you take a step back, you’ll realize that nothing has actually changed for the school in terms of top tier bowl access.  As of today, the only way that BYU can get automatic access to any BCS bowl is to qualify for the national championship game itself, which is practically no different than BYU only gaining automatic access if it qualifies for a semifinal in the new system.  Since BYU chose independence under the current BCS circumstances with virtually no prescribed access at all, no one should assume that the new G5 bowl spot will seriously alter their thinking.  At the end of the day, I continue to believe that Air Force will end up as football school #14 in the Big East while BYU will maintain its independence.

(6)  Any other unusual details? – Well, Sugar Bowl CEO Paul Hoolahan has some loose lips, where he provided some quirky information from the BCS meetings to the Baton Rouge Advocate (h/t to Alan from Baton Rouge):

While the nonplayoff Sugar Bowls will be exclusively between SEC and Big 12 teams, much as the Rose Bowl is exclusively between Big Ten and Pac-12 teams, the semifinals can feature teams from any conference, although if an SEC or Big 12 team is seeded first or second, its game will be in the Sugar Bowl.

********

The rotation for the semifinals is yet to be set. Hoolahan said he did not know which year would be the first for New Orleans to host a playoff game but understood the Sugar Bowl would be paired with the Rose Bowl.

“That way, we’ll have an uninterrupted afternoon and evening of playoff games,” he said. “That’s going to be exciting.”

The first portion of Hoolahan’s info doesn’t surprise me, where the contract bowls would get preferences to host their respective conference partners when they are semifinal games.  It makes complete sense that a #1 or #2-ranked Big Ten or Pac-12 team ought to go to the Rose Bowl if that game happens to be a semifinal site for that particular season.  However, the second portion about how the Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl would always be semifinal games in the same year is completely perplexing to me.  I understand Hoolahan’s point that the years when both of them are hosting semifinals would make for an exciting New Year’s Day, but the flip side is that there would now be no New Year’s Day semifinals at all in 1 out of every 3 years.  A clear and logical annual setup of 1 host bowl being a semifinal on New Year’s Eve and 1 contract bowl being a semifinal on New Year’s Day seems to be thrown up in the air with this information.  Usually, I’m able to understand the intent and reasoning behind various actions by the powers that be (even if I don’t personally agree with them), but I’m at a loss as to why the commissioners believe that this is a good idea.

All-in-all, there has been a flurry of progress over the past couple of weeks on the playoff front after a long pause in deliberations.  Hopefully, we’ll get some final information about how the semifinal rotation will be set up, confirmation that ESPN will be the television partner, and where the national championship game itself will be played sooner rather than later.

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

(Image from Sports Illustrated)

The Lakers Beat the Supersonics: College Football Playoff Payoff, BlogPoll Ballot, Football Parlay and Classic Music Video of the Week

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Sports207 Comments

It’s the home stretch for the college football regular season.  Let’s get to it.

(1) College Football Playoff News Leads to More College Football Playoff Questions – Every few weeks, a flurry of news about the college football playoff comes out and it ends up being more head-spinning than clarifying.  Last month, it appeared that a 7th BCS bowl (or whatever we will call the system going forward) would be a lock in order to provide more top tier bowl access to the new class of “non-contract” conferences (Big East, Mountain West, Conference USA, Sun Belt and MAC) known as the “Gang of Five” (hereinafter referred to by me as the “G5″*) along with an additional contract spot for the Pac-12 and Big 12 (to match the Orange Bowl contract spot that the Big Ten, SEC and Notre Dame are occupying opposite of the ACC).   It now looks like that idea lasted about as long as Mike Brown’s coaching tenure with the Lakers, complete with the BFFs of the Big Ten and Pac-12 getting into a tiff over the bowl’s viability.

(* Whenever I hear a reference to a G5, I always think of this moment.)

As a result, the FBS commissioners are going to recommend the original plan of a 4-team playoff incorporated into 6 bowls, with the Rose, Sugar (which has finally been named as the home of the SEC-Big 12 matchup and allows all of us to stop calling it the pompous Champions Bowl) and Orange Bowls as “Contract Bowls” and 3 other “Access Bowls” that will likely consist of the Cotton, Fiesta and the I Really Love Chick Fil-A Breakfast Biscuit Sandwiches So Please Have Your CFO Not Talk About Politics So I Can Eat Them Without Guilt Bowls*.

(* In full disclosure for those that don’t already know from some of my past blog posts, I have long considered myself to be a libertarian Republican, so I have a constant tension in my head between my belief that there needs to be significantly lower government spending with fewer regulatory restraints on the free market and social viewpoints that I completely disagree with.  This election year certainly didn’t ease that tension at all.  At least we can all depend upon Nate Silver.)

