Realignment Megathread (All The Moves)

[RustShack]

If the ACC gets poached, they aren’t back filling with Big12 schools. The Big12 would just poach who’s left of value in the ACC. It’s the exact same scenario are the PAC getting poached by the B1G. ESPN drops the ACC, keeps the SEC. Fox keeps the B1G. Both share the Big12.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

All of that would have to get voted on. Schools in the past have voted to accept bad deals because of credible threats that the top schools would leave otherwise. I’m not sure the Rutgers/Purdue type schools would vote to accept a lot less because I don’t believe Ohio State and Michigan could make a credible threat to leave.

That being said, I do think some sort of performance bonus where schools that make the CFP get to eat a lot of what they kill is a pretty likely alternative.

And functionally I’m not sure how much difference it makes. Even under the current system there is a massive difference in revenue (and payrolls) from the top of the conference to the bottom. It’s not like it’s remotely close to a level playing field now, the Ohio State roster has to have at least double the cost of the bottom of the league as it is.

This is already in place for the tourney and CFP but if they go to take a bigger cut of that for participation I don’t think there will be much issue.

The media dollars will never be unequal despite the wishcasting of many on here

 

[Al_4_State]

Totally disagree.

Ohio State has an obligation to the networks that are paying the bills to ensure that Purdue, Minnesota, et al remain competitive not to mention their own self interest. The networks and their own fan base want competitive games. Interest dries up real quick if you get to the point where you're just pounding everyone and eventually the fans start voting with their feet (see North Dakota State) and dollars which trickles to the networks. The NFL is what it is because true blowouts are few and far between and that's why it's in the best interest of college football to have some sort of a level playing field, at least within conferences. You also don't want to create a situation where your lesser teams are getting beat by other leagues consistently in bowl and OOC games.

I don't think you'll ever see unequal media revenue sharing because that creates a baseline to keep smaller population, resourced and less historical programs on a reasonably competitive footing. I do think the programs that earn the NCAA and CFP shares will get to keep more of what they earn in the next round of contracts but the media dollars are going to remain as they are.

When have Purdue and Minnesota ever been competitive with Ohio State? The Kennedy administration?

This is runaway greed. Short of government intervention, that will continued unabated. As JP says “those with the gold make the rules”.

The only reason Purdue and Minnesota have the gold is because Ohio State has let them.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

When have Purdue and Minnesota ever been competitive with Ohio State? The Kennedy administration?

This is runaway greed. Short of government intervention, that will continued unabated. As JP says “those with the gold make the rules”.

The only reason Purdue and Minnesota have the gold is because Ohio State has let them.

I get it. You guys got hurt by OUT and so think everyone has to react the same way. Outside of the pandemic the big ten has pretty much been in lock step for almost a century. That’s not gonna change no matter how many on here wish it.

Don’t know how many more years or media deals need to go by before people realize that not every conference is a dysfunctional and prone to infighting like the Big12 is.

I wish ISU was in the big ten and hope no one breaks away (despite JP wanting it and dooming ISU in the process) but that unequal rev share just isn’t happening for the next media deal

 

[1SEIACLONE]

I get it. You guys got hurt by OUT and so think everyone has to react the same way. Outside of the pandemic the big ten has pretty much been in lock step for almost a century. That’s not gonna change no matter how many on here wish it.

Don’t know how many more years or media deals need to go by before people realize that not every conference is a dysfunctional and prone to infighting like the Big12 is.

I wish ISU was in the big ten and hope no one breaks away (despite JP wanting it and dooming ISU in the process) but that unequal rev share just isn’t happening for the next media deal

Rewriting history does not make it correct, during the 80s moving forward there was no conference that was stuck in the past more than the B10. The ride of Bo and Woody had ended a decade before and all the league wanted to talk about was the tradition of the B10, the Rose Bowl, the academics and how the B10 was just a little better than the upstarts around the country. To many of them there were two conferences playing football the way it was supposed to be played with "student athletes" and that was the B10 an P10.
The league itself won nothing on the field, from 1970 till Michigan won a split championship in 1997, but once the century turned and in 2007 with Delaney going out on a limb and setting up their own network, everything changed.

Once the money started to pour in under their media deal, other leagues and universities wanted in on the money and started to think about themselves instead of the good of the conference. No team was going to leave the B10 when they were making more money than anyone else, but the money started to get teams thinking about jumping leagues and it spelled the death of the Pac12 and rebirth of the B12.

