For most of college football's existence, teams got together with peer institutions in their region to play as (mostly) friendly rivals. They formed conferences to support their mutual self-interest. Most of the money came from ticket sales and boosters. Then TV happened. Many schools continued along much as they had before. But at least one, and gradually everyone, came to realize that TV was the new game, and the game was on.

The Big Ten has arguably been the most successful at this new game. I believe they were the first to use the language of business to describe the game they were playing. Jim Delaney talked often about how hard they had worked to "build their brand". He saw they were winning this game, and he was very active in both promoting the brand and expanding its reach. Even when they were not the best on the field, they continued to succeed at the negotiating table.

Some folks, myself included, are beginning to think the game has gotten out of hand at its highest level. I would hope that some of the leaders of these primarily academic institutions would welcome a paradigm shift that would restore some of the balance between athletics and academics before it is hopelessly too late (if it isn't already).

I would love to see the pursuit of media riches change from being a competitive, eat or be eaten battle to the death. Especially because a single dominant network like ESPN gets fabulously rich when there are numerous conferences fighting with each other to get the best deal, while the losers have to settle for Fox. Conferences have expanded by realizing they improve their negotiation position when they are bigger. So why not stop competing with each other and cooperate instead?

I propose a 72 member conference that shares TV, bowl and tournament revenues equally. Let it negotiate with the Mouse from a position of ultimate strength. The P5 revenues are already relatively close, and far in excess of what most of their members really need to operate their athletic programs. Just think how much overhead could be reduced with a mega-merger.

Who knows? Maybe some of that money could be used to support academics.

I say we should all swallow our pride, declare the Big Ten the winner of the game we've been playing, and start a new, different game.

Here are my 72 teams. They are divided into eight 9-team divisions. They are listed in order of each schools average attendance over the past 4 years. The average attendance for each proposed division is in parentheses after the division name.

Pacific (49,315)
USC, Washington, UCLA, Oregon, Cal, Stanford, Oregon St, San Diego St, Washington St

Southwest (50,661)
Oklahoma, BYU, Texas Tech, Arizona St, Oklahoma St, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Boise St

Prairie (57,014)
Nebraska, Wisconsin, Iowa, Iowa St, Kansas State, Illinois. Minnesota, Kansas, Northwestern

East (66,842)
Michigan, Ohio St, Penn State, Michigan St, Purdue, Rutgers, Indiana, Maryland, UConn

Northeast (44,466)
Notre Dame, Kentucky, Louisville, Cincy, West Virginia, Pitt, Syracuse, BC, Wake Forest

Atlantic (52,623)
Clemson, FSU, Va Tech, NC State, UNC, Miami, Ga Tech, Virginia, Duke

Southeast (73,658)
Alabama, Tenn, Georgia, Florida, Auburn, S. Carolina, ECU, UCF, Vanderbilt

Central (66,991)
Texas, LSU, Texas A&M, Arkansas, Missouri, Miss St, Ole Miss, Baylor, TCU

If the Big 10 is declared the winner, then they get to choose who to add. It will be far less than 72 teams, I guarantee you.

The Big 10 is only interested in schools that fit their profile. I think if there was no concern about adding too many schools, the Big 10 would add Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, Texas A&M, Florida, Georgia, LSU, UNC, UVA, Vanderbilt, Duke, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, and the whole Pac-12 (except WSU and OSU). That's 24 additional teams, for a 38 team conference. There's a few schools that fit their profile that they'd exclude (like Cincinnati, Pitt, Iowa State, and NC State) because of petty institutional rivalries. There's also schools that come close to fitting their profile that they might consider, like Tennessee, Florida State, Miami, UConn, and Alabama (now that UAB "counts" as part of their system).

But the Big 10 simply isn't interested in partnering with schools like West Virginia, Louisville, Ole Miss, and Clemson no matter how good their sports teams are. And if they're in a position to exclude schools from a clear top-echelon, they'll only invite those that fit their institutional goals.

This conference could determine its champion by a CCT (Conference Championship Tournament). In the week following Thanksgiving weekend, the champions of the first four divisions would be paired to determine two semifinalists, and the other four divisions would do the same. The first pair of semifinalists would meet on New Year's in the Rose Bowl. The other pair would play in the Sugar Bowl on the same day.

A week to 10 days later, those two winners would play for the Conference Championship at Jerry Word in Dallas. Teams not in either the Sugar Bowl or Rose Bowl would be eligible to play in other bowl games as always.

As with any tournament, the best team doesn't always win. Since the eight division champions would be qualified based exclusively on their record in the division round robin (the preliminary tourney, if you will), some excellent teams might not make the field of 8.