That leaves a multitude of questions that need to be answered ASAP:

  • How often will the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl host semifinals compared to the other top bowls?
  • How will the conferences split the playoff money?
  • Will the G5 conferences receive a dedicated bid to the access bowls, a provisional bid based on a top 15/20 ranking threshold similar to the current BCS system, or no guaranteed access at all?
  • Will ESPN win the TV rights or do the conference commissioners want to take the playoff package to the open market?  (Currently, it looks like Disney is going to buy up everything once again just as it swallowed up Star Wars.)
  • Who will be on the playoff selection committee?
  • Are playoff games really going to be played on New Year’s Eve or will TV interests nix that prospect?
  • What happens when the first Monday after the NFL Wild Card weekend, which TV partners have said is the optimal date for the national championship game, comes on a date that is less than a week after New Year’s Day?
  • Where is the first national championship game going to be played?
  • Since ESPN is ready to pay over $600 million per year for the college football postseason, when will a further expansion of the playoff become too irresistible for the powers that be?*

(* Unlike a lot of people, I personally don’t believe that an 8-team playoff is going to be inevitable by any means.  If there’s an expansion of the postseason, I think a “plus three” system of a 4-team playoff with the participants chosen after the bowls are played would be more likely, but that’s another discussion for another day.)

With the new playoff starting for the 2014 season, there honestly isn’t that much time to hammer all of these details out.  We’ll see what comes out on Monday after the Presidential Oversight Committee hears from the FBS commissioners.

(2) BlogPoll Ballot

I had been holding out on elevating Oregon to #2 since I believed that Notre Dame had a much better resume, but the Ducks continuing its thrashings against USC combined with a game that the Irish should have completely lost versus Pitt has finally gotten me to go with the conventional wisdom among the human pollsters (if not the computers that still like Kansas State much better).

(3) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

Minnesota (-3) over ILLINOIS

SYRACUSE (+2) over Louisville

Northwestern (+9.5) over MICHIGAN

(4) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

BEARS (PK) over Texans

EAGLES (+1) over Cowboys

Lions (-1) over VIKINGS

(5) Classic Music Video of the Week – “It Was a Good Day” by Ice Cube

While it is now impossible for the Lakers to beat the Supersonics (particularly for Mike Brown), any list of the top Internet achievements of 2012 needs to include the pinpointing of November 30, 1988 as Ice Cube’s “good day” (after an original argument that it was January 20, 1992).

Enjoy another great weekend of football!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

Quick Hits: BlogPoll Ballot and Football Parlay Picks

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Bears, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, NFL Football, Sports204 Comments

It’s been a crazy week in the Frank the Tank household, so I just have time for my BlogPoll Ballot and parlay picks for this post.  Some more in-depth posts about conference realignment, the college football playoff picture and TV contracts are forthcoming.

(1) BlogPoll Ballot

This is the first time in history where an undefeated Notre Dame team is actually underrated.  The Irish resume is deserving of a #2 ranking.

(2) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

Illinois (+27.5) over OHIO STATE – As evidenced by last week’s post, I’m waaaaaay down on the state of the Illinois football program, but for whatever reason, the Illini generally outperform expectations whenever they play Ohio State (if only because this matchup typically comes with trap game timing for the Buckeyes).

USC (+8.5) over Oregon – I’m feeling upset #1…

LSU (+8.5) over Alabama – … and upset #2.  Identical lines for two uber-talented home teams in the biggest games of the weekend.  Get ready for that Notre Dame vs. Kansas State national championship game.

(4) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

Bears (-3.5) over TITANS – I’m going to chalk up last week’s sub par performance by Smokin’ Jay Cutler and the Bears to a short week coming off of a Monday Night Football appearance.

FALCONS (-3.5) over Cowboys – Atlanta should honestly be getting more love from the oddsmakers here.

Ravens (-3.5) over BROWNS – This Browns team was challenging to be the among the worst Cleveland teams ever (which is saying something) before it pulled out that cringe-inducing victory over San Diego last week.  I think they’ll revert to true form against the Team Formerly Known as the Cleveland Browns.

