Report: OU & Texas reach out to join SEC

BillBrasky4Cy

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Really hope JP is leading instead of following. We really need ESPN/OU/TX to offer some kind of settlement since we cannot afford to wait until 2025 in limbo. Problem is they know this too. ESPN tried to accelerate things, but OU and TX can just wait us out and borrow against their new $EC payday.

Right now I'm:
75% zombie league
15% AAC
10% MW
0% BIG or PAC

Yes, one of the best AD's in the country is just sitting on his hands and hoping this all works out for ISU.... I'm just praying we don't see him on a jet ski again this weekend :jimlad:
 

AuH2O

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Time will tell. It is not my intent to trigger such volatile emotions from some of you. It is just a view. No more no less. My view is likely more objective than most on this forum. With that said, time will prove me right or it will prove me wrong. I want ISU and Iowa to remain nationally relevant. Neither school is in a strong position over the next 2-15 years.

I wish everyone a good day!

You are correct that neither ISU or Iowa or well positioned IF things head the way of a select 30-40 team league. But then again, I very strongly believe that no college team will ultimately do well in that scenario, and it will take only about 5 years from that point and college football will be a very niche sport, and financially will start a decline as well. One of the big mistakes people are making is seeing that the contracts for media are still very large, but need to understand that 1. Attendance pre-COVID most places was dropping, 2. Last year viewership absolutely tanked in CFB, 3. Every football product non-NFL and non-college football has been an absolute and utter failure. 4. Participation in football in youth and HS has been absolutely plummeting for years.

MLB teams are making TONS of money, but nobody in their right mind would think that MLB is healthy right now.

It is a simple matter of product differentiation. CFB is a very different product from the NFL, and that is a requirement for it to be successful. If you make a league that is essentially an NFL but with less talent and skill, it is going to ultimately fail. Same goes for college basketball, but I think a lot of people in CBB seem to get this.

But people are right to call you out on thinking ISU is going to be relegated to the MAC. A team that in a 7-6 year (2019) was 21st in the nation in attendance, and had the TV viewership ISU did last year has far too much value to be in the MAC, MWC, or be absorbed by the AAC. That's why the ESPN plan was so ******* stupid. The remaining Big 12 teams at worst are absorbing the best of the AAC. That's worst case scenario, unless this sort of NFL-lite plan kicks into action in the next couple of years.
 

Bestaluckcy

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Yes, one of the best AD's in the country is just sitting on his hands and hoping this all works out for ISU.... I'm just praying we don't see him on a jet ski again this weekend :jimlad:

JP is welcome to do anything he would like to do after this deal gets signed ;) .
 

SEIOWA CLONE

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I agree on the PAC 12. If they don't do something now, they will have no good options to expand at all. I'm not sure the Big 10 needs Pacific exposure, but if they did, the remainder of the Big 12 and Pac 12 getting together is an attractive option (3rd behind a Big Ten invite and an invite to an intact PAC 12).
I agree that its the better than a AAC/ Big 12 merger of some type, but how much money is Fox going to pay for a conference with few anchor teams to build the conference on?

Fox will have as much as the Pac 12 and Big 10 about what is going to happen, is it in their best interest to merge the best of the Pac 12 into the Big 10 or to merge the remaining Big 12 schools into the Big 10 and Pac 12. Until that decision is made we are struck in limbo.
 

HFCS

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Nobody even knows what the postseason will look like yet.

In terms of expense, FCS buy games are cheaper than G5 buy games. If we are playing 9 conference games a year, we could fill out the schedule with all home-and-home series and get 6 home games per year, or we could have one buy game spot to alternate between 6 and 7 home games (which is what we do now with a Big 12 budget). Not sure which would be most cost effective.

If our new league is especially poor, we could be the team getting bought in a buy game in years where we have 5 home conference games, too. Some SEC or B1G program could pay us $1.5-2M to go play them.

The committee has proven they reward brand names not schedules. TCU was required to play 13 games to qualify. 12 games did not tell them enough so 13 game Ohio state got in with a weaker SOS. Then another year Ohio State only needed six games when everybody else had 11 or 12. It doesn't get more irrational and hypocritical than that.

