Odds of the Big 12 staying together

[NUance]

It seems like one thing after another in our former conference. How long will the Big 12 remain intact before teams start bailing out?

[n.e.husker]

3 years, i just dont see the league bending over for Texas for too much longer.

 

Edit: BTW I noticed your name change, I dig it.

[NUance]

3 years, i just dont see the league bending over for Texas for too much longer.

 

Edit: BTW I noticed your name change, I dig it.

Thanky. AR was kind enough to implement it for me. I originally chose the username "nuance" for the "NU" because I'm a grad of NU. Even though we always called it UNL the whole time I was there.

[knapplc]

Yeah, but UNL-ance doesn't sound very good, does it?

 

There's already a poll about this somewhere here. It would be interesting to compare results from then (last year sometime, I believe) to now, with all the tumult caused by the LHN.

[corncraze]

I say by 2014 that conference is done

[NUance]

Yeah, but UNL-ance doesn't sound very good, does it?

 

There's already a poll about this somewhere here. It would be interesting to compare results from then (last year sometime, I believe) to now, with all the tumult caused by the LHN.

UNL-ance, Ha! I couldn't think of a word starting with UNL that would be a good name. UNLeavened? Eh, maybe if I was Jewish.

[redblooded]

I picked 3 years, only because there was no option for 2. Some people point to the 2014 TV contract negotiations, but that will have no bearing IMO. I've also seen some Texas fans talking about the supposed increased penalties upon leaving as a reason why no one can or will leave, which are also irrelevant. If they lose another member they start looking at being dissolved. If they lose 2 or more, its over, there will be no conference left to pay penalty clauses too as everyone will be scrambling for the nearest parachute.

 

What will set it off is the LHN and the issues that have come up from it. Even with the new found backbone of A&M and OU over this issue, they can't really do much but look elsewhere. In the end Texas will never care about what is good for the whole conference, they simply look to squeeze every nickle and dime they can get for themselves.

 

I'd expect the next year to be basically Texas saying they have absolutely no intention of turning the LHN into the big 12 network. ESPN probably won't simply write off 300 million dollars so they'll move forward with plans to make it more attractive to cable providers. Unless they start looking at it as what it was, a Texas tax to try and avoid super-conferences. But that will look embarrassing to both of them, paying 15 million a year to a network nobody subscribes to, Texas unable to get on cable networks in Texas.

 

Most likely A&M will announce before next July that it is seeking to become the newest member of the SEC in 2013, along with a couple other teams announcing destinations after that. So the big 12 has, in my opinion, two seasons of play left.

 

Texas ultimately will get what it wanted, out of the conference with their own network and able to pretend they were blameless because they were just looking out for number one with their network deal and were not the ones who left the conference. That's the spin they'll put on it to the Baylor and TTech alum, when they complain about competing in the MWC or Sunbelt, while trying to point the blame to OU and A&M, but mostly A&M.

 

ESPN let themselves get played in the LHN deal, as they are going to be directly responsible for the realignment that creates conferences that command dollar amounts they can't keep afford to keep their monopoly of the entire sport on.

[Blaze1up]

Mega Conferences are the future time to trim the fat.

[Atbone95]

Bigger question: Is the implosion of the Big 12 the start of Super Conferences? They have to go somewhere...

[VectorVictor]

Bigger question: Is the implosion of the Big 12 the start of Super Conferences? They have to go somewhere...

 

Possibly--if the Big XII doesn't implode (unlikely), but other events could trigger it. Those include, but aren't limited to, the SEC raiding the ACC and Big East to go to 16. Depending on how many the SEC were to take, it would force the ACC to start robbing from the Big East and (possibly) the MAC/CUSA teams available.

 

This idea came about as a way design for the Big 10 to land Notre Dame (by pulling the rug out from under their Olympic sports). If there's a move to 16 team conferences, many pundits don't see the Big East surviving ACC and SEC expansion raids.

 

Ultimately, it's like the movie Wargames: WOPR will run through all the College Football Global Thermal Nuclear War scenarios, but in the end, WOPR, too, will settle for a nice game of chess with Dr. Stephen Falken and wait for the inevitable to happen.

