Realignment talk not going away

[clapclapclap 9000]

3 hours ago, Thiefery said:

I think it's a no brainer to bring in both AZ schools.. 

This ain't Noah's ark.

[Aqua Buddha 14488]

1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

We need to keep WV.  They've been a good school and more loyal to the B12 than fucking aggy or Corn ever were.  And I want to travel there for an away game sometime.

That's kind of where I'm at.  They've been a good add and, quite frankly, the 3rd largest fan base in the current Big 12.  Part of me thinks to take Nebraska, offer Arky and if they turn us down then offer UCF, who would take it.  That gets us into the Florida markets.

[LTbear 4152]

1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

We need to keep WV.  They've been a good school and more loyal to the B12 than fucking aggy or Corn ever were.  And I want to travel there for an away game sometime.

WVU is an odd fit geographically but in every other way they fit right in. I like having 'em here.

[Hurtlocker 2208]

5 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

We need to keep WV.  They've been a good school and more loyal to the B12 than fucking aggy or Corn ever were.  And I want to travel there for an away game sometime.

Agreed, and its a fun trip.   Made it a few years back.   Fuckers will give you shit non-stop, but they do it while passing you a drink, which is solid.

[Hurtlocker 2208]

And if we're having fun with the Pac, I said this before but basically none of it matters without USC.   So just fly in to say hi, like when interviewing Urban, and ask who they want to bring, up to 5 friends.

None of them are bus trips, so travel is going to be travel.   The Pac's travel is already shitty.

 

 

Edited December 22, 2020 by Hurtlocker

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

dammit

no corn at all

stop with corn

corn is fetch

they have the same value as minnesotra

iowa state is now more relevant than corn

 

[Caddox 952]

Why would we need both Arizona schools?

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

caddox, please provide a real-life vouch from someone you know that is also on the surl

[Caddox 952]

35 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

caddox, please provide a real-life vouch from someone you know that is also on the surl

I dont know anyone on here i dont think. I wouldnt do it anyways. 

[Kurt Bowels 213]

If 12 schools, you need at least 3 bluebloods and very little deadweight at the bottom. Deadweight can be one or more of the following: small fanbase, recruiting limitations, lack of media and/or recruiting footprint

A balanced league has some combo of bluebloods, large fan bases (not always bluebloods), great recruiting territory within the footprint and, hopefully, at least half the teams as strong top 10 or top 15 recruiting rankings on a typical year. Teams that have underrated recruiting within their state are good as well. Wisconsin is a good example. Utah is actually a good example of a growing fan base with a good, underrated recruiting base within the state borders. 

 

1. USC

2. OU

3. Texas

4. Oregon

5. Washington

6. UCLA

7. Oklahoma State

8. Arizona State

9. Utah

10. Texas Tech

11. Colorado 

12. Nebraska OR Kansas State OR Iowa State OR Arizona

 

First 10 or easy IMO

Both Arizona schools is a lot of deadweight. Try to get USC, who has hated the PAC for decades, to breakaway and you can cherry pick. If not, then take both Arizona schools in order to bust open the conference.

Utah isn't a top priority, but has more potential than given credit for in this thread. They are new to the P5 and can't add on to their stadium fast enough. Sellout every game. They will probably have a 60k-65K seat stadium within the next 10 years.

Colorado sucks. Admittedly put them in to connect the states, which isn't necessary.

 

[Kyle 207]

What does it say that Baylor has won more XII titles than Texas? You mad bruh?

[camel at sea 589]

No need to overcomplicate it.  Nebraska + 1.  Get the Huskers an annual game with OU.  Husker fans are happy.  They feel like a Big 8 wrong is righted.  Sooner fans are happy (no more boat rocking about leaving.)  It works financially.  NU might take a pay cut with that move, but it would be a small one on a per team basis.  They probably make up the difference with better travel and happier donors.  

Who should be the plus one?  It's probably gonna be a G5 school but NU's fanbase is large enough to carry someone like Cincinnati.  No harm asking CU or Arky if they want to be 12, though.

North:  NU, WVU, UC, ISU, KU, KSU
South:  OU, UT, TCU, BU, TTU, OSU

Something like that probably works.  9 game schedule + an annual cross-division game and everyone plays everyone home and home every three years or so.          

If SC wants out of the PAC, give them a Big 12 version of the ND deal with the ACC.  But make it football only.  They get CTZ exposure for football, big money, and nobody has to deal with travel issues.  Partial membership avoids travel issues.  They can park everything else next to Gonzaga or something.  They'd have enough empty schedule slots left over in football to play whichever PAC schools + ND that they want to play, too.  Everybody wins except the PAC and they're losing already.  

[ImissWallyPryor 9045]

59 minutes ago, Kurt Bowels said:

1. USC

2. OU

3. Texas

4. Oregon

5. Washington

6. UCLA

7. Oklahoma State

8. Arizona State

9. Utah

10. Texas Tech

11. & 12.
Pick two from Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas State, Iowa State, and Arizona

Then there’s the question of whether KU basketball is a better long-term bet than KSU football. 

Edited December 22, 2020 by ImissWallyPryor

[kopp0e 1135]

9 hours ago, Kurt Bowels said:

If 12 schools, you need at least 3 bluebloods and very little deadweight at the bottom. Deadweight can be one or more of the following: small fanbase, recruiting limitations, lack of media and/or recruiting footprint

A balanced league has some combo of bluebloods, large fan bases (not always bluebloods), great recruiting territory within the footprint and, hopefully, at least half the teams as strong top 10 or top 15 recruiting rankings on a typical year. Teams that have underrated recruiting within their state are good as well. Wisconsin is a good example. Utah is actually a good example of a growing fan base with a good, underrated recruiting base within the state borders. 

 

1. USC

2. OU

3. Texas

4. Oregon

5. Washington

6. UCLA

7. Oklahoma State

8. Arizona State

9. Utah

10. Texas Tech

11. Colorado 

12. Nebraska OR Kansas State OR Iowa State OR Arizona

 

First 10 or easy IMO

Both Arizona schools is a lot of deadweight. Try to get USC, who has hated the PAC for decades, to breakaway and you can cherry pick. If not, then take both Arizona schools in order to bust open the conference.

Utah isn't a top priority, but has more potential than given credit for in this thread. They are new to the P5 and can't add on to their stadium fast enough. Sellout every game. They will probably have a 60k-65K seat stadium within the next 10 years.

Colorado sucks. Admittedly put them in to connect the states, which isn't necessary.

 

XVI North:

Iowa State 

Nebraska 

Kansas 

Colorado 

Utah

California 

Oregon

Washington

 

XVI South:

UCLA

USC

Arizona State 

Texas

Texas Tech 

TCU

Oklahoma 

Oklahoma State 

 

1 annual cross-division game: Oklahoma v Nebraska/ Texas v California, ect. while the league expands footprint to 108+m. folks...

