I personally thought that a rebuilt PAC with:
SMU, SDSU, Rice, Tulane, Army, Navy, Air Force, and CSU was their best option
that is a really strong set of academics there, you do have Navy and Army across the country, but that is more their issue than anyone in the PAC 4, that is a national following with San Diego being appealing for Navy, you get all 3 Academies together, and you have some "markets" even if the teams in them are not really delivering them
I think looking at a 5 or 6 year contract to wait out further developments would have made that work for the PAC 4.....as of now I am not confident that the ACC will fall apart after all Big Bad Texas did not break the Big 12 GOR along with OU so who the fuck thinks that FSU and Clemson will get it done with a very similar GOR
even then there are still exit fees in place for the ACC members that go beyond the GOR (the Big 12 goes to 2111) so if something breaks the GOR somehow and Stanford and Cal want to jump.....well they are still on the hook for exit fees after taking pretty much shit money in the ACC
in addition no matter what people thought the Big 10 was pretty clearly not at all interested and I do not think the Big 12 wanted the headaches of Cal and Stanford (plus the other 4 that had blindly followed Stanford to a PAC collapse) and I do not think Stanford and Cal wanted it either
so you have Stanford and Cal hoping that FSU and Clemson can do what Texas and OU could not and then still having to pay a large exit fee to the ACC and that is on the hopes that their athletics do not completely fall apart in the ACC and that the Big 10 or someone else that never wanted them now or that they did not want will suddenly look good to them or invite them
seems like a terrible risk and a really poorly thought out plan