Enjoy the weekend, stay safe if you’re on the East Coast and, no matter what your political persuasion might be, please vote on Tuesday!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

 

No One Goes to Hooters For Wings: Crazy Like a Fox Part 2, BlogPoll Ballot, Football Parlay and Classic Music Video of the Week

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Sports242 Comments

It has been quite crazy in the real life of Frank the Tank over the past couple of weeks, so I apologize for the hiatus.  Let’s get right back into it:

(1) The Enemy of My Enemy is My Friend: Fox Emerging as Top Competitor to ESPN Instead of Comcast (Because That’s How ESPN Wants It) – When I wrote this post on potential challengers to ESPN back in March, I was fairly skeptical of anyone being able to step up to create a full-fledged all-sports network competitor.  Unlike Fox News Channel and MSNBC, which were able to establish audiences to compete with CNN with internal programming decisions within their full control, new sports networks are largely dependent upon winning sports rights from third parties (which aren’t guaranteed).  To its credit, though, Fox has been able to assemble a broad array of what I called “tier one” properties since that time, such as cable rights for Major League Baseball (including postseason games) and NASCAR.  When combined with the Big 12, Pac-12 and soccer (e.g. future FIFA events such as the World Cup, English Premier League, etc.) rights that Fox already has in hand, the likely-to-be-formed “Fox Sports One” looks like a legitimate counterweight to ESPN.  Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. certainly has a lot of experience building empires based on sports properties with BSkyB in the United Kingdom breaking through after the purchase of English Premier League rights and over-the-air Fox doing the same after winning NFL games here in the United States.  (If you were around in the early-1990s, there were legitimate concerns and tons of late night talk show fodder about whether enough people would be able to find the Fox network.  Within a couple of years of having NFL games, though, Fox established itself as every bit as powerful of a network as ABC, CBS and NBC.)  It looks like he’ll finally have a cable sports network in the US that will have access to top properties during the entire calendar year.

In contrast, it appears that Comcast has very few options left for its NBC Sports Network.  For all of the bluster from Comcast that it was looking to invest heavily in NBCSN, it has ended up losing out on every competitive bidding situation for sports rights over the past 2 years with the exception of retaining the NHL and Olympics rights that it already had.  The other properties that NBCSN has added during that time frame are generally low value, such as MLS soccer, Formula One racing and Atlantic 10 basketball.  Comcast may no longer have much incentive to spend significantly on NBCSN since there is literally nothing else of value available over the next few years outside of the Big East rights (which we’ll address separately in a moment).  As a result, I wouldn’t be surprised to see NBCSN go more toward the CBS Sports Network route of trying to keep costs down while providing an overflow outlet for the main over-the-air NBC Sports operation.

What’s interesting here is that ESPN effectively picked the winner between News Corp. and Comcast when it chose to work with Fox in winning the Pac-12 rights against NBC last year.  Once that occurred, it established (or maybe just reflected) a fascinating bond between Disney (ESPN) and News Corp. (Fox) along with Time Warner/Turner (TBS/TNT): no matter how much they might have hated each other, they all hated Comcast even more and showed that they would rather work together to squash NBCSN than let the fledgling network gain any traction.  ESPN and Fox have partnered on the new Big 12 TV deal, while Turner is going to pay twice as much as it does now for MLB rights for half as many games (with virtually all of the games that they’re losing heading over to Fox).  From the perspective of these media companies, it makes complete sense.  Comcast is the largest source of subscriber fees for all of the top cable networks, which means that a Comcast-owned sports network that has enough top tier properties to be used as leverage in carriage fees negotiations is much more dangerous for ESPN, Fox and Turner than any other potential competitor.  So, for ESPN, it was much better for them to allow Fox to rise up as its primary competition than Comcast/NBC.  It’s a classic “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” situation.

The Big East is sitting back seeing this dance unfold.  A few months ago, many sports media industry observers thought that it was a foregone conclusion that the Big East’s new TV contract would end up with Comcast/NBC.  Now, the view seems to have shifted to where a number of people are betting on an ESPN/Fox combo for the Big East (similar to what they have in place with the Pac-12 and Big 12).  What’s hard to tell is whether this is going to end up working out financially well for the Big East since, whether or not they ultimately sign a contract with any particular media entity, they need all three of ESPN, Fox and Comcast/NBC (plus CBS for basketball) to be legitimately interested in the conference’s rights to drive up the price.  If ESPN and Fox are working together while Comcast/NBC decides that it’s going to take a low cost approach, then the Big East may not receive the payday that many of the league’s fans are hoping for.  Therefore, the Big East had better hope that Comcast/NBC is willing to legitimately pay up to compete with ESPN and Fox and not just sell the availability of “exposure” with open Saturday time slots that ESPN can’t offer.  The fact that Comcast/NBC wasn’t willing to do that with MLB rights is a negative sign, but as always, we’ll find out whether that will be the case here soon enough.

(2) BlogPoll Ballot

I seriously don’t try to win the Jim Tressel’s Numb Existence Award every week, but I’m on top of the list again despite my love for Toledo.

