I see where you are coming from. Ga has more FBS signees tha Ohio, but will now have 4 FBS schools compared to 8 in Ohio. You guys will always be fighting an uphill battle. Ga Southern and Ga St have a high ceiling with all the talent available within a few hours of the schools.

(04-14-2013 02:13 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(04-14-2013 01:36 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  Frankly, I don't know why any school wouldn't either (1) move from FCS or FBS if they can cover the Title IX and facilities costs (unless you're one of the Big East schools with an FCS football program, in which case you're better off just collecting your basketball paychecks) or (2) drop football altogether. FCS is financial purgatory - you still have to spend about 70-80% of the costs that a low level FBS program would have with none of the revenue upside. With the new college football postseason revenue structure, I think you'll see a LOT more movement from FCS to FBS unless the NCAA steps in and puts a cap on further upgrades. You saw the Idahos and New Mexico States of the world absolutely refuse to even consider downgrading even when they couldn't find a conference home, and it honestly makes sense in this new world. FCS football is almost a guaranteed money-loser for an athletic department. FBS at least gives you a chance to make some revenue and the cost of the extra scholarships is likely worth it.

A few years ago, I expected FCS schools to be dropping football or scholarships like crazy. Yet in this recession, the opposite is happening. Non-scholarship and low scholarship schools (i.e. Patriot League) are adding scholarships and more schools, especially commuter schools in the south, are adding football. Just off the top of my head, commuter schools in the last 20 years or less that have added (or will soon be adding) fb-UTSA, Lamar, SE Louisiana, South Alabama, Alabama-Birmingham, Georgia State, Kennesaw State, Central Florida, South Florida, FIU, FAU, Coastal Carolina, UNC-Charlotte and Old Dominion. That doesn't include schools like Houston Baptist, Incarnate Word and a bunch of division II/III & NAIA private schools.

Apparently they are convinced the intangible costs are worth it in order to connect with alumni and draw students, particularly male students, who are attending in lower numbers. I don't see any trend towards dropping football or scholarships.

FCS is a financial black hole, worse than being the bottom of FBS and worse than Division II with significantly fewer scholarships (although without Division I basketball revenues). But its not going away.

FCS schools will drop football like crazy if the top 5 FBS conferences stop playing FCS teams in non-conference.

(04-14-2013 02:13 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(04-14-2013 01:36 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  Frankly, I don't know why any school wouldn't either (1) move from FCS or FBS if they can cover the Title IX and facilities costs (unless you're one of the Big East schools with an FCS football program, in which case you're better off just collecting your basketball paychecks) or (2) drop football altogether. FCS is financial purgatory - you still have to spend about 70-80% of the costs that a low level FBS program would have with none of the revenue upside. With the new college football postseason revenue structure, I think you'll see a LOT more movement from FCS to FBS unless the NCAA steps in and puts a cap on further upgrades. You saw the Idahos and New Mexico States of the world absolutely refuse to even consider downgrading even when they couldn't find a conference home, and it honestly makes sense in this new world. FCS football is almost a guaranteed money-loser for an athletic department. FBS at least gives you a chance to make some revenue and the cost of the extra scholarships is likely worth it.

A few years ago, I expected FCS schools to be dropping football or scholarships like crazy. Yet in this recession, the opposite is happening. Non-scholarship and low scholarship schools (i.e. Patriot League) are adding scholarships and more schools, especially commuter schools in the south, are adding football. Just off the top of my head, commuter schools in the last 20 years or less that have added (or will soon be adding) fb-UTSA, Lamar, SE Louisiana, South Alabama, Alabama-Birmingham, Georgia State, Kennesaw State, Central Florida, South Florida, FIU, FAU, Coastal Carolina, UNC-Charlotte and Old Dominion. That doesn't include schools like Houston Baptist, Incarnate Word and a bunch of division II/III & NAIA private schools.

Apparently they are convinced the intangible costs are worth it in order to connect with alumni and draw students, particularly male students, who are attending in lower numbers. I don't see any trend towards dropping football or scholarships.

FCS is a financial black hole, worse than being the bottom of FBS and worse than Division II with significantly fewer scholarships (although without Division I basketball revenues). But its not going away.

FCS schools will drop football like crazy if the top 5 FBS conferences stop playing FCS teams in non-conference.

