(01-28-2013 12:27 PM)mturn017 Wrote:  

(01-27-2013 10:38 AM)panama Wrote:  It's the standard that pays the bills. The creampuff in a major market can hire a new coach, recruit and build facilities and become a juggernaut. The small market juggernaut cannot grow a TV audience. A conference does not have to be all large market but the reverse will not get you paid by the networks. You build for the best case scenario. If a large market school makes a championship run, how many people in that market are likely to start watching due to local interest? If it's a top DMA and only 5% turn to that game that 100k TV sets is more than if 100% of a small market is interested.

Or so you hope.

But you're right. I remember when VCU made thier final four run, Richmond and to a degree the rest of the state went crazy with Ram fever. People who normally wouldn't tune in were. Richmond's not the largest market but it's not small. If it had been JMU you still would have gotten a boost out of Virginia but not as large.

That is the entire points of markets. If, as people like to often state that these things are cyclical, then having a teams in a large markets makes it much more likely that the networks will see a huge trend regional demand as the rise and fall of conference members ebb and flow.

Simple math.. Lets say for some unknown reason (pay to play baby!$!$) UNT and UTSA fight out over a decade for a spot in the CUSA title game and then both end up in nice bowls. Even if you look at an aggregate slow increase in viewership, the overall size of those two DMA's make for a huge boon for the advertising dollars of the CUSA media partner in Texas. Combine that with the idea that being two large schools with a large subset of living alumni and that as a general rule alumni are some of the easiest bandagon fans to get viewership from across the footprint. A decade long run for those two would print money for the TV partners and provide a big boost to the CUSA brand.

Now lets do the same scenario, but instead use LaTech and Tulsa instead. Much smaller DMA's, less reach into major population centers, and smaller living alumni bases. This leads to a harder time building the brand equity and viewership. It still makes money, because longstanding success tends to built familiarity and viewership, but nothing close to the top scenario. 5% of DFW carries more viewers than 20% of Tulsa. It is what it is.


CUSA is gambling that a few of the big market teams (and hopefully two in the same side of the conference) take off and they can capitalize on them in the next few years prior to the renegotiation of the current TV deal. It is not a bad bet to make. If you can get two of the big DMA's pitted against each other, then you can essentially double dip. People will always watch their team to win and will guiltily admit they tune into their rival to hopefully see them lose.