Confernce Realignment Chaos is Here!!!!!! (maybe ... probabbly not) (Rumor Texas and OK reach out to SEC about joining)

[Ski-U-Ham]

Ouch Big12

Oklahoma president Joseph Harroz gave a lengthy speech about why the Sooners are making this move. He said it was clear the Big 12 had become “last in line” when it came to the other Power 5 conferences.

 

[fmlizard]

Ouch Big12

Oklahoma president Joseph Harroz gave a lengthy speech about why the Sooners are making this move. He said it was clear the Big 12 had become “last in line” when it came to the other Power 5 conferences.

Well yeah they were. Academically, historically, financially, and athletically. They didn't even have the advertised number of schools.

Still, I think the Big 12 is better off trying to regroup and be creative about additions rather than scatter to the winds. The Big 12 for now still carries power conference status and they could help some G5 schools make the leap by upping their recruiting and resources. What if they added NDSU? Boise State? UCF? The Big 12 could try and re-tool itself as sort of a G5 super-league including much of its remaining core.

 

[hello-world]

If the B1G was to get USC it would seem almost a given it means the B1G gets UCLA too.

If USC comes with UCLA then UCLA comes with Cal and Cal comes with Stanford.

If those four schools joined the B1G, then Notre Dame would come calling shortly after.

 

[fmlizard]

If USC comes with UCLA then UCLA comes with Cal and Cal comes with Stanford.

If those four schools joined the B1G, then Notre Dame would come calling shortly after.

If the Big Ten were solely interested in building a national super-conference and was OK with chucking much of its historical roots, these 5 + Washington would make 20.

That 20 would scarcely resemble the Big Ten, but it would be a financial and academic and multi-sport athletic machine that would make this newfangled SEC look weak.

 

[A_Slab_of_Bacon]

If the Big Ten were solely interested in building a national super-conference and was OK with chucking much of its historical roots, these 5 + Washington would make 20.

That 20 would scarcely resemble the Big Ten, but it would be a financial and academic and multi-sport athletic machine that would make this newfangled SEC look weak.

I say just combine media rights, eat up all the geogrphy ... but leave the academic stuff and conferences to their own devices.

 

[Some guy]

I say just combine media rights, eat up all the geogrphy ... but leave the academic stuff and conferences to their own devices.

Combining media deals that make x with media deals that are worth x-20% doesn’t make the X per team bigger.

 

[Wally]

If the Big Ten were solely interested in building a national super-conference and was OK with chucking much of its historical roots, these 5 + Washington would make 20.

That 20 would scarcely resemble the Big Ten, but it would be a financial and academic and multi-sport athletic machine that would make this newfangled3 SEC look weak.

Oregon, Washington and 3 California schools.

Lock up the West Coast markets. That would be money right there. Its the only thing that really matters....

 

[Some guy]

Oregon, Washington and 3 California schools.

Lock up the West Coast markets. That would be money right there. Its the only thing that really matters....

Making more money matters less than making net money

 

[mngolf]

It sucks TX and OU picked SEC over B1G. B1G now needs to get a major team such as USC, Oregon, ND, x2 to make up. I also don’t believe Kevin Warren is the man to lead that as he has shown he is a complete failure to this point

They didn't. B1G wouldn't take OU and therefore had to go to the SEC.

 

[FormerFatOL]

Hell, forget expansion. I wish the Big 10 would actually go back to the Big 10. Let Penn State, Maryland and Rutgers go ACC and Nebby to....who cares.

 

[PhiloVance]

You know what other schools have one top 10 finish in the past 11 years? Cincinnati. Iowa State, Minnesota. Washington State. Houston. Iowa. Baylor. Mississippi State. Arizona. Missouri. This is who Texas keeps company with nowadays.

 

[Wally]

Making more money matters less than making net money

Adding Seattle, Oregon and California media markets would net more media money from BTN for the league.