The 3rd tier network alignment would likely be with XVIN/ ESPN+ & 1st/ 2nd with Disney networks ABC/ ESPN, along with either (or both) of CBS & FOX...

 

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

8 hours ago, camel at sea said:

No need to overcomplicate it.  Nebraska + 1. 

 

i'm going to cut the next person who advocates corn

death

taxes

rona

aggy

corn

[IDIOTsavant 8437]

6 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

i'm going to cut the next person who advocates corn

death

taxes

rona

aggy

corn

How do you feel about hominy?

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

AAU:

Arizona

Cal

Colorado

Iowa State

Kansas

Stanford

Texas

UCLA

USC

Utah

in addition, corn were KICKED OUT of the AAU in 2011 and would not have stolen missorui's spot in the b1g if that had happened a year earlier

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_American_Universities

 

 

[Hurtlocker 2208]

5 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

AAU:

Arizona

Cal

Colorado

Iowa State

Kansas

Stanford

Texas

UCLA

USC

Utah

in addition, corn were KICKED OUT of the AAU in 2011 and would not have stolen missorui's spot in the b1g if that had happened a year earlier

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_American_Universities

 

 

That's a solid group, but Nebraska was persona non grata in the AAU long before the Big Ten invite.    Part of me thinks Perlman thought the other Big Ten Presidents would step in to save them after they moved.

They didn't.

Also, Oregon and Washington are AAU

Edited December 22, 2020 by Hurtlocker

[utee94 15742]

12 hours ago, Hurtlocker said:

And if we're having fun with the Pac, I said this before but basically none of it matters without USC.   So just fly in to say hi, like when interviewing Urban, and ask who they want to bring, up to 5 friends.

None of them are bus trips, so travel is going to be travel.   The Pac's travel is already shitty.

 

 

I've agreed with you for the most part, except I don't think it's 5 friends.  Even one might take away more than USC adds.  The PAC football properties simply aren't valuable.  If they were, they'd already be getting paid and wouldn't need any outside help.

[jinx 2635]

I have to admit I am curious to see what happens next.  I never liked the idea of joining the Big 10, and while the Pac merger that was floated during all of the movement in the past seemed intriguing, I think it would have been a bad decision in hindsight.

I am fully in the camp of expanding the league and reducing the conference games.  That would allow us to play the same sham game that the SEC does, where most of the good teams duck each other and pad their records feasting on the bottom half of the league and 4 OOC games.  That would allow a team like Kansas to find 4 teams they can beat, and change their record from 2-10 to 5-7 or something close to it.  The top teams can pad their resume and not all knock each other off, while having more flexibility to schedule other P5 teams.

I'm much less interested in the "who" mainly because I don't see teams like USC leaving the PAC or Arkansas leaving the SEC, even though it may be in their and the Big 12s best interest.  Obviously, we should get the best teams possible, but I would rather look east than west.

To @Al_4_ISU point, I think the discord in the Big 12 stems mostly from the point that it is the only P5 conference that most of us were alive when it began.  The fact that Nebraska was butt hurt from the beginning didn't help.  But I think it is good that OU and Texas seem to want to stay in the Big 12.  I don't think abandoning the center of the US to join an edge conference is in our best interest long term.  We need to stake down the center and grow.  

I was hopeful that CDC would help the Big 12 by focusing Texas and our admin on the health, growth and long term future of the Big 12.  I am less optimistic based on current events, but hope I am reading that wrong.  Regardless, there is something to be said about the passion and unity of the SEC and to a lesser extent, the Big 10.  Those schools want to be together and it starts at the top.  Texas and OU need to work to make the Big 12 a place to be.  Arguing for an 8 team playoff that includes all P5 champions would seem to be the right place to start.

Call me crazy, but I would personally be fine with taking UCF, Cincinnati or others in that range out east.  I was ok with the WVU add, but wished we had picked up Pitt or Louisville to make them a better fit.  I think we would need to do the same if we added someone like UCF.

TL;DR - We should definitely look to grow and alter our model to avoid the round robin format that kills our top teams and makes our conference championship game a useless rematch.

[Al_4_ISU 12408]

An 8 team playoff with P5 champs getting an auto bid would end the further consolidation of the existing P5 conferences instantly.

[utee94 15742]

2 minutes ago, Al_4_ISU said:

An 8 team playoff with P5 champs getting an auto bid would end the further consolidation of the existing P5 conferences instantly.

I don't know if it would end it. The PAC still has major viewership/attendance problems and will only fall further behind as the years go on.

But, it would certainly remove some urgency from it.

Edited December 22, 2020 by utee94

[Hurtlocker 2208]

6 minutes ago, utee94 said:

I've agreed with you for the most part, except I don't think it's 5 friends.  Even one might take away more than USC adds.  The PAC football properties simply aren't valuable.  If they were, they'd already be getting paid and wouldn't need any outside help.

There are very valuable properties in the Pac 12, including UCLA, Oregon, and Washington.  Cal and Stanford are no slouches either.   

The issue the Pac has isn't properties, outside the fact that they don't have any football powers at the moment, but that can be changed considering Cali pumps out talent.  The conference, though, is struggling with the ramifications of a few bad decisions and geography:

1 - While the west coast is populous and loaded, it is very spread out compared to the east coast and from the East Coast as well.    CFB eyeballs are driven by Eastern (47% of US population), Central (29%), Pacific (17%), and then Mountain time zones (7%), in that order.   Due to that, most Pac 12 games are played in front of a market of 80m instead of 250m.

2 - The deal, part one:  That CBS 3:30 eastern time slot for the SEC is basically the start of nationwide viewing and it gives a shit ton of exposure for the teams within it.   The other Big 4 can play in the noon eastern slot and still be in front of 200m people, so their secondary slot is still very valuable.   The Pac 12's deal didn't get them into these windows, matter a fact most of their games are structured for west coast timing.   Which, can be smart if you leverage your own market and can get everyone (See Birmingham), but in this case they needed to get outside their market.  This is why you see Oregon, Washington and USC fly to the east coast for made for tv early season games.   So instead of getting a larger audience, they're trying to maximize a terribly small audience and ended up relegated to timing windows that were unused by the other conferences, e.g. after prime time eastern.   No eyeballs, no money.

