College Conference Musical Chairs

I want to wade into “college football” today and some of this may spill over into tomorrow.  I have already commented on the move by Colorado from the PAC-12 to the Big-12 and speculated on the possibility that the Big-12 might want to poach the other three so-called “Four Corner schools”.  A headline yesterday at CBSSports.com made me sit up and take notice; it said that the Big-10 might have its expansionary eye on:

• Cal
• Oregon
• Stanford
• Washington.

I can quickly understand why the Big-10would be interested in Cal, Stanford and Washington.  Those three schools are located in large TV markets and the big money in college football comes from TV revenues.  “More money” is a powerful motivator.  San Francisco is the 10^th largest TV market in the US and Seattle is the 12^th largest.  However, the inclusion of Oregon on this list is interesting.

Over the past 10-15 years, Oregon has been a solid football program.  Since the arrival of Chip Kelly in 2009, Oregon has been to the Rose Bowl 4 times and played in the National Championship Game in 2014.  But Eugene Oregon is a flyspeck of a TV market; it ranks 119^th in the US, one spot ahead of Macon, GA and six spots below Fargo, ND.

Meanwhile, there is a current PAC-12 team in a very large TV market not on this speculative list.  That would be Arizona State sitting in the middle of the Phoenix, AZ TV market which is sandwiched right between San Francisco and Seattle.  So, let me assume that the headline and report from yesterday is correct; what might that mean in terms of the thought processes ongoing in Big-10 HQs:

• The conference wants the better team/program (Oregon) because it feels it already has three large TV markets on the West Coast covered?
• The Big-10 knows or thinks that the Big-12 has the origins of a deal in place already with Arizona State and does not want to get into a bidding war?
• Arizona State does not want to go anywhere without Arizona and the Big-10 is not willing to take Arizona at the expense of Cal, Stanford and/or Washington?

Any or all those questions could be in play here; that would be grist for a discussion among people who cover college football closely – – not a faux debate among people who yell at one another on TV.  But no matter the consensus that might arise regarding the behind-the-scenes machinations here, one thing is clear to me:

• The Pac-12 will cease to exist if Cal, Stanford, Washington and one other school go elsewhere.

I find it interesting that the PAC-12 used to be the “poacher” here and is now the “poachee”.  The Big-12 originated in the mid-1990s when what used to be the Big Eight absorbed 4 teams from the old Southwest Conference; Colorado was one of the founding members of the Big-12 in those days and in 2010, the PAC-12 lured the Buffaloes away from the Big-12.  At the time, there were rumors all over the place that Texas, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State would follow Colorado to a new conference home and that the PAC-12 or PAC-14 would be a dominant force in college football forever and a day.  In addition, that would have been the death knell for the Big-12 which also lost Texas A&M to the SEC and Nebraska to the Big-10.

Texas turned down the invitation by the PAC-12 because it has its own TV network – – Longhorn Network – – and the PAC-12 TV deal would have forced Texas to shut that down.  When Texas opted out, so did the two Oklahoma schools and the PAC-12 settled for Utah in addition to Colorado giving the conference an even number of teams.  No matter how you slice that cake, adding Utah when there was the potential to add Texas, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State is settling for crumbs; and it seems as if the PAC-12 never got past that gut-punch.

The other interesting about-face here is that the Big-12 survived a PAC-12 onslaught in 2010 and maintained itself as part of the so-called “Power-5” since then.  But once again, the Big-12 had to scramble because Texas and Oklahoma will be leaving to join the SEC in another year; those have been the flagship programs of the Big-12 and folks wondered if it could survive.  The conference has expanded itself; its additions have not been blueblood programs like Texas or Oklahoma, but they are widespread across the country from West Virginia to Colorado to Houston to Iowa State.  Can it survive in that condition?  Time will tell, but I like the Big-12’s chances for survival better than the PAC-12’s chances as of today.

So, four of the five so-called “Power 5” have been participants in the game of conference musical chairs recently:

• The Big-10 added USC and UCLA
• The SEC added Texas and Oklahoma
• The Big-12 added schools from lower conferences and Colorado
• The PAC-12 lost Colorado

And while all this was going on, the ACC stood pat – – which is interesting simply because everyone else is behaving differently.  The next big change in the revenue stream for college football is going to be the expansion of the College Football Playoffs from 4 teams to 12 teams.  I am not a TV marketing guy, but if March Madness brings $1B to the NCAA every year, I have to suspect that the TV rights for the 11 college football playoff games will bring half again as much or $1.5B  How that money will be shared among conferences is still TBD – – but it sure will be better to be perceived as a solid member of the football hierarchy than not.  You may not think it’s fair, but the SEC and the Big-10 are going to get more money from that deal than will the Sun Belt Conference; bet on it.

So, what is the ACC thinking here?

• We can’t leapfrog either the Big-10 or the SEC in football relevance so let us just sit back and maintain ourselves as one of the “Power Players”?
• Our ACC Network is not the biggest one in the country, but we are on the air in enough major markets to keep it and the conference afloat.  So, we need not dilute its viability by expanding to a far-flung outpost with no ACC ties or tradition?

Now, all of this gets tied up in the still-evolving nature of Name, Image and Likeness regulation which is a topic for tomorrow.  So, consider this topic  “To Be Continued”.

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………