This is what should be used to separate the contenders from the pretenders....

http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/

Take the top 32 and move on....
CJ

(09-12-2018 08:48 AM)CardinalJim Wrote:  This is what should be used to separate the contenders from the pretenders....

http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/

Take the top 32 and move on....
CJ

Are you factoring in Maryland and Rutgers will be moving up once they get a full B1G share?

If your plan is going to work, it would have to be after all the "waiting periods" are over. Much could change between now and 2025 or so.

Jim, You are pretty close on point...but, the list doesn't include the Private schools.

Notre Dame, Stanford, Duke, Cuse, USC, BYU,....just saying

Also, revenues at some schools are heavily supplemented with infusions from the actual students. Is that really a legit source of revenue?

Guys those are the details that need to be worked out. Maybe the cut-off is 48.
Just include the programs that make the money. If they are making money, somebody is watching and willing to pay.

This eliminates all the programs that have been grandfathered into conferences with big paydays.
It wouldn't eliminate the present conference just move the top programs from those conferences into one league.

Also need to add an element of promotion and relegation. Stop performing, stop making money, resting on your laurels, you get sent down.
CJ

I'd look at AD revenues excluding money from the current media deals and from school subsidies. Some schools get a bunch of subsidy money from the school's general fund to prop up athletics. And, many schools benefit from enormous media contracts to which they provide little value because of much stronger conference mates.

(09-12-2018 09:57 AM)CardinalJim Wrote:  Guys those are the details that need to be worked out. Maybe the cut-off is 48.
Just include the programs that make the money. If they are making money, somebody is watching and willing to pay.

This eliminates all the programs that have been grandfathered into conferences with big paydays.
It wouldn't eliminate the present conference just move the top programs from those conferences into one league.

Also need to add an element of promotion and relegation. Stop performing, stop making money, resting on your laurels, you get sent down.
CJ

If you are promoting/relegating based on money there will never be promotion or relegation because no one will be able to touch the funds raised by the break group from media rights.

The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

Lets subtract men's basketball since that money do not equal the income from football. The problem is this. We should look at the value of the football teams. BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, UCF, USF, ECU, Memphis and Boise State have more of a fan base in football than some P5 schools. If these schools have the tv contracts like the P5? They would ask less from students. We have to look at the performance of the teams. Since 2000, Boise State is still number 1 in the most wins which is in the 60% range. Every other schools had at least 1 6-6 or lower seasons. I noticed that USC and OHIO State's wins that were taken away would have put them up higher. Right now, Boise State's football team is more valuable which they are keeping on winning.

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

The simple reason is that the schools that can command the money can make a whole lot more this way.

Your thesis is that these schools would stand to lose the money they make on ticket sales from home games, specifically the ones that they buy. OK, let's explore that. Michigan is one of the biggest money makers in this regard, and I'm going to use them to illustrate this. Per this article:

https://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201..._cost.html

Michigan makes $39.5MM in ticket sales (for a >100,000 person stadium) per season. They typically play either 7 or 8 home games per year. In order to make the best case scenario for your argument, we'll argue that that $39.5MM is divided over 7 games, making a per game ticket sales of $5.6MM. We'll even be more generous and round that up to $6MM (because I'm lazy). In my proposed 32 team breakaway, every team would get 6 home games, meaning they'd be giving away a home game (or $6MM). Let's even say that Michigan is planning on playing 8 home games every year from now on, and somehow would be giving up 2 annual home games here, or $12MM. This same proposal I made was that every team in the breakaway would be getting $100MM every year exclusively for football broadcasts. Each B1G school made roughly $50MM per year on broadcast money for all sports last year. Don't forget that these schools would still be able to command additional revenues from their other athletic programs, but even if they didn't, $50MM >>>> $12MM, and this doesn't even include the costs of having to pay the teams they bring in for those payday games.

So that is WHY schools would want to break.

USFFan

Competitively, I don't think 32 works ... more like 64.

(09-12-2018 11:09 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  Competitively, I don't think 32 works ... more like 64.

