Texas Wahoo

Eh - it just seems like particularly loud saber-rattling to me. For me, that video confirms the reason for going public like this, and that is to satiate the fanbase and make FSU and its administrators look like the good guys. Every comment is something like "Hell yeah! Tell them to call us Daddy!" or "We needed great leadership like this." In a decade, when everything is mostly changed, it may be harder to pull off, but it will work for a few years at least.

Cincinnati is pretty close to WVU. UCF is actually a bit further away from WVU than KU is.

The obvious distinction between the FSU situation and every other school that has moved so far is the fact that there is 13 years left on a GOR. I am not sure why they are doing so much publicly, but I do not think it means anything vis-a-vis the other schools because the situation is so different. As others have said, it probably has something to do with embarrassing the ACC in order to get a more uneven share (whether through TV money, bowl money, etc.). It may also be to point the ire of the fanbase, etc. on the conference and not on FSU. "We are struggling because of the conference holding us back, not because of anything we have done wrong."

Not to mention the fact that the SEC deal actually ends before the ACC deal, so unless this leads to the SEC and ESPN extending their agreement a decade before it ends (which is going to cost ESPN a fortune), those schools could actually join the Big Ten sooner in such a scenario, assuming ESPN is actually that concerned about that happening. I can't imagine that ESPN is sitting up at night worrying about which schools will be in which conference in 13 years after all of their current deals are over.

I don't see why either ESPN or the ACC would want that. ESPN: I mean, I guess the reasoning would be to keep Florida State and Clemson in an SEC broadcasted conference. But they are already in an SEC broadcasted conference with an ESPN deal that is actually longer than the SEC's new deal by a couple of years. ACC: I see no benefit for them. Each school keeps getting the same amount of money they would get and their conference gets markedly worse. SEC: Unless ESPN is going to pay the conference even more money per school, I do not see how the SEC agrees to this either - which just makes ESPN agreeing to it even less likely. It seems like only FSU and Clemson win in this scenario.

Again, the rights have already been granted. This is not an agreement to give FSU's TV rights to the ACC in the future; the rights are already given. That is the entire point of a Grant Of Rights vs. just a normal TV contract that the members would agree to. Sovereign immunity is the doctrine that a state cannot be sued without its consent, but the ACC does not need to sue FSU to get its TV rights, it owns them. Also, note that a North Carolina appeals court ruled against Maryland's motion to dismiss based on sovereign immunity when the ACC sued to enforce the termination clauses in the ACC agreement, before there was a grant of rights. I'm not sure why the result would be different here, even if we're just talking about the regular contract.

If there is a breach of fiduciary responsibility (and that's really hard to prove), the claim would be against John Swofford and possibly others in charge at the time of the signing of the media contract. There is no way that getting out of the GOR is a remedy for such a claim.

Whoopsie...

I'm assuming the ACC is based in North Carolina, which would mean there is diversity of parties, so the lawsuit would definitely end up in Federal Court regardless. The purpose of a Grant of Rights is to avoid issues like sovereign immunity. Florida State already gave their TV rights to the ACC - they no longer have those rights. If FSU leaves the ACC and goes to another conference, the rights stay with the ACC and the ACC would be the ones with the rights to broadcast FSU home games. FSU would have to sue to try to get those rights back, which would make sovereign immunity mute, because they would be the ones bringing a lawsuit. Now in practice, who knows what would happen if FSU threw caution to the wind, left the ACC and joined another conference, and tried to broadcast the games through that conference's TV deal. My guess is it would never happen because that conference would not want to get involved in a dispute like that. This is the reason that the SEC was all 2025 is great until Texas negotiated their way out of the GOR a year early.

This is my understanding as well. There is no way they are getting their next 13 years of TV rights back for $120 million:

To be clear, the Grant of Rights grants FSU's TV rights to the ACC through the length of the contract: "That deal, per Steve Wiseman of The News and Observer, based out of Raleigh, North Carolina, 'irrevocably and exclusively grants to the conference during the term all rights necessary for the conference to perform the contractual obligations of the conference expressly set forth in the ESPN agreement.'” The point of a Grant of Rights as opposed to an agreement to provide rights in the future is that the ACC owns those rights. Thus, FSU would have to sue the ACC to get out of the contract, and if successful, ESPN would sue the ACC for failing to provide the rights promised. This is all theoretical because I cannot imagine it ever going this far.

Not sure where the $120 million comes from, but if that is all that it takes to break free from a GOR 13 years early, that's a pretty week GOR. Also, what on earth does "Alford said FSU will look at windows if conference realignment significantly affects the Pac-12, for example. " mean? Look at windows?

And you guys thought Spelling Bees don't pay the bills...

CU would probably complain as well.

Anything interesting in this?

The article I posted suggested that it will be like the MLS deal where you pay $99 a year for MLS content separate from the payment for normal Apple plus. It’s not likely to be like the MLB deal where you get it just for having a subscription to Apple plus.

https://nypost.com/2023/02/21/apple-emerges-as-potential-landing-spot-for-pac-12-football/ If this ends up being a separate deal where you have to pay $X per year for Pac 12 content, that is way worse than just being on Amazon Prime available to everyone with Prime. No one that is not a fan of a Pac 12 team is going to fork over money for just Pac 12 sports.

This logic doesn't make any sense. If LSU would have no one but OU to play on the last week of the year; having them play A&M would leave Texas with no one at all to play, because they obviously cannot play OU that weekend. So either way, you are going to have to move one of the other rivalry games if you want everyone to have a rivalry game that weekend.

Singles not going well so far. Already lost two first sets and down in two others.

I had not realized that “the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry” had recently caught up to “the South’s Oldest Rivalry” (UVA/UNC) because they played twice in 2017.

I would be surprised if UVA/UNC split up. If they had a choice, I am not sure which way they would go (SEC vs. B1G), but I think it would be together.

It is the flagship University of a decently sized state that is relatively wealthy and growing and that has disproportionate influence in DC. It is also one of the few schools that is located in geographic proximity for both major conferences (especially when paired with UNC). It does not hurt that is is a great academic school with good non-football sports. Obviously football is questionable, but perhaps being in a major conference could help it keep some of it's home-grown recruits from going to Penn State.

Ah yes, a five team pod in which all of the teams do not play each other...

I was looking at the list of SEC champions and two things struck me. First, no team that has joined the SEC since 1932 has ever won an SEC championship; and second, only six teams have won an outright SEC championship since Ole Miss in 1963. So really, Alabama, UGA, Florida, LSU, Tennessee, and Auburn are the only ones that have won championships in sixty years. If you add Texas, OU, and A&M (purely based on willingness to spend), then you have nine potential champions and seven also-rans. Optimal fairness would probably be to give all nine of the potential champions two other potential champions and one of the others. Each of the others can get one or two potential champions to fill out the schedule, but it does not really matter.