3 - The deal, part two:  The Pac12 Network was great in concept, terrible in execution.  Sports networks, outside ESPN, are inherently regional.   Even the best of them all, the Yes Network, is carved out of like 50 square miles.   Each non-football pro team goes with a small footprint around a major market and the NFL takes this to the max by carving up the US to show the games they think will be the highest rated in that specific metro area.  So the idea having 6 smaller networks instead of one big one, had some good stuff in it, but the issue became, "why do I need to pay for two channels?"   Creating a big Pac12Network and regional satellites meant they had to not only ask all the distributers to pony up twice, but they also had to feed that beast with inventory.   They made a very solid contract originally, but it was for 70-80% of their inventory and the rest was used to feed the PacN.   Since the PacN had no carriage, it made very little money, but had huge expenses, so very little made it back to the schools.   In reality, sports conferences (or teams for that matter), shouldn't really be in the distribution business.   When Larry got hard thinking he'd turn the Pac12 into a "media company" instead of a sports conference, they lost sight of, like, everything.

TLDR - its not that they don't have value, its that they don't maximize their value nor even realize 100% of the value.    They're sort of in the same place the SWC and Big 8 were 25 years ago.   If they don't find a way to get out of their bubble, by more than playing ND, they aren't going to reverse their trend line.   And, quite simply, they need to focus on football more than they do.

Raiding - you don't need them all.  One team in LA and one in SF is enough.   You don't need two from Oregon and Washington.   You likely don't need two from AZ either.  Matter a fact, none may work out because, to give Dodds some credit, he knew the money pointed east, not west.   Unless you could take select properties, enhance them to be world beaters again, AND only play them at 3:30 or PT against current Big 12, then you risk driving your own eyeballs west, instead of east.  

[Hurtlocker 2208]

31 minutes ago, jinx said:

 

Call me crazy, but I would personally be fine with taking UCF, Cincinnati or others in that range out east.  I was ok with the WVU add, but wished we had picked up Pitt or Louisville to make them a better fit.  I think we would need to do the same if we added someone like UCF.

TL;DR - We should definitely look to grow and alter our model to avoid the round robin format that kills our top teams and makes our conference championship game a useless rematch.

There is some value here too, but its longer term.   And, to date, we've been more focused on the short term in both righting the ship and trying to keep up with those whose ship was already righted.   But, look at the attention Cinci is getting this year.   Why couldn't you bridge the gap between TX and WVU with a Memphis(preferably Arky)/Cinci and spend a decade beefing them up.   You'd be better off in the long run than hitching up to San Fran.   Time Zones are a bitch.

[jinx 2635]

15 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

There is some value here too, but its longer term.   And, to date, we've been more focused on the short term in both righting the ship and trying to keep up with those whose ship was already righted.   But, look at the attention Cinci is getting this year.   Why couldn't you bridge the gap between TX and WVU with a Memphis(preferably Arky)/Cinci and spend a decade beefing them up.   You'd be better off in the long run than hitching up to San Fran.   Time Zones are a bitch.

Yep, and as already stated, you can't have all 4 time zones in one conference.  Also, abandoning WVU doesn't seem like the right long term decision for the health of the league or the short term optics.  Getting G5 teams that are fully committed to maximizing their football brand like Cincy, UCF and even Memphis would help.  Playing games in Memphis and Orlando would help offset the SEC raid that A&M has opened the door for.  A Louisiana team might be good.  Not sure who to bring with UCF, but I am not sure that they would really care about being isolated.  That school is printing cash and growing daily.  They would sell their soul for a spot in a P5.

If we aren't thinking long term with this re-org we are doing it wrong. East seems the way to go, and if you can't steal good names from the SEC and ACC, take the best G5 teams that have been all over the college football news for the past decade.

[Al_4_ISU 12408]

24 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

There is some value here too, but its longer term.   And, to date, we've been more focused on the short term in both righting the ship and trying to keep up with those whose ship was already righted.   But, look at the attention Cinci is getting this year.   Why couldn't you bridge the gap between TX and WVU with a Memphis(preferably Arky)/Cinci and spend a decade beefing them up.   You'd be better off in the long run than hitching up to San Fran.   Time Zones are a bitch.

Ohio and Tennessee both have a passion for football and currently have 3 P5 teams between them.  And one of them is a small private school with a tiny fanbase.

[LTbear 4152]

Cincy feels like a solid add to me, and did even before this year. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think they're one of the few (if not the only?) teams that was originally in a BCS conference that hadn't now found its way back into a P5 conference.

[utee94 15742]

46 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

There are very valuable properties in the Pac 12, including UCLA, Oregon, and Washington.  Cal and Stanford are no slouches either.   

The issue the Pac has isn't properties, outside the fact that they don't have any football powers at the moment, but that can be changed considering Cali pumps out talent.  The conference, though, is struggling with the ramifications of a few bad decisions and geography:

1 - While the west coast is populous and loaded, it is very spread out compared to the east coast and from the East Coast as well.    CFB eyeballs are driven by Eastern (47% of US population), Central (29%), Pacific (17%), and then Mountain time zones (7%), in that order.   Due to that, most Pac 12 games are played in front of a market of 80m instead of 250m.

2 - The deal, part one:  That CBS 3:30 eastern time slot for the SEC is basically the start of nationwide viewing and it gives a shit ton of exposure for the teams within it.   The other Big 4 can play in the noon eastern slot and still be in front of 200m people, so their secondary slot is still very valuable.   The Pac 12's deal didn't get them into these windows, matter a fact most of their games are structured for west coast timing.   Which, can be smart if you leverage your own market and can get everyone (See Birmingham), but in this case they needed to get outside their market.  This is why you see Oregon, Washington and USC fly to the east coast for made for tv early season games.   So instead of getting a larger audience, they're trying to maximize a terribly small audience and ended up relegated to timing windows that were unused by the other conferences, e.g. after prime time eastern.   No eyeballs, no money.

3 - The deal, part two:  The Pac12 Network was great in concept, terrible in execution.  Sports networks, outside ESPN, are inherently regional.   Even the best of them all, the Yes Network, is carved out of like 50 square miles.   Each non-football pro team goes with a small footprint around a major market and the NFL takes this to the max by carving up the US to show the games they think will be the highest rated in that specific metro area.  So the idea having 6 smaller networks instead of one big one, had some good stuff in it, but the issue became, "why do I need to pay for two channels?"   Creating a big Pac12Network and regional satellites meant they had to not only ask all the distributers to pony up twice, but they also had to feed that beast with inventory.   They made a very solid contract originally, but it was for 70-80% of their inventory and the rest was used to feed the PacN.   Since the PacN had no carriage, it made very little money, but had huge expenses, so very little made it back to the schools.   In reality, sports conferences (or teams for that matter), shouldn't really be in the distribution business.   When Larry got hard thinking he'd turn the Pac12 into a "media company" instead of a sports conference, they lost sight of, like, everything.

TLDR - its not that they don't have value, its that they don't maximize their value nor even realize 100% of the value.    They're sort of in the same place the SWC and Big 8 were 25 years ago.   If they don't find a way to get out of their bubble, by more than playing ND, they aren't going to reverse their trend line.   And, quite simply, they need to focus on football more than they do.

