(05-19-2017 10:43 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(05-19-2017 02:33 PM)ken d Wrote:  

(05-19-2017 12:08 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(05-19-2017 09:23 AM)ken d Wrote:  

(05-19-2017 06:05 AM)micahandme Wrote:  As for "clean and easy" scenarios go...I like OU and OkSt being the "first movers" to the SEC.

They fit the SEC culture...solidify its presence/claim to the state of Texas (and Oklahoma, obviously)...and they allow the SEC to have a new "west" pod that helps overall balance. Not only are many rivalries preserved...geography is preserved...and the "expansion" teams get to keep some of their natural connections.

OU/OkSt/Mizzou/TAMU
LSU/Arky/Miss/MSU
Bama/Auburn/UT/Vandy
UK/USCe/UF/UGA

This move would then clear the way for UT and Kansas to go whichever direction they choose--Pac-12 with two other regional,non-religious schools (TTech? Kansas State? Iowa State?) OR Big Ten alone.

For the Big Ten...the pods work out nicely. (Yes, Texas is still traveling a ton...but pods in the Olympic sports would help minimize that travel. Pod opponents twice...everybody else once, rotating home/away each season...18 games clean and easy. Or, if there are fewer "conference games" for a certain sport, your pod once and rotate through the other pods evenly--9 games.)

UT/Nebraska/Kansas/Illinois
Minny/Wiscy/Iowa/MSU
OSU/UM/NW/Purdue
Indiana/PSU/UMD/Rutgers

I'm with you on your first two paragraphs. After that, not so much, for reasons I stated earlier.

For Oklahoma, a move to the SEC likely means that league goes to a 9 game schedule. If the RRR game with Texas becomes an OOC game, they need for their other mandatory rivalry game against OK State to be a conference game.

As for the B1G, they don't need Texas and all the problems having them would cause, and they really don't need Kansas either. Maybe if they could get other P5 conferences to approve pod scheduling for football, it would be a little easier. But I don't think any of them are all that interested in helping out the B1G.

Some PAC members may want to expand into Texas to help their network. But they would have to overcome the objections of the four Mountain time zone schools who joined the PAC because they wanted their focus to be toward California instead of Texas. They have enough votes to block such a move.

I think the remaining 8 B12 schools would have to reconsider the expansion scenarios they just rejected. Maybe they didn't add enough value to a 10 team conference, but if the alternative is to remain at 8 members, maybe the math changes enough. It would all depend on how much ESPN and Fox would want to reduce their payout by as a result of the loss of OU and OSU.

I could see the B12 just adding one more member to get back to an 8 game league schedule and stopping there. I have no idea who that might be, because there are no options where the pluses clearly outweigh the minuses.

My question would be: How soon would OU and OSU move to the SEC?

I have heard several options but don't necessarily believe or trust the reasoning.
I have heard that the State of Oklahoma would push a Sovereign Immunity as a path to reducing the economic impact to just exit fees. This might take years and could just as easily prove unsuccessful so I find it doubtful.

The better possibility would be the networks claiming diminished value should Baylor be expelled or hit with some really punitive sanctions. While not likely (unfortunately) it seems more likely than the first and the contract does stipulate content for 10 schools and agreement upon a 10th at this point might be hard to attain and the networks may or may not want to keep those contracts.

The earliest date all things being equal would be for OU and OSU to put in a notice of intent to leave in 2023 and serve the last two years until the end of the GOR. That way the avoid the exit fee and wait out the GOR.

They could risk an earlier announcement 2021 and could probably afford a negotiated exit at that point. But that's a best guess. Of course their leaving could trigger a run and that might the negotiated settlement easier.

But I agree with the reasoning expressed so far. Without OU is KU really worth it to the Big 10? I don't think so. They help with the Big 10's need which is a football brand to increase their content value in the conference. And the Big 10 already carries most of Kansas's major markets. So I don't think so.

To keep the RRR in the face of larger conferences should UT and OU find themselves under different logos would require OSU to travel with OU. That leaves the PAC and the SEC as the only two conferences that might take both of them. Whichever did might also attract Texas.

With Notre Dame strongly affiliated and Oklahoma off the market the pressure will never be greater for Texas to move. If the Horns do move then realignment for the foreseeable future is over and we likely move to a champs only scenario which is what ultimately will make N.D. decide.

As I look at UT's options, I don't see one that gives them fully what I think they want. I believe they want to be viewed as an academic peer of highly regarded universities. Specifically, of eastern universities. The PAC has a few schools (like Cal and Stanford) that would satisfy that desire. There are other excellent schools in the PAC, but they aren't necessarily the names you think of unless you live on the west coast.