It's interesting to think about if the Big East had decided to just stay a BB league or if Penn State had decided to join that league instead of the Big 10 how things would have changed. Or if the B12 which had the idea first to set up its own network was not held back by UT, OU ,aTm and Nebraska only worrying about themselves, not what was best for the league as a whole.

 

[FinalFourCy]

If the ACC gets poached, they aren’t back filling with Big12 schools. The Big12 would just poach who’s left of value in the ACC. It’s the exact same scenario are the PAC getting poached by the B1G. ESPN drops the ACC, keeps the SEC. Fox keeps the B1G. Both share the Big12.

Except the PAC didn’t have a tv deal or exit fees

So basically nothing like the PAC situation

 

[FinalFourCy]

I think my main disagreement is that the cap doesn’t seem to mean much. Teams are openly spending way over the cap as it is and I’m not sure you’ll ever get that to go away. I would love to be wrong of course.

That’s because the cap is low right now. It will be increased so the rev share cap was $40 million, schools can launder it as revenue share The real cap being high or uncapped is even more incentive ,

 

[Al_4_State]

I get it. You guys got hurt by OUT and so think everyone has to react the same way. Outside of the pandemic the big ten has pretty much been in lock step for almost a century. That’s not gonna change no matter how many on here wish it.

Don’t know how many more years or media deals need to go by before people realize that not every conference is a dysfunctional and prone to infighting like the Big12 is.

I wish ISU was in the big ten and hope no one breaks away (despite JP wanting it and dooming ISU in the process) but that unequal rev share just isn’t happening for the next media deal

I get it. You exist but by the largesse of bigger schools. “It hasn’t happened yet so it never will”.

We’ll see.

 

[FriendlySpartan]

I get it. You exist but by the largesse of bigger schools. “It hasn’t happened yet so it never will”.

We’ll see.

Yep that’s the advantage your argument has, you can just keep saying “we’ll see” after every media deal and just say it’s coming.

Football is cyclical. Teams that are on top unless named Ohio State rarely stay on top. Bama has had periods where they are irrelevant and struggle to get 4 wins before saban. Michaign has had to give away tickets with a coke purchase as their team was a disaster for years in a row. Texas, Clemson, you name it have had disastrous runs for years on end.

What the big ten understands (and the SEC to a certain extent) is that when you keep the payouts equal you allow teams like Indiana, like Auburn, like MSU, to have opportunities to rise up and go on runs. It’s about the good and strength of the conference. The Big12 has never understood that due to OUT and Nebraska and now TT that work against the good of the whole.

Indiana led the ratings last year in the big ten and brought home a natty. That’s what equal media dollars and voices get you. When a power team like Penn State falls flat, there is another team ready to pick up where they left off.

I don’t expect you to get it and I know before you have said you just want everyone to suffer like ISU but that’s the reality. No one in the Big Ten is worried about unequal media dollars because it isn’t a thing and Indiana is exhibit A-Z as to why.

 

[1SEIACLONE]

Yep that’s the advantage your argument has, you can just keep saying “we’ll see” after every media deal and just say it’s coming.

Football is cyclical. Teams that are on top unless named Ohio State rarely stay on top. Bama has had periods where they are irrelevant and struggle to get 4 wins before saban. Michaign has had to give away tickets with a coke purchase as their team was a disaster for years in a row. Texas, Clemson, you name it have had disastrous runs for years on end.

What the big ten understands (and the SEC to a certain extent) is that when you keep the payouts equal you allow teams like Indiana, like Auburn, like MSU, to have opportunities to rise up and go on runs. It’s about the good and strength of the conference. The Big12 has never understood that due to OUT and Nebraska and now TT that work against the good of the whole.

Indiana led the ratings last year in the big ten and brought home a natty. That’s what equal media dollars and voices get you. When a power team like Penn State falls flat, there is another team ready to pick up where they left off.

I don’t expect you to get it and I know before you have said you just want everyone to suffer like ISU but that’s the reality. No one in the Big Ten is worried about unequal media dollars because it isn’t a thing and Indiana is exhibit A-Z as to why.

That is a stretch, MSU raised up when Michigan was down and hired a very good coach, once the coach left and Michigan hired a decent coach, it went back to what is was before. Auburn won when they bought an amazing QB, and Indiana when they hired their coach. You notice a tread, put a good coach or great player and you can win, but MSU and Auburn dropped back to what they were before after that person was gone.

Unequal dollars are coming, like I said earlier, I would expect a floor put in, and to earn more you have to prove it and earn it. The days of Purdue and Maryland getting equal dollars as Ohio State and other have's is coming to an end. Ohio State, Michigan and a few others will assure it happens.

