2022 NCAA Football Thread

[buddha]

1 minute ago, gehringer_2 said:

I don't any way around this, but there will be a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth in places like the MAC to get there.

all of a sudden, sham amateurism doesnt seem so bad...

[Hongbit]

1 hour ago, buddha said:

all of a sudden, sham amateurism doesnt seem so bad...

I love Shamatuerism!

Edited June 30, 2022 by Hongbit

[MichiganCardinal]

If the Big Ten were smart (they’re probably not), they would move to poach the PAC12 of all their schools with  AAU academic prowess (Washington, Oregon, Cal, Stanford, USC, UCLA, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado). If they all accept it puts you at 23 and even if they don’t all I think most would, and it puts you very close to a true super conference. You can send invites to Kansas, Duke, UNC, Vanderbilt, and/or Pitt to fill you out to where you want to be.

[Hongbit]

I’m a little surprised that UCLA can do this without taking Cal.   They are part of the same university system and ultimately run by the same people.   Hell, they have the same fight song.  

Edited June 30, 2022 by Hongbit

[buddha]

37 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said:

If the Big Ten were smart (they’re probably not), they would move to poach the PAC12 of all their schools with  AAU academic prowess (Washington, Oregon, Cal, Stanford, USC, UCLA, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado). If they all accept it puts you at 23 and even if they don’t all I think most would, and it puts you very close to a true super conference. You can send invites to Kansas, Duke, UNC, Vanderbilt, and/or Pitt to fill you out to where you want to be.

the big ten can really pick and choose.  oregon and washington seem like no brainers from a football perspective, but im not sure if oregon fits the academic bill.  stanford and cal certainly do.

kansas brings nothing to the table.  vandy has academics but nothing else and would never leave the sec.

duke , carolina, and notre dame are the prizes left for the big ten.  maybe bringing stanford AND usc adds extra incentive for notre dame to come?

[MichiganCardinal]

Academics will be the spin the Big Ten gives this expansion, even though you can rub two brain cells together to see it's all about TV deals and money. Notre Dame can F themselves sideways and I feel like a lot of B1G presidents likely feel the same way, though I would still be surprised if they aren't given one last chance at the final spot. A call with an ultimatum of "we have 23 schools and we are stopping at 24. You have 48 hours to take it or we are offering (Kansas/Pitt/Virginia/whoever) and we already know their answer".

Another school I haven't seen brought up is Georgia Tech. They are AAU and would bring the Atlanta market, though would probably prefer the SEC.

If I had to predict where we are in 2026, it would involve the B1G and SEC withdrawing from the NCAA for football and forming their own league with its own playoff...

B1G East: Penn State, Rutgers, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State

B1G Midwest: Wisconsin, Northwestern, Purdue, Illinois, Indiana, Notre Dame

B1G Plains: Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, Arizona

B1G West: Washington, Oregon, UC Berkeley, Stanford, USC, UCLA

-

SEC Atlantic: Florida, Florida State, Miami, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Clemson

SEC East: Georgia, Alabama, Auburn, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Tennessee

SEC North: UNC, Duke, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Missouri

SEC West: Texas, Texas A&M, Arkansas, LSU, Ole Miss, Mississippi State

-

Each team plays every other team in their own division every year, plus every team in another rotating division in their conference, for 11 total games, plus one game with a team from the other conference and one game against an FCS team (practically a preseason game), for 13 games total. If you win your division you make the postseason and play a quarterfinal against the winner of another division, then the semifinal is the conference championship, and the National Championship is Big Ten vs. SEC.

 

[Deleterious]

2 hours ago, MichiganCardinal said:

If the Big Ten were smart (they’re probably not), they would move to poach the PAC12 of all their schools with  AAU academic prowess (Washington, Oregon, Cal, Stanford, USC, UCLA, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado). If they all accept it puts you at 23 and even if they don’t all I think most would, and it puts you very close to a true super conference. You can send invites to Kansas, Duke, UNC, Vanderbilt, and/or Pitt to fill you out to where you want to be.