Raiding - you don't need them all.  One team in LA and one in SF is enough.   You don't need two from Oregon and Washington.   You likely don't need two from AZ either.  Matter a fact, none may work out because, to give Dodds some credit, he knew the money pointed east, not west.   Unless you could take select properties, enhance them to be world beaters again, AND only play them at 3:30 or PT against current Big 12, then you risk driving your own eyeballs west, instead of east.  

thanks, but still disagree.  Other than USC, nobody adds to the B12.  So anything beyond USC is a net subtraction.  There's no point in adding more than USC+1.  And there's also no point in adding any PAC combination that doesn't include USC.

 

Edited December 22, 2020 by utee94

[jinx 2635]

11 minutes ago, Al_4_ISU said:

Ohio and Tennessee both have a passion for football and currently have 3 P5 teams between them.  And one of them is a small private school with a tiny fanbase.

Adding Memphis could also help sink Tennessee, which would only help the Big 12 overall.

[Hurtlocker 2208]

1 hour ago, Al_4_ISU said:

An 8 team playoff with P5 champs getting an auto bid would end the further consolidation of the existing P5 conferences instantly.

Obviously work is slowing down, I'm spending too much time on this board today.   I think it would help, but it will cause some issues too.  No one in their right mind things Oregon deserves a shot at a title this year.  And, while we can say Rona, Georgia Tech won the ACC with a 6-6 record when FSU was suspended.   I'd argue that's why they seed, but someone will say they're not deserving.

Part two is, does the AAC get a bid?

Personally, and I know its kind of silly considering I just had three posts talking about realignment, but my wish list, which would also solve this, is dissolving conferences and the bowl system completely as a relic of a bygone era.   I feel like we always try and make some perfect system fit into the confines of an imperfect one that no matter what we do its a lost cause.   So, I recommend you blow it up and come up with something different:

Tier 1:

Requirements: Minimum spend threshold for football (not researching now, but, for example, lets say you need to spend $30m in running a program.  Its not revenue based, its investment based).  NIL for all players, 4 year/lifetime scholarships, enhanced medical treatment/insurance.  Players union and both professional and HS agent rules.  Work with NFL combine/scouts/whoever to provide professional insurance, which provides players a benefit for what they would have been predicted to earn with a rookie contract if they chose to stick around school and got injured in later years.

Limitations: To keep things in check  Open books, subpoena powers, everything managed by a single Czar, including media rights for the entire Tier, etc. etc. etc.   Perhaps even a limitation with how much can be invested in the sport.   If we really wanted more parity, they could find a way to limit the amount of high ranked kids someone can have on the roster per class (like you only have 3 5* slots to spread out over your positions, 15 4*, etc.   Random numbers for examples)

Set up:  Would depend on the teams who chose to qualify, but focus being on the bulk of the season in regional games, with part of the schedule playing between areas.   Since there is no conference, you don't need a CCG, which allows at least one more round of playoffs, which could easily go to 16.  Seed everything to the bottom though and anyone 17 and below (if 16 is the magic number) is slotted into exhibition bowls, so 17 plays 18, 19 plays 20, etc.    

Revenues: Shared with all members with a boost given per final ranking.

Relegation: Lack of investment over a 5 year cycle would kick you out

Tier 2:

Requirements:  Min/Max spend threshold like T1, but could be more like $10m to 30M.   Players still have representation, scholarships and 

Limitations: Run by the same Czar office 

Set Up: exactly the same with their own playoffs/champion.   Likely wouldn't have as many exhibition bowls.   Though 17/18 of Tier 2 may be worth more than 29/30 of T1, who knows.

Revenues: Shared with all members with a boost given per final ranking.

Relegation: Investing within a certain window, full plan for increased investment, and success over a 5 year cycle sets you up to slide into T1 as an associate (where you have a set time to ramp up) if someone chooses to fall out.   

 

Anyway, this is all off the cuff as I ignore this conference call.  The point is, fuck the entire current set up.   Blow it to hell and set it up differently going forward.

 

EDIT:  forgot to add, to maximize money, T2 could be Spring ball and T1 could be Fall

Edited December 22, 2020 by Hurtlocker

[FloridaBig12Fan 6]

54 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

There are very valuable properties in the Pac 12, including UCLA, Oregon, and Washington.  Cal and Stanford are no slouches either.   

The issue the Pac has isn't properties, outside the fact that they don't have any football powers at the moment, but that can be changed considering Cali pumps out talent.  The conference, though, is struggling with the ramifications of a few bad decisions and geography:

1 - While the west coast is populous and loaded, it is very spread out compared to the east coast and from the East Coast as well.    CFB eyeballs are driven by Eastern (47% of US population), Central (29%), Pacific (17%), and then Mountain time zones (7%), in that order.   Due to that, most Pac 12 games are played in front of a market of 80m instead of 250m.

2 - The deal, part one:  That CBS 3:30 eastern time slot for the SEC is basically the start of nationwide viewing and it gives a shit ton of exposure for the teams within it.   The other Big 4 can play in the noon eastern slot and still be in front of 200m people, so their secondary slot is still very valuable.   The Pac 12's deal didn't get them into these windows, matter a fact most of their games are structured for west coast timing.   Which, can be smart if you leverage your own market and can get everyone (See Birmingham), but in this case they needed to get outside their market.  This is why you see Oregon, Washington and USC fly to the east coast for made for tv early season games.   So instead of getting a larger audience, they're trying to maximize a terribly small audience and ended up relegated to timing windows that were unused by the other conferences, e.g. after prime time eastern.   No eyeballs, no money.

3 - The deal, part two:  The Pac12 Network was great in concept, terrible in execution.  Sports networks, outside ESPN, are inherently regional.   Even the best of them all, the Yes Network, is carved out of like 50 square miles.   Each non-football pro team goes with a small footprint around a major market and the NFL takes this to the max by carving up the US to show the games they think will be the highest rated in that specific metro area.  So the idea having 6 smaller networks instead of one big one, had some good stuff in it, but the issue became, "why do I need to pay for two channels?"   Creating a big Pac12Network and regional satellites meant they had to not only ask all the distributers to pony up twice, but they also had to feed that beast with inventory.   They made a very solid contract originally, but it was for 70-80% of their inventory and the rest was used to feed the PacN.   Since the PacN had no carriage, it made very little money, but had huge expenses, so very little made it back to the schools.   In reality, sports conferences (or teams for that matter), shouldn't really be in the distribution business.   When Larry got hard thinking he'd turn the Pac12 into a "media company" instead of a sports conference, they lost sight of, like, everything.