(04-14-2013 07:52 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(04-14-2013 09:44 AM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(04-14-2013 09:25 AM)BruceMcF Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

My only question here is, who is this "we" you speak of?

Its silly to pretend that the "adding new markets" is the driving force for the call-ups. The driving force for the call-ups are the efforts of Mid-Major FBS conferences to survive while coping with the aftershocks of Major FBS conference expansion.

If Major FBS conference expansion stops, the FCS call-ups will come to a stop shortly thereafter.

So in the end this is a call for "can we please stop the game of Major FBS conference realignment", and while I'm all for it, its not quite clear who this "we" is on this board who is doing the game of Major FBS conference realignment and who can therefore stop doing it.

I think the whole points, how many overlapping non-AQ conferences are rally needed to give everyone a home? Do we really need a MAC, Sunbelt, CUSA, and a AAC? Probably not.

What we really need is a serious meeting of the G5 schools where all exit and entry fees are suspended. Have tv people there. Let the schools that want to be together be together. Reorganize and hopefully come up with new conference lineups that make sense for everyone and cut costs while allowing like universities to associate. Make it a week long and have tv people and NCAA there to aid in the decision making. The only rule is that at the end of the conference, everyone has a home. The goal is ending the stream of FCS move ups. After this conclave there is a moratorium on move ups. Come to think of it, maybe the power 5 should have one of one of these too (before the G5 has theirs).

That would be like that time when a girl blows of her friends to hang out with the most popular girl in school, then the popular girl says shes not cool enough to she acts like her old friends are okay.

Reorganizing would never work because Troy may want to be in a league with USA, USM, UAB, Georgia State, Middle Tenn, Georgia Southern, WKU, ASU, ULL, and La Tech. But I can point to at least three schools who think they are better than each other on that short list. USM wont want to be with South, La Tech wont want to be with ULL, UAB wont want to be with Troy, Marshall wont want to be with Georgia State or Troy.

Now imagine doing this with over 50 schools, would be madness. For the record I remember when Texas State beat you guys, Houston fans were sick to their stomach and acted like they lost to a girls team. I'm pretty sure Houston doesn't want to be in a conference with UNT, Texas State, and UTSA.

Thats not what would happen. With exit fees and entry fees eliminated, television would be on site (probably guiding much of this). The NCAA on site to asnwer questions with the power to make on the spot rule on questions and make guideline revisions to make things make sense.

With this setup, the conferences and schools would be free to wheel and deal. Maybe some teams get added to some conferences--maybe some conferences split in two and become seperate conferences. Maybe entirely new conferences that we are not expecting come out of this. The point is--only schools who want to be together would end up together. Ity would have to be mutual. The rule that nobody goes homeless might make a few forced shotgun marriages at the end of the night--but overall, it likely ends up a more reasonable set up. Maybe you end up with a mini-SWC built from CUSA west and western Sunbelt teams. Then an eastern league with CUSA east, some of the scheduled call-ups, and a MAC team or two. Then maybe the MAC picks up a few teams CUSA or Sunbelt teams on the northern edge of the current CUSA/Sunbelt footprint. Maybe AAC even allows two more in to fill out their footprint a little. Sunbelt would dissappear. You now have 3 regional conferences that do not overlap, and one large overlapping 14 school conference for the schools that are convinced they would be better off traveling farther to matchup with schools of similar size and profiles.

(04-14-2013 08:19 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  

(04-14-2013 07:45 PM)rknj8993 Wrote:  Appalachian State's 2011 average football attendance was just over 26,000. Seeing as some of these FCS call ups have better average attendance than many current FBS teams, why complain?

.......

So, I see your point, but I don't get your point at all. Some of these FCS move-ups are going to be stronger teams than some that are already in the FBS. Who are you to say who can move up and who can't?

26K, 16K, who cares? neither number is anywhere near what the big schools do. Do you think the commission of the SEC looks at 26K and thinks that's impressive? its all small potatoes. nobody but other non-AQ fans waste time splitting hairs over such relatively tiny numbers.

and why would I want stronger teams to move up? I'm rooting for my team, not yours. I'm selfish, I don't want to share and i was his here first. Unfair and unreasonable? YES. as is everything else about college football.

