nzmorange
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RE: Ideal Conference Draft
(09-16-2014 05:06 PM)Lenvillecards Wrote: With that announcement, lets close trading.
MARK: Florida, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, Auburn, Georgia, Arkansas, Arizona, Mississippi, Baylor, New Mexico
HUSKY: Ohio State, Michigan State, Virginia, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa State, UConn, UMass
WEST: Miami, North Carolina, South Carolina, North Carolina State, Clemson, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, Temple, Appalachian State
GT: USC, Stanford, California, UCLA, Washington, Arizona State, Oregon State, BYU, San Diego State, UNLV, Nevada, Hawaii
BIZZLE: Texas, Utah, Syracuse, Illinois, Rutgers, Purdue, Navy, Texas Tech, Ohio, Air Force
JOHN: Notre Dame, Penn State, Nebraska, Oregon, Iowa, Maryland, Colorado, Kansas State
LEN: Alabama, LSU, Florida State, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Memphis, Oklahoma State, SMU, Houston, TCU, Rice, Tulane
KRONKE: Michigan, Wisconsin, Duke, Vanderbilt, Minnesota, Indiana, Northwestern, Boston College, Army
MIKE: Louisville, Tennessee, Virginia Tech, West Virginia, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, USF, UCF, Old Dominion, Western Kentucky, Liberty, ECU
After trades, these are our new conferences.
MARK: Florida, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, Auburn, Georgia, Arkansas, Arizona, Mississippi, Baylor, New Mexico
-You should have kept Texas. Sure UF + UGA > UT + Utah objectively, but a lot of your conference was based on Texas. UT gives big name recognition, and rivalry games with OU, TAMU, and Arkansas, and significant games with Auburn, Zona, Mississippi, and Baylor. Neither UF nor UGA can do anything close to that. Picking up Oklahoma State or Arizona State would have been nice. Other than that, I think that Baylor and New Mexico are low value adds that drag the conference down. None the less, OU, Auburn, TAMU, Arkansas is an excellent western core, and UGA and UF are strong teams with significant followings in fertile recruiting areas.
RANKING: 2
HUSKY: Ohio State, Michigan State, Virginia, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa State, UConn, UMass
-I see some obvious rivalries here in the form of OSU-MSU, MIZZOU-KU-ISU, and UConn-UMass. I just don't see any geographic connection. MSU, KU, UConn, and OSU will give this conference basketball firepower (with UMass and Virginia as good second tier teams), but what does KU and UConn have in common? In football, what do UVA, UMass, and ISU have in common with each other? Also, after MSU and OSU, who else can field a strong football team? I think that you are too spread out, both geographically and culturally. You have big names, but you aren't getting the most out of them and could probably have traded them to someone who could. Ideally, that would have gotten you schools that you could have leveraged to create a positive synergistic affect, improving your entire conference.
RANK: 6
WEST: Miami, North Carolina, South Carolina, North Carolina State, Clemson, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, Temple, Appalachian State
-I get that you're trying to build the core of the ACC. However, I think you went too far. An 8 team conference was the minimum, and that would have worked really well for you. Picking a FCS move up was a mistake.
RANK: 3
GT: USC, Stanford, California, UCLA, Washington, Arizona State, -Oregon State, BYU, San Diego State, UNLV, Nevada, Hawaii
-You flew too high. I like the idea of going west. I just don't see the added value of your last 3 adds. Hawaii is a royal pain to visit, they don't have fans, they don't have academics, they don't have basketball, they don't have recruits, and they don't have competitive teams (usually). So why add them? Nevada is a similar head scratcher. I can kind of see UNLV because they have some basketball history and Vegas is fun. The same is true for SDSU. They have some football history, they're in SoCal, and San Diego is fun to visit. However, I don't think that both are necessary for this conference. Instead, I would hold out for Oregon to break loose and I might try to make a move on Zona.