If we went back to the previous and superior BCS ranking it might help to schedule all top non conf, this small committee is never going to value a strong schedule unless it happens to be one of their brands.
 

LivntheCyLife

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There is zero chance the B1G and the Pac12 sit on their hands. They both will need more teams in order to grab the available TV inventory. As it sits now, the Pac needs the central time zone and the B1G needs the Pacific zone in order to sweeten the next round of negotiations.

Whether they need more teams really depends on Fox's plans. It's pretty clear ESPN is angling to have a headline conference with the SEC and fill up the rest of their inventory with AAC/MAC content that can be had for cheap. If Fox took the same approach trying to get some Pac teams to the Big 10, the rest of college football is in trouble.
 

BillBrasky4Cy

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In my view, with the landscape of college athletics changing, conference affiliation matters exponentially more going forward. My opinion is that both ISU and UI are on the outside looking in. The best chance for one of them to remain relevant is for the other to take a back seat. Even then, it is hard for me believe either school will be relevant on the national stage 15 years from now.

Hawk fans who are taking joy in what is happening to ISU are naive to think otherwise. What is best for the state of Iowa would be for both teams to be nationally relevant. With that said, it seems clear to me that JP and other Big 12 conference schools sought indications of interest from other conferences and were politely told "not now".

Digging in until 2025 will end badly. Breaking away within 1 year will end badly. The remaining 8 will hold out as long as they can to make UT/OU pay as much as possible, but JP seems to understand they are ending up in the MAC no matter what. You might as well seek as much in damages as you can in the process. UI will face a similar fate by 2035 is my guess.

Politely go f*ck yourself. This is an absolutely horrible take from a tavern hok.
 

Cyclonepride

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I agree that its the better than a AAC/ Big 12 merger of some type, but how much money is Fox going to pay for a conference with few anchor teams to build the conference on?

Fox will have as much as the Pac 12 and Big 10 about what is going to happen, is it in their best interest to merge the best of the Pac 12 into the Big 10 or to merge the remaining Big 12 schools into the Big 10 and Pac 12. Until that decision is made we are struck in limbo.

IMO, it really depends on who and how many the Big Ten would take, but there are quite a few strong programs that would be conceivably left, and I think the anchors, while initially weak, would develop over the next few years.
 

SEIOWA CLONE

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IMO, it really depends on who and how many the Big Ten would take, but there are quite a few strong programs that would be conceivably left, and I think the anchors, while initially weak, would develop over the next few years.
The rumor is 4 to 6, they are interested in USC, UCLA, Oregon, Washington, and then 2 of the following Cal, Colorado, Utah and maybe Stanford.

That leaves the Big 12 the Arizona schools, Wash. ST, Oregon St. and two of Cal, Colorado, Utah or Stanford. Now which one of those schools is going to be an anchor school for the conference? Maybe Cal or Stanford, with who from the remaining Big 12 OSU, ISU, TCU, what network is going to pay 40 million for those schools?

This option is bad but not horrible like dissolving the conference or adding in ACC and MW teams.
 

CascadeClone

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No ****. We’ll all be joining a new league.

Yeah, and actually, if I am a coach recruiting a kid, that's my pitch:
"looks like we will be in conference X or Y in a couple years, isn't that exciting!?!"

If you are Neal Brown, the X and Y are ACC and SEC, and if you are CMC it's Pac12 or B1G. You just make sure to say "looks like" or "think so" or whatever other caveat you want to use.
 

Cyclonepride

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The rumor is 4 to 6, they are interested in USC, UCLA, Oregon, Washington, and then 2 of the following Cal, Colorado, Utah and maybe Stanford.

That leaves the Big 12 the Arizona schools, Wash. ST, Oregon St. and two of Cal, Colorado, Utah or Stanford. Now which one of those schools is going to be an anchor school for the conference? Maybe Cal or Stanford, with who from the remaining Big 12 OSU, ISU, TCU, what network is going to pay 40 million for those schools?

This option is bad but not horrible like dissolving the conference or adding in ACC and MW teams.

I'm really having issues seeing the workability of an 18 or 20 team conference. Just seems to water down the desirable match ups each year (even with the Big Ten at 14 teams, it seems like you have way too many years where good teams don't end up playing each other).
 

cyrocksmypants

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The rumor is 4 to 6, they are interested in USC, UCLA, Oregon, Washington, and then 2 of the following Cal, Colorado, Utah and maybe Stanford.