Who said we're trying to impress the SEC? We're trying to win. We're not here to impress you, but we're here to succeed, just like you are here to succeed. You can't always be a big fish in a little pond, so stuff will change. Your school will have its ups and downs. Root for your team and I'll root for mine, but that doesn't mean mine does not deserve the same opportunities that your school has. You were here first, awesome, but that does not mean you own the FBS and your word will be the last. All in all, we're here and we haven't/won't ruin the FBS. If you really think adding four more FCS teams to the FBS will ruin the "incredible" reputation that the FBS has, you're wrong. There are current FBS teams that have brought the FBS down more than FCS move-ups have.

(04-14-2013 08:19 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  26K, 16K, who cares? neither number is anywhere near what the big schools do. Do you think the commission of the SEC looks at 26K and thinks that's impressive? its all small potatoes. nobody but other non-AQ fans waste time splitting hairs over such relatively tiny numbers.

and why would I want stronger teams to move up? I'm rooting for my team, not yours. I'm selfish, I don't want to share and i was his here first. Unfair and unreasonable? YES. as is everything else about college football.

And the lower conferences are being selfish adding FCS schools for survival, which is apparently their right. Glad we could play this game, have a nice day.

(04-13-2013 09:50 PM)UConn-SMU Wrote:  Schools moving from FCS to FBS will hasten the big schools eventually breaking away from the pack and forming a "Junior NFL".

That will kill college football as we know it. And millions of fans will tune out.

Agree with the first line. Disagree with the second.

I think the top 64 or so teams playing each other every week would bring way more excitement to the sport. I would expect a huge increase in viewership as every week of the season you're playing a major opponent.

(04-14-2013 07:45 PM)rknj8993 Wrote:  Appalachian State's 2011 average football attendance was just over 26,000. Seeing as some of these FCS call ups have better average attendance than many current FBS teams, why complain?

App State topped these schools in average attendance in 2011, just to name a few:
Akron
Arkansas St.
Ball St.
Bowling Green
Colorado St.
Duke
Eastern Michigan
FIU
FAU
Idaho
Kent State
ULM
Marshall
Memphis
Miami (OH)
MTSU
Nevada
New Mexico
New Mexico St.
Northern Illinois
Ohio
Rice
San Jose St.
SMU
Toledo
Troy
Tulane
Tulsa
UAB
UNLV
Utah St.
Western Kentucky
Western Michigan
Wyoming

And we were only behind a few of these teams by a less than ten thousand fans, our stadium capacity holding us back:
Boise St.
Boston College
Connecticut
Fresno St.
Hawaii
Houston
ULL
Navy
Northwestern
Southern Miss.
TCU
Temple
UCF
Vanderbilt
Wake Forest
Washington St.

So, I see your point, but I don't get your point at all. Some of these FCS move-ups are going to be stronger teams than some that are already in the FBS. Who are you to say who can move up and who can't?

The fact is, except for maybe GaSt, all of the recent FBS additions (and possibly JMU) belong with this list of schools. Now if we were talking about Albany or Coastal Carolina or another school that doesn't draws flys maybe I'd see the OP's point, but that's not what's happening.

(04-14-2013 01:36 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  Frankly, I don't know why any school wouldn't either (1) move from FCS or FBS if they can cover the Title IX and facilities costs (unless you're one of the Big East schools with an FCS football program, in which case you're better off just collecting your basketball paychecks) or (2) drop football altogether. FCS is financial purgatory - you still have to spend about 70-80% of the costs that a low level FBS program would have with none of the revenue upside.

I take it you are referring to the "full scholarship" FCS programs. Ivy League style programs and the "under 90% of scholarship limit" FCS schools would have lower costs, though they don't to earn the $500,000 to be the FCS sparring partner for an FBS school.

For the "under 90% scholarship commitment" FCS schools, I have the impression that they are in the FCS because, as a Div1 school that happens to play football, the rules don't allow them to play Div2 football.

(04-15-2013 01:13 AM)ChrisLords Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:50 PM)UConn-SMU Wrote:  Schools moving from FCS to FBS will hasten the big schools eventually breaking away from the pack and forming a "Junior NFL".

That will kill college football as we know it. And millions of fans will tune out.

Agree with the first line. Disagree with the second.