(3) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

Indiana (+1) over ILLINOIS – I don’t care how bad Indiana might be (and believe me, they’re awful) – Illinois should not be giving points to any team.  Look, I’ve had some prolonged rough stretches as an Illini fan.  During my first three years of college in Champaign, the Illinois football team amassed a 5-28 record (including a winless season in 1997).  When Illinois finally won a game in 1998, fans rushed the field even though that win was against the mighty Middle Tennessee State.  2003 through 2006 featured an 8-38 stretch, which was mitigated a little bit by some glory years for the Illini basketball team.  However, I’m not exaggerating here when I say that this is the most dejected that I’ve ever seen the Illini football fan base.  At least with Ron Zook, there was the inkling of hope that his legendary recruiting ability would eventually turn things around.  Plus, I think we’ll eventually remember the Zook years as being “funny bad”.  Between the asinine 2-point conversion attempts in the first quarter, rugby punts and water skiing without water skis, Zook at least sucked with some style.  (Other examples of “funny bad”: “Evil Dead 2”, the “Cheaters” TV show, and the Henry Burris stint as quarterback for the Bears.)

The Illini team under Tim Beckman, on the other hand, has been completely listless since the loss to Louisiana Tech in week 4.  To use a sports cliche, it’s not that the Illini are losing per se that bothers me, but rather how they are losing.  Several other top Illini boosters are bothered by it, as well, and have made it known publicly that they aren’t happy at all with Beckman or Illinois athletic director Mike Thomas.  Granted, it’s tough to fire any new head coach after only one season (compounded by the fact that the Illinois athletic department is still paying buyouts to both Ron Zook and Bruce Weber at the same time), but we’re getting dangerously close to the point where fan anger turns to fan apathy, which is the worst thing that can happen to a program that can’t count on 100,000 people showing up every week no matter what like Ohio State and Michigan.  For practical purposes, I’m resigned to the fact that Beckman will almost certainly get another year (if only because Thomas would be admitting he made a major mistake in the hiring by axing Beckman so quickly), yet Illinois might be trading a short-term contract buyout issue for a legitimately long-term setback once again.

Cincinnati (+4) over LOUISVILLE – Even though Cincinnati lost a trap road game to Toledo last week, I believe that the real fight in the Big East will eventually come down to between the Bearcats and Rutgers.  Louisville has already had multiple close escapes with a very weak schedule, so the Cardinals’ undefeated record and #16 ranking are paper thin in my eyes.  (The sharps in Las Vegas apparently agree with me since this line has been dropping with money heading towards Cincinnati all week.)

Michigan (+2.5) over NEBRASKA – This ought to be a fun atmosphere in Lincoln with Michigan coming to town, but my feeling is that the Wolverines will end up running the table for the rest of the year to get to the Rose Bowl.

(4) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

BEARS (-8) over Panthers – An organization in a tailspin versus the NFL’s best defense isn’t a great combo for Cam Newton and Ron Rivera.  Granted, I’m concerned about Jay Cutler’s bruised ribs (as his passes were nowhere near as crisp in the 2nd half against the Lions on Monday Night as they were in the 1st half), but the Bears have definitely taken care of business against all of the teams that they were supposed to beat so far this season.  Lovie Smith has had this team completely focused game-to-game.

LIONS (-1) over Seahawks – As stifling as the Bears defense might be, the Lions were actually able to move the ball fairly well down field in the 2nd half and it took multiple disastrous red zone turnovers by Detroit for Chicago to come away with the win.  I have no idea why Matthew Stafford seems to miss on half of his throws toward Calvin Johnson with Megatron being such a massive target, but those two connecting consistently is much more likely at home against Seattle than it was on the road against Chicago.

Falcons (+2) over EAGLES – I know that Atlanta has to eventually lose, but I don’t feel that it’s going to come against an underachieving .500 squad in the middle of Philly fan calls for the scalps of Michael Vick and Andy Reid.

(5) Classic Music Video of the Week: “No Sex in the Champagne Room” by Chris Rock

In honor of Tom Fornelli starting up The Champaign Room at SBNation to cover the Fighting Illini (the logo is even better than the name), here’s a memorable ditty from Chris Rock:

Enjoy the World Series and the rest of your week!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

Like A Drifter I Was Born to Walk Alone: Beastly Big East Expansion, DePaul Arena Dreaming, BlogPoll Ballot, Parlay Picks and Classic Music Video of the Week

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, Chicago Bears, College Basketball, College Football, DePaul Blue Demons, Illinois Fighting Illini, Sports538 Comments

You just knew that one of either Tony Romo or Jay Cutler was going to have a sub-zero passer rating game on Monday night, right?  It was preordained with a prime time game featuring the two erratic quarterbacks.  Fortunately for the Bears, Bad Romo showed up that even more gloriously led to a nostalgic appearance by the Neckbeard.  Let’s get onto some other news:

(1) Beastly Big East Expansion – I didn’t get to write about this at all last week, but the Big East reportedly has been looking at BYU and Air Force for its 14th football member (and might even add those 2 plus Army to have a 16-team football league).  If the Big East can pull off that trifecta, that’s effectively the best that the conference could realistically do considering the circumstances.  However, I continue to have doubts about the viability of a BYU candidacy for the Big East because of that school’s very different leadership structure and goals compared to any other FBS school.  Indeed, Brett McMurphy, in his report linked above, said, “BYU was close to joining the Big East last November, until the deal blew up essentially at the last minute when the Cougars refused to relinquish their home television rights.”  That’s such a basic fundamental issue that I find it difficult to believe that it could have possibly only been brought up at the last minute unless a group far above the athletic director’s pay grade (AKA the actual leadership of the LDS Church) purposefully lobbed in a grenade to tank the negotiations.  My understanding from BYU people has always been that TV exposure trumps TV money by a wide margin to LDS leadership, which means that they aren’t going to be persuaded by merely a larger check from a share of Big East TV rights versus the guaranteed widespread exposure that the school receives now in its ESPN contract.  Plus, BYU has effectively stated previously that Comcast’s dealings with the Mountain West were the biggest reason why the school turned independent in the first place, so it will be an extremely tough sell for the Big East to pitch the value of any potential NBC/Comcast deal to the Cougars no matter how much it might pay.  The Big East’s largest selling point to BYU would be that the access to the new 7th top tier bowl discussed here last week may only be open to the champions of the “Gang of Five” conferences (the Big East, Mountain West, Conference USA, Sun Belt and MAC), which means that the school’s ability to make it into the new BCS (or whatever it will be called) system will solely be via a handful of access bowl slots determined by a selection committee.  Essentially, Big East commissioner Mike Aresco has to convince the LDS Church (NOT the BYU athletic department, which seems to be much more open to conference membership) that the exposure gained from having access to this new 7th bowl trumps the week-to-week exposure that the school is receiving from its current TV deals.  I think the chances of BYU joining the Big East are better than they were two weeks ago, but still nowhere near a foregone conclusion.  Hence, the hedging comment in the McMurphy piece that the Big East is “divided over whether to pursue Air Force or BYU.”  It’s very clear that BYU is the superior option, but the Big East needs to make it look like that it chose Air Force (instead of getting rejected by BYU) if it ends up adding the Falcons.  (“You didn’t reject us!  We rejected you!”)

As you can see, I believe that Air Force is a much more realistic addition to the Big East compared to BYU.  Things have changed greatly for Air Force since it rejected the Big East’s overtures 1 year ago, particularly the fact that the Big East decided to raid Air Force’s home of the Mountain West of Boise State and San Diego State.  Navy has also committed to join the Big East for football since that time, so that gives the Air Force a service academy rival to potentially enter the league with.  In contrast, nothing has really changed for BYU other than potentially the bowl situation.  As a result, if I were a betting man, Air Force is going to end up as Big East football school #14.

On another note, Big East Coast Bias points out that the new Atlantic 10 TV contract shows why the Catholic members of the Big East aren’t going to be splitting off to create a CYO basketball league.  In this era of skyrocketing sports rights contracts, the Atlantic 10 is going to be receiving $40 million over the course of 8 years.  That translates into $5 million per year to be split among 14 members, which amounts to an average of a little more than $350,000 per year per school.  This has to be a scary figure for the schools that solely depend upon basketball revenue.  Granted, I believe that a CYO basketball league made up of the current Big East Catholic schools plus a handful of others (e.g. St. Louis University, Xavier, Dayton) would command a better TV contract than what the Atlantic 10 is receiving, but this new deal effectively ensures that those Big East members won’t even take the chance of a split.  As I noted last year, splitting up the Big East would be as misguided as the maligned and eventually overturned decision to split up Netflix and this is more evidence of that being the case.

(2) DePaul Arena Dreaming – Speaking of the Big East and on a more personal note, the notion of DePaul basketball returning to the Chicago city limits is finally gaining steam.  DePaul is looking at either moving home games to the United Center or partnering with the city and Mayor Rahm Emanuel to build a new arena near McCormick Place.  I have been arguing that DePaul basketball ought to move to the United Center at a minimum ever since I started this blog (see this post about DePaul’s very first Big East game, which happened to be against Notre Dame, complete with an outdated reference to the now-defunct Demon Dogs), so it’s been a long time coming.  Personally, I like the McCormick Place proposal even more since the funding appears to be available, Rahm seems to want to get it done (meaning that it’s much more than a pipe dream) and it would be an arena whose primary tenant is DePaul (compared to the United Center, where the order of precedence is (1) Ringling Bros. Circus, (2) Disney on Ice, (3) Bulls, (4) Blackhawks and (5) everything else).  A new CTA Green Line Station at Cermak Road to serve McCormick Place is being built, which means that even though the arena isn’t necessarily close to Lincoln Park, it would be easily accessible by public transportation for students on the North Side and even easier for people based at DePaul’s expanding South Loop campus.  There is also plenty of parking structures already in place for people that want to drive.  It’s not as desirable as having a Lincoln Park location, but considering the practical issues of cost and transportation, this is the most viable option for a DePaul arena within the city limits that we have ever seen.

