Realignment Megathread (All The Moves)
- Thread starter ISUcyclones11
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Dude the people writing the checks don't care who wins. They care who watches. College football viewership peaked in 2015 and the Big Ten is not exempt from that.
The NFL is making around $10B per year in TV deals. The Big10 is making just over $1B. By teams like tOSU and Mich only playing one or two competitive games a year, they are absolutely leaving money on the table. If the top 20-30 teams were to only play each other, the TV dollars would be closer to the NFL than the current deal.
The value of the top 20-25 schools, when locked into the 10ish best viewing slots, is astronomical compared to the status quo (back of napkin, $2B just for regular season).
The TV people (and their money) will inexorably push towards a superleague. Just need to poach a handful more brands from the PAC and ACC and it's ready. 20-25 brands will "rapture" out of their conferences (just for football). Heck, they may kick back a few $$ to the conference to make it less stinky.
The TV people (and their money) will inexorably push towards a superleague. Just need to poach a handful more brands from the PAC and ACC and it's ready. 20-25 brands will "rapture" out of their conferences (just for football). Heck, they may kick back a few $$ to the conference to make it less stinky.
I could be an anomaly...but part of why I have always watched college football outside of ISU, is that it's the only major sport where every game actually does matter for the best teams.
If we had a 32 team playoff I'd probably exclusively watch ISU because the Alabamas and Ohio States of the world could just mail it in and make the playoff.
Baseball regular season is the extreme example. The Yankees can be the best team because they lose one out of three games. Checking the box score until the playoffs makes more sense than watching or even listening to every game.
I hope 12 team playoff doesn't lose that, 8 for sure would not have, 16 for sure would have. 12 is on the edge. The powerhouse teams can probably take a week off or be lazy one week, two gets them in trouble, three and they are out.
I probably would never watch regular season 32 team college football super league with a 16 team playoff for the same reason I rarely watch regular season pro sports. I just follow it with a passing interest, watch highlights of ISU players or something in the background. If my teams suck or no ISU players doing well not at all.
If the top 20-30 teams were to only play each other, it wouldn't be long before they weren't the top 20-30 teams anymore. A consistent top, a consistent middle, and a consistent bottom would emerge. Then you'd have people questioning why are those teams at the bottom getting an equal cut as the teams at the top. They'd no longer be considered bluebloods or elite because they're finishing with 3 or 4 wins every year, their brands take a massive hit, and since many of them are in low population areas, they won't bring much value in terms of TV markets or the number of fans who care. So then what? Trim the fat again and go with a conference of the 10 or 15 best? Then what happens when a top, middle, and bottom emerges there? Go to a 6 or 8 team conference of the really really best? Guess what, a top and a bottom will emerge there too.
Conferences, and more specifically conference flagships, need cannon fodder.
What's good for the few shrinks college football as a whole though. A few boom years then the entire thing bottoms out. Even the networks, their short term profits would work against long term profits.
Right now about 40 states have a passionate stake in this thing, so strong many of them LIVED on the campus of these teams.
You turn that into 20-30 schools in 15-20 states and there's a very clear expiration date on what has always made college football special.
Why watch minor league pro athletes in another state tied to a university I never went to? A few states without NFL like Alabama would boom, most states would see fandom plummet. Even those states...can college football really get bigger in Alabama than it is? If a state used to have 3-4 universities tied into major college football and now only one...NFL will be the winner. Even more for states that go from 1-3 to zero at the highest level.
If Yormark is successful separating FB and MBB media rights, things could get interesting. Come up with a sliding scale for each sport and justify it by saying everybody now has two chances at the bigger pieces of the pie. If the cuts between sports are somewhat equal ( which they wouldn’t be I’m sure) I could see somebody like Kansas throwing the lion’s share of their money at MBB.
There are some weird unrealistic fantasies in this thread. The “P2” isn’t breaking away. Just because the B1G is talking about reduced shares with Oregon and Washington, just like they’ve done with every other new addition other than USC/UCLA doesn’t meant unequal revenue sharing is coming.
Everyone needs to step back and look at how capitalism works. Tv Networks and partners have shareholders. There is only way in a situation like that and that is up up and up. When ESPN gets to a point they are not going up, they either find a way to keep going up or shareholders start losing value, shareholders start loosing value, they go elsewhere to find value.
If anyone thinks there’s not a point in time that individual schools and networks wouldn’t do something extreme to keep increasing value they are mistaken.
If anyone thinks there’s not a point in time that individual schools and networks wouldn’t do something extreme to keep increasing value they are mistaken.
