(05-24-2012 10:55 AM)blunderbuss Wrote:  

(05-24-2012 10:34 AM)ECUPirated Wrote:  

(05-24-2012 10:27 AM)b0ndsj0ns Wrote:  Interesting graph. Attendance doesn't drive realignment, but it's not really surprising that the leagues that have the highest overall attendance make the most money. However there are only so many schools who draw 80k people per game, and most of them are in the B1G, SEC, and B12.

Makes you wonder if East Carolina wasn't the only team in CUSA averaging 50,000 what our TV media deal would look like. Imagine if every team in CUSA was averaging 40,000 to 50,000 in attendance or more how the networks might look at that and then factor a Tulane in the New Orleans market, UAB in Birmingham, Memphis in Memphis, UTSA in San Antonio, ODU in Norfolk, FIU in Miami, etc. There has to be a direct correlation.

First off....VERY good visual aids to the OP.

I've always thought our media deal would be A LOT better if our current members could just put 35K butts IN THE SEATS. A lot of the numbers are reporting sold tickets as "attendance". Bottom line is CUSA & MWC product is horrible for the most part.

Joe Sports Fan doesn't want to watch a game say....@UAB or @Tulane or @Rice with 10K in the stands. I barely wanted to watch ECU @UAB the last time we played there. It's freaking embarrassing to be in a conference with THAT to be totally honest. Don't get me wrong, I don't think we'd all of a sudden get SEC or Big10 type ratings with better attendance but I DO believe it would help a lot.

There's something cool about watching a game where you can hear the fans roar in the background and cameras pan over a crowd that's whipped into a frenzy. We don't really have much of that at all in CUSA and that really hurts us.

Exactly. I wouldn't expect our TV deal to be anywhere near the levels of the others, but it would be better. The other aspect of marketing CUSA and/or MWC is making sure those games are timeslotted properly where we aren't going up against an SEC v ACC matchup or "American Idol" i.e.

can you do it as well w/o MWC, CUSA, and Big East. That would show the 5 conferences a lot better...

Also- Almost everyone thinks new Big East will get more than any 5 million dollars.

(05-24-2012 10:54 AM)4x4hokies Wrote:  

(05-24-2012 10:45 AM)piratefan1975 Wrote:  4x4Hokie, I don't know if I included the proper revenue for the SEC or not. I'll be glad to check and adjust the chart if necessary.

I don't think it is official but the strongest rumor is 25 million which fits in well with your line.

EDIT: Actually, with the steeper line it looks to be low

Thanks for that 4x4. I'll update my excel chart showing the revised SEC contract at $25 million as well as their revised attendance numbers after adding A&M and Mizzou.

It'll be interesting to see how close to the line it is.

(05-24-2012 11:07 AM)stever20 Wrote:  can you do it as well w/o MWC, CUSA, and Big East. That would show the 5 conferences a lot better...

Also- Almost everyone thinks new Big East will get more than any 5 million dollars.

Sure, I can do that too.

Can redo looking at average coed bra size, divided by the number of Starbucks in each town. Thanks in advance.

These graphs tell me that (1) the Big East is currently severly undervalued, (2) the Big East-ESPN TV offer that was turned down was in the ballpark, and (3) that given market forces the next TV deal the Big East signs will likely be in the same balpark, but a little north on a per team basis.

Good stuff.

OK, Thanks to 4x4hokie, I've updated the graph to show the new SEC contract; both in terms of their annual payout as well as the very slight hit they took in average attendance.

The Big East is still WAY undervalued. But, as will be shown in subsequent charts, the addition of CUSA and MWC, both of which have been changed dramatically, skews the line.

This chart includes the new SEC contract.

(05-24-2012 10:22 AM)piratefan1975 Wrote:  It seems as though expansion has been solely about TV markets with little regard to attendance and size of fan base.

There have been many discussions in the past as to which is the driving force behind television revenues; the amount of market "pull" or penetration schools and conferences have or is it merely the amount of potential "eyeballs" that could be sold to advertisers.

I've put together a series of grahical representations that may shed some light on these questions.