Because only division records count in qualifying, there is no longer any concern on the part of the better programs for playing strong opponents outside their division. Such games can be scheduled freely to improve the quality of the regular season package the conference has to offer its media partners.

If, after the CCT is over, the media wants to offer its idea of how the teams should be ranked (for amusement and discussion purposes only, of course), they are welcome to do so. Not that we could stop them. That might give us all something to talk about while we wait for the start of the next season.

The winning formula these days is a conference composed mostly of the big public, research flagship/Landgrant that represent statewide audiences across an entire Megaregion with as little redundancy within the footprint as possible.

The B1G and SEC do this best. The B12 does this worst.

(02-17-2015 12:27 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  If the Big 10 is declared the winner, then they get to choose who to add. It will be far less than 72 teams, I guarantee you.

The Big 10 is only interested in schools that fit their profile. I think if there was no concern about adding too many schools, the Big 10 would add Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, Texas A&M, Florida, Georgia, LSU, UNC, UVA, Vanderbilt, Duke, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, and the whole Pac-12 (except WSU and OSU). That's 24 additional teams, for a 38 team conference. There's a few schools that fit their profile that they'd exclude (like Cincinnati, Pitt, Iowa State, and NC State) because of petty institutional rivalries. There's also schools that come close to fitting their profile that they might consider, like Tennessee, Florida State, Miami, UConn, and Alabama (now that UAB "counts" as part of their system).

But the Big 10 simply isn't interested in partnering with schools like West Virginia, Louisville, Ole Miss, and Clemson no matter how good their sports teams are. And if they're in a position to exclude schools from a clear top-echelon, they'll only invite those that fit their institutional goals.

Think of the Prairie and East divisions as successors to the original Big Ten. Those schools pretty much fit the profile.

(02-17-2015 12:01 PM)ken d Wrote:  For most of college football's existence, teams got together with peer institutions in their region to play as (mostly) friendly rivals. They formed conferences to support their mutual self-interest. Most of the money came from ticket sales and boosters. Then TV happened. Many schools continued along much as they had before. But at least one, and gradually everyone, came to realize that TV was the new game, and the game was on.

The Big Ten has arguably been the most successful at this new game. I believe they were the first to use the language of business to describe the game they were playing. Jim Delaney talked often about how hard they had worked to "build their brand". He saw they were winning this game, and he was very active in both promoting the brand and expanding its reach. Even when they were not the best on the field, they continued to succeed at the negotiating table.

Some folks, myself included, are beginning to think the game has gotten out of hand at its highest level. I would hope that some of the leaders of these primarily academic institutions would welcome a paradigm shift that would restore some of the balance between athletics and academics before it is hopelessly too late (if it isn't already).

I would love to see the pursuit of media riches change from being a competitive, eat or be eaten battle to the death. Especially because a single dominant network like ESPN gets fabulously rich when there are numerous conferences fighting with each other to get the best deal, while the losers have to settle for Fox. Conferences have expanded by realizing they improve their negotiation position when they are bigger. So why not stop competing with each other and cooperate instead?

I propose a 72 member conference that shares TV, bowl and tournament revenues equally. Let it negotiate with the Mouse from a position of ultimate strength. The P5 revenues are already relatively close, and far in excess of what most of their members really need to operate their athletic programs. Just think how much overhead could be reduced with a mega-merger.

Who knows? Maybe some of that money could be used to support academics.

I say we should all swallow our pride, declare the Big Ten the winner of the game we've been playing, and start a new, different game.

Division One!

(02-17-2015 12:47 PM)Wilkie01 Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:01 PM)ken d Wrote:  For most of college football's existence, teams got together with peer institutions in their region to play as (mostly) friendly rivals. They formed conferences to support their mutual self-interest. Most of the money came from ticket sales and boosters. Then TV happened. Many schools continued along much as they had before. But at least one, and gradually everyone, came to realize that TV was the new game, and the game was on.

The Big Ten has arguably been the most successful at this new game. I believe they were the first to use the language of business to describe the game they were playing. Jim Delaney talked often about how hard they had worked to "build their brand". He saw they were winning this game, and he was very active in both promoting the brand and expanding its reach. Even when they were not the best on the field, they continued to succeed at the negotiating table.

Some folks, myself included, are beginning to think the game has gotten out of hand at its highest level. I would hope that some of the leaders of these primarily academic institutions would welcome a paradigm shift that would restore some of the balance between athletics and academics before it is hopelessly too late (if it isn't already).

