Especially when this is all about football and they play a 12 game schedule. Some of those teams would play once every 10-15 years.
Realignment Megathread (All The Moves)
- Thread starter ISUcyclones11
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Yup. Extortion isn't just for conferences outside the P2. Next step will be turning inward with a revenue agreement among SEC/B1G conference members to let their biggest brands have the biggest share. Heck, it's already started with UO/UW. Just like the old Big 8. I'm sure it will work out better though!
Some schools in both the Big Ten and the SEC will thank their lucky stars that they were in the "right place at the right time" over 100 years ago in 2024.
agreed. those schools will make the cut for a few reasons. some regionality, travel cost, "history", the guise of not being cutthroat, but above all... punching bag. while ISU has some of those, rutgers etc check more of those boxes
That's what's coming. A pro college league. Basically the SEC and Big 10 plus Florida State, Clemson, and Notre Dame (maybe). The Big 12, ACC and the rest will play in a lower division with a different playoff. I doubt I will watch college football after that. My hope is that the Bears make the right decision with the upcoming draft and I'll get my entertainment in the real pro league. Screw college football. All of the greedy d!cks can eat a d!ck as far as I'm concerned.
I dumbed it becuase there is zero chance Michigan leaves the big ten or your scenario of a bunch of spin off independents happening
All I know is that if those teams split off for football, they better not expect to participate in any other NCAA sports. Let them play with themselves in their own basketball tournament.
Where is Randy Pete, before riding off into the sunset, to put out his own expansion list and include the good guys with the New World Order of the SEC & Big 10? Other media guys, local or national, have put out their lists, and ISU is never on there. Hope this breakaway never happens whether we are included or not. There should be more inclusive teams, not less.
At some point I think the only thing that makes sense is the Top 16 brands breaking away for their own circle jerk. Nothing but blue bloods vs blue bloods and no schools to subsidize.
This would push schools like Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, Illinois, NW, etc into our level.
Frankly, that would be a lot more fun to me. The only reason this reorganization sucks is that schools that bring nothing more to the table than we do are getting to go along for the ride because of who they hooked up with 100 years ago. If ISU had hooked up with Ohio State and Michigan instead of Nebraska and Oklahoma, we'd be in the same boat as Iowa. If they had hooked up with Nebraska and Oklahoma, they'd be in the same boat as us.
This would push schools like Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, Illinois, NW, etc into our level.
Frankly, that would be a lot more fun to me. The only reason this reorganization sucks is that schools that bring nothing more to the table than we do are getting to go along for the ride because of who they hooked up with 100 years ago. If ISU had hooked up with Ohio State and Michigan instead of Nebraska and Oklahoma, we'd be in the same boat as Iowa. If they had hooked up with Nebraska and Oklahoma, they'd be in the same boat as us.
My dream scenario is the 'blue bloods' have their own league and the rest of cfb goes back into new regional conferences. Know it'll never happen but that would be amazing
I'm not so sure.
There seems to be this overarching need to maximize value, while also engaging in a real playground "you can't sit in our tree fort" mentality. Either things kind of stabilize in something that resembles the current format, or the blue bloods will start shedding the SEC and Big 10 schools that aren't major brands. That's about 2/3rds of the Big 10 and half of the SEC.
I believe that those 16 brands would watch their popularity quickly fall. So sign me up for that.
Same. I'd watch occasionally, but not religiously.
But if there's going to be this obsession with having the best games and best TV product, yadda, yadda, yadda, don't try to push the idea that Iowa vs Purdue is a better product than Oklahoma State vs. Arizona because everyone knows it's not.
If you let those absolute big brands break off, you could see a geographical reorganization. Imagine our "conference" schedule looking like this:
Iowa
Mizzou
KU
KSU
OK State
Minnesota
Nebraska (they might make that top 16 or whatever)
Illinois
NW
I can't imagine CFB being more fun that that.
I think if that happens, you're always going to have someone at the top of the "2nd" league trying to get into the blue bloods league, and the cycle would just repeat itself. For every ISU or Illinois that's happy in the 'normal' league, you'll have an Iowa or Arkansas or Utah that's desperately trying to get into the big boys club and will try to sabotage things or ruin the good thing we have.
I might be a little pessimistic on the current state of things in CFB but I just don't ever see the most perfect and logical scenario ever playing out in my lifetime
That’s why it would never happen, again for all the understandable doom and gloom there have actually been more schools added to the P4 then retracted and ISU has never been positioned better then they are now to make a playoff and see real postseason success.
I think the Top 20ish would do well enough that they wouldn't need/want to add. Theres only so much prime tv real estate. And you'd see such a steep divide it would be hard to bridge that gap.
The money would go down for the 50ish 2nd tier schools, it would prob be more like $20M each (in 2024 dollars). But if the competition is balanced, that's a successful product. You'd probably have the same number of viewers, but spread over more games, and in less favorable time/channel slots, so lower per game ratings and value.
Imagine five 10-team divisions built geographically (NE, SE, MW, S, W) playing round robin. Then an 8 team playoff with the 5 winners and 3 wildcards. It's so beautiful it will never happen.
It comes down to whether the B1G tagalongs and SEC underachievers are content to earn more money but suffer competitively, with increasingly reduced exposure on outlets like SECN or Peacock. Because the media cost of the package is getting so high now that MSU or Rutgers at some point isn't getting an NBC game unless they are delivering the viewers that OSU or Michigan gets.
The idea of it sounds nice but the paycut for the AD and having every game on a platform like ESPN+ does not sound great.
Oh and throw in having to pay for players coming soon there will be some hard conversations to be had.
That’s gonna be a bigger SEC problem than a big ten one due to SEC having only one partner in ESPN/ABC as opposed to having Fox, CBS, and NBC. Teams have already been playing on BTN regularly though which isn’t much different. Even Michigan had games on peacock and BTN.
Point is that with just the new additions it doesn’t really change the exposure, especially if these west coast teams are going to be playing some night games.