It's all hypothetical, but I don't see a network paying double the money for 64 teams that they would for 32.* And a network (or streaming service) that would be buying this is not going to be using any kind of a nostalgia-grab. They're going to maximize their profits. So once the instigator hatches this plan and shows these university presidents the prospects of making $100MM/year at 32 compared with, let's say, $70MM/year at 64, they'll cut those lower 32 loose faster than you can say "longtime rivalries!" Look at all the historic rivalries they've already been willing to kill in the name of the almighty dollar.

USFFan

*I realized after I posted my plan that a better number would be 36, because that would be 4 divisions of 9 teams, which gives each team 8 division games (4 home, 4 away) plus 4 non-division games (2 home, 2 away) every year. That would require the network to pay $3.6BB/year instead of $3.2BB in order to have each school still maked $100MM/year, but I think that's probably still doable. So it opens up 4 more slots. Let the Hunger Games begin!

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games.

This is an important factor that is overlooked too often. The "name" programs are popular because they historically have had very lopsided W-L records, and one big reason they win so many more games than they lose is that they play so many games that they have at least a 90% chance of winning. If you create "the NFL of college football" and make all of those teams play a schedule for which every game is a 50-50 proposition, then you'll have a lot of teams that are around .500 every year. College football isn't the NFL. "Big time" college teams that are rarely above .500 will not keep their fanbase for very long because those fans are spoiled to expect 9 or more wins every year. Those big stadiums will empty out, TV viewers will watch something else, etc., if all these "big time" programs averaged 6 wins a year from now on.

That's why this won't happen. The people running these programs know they need their "90 percent" games to secure their impressive W-L records.

(09-12-2018 10:41 AM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

The simple reason is that the schools that can command the money can make a whole lot more this way.

Your thesis is that these schools would stand to lose the money they make on ticket sales from home games, specifically the ones that they buy. OK, let's explore that. Michigan is one of the biggest money makers in this regard, and I'm going to use them to illustrate this. Per this article:

https://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201..._cost.html

Michigan makes $39.5MM in ticket sales (for a >100,000 person stadium) per season. They typically play either 7 or 8 home games per year. In order to make the best case scenario for your argument, we'll argue that that $39.5MM is divided over 7 games, making a per game ticket sales of $5.6MM. We'll even be more generous and round that up to $6MM (because I'm lazy). In my proposed 32 team breakaway, every team would get 6 home games, meaning they'd be giving away a home game (or $6MM). Let's even say that Michigan is planning on playing 8 home games every year from now on, and somehow would be giving up 2 annual home games here, or $12MM. This same proposal I made was that every team in the breakaway would be getting $100MM every year exclusively for football broadcasts. Each B1G school made roughly $50MM per year on broadcast money for all sports last year. Don't forget that these schools would still be able to command additional revenues from their other athletic programs, but even if they didn't, $50MM >>>> $12MM, and this doesn't even include the costs of having to pay the teams they bring in for those payday games.

So that is WHY schools would want to break.

USFFan

They also rely on donations and sponsorships. Losing a home game reduces the value of in-game sponsorships 1/7th and increased losing increases the possibility donations fall.

(09-12-2018 11:56 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:41 AM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

The simple reason is that the schools that can command the money can make a whole lot more this way.

Your thesis is that these schools would stand to lose the money they make on ticket sales from home games, specifically the ones that they buy. OK, let's explore that. Michigan is one of the biggest money makers in this regard, and I'm going to use them to illustrate this. Per this article:

https://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201..._cost.html

Michigan makes $39.5MM in ticket sales (for a >100,000 person stadium) per season. They typically play either 7 or 8 home games per year. In order to make the best case scenario for your argument, we'll argue that that $39.5MM is divided over 7 games, making a per game ticket sales of $5.6MM. We'll even be more generous and round that up to $6MM (because I'm lazy). In my proposed 32 team breakaway, every team would get 6 home games, meaning they'd be giving away a home game (or $6MM). Let's even say that Michigan is planning on playing 8 home games every year from now on, and somehow would be giving up 2 annual home games here, or $12MM. This same proposal I made was that every team in the breakaway would be getting $100MM every year exclusively for football broadcasts. Each B1G school made roughly $50MM per year on broadcast money for all sports last year. Don't forget that these schools would still be able to command additional revenues from their other athletic programs, but even if they didn't, $50MM >>>> $12MM, and this doesn't even include the costs of having to pay the teams they bring in for those payday games.