 

[gophernut1]

I wish people would understand there is no going back. College Football has unofficially being the professional "minor" leagues of the NFL. Academics drove the bus for conference alignment 100 years ago, but the fact you have NIL, huge TV contracts and BCS playoffs . This makes college football and athletics a different beast all together. What we are moving to is a 40 team semi-pro football league made. B1G has a choice, be a part of making it happen or get run over and lost by those who are.

ESPN is seeing what is going on and driving the bus on this. TV money is what is ruling this song and dance. College athletics has to decide if it wants to play by those rules or not, without the NCAA it really doesn't have a choice. The pandemic and changes in college all together made it so the money mean more than ever and ESPN is capitalizing on that. I like the B1G combining with the PAC. It makes sense academically and for the new sports reality that is coming our way. Let the ACC and SEC fight for the South, the BIG can take the rest of the country.

 

[alchemy2u]

I agree that affiliating with those schools would be a boon for the B1G.

I don't think there's a workable solution to put these two conferences under the same roof, and I don't think they would be politically compatible even if they tried to do it. There are thousands of miles of prairie, mountains, and deserts between the two power centers of these conferences.

The priorities of the Pac 12 are not the same as the priorities of the B1G. People in San Francisco are not going to make decisions in the best interest of people in Minneapolis, much less people in Happy Valley. The power center would not stay in Chicago. Unless you want to watch Gopher games on Periscope, better off leaving the Pac 12 to do their own thing. They might be panicking, but the B1G doesn't _need_ to do anything to respond to this. They _should_ try to poach a few schools from the ACC.

Is this an attempt at comedy? The B1G and the PAC12 have had alliances for decades and decades. They are more aligned than any other conferences in the country. UCLA, USC, Stanford, Washington, etc, all have very similar priorities to the B1G. Much different than the typical SEC school that places sports way ahead of education. Do not try to inject your own political biases into a totally unrelated discussion.

 

[alchemy2u]

Well yeah they were. Academically, historically, financially, and athletically. They didn't even have the advertised number of schools.

Still, I think the Big 12 is better off trying to regroup and be creative about additions rather than scatter to the winds. The Big 12 for now still carries power conference status and they could help some G5 schools make the leap by upping their recruiting and resources. What if they added NDSU? Boise State? UCF? The Big 12 could try and re-tool itself as sort of a G5 super-league including much of its remaining core.

Morphing into a G5 “super-league” pushes them even farther back down the pecking order from the other power conferences. They are dead and have no chance of luring any big fish to keep them alive as a P5.

 

[alchemy2u]

Combining media deals that make x with media deals that are worth x-20% doesn’t make the X per team bigger.

Exactly. You need to create a package that requires the TV pay more for less attractive games in order to get access to the premier games.

 

[fmlizard]

I think folks are sleeping on FOX in this power shift, and are assuming ESPN runs all and will just walk into its own super league it owns 100%

FOX badly wants to compete with ESPN in sports programming, and has done a decent job of it. FOX owns the Big Ten Network and has increasingly made Big Ten coverage the showpiece of FOX and FS1 coverage. While the Big Ten still runs some games on ESPN properties, it is likely that the entire conference eventually comes under FOX properties.

Because FOX and ESPN are very likely going to compete, they could drive an arms race with the Big Ten and SEC at their center. This might lead to a couple of major super-conferences based on competing media rights, sort of like the AFC on CBS and the NFC on FOX. Other media giants could also enter the fray (Viacom/CBS, NBC/Comcast) and build their own circuits, with a western league based off the Pac 12 the most likely candidate.

If this happens, the Gophers are likely still a part of the A tier. The MSP media market, founding member status, and reasonable performance probably keep any boot-outs away from us, but we are probably going to lose a lot.

 

[GopherFanatic19]

I don’t think Gophers lose a lot. I feel PJ has us upcoming and if this stuff does happen we are in great shape to compete with USC Ohio state etc

 

[stocker08]

I'm surprised Texas A&M voted to invite as well. When this initially came out they seemed pretty against it since they would no longer be "The only Texas team in the SEC". Perhaps after some thought they decided they liked the fact that the rivalry could become yearly again, and feel pretty confident they could dominate it?