But that's no different than people. Can Gates, Buffett, Musk or Bezo's spend their billions?
Nope, but they are/were DRIVEN to make more & more money over their careers. Why? Greed, Ego, Competitiveness, etc.
The OSU, Michigan, Texas, A&M, Bama, Georgia, etc may be happy with a fairly even split in the future. But their greed, ego, etc really hasn't been tested. With the 4 team playoff each conference split around $80M. So for Big10/SEC schools that was $5.5M per year. And if they made the playoffs they got another $5M to cover expenses. Come 2027 the P5 conferences are going to get $300M each MINIMUM. Those dollars are going to test their interest in $ equality.
Brands will always matter. Nebraska going through their lean years has always been a National media story. Same with Michigan with their struggles up to the last couple years.
No different than the NFL. A team at the bottom would always have hope. Michigan is a also a good example of this- going from a middle tier Big10 team to being in 4 team playoff last 2 years.
TV $ drives major college sports- a brand is more important than wins/losses to networks.
You B1G guys keep saying this...but everyone else seems to realize that these conferences arent taking the Vandys and Northwesterns anymore. They are taking the strongest teams and brands...because it is about money.
The only reason B1G took cream puffs the last round was because MONEY. Not because they needed more losers. (well maybe it was, because all the B1G homers seem to think they have to have losers to make the winners happy) They wanted the NY, and DC etc cable market.
The SEC is not going to take Wake Forest or BC just so they can pad their schedule more. Why.....? Because the media companies want games between Alabama and Ohio State, because MONEY, not Alabama and Wake Forest.
If it comes down to money and they do believe a super conference of the blue bloods is the way to make the most money... they wont think about adding Northwestern to build in Wins.
Oklahoma just went to the SEC with Bama, Georgia, LSU etc... knowing they have to go through those to get to the playoff...not because they wanted to go where there were more cream puffs, but because MONEY!
No I dont think there is going to be a break away in the next few years....But the next media contract time, I will be worried, because at some point the top teams in the SEC and B1G are going to realize there is no more additions, or changes to make in their conferences to significantly boost the media value. When that happens they will start being more receptive of alternate ideas, like a break away, to significantly increase their income. At that point all bets are off. And when that happens, I guarantee they wont be worrying about built in wins, they will be worrying about what maximizes their MONEY.
While that is all true, there's also a time when capitalism becomes its own worst enemy. Like when the never ending thirst for bigger and bigger profits destroys the very ecosystem that makes those profits possible to begin with. College football seems like a great example.
It matters until it doesn’t.
Army and Minnesota don’t get to be dominant football legacies anymore.
Nebraska fb and Indiana bball are getting to be 3ish decades away from anything that ever made them a brand and Nebraska is one of the lowest population states.
Those schools like Texas and OU went to the SEC not just for the money but to be surrounded by what they believe their peers in the sport are. It’s the same reason we dump on Pac teams not wanting to come to the Big12 because they view it as lesser. They can make more money for sure but they don’t really want to be associated with the Big12. Michigan could probably make more money elsewhere but they make more then enough, have tons of cash at their disposal and don’t want to be associated with SEC schools.
As plenty people have pointed out AD revenue is a drop in the bucket for most of these schools especially the big ten schools. The presidents are the ones making the decisions at the end of the day and who they associate with matters to them A LOT.
Yeah they're not adding cannon fodder because they already have cannon fodder. Of course it's about money and adding the big brands. But they're also not losing the middle and lower tier programs, because they're needed to prop the big guys up.
What I'm saying is that I don't see any kind of "superconference" happening where it's comprised entirely of bluebloods and elite brands, because once that happens, over half of those programs will no longer be bluebloods or elite brands. There are just as many L's to go around in conference play as there are W's.
Keep dreaming.
Right now where can Michigan go to make more money?
When you realize that Academics and Athletics are separate entities you will start to figure out that when push comes to shove its all about money. And saying they think they make enough, just makes you look even more ignorant. I guarantee Michigan has never went into a meeting about Money and said "Oh we make enough, we dont need more, you dont have to increase our deal" You have to be insane to think that.
My point is 7 years from now when the media companies say, "yeah we are maxed out, we cant give you an increase" And all the schools left on the table only reduce the share instead of increasing it, People will start coming up with other ideas. And when Fox and ESPN tells Ohio St and Mich and Alabama and Georgia etc, they will pay them double to create a new league, I guarantee they all jump, and wont care one bit about building in auto wins.