Go to East/West divisions.  Winner of each division play each other, possibly on New Years.  Get one of the worlds most iconic stadiums to host it.  Have a parade, a pretty woman to be queen of the event.  I don't know.  Just kicking the tires to see if this idea could be anything.

[holygoat]

This bit is surprising to me.

They're gonna send all of their minor sports teams across the country? That's crazy.

[MichiganCardinal]

16 minutes ago, holygoat said:

This bit is surprising to me.

They're gonna send all of their minor sports teams across the country? That's crazy.

Except beach volleyball, those selfish bastards.

[buddha]

37 minutes ago, holygoat said:

This bit is surprising to me.

They're gonna send all of their minor sports teams across the country? That's crazy.

the payout per school in the big ten in a couple years is expected to be over $100 million per year.

the expected payout in the pac 12 is less than $50 million.

i think that's worth a few road trips for women's volleyball.

[buddha]

58 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said:

Academics will be the spin the Big Ten gives this expansion, even though you can rub two brain cells together to see it's all about TV deals and money. Notre Dame can F themselves sideways and I feel like a lot of B1G presidents likely feel the same way, though I would still be surprised if they aren't given one last chance at the final spot. A call with an ultimatum of "we have 23 schools and we are stopping at 24. You have 48 hours to take it or we are offering (Kansas/Pitt/Virginia/whoever) and we already know their answer".

Another school I haven't seen brought up is Georgia Tech. They are AAU and would bring the Atlanta market, though would probably prefer the SEC.

If I had to predict where we are in 2026, it would involve the B1G and SEC withdrawing from the NCAA for football and forming their own league with its own playoff...

B1G East: Penn State, Rutgers, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State

B1G Midwest: Wisconsin, Northwestern, Purdue, Illinois, Indiana, Notre Dame

B1G Plains: Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, Arizona

B1G West: Washington, Oregon, UC Berkeley, Stanford, USC, UCLA

-

SEC Atlantic: Florida, Florida State, Miami, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Clemson

SEC East: Georgia, Alabama, Auburn, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Tennessee

SEC North: UNC, Duke, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Missouri

SEC West: Texas, Texas A&M, Arkansas, LSU, Ole Miss, Mississippi State

-

Each team plays every other team in their own division every year, plus every team in another rotating division in their conference, for 11 total games, plus one game with a team from the other conference and one game against an FCS team (practically a preseason game), for 13 games total. If you win your division you make the postseason and play a quarterfinal against the winner of another division, then the semifinal is the conference championship, and the National Championship is Big Ten vs. SEC.

 

i dont think unc, duke, virginia are going to the sec.  to join the cheatinest conference in america with a bunch of non-academoc schools?  also, what does duke being to the sec?  the same as kansas to the big ten: nothing.  college basketball is nothing, its all about football.

they'll be begging the big ten to let them in.

clemson, miami, and florida state?  yup.  sign em up!  sec 1000%.

notre dame will be the interesting one.  

also, if notre dame comes to the big ten, it is NOT going to be in a division without one of michigan, ohio state, or penn state.  notre dame will not be playing iowa and wiscy every year.  more likely to send penn state east and maybe msu, but um/ohio state/nd are likely to be in the same division.

[buddha]

now reports of washington and oregon applying.  also reports of every team in the pac 12 applying...

apres usc, le deluge...

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, buddha said:

now reports of washington and oregon applying.  also reports of every team in the pac 12 applying...

apres usc, le deluge...

Have you looked at attendance figures in the Pac 12 for recent years? I think most of these teams are bring more liabilities than assets.

[lordstanley]

Burning question: Do the Song Girls travel? I can picture them on the sidelines at Michigan or Iowa on nippy October days. 

[buddha]

7 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

Have you looked at attendance figures in the Pac 12 for recent years? I think most of these teams are bring more liabilities than assets.

have you looked at the population centers on the west coast?  los angeles, seattle, san francisco?  the homes to the most dynamic industries in the world?

they bring money, alumni, and tradition.  they bring successful brands.  brands that may be in need of a little rehabilitation, but that can be done with some work.

its all about the ability to attract eyeballs and the ad money that comes with it.  usc-ohio state is a much bigger draw than northwestern-purdue.