Probably realized that their one vote wouldn't matter and that it would be better to just get on board.

 

[stocker08]

I'm not sure what the B1G is supposed to do.

Texas and Oklahoma don't want to be in the B1G ... if they had they would have asked to be in it.

Beyond that what do you do? Get into a bidding war and tell them you'll give them more money than everyone else?

That's how you win the battle but in doing so possibly lose the war ...

I'm shocked that they didn't want to join Nebraska in taking over the Big Ten.

 

[Gophergrandpa]

We should just add USC and Oregon of Pac 12.

Plus UCLA and the Washington Huskies …

 

[Denver_Gopher]

What if the B1G and PAC 12 partnered with scheduling (one game per year per team - the PAC 12 would need to add 2, a joint media deal and Rose Bowl protection. Not a mega conference, but two conferences joined at the hip

 

[Plato]

I am all in for having some Pac!2 teams join the BIG.
Some are very good academic fits and there is the tradition of the playing teams from that conference in the Rose Bowl.
Most importantly, I would get to see the USC Song Girls every Saturday.

 

[matt]

Does anyone have a link that explains how a scheduling alliance with the PAC-12 results in more revenue for both sides? It’s not intuitive to me. From what I can see, it would result in fewer opportunities for revenue. For example, if every B1G and PAC-12 plays a game against a Group of 5 team in Week 1, that results in 26 games with ticket sales and televised commercials. However, a scheduling alliance in Week 1 results in 14 games with ticket sales and televised commercials. Without a doubt, the alliance results in more interesting games with more eye balls and more ticket revenue per game, but is it worth close to twice as much? Maybe, but I don’t know. It could also be a little messy trying to determine how to split the money from B1G vs. PAC-12 games as the current TV deals show that B1G teams are a bigger revenue draw than the PAC-12 teams.

I believe that a scheduling alliance could be financially beneficial for both sides, but I would like to understand how if that’s the case.

 

[Some guy]

Adding Seattle, Oregon and California media markets would net more media money from BTN for the league.

How would adding the entire pac 12 net more money than the pac 12 currently makes? Are you saying the big ten is just that much better at negotiating?
The pac 12 is worth x dollars per team this year
The big ten is worth x dollars per team this year.

For the big ten to make money adding the pac 12, they pac 12 X brought in would need to be bigger than the big ten X.




Because math.
combining leagues doesn’t create money out of thin air.

 

[Some guy]

Does anyone have a link that explains how a scheduling alliance with the PAC-12 results in more revenue for both sides? It’s not intuitive to me. From what I can see, it would result in fewer opportunities for revenue. For example, if every B1G and PAC-12 plays a game against a Group of 5 team in Week 1, that results in 26 games with ticket sales and televised commercials. However, a scheduling alliance in Week 1 results in 14 games with ticket sales and televised commercials. Without a doubt, the alliance results in more interesting games with more eye balls and more ticket revenue per game, but is it worth close to twice as much? Maybe, but I don’t know. It could also be a little messy trying to determine how to split the money from B1G vs. PAC-12 games as the current TV deals show that B1G teams are a bigger revenue draw than the PAC-12 teams.

I believe that a scheduling alliance could be financially beneficial for both sides, but I would like to understand how if that’s the case.

The same way the big ten adding a 9th game was. The 9th game eliminated some home games for teams but the 7 extra big ten games brought greater value than the 10-14 non conference games.

 

[matt]

The same way the big ten adding a 9th game was. The 9th game eliminated some home games for teams but the 7 extra big ten games brought greater value than the 10-14 non conference games.

That is a very relevant point, but did the 9th game actually add extra revenue? It may have, but other conferences considered a 9th conference game and they decided not to. If a 9th game would result in more money, why would other conferences not play one as well?

