CSNbbs

Conference USA's television contract will drop considerably, to the tens of millions of dollars, once the teams leave for the Big East. ESPN has the right to re-negotiate with a conference once its league membership changes.


<a href='http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=1655559' target='_blank'>http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/stor...andy&id=1655559</a>

I knew it would happen, but not this soon. And Marshall thinks they are making a better move financially?????

Is any one suprised by this (besides Marshall fans)?

It's a good thing nothing will happen to the MAC TV contract once its flagship team leaves for C*USA. Think about how many times Marshall has been on ESPN compared to your team over the past few years.

Marshall is the reason the MAC has a TV contract in the first place. It's no coincidence MAC teams finally got television exposure when MU entered the league.

You might be right Murox, however right now the MAC has 3 teams in the BCS top 25 - pretty good for ESPN. Also, the MAC deal is not that great right now, so it will be hard to make it fall even lower. CUSA, on the other hand, is in trouble. Some of those schools are already losing BIG money on athletics. When that ESPN revenue stream dries up, it will be even worse so they are going to tighten their wallets. One way of doing that, of course, is to not subsidize 5 bowl games.

You're right - Miami's Sweet Sixteen run and Kent's Elite 8 had nothing to do with it. See you on Wednesday!!!! :rolleyes:

murox- Wrote:It's a good thing nothing will happen to the MAC TV contract once its flagship team leaves for C*USA. Think about how many times Marshall has been on ESPN compared to your team over the past few years.

Marshall is the reason the MAC has a TV contract in the first place. It's no coincidence MAC teams finally got television exposure when MU entered the league.

If we all said "Thanks Marshall", would you shut the f**k up! My god, it's like Herdon has mutated. Nearly every Marshall response is basically the same as the classic Herdon response with a minor deviation>

There is no doubt that Marshall coming to the MAC was a big jumpstart for the conference. However, losing Marshall will not hurt our TV contract.

The last 2 football games on TV were sellouts and did very good in TV ratings. Marshall has done nothing for basketball, which is a big part of our TV contract too.

The MAC's contract will not change.

The relevant difference is that CUSA's contract was relatively old and easily pre-dated the latest rounds of conference speculation and realignment. In contrast, the MAC's contract was signed after Marshall already had signaled its intentions to leave at the first available opportunity -- and had already done so at least once according to the West Virginia media.

Presumably, any ESPN executive with an ounce of sense would have factored that into the pricing. (You may insert your own joke as to who at ESPN possesses this requisite amount of sense, but the division DOES account for close to a quarter of Disney's net profits.) My guess is that the MAC doesn't take much, if any, haircut on its deal.

We're not getting much money for the contract, anyway. Plus, I understand that the ratings for BG v. NIU and BG v. Miami were very strong. That would tend to indicate interest in the MAC without Marshall.

From the article:

Quote:The exit fee for teams leaving Conference USA has been altered. No longer are the schools fully responsible for the decrease in a television contract. The original exit penalties included a clause that teams leaving would be responsible for the difference in dollars of a negotiated television contract. Conference USA's television contract will drop considerably, to the tens of millions of dollars, once the teams leave for the Big East. ESPN has the right to re-negotiate with a conference once its league membership changes. Instead, the departed schools must agree to schedule the remaining teams.

The important question is this: Has all this been factored into Marshall's assessment of whether it can make it financially in Conference USA?

Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't.

rocketfootball Wrote:There is no doubt that Marshall coming to the MAC was a big jumpstart for the conference. However, losing Marshall will not hurt our TV contract.

The last 2 football games on TV were sellouts and did very good in TV ratings. Marshall has done nothing for basketball, which is a big part of our TV contract too.

The MAC's contract will not change.

Only one or two teams in the MAC get to do anything for basketball. We finished third in basetball with 22 wins, in 2001 and still got no post-season. That says more about the MAC than it does Marshall. In the same way only one or two teams have received football post-season play. Since we have 6 times that doesn't leave a lot of room for other MAC teams to contribute but they have been worthy. That is a product of being in the MAC not an individual team's fault. We may struggle early in CUSA as a conference but I believe that once the first couple of years are put together we will have been part of something bigger and better than was possible in the MAC. No one's fault , it's just the way it seems to work. If we're wrong, so be it, but it was our choice to make and all the scond guessing in the world by you guys is not going to change that and we will live with the consequences either way they shake out.

:lolup:

MAC fans criticizing another conferences TV package...that's rich.

22 wins in college baseball is no big deal whatsoever, dude... especially when you play Rio Grande, WV State and Charleston.

:lolup:

A Marshall fan missing the point and being an ******. That's typical.

And you really oughta finish in say, the Top TEN in the MAC all-sports race before bagging on the league in those sports, doofus...

Oddfellow,
Cheer up ol' chap, the sun will come up tomorrow...it just won't have that nice green and white tint that you've grown to love over the years. :)

Papa Lou BSU Wrote:22 wins in college baseball is no big deal whatsoever, dude... especially when you play Rio Grande, WV State and Charleston.

b-a-s-k-e-t-b-a-l-l

I misread your original post, but you misspelled the word "basketball" so that's probably why.

My point about the level of non-conference competition stands. Non-D-1 wins are not considered by tournament selection committees, so it's likely they viewed Marshall as a 19 win team.

It also would help if you finished higher than fourth in the conference.