[knapplc]

Ultimately, it's like the movie Wargames: WOPR will run through all the College Football Global Thermal Nuclear War scenarios, but in the end, WOPR, too, will settle for a nice game of chess with Dr. Stephen Falken and wait for the inevitable to happen.

 

Stephen Falken: Now, children, come on over here. I'm going to tell you a bedtime story. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin. Once upon a time, there lived a magnificent race of animals that dominated the world through age after age. They ran, they swam, and they fought and they flew, until suddenly, quite recently, they disappeared. Nature just gave up and started again. We weren't even apes then. We were just these smart little rodents hiding in the rocks. And when we go, nature will start over. With the bees, probably. Nature knows when to give up.

[redblooded]

Bigger question: Is the implosion of the Big 12 the start of Super Conferences? They have to go somewhere...

 

Possibly--if the Big XII doesn't implode (unlikely), but other events could trigger it. Those include, but aren't limited to, the SEC raiding the ACC and Big East to go to 16. Depending on how many the SEC were to take, it would force the ACC to start robbing from the Big East and (possibly) the MAC/CUSA teams available.

 

This idea came about as a way design for the Big 10 to land Notre Dame (by pulling the rug out from under their Olympic sports). If there's a move to 16 team conferences, many pundits don't see the Big East surviving ACC and SEC expansion raids.

 

Ultimately, it's like the movie Wargames: WOPR will run through all the College Football Global Thermal Nuclear War scenarios, but in the end, WOPR, too, will settle for a nice game of chess with Dr. Stephen Falken and wait for the inevitable to happen.

 

If the big 12 implodes I think it is pretty much for sure the start of super conferences. There are just too many valuable schools there for existing conferences not to salivate at adding them, especially OU and A&M for one prestige in OU and TV markets + recruiting inroads in A&M. Plus Kansas for bball, and Mizzou for a play at both the St. Louis and KC markets.

 

But mostly for the fact that the conferences already at 12 adding more teams will trigger an arms race.

 

I think too much has been made out of the TV markets. Yes that's the bread of the conference channels, but the butter is the marquee games. Adding a Nebraska (in the big 10's case) added at least 6 (and not less then 4 perennially) marquee games between Mich, OSU, Penn St., Wisconson, Iowa, and Mich St. this year. Since advertising revenue is driven by actual ratings (and what ESPN/FOX/WHOEVER bid on them is driven by that), that is the bigger picture in all of this. The male 18-35 advertising demographic is what drives college football. They don't watch anything else on TV with ads but live sporting events. Anything else they watch is mainly off of a dvr, if they watch it at all.

 

P.S. that is also why we got the schedule we did, so they could have the ratings to take to the networks when they negotiate the next deal.

[VectorVictor]

I think too much has been made out of the TV markets. Yes that's the bread of the conference channels, but the butter is the marquee games. Adding a Nebraska (in the big 10's case) added at least 6 (and not less then 4 perennially) marquee games between Mich, OSU, Penn St., Wisconson, Iowa, and Mich St. this year. Since advertising revenue is driven by actual ratings (and what ESPN/FOX/WHOEVER bid on them is driven by that), that is the bigger picture in all of this. The male 18-35 advertising demographic is what drives college football. They don't watch anything else on TV with ads but live sporting events. Anything else they watch is mainly off of a dvr, if they watch it at all.

 

It's about 50/50 or 60/40, with the 60 going towards marquee programs/matchups vs. TV markets. You still need something of local interest, and that localized interest and local footprint factor into ad revenue as well.

 

Currently, the Big 10 is, comparatively speaking, stacked with talent. Now you need to need to expand the local footprint to give people a reason to tune in. For example, we discussed Maryland as a possible target--Maryland normally may not give two ****s about the Nebraska/Ohio State matchup normally, but now that they're in the conference, it has an indirect (and possibly direct) bearing on their fortunes--they're invested locally, specifically in the sizable Baltimore/DC markets.

 

Like most things in life, you have to take a balanced approach to achieve optimal success. That's why schools like Rutgers and Maryland have been floating around--the schools and their programs are nothing great on their own, but they command viewership from large media markets.