TLDR - its not that they don't have value, its that they don't maximize their value nor even realize 100% of the value.    They're sort of in the same place the SWC and Big 8 were 25 years ago.   If they don't find a way to get out of their bubble, by more than playing ND, they aren't going to reverse their trend line.   And, quite simply, they need to focus on football more than they do.

Raiding - you don't need them all.  One team in LA and one in SF is enough.   You don't need two from Oregon and Washington.   You likely don't need two from AZ either.  Matter a fact, none may work out because, to give Dodds some credit, he knew the money pointed east, not west.   Unless you could take select properties, enhance them to be world beaters again, AND only play them at 3:30 or PT against current Big 12, then you risk driving your own eyeballs west, instead of east.  

Great post.
 

First, let me say I’m a big Big 12 fan. But we do have a perception problem. This started with a lack of history facilitating losing assets, but more than anything because our bluebloods havent been as good as Bama, LSU, Ohio St, and Clemson. Had UT hired Saban, I firmly believe the scoreboard fans in other conferences would change their tune.

Nevertheless, there are assets in the PAC 12 that would be more valuable if in the Big 12 (or any other central/East conference) imo. I’m not sure the reverse is true if UT went west. Your map shows why. The math on adding them may be better than adding their current value imo. Anecdotally, I have found people in Big 12/10/SEC areas know as much or more about the PAC 12 than the general population in the West. CFB matters more here.
 

The central and east want to care about USC, UCLA, Oregon Stanford etc, but it’s tough when they’re effectively playing in their own world. Add them to the schedule in better kickoff times, and it would work imo. And just the act of adding those brands would help the Big 12’s perception problem. Adding more to the demographic diversity helps too. 

The contention you can’t be successful with three time zones is amiss imo. It’s the fact that those other conferences were desperate and needed to span 3 time zones is why it struggled. Does anyone think the SEC would have faltered adding USC and Texas rather than Missouri and A$M? That said, there is something to be said for cultural continuity and a continuum, which correlates with geographical fit. That’s how you get mouth breathers chanting SEC SEC. 

 

[Hurtlocker 2208]

25 minutes ago, jinx said:

Yep, and as already stated, you can't have all 4 time zones in one conference.  Also, abandoning WVU doesn't seem like the right long term decision for the health of the league or the short term optics.  Getting G5 teams that are fully committed to maximizing their football brand like Cincy, UCF and even Memphis would help.  Playing games in Memphis and Orlando would help offset the SEC raid that A&M has opened the door for.  A Louisiana team might be good.  Not sure who to bring with UCF, but I am not sure that they would really care about being isolated.  That school is printing cash and growing daily.  They would sell their soul for a spot in a P5.

If we aren't thinking long term with this re-org we are doing it wrong. East seems the way to go, and if you can't steal good names from the SEC and ACC, take the best G5 teams that have been all over the college football news for the past decade.

Yeah I agree on WVU, they're a good position and they've got a pretty large brand in the east.   They're basically a suburb of Pittsburgh and draw lots of attention from DC too.   In the mid-Atlantic from NYC to NC, which has a ton of people, they're likely the second tier of brands with ND/Penn State being the top, then WVU/Vtech, then the Maryland/Rutgers/UVA/Pitts of the world.   

The SEC could do it easier with WVU, but if you're out there, figure out how to maximize it.

[Al_4_ISU 12408]

11 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

Obviously work is slowing down, I'm spending too much time on this board today.   I think it would help, but it will cause some issues too.  No one in their right mind things Oregon deserves a shot at a title this year.  And, while we can say Rona, Georgia Tech won the ACC with a 6-6 record when FSU was suspended.   I'd argue that's why they seed, but someone will say they're not deserving.

Part two is, does the AAC get a bid?

Personally, and I know its kind of silly considering I just had three posts talking about realignment, but my wish list, which would also solve this, is dissolving conferences and the bowl system completely as a relic of a bygone era.   I feel like we always try and make some perfect system fit into the confines of an imperfect one that no matter what we do its a lost cause.   So, I recommend you blow it up and come up with something different:

Tier 1:

Requirements: Minimum spend threshold for football (not researching now, but, for example, lets say you need to spend $30m in running a program.  Its not revenue based, its investment based).  NIL for all players, 4 year/lifetime scholarships, enhanced medical treatment/insurance.  Players union and both professional and HS agent rules.  Work with NFL combine/scouts/whoever to provide professional insurance, which provides players a benefit for what they would have been predicted to earn with a rookie contract if they chose to stick around school and got injured in later years.

Limitations: To keep things in check  Open books, subpoena powers, everything managed by a single Czar, including media rights for the entire Tier, etc. etc. etc.   Perhaps even a limitation with how much can be invested in the sport.   If we really wanted more parity, they could find a way to limit the amount of high ranked kids someone can have on the roster per class (like you only have 3 5* slots to spread out over your positions, 15 4*, etc.   Random numbers for examples)

Set up:  Would depend on the teams who chose to qualify, but focus being on the bulk of the season in regional games, with part of the schedule playing between areas.   Since there is no conference, you don't need a CCG, which allows at least one more round of playoffs, which could easily go to 16.  Seed everything to the bottom though and anyone 17 and below (if 16 is the magic number) is slotted into exhibition bowls, so 17 plays 18, 19 plays 20, etc.    

Revenues: Shared with all members with a boost given per final ranking.

Relegation: Lack of investment over a 5 year cycle would kick you out

Tier 2:

Requirements:  Min/Max spend threshold like T1, but could be more like $10m to 30M.   Players still have representation, scholarships and 

Limitations: Run by the same Czar office 

Set Up: exactly the same with their own playoffs/champion.   Likely wouldn't have as many exhibition bowls.   Though 17/18 of Tier 2 may be worth more than 29/30 of T1, who knows.

Revenues: Shared with all members with a boost given per final ranking.

Relegation: Investing within a certain window, full plan for increased investment, and success over a 5 year cycle sets you up to slide into T1 as an associate (where you have a set time to ramp up) if someone chooses to fall out.   

 

Anyway, this is all off the cuff as I ignore this conference call.  The point is, fuck the entire current set up.   Blow it to hell and set it up differently going forward.

8 team playoffs.  5 auto bids for the P5.  3 at large spots.  The AAC would get a qualifying team in on a regular basis, but it wouldn't be guaranteed.

I actually like the current system and the bowls to some extent.  If you could move back towards something looking like the old conferences that had fed the 8 team playoff, that would be great.

And you keep the bowls because who the fuck doesn't enjoy them?  People always bitch about too many bowls, but a lot of the lower tier bowls are surprisingly entertaining and I will never hold my nose up at more college football.

[BigHornedLurker 1894]

Speaking of building up teams, how is Tulane rarely on the build up list ? 

Great road game, academic prowess, some decent history, and sits in the middle of a recruiting hotbed. If we're thinking investments this seems like a good one. 

