It's not a large enough pool of affected schools yet.
A Big 10/SEC breakaway (which seems a lot less likely to me now than it did a month ago) would do that.
Realignment Megathread (All The Moves)
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A Big 10/SEC breakaway (which seems a lot less likely to me now than it did a month ago) would do that.
Interesting thought. We've been assuming the only way aggregation could happen is gvmt fiat or PE.
But what if an Amazon or Netflix came in and made an enormous offer, say $125M per school annual but everyone needed to sign up? Would everyone be able to come together to take that, or would the P2 still say "we'd rather have less money and more advantage" ?
Aggregation will only happen if Congress and/or a Fed court threaten to break up or actually take the steps necessary to break up the ESPN/Fox stranglehold on the sport. ESPN/SEC and Fox/B10 obviously know that is a possibility because they have been having anti-trust SMEs/lawyers attend their recent meetings. Any additional schools being relegated will or should be the final tipping point to trigger those breakup steps.
IMO, PE is highly questionable if ACC and B12 schools don't know the status of their TV revenue streams beyond 2032. How can they pay off PE investment if they don't know their TV revenue streams beyond 2032 and why would PE invest near-term in ACC or B12 schools if they don't know those revenue streams under the looming threat of financial/competitive relegation?
To be honest I think that’s more of a Rodney Terry issue than a realignment issue.
He must know of some skeletons in the closet for him to be keeping his job.
I don't think PE gets involved as a silent partner / passive investor. As you point out, its risky on the revenue side. And if schools just want money temporarily until they can adjust their costs to revenues, they can borrow that money much cheaper than PE. At least, most can, anyway. So passive PE makes no sense to me.
My thinking is that PE would get involved as a way to bring in coherent leadership/management to run the CFB organization structure. You'd bring in actual businesses management to be in charge of the thing, the way the NFL owners have a group running all that for them. The PE money, is basically how they buy into the new organization/company while the schools buy in with their media rights value. Not saying it will happen, but that is the structure that would make sense in my mind.
Neither Wazzu nor Oregon State have been destroyed by any reasonable metric.
JP is an AD of what is currently considered a “power conference” athletic department. He has a peculiar perspective, and even then is being hyperbolic.
The consensus opinion is that post election Congress will pass a measure granting antitrust exemptions to overcome court rulings that determined athletes could be considered employees and that athletes can’t be denied compensation. The various “college sports” organizations (NCAA, NAIA, NJCAA, Ivy League, Big 10, MVC, etc) will have more autonomy to set their own rules.
Do you really think this same federal government will have the stomach to interfere in media contracts these organizations pursue because a few dozen schools see their payouts cut by 60%?
You have got to be kidding regarding your take on Wazzu and Oregon St.
Their future TV payouts are going to be cut from $35M/yr to $10M or less (likely less) due to the direct actions of Fox and the B10. Both do have some leftover funds to work with due to exit fees and other funds due to the PAC being destroyed.
Not only that, Wazzu has lost their FB and MBB HCs since the PAC was blown up (FB HC Jake Dickert bailed to Wake Forest of all places). Oregon St lost their homegrown FB HC. For players with eligibility left, Oregon St essentially lost their entire WBB roster to transfer after making the Elite 8 last season (including one to ISU). Wazzu has lost elite QBs to the portal for two consecutive seasons due to relegation and inability to competitively pay them. Oregon St did a massive renovation of their FB stadium and are now stuck with the significant attendance and payout cuts to pay for and justify the renovation through no fault of their own. Oregon St has won a couple of CWS in recent years and that program is also facing competitive/financial relegation. Also safe to say both schools are dealing with enrollment and donor decreases as well due to the relegation.
25-30 more ACC and B12 schools face similar consequences due to the ESPN/Fox CFB strangehold. That certainly justifies Congressional or Judicial intervention as JP is suggesting.
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No.
But they might intervene if 2/3rds of the schools in current D1 football become formally blocked from the playoffs.
This is why they'll never formally block that many schools. They don't need to make a rule prohibiting it, they can make it nearly impossible for non-P2 schools to compete anyway.
Will there be enough popular sentiment to motivate congress? What if half the sentiment is the other way? And all the money will be coming from ESPN/Fox to preserve status quo.
That's probably the most likely outcome for now. Why ban them, when you can just let a token or two in and keep the money? I am sure a lot of SEC folks would love that kind of "separate but equal" setup for the CFP. And yes, that is incendiary language, its intentional.
They can do basically what they did right now, the P2 gets a bunch of stupid advantages and the rest still get access. That’s why this talk of a super league was always just tin foil hat talk, it never made any sense to doom yourself and cut that many people’s interest off.
Thing is I dont see 2/3rds of the schools being relegated, if realignment continues the same way it has gone.
Right now Exactly 1/2 of the P4 teams are in the B1G and SEC.
The last round exactly 2 teams were essentially Relegated, Something like 3/100ths of the P5, but essentially kept their conference and their injury was at least muted.
Assuming the ACC implodes, We can also assume 4-8 of those schools go to the SEC and/or the B1G, at the same time another 4 go to the B12. Leaving 5-9 max to either rebuild the ACC or move down etc. Meaning about 1/10th or less of the original P5 total would be relegated at that point. Keep in mind how many have be elevated from G5 in recent years too.
If it continues that way, while I agree the B1G and SEC may pull further away, it would be hard for anyone in that new makeup of the B12 to claim serious injury, especially if the payouts continue to increase or at least remain the same. And I dont think a handful of schools would be enough to trigger something even at that point. Especially when at the same time a similar amount of G5 Schools were elevated in recent years. The only thing that would be an issue is if they make the playoff only available to the SEC and B1G but I am 95% sure they know that, so will avoid doing that for the foreseeable future.
Is it possible, sure. Is it likely, no.
The forums I see are placing the blame on Terry and realignment. They are saying that Texas football is getting all the nil now that they are in the sec. Terry is also a lot like Tang.
Exactly this. While OSU and WSU were effected in a very negitive way, BYU, CINCI, UCF, and Houston were all effected in a very positive way. Hard to say to most people that the system is destroying schools when more have been promoted to the P4 level and every single P4 conference is making more money then it ever does in history.
To avoid any further issues I can also see it being very possible that the P2 just say no to future ACC schools to preserve this and avoid issues. FSU falling off a cliff and Clemson reverting back certainly don’t help and with the SEC already complaining how “hard” they have it why would they want to add more potential threats?
Not saying the ACC lives forever but over the past year I’ve come around to thinking they will remain intact for longer then anticipated
Honestly not sure if serious... The super league is here with the SEC playing the role of the AFC and the B!G playing the role of the NFC. Once those two conferences gut the ACC the super league will be complete.
Also, there are enough d*ckheads like Lane Kiffin in this that are shot callers that re-seeding will absolutely happen. Has everyone already forgot the SEC crying at UT's seeding? The team that needed two OTs to beat lowly ASU...?
I agree. I don't think the Big 12 or most of the ACC is getting left behind on paper for these exact reasons.
I'm just saying that the threat keeps getting waived out there by some in the media, and I believe that IF we got that point, intervention would happen.
But I don't believe we'll get to that point, so it's moot.
Serious as I don’t think they need to or have the desire to gut the ACC right now.
Yes reseeding will happen or something to get rid of autobyes for champions. Don’t know if it will happen before next season or if they wait to see if this year was the outlier or not.
You won’t hear me defending the SEC or their constant ******** anytime soon.
I think that the Big 10 and Sec are inclined not to add, too.
