(11-01-2017 11:04 AM)mikeinsec127 Wrote:  

(11-01-2017 10:19 AM)megadrone Wrote:  

(11-01-2017 06:28 AM)8BitPirate Wrote:  

(11-01-2017 12:02 AM)AntiG Wrote:  

(10-31-2017 08:50 PM)GE and MTS Wrote:  Kicking out Rutgers and Maryland would not sit well with Penn State. Both are prime areas where they recruit students and athletes, in addition to where large alumni bases live. They aren't rivals but there is some history which is more to say about the rest of the conference.

Getting Oklahoma and Texas should be schools 15 and 16. Helping Nebraska return to prominence would be a boon for the Big Ten and adding two local schools would help them feel more at home.

Kicking out Rutgers and Maryland would also cut the BTN out of NYC, NJ, MD and DC regular market carriage, so that's never going to happen in the near future...

Agree OU and UT being the ideal targets.

Would it? Here in NC we have the option for every Conference Network, even the PAC12, but only the AAC and ACC have teams here. I'd also argue that the traditional B1G teams have enough alumni in those areas to make having the BTN on your local carriers menu profitable.

It's the carriage rates that the network charges the cable provider. Since there aren't any B10 schools in NC, the rate is different than what can be charged in NJ. The Big 10 network model is dependent on the carriage rates.

It's why Rutgers was a better target for the B10 than Pitt during the last round of realignment. While Pitt would have been a good addition to the B10 and an institutional fit, Pitt didn't deliver what PSU already did.

Yeah, the last round of expansion was about set-top boxes. In other words, it was about how much extra $ the BIG would make by being able to charge cable companies the higher carrying fee for its network. Oklahoma only has 3.9m people. By comparison Md is at 6m and NJ at 8.9. That is the long and short as to why we both were invited.

Just to add to that, getting into NJ meant getting into the NYC DMA, which by itself is 20.2M population (7.36+M TV DMA, #1 nationally)... then you add to that the part of NJ that is not covered under the NYC DMA (Southern Jersey - Burlington to Cape May counties, so this includes Camden/Trenton/AC) which is about 1.6M people (so let's assume it'd be about one third for TV coverage) for a total of 21.8M population and nearly 8M in subscribers.

Maryland bought in the state of MD/Baltimore DMA (#26 nationally with 1.1M) + DC DMA (#7 nationally with 2.44+M). DC Metro (which includes parts of Northern VA) is now a bigger population than Philadelphia, and add the rest of Maryland and part of Delaware as well and that's a nice coup as well at around 3-4M total subscribers.

The BTN didn't add football studs persay, but the shrewd move netted them TONS of cash for all members involved.