(03-03-2023 08:11 AM)XLance Wrote:  

(03-03-2023 07:53 AM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(03-03-2023 07:36 AM)GTFletch Wrote:  

(03-02-2023 10:59 AM)PeteTheChop Wrote:  A few items of interest:

The GoR and its ironcladness:

"Over the past two years, a number of schools have sent teams of lawyers to examine the official grant of rights document, either looking for a potential pathway out or assurances that the biggest brands can't leave without a serious fight. As one administrator told ESPN, those reviews have established several potentially compelling arguments for breaking the agreement but have uncovered no obvious loophole that would provide a pathway out without engaging in protracted litigation.

'Is it worth the paper it's written on?' one AD said. 'If one school starts to leave, then another, how strong is it? It would involve a major legal battle.'"

Discussions wrt unequal revenue sharing:

"Yet, after lengthy discussions at the ACC's winter meetings, ADs emerged without anything approaching consensus on a new distribution plan, something that would require a two-thirds majority vote. Indeed, they can't even agree on what to call the plan -- 'weighted distribution,' as one AD said, 'alternative revenue," as the league called it or 'unequal' as most administrators opposing the plan have said.

Even the most seismic shifts in distribution don't exactly paint the picture of a financial windfall for power programs like Clemson and Florida State, however. Estimates shared by sources with knowledge of the discussions suggest a net shift of between $250,000 and $3 million annually -- 'pocket change,' as one AD called it -- leading some administrators to wonder if it's worth all the trouble."

The ACC's future:

"To the mind of FSU athletic director Michael Alford, the longer term picture remains bleak compared with the immense growth of the SEC and Big Ten. When the ACC signed its 20-year TV deal with ESPN in 2016 -- a deal approved by several of the current athletic directors and school presidents, it should be noted -- the payout wasn't entirely out of step with the rest of the country, and it opened the door for the league to launch its own TV network. But six years later, the landscape has changed markedly, the frustrations have grown exponentially, and the financial constraints, which several ADs noted are already being felt, will soon become an existential threat.

Alford's comments (last week) were a warning to his colleagues that time is running out to change those fortunes, and several administrators privately offered a similar lament to Alford's public statements. Change isn't about appeasement. It's about survival.

'At the end of the day, we need to try. And if, if we can't get things done, then, at least we can look around and say, 'All right, we attempted to get something done, we weren't able to do it,' Miami AD Dan Radakovich said. 'And then, if down the road, schools do choose to leave, it should not be a surprise.' "

Tik, tik, tik ...

https://www.espn.com/college-football/st...ney-battle

I will be surprised if ESPN allows the ACC to blow up after all the time they spent on building the brand.

ESPN gave the Big East a lot of air time for decades, grew together. Then things changed, ESPN executives decided to make different financial decisions, and 2-3 years later ESPN is running a 30 for 30 "Requiem for the Big East."

The Big East should have taken ESPN's deal........the ACC did.

It WAS a lowball deal though. 2 years later, everyone but UConn, USF and Cincinnati was in a conference making more money than they would have under that deal.

Might sketch out how the landscape evolves if the Big EAst signs that deal at some point, putting in the assumption that ESPN does some amount of deterring the ACC from a second Big East raid. ACC doesn't go to 14, West Virginia doesn't take the Big 12 invite. Next man up, Houston to go with TCU? Big 12 is looking pretty boxed in with the PAC taking Colorado, the SEC taking Mizzou and the Big Ten taking Nebraska. Maybe Memphis gets their moment? Does Louisivlle bolt for the Big 12?

If ACC can't move to 14, do they pursue Texas more aggressively? Offer the same deal they gave Notre Dame a year later? Longhorn Network can nestle in just fine along Swofford's Raycom syndication buddies.

(03-03-2023 06:02 AM)ouflak Wrote:  

(03-02-2023 11:32 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  You’d have to engage in protracted litigation (using the words of the article) to find out that answer and being wrong could be bankruptcy-level damages for an athletic department.

Generally if I find myself jumping to extremes like this, that's probably a flag that I've put some distance between myself and reality. We've just seen OU/UT get their GOR wiped off the books (and the likewise 'ironclad' exit fees negotiated downwards). All sides (broadcasters, conferences, schools) have a vested interest in making the best deal possible for everybody to move on and maximize their respective value in their future situation.

(03-02-2023 11:32 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  ...start talking about the financial aspect of what it would take to buy it out if we’re going to get anywhere.

Whatever the broadcasters, conferences and school(s) can work out. The lawyers will get their cut. And everybody will get on with business. Not saying there won't be some pain for some schools having to take reduced payouts for some number of years (in FSU and Clemson's case possibly as long as a decade?) and that sort of thing. But nobody is going 'bankrupt'.

I’m not the person on this thread that has any distance from reality.