I'm not convinced we need more football power, we need re-use the fuckery of the SEC scheduling until it stops being an advantage to boost our numbers. 

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

1 hour ago, jinx said:

I have to admit I am curious to see what happens next.  I never liked the idea of joining the Big 10, and while the Pac merger that was floated during all of the movement in the past seemed intriguing, I think it would have been a bad decision in hindsight.

I am fully in the camp of expanding the league and reducing the conference games.  That would allow us to play the same sham game that the SEC does, where most of the good teams duck each other and pad their records feasting on the bottom half of the league and 4 OOC games.  That would allow a team like Kansas to find 4 teams they can beat, and change their record from 2-10 to 5-7 or something close to it.  The top teams can pad their resume and not all knock each other off, while having more flexibility to schedule other P5 teams.

I'm much less interested in the "who" mainly because I don't see teams like USC leaving the PAC or Arkansas leaving the SEC, even though it may be in their and the Big 12s best interest.  Obviously, we should get the best teams possible, but I would rather look east than west.

To @Al_4_ISU point, I think the discord in the Big 12 stems mostly from the point that it is the only P5 conference that most of us were alive when it began.  The fact that Nebraska was butt hurt from the beginning didn't help.  But I think it is good that OU and Texas seem to want to stay in the Big 12.  I don't think abandoning the center of the US to join an edge conference is in our best interest long term.  We need to stake down the center and grow.  

I was hopeful that CDC would help the Big 12 by focusing Texas and our admin on the health, growth and long term future of the Big 12.  I am less optimistic based on current events, but hope I am reading that wrong.  Regardless, there is something to be said about the passion and unity of the SEC and to a lesser extent, the Big 10.  Those schools want to be together and it starts at the top.  Texas and OU need to work to make the Big 12 a place to be.  Arguing for an 8 team playoff that includes all P5 champions would seem to be the right place to start.

Call me crazy, but I would personally be fine with taking UCF, Cincinnati or others in that range out east.  I was ok with the WVU add, but wished we had picked up Pitt or Louisville to make them a better fit.  I think we would need to do the same if we added someone like UCF.

TL;DR - We should definitely look to grow and alter our model to avoid the round robin format that kills our top teams and makes our conference championship game a useless rematch.

that's a well-reasoned, well-written take.  i agree with all of it up to the point of going east for city schools.

raiding the PAC for state flagships in the AAU also delivers far more market footprint per school.

[Hurtlocker 2208]

2 minutes ago, Al_4_ISU said:

8 team playoffs.  5 auto bids for the P5.  3 at large spots.  The AAC would get a qualifying team in on a regular basis, but it wouldn't be guaranteed.

I actually like the current system and the bowls to some extent.  If you could move back towards something looking like the old conferences that had fed the 8 team playoff, that would be great.

And you keep the bowls because who the fuck doesn't enjoy them?  People always bitch about too many bowls, but a lot of the lower tier bowls are surprisingly entertaining and I will never hold my nose up at more college football.

 

Its not that I don't like bowls.   You'd still have them.   What I'm saying is currently conferences and bowls are dictating what has to happen, instead of being dictated to.   Look at how much had to be given up to the Rose Bowl just to have a 4 team playoff.   That ended up benefiting the Big 12 and SEC, since they went and did the Sugar deal, but just because you benefited doesn't mean it wasn't a bad deal.   Or look at this year when 2-8 South Carolina had a post season slot and 9-2 Army was left out in the cold.   These micro agreements fracture the overall sport and make it harder to put in the 4, 8, or even 16 best teams, let alone keep it from just being the best 3 teams, all the time.

If there is a central power for all qualifying teams, as opposed to fifedoms in conferences and big bowls who can play different amounts of games (remember the SEC played less games long before Ohio State did it this year) and have different qualifying rules, then you're not placating the Rose to devise a system, you're bidding out your assets.   In what I suggest, since CFB would own the games, each location/bowl would have to bid on their slot (e.g. whether they are the 1/16 match up, the 4/5 match up, the 19/20 match up or even a quarter or semi) and each media company would bid on parts, much like how the NFL sells its rights.   The Rose is still the Rose, but it has to also invest to stay big.

You're not really getting rid of the end result for the viewer, you're just changing the execution on how they're slotted.

[DCLonghorn 244]

Houston boy on the East Coast. I watch WAY less of my Astros since they moved west from the central.

We risk the same if we start playing more games out west. The best PAC properties are two times zones from Austin and three from the populated EST.

Lots of arguments for a Texas versus USC game being put on TV earlier and we'd never be subject to that late game. But there's no guarantee of that.

And just like we used to say there's no way in holy hell that our game would be moved away from Thanksgiving Day, we'd most certainly be subject on occasion to that crap ass 8 or 9 a.m. PST college football game that's being discussed. Better than the late late show I guess.

Long-standing notion is that sports reporters won't stay up and watch the West Coast games. That's not going to change just because big 12 teams play a few more games out there.

Every growing/future property in CFB is east of Austin notwithstanding unrelated issues with BYU and Boise. Everything else is just poaching existing brands.

[SwanderedTalent 5761]

I wonder if we could realistically get Louisville and Missouri into the Big 12. Does Missouri really like being in the SEC, other than so they can say "FUCK YOU HA HA WE DON'T WANT TO PLAY YOU" to Kansas? Pitt to me is too far East, and I really think they identify with the East Coast too much to want to be in a conference with a bunch of schools in the geographic middle of the country. 

What makes the most sense for us is middle-of-the-country expansion. If we could get Nebraska, I'd be in favor of that but I don't see that happening. I don't think we could get anyone out of the Big Ten. There aren't a lot of attractive candidates in the state of Texas now that we have TCU-- I just don't see Houston as a value add, SMU and North Texas are total G5 programs. There also aren't any FCS programs ready to move up where they'd make sense. 

Boise is intriguing. Utah would have been good. I'd take BYU. 

All of the above is strictly me wrestling with realistic scenarios-- what I would prefer is a Big 12 without Colorado, but with A&M and Nebraska. That was this conference at its best. Or, moreover, I'd like to see a massive realignment that took the conferences down to no more than ten teams playing an internal round-robin with no CCG and the champions receiving one of eight available post-season bids. Texas' best conference would be playing OU and Arkansas and A&M every year, plus other Texas schools, and a couple of marquee games out of conference that no longer determined if we got into the playoff or not (e.g., you could play and lose to Alabama and Ohio State, but win the conference and get into the playoff). 

But that's not realistic. 

[FloridaBig12Fan 6]

5 minutes ago, BigHornedLurker said:

Speaking of building up teams, how is Tulane rarely on the build up list ? 