RANK: 1
BIZZLE: Texas, Utah, Syracuse, Illinois, Rutgers, Purdue, Navy, Texas Tech, Ohio, Air Force
-I see Texas, Texas Tech, Air Force, and possibly Utah together. I see Syracuse, Navy and Rutgers together. I see Illinois, Purdue, and Ohio together. I see Navy and Air Force together. But these clumps don't seem to be unified. Instead, they look like beginnings to conferences. I also don't see a bunch of fire power. Texas is obviously #1 in football, but who is #2? Syracuse? If so, who is #3? As for basketball, SU is #1 followed by UT #2 and Purdue #3, but I don't see a #4. Illinois, I guess, but that doesn't inspire a bunch of confidence.
RANK: 9
JOHN: Notre Dame, Penn State, Nebraska, Oregon, Iowa, Maryland, Colorado, Kansas State
-After you picked ND and PSU, I thought that you were going to make an eastern conference with Syracuse, Pitt, BC, UMD, and VT. However, that dream fell through when SU was picked up and you looked west to Nebraska. At that point, I thought that you were trying to rebuild the B1G, but your 4th pick was Oregon. That was perplexing to me because it's a waste of a pick. Oregon is good, but they are way too geographically isolated to be of any real value to anyone other than GTS, and GTS's picks were all to geographically isolated from everyone to be of any real value to anyone else. In other words, Oregon doesn't do anything for you, and you can't trade them away. After that, you picked a western team, a very eastern team, a very western team, and then ended by picking a western team. I have no idea what the core geography/culture of this conference is supposed to be. What do UMD, Oregon, and Nebraska have in common?
RANK: 7
LEN: Alabama, LSU, Florida State, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Memphis, Oklahoma State, SMU, Houston, TCU, Rice, Tulane
-I LOVED your first three picks. All of which are fairly close together, in rich recruiting areas, and field very competitive teams. I also like Tulane and Rice. Both of those are whipping boys with great academics who happen to be in rich recruiting areas. MSU makes sense to me as they are in keeping with your western part of the SE USA themed conference. I also really liked the Memphis add. It was creative and it got you a school with good basketball that has the right geography. That's 7 very good picks. Kentucky seemed like a stretch. Sure they have great basketball, but they're a HUGE outlier. IMHO, they work in the SEC because of A) Vandy and UT, and B) because they fill an otherwise void gap (basketball). I think that you would have been better off trading them for a more southern school. After that, UH was a decent add, but then you added OSU, SMU, and TCU. I don't see SMU and TCU adding value, and OSU should have been traded to Mark for a school like Arkansas and/or left alone.
RANK: 4
KRONKE: Michigan, Wisconsin, Duke, Vanderbilt, Minnesota, Indiana, Northwestern, Boston College, Army
-I have no idea what any of these schools have in common with each other. Duke, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin have good basketball. Duke, Vandy, BC, Michigan, and NW have good academics. Duke, Vandy, NW, and BC are private. UM, Wisc, Minn, Indiana, and NW are in varying parts of the Midwest. BC and Army are in the Northeast. Duke and Vanderbilt are in the Southeast. It seems like you're all over the place. I would have tried to trade some of the far-flung wings of the conference away to develop a common cultural and/or geographic core. You have value. You just aren't using it effectively.
RANK: 8
MIKE: Louisville, Tennessee, Virginia Tech, West Virginia, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, USF, UCF, Old Dominion, Western Kentucky, Liberty, ECU
-I was originally down on this conference, but I really like the UL, UT, VT, WVU, Pitt, and UC core. All of those schools either have existing rivalries with each other, or should. You lack fire power up top, but as I predicted, you have depth. However, after pick #6, you started to fade. WKU was a geographically consistent #7. They might not bring much, but they're an easy trip for pretty much every team in the conference. I'll buy that. The same goes for Old Dominion. Every conference needs a couple scrubs to beat up on. USF and UCF are probably decent picks in the abstract, but going into Florida is a bit of a stretch. However, it isn't a total stretch. There is history, and you aren't *that* far away. I'll buy that, too. I think that you could have not gone into Florida with the WKU and Old Dominion picks. Conversely, and ideally, I think that you should have not gone with WKU and Old Dominion after picking schools in Florida. You