Realignment Megathread (All The Moves)

Kinch

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Sep 19, 2021
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Looks like they all shared their homework assignment this weekend. Sorry, you're going to have to do it again because you all copied from each other.


An ad who doesn't want to be identified making that quote, tells you all you need to know about the P12's troubles.
 

12191987

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Aug 20, 2012
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The networks always put OU and UT on the best channels, so there were only 12 non-OU/UT games on those four channels per year.
If the p12 goes all in on the 1030 est kickoffs, that means Oregon, Washington and Utah will be playing at that time most weeks. It helps those teams but the other teams will get pushed to less attractive time slots, losing the current bump they get from having no power conference to compete with. If the purpose of the league is going to be to try to prop up the best 3 or 4 programs at the expense of the other schools TV numbers, why would the others be interested at all?

Even worse, rumors are the Pac-12 schools are discussing unequal revenue sharing!

Seems like you’d have to be a pretty sad-sack, desperate little program to submit to that kind of humiliation for a few tens of millions in extra media deal dollars in your pocket.
 

FriendlySpartan

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I am not addressing demographics, which I think is what you are getting at, but I do have a side point.

It's my belief (not knowledge) that the value of games to the networks goes up EXPONENTIALLY with viewership. Low end games are almost valueless, because they can get de minimus viewers for free, just showing rerun cop shows for nearly nothing.

So breaking that down with some guesswork:
The SEC has 56 conference games. And if they are getting roughly $700M for them (no CFP money in this), that's $12.5M per game.
What if the 10 highest viewer games drive 80% of the value? e.g. 10 games are worth $55M each, and the other 46 games are only worth $3M each? And even of those, it probably splits that 10 games with 2-3M viewers are worth $10M each, and the other 36 games with <1M viewers are worth $1M each.

It would explain why an expanded CFP with 11 games would be worth $1B as we see in the reports and estimates. They'd all be the highest rated games of the year.
This is correct. The common figure thrown around is that games with 4mil or more viewers is the number that the broadcasters are very interested in but there aren’t that many of those.

One thing that I’m seeing talked about is that if you aren’t on one of the major networks your ratings take a hit regardless. So for all the fans out there would you be ok with a massive ratings hit if you moved to a streaming platform like Apple, Amazon, peacock, etc as long as the money was good?
 
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1UNI2ISU

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Jan 30, 2013
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Waterloo
Interesting if you look at that and compare Iowa with Big 12 schools and extrapolate that to conference championships. Iowa vs. Michigan (conference championship) drew 11 million, Iowa vs. Illinois drew 600,000, Indiana vs. Michigan drew 2.6 million. That means the 11 million that watched the Big 10 champiolnship, were concerned only about Michigan, not Iowa. Compare that to Baylor vs. OSU, over 8 million. Be interesting if the big 10 didn't have either MU or OSU in the championship what that would do for their ratings. Another amazing thing is what BYU adds to the ratings and that there are several combination of games that the Big 12 offers besides OU and Tex that would beat several Big 10 combinations involving Michigan.
The Iowa-Illinois game being a 1:00 kick on FS1 while the Indiana-Michigan game was a primetime kick on FOX had nothing to do with it, I'm sure. Then you're comparing two regular season games involving awful teams to the Big 12 title game.

The last Big Ten Title game without Michigan or Ohio State got 9.2 Million viewers for Wisconsin-Penn State in 2016. The Big Ten Title game is ratings juggernaut because you've got name brand schools with giant, national alumni bases playing in a standalone prime time game on broadcast television.

Somehow this post gets worse the more I think about it.
 

Stormin

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Apr 11, 2006
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I simply don't agree. The only time slot they miss out on is 11:00 AM Central. Also, it's a little unfair to judge current TV deals that were signed over a decade ago into a very different media landscape and even if we were, their deal is marginally different than the current Big 12 deal and I think the Big 12 losing Texas and Oklahoma will ultimately have a bigger impact than the Pac 12 losing UCLA and USC. We will see, I guess.

Then I will wait for the super deal the PAC 12 comes back with. PAC 12 should not be afraid at all then. Clearly a position of strength.
 

CascadeClone

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Oct 24, 2009
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This is correct. The common figure thrown around is that games with 4mil or more viewers is the number that the broadcasters are very interested in but there aren’t that many of those.

One thing that I’m seeing talked about is that if you aren’t on one of the major networks your ratings take a hit regardless. So for all the fans out there would you be ok with a massive ratings hit if you moved to a streaming platform like Apple, Amazon, peacock, etc as long as the money was good?

That's a REAL interesting question.

On one hand, if there aren't many viewers on streaming platform, then the money SHOULDN"T be that great, right? But then again it might be-- they have a different revenue model, and they might just be willing to overpay to get into the business.

But if you suddenly have much less viewership, does that lower exposure hurt your fan interest and future product in the longer term? Or conversely, will that viewership increase substantially as tastes change over time?

I sure af don't know. I think hedging your bets for now with a bit of both would be the best course of action.
 
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heitclone

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Way up there
Even worse, rumors are the Pac-12 schools are discussing unequal revenue sharing!