I would love to see the pursuit of media riches change from being a competitive, eat or be eaten battle to the death. Especially because a single dominant network like ESPN gets fabulously rich when there are numerous conferences fighting with each other to get the best deal, while the losers have to settle for Fox. Conferences have expanded by realizing they improve their negotiation position when they are bigger. So why not stop competing with each other and cooperate instead?

I propose a 72 member conference that shares TV, bowl and tournament revenues equally. Let it negotiate with the Mouse from a position of ultimate strength. The P5 revenues are already relatively close, and far in excess of what most of their members really need to operate their athletic programs. Just think how much overhead could be reduced with a mega-merger.

Who knows? Maybe some of that money could be used to support academics.

I say we should all swallow our pride, declare the Big Ten the winner of the game we've been playing, and start a new, different game.

Division !

Shh!

(02-17-2015 12:17 PM)ken d Wrote:  They are divided into eight 9-team divisions.

Football drives the bus, but P5 schools aren't going to form football-only conferences. For all-sports conferences, there is a distinct advantage in having 10 or more schools -- not every varsity sport will be played by every team in the conference, so if you have 12, for example, and 4 don't have a women's soccer team, you're still ok because the conference still has 8 soccer teams.

But, since football does drive the bus, there is also little incentive to add 7 or 8 more members to the P5 "club" unless each of them adds at least average value to TV deals.

Why not the P5 getting a bit smaller? The SEC, Big Ten, and ACC already have 14 each. Each could get the same amount of TV money, and split it 12 ways instead of 14, and still have two divisions and the football title game, if each dropped two of their least valuable members.

Another possibility -- which IMO is more likely -- is that the most valuable programs will demand an end to equal TV revenue sharing within the conference, so that Purdue gets a much smaller share than Ohio State, Wazzu gets less than USC, Vandy gets less than Bama, etc.

The 72 teams in this conference average 58K in attendance, and account for 78% of total FBS attendance over the past four years.

The remaining 56 teams average 21K, and account for 22% of FBS attendance.

Only seven of those 56 teams averaged more than 30K attendance, including all 3 service academies, USF, Fresno, Hawaii and UT-San Antonio.

(02-17-2015 12:54 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:17 PM)ken d Wrote:  They are divided into eight 9-team divisions.

Football drives the bus, but P5 schools aren't going to form football-only conferences. For all-sports conferences, there is a distinct advantage in having 10 or more schools -- not every varsity sport will be played by every team in the conference, so if you have 12, for example, and 4 don't have a women's soccer team, you're still ok because the conference still has 8 soccer teams.

But, since football does drive the bus, there is also little incentive to add 7 or 8 more members to the P5 "club" unless each of them adds at least average value to TV deals.

Why not the P5 getting a bit smaller? The SEC, Big Ten, and ACC already have 14 each. Each could get the same amount of TV money, and split it 12 ways instead of 14, and still have two divisions and the football title game, if each dropped two of their least valuable members.

Another possibility -- which IMO is more likely -- is that the most valuable programs will demand an end to equal TV revenue sharing within the conference, so that Purdue gets a much smaller share than Ohio State, Wazzu gets less than USC, Vandy gets less than Bama, etc.

I take it as a given that, once in the club, you aren't going to get kicked out unless you leave a turd in the punchbowl. And your more likely solution - unequal revenue sharing - is pretty much what the original Big 12 model looked like. How did that work out for them?

By contrast, the most successful model - the Big Ten - took revenue equality further than any other conference. They even had a revenue sharing plan for gate receipts.

(02-17-2015 01:06 PM)ken d Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:54 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:17 PM)ken d Wrote:  They are divided into eight 9-team divisions.

Football drives the bus, but P5 schools aren't going to form football-only conferences. For all-sports conferences, there is a distinct advantage in having 10 or more schools -- not every varsity sport will be played by every team in the conference, so if you have 12, for example, and 4 don't have a women's soccer team, you're still ok because the conference still has 8 soccer teams.

But, since football does drive the bus, there is also little incentive to add 7 or 8 more members to the P5 "club" unless each of them adds at least average value to TV deals.

Why not the P5 getting a bit smaller? The SEC, Big Ten, and ACC already have 14 each. Each could get the same amount of TV money, and split it 12 ways instead of 14, and still have two divisions and the football title game, if each dropped two of their least valuable members.

Another possibility -- which IMO is more likely -- is that the most valuable programs will demand an end to equal TV revenue sharing within the conference, so that Purdue gets a much smaller share than Ohio State, Wazzu gets less than USC, Vandy gets less than Bama, etc.