Also, I can see Rahm’s reasoning for pushing this plan from an urban planning perspective.  As someone that lived in Chinatown for a time (which is one mile directly west of McCormick Place straight down Cermak Road), there’s definitely a major gap in commercial development (or at least conventioneer/tourist-friendly commercial development) in the blocks between the Chinatown Red Line station and the convention center complex.  Considering that McCormick Place is arguably the largest single draw for business visitors to Chicago (who have expense accounts to spend), there is decidedly very little in the way of restaurants and bars in that area.  A new arena can be a catalyst for more development in a spot that definitely needs it along with connecting the McCormick Place area to the more developed Chinatown to the west and the rest of the South Loop that is already gentrified to the north.  Granted, there have been plenty of DePaul arena options that have fallen through over the years, so we’ll proceed with cautious optimism here.

(3) BlogPoll Ballot

My main disagreements with the overall poll is that I believe that LSU, Notre Dame (out of all teams) and Northwestern are underrated, while the winner of the Georgia-South Carolina game this weekend is going to end up overrated.  Also, I will continue to bring the love for Louisiana Tech as long as they keep winning.  That’s a legit BCS buster.

(4) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

WISCONSIN (-14) over Illinois – I’m counting down the days to basketball season at this point.  It’s getting ugly for the Illini.

Miami (+14) over Notre Dame (game at Soldier Field in Chicago) – Despite my belief that Notre Dame is actually underrated in the polls at this point, I don’t think that I’ve agreed with a single Vegas line for the Irish all year.  Miami isn’t nearly the pushover that it looked like they could have been after getting waxed by Kansas State.

Georgia (+1) over SOUTH CAROLINA – I think both of these teams are a bit overrated from the glow of the top of the SEC, but I have more faith in Georgia this year.

(5) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

RAMS (+2.5) over Cardinals – Arizona is worse than their record and, as I said last week, St. Louis is better than their record.

REDSKINS (+3) over Falcons – I don’t quite know what to make of the Redskins so far this season, but RGIII certainly makes them interesting.

JAGUARS (+5) over Bears – The Bears should be winning this game, but this is the type of matchup that always puts us fans on edge.  We were at least able to count on Bad Romo rearing his head this past Monday night.

(6) Classic Music Video of the Week – “Here I Go Again” by Whitesnake

If the Mo Money Mo Problems video was a late-1990s time capsule, then this classic from Whitesnake is everything that a late-1980s trash rock video should feature: lots of hair, lots of guitars, and lots of a pre-husband abuse/Celebrity Rehab Tawny Kitaen.  Of course, this song is also a favorite of my namesake Frank the Tank.

Enjoy the games!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

Federal Agents Mad ‘Cause I’m Flagrant: Seventh BCS Bowl, BlogPoll Ballot, Parlay Picks and Classic Music Video of the Week

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, Chicago Bears, Chicago White Sox, College Basketball, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Major League Baseball, NFL Football, Sports310 Comments

To take our minds off of NFL replacement refs (and even as a Bears fan that loathes the Packers with every fiber of my being, I can’t take joy in such an abominable outcome from Monday night’s game), let’s move onto some other news:

(1) Seventh BCS Bowl: Progress for the Little Guys or More Consolidation of Power for the Big Guys? – The powers that be of college football are reportedly going to add a seventh bowl to the top tier of games (widely presumed to consist of the Rose, Cotton, Orange, Sugar, Fiesta and Chick-Fil-A Bowls) that will be a part of the new playoff rotation and host the highest ranked champion of the “non-contract” conferences (the Big East, Conference USA, Mountain West, Sun Belt and MAC). Dennis Dodd of CBSSports.com is reporting that industry sources believe that this new seventh bowl will make approximately $20 million per year in TV money. For the sake of comparison, the Rose Bowl will be receiving $80 million per year and the Please Choose a Freaking Site Already So I Can Stop Calling This the Champions Bowl will likely receive the same.