I think the top 64 or so teams playing each other every week would bring way more excitement to the sport. I would expect a huge increase in viewership as every week of the season you're playing a major opponent.

I would be much less excited, since I don't really like seeing the same teams play each other over and over. I like to see new matchups. To me, that's partly what makes the NCAA tournament interesting.

(04-14-2013 08:58 PM)FargoBison Wrote:  FCS schools will drop football like crazy if the top 5 FBS conferences stop playing FCS teams in non-conference.

The $400-500k paydays for FCS schools playing up help take the financial edge off, but certainly don't justify maintaining an FCS football program costing $5 million/year. Without the opportunity for these paydays, it seems more likely to me that the outcome would be a few schools dropping to 40 scholarship or something like that.

You might have non-AQ FBS schools dropping football too, if the power conferences were to stop playing them.

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

(04-16-2013 05:50 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

So USF and UConn are legit?

(04-16-2013 05:50 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

So half of your conference is Illegitimate?

Since the current round of college football realignment began in 2010 (with Nebraska's move to the Big 10), we've seen the following expansion in major conferences:

Big 10 +3 (11 to 14)
Pac 12 +2 (10 to 12)
Big 12 -2 (12 to 10)
ACC +2 (12 to 14)
SEC +2 (12 to 14)

Net increase +7

We've also seen the following move-up programs added to Group of Five conferences:

MAC +1 (UMass)
CUSA +3 (Old Dominion, Charlotte, UTSA)
Sun Belt +4 (Texas State, Georgia State, App State, Georgia Southern)

Net increase +8

Don't know about you but I detect a pattern...

The FCS additions are 1 ahead of the BCS additions because the UMass upgrade was due to a BCS conference expelling a member (Temple) rather than adding one. This gave the MAC an odd number of teams that could only be balanced by drawing from the FCS ranks.

(04-16-2013 06:28 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(04-16-2013 05:50 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

So half of your conference is Illegitimate?

I don't really consider it "my" conference, but, yeah, I would say at least half of the teams in CUSA have no business playing FBS football.

USM had an interim president and an AD on a 1-year contract when most of this went down. I'm hoping that, once we get strong leadership in place, we'll do what we need to do to get out. USM still (somehow) has strong support and ambitious donors.

(04-16-2013 06:26 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(04-16-2013 05:50 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

So USF and UConn are legit?

I can't remember the exact timing... I think UConn moved up after Marshall but I could be wrong. In any case, I think it's much easier to make a case for UConn than for a lot of the Sun Belt teams. They have a strong sports tradition. The are (I think) a pretty well-established residential college.

I think Florida should have 5 FBS schools. I'm not going to get into a bunch of hair-splitting about which of their schools should be in/out. Hell, they've had like 4 schools that have been named variations of "Florida Tech" and I just can't keep all of that straight any more.

(04-16-2013 07:10 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-16-2013 06:26 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(04-16-2013 05:50 PM)AndreWhere Wrote:  

(04-13-2013 09:32 PM)perimeterpost Wrote:  Can we please stop diluting FBS by calling up every community college with a goal post in the name of "adding new markets"?

We are not helping ourselves at all. There are already 9 teams that have recently began the transition from FCS to FBS with talks of more on the way.

That's an entire conference worth of FCS schools we've invited ove the last couple of years to share our revenue and exposure with all so we could keep 5 non-AQ conferences when we only need 4.

If it's too late to kick the 9+ newbies back down to FCS can we at least stop with the new additions? Its getting ridiculous.

I agree 100%. The last legit move up was Marshall.

So USF and UConn are legit?

I can't remember the exact timing... I think UConn moved up after Marshall but I could be wrong. In any case, I think it's much easier to make a case for UConn than for a lot of the Sun Belt teams. They have a strong sports tradition. The are (I think) a pretty well-established residential college.

I think Florida should have 5 FBS schools. I'm not going to get into a bunch of hair-splitting about which of their schools should be in/out. Hell, they've had like 4 schools that have been named variations of "Florida Tech" and I just can't keep all of that straight any more.

See my seperate thread on the evolution of FBS for a detailed list of move ups. uConn and USF did both move up after Marshall.

Florida's current 7 FBS schools are not out of line with Alabama's 5, UNC's soon to be 7, Ohio's 8, or Texas' 12, particularly given its prime recruiting grounds.