First of all, here is a graphical representation showing the correlation between Average Conference Attendance and the Average Annual TV Revenues per team.




As the title of the graph illustrates, this is based on 2011 numbers; prior to the movement of Pitt and Cuse to the ACC and TCU and WVU to the B12.

From this chart, it indicates some degree of correlation between attendance (market penetration) and TV revenue.

It would indicate that the Pac 12 hit a homerun in their negotiations. I presume, this may be due to the ability to show games on the East Coast at a late time slot. (maybe)

It also shows the Big East to be undervalued.

Graph shows that there is a corrolation between attendance and TV revenue. This makes anecdotal sense since many of the same contributing factors are at play - in particular the breadth and depth of support for a school within its respective market (which for college sports teams, is generally the state in which they are located as opposed to a TV DMA).

The corrolation has the potential to break down on an individualized basis. Fans buying season tickets have deep support, as demonstrated by the commitment of time and money to supporting the school. Fans watching only on TV are by definition less committed, but could be numerous even in the case of a school without deep support. Consider American Idol - the willingness to watch and vote for a singer may not equate to a willingness to buy that singer's records or concert tickets. Also, attendance can be boosted by lowering ticket prices, or suppressed by high ticket prices. Syracuse hoops, for instance, stopped breaking attendance records when they increased the price of those mile away tickets in the far end zone to $25 and more.

Now, per Stever20's request, I've removed CUSA and MWC to just reflect the former 6 AQ conferences. This results in a DEFINITE linear relationship.




In my haste, I forgot to label the data points, but the green line shows the forecasted TV revenues for the New Big East, which fall at about $10 million per team. This gives credence to the forecast above, which I presumed would be somewhere between $6 and $10 million per team.

Also, from this graph, assuming CUSA can still manage to average around 25,000 per game (just 9,000 per game shy of the New Big East) we could see a payout in the $5 to $7 million per team range.

For these reasons, I have long been a proponent of attendance as a good measure. I am glad that CUSA got UTSA, as well as ODU. ODU already out-draws most SunBelt teams.

I like where we're headed. I also see the value of a school like mine, with a large and rabid fanbase.

That doesn't take into consideration the impact of a large fanbase's willingness to travel to bowl games.

Using the graph in Post 29, there is a definite correlation between market pull and tv revenues. The new ACC, B-12 and SEC contracts fall directly in line.

I understand why the Big East chose Boise State. They were trying to save BCS AQ status. To me, that was first and foremost on the minds of the presidents during expansion. To get Boise, they had to get SDSU.

The Big East based their expansion primarily on TV markets; which, graphically, does not indicate any correlation between sheer market size and TV revenues.

It makes me wonder what impact it would have been on the New Big East TV contract if they could have landed BYU in the west, drawing 60,000+ fans per game and ECU in the east, drawing 50,000+ fans per game and growing at a very rapid rate.

This chart shows ECU's attendance growth as compared to NCSU and UNC-CH.

(05-24-2012 12:01 PM)piratefan1975 Wrote:  Using the graph in Post 29, there is a definite correlation between market pull and tv revenues. The new ACC, B-12 and SEC contracts fall directly in line.

I understand why the Big East chose Boise State. They were trying to save BCS AQ status. To me, that was first and foremost on the minds of the presidents during expansion. To get Boise, they had to get SDSU.

The Big East based their expansion primarily on TV markets; which, graphically, does not indicate any correlation between sheer market size and TV revenues.

It makes me wonder what impact it would have been on the New Big East TV contract if they could have landed BYU in the west, drawing 60,000+ fans per game and ECU in the east, drawing 50,000+ fans per game and growing at a very rapid rate.

This chart shows ECU's attendance growth as compared to NCSU and UNC-CH.

I think it's entirely possible that within 20 years we have the largest football fan base in the state. Does that mean anything in the grand scheme of things? Not really sure.

EXCELLENT thread 1975. I've always believed this to be the case but hadn't bothered plotting the data as you've done. Using this logic the Big East should add BYU & Fresno in the west and ECU in the East for a 16 team football conference.