Whether this new seventh bowl is a good deal for what Dodd calls the “Gang of Five” depends upon what starting point you’re comparing it to. This sounds like progress compared to the prospect of simply a merit-based selection process to the “Access Bowls” that will have at-large slots in the new college football postseason (where the Gang of Five could have been frequently completely shut out of any top tier bowl games). However, it’s worse than the current BCS system for that same group since this is effectively consolidating what has been two separate bowl bids (the Big East champ AQ bid and the top 12 non-AQ conference champ auto bid) into one bowl bid. Dodd’s report also suggests that the Gang of Five champ will be locked into this seventh bowl game (hereinafter referred to as the “Gang of Five Bowl”) as opposed to being rotated around among the other Access Bowls, which means that that power conferences can still take up most (if not all) of the slots in those other games. Essentially, the Gang of Five Bowl looks like a mini-Contract Bowl that will need to find another tie-in instead of selecting from the Access Bowl pool, only that it still will be part of the semifinal rotation. (Dodd suggests that a third or fourth place team from a power conference could be interested in that tie-in, while an AP report says that either the Big 12 or Pac-12 could end up sending a team to this game.)

On paper, the Big East ought to be winning this Gang of Five bowl slot in most seasons, but it’s still quite a fall from a money perspective if Dodd’s financial figures are correct. Currently, the Big East is receiving at least $17 million per year for having an AQ bid in today’s BCS system, which is a figure that will almost certainly go down for the conference if the new Gang of Five Bowl is worth $20 million (as that revenue will need to be split up between the Gang of Five conferences and whichever other conference signs a tie-in). However unlikely it might be that Gang of Five school ends up finishing ranked higher than the Big East champ in the future, it’s still not an iron-clad that the Big East has now (or what the other power conferences continue to have). Once again, this scenario is better than the Armageddon situations facing the Big East a week or two ago, but still a downgrade from the current BCS system for them. We could arguably say the same thing about all of the other Gang of Five conferences. Nearly a year ago, when the playoff was still a dream and the talk was merely about “removing AQ status”, I wrote that it was a matter of semantics and the practical effect would be that the Big East and non-AQ conferences were actually going to be the ones being screwed. For the leagues outside of the Big Ten, SEC, Pac-12, Big 12 and ACC, the destruction of the BCS system was a “be careful for what you wish for” event and now everyone sees why.

(2) BlogPoll Ballot

It continues to be ugly for the Big Ten in terms of elite teams. This might be Northwestern’s time to shine with a 1995-esque run to the Rose Bowl.

(3) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

WASHINGTON (+6.5) over Stanford – There’s some weird juju going on in Seattle this week. I’ll take the points for the home team in the land of rain and caffeine.

Penn State (PK) over ILLINOIS – I’ve seen many debilitating Illini losses like the one that occurred this past Saturday night against Louisiana Tech over the past 15 years. The most frequent response from the team in that type of situation is to head into a complete tailspin for the rest of the season. Both Ron Turner and Ron Zook could never, ever, ever limit the collateral damage of a bad loss to just a single game, so the deck is stacked against Tim Beckman here. Of course, the postseason ineligibility of Penn State and Ohio State is setting up the Big Ten Leaders Division to have Illinois-Indiana on October 27th become a critical matchup for the conference championship. My apologies in advance to the rest of the college football world.

Ohio State (+3) over MICHIGAN STATE – The Buckeyes are really the only team that could possibly be a factor nationally for the Big Ten at this point… except that they aren’t allowed to win anything. It’s unfortunate for the conference since I believe that Urban Meyer is everything as advertised as a coach.

(4) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

Browns (+12.5) over RAVENS – Maybe it’s just me, but this feels like a patented Admiral Ackbar “It’s a trap!!!” game for Baltimore.

RAMS (+3) over Seahawks – Rams are much better competitively than their scores would indicate and, if there’s any justice in the world, there are going to be some karmic repercussions to Seattle here.

Bears (+3) over COWBOYS – I’d feel much better about this game if it was being played at Soldier Field, but it still comes down to a tale of two bad offensive lines and which defense can take the most advantage (and I sincerely believe that the Bears have the edge there).

(5) Classic Music Video of the Week: Mo Money Mo Problems by The Notorious B.I.G. featuring Mase and Puff Daddy

This is one of my favorite songs of any genre of all-time with a video that’s a fantastic time capsule of the late-1990s with its Tiger Woods-Fuzzy Zoeller reference in the intro, shiny jumpsuits and a posthumous appearance by the late Biggie Smalls. Speaking of which, if you ever have a couple of hours to kill on Netflix, you could do worse than checking out Nick Broomfield’s 2002 documentary Biggie and Tupac that sets forth the evidence that former Death Row Records CEO Suge Knight was responsible for the deaths of both Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur. Broomfield essentially looks and sounds like someone that you would expect to see on BBC World News, so it was quite a scene when he challenges Suge face-to-face in a prison courtyard (which was a sequence that the cameraman was apparently too scared to film, so he kept shooting the sky). Hopefully, the Illini won’t play the same type game that they did last week or else I might be flipping this documentary on pretty quickly.