Seems like you’d have to be a pretty sad-sack, desperate little program to submit to that kind of humiliation for a few tens of millions in extra media deal dollars in your pocket.
This is why I'm glad to be in the big 12, it's balanced enough to avoid bigger brands throwing their weight around. If the pac 12 gets away with this, it should really scare the smaller brands in leagues like the big 10 and SEC. Most teams could probably accept teams like tOSU and Michigan wanting more money but what will programs like Minnesota, Iowa, NW and Illinois do when Nebraska wants a bigger share? Huskers have struggled in part because being the biggest brand in the big 10 west, they have had made for TV matchups against teams like Penn St, Michigan and Ohio St every year. The are taking bullets for these smaller brand programs.
 
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aeroclone

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This is correct. The common figure thrown around is that games with 4mil or more viewers is the number that the broadcasters are very interested in but there aren’t that many of those.

One thing that I’m seeing talked about is that if you aren’t on one of the major networks your ratings take a hit regardless. So for all the fans out there would you be ok with a massive ratings hit if you moved to a streaming platform like Apple, Amazon, peacock, etc as long as the money was good?
To continue down this line, why do we think Amazon or Apple want to outbid traditional outlets if the ratings of the games would be really low on the streaming platform? Just because those companies have a lot of cash in the bank doesn't mean they want to spend it on CFB without a positive return.
 

FriendlySpartan

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This is why I'm glad to be in the big 12, it's balanced enough to avoid bigger brands throwing their weight around. If the pac 12 gets away with this, it should really scare the smaller brands in leagues like the big 10 and SEC. Most teams could probably accept teams like tOSU and Michigan wanting more money but what will programs like Minnesota, Iowa, NW and Illinois do when Nebraska wants a bigger share? Huskers have struggled in part because being the biggest brand in the big 10 west, they have had made for TV matchups against teams like Penn St, Michigan and Ohio St every year. The are taking bullets for these smaller brand programs.
I don’t think that’s the primary reasons for their struggles but this year they don’t play OSU, sparty or Penn state so we will see. Last year their schedule was brutal but usually it isn’t that bad.
 

WhoISthis

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In terms of schools left out of P2, is it better to have 3 weakened rump conferences trying to share the P2 scraps, or consolidate into a 3rd super conference?

A PAC with SDSU and Fresno is further from P2 than if 6-8 are part of a 24 school consolidation.

Same with Big 12. Also ACC, once they lose schools.

This is just a pillow fight over which conference lineage survives, but that’s just pride, and for several reasons it can only be the Big 12. Exit fees, central location, better time zone and college athletic markets, less risk of P2 departures, etc

The 6-8 PAC schools need to bite the pillow and accept it’s the P2 era.
 

Kinch

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The Iowa-Illinois game being a 1:00 kick on FS1 while the Indiana-Michigan game was a primetime kick on FOX had nothing to do with it, I'm sure. Then you're comparing two regular season games involving awful teams to the Big 12 title game.

The last Big Ten Title game without Michigan or Ohio State got 9.2 Million viewers for Wisconsin-Penn State in 2016. The Big Ten Title game is ratings juggernaut because you've got name brand schools with giant, national alumni bases playing in a standalone prime time game on broadcast television.

Somehow this post gets worse the more I think about it.
Not a great rating for the Big 10, Baylor and OSU had viewership in that ballpark this year. Thanks, you just made my point.
 

CyJack13

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May 21, 2010
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This is why I'm glad to be in the big 12, it's balanced enough to avoid bigger brands throwing their weight around. If the pac 12 gets away with this, it should really scare the smaller brands in leagues like the big 10 and SEC. Most teams could probably accept teams like tOSU and Michigan wanting more money but what will programs like Minnesota, Iowa, NW and Illinois do when Nebraska wants a bigger share? Huskers have struggled in part because being the biggest brand in the big 10 west, they have had made for TV matchups against teams like Penn St, Michigan and Ohio St every year. The are taking bullets for these smaller brand programs.

That’s not how B10 schedules work.
 

StPaulCyclone

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Duh!
I mean pulling out USC and UCLA (especially UCLA) probably barely effects the PAC teams vs pulling out our top schools dings us more. Also why pull out 2020? I would also be interested in seeing it plotted out year by year instead of an avg over several years.
All he proved OU/UT >>>>>>>UCLA/USC
 

agrabes

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Oct 25, 2006
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To continue down this line, why do we think Amazon or Apple want to outbid traditional outlets if the ratings of the games would be really low on the streaming platform? Just because those companies have a lot of cash in the bank doesn't mean they want to spend it on CFB without a positive return.
Right - and what Apple did pick up (MLS soccer) is something already is too niche to make it onto the major outlets. Amazon did pay up to buy NFL Thursday night games, but that's the NFL - it's the most watched sport in America so that makes sense.

On the other hand it is true that the business model is different. Their revenue is based on driving new subscribers rather than selling ads, though I'm sure they would run ads if they picked up live sports. Still seems hard to believe with all that that they could compete with the traditional broadcasters for primetime games.

The streamers are a T2/T3 option but no one would take them over the T1 primetime, imo. Even the proponents of going to streaming seem to feel that way now too.