I just think the Big East leadership doesn't fully understand college football. They're really the only conference to strictly follow the market theory really. Seems like they're trying to apply an NFL type of model in their recent expansion. In the NFL there are large market teams and small market teams with the large market teams being the richest. In college football, the exact opposite is often true. Even though Alabama and Auburn both SHARE one of the....less wealthy states in the country, they're also 2 of the most valuable properties in the nation due to their rabid followings.

I'm not trying to compare ECU to Alabama by any stretch of the imagination but considering the BE's options I DO believe there is a correlation there as you've displayed perfectly. Obviously I'm biased but the Big East should go to 16 if they're going to thrive long term. ECU & BYU would seem to be no brainers. Fresno State should probably be up there too, I believe they're drawing or used to consistently draw a little over 40K. They'd all shore up bowl tie-ins, especially BYU.

It also shows that the loss of ECU would be devastating to the new C-USA. Behind ECU, the next highest attended programs are UTSA at 35,521 and USM at 28,400.

You can dazzle me with market size, potential, yada yada. Where the rubber hits the road is the size of the fan base and attendance.

Good fan base and attendance means good gate revenues, concession revenues, merchandise sales and less subsidizing of the athletic department. It means better bowls and better perception of the school. As shown in this thread, it also means more TV money.

Hey, don't look now, but Clemson and Florida State just so happen to be #1 and #2 in attendance in the ACC. Even though both have been down recently, do you think there's a coincidence why they're being mentioned in expansion rumors to the Big12? The Big12 knows where the money is.

(05-24-2012 12:16 PM)blunderbuss Wrote:  EXCELLENT thread 1975. I've always believed this to be the case but hadn't bothered plotting the data as you've done. Using this logic the Big East should add BYU & Fresno in the west and ECU in the East for a 16 team football conference.

I just think the Big East leadership doesn't fully understand college football. They're really the only conference to strictly follow the market theory really. Seems like they're trying to apply an NFL type of model in their recent expansion. In the NFL there are large market teams and small market teams with the large market teams being the richest. In college football, the exact opposite is often true. Even though Alabama and Auburn both SHARE one of the....less wealthy states in the country, they're also 2 of the most valuable properties in the nation due to their rabid followings.

I'm not trying to compare ECU to Alabama by any stretch of the imagination but considering the BE's options I DO believe there is a correlation there as you've displayed perfectly. Obviously I'm biased but the Big East should go to 16 if they're going to thrive long term. ECU & BYU would seem to be no brainers. Fresno State should probably be up there too, I believe they're drawing or used to consistently draw a little over 40K. They'd all shore up bowl tie-ins, especially BYU.

Paul Tagliabue was their consultant. It makes sense.

Unfortunately for ECU, our only hope of a better conference was the ONLY one that chose market size as their sole basis for expansion. There's nothing we could have done.

(05-24-2012 10:37 AM)piratefan1975 Wrote:  Now, lets take a look at at a graph that shows the relationship between the Average Number of TV Households per Team and the Annual TV Revenue per team.

The information regarding DMA and number of television households was gathered from the Neilson website.

It should be noted, that if a conference had more than one team within a defined DMA, they were given credit for each team. For instance, the Pac 12 got credit for both USC and UCLA in the same DMA. The same goes for every conference that had multiple teams within the same DMA.



It is very interesting that this graph shows no correlation between the number of TV households and TV revenues.

I think your correlation will improve here is you de-dupe the DMAs (e.g. counting the Raleigh, NC DMA 3 times inflates the ACC TV viewership numbers. Only counting it once may undervalue, but it's probably closer than 3x. Also, I assume you include the Charlotte, NC DMA in the ACC numbers as well (if not, you definitely should - Charlotte is ACC country for sure)

I would think good attendance in a small market is a negative for TV. Already have a small market and a larger percentage are at the game.

(05-24-2012 03:28 PM)goodknightfl Wrote:  I would think good attendance in a small market is a negative for TV. Already have a small market and a larger percentage are at the game.

Only most of our Almuni don't live in Greenville. Otherwise we'd have a much larger market. I guess that's a pretty difficult concept to understand in a commuter school conference.