Enjoy all of the games (and may the White Sox hang on for dear life)!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)

I Once Got Busy in a Burger King Bathroom: B1G Orange Bowl News, BlogPoll Ballot, Parlay Picks and Classic Music Video of the Week

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, Chicago Bears, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, NFL Football, Sports718 Comments

Between the Bears and Illini, the respective quarterbacks of my teams have thrown a total of 8 interceptions over the past 6 days.  I’m not in a state of mind to make jokes about this right now, so let’s move on:

(1) Orange Bowl Tie-ins with Big Ten, SEC and Notre Dame – Lost in the shuffle of Wednesday’s massive news of Notre Dame joining the ACC as a partial member was this quote from Jack Swarbrick:

That’s a pretty significant development in the otherwise trickle of substantive news regarding the new postseason system since the powers that be agreed upon a playoff format.  The new ACC/Notre Dame partnership reportedly allows for Notre Dame to take an ACC tie-in for bowls other than the Orange Bowl (provided that Notre Dame is within 1 win of the ACC team that it’s replacing).  The Orange Bowl itself, though, is an ironclad tie-in for the ACC with the opponent now apparently coming from a pool of Notre Dame, the Big Ten and SEC.  Seeing that Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany and SEC commissioner Mike Slive are far from shrinking violets, I’d expect them to be negotiating the following parameters:

(a) The Rose, Champions and Orange Bowls will rotate semifinals in a manner where none of them will ever host the semis in the same year. (This is likely more of a demand from ESPN than from the conferences.)

(b) When the Rose Bowl is hosting a semifinal, Big Ten #1* goes to the Orange Bowl.

(c) When the Champions Bowl is hosting a semifinal, SEC #1 goes to the Orange Bowl.

(d) If Notre Dame is ranked higher than Big Ten #1 or SEC #1, as applicable, then the Irish go to Orange Bowl instead, except that Notre Dame may only replace each of the Big Ten and SEC once in a 6-year cycle.

(* This should go without saying, but the #1 pick means the top selection from the conference that isn’t playing in the semifinals.)

The upshot of this would be that ACC #1 will be playing either Big Ten #1, SEC #1 or a highly-ranked Notre Dame team in the Orange Bowl in any given year, which will likely yield a media rights payout for the ACC that will be in line with what the Big Ten and Pac-12 are receiving for the Rose Bowl and the SEC and Big 12 are receiving for the Champions Bowl.  Thus, any chicken little beliefs that the ACC is going to end up playing subpar opponents in the Orange Bowl are going to go by the wayside.  For the other side of the Orange Bowl, in a 6-year cycle, Notre Dame would be capped at 2 appearances while both the Big Ten and SEC are guaranteed 1 invite each under this arrangement.  This would meet Notre Dame’s goal of having a strong relationship with a top bowl while having the flexibility to go to other “Access Bowls”.  In the meantime, the Big Ten and SEC effectively have backup tie-ins for their #1 selections, which means that those conferences are going to be swimming like Scrooge McDuck in a vault full of new postseason money.  If the above scenario occurs, this is looking like a great deal for everyone involved.

(2) BlogPoll Ballot

Nothing too crazy here except that I dropped Nebraska, Arkansas, Wisconsin and Oklahoma State like bad habits.  Last week was pretty ugly for the Big Ten.  The conference is going to need Michigan State to come through against Notre Dame.  Speaking of which…

(3) College Football Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

MICHIGAN STATE (-6) over Notre Dame – Michigan State along with bowl ineligible Ohio State are probably the only 2 Big Ten teams worthy of cracking the top 10 in the rankings this year based on the early returns.  Weird stuff typically happens in favor of Sparty whenever they play the Irish in a home night game.

MISSOURI (-4) over Arizona State – Arizona State rolled up a lot of points last week, but let’s face it, that was against an Illinois team without a functioning quarterback.

BYU (-3.5) over UTAH – I’m sure Utah is going to be pretty focused for this rivalry game after last week’s debacle, but I don’t think it will be enough.

(4) NFL Parlay Picks (odds from Yahoo! and home teams in CAPS)

PACKERS (-150 total yards) over Bears – GAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!

Raiders (-1) over DOLPHINS – The ’72 Dolphins might have to pop champagne for Miami’s first win this season.

SEAHAWKS (+3) over Cowboys – Coming off of a huge division win, this is exactly the type of game that Tony Romo loses.

Ravens (+1) over EAGLES – I know that you can’t take too much away from the first week of the season (as evidenced by the Bears and Packers), but I have a hard time passing up taking points with Baltimore.

(5) Classic Music Video of the Week: “The Humpty Dance” by Digital Underground

All that I’ll say about this song is that I know these lyrics as well as I know the Pledge of Allegiance:

Enjoy the weekend!

(Follow Frank the Tank’s Slant on Twitter @frankthetank111 and Facebook)