I take it as a given that, once in the club, you aren't going to get kicked out unless you leave a turd in the punchbowl. And your more likely solution - unequal revenue sharing - is pretty much what the original Big 12 model looked like. How did that work out for them?

The programs that left the Big 12 were getting above-average revenue shares.

Pac-10 had unequal revenue sharing for 20-plus years until they hired Larry Scott and he convinced them to share TV revenue equally.

Equal revenue sharing could just as well create instability by increasing the temptation for king programs to leave and get more revenue that doesn't have to be shared with less-valuable programs.

And I don't take it as a given that equal revenue sharing is forever. For example, when Florida State looks at revenue streams and at trying to keep up with their big-spending local SEC football rivals, I would not be surprised if they ask themselves why they have to share conference revenue equally with Wake Forest and others, and wonder when is the right time to seek conference revenue sharing proportionate to each program's TV value.

Why not go to an eight (8) team playoff and create eight (8) conferences of nine (9) teams each? Also, allow no independents in this division. This is the 72 teams, that you have proposed.

(02-17-2015 01:17 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 01:06 PM)ken d Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:54 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(02-17-2015 12:17 PM)ken d Wrote:  They are divided into eight 9-team divisions.

Football drives the bus, but P5 schools aren't going to form football-only conferences. For all-sports conferences, there is a distinct advantage in having 10 or more schools -- not every varsity sport will be played by every team in the conference, so if you have 12, for example, and 4 don't have a women's soccer team, you're still ok because the conference still has 8 soccer teams.

But, since football does drive the bus, there is also little incentive to add 7 or 8 more members to the P5 "club" unless each of them adds at least average value to TV deals.

Why not the P5 getting a bit smaller? The SEC, Big Ten, and ACC already have 14 each. Each could get the same amount of TV money, and split it 12 ways instead of 14, and still have two divisions and the football title game, if each dropped two of their least valuable members.

Another possibility -- which IMO is more likely -- is that the most valuable programs will demand an end to equal TV revenue sharing within the conference, so that Purdue gets a much smaller share than Ohio State, Wazzu gets less than USC, Vandy gets less than Bama, etc.

I take it as a given that, once in the club, you aren't going to get kicked out unless you leave a turd in the punchbowl. And your more likely solution - unequal revenue sharing - is pretty much what the original Big 12 model looked like. How did that work out for them?

The programs that left the Big 12 were getting above-average revenue shares.

Pac-10 had unequal revenue sharing for 20-plus years until they hired Larry Scott and he convinced them to share TV revenue equally.

Equal revenue sharing could just as well create instability by increasing the temptation for king programs to leave and get more revenue that doesn't have to be shared with less-valuable programs.

And I don't take it as a given that equal revenue sharing is forever. For example, when Florida State looks at revenue streams and at trying to keep up with their big-spending local SEC football rivals, I would not be surprised if they ask themselves why they have to share conference revenue equally with Wake Forest and others, and wonder when is the right time to seek conference revenue sharing proportionate to each program's TV value.

This proposal is for a single conference, not 8 different ones. If a "king" program wanted to leave, where would they go? Who would they play? And I didn't suggest that all revenue streams be shared. Gate receipts obviously vary enormously. Provision could be made for schools to retain some Tier 3 media rights, and they would control merchandise sales, naming rights, etc. Certainly booster donations wouldn't be shared. The things that would be shared are things that aren't all that different between P5 conferences now.

What I am suggesting, though, is that a single megaconference would likely get more of what is currently the obscene profits of ESPN/Disney, in sufficient amount that even the richest programs in today's market would get more than they do now.

I am also aware that this proposal isn't just tweaking the current system. It is changing the paradigm drastically. That doesn't happen without a lot of angst. Human nature being what it is, first reactions are usually to look for ways in which change will hurt us, and largely ignore ways the change will help us. If I were a university president, I could see lots of ways this would help. The only people who would be hurt badly by this, IMO, would be the existing conference commissioners and their enormous staffs. Most of the P5 commissioners are getting ready to retire soon anyway.

(02-17-2015 12:01 PM)ken d Wrote:  ... a single dominant network like ESPN gets fabulously rich when there are numerous conferences fighting with each other to get the best deal, while the losers have to settle for Fox. Conferences have expanded by realizing they improve their negotiation position when they are bigger. So why not stop competing with each other and cooperate instead?... Let it negotiate with the Mouse from a position of ultimate strength. The P5 revenues are already relatively close, and far in excess of what most of their members really need to operate their athletic programs. Just think how much overhead could be reduced with a mega-merger.

