(01-27-2018 11:41 AM)TerryD Wrote: (01-26-2018 11:59 PM)AllTideUp Wrote: (01-26-2018 11:19 PM)TerryD Wrote: It is fantasy. ND and the ACC are locked into status quo (ND football not part of the ACC, but 24 other sports are) through 2036.
Who really cares after that?
The ACC is not going to do anything to change ND's status. It is merely wishful thinking, without cause, to insist otherwise.
ND will join the ACC for football in ten minutes if a P4 champs only playoff is announced. Otherwise? Status quo through 2036.
Now that I've backed you an inch off that "ND will never ever join a league" position
This is really my point. Would the ACC try to force ND's hand today? Absolutely not, they wouldn't dare think it. Ten years from now? Probably still a hard 'no.'
But 20 and 30 years from now? Neither you nor I know exactly what the economic picture will be. Whether there is a P4 playoff or not, ND will eventually have to accept that the economics of college football are not what they were 30, 40, or 50 years ago. That day is long gone.
Who cares what ND does after 2036? Well, hopefully someone still does...
If nobody cares then that sort of underscores the problem. The time may very well be coming when ND just doesn't move the needle that much. They might end up joining one league or the other simply because some of the others might not be interested.
More to the point, the ND faithful will care and so someone will be around to make decisions for the university and my bet is that the reality of a need rather than a preference to join a conference will be slapping ND leadership in the face.
Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday and for the rest of your lives...
You didn't "back me" into anything. Jack Swarbrick has said that is the only way ND will give up football independence. Since then (a few years ago), nobody could argue otherwise.
My bet to you is that ND will not join a football conference prior to 2036 unless a P4 champs only playoff is established.
Otherwise, ND's position will be status quo until at least 2036 no matter what fans of other programs want or think on message boards.
After that? Hell, there may be no college football at that point. I will be 79 years old in 2036, if still alive. I doubt I will care one way or the other by then. :)
Well, "never" and "might as well be 2545" wouldn't exactly qualify as "status quo until 2036," but believe what you will.
But you still don't seem to understand what I'm really getting at. The fact that I'm a fan of another program has nothing to do with it. It doesn't matter what the consensus of college football fans think, sure. It also doesn't matter what the consensus of Notre Dame fans think either. It's an economic question and really nothing more.
The fact that you'll be nearly 80 by the time 2036 arrives informs us of something...you grew up in an era when Notre Dame was synonymous with the pinnacle of college football. That is no longer the world we live in. By 2036, I'll be in my mid 50s and I grew up in a world where Notre Dame is more a relic than anything else. They're a curiosity more than a force.
You grew up in a world where Notre Dame was unequivocally the captain of its own ship. That world doesn't exist anymore. The Notre Dame of 2011 was forced to sign over 5 games a season to a league like the ACC just to maintain relative independence. ND got a special arrangement compared to most schools, but do you really think that if ND could have simply parked their non-revenue sports in the ACC without guaranteeing a single football game that they wouldn't have done it? That simply wasn't an option for them...
It's like Doc Brown said..."Marty, you're not thinking 4th dimensionally!"
It's entirely possible that ND won't join a league before 2036. I never said they would although I wouldn't be shocked to see it in the next 10 years. What I said is that it's inevitable that they will have to join some league at some point in the not too distant future. Economics will demand it because the ND brand will continue to weaken without conference membership to buoy it. One of these days, ND is going to have to join a conference...it will no longer be a matter of what they want or don't want. If they have a desire to maintain the entity that is Notre Dame football then they'll have one choice in front of them.
The specific year it happens is immaterial to the point I'm making. It won't happen in the next few years because the ACC will stick around a while longer and ND won't bleed too much influence in that short a period of time. When precisely it happens will depend on various factors:
1. How many playoff appearances will ND have in the next 10 years?
2. How profitable will the ACC Network be in that period of time? Could a strong network lead to a stronger ACC in other words?
3. Will the ACC stick around in the long term or will they essentially dissolve if the SEC and B1G continue to grow?
4. Will the Power leagues form a new division?