Ohio State and Michigan are a class onto themselves. They can play Rutgers and pull 4 million OTA almost without fail.
Cowherd acting like Oregon, Washington, or even USC will do that now just because they are Big Ten is dumb. Yes, the big games will get bigger but ultimately nobody watches bad West Coast football and that not going to change because they swap Arizona schools for Indiana ones not named Notre Dame.
If they Big Ten truly schedules OSU/USC, Michigan/UCLA, Penn State/Oregon, and Nebraska/Washington all on a single day they absolutely would dominate that day in the ratings, but you can’t pull that off every week. The goal of setting the schedule will be to get 2-3 quality matchups for their OTA partners FOX/CBS/NBC but that’s not going to be possible every week. Someone will get stuck with Iowa/Michigan State or Wisconsin/Purdue.
Until the Big Ten gets Notre Dame, the SEC still has the advantage. Adding ND would give them 3 bonafide bluebloods that can draw in a every window every week plus plenty of second tier options that could fill a 4th OTA spot and a late night kick.
Still I think the quality will hold up well enough for the SEC. The SEC has 8 teams that have won BCS/CFP titles, the Big Ten even with 18 doesn’t even have 8 different teams that have made the CFP/BCSNCG.
Adding Texas/OU is also going to have a compounding effect on SEC ratings, Far more of our fans will now watch a game like UGA/Mizzou or Bama/UK than ever have before. They got a taste of the Texas market with aggy/LSU/Arkansas, but now they’ll get a lot more (and Texas/OU’s rating will likely see a bump as well).
The Big Ten may be better positioned with OTA slots and media markets, but the SEC has the better recruiting and football success. I don’t think either conference will fail so I think Cowherd’s take is relatively meaningless.