(06-07-2016 08:54 AM)Captain Bearcat Wrote: So the SEC buys Texas, Oklahoma, Clemson, and FSU. I assume the Big 10 buys Kansas, UVA, Duke, and UNC. So if this is a battle of the conference networks, who wins?
Answer: the Big Ten Network, hands down. The Big 10 network gets 3 new states, and the SEC network gets 1 new state.
I've remained silent on your B.S. for quite some time. Texas didn't reject the SEC in '91 they were interested. In fact they approached us first. It's just that they knew the SWC days were numbered and they were doing due diligence to determine their value. They approached the Big 10 and the PAC as well. The SEC and PAC were willing to take friends.
The SEC was looking at expansion to 16 with Texas, Texas A&M, Arkansas, Clemson, and Florida State with a silent school agreeing to come based upon Texas & Texas A&M's inclusion. That school was Oklahoma.
Texas after the huge scandals of the SWC might have been looking for less attention upon recruiting violations, but the sins of the old SWC made the ole payola of the SEC look tame by comparison.
BTW, the SEC has not yet had the egg on its face that Ohio State did under Tressel with coeds providing favors to recruits, or like the atrocities at Penn State. So stow the Big 10 crap.
But getting back to the point, Texas was more interested in the PAC, mostly because of shared research with schools out West and A&M was more interested in the SEC due to history with LSU and ties to Alabama. Arkansas just wanted out. But before resolution Baylor disrupted Texas politics and hamstrung the attempts of Texas an A&M to get out.
Clemson was never anything but tepid and South Carolina heard about the play with Clemson through the good ole boy system in their state and applied.
Bowden reportedly wanted the easier path to championships that the ACC provided, at least that was the cover story. Behind the scenes ESPN feared the SEC would gain too much leverage with F.S.U. and they provided the lure that helped to close the deal with the ACC.
This piece by the Orlando Sentinel is a speculation piece based on information that is 25 years old.
Now as to your assertions, markets aren't even the motivator any longer, at least not the extent they were in 2010. Content is the safest bet for moving forward as streaming will play a larger part of the delivery model and the footprint pay model is likely going to replaced with one that pays for the viewers.
If the latter happens the Big 10 is at a significant disadvantage, but not one as severely disadvantaged as the ACC & PAC. The SEC and Big 12 actually both saturate their markets more efficiently than does the Big 10 (3rd among the P5 in saturation) and the ACC & PAC (nip & tuck for last place).
Think of it this way. The Big 10 has two unquestioned national brands and 4 more that draw the nations eyeballs. They don't all play each other either. Therefore they have fewer than 10 T1 games in conference that draw national attention. If they schedule some top names OOC they only have those games to sell half of the time.
If we move to streaming or some form of paying only actual viewers (even though the Big 10 has more potential viewers) the additions of Rutgers and Maryland aren't going to prove as profitable as they were under the footprint model.
But long term, paying for actual viewers will become a point of contention on simply keeping any conference together under an equal pay model. So we'll see. The Alabama's, Ohio State's, Texas's, Florida's and Michigan's of the world are going to get darned tired of supporting the Purdue's, Indiana's, Maryland's, Vanderbilt's, Mississippi State's, T.C.U.'s, Kansas State's, Oregon State's and Washington State's of the world, let alone the Wake Forest's.
Those of you born after 1980 won't be familiar with what I'm about to say, but those of you born before 1960 will. In the early 70's there was some serious discussion about doing away with conference boundaries and taking the top 24 to 36 revenue producers and forming a kind of a league. Old ties and neighborly rivals prevented it. I wouldn't be surprised to see some iteration of that concept rotate back into the discussion at some point.