Personally, Even with ND, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Louisville, Rutgers and WV gone from the Big East, I think that with UConn,Temple, Memphis, Cincinnati, Houston, SMU, UCF, USF along with the rest of the old Big East lineup should have stayed together as the Big East. even with those losses of schools That league as a whole and adding ECU, Tulsa would have been a much stronger entity that the Two separate ones. There was far more Basketball tradition with Temple, Memphis, UConn, Cincinnati and Houston than what the Big East replacements brought into the NBE. Football would have kept the Big East name out there for the entire Major sports seasons and The TV Contract could have been far more lucrative in the long run . The Ugly Split shattered any interest left from fans of the old Big East that went Separate ways and reduced the Viewing market shares a combined league would have offered.

The AAC will be better than the WAC was..... and the Big East will be the ASUN of the North in 10 years...

This article breaks down the changes since the end of the BCS. It's written from a WVU perspective. But it gives all the facts and figures.

Dave Hickman: More evidence that WVU’s move to Big 12 was the right one

Quote:The financial numbers are out now from the first year of the College Football Playoff, and for schools like West Virginia — which is a Power 5 conference member thanks to that move to the Big 12 — the news is staggeringly good.

According to the NCAA, the Big 12’s share of revenue from the first CFP was $64,700,801. Of the five power conferences, that was just above the average. The Pac-12 made the most at roughly $69.3 million, the ACC the least at $58.2 million. The Big Ten was just shy of $64 million and the SEC was at about $65.6 million.

Now those numbers probably mean little to most. They need some perspective, right? Well, here’s the first part of the perspective: In the final year of the BCS, the standard payout was $34.2 million. So the Big 12 made an extra $30 million.

That’s not the real eye-opener, though. Call this the what-you-have and what-you-could-have moment:

The American Athletic Conference lost almost $12.7 million from the last year of the BCS to the first year of the CFP. It went from a share of $27.9 million as an automatic qualifier in the BCS to $15.2 million as a Group of Five member of the CFP.

Even of the five Group of Five conferences, it ranked just third in total payout.

(05-21-2015 12:58 AM)Tigersmoke Wrote:  Stever no use arguing with those chuckle heads. They actually get what you are saying but will never admit it. If they believe what their saying then they have proven your point. If they are getting wider coverage of more games then why are the AAC numbers better? Why is it that fans of other sports can find fs1 but for nbe games it's a mystery Channel. It's going to be interesting to see which league prospers more. One took the quick easy fix and one took a more strategic long-term approach. I see you get it on the exposure creates wealth scenario but I can see their (keep the big east name and fake it tell you make it take the $$ and run scheme). We will see in a few years lol.

So you agree that as of now, there's no evidence that the AAC's "strategic approach" has generated wealth, you just have Hope and Faith that it will, right?

PS - Also, nobody has presented any evidence that the AAC took any "strategic approach", i.e., choosing exposure over money. There's no evidence that any other network offered them more money for less exposure. The AAC took the only deal on the table.

(05-20-2015 03:30 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-20-2015 03:05 PM)stever20 Wrote:  

(05-20-2015 02:53 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(05-20-2015 02:48 PM)stever20 Wrote:  

(05-20-2015 02:42 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  The AAC deal with ESPN is dreadful, they gave away all their games and got absolutely peanut money. The AAC gets what, about $2.1m per school? And most of that is for football, so we are getting maybe $700k per school for our basketball! That is beyond peanuts. It's nothing.

In contrast, the Big East is getting almost twice as much $$$ for basketball from FOX than the AAC is getting for football and basketball.

You have to be borderline to think the AAC deal is anywhere near as good as the Big East TV deal.

Money is only part of it. I'm sorry- but being on a network where they only got 3 games drawing more than 250k, is a complete joke. Folks are focusing WAY too much on money. FS1 right now for mainstream sports is a joke. And with the ratings that UFC/NASCAR/Big East get- who do you think has the leverage with Fox? Who is Fox going to cater to?

Money is just about all of it: You sign a media deal to ... make money. Any other aspect of a media deal - such as 'exposure'- is irrelevant unless somehow, some way, it translates into more money.

So how are these AAC games on ESPNu and ESPN News translating into more money? Wake me up when you can answer that. In the meantime, the Big East is banking very nice dollars.

The media money for the Big East and AAC is such a small part of their budget it's not funny. If your program is hinging on that extra 2 million dollars- than your program isn't worth much at all to begin with. Not at all. I mean do you think Georgetown would stop being Georgetown if they were only making 2 million per year in media rights? No way. Let's be real here. What is the budget of these schools for sports? According to BBState, for Georgetown it's 35 million. Do you think if it was only 33 million, that they would crumble?

The highest one in the Big East was St John's at 37.6 million. 8 of the 11 AAC schools had a budget over that- and only Tulsa and Tulane were under Georgetown. So don't think that 2 million means a whole hell of a lot. Being on ESPN at least some means a whole hell of a lot more.

Of course Georgetown wouldn't crumble if its budget fell from $35m to $33m, but if they suddenly lost those $2m, there would be cuts, it would be felt. It's like Michael Jordan said when he was making $30m a year from the Bulls and another $20m a year from Nike, "a million dollars is still a million dollars".

In contrast, nobody has yet been able to show how AAC "exposure" of 300k viewers per game compared to Big East exposure of 100k viewers per game means anything at all.

Anything.

Can't speak to the 300k vs. 100k value of viewers, but at least one school recognizes the benefit of being on ESPN over FOX. Memphis applications have soared since the move to the AAC from CUSA. ESPN exposure has been cited as a reason. Obviously, it's not the only one as the UofM is focusing on national recruitment vs. relying on the region as in the past. They have utilized the platform to further these goals and specifically credit it when discussing record apps and future enrollment.