 

[RustShack]

Except the PAC didn’t have a tv deal or exit fees

So basically nothing like the PAC situation

The Big12 has a TV deal and exit fees… why would Big12 schools leave for a conference, with similar payout, which would likely be a pay cut after the big dog ACC schools leave for the B1G/SEC?

 

[FriendlySpartan]

That is a stretch, MSU raised up when Michigan was down and hired a very good coach, once the coach left and Michigan hired a decent coach, it went back to what is was before. Auburn won when they bought an amazing QB, and Indiana when they hired their coach. You notice a tread, put a good coach or great player and you can win, but MSU and Auburn dropped back to what they were before after that person was gone.

Unequal dollars are coming, like I said earlier, I would expect a floor put in, and to earn more you have to prove it and earn it. The days of Purdue and Maryland getting equal dollars as Ohio State and other have's is coming to an end. Ohio State, Michigan and a few others will assure it happens.

Great analysis and I agree! Notice that trend? When a team bring in a great coach they tend to do well. Michigan was down for a decade and then post Harbaugh happened. Since he left, nothing. Bama was awful for a decade then got saban now post saban…pretty meh just coasting off the name and ESPN.

Same for Clemson, Texas, FSU, Florida, I could keep going. You are literally making my point. If you aren’t OSU football is cyclical that’s why unequal media dollars isn’t happening.

You claim Michaign and OSU will assure it happens without having any insight or knowledge of either program. I do, and it’s not happening. The additional funds for playoff and tourney births will continue and they should. They also in my mind should probably increase a bit.

But that core media deal, that is staying equal even though you can’t fathom it based on your past experience

 

[Gonzo]

That is a stretch, MSU raised up when Michigan was down and hired a very good coach, once the coach left and Michigan hired a decent coach, it went back to what is was before. Auburn won when they bought an amazing QB, and Indiana when they hired their coach. You notice a tread, put a good coach or great player and you can win, but MSU and Auburn dropped back to what they were before after that person was gone.

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Unequal dollars are coming, like I said earlier, I would expect a floor put in, and to earn more you have to prove it and earn it. The days of Purdue and Maryland getting equal dollars as Ohio State and other have's is coming to an end. Ohio State, Michigan and a few others will assure it happens.

B1G may very well move away from equal spit of CFP and Bowl revenues and instead give a higher % of those dollars to the teams that earned them that year. So yes in that sense there will be "unequal" revenue sharing in the B1G. But if you're saying there will be unequal cuts of the media deal revenues, I don't see that happening.

 

[MountainManHawk]

That’s because the cap is low right now. It will be increased so the rev share cap was $40 million, schools can launder it as revenue share The real cap being high or uncapped is even more incentive ,

It’s an interesting thought experiment. I agree with you the rev share cap is way too low right now and will almost certainly increase significantly in the coming years. I get it the schools have all kinds of unrelated things they are spending on because they are still adjusting from a system where the rev share was 0. But even the poor schools have revenue over $100m and only allocate around $15m to football. If they had been paying players all along, a lot more would be going to players and nobody would think it was odd.

I go back and forth on what impact it will have once the cap is much higher. I definitely see the point that if even the poor schools can pay millions then they should be able to pry away good players that in the past would have sat on the bench at Alabama for several years waiting their turn.

But it feels like we’ve already made that change with the huge number of kids entering the transfer portal each offseason and with a couple exceptions I don’t feel like there’s more parity.

Also the transfer portal seems like one of the few areas where they are going to be able to make real reforms. It feels likely that players will be signing multi year contracts at some point.

 

[MountainManHawk]

The Big12 has a TV deal and exit fees… why would Big12 schools leave for a conference, with similar payout, which would likely be a pay cut after the big dog ACC schools leave for the B1G/SEC?

I don’t have any view one way or the other but I believe the Big12 media deal expires in 2030, which is the same year that the exit fees in the ACC drop and one year after the Big10 deal expires.

That’s why everyone keeps pointing to that time frame for when a lot of reshuffling might happen because all of these deals are up at the same time.

I don’t think it’s cynical at all to think that the TV networks openly tell the conferences what kind of TV deal they’d be willing to offer if certain schools would switch conferences. I think that’s probably what caused USC to jump to the Big10 for instance, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that coincided with the new TV deal.

There’s probably someone at ESPN that has a model showing what the TV deal would look like if the Big12 poached ACC schools and also a similar model showing what would happen if the ACC poached someone from the Big12.