[Hongbit]

The PAC-12 presidents made a huge mistake not firing their previous commissioner, Larry Scott, five years ago.   He had a pipe dream vision to solely own the Pac-12 Network and that failed miserably.  He should’ve taken a network partner like all of the other conferences.  He had come from running the Women’s Tennis Association prior and had this silly idea that the PAC-12 olympic sports had tremendous TV value and would boost the network.  He was very wrong.   This created the huge financial inequality that wasn’t helped with a down stretch for USC football, UCLA & Arizona basketball.  The PAC-12 was sliding into oblivion and it was only going to get worse with the next TV contracts.  I think everyone can see that contraction of the traditional power 5 conferences is coming at some point into a new model and the PAC was going to get left behind.   
 

And yes @lordstanley, the Song Girls do travel.    

Edited July 1, 2022 by Hongbit

[gehringer_2]

2 hours ago, buddha said:

have you looked at the population centers on the west coast? 

The number of people is enticing, but their fandom is weak. I’d rather have Columbus than SF  if I had the choice of two College football markets!

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, Hongbit said:

 I think everyone can see that contraction of the traditional power 5 conferences is coming at some point into a new model 

This is where I don’t see how the next shoe drops. It seems you have to start new conferences to jettison your deadwood but acPAC12/B10 merger is going in the opposite direction. 

[casimir]

28 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

This is where I don’t see how the next shoe drops. It seems you have to start new conferences to jettison your deadwood but acPAC12/B10 merger is going in the opposite direction. 

Yup.  This current go round is to figure out the haves and have nots.  And, really, its just how remains at the "power 5" table, or however you want to call that.

Once that's figured out, the TV contracts are next.  How can they be altered, how do the different networks get satisfied.

Then its another round of some sort of reorganization geographical alignment.  TV will be heavily involved in that to get a few USC-OSU types matchups per weekend without loading up the top tier school schedules to play only top tier opponents.  There will still be the Purdue-Northwesterns because those schools minor league programs are going to be needed to fill things out.  They're not going to have Alabama play a schedule of Clemson, Ohio State, USC, Oregon, Oklahoma, Michigan, Georgia, Notre Dame, LSU, Florida, Utah, Texas, Penn State.  They'll figure out how to shuffle in Boston College, Rutgers, Arizona, Kansas, etc, etc.

[MichiganCardinal]

43 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

The number of people is enticing, but their fandom is weak. I’d rather have Columbus than SF  if I had the choice of two College football markets!

I think this is a really interesting point, because it speaks to the evolving landscape and how much things have changed (while other things have remained the same) since the Big Ten added Rutgers and Maryland in a clear money grab at adding the NYC and DC television markets.

I look at fandom in two ways: (1) butts in seats/game day experience and (2) nationwide following. As fans, we care about #1 because games are more exciting in a sold out Big House or a Penn State white out… Butts in seats is a small fraction of the overall revenue generated though which is why (1) is pretty much outright dismissed by the powers that be in conference expansion… Frankly, ten years ago, the powers that be didn’t really care about fandom at all. The system was setup such that it was a binary: either your regional market carries the B1G Network or they don’t. Adding Maryland and Rutgers checked those critical market boxes, fandom and competitiveness be damned.

Nowadays though, streaming is all the buzz. Butts in seats still means nothing to anyone but fans, but national following now matters increasingly more. Not only does checking the “Los Angeles” box matter, so too does garnering interest from USC and UCLA’s alumni base. They may not have attended a game in 20 years, but they still care, and they’ll buy the B1G Network streaming service. That’s what is wanted and that’s what will drive this round of expansion.

I think it’s also why a school like Stanford and/or Cal might be the next target, before UW, Oregon, or Utah, despite the latter three generating far more fan interest for their competitiveness and game-day experience (though Oregon is an interesting case and might be an exception). Stanford and Cal would bring the SF market (to check the boxes of yesteryear), but also have international followings. Their attendance figures are pitiful when compared to the Midwest or SEC, but that just doesn’t matter when it comes to the real money.