 

[matt]

How would adding the entire pac 12 net more money than the pac 12 currently makes? Are you saying the big ten is just that much better at negotiating?
The pac 12 is worth x dollars per team this year
The big ten is worth x dollars per team this year.

For the big ten to make money adding the pac 12, they pac 12 X brought in would need to be bigger than the big ten X.




Because math.
combining leagues doesn’t create money out of thin air.

Below is a very rudimentary attempt at showing one factor that could result in more money by adding teams. All numbers below are dumbed down to make math easier, and there are a million factors this doesn't include. It could also be wildly off base for all I know.

Pretend that right now:
- B1G conference games average 100 viewers each
- PAC-12 conference games average 75 viewers each

Over the course of a season that results in:
- B1G: 100 viewers x 63 conference games = 6,300 viewers
- PAC: 75 viewers x 54 conference games = 4,050 viewers
- Total: 10,350 viewers

There are people in the midwest today that have BTN but not the PAC-12 Network. Similarly, there are people in the west that have the PAC-12 Network but not BTN. In a combined conference, it is very likely that more people will have the new Big-PAC Network channel than currently have BTN or the PAC-12 Network. This is likely to result in more average viewers per game. Let's pretend this results in an average of 120 viewers per game.

Over the course of a season that results in:
- Big-PAC Super Conference: 120 viewers x 117 conference games = 14,040 viewers

That would be 36% more viewers than before without increasing the number of games. An important factor not included here is the monthly fee provided to the network from cable/satellite/TV subscribers. This is the issue that the drives us to minimize the overlapping viewer geography. If you add the areas with a lot of TV sets such as LA, San Francisco, Seattle, and Oregon while minimizing the number of schools to spread the money, the increased viewership and increased subscriptions could be bigger per school than it is currently for the B1G.

 

[Some guy]

Below is a very rudimentary attempt at showing one factor that could result in more money by adding teams. All numbers below are dumbed down to make math easier, and there are a million factors this doesn't include. It could also be wildly off base for all I know.

Pretend that right now:
- B1G conference games average 100 viewers each
- PAC-12 conference games average 75 viewers each

Over the course of a season that results in:
- B1G: 100 viewers x 63 conference games = 6,300 viewers
- PAC: 75 viewers x 54 conference games = 4,050 viewers
- Total: 10,350 viewers

There are people in the midwest today that have BTN but not the PAC-12 Network. Similarly, there are people in the west that have the PAC-12 Network but not BTN. In a combined conference, it is very likely that more people will have the new Big-PAC Network channel than currently have BTN or the PAC-12 Network. This is likely to result in more average viewers per game. Let's pretend this results in an average of 120 viewers per game.

Over the course of a season that results in:
- Big-PAC Super Conference: 120 viewers x 117 conference games = 14,040 viewers

That would be 36% more viewers than before without increasing the number of games. An important factor not included here is the monthly fee provided to the network from cable/satellite/TV subscribers. This is the issue that the drives us to minimize the overlapping viewer geography. If you add the areas with a lot of TV sets such as LA, San Francisco, Seattle, and Oregon while minimizing the number of schools to spread the money, the increased viewership and increased subscriptions could be bigger per school than it is currently for the B1G.

Yeah or fewer people watch Oregon vs Purdue than would’ve watched Oregon vs Washington state

 

[Some guy]

That is a very relevant point, but did the 9th game actually add extra revenue? It may have, but other conferences considered a 9th conference game and they decided not to. If a 9th game would result in more money, why would other conferences not play one as well?

Not sure. I’m sure someone does the math for the network and for the conference


I could see the big ten adding 2-6 teams from out west. I can’t see them adding all 12. Too many mouths to feed to make it profitable.

drop Oregon state, Washington state, Arizona, Cal, Utah I start to believe it’s a money maker.


If the whole pac 12 is basically power 5 dead weight, you can’t take them and make MORE money when you have to subsidize them.

A scheduling agreement could work because then there doesn’t have to be a revenue sharing agreement