A lot of those schools are in the ACC (like Georgia Tech, UNC, Virginia, Duke, Pitt, Miami). But I don't believe the ACC really wants them and their baggage, especially if OU is off the table. The B1G has a bunch of schools that suit their eye, but I don't think it's a slam dunk that they would get an invite there either.

There are no G5 schools that are both academic elite and top shelf athletically as well. Adding schools from the G5 to have a CCG had no appeal for them, and I don't think adding them to get back to 10 (or 12) would either. If they are stuck in a B12 minus OU, they might as well consider adding someone like BYU for football only just to get to an 8 game league schedule without adding any inconvenience in Olympic sport travel.

My crystal ball says no P5 realignment activity for about five years, and UT stays in the Big 12 even then, where they can be (or believe they are) the big dog.

Ken D that perspective is as good as any, but with UT you just never know. The one point I'm not sold on is 5-6 years. The desire to get out is current. Should Baylor at least lose their vote as part of conference punishment, which is more likely than expulsion, it would only take 7 to dissolve. Personally I think Texas will take Tech and seek entry into the next best thing to what they have, a division of either the PAC or SEC in which they have their old SWC and Big 12 friends.

I would submit that if the SEC moves to 16 with OU and OSU, which is more likely that folks realize, then Texas and Tech could put us at 18. Sure they don't like what the SEC offers academically, but they have chose since their inception to sacrifice academic associations to keep neighbors close. Give them a division of Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas and Texas Tech with a cross division permanent rival of Texas A&M and Florida and I think they could buy into that.

Yes they are a royal pain in the butt, but in the SEC they are just one pain in the but out of 18 at that point. Even if they control 4 votes it isn't enough to even block legislation. They make oodles of cash, get to pretend to be the Kings of their division, the LHN becomes the SECNetwork West and helps with the transmissions in Spanish to TotalView in Mexico where the SECN will be broadcast in over 22 cities, and they play folks that make their donors happy.

It suits ESPN's purposes as well. They can rotate playing Virginia, North Carolina, Notre Dame and Duke and feel just fine. The money is kept in house at ESPN and we both prosper.

If ESPN can utilize them to get a piece of the PACN as some have suggested then maybe they take their Texas buddies with them. But personally with the options available to the PAC to cut FOX and ESPN out and go with Amazon I don't think that will happen, which leads us back to the SEC where they can keep friends.

I certainly could be wrong about that but its the feel I have for the situation given the 3 past times Texas has held conversations with us since '91.

And for the record if the Big 12 passes into history I strongly believe that a champs only will arise and with it full inclusion for N.D. in the ACC.

JR, there are a lot of big assumptions here. The first is that the P5 will be able to autonomously change the NCAA scheduling rules in order to allow for three divisions instead of two, and that they also permit a four team conference playoff. That would, in turn, require guarantees that enough B12 members will find a home in a P4 conference that they would agree to go to, and that they would vote to dissolve the Big 12.

Another change would require moving the start of the regular season up by a week. This isn't hard, since the camel already got his nose under the tent with the change to "Week Zero" games to benefit Hawaii.

It would only take 7 votes to dissolve the Big 12 if Baylor were stripped of their vote. But it takes 8 votes to strip that vote, and Baylor would have a vote. I think that's a long shot.

There is one attraction to allowing three divisions you haven't touched on. Yes, it allows an 18 team conference to have 3 six team divisions. But it could just as easily work for 15 team conferences, or even 12. The problem here is that if the PAC didn't like the 3 teams available to them in order to expand to 15, and chose to stay at 12, then there aren't enough Big 12 votes to dissolve in the first place, and the whole plan either collapses (or at least gets very expensive) or has to be deferred until near the end of the B12 GoR.

Here is the only scenario I could come up with that makes everything work. After the SEC takes UT, TT, OU and OSU, there are six B12 members left. The ACC wants none of them, if they are going to have to accommodate ND as a full member (bringing them to 15). The B1G goes along, accepting Kansas as their only acquisition (something we have both said is not likely). Now they are at 15.

Now there are five remaining B12 schools available to the PAC: Kansas St, Iowa St, TCU, Baylor and West Virginia. They clearly won't want West Virginia, and almost surely won't want Baylor, so they have to convince the other three to join, and persuade 9 current members to invite those three. That means that one of the mountain schools would have to be assured of being in the California division.

Now you have placed 8, giving you the votes you need to dissolve (without even having to vote to expel Baylor or strip them of their vote). My take, though, is that all this is way too complicated to piece together. Further, it requires the reluctant cooperation of three other conferences, all of whom would see clearly that this scheme benefits the SEC far more than it does any of them. So why would they go along?

It is this conclusion that leads me to say that the SEC can ultimately get what it wants, but not in the next few years and not thanks to cooperation from other conferences..