[buddha]

6 minutes ago, MichiganCardinal said:

I think this is a really interesting point, because it speaks to the evolving landscape and how much things have changed (while other things have remained the same) since the Big Ten added Rutgers and Maryland in a clear money grab at adding the NYC and DC television markets.

I look at fandom in two ways: (1) butts in seats/game day experience and (2) nationwide following. As fans, we care about #1 because games are more exciting in a sold out Big House or a Penn State white out… Butts in seats is a small fraction of the overall revenue generated though which is why (1) is pretty much outright dismissed by the powers that be in conference expansion… Frankly, ten years ago, the powers that be didn’t really care about fandom at all. The system was setup such that it was a binary: either your regional market carries the B1G Network or they don’t. Adding Maryland and Rutgers checked those critical market boxes, fandom and competitiveness be damned.

Nowadays though, streaming is all the buzz. Butts in seats still means nothing to anyone but fans, but national following now matters increasingly more. Not only does checking the “Los Angeles” box matter, so too does garnering interest from USC and UCLA’s alumni base. They may not have attended a game in 20 years, but they still care, and they’ll buy the B1G Network streaming service. That’s what is wanted and that’s what will drive this round of expansion.

I think it’s also why a school like Stanford and/or Cal might be the next target, before UW, Oregon, or Utah, despite the latter three generating far more fan interest for their competitiveness and game-day experience (though Oregon is an interesting case and might be an exception). Stanford and Cal would bring the SF market (to check the boxes of yesteryear), but also have international followings. Their attendance figures are pitiful when compared to the Midwest or SEC, but that just doesn’t matter when it comes to the real money.

....and stanford might help bring in the real prize: notre dame....

[casimir]

7 minutes ago, buddha said:

....and stanford might help bring in the real prize: notre dame....

Ding ding ding.  We have a winner.

[Hongbit]

1 hour ago, gehringer_2 said:

This is where I don’t see how the next shoe drops. It seems you have to start new conferences to jettison your deadwood but acPAC12/B10 merger is going in the opposite direction. 

Things will move quickly from here.   The rest of the Pac will be courted.   If I had to guess the B10 takes Oregon, Washington, Cal, Stanford.   Big 12 gets Utah, Colorado and the Arizona schools.    

The ACC is the one to watch.  Their terrible TV deal that keeps schools rights until 2035 is really the only thing holding it together.   I’m sure lawyers from places like Clemson and Miami are trying to find a legal loophole.  If they can, then expect the ACC to get swallowed up by SEC and Big12.   That’s where things will get interesting and what do the B10 and SEC do with their Nebraska,Rutgers, and Vandy type schools.   Do they kick them to the curb or are they grandfathered in?   

Big 12 has a chance to stay around for a while as a 3rd major conference if they play their cards correctly and pick up remnants of ACC and Pac.

 Fun times…

[Hongbit]

31 minutes ago, buddha said:

....and stanford might help bring in the real prize: notre dame....

USC on board would be enough to entice ND if they are so inclined.  Not sure how adding Stanford really moves the needle for the Irish.

Edited July 1, 2022 by Hongbit

[buddha]

1 hour ago, Hongbit said:

Things will move quickly from here.   The rest of the Pac will be courted.   If I had to guess the B10 takes Oregon, Washington, Cal, Stanford.   Big 12 gets Utah, Colorado and the Arizona schools.    

The ACC is the one to watch.  Their terrible TV deal that keeps schools rights until 2035 is really the only thing holding it together.   I’m sure lawyers from places like Clemson and Miami are trying to find a legal loophole.  If they can, then expect the ACC to get swallowed up by SEC and Big12.   That’s where things will get interesting and what do the B10 and SEC do with their Nebraska,Rutgers, and Vandy type schools.   Do they kick them to the curb or are they grandfathered in?   

Big 12 has a chance to stay around for a while as a 3rd major conference if they play their cards correctly and pick up remnants of ACC and Pac.

 Fun times…

duke, nc, and virginia are made for the big ten.  notre dame too, of course.