The UT/OU exit means very little to the ACC outside of the fact that it took 18 months for the parties to negotiate a deal for UT and OU to leave a grand total of ONE YEAR early. UT and OU also never breached the terms of the GOR. If the Big 12 waited any longer, the GOR would have simply expired and wouldn’t have received any type of compensation at all (like the Pac-12 with USC/UCLA leaving), so they also had motivation to make a deal.

All the UT/OU situation showed is that if an ACC school decides to leaves around 2031/2032, they’d probably be able to find a deal to get out of the GOR at that point because (a) they’re not risking protracted damages because the GOR is nearing expiration and (b) the ACC has an incentive to deal at that post because time is no longer on their side near the end of the GOR period. That tracks exactly what I’ve said - I have NEVER said that ACC schools won’t eventually move, but they’re realistically going to have to wait until circa 2030 no matter how much they may complain right now.

You can just do the back-of-napkin math. If the ACC is paying each school $30 million per year in TV rights (and this is a low end figure - it’s going to be more this year, but I’m keeping it simple and on the low end), that’s $390 million over the course of the next 13 years. This is just a straight low end number and that’s assuming FSU is worth the exact same as Wake Forest. That’s 40% of the entire endowments of FSU and Clemson. No athletic department anywhere can afford to pay $390 million in damages for anything as this isn’t going to be paid by any insurance policy, either. (Whether it’s right or wrong, you can get insurance to protect against a monster like Larry Nassar, but not openly and intentionally breaching a contract.) So, yes, those are bankruptcy-level damages for an athletic department.

And putting aside the GOR, the “vested interest” here is ESPN keeping probably its best ROI contract - a cheap ACC agreement with top brands until 2036 - until the very last day.

I once again urge everyone to listen to the Marchand and Ourand interview a few months ago with Burke Magnus, who was just named the #2 executive at ESPN this week. He directly addressed the complaints of ACC schools rights fees and pretty sternly talked about how much risk ESPN took on to create the ACC Network when that contract started, which the ACC begged for despite cord cutting happening already. The bargain that ESPN needed to take on risk was security from the ACC for a 20-year contract. Magnus talked about how much risk ESPN took multiple times. I don’t know how anyone could listen to that interview - *directly* with the person in charge of negotiating ESPN’s rights fees - and think for one second that ESPN is subsidizing any type of move from the ACC to SEC.

Ultimately, the SEC is an expensive contract and the ACC is a cheap contract. ESPN, a declining revenue business, isn’t going to make an expensive contract even more expensive and a cheap contract that has a lot of value into a worthless one when it pretty much has total power to stop it from a financial perspective.

(03-02-2023 02:35 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(03-02-2023 02:28 PM)Skyhawk Wrote:  If this is truly as insane a play as you suggest, why else would multiple schools - these college institutions that we all agree tend to be risk adverse - why would they go out on this limb as you describe it?

Because most people have the attention span of goldfish, so if nothing comes of the FSU and Clemson folks jumping up and down and making a lot of noise, it will be forgotten in a year or two.

That presumes that all they do is "jump up and down".

Besides, "jumping up and down" in public, is a not uncommon way to sway debate, and thereby, decision-making.

And that likely happens before the next goldfish distraction.

After all, check the media reporting - it's started a discussion.

I guess we'll have to wait and watch to see how fruitful it is.

My guess is that this is saber rattling in an effort to scare other ACC schools with P2 options to join the case against the GoR. Clearly FSU and Clemson are on board. UNC has already been antsy about their position and the current tumult will certainly add to that. Its already on the minds of admins and donors and the cry will get louder for schools that have options. Are there enough to get the job done though?

(03-03-2023 08:23 AM)johnbragg Wrote:  It WAS a lowball deal though. 2 years later, everyone but UConn, USF and Cincinnati was in a conference making more money than they would have under that deal.

Might sketch out how the landscape evolves if the Big EAst signs that deal at some point, putting in the assumption that ESPN does some amount of deterring the ACC from a second Big East raid. ACC doesn't go to 14, West Virginia doesn't take the Big 12 invite. Next man up, Houston to go with TCU? Big 12 is looking pretty boxed in with the PAC taking Colorado, the SEC taking Mizzou and the Big Ten taking Nebraska. Maybe Memphis gets their moment? Does Louisivlle bolt for the Big 12?

If ACC can't move to 14, do they pursue Texas more aggressively? Offer the same deal they gave Notre Dame a year later? Longhorn Network can nestle in just fine along Swofford's Raycom syndication buddies.

The old football-playing Big East came unglued mainly because it was an unstable structure all along. It was a good basketball league that glued football onto itself when it saw that football was bringing in cash. The structure was always awkward and wobbly. Georgetown was always going to be happier in the league than Virginia Tech or Pittsburgh. As a result, that version of the BE was not long for this world.

The BE football schools were fine with playing each other. As we know, most of them still do. ESPN was fine with showing them, too. As we know, ESPN still does. The ACC as a conference was simply better built.

The ACC could welcome all the Big East football schools it wanted because the schools liked its more straightforward way of doing things over the wobbly BE way of doing things. John Swofford noticed this early.