Great road game, academic prowess, some decent history, and sits in the middle of a recruiting hotbed. If we're thinking investments this seems like a good one. 

I'm not convinced we need more football power, we need re-use the fuckery of the SEC scheduling until it stops being an advantage to boost our numbers. 

Well, the SEC could do it with their loyal lunacy. And the Big 10 could swing it with rust belt brute force. 
 

For the Big 12, it would need to be a bridge institution. Like a bridge to the heart of the ACC. If you’ve lived in the other P4 conferences, adding Tulane, without P5’s on the other side, to Big 12 would more likely further the Big 12 to G5 status than Tulane to P4/5 status. Adding an athletic department that is second or third tier (in sports) in their area must have immediate on field appeal imo. Like TCU, I guess (sigh).

My pipe dream will always be to add Clemson, FSU, ND, UNC, Duke, UVa to the Big 12 to rival the SEC. Drop Baylor, TCU, even KSU if needed. Maybe Tulane fits in continuity in that pipe dream. The ACC suffers from being coterminous with the most important conference. They’re the Auburn of conferences right now. But Clemson has single handily saved the ACC, as otherwise their assets may have been better off doing an A$M and running for the Big 10 or Big 12.

Outside of OSU the Big 10 is a dying rust belt brand, but it will remain strong in sheer population and CFB having ingrained cultural importance. The brilliant move to have a revenue mechanism solely exploiting overall general population has given them an advantageous head start that will outlast cord cutting. 
 

The SEC is the SEC. 

 

[closetohumping 17380]

4 minutes ago, SwanderedTalent said:

I wonder if we could realistically get Louisville and Missouri into the Big 12. Does Missouri really like being in the SEC, other than so they can say "FUCK YOU HA HA WE DON'T WANT TO PLAY YOU" to Kansas? Pitt to me is too far East, and I really think they identify with the East Coast too much to want to be in a conference with a bunch of schools in the geographic middle of the country. 

What makes the most sense for us is middle-of-the-country expansion. If we could get Nebraska, I'd be in favor of that but I don't see that happening. I don't think we could get anyone out of the Big Ten. There aren't a lot of attractive candidates in the state of Texas now that we have TCU-- I just don't see Houston as a value add, SMU and North Texas are total G5 programs. There also aren't any FCS programs ready to move up where they'd make sense. 

Boise is intriguing. Utah would have been good. I'd take BYU. 

All of the above is strictly me wrestling with realistic scenarios-- what I would prefer is a Big 12 without Colorado, but with A&M and Nebraska. That was this conference at its best. Or, moreover, I'd like to see a massive realignment that took the conferences down to no more than ten teams playing an internal round-robin with no CCG and the champions receiving one of eight available post-season bids. Texas' best conference would be playing OU and Arkansas and A&M every year, plus other Texas schools, and a couple of marquee games out of conference that no longer determined if we got into the playoff or not (e.g., you could play and lose to Alabama and Ohio State, but win the conference and get into the playoff). 

But that's not realistic. 

Mizzou had a hard on for the SEC, like aggy did.  Colorado had to be in the PAC, they want to be associated with them.

[SwanderedTalent 5761]

4 minutes ago, closetohumping said:

Mizzou had a hard on for the SEC, like aggy did.  Colorado had to be in the PAC, they want to be associated with them.

Yes, I like playing Colorado but they don't fit in the B12 as well as they do in the Pac-12. Missouri, though, culturally is a way better fit for the Big 12. I don't know what we could really offer them to get them to switch back. 

[David Dennison 18601]

49 minutes ago, jinx said:

Adding Memphis could also help sink Tennessee, which would only help the Big 12 overall.

Reading things like this reminds me why this is easily the most depressing thread on the football board.

[Aqua Buddha 14488]

1 hour ago, Hurtlocker said:

There are very valuable properties in the Pac 12, including UCLA, Oregon, and Washington.  Cal and Stanford are no slouches either.   

The issue the Pac has isn't properties, outside the fact that they don't have any football powers at the moment, but that can be changed considering Cali pumps out talent.  The conference, though, is struggling with the ramifications of a few bad decisions and geography:

1 - While the west coast is populous and loaded, it is very spread out compared to the east coast and from the East Coast as well.    CFB eyeballs are driven by Eastern (47% of US population), Central (29%), Pacific (17%), and then Mountain time zones (7%), in that order.   Due to that, most Pac 12 games are played in front of a market of 80m instead of 250m.

2 - The deal, part one:  That CBS 3:30 eastern time slot for the SEC is basically the start of nationwide viewing and it gives a shit ton of exposure for the teams within it.   The other Big 4 can play in the noon eastern slot and still be in front of 200m people, so their secondary slot is still very valuable.   The Pac 12's deal didn't get them into these windows, matter a fact most of their games are structured for west coast timing.   Which, can be smart if you leverage your own market and can get everyone (See Birmingham), but in this case they needed to get outside their market.  This is why you see Oregon, Washington and USC fly to the east coast for made for tv early season games.   So instead of getting a larger audience, they're trying to maximize a terribly small audience and ended up relegated to timing windows that were unused by the other conferences, e.g. after prime time eastern.   No eyeballs, no money.

3 - The deal, part two:  The Pac12 Network was great in concept, terrible in execution.  Sports networks, outside ESPN, are inherently regional.   Even the best of them all, the Yes Network, is carved out of like 50 square miles.   Each non-football pro team goes with a small footprint around a major market and the NFL takes this to the max by carving up the US to show the games they think will be the highest rated in that specific metro area.  So the idea having 6 smaller networks instead of one big one, had some good stuff in it, but the issue became, "why do I need to pay for two channels?"   Creating a big Pac12Network and regional satellites meant they had to not only ask all the distributers to pony up twice, but they also had to feed that beast with inventory.   They made a very solid contract originally, but it was for 70-80% of their inventory and the rest was used to feed the PacN.   Since the PacN had no carriage, it made very little money, but had huge expenses, so very little made it back to the schools.   In reality, sports conferences (or teams for that matter), shouldn't really be in the distribution business.   When Larry got hard thinking he'd turn the Pac12 into a "media company" instead of a sports conference, they lost sight of, like, everything.

TLDR - its not that they don't have value, its that they don't maximize their value nor even realize 100% of the value.    They're sort of in the same place the SWC and Big 8 were 25 years ago.   If they don't find a way to get out of their bubble, by more than playing ND, they aren't going to reverse their trend line.   And, quite simply, they need to focus on football more than they do.

Raiding - you don't need them all.  One team in LA and one in SF is enough.   You don't need two from Oregon and Washington.   You likely don't need two from AZ either.  Matter a fact, none may work out because, to give Dodds some credit, he knew the money pointed east, not west.   Unless you could take select properties, enhance them to be world beaters again, AND only play them at 3:30 or PT against current Big 12, then you risk driving your own eyeballs west, instead of east.  