I think this is where we're at. Additional revenues have been squeezed from the consumer, but we've likely reached the limit there. If the conferences/schools want more money is has to come at the expense of the distributors (ESPN, FOX, DTV, DISH, Comcast, etc). The recent increase in content delivery platforms (Netflix, Hulu, Youtube) outside traditional cable/sattelite providers/networks also gives added leverage to the content producers (schools/conferences). It's a rising tide lifts all boats situation.

Scrap all conferences, have everyone go completely independent in all sports, and make ESPN negotiate separately with each school for content in every sport. Wear them down with multiple negotiations at the same time.

One major network vs. 80 schools. ESPN can't lock down 80 schools with five TV deals.

All conference commissioners and their staffs are immediately unemployed. ESPN has to fill up all of that air time they have created. They have to negotiate with a number of schools to fill that content. Start the bidding!

Which schools can get the better deals? How much can power schools squeeze from ESPN? Line up at the money trough!

(02-17-2015 02:02 PM)ken d Wrote:  I am also aware that this proposal isn't just tweaking the current system. It is changing the paradigm drastically.

I tend to see all this from a biochem perspective.

The last round of realigment consisted of a bunch of small moves that required little energy input (basically covered by schools like TCU and Utah taking reduced payouts initially). The end result wasn't that more stable than what we started with.

The next round requires a huge energy imput to initiate but has a way bigger ΔG from reactants to product. There are a few potential catalysts in play namely 1) conference championship deregulation 2) division play deregulation 3) P5 vs P5 only scheduling.

UT going indy with Olympic sports in the ACC is the potential big move at the end of the GoR, and I think could be the final catalyst for moving to a P1/P2 megaconference scenario. The B1G has been the most aggressive "first move" conference. The only real move they have to block UT to indy/ACC is big move to destabilize both the ACC and BigXII. If they're going that far, there's little additional risk and a much bigger payoff in absorbing the PAC or PAC and SEC into a P1/P2 setup.

(02-17-2015 01:24 PM)Wilkie01 Wrote:  Why not go to an eight (8) team playoff and create eight (8) conferences of nine (9) teams each? Also, allow no independents in this division. This is the 72 teams, that you have proposed.

That's an option I considered. But doesn't that just shuffle the deck a little without really changing the game? Now you would have 8 conferences instead of 5, meaning each of them has less bargaining power. And you are right back to the situation where one conference will try to poach somebody else's members to get that bargaining power - and a competitive edge - back.

And there are other advantages to a single, unified conference, many of them on the academic side. How much easier would it be to have a uniform set of rules that all schools have to abide by? And with that uniformity comes the possibility of adding a measure of academic rigor that even SEC presidents would like, even if their coaches (and fans) don't.

How nice would it be to have one source for officials instead of 8? To have uniform practices with regard to redshirts, grayshirts, and any other color somebody will come up with to game the system to their advantage?

A single conference seems to add value for me in a way multiple conferences doesn't.

Ken, it's clear you've put a lot of thought into this. You're getting a lot of crap here (some from me) but it's easy for others to shoot down new ideas.

I think your overall idea of one big entity negotiating with ESPN has some merit. This isn't the 1980s anymore, and I think most schools realize that they'd be better off in the long run by sticking together. The extra negotiating power would seriously bite into the margins that ESPN/Fox are earning off CFB/CBB.

The problem is that it requires about 20-30 of the top schools to stick together at all costs. Otherwise ESPN will figure out who it can overpay to kill the whole system. For example, they're currently overpaying Texas for the Longhorn Network in order to preserve the current status quo.

(02-17-2015 02:59 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  I think your overall idea of one big entity negotiating with ESPN has some merit. This isn't the 1980s anymore, and I think most schools realize that they'd be better off in the long run by sticking together. The extra negotiating power would seriously bite into the margins that ESPN/Fox are earning off CFB/CBB.

The problem is that it requires about 20-30 of the top schools to stick together at all costs. Otherwise ESPN will figure out who it can overpay to kill the whole system. For example, they're currently overpaying Texas for the Longhorn Network in order to preserve the current status quo.

Why would that many schools stick together at all costs? I doubt they could even agree on whether to be paid equally or who would get more money than the others. It's one thing to persuade Ohio State to grudgingly share with schools like Purdue and Minnesota who have been their conference mates for 100 years. It's quite another to persuade them to share equally with Ole Miss, Boston College, Wazzu, or Oklahoma State.

At most, there might be an alliance between two P5 conferences to jointly negotiate TV deals, but even that would likely fall apart in squabbles over control and the division of money.