That leaves the Big 12 the Arizona schools, Wash. ST, Oregon St. and two of Cal, Colorado, Utah or Stanford. Now which one of those schools is going to be an anchor school for the conference? Maybe Cal or Stanford, with who from the remaining Big 12 OSU, ISU, TCU, what network is going to pay 40 million for those schools?

This option is bad but not horrible like dissolving the conference or adding in ACC and MW teams.
I really struggle to see USC voluntarily leave the Pac. Aren’t they a founding member?
 

isufbcurt

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I'm really having issues seeing the workability of an 18 or 20 team conference. Just seems to water down the desirable match ups each year (even with the Big Ten at 14 teams, it seems like you have way too many years where good teams don't end up playing each other).

Maybe that's the point though. They can have all the top teams avoid each other and have good enough records to make the playoffs.
 
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cygrads

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An undeniable law of physics when it comes to college football (or basically any form of competition) is that one team's success must come at the expense of another team. And this simple law of physics is the fatal flaw of the superconference.

The "blue blood" programs became blue bloods because they had a long history of success in their respective conferences. They achieved this long history of success because their conferences included weaker programs.

When you stack these blue blood programs into the same conference, the majority of them will no longer enjoy that degree of success. Their fans will become unhappy and their coaching staff will turn over. Of course, all these blue blood programs think they'll still be successful, but it's mathematically impossible.

Having many conferences stocked with programs of varying levels of success is vital to the ecosystem of college football. ESPN and the SEC have just destroyed this ecosystem because they no longer feel that $50+ million per year in TV revenue is satisfactory.

College football as we know it is about to die and greed will be the cause of death.
Completely agree, at what point do the Vanderbilt, MSU, Ole Miss, Kentucky's going to start pushing back against their conference when they keep bringing in teams that will only push them further down. I don't know how many times I've seen ESPN graphics show only the top 5 teams in each division so you don't even see the bottom couple of teams. Is the money really worth being completely marginalized!?
 

Cyclonepride

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I really struggle to see USC voluntarily leave the Pac. Aren’t they a founding member?

I struggle to see the Big Ten wanting to extend that far west, or the PAC 12 teams wanting to join up with a conference that far east. The Big Ten is already strong. The PAC 12 has a nice conference that simply needs to expand to strengthen it's standing and broaden its reach. Picking up four Big 12 teams would do that (I'm thinking ISU, KU, OSU and one other).
 
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SEIOWA CLONE

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I struggle to see the Big Ten wanting to extend that far west, or the PAC 12 teams wanting to join up with a conference that far east. The Big Ten is already strong. The PAC 12 has a nice conference that simply needs to expand to strengthen it's standing and broaden its reach. Picking up four Big 12 teams would do that (I'm thinking ISU, KU, OSU and one other).
The only AAU schools left in the Big 12 is ISU and KU, anyone else would not get an invite, the Big 10 is standing their ground on that one.

I agree with your thought of "do the Pac 12 school want to fly all the way to the eastern time zone a couple times a year to play games?" For every trip USC gets to Ohio State and Penn St. they also have a trip to Maryland and Rutgers. Just cannot see their fans all excited about playing Purdue, Illinois either. As much as EIU fans love to talk about Iowa City, its not a destination place to visit if you are on the West coast, Chicago and Minneapolis are fun trips but Iowa City?
 

1UNI2ISU

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I struggle to see the Big Ten wanting to extend that far west, or the PAC 12 teams wanting to join up with a conference that far east. The Big Ten is already strong. The PAC 12 has a nice conference that simply needs to expand to strengthen it's standing and broaden its reach. Picking up four Big 12 teams would do that (I'm thinking ISU, KU, OSU and one other).

See, I'm not sure the Pac12 really cares about what other people think about their sports programs. It's an academics dominated league that dances to the beat of it's own drum. It's a Power league in name only at this point and there doesn't seem to be any real urgency to change it.

In their ideal world they'd go back to the traditional bowl system that gets them games against the Big Ten and bowing down to UCLA Basketball.