Strong to quite strong.

It won't happen with the ACC signing their GOR a few years ago but I always liked the idea of grabbing Clemson, Florida State, and various other schools in that region like GTEch, UCF, etc.  They all had good travel access and would get us into those recruiting markets.

 

[FloridaBig12Fan 6]

1 minute ago, SwanderedTalent said:

Yes, I like playing Colorado but they don't fit in the B12 as well as they do in the Pac-12. Missouri, though, culturally is a way better fit for the Big 12. I don't know what we could really offer them to get them to switch back. 

Now, but it was less so for nearly the entirety of the Big 8. 
 

If purely based on last century regionalism, Missouri, Arkansas, Nebraska, A&M and CU should all be in the Big 12. Sorry Baylor. That set of 12 then listens to Weinberg and is the first to start pool rights into a network, then going on the attack to add the ACC programs of choice in the mid-2000’s. Removing ACC sweetheart deals, and more desirable conference mates, maybe we even snag ND around 2020.

Instead Arky, then Missouri are sucking hind tit in the SEC. Soon to be joined by Nebraska in the Big 10. CU is enjoying being surrounded by equitable disinterest in college athletics. 

[SwanderedTalent 5761]

1 minute ago, FloridaBig12Fan said:

Now, but it was less so for nearly the entirety of the Big 8. 
 

If purely based on last century regionalism, Missouri, Arkansas, Nebraska, A&M and CU should all be in the Big 12. Sorry Baylor. That set of 12 then listens to Weinberg and is the first to start pool rights into a network, then going on the attack to add the ACC programs of choice in the mid-2000’s. Removing ACC sweetheart deals, and more desirable conference mates, maybe we even snag ND around 2020.

Instead Arky, then Missouri are sucking hind tit in the SEC. Soon to be joined by Nebraska in the Big 10. CU is enjoying being surrounded by equitable disinterest in college athletics. 

I like most of this, I just don't think Colorado's a fit. But if we could get those other schools (and I'd have no qualms about booting Baylor), it just makes sense regionally speaking. But then I remain convinced that Texas fans would rather play Texas schools than Indiana and Purdue every year-- like, the Texas to the Big Ten stuff is attractive until you start talking about playing a bunch of schools that you have no history with, no regional ties to, and who don't take football seriously. 

[Al_4_ISU 12408]

31 minutes ago, closetohumping said:

Mizzou had a hard on for the SEC, like aggy did.  Colorado had to be in the PAC, they want to be associated with them.

Mizzou had a hard on for the Big 10.  They took the SEC as a way to save face.

I've known a few Mizzou fans, and every single one of them hates not playing a regional schedule.  They thought in the Big 10 they could marry academic prestige to a fairly regional schedule playing the Illinois schools and Iowa, and get more east coast visibility.  I don't think they really gave the SEC much of a thought until their flirtation with the Big 10 left them stuck in the Big 12.

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

44 minutes ago, Hurtlocker said:

blow it up and come up with something different

every P5 has dead weight, and the secX3 & disney just locked in klan aggy and vanderbilt as P5s for another 15 years

there are currently 64 schools in P5 conferences + domer

the only way to blow it up is to jettison 2 schools from the remaining 4 conferences, add domer, and then reconstruct 3 conferences from what's left over.

a theoretical timeline:

the moment this looks possible, the b1g and domer will finally fornicate, and probably give missouri the home they've always wanted.

the sec grabs clemson, miami & florida state

the acc, b12 and pac are screwed - how do those 3 consolidate to 2 with any sanity for geography, population, timezones (i.e. tv as discussed last 2 pages)

[Al_4_ISU 12408]

18 minutes ago, FloridaBig12Fan said:

Now, but it was less so for nearly the entirety of the Big 8. 
 

If purely based on last century regionalism, Missouri, Arkansas, Nebraska, A&M and CU should all be in the Big 12. Sorry Baylor. That set of 12 then listens to Weinberg and is the first to start pool rights into a network, then going on the attack to add the ACC programs of choice in the mid-2000’s. Removing ACC sweetheart deals, and more desirable conference mates, maybe we even snag ND around 2020.

Instead Arky, then Missouri are sucking hind tit in the SEC. Soon to be joined by Nebraska in the Big 10. CU is enjoying being surrounded by equitable disinterest in college athletics. 

Colorado is in a weird spot.  They were the closest thing to an outlier in the Big 8/Big 12 North.  Their cultural fit has only diminished since they left, but I would gladly have them back due to history and one can make the argument they don't really fit well in the Pac 12 either.

[FloridaBig12Fan 6]

7 minutes ago, SwanderedTalent said:

I like most of this, I just don't think Colorado's a fit. But if we could get those other schools (and I'd have no qualms about booting Baylor), it just makes sense regionally speaking. But then I remain convinced that Texas fans would rather play Texas schools than Indiana and Purdue every year-- like, the Texas to the Big Ten stuff is attractive until you start talking about playing a bunch of schools that you have no history with, no regional ties to, and who don't take football seriously. 

It’s not now, but it was.

Nebraska is a conference-mate of Rutgers. Fit isn’t very important now, so based on that I’d take them.

Im not a UT fan, but I give the previous UT leadership a lot of credit after NU’s butthurt brought this on the conference. The play was to get the football schools of the ACC once Maryland destabilized, taking the basketball ones too if needed. Unfortunately A&M and Missouri wanting new overlords, and now Clemson’s rise, derailed that. 
 

Take the original 12, sans NU, CU, and Baylor, add Clemson, FSU, GT, UNC, Duke, UVa, and one more. Profit

[Hagbard Celine 10734]

58 minutes ago, Al_4_ISU said:

8 team playoffs.  5 auto bids for the P5.  3 at large spots.  The AAC would get a qualifying team in on a regular basis, but it wouldn't be guaranteed.

I actually like the current system and the bowls to some extent.  If you could move back towards something looking like the old conferences that had fed the 8 team playoff, that would be great.

And you keep the bowls because who the fuck doesn't enjoy them?  People always bitch about too many bowls, but a lot of the lower tier bowls are surprisingly entertaining and I will never hold my nose up at more college football.

going to 8 takes away the top 16 teams and kills the bowls (which need to die)

there will no longer be any compelling bowl matchups of any kind..... 3-loss schedule-padded sec-east team vs. 2-loss washington state.... that will be your best bowl matchup

going to 8 means the rose bowl is no longer a celebration of pac/b1g special-ness, it's a label on a quarterfinal that likely never has the b1g/pac champions ever again

the bowls and their political stranglehold on school leadership and league power brokers is the reason we didn't go to 8 to begin with

anyone that hasn't seen it please watch the joel klatt video