So that is WHY schools would want to break.

USFFan

They also rely on donations and sponsorships. Losing a home game reduces the value of in-game sponsorships 1/7th and increased losing increases the possibility donations fall.

If you think that donations and sponsorships are going to go down because a Michigan is giving up 1 or two home games vs. Western Michigan, SMU, Cincinnati or Air Force (their buy games for each of the last two years) but is replaced by home games vs. any of the schools in that top 32 scenario, you're crazy.

I think Wedge's losing point might be a somewhat legitimate one, and yet we all know how much fans say they'd rather "lose in the first round of the NCAA tournament than win the NIT." I know I'm mixing sports for my metaphor, but schools would line up for a shot at the Premier League rather than be considered the top of Tier 2.

USFFan

(09-12-2018 11:39 AM)Wedge Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games.

This is an important factor that is overlooked too often. The "name" programs are popular because they historically have had very lopsided W-L records, and one big reason they win so many more games than they lose is that they play so many games that they have at least a 90% chance of winning. If you create "the NFL of college football" and make all of those teams play a schedule for which every game is a 50-50 proposition, then you'll have a lot of teams that are around .500 every year. College football isn't the NFL. "Big time" college teams that are rarely above .500 will not keep their fanbase for very long because those fans are spoiled to expect 9 or more wins every year. Those big stadiums will empty out, TV viewers will watch something else, etc., if all these "big time" programs averaged 6 wins a year from now on.

That's why this won't happen. The people running these programs know they need their "90 percent" games to secure their impressive W-L records.

And without a draft and free agency the schools that falter in perception by going from being 6-7 game winners to 4-5 game winners will find recruiting even more difficult and fall further behind on the field, while their expenses will rise as competition for coaches becomes more fierce against the richer and more successful who can inflate coaching costs even more.

(09-12-2018 12:11 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 11:39 AM)Wedge Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games.

This is an important factor that is overlooked too often. The "name" programs are popular because they historically have had very lopsided W-L records, and one big reason they win so many more games than they lose is that they play so many games that they have at least a 90% chance of winning. If you create "the NFL of college football" and make all of those teams play a schedule for which every game is a 50-50 proposition, then you'll have a lot of teams that are around .500 every year. College football isn't the NFL. "Big time" college teams that are rarely above .500 will not keep their fanbase for very long because those fans are spoiled to expect 9 or more wins every year. Those big stadiums will empty out, TV viewers will watch something else, etc., if all these "big time" programs averaged 6 wins a year from now on.

That's why this won't happen. The people running these programs know they need their "90 percent" games to secure their impressive W-L records.

And without a draft and free agency the schools that falter in perception by going from being 6-7 game winners to 4-5 game winners will find recruiting even more difficult and fall further behind on the field, while their expenses will rise as competition for coaches becomes more fierce against the richer and more successful who can inflate coaching costs even more.

Again, this is somewhat speculative, but I don't think they'll struggle in recruiting since college players will want to compete at the highest level. Even now, some recruits are swayed by having a Power 5 offer, even if it's from a weaker program in the Power 5 over an offer from a top team outside of the Power 5. Since this plan calls for at least half of the games to be broadcast nationally, the players will get the exposure they seek playing there, even if it's for an 8-4 team.

That said, if one of those programs begins to be the Kansas of the Premier League, it might cause irreparable damage.

USFFan

(09-12-2018 12:05 PM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 11:56 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:41 AM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

The simple reason is that the schools that can command the money can make a whole lot more this way.

Your thesis is that these schools would stand to lose the money they make on ticket sales from home games, specifically the ones that they buy. OK, let's explore that. Michigan is one of the biggest money makers in this regard, and I'm going to use them to illustrate this. Per this article:

https://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201..._cost.html

Michigan makes $39.5MM in ticket sales (for a >100,000 person stadium) per season. They typically play either 7 or 8 home games per year. In order to make the best case scenario for your argument, we'll argue that that $39.5MM is divided over 7 games, making a per game ticket sales of $5.6MM. We'll even be more generous and round that up to $6MM (because I'm lazy). In my proposed 32 team breakaway, every team would get 6 home games, meaning they'd be giving away a home game (or $6MM). Let's even say that Michigan is planning on playing 8 home games every year from now on, and somehow would be giving up 2 annual home games here, or $12MM. This same proposal I made was that every team in the breakaway would be getting $100MM every year exclusively for football broadcasts. Each B1G school made roughly $50MM per year on broadcast money for all sports last year. Don't forget that these schools would still be able to command additional revenues from their other athletic programs, but even if they didn't, $50MM >>>> $12MM, and this doesn't even include the costs of having to pay the teams they bring in for those payday games.

So that is WHY schools would want to break.

USFFan

They also rely on donations and sponsorships. Losing a home game reduces the value of in-game sponsorships 1/7th and increased losing increases the possibility donations fall.

If you think that donations and sponsorships are going to go down because a Michigan is giving up 1 or two home games vs. Western Michigan, SMU, Cincinnati or Air Force (their buy games for each of the last two years) but is replaced by home games vs. any of the schools in that top 32 scenario, you're crazy.

I think Wedge's losing point might be a somewhat legitimate one, and yet we all know how much fans say they'd rather "lose in the first round of the NCAA tournament than win the NIT." I know I'm mixing sports for my metaphor, but schools would line up for a shot at the Premier League rather than be considered the top of Tier 2.

USFFan

Run do the math.

More than one-fourth of schools in the Power 5 were able to reach six or more wins despite having a losing record vs Power 5 schools last year.

Florida State went 7-6 last year they were 4-6 vs Power 5. Florida was 3-7 vs Power 5. Miss State went 9-4 last year but they were only 5-4 vs P5. 9-4 is 0.692 winning percentage think that .555 sells as well? That would be 7-6 on a 13 game slate with a bowl.

It's the power of math.

If you break off into a power team universe the net record is .500. Every win incurs a breakaway team loss as well.

The SEC last year was 107-73 .594 in a breakaway it is going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 90-90 .500 because of crossover games.

If you cull some power teams the impact is going to be even greater because you've denied everyone their win vs Vandy or Arkansas (who went 1-7 each in league play last year).

You simply cannot escape .500

(09-12-2018 12:27 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 12:05 PM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 11:56 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:41 AM)usffan Wrote:  

(09-12-2018 10:07 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The thing no one can ever effectively answer is WHY would anyone want to break? The non-wealthy are a resource that the richest programs use to enhance the reputation of their programs and to permit for more home games. There is no sharing of media money. Nominal sharing of post-season football revenue. The only money to gain is in post-season basketball and again the power system relies on playing an unbalanced number of home games.

The simple reason is that the schools that can command the money can make a whole lot more this way.

Your thesis is that these schools would stand to lose the money they make on ticket sales from home games, specifically the ones that they buy. OK, let's explore that. Michigan is one of the biggest money makers in this regard, and I'm going to use them to illustrate this. Per this article:

https://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/201..._cost.html

Michigan makes $39.5MM in ticket sales (for a >100,000 person stadium) per season. They typically play either 7 or 8 home games per year. In order to make the best case scenario for your argument, we'll argue that that $39.5MM is divided over 7 games, making a per game ticket sales of $5.6MM. We'll even be more generous and round that up to $6MM (because I'm lazy). In my proposed 32 team breakaway, every team would get 6 home games, meaning they'd be giving away a home game (or $6MM). Let's even say that Michigan is planning on playing 8 home games every year from now on, and somehow would be giving up 2 annual home games here, or $12MM. This same proposal I made was that every team in the breakaway would be getting $100MM every year exclusively for football broadcasts. Each B1G school made roughly $50MM per year on broadcast money for all sports last year. Don't forget that these schools would still be able to command additional revenues from their other athletic programs, but even if they didn't, $50MM >>>> $12MM, and this doesn't even include the costs of having to pay the teams they bring in for those payday games.

So that is WHY schools would want to break.

USFFan

They also rely on donations and sponsorships. Losing a home game reduces the value of in-game sponsorships 1/7th and increased losing increases the possibility donations fall.

If you think that donations and sponsorships are going to go down because a Michigan is giving up 1 or two home games vs. Western Michigan, SMU, Cincinnati or Air Force (their buy games for each of the last two years) but is replaced by home games vs. any of the schools in that top 32 scenario, you're crazy.

I think Wedge's losing point might be a somewhat legitimate one, and yet we all know how much fans say they'd rather "lose in the first round of the NCAA tournament than win the NIT." I know I'm mixing sports for my metaphor, but schools would line up for a shot at the Premier League rather than be considered the top of Tier 2.

USFFan

Run do the math.

More than one-fourth of schools in the Power 5 were able to reach six or more wins despite having a losing record vs Power 5 schools last year.

Florida State went 7-6 last year they were 4-6 vs Power 5. Florida was 3-7 vs Power 5. Miss State went 9-4 last year but they were only 5-4 vs P5. 9-4 is 0.692 winning percentage think that .555 sells as well? That would be 7-6 on a 13 game slate with a bowl.

It's the power of math.

If you break off into a power team universe the net record is .500. Every win incurs a breakaway team loss as well.

The SEC last year was 107-73 .594 in a breakaway it is going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 90-90 .500 because of crossover games.

If you cull some power teams the impact is going to be even greater because you've denied everyone their win vs Vandy or Arkansas (who went 1-7 each in league play last year).

You simply cannot escape .500

That's fine, but there will be schools willing to be under .500 if they're well paid for it. Rutgers, Kansas, Wake Forest, Vandy - every conference already has people who sit back and collect checks for being the whipping boy. When the money gets high enough, administrators will jump at it.

And don't lose sight of the squeeze they'll be able to put on supporters. "Hey, we're in the big leagues now, and if you want us to avoid being at the bottom, now is the time for you to really step up and put your money where your mouth is."

Something like this WILL happen. It's a matter of when, not if.

USFFan

The NFL has 32 teams and they do not all finish at .500.

(09-12-2018 01:57 PM)TerryD Wrote:  The NFL has 32 teams and they do not all finish at .500.

The NFL doesn't run on donations, isn't an educational instutition and not subject to Title IX, they have a draft, free agency, and franchises can relocate when the locals don't cover enough of their capital costs.

But true they have teams with losing records.

Notre Dame would be hella more valuable some place other than South Bend I would think.

(09-12-2018 12:38 PM)usffan Wrote:  That's fine, but there will be schools willing to be under .500 if they're well paid for it. Rutgers, Kansas, Wake Forest, Vandy - every conference already has people who sit back and collect checks for being the whipping boy.

Your 32 team proposal eliminates all of those teams in addition to eliminating the entire G5.

Which goes to arkstfan's point that you are compounding the problem by eliminating that many teams. Take Michigan, for example, and look at this season's schedule: You effectively want to take Western Michigan, SMU, Maryland, Rutgers, and Indiana off of Michigan's schedule and replace them with, say, LSU, Auburn, Clemson, Oklahoma, and Virginia Tech. Michigan's not going to win 9 games playing that schedule every year. They wouldn't even win 6 games a year against that schedule with their current personnel. "Big" programs like Michigan are not going to do that to themselves. They want and need teams like Western Michigan, SMU, Maryland, Rutgers, and Indiana on their football schedules. It's the only way to maintain a legacy of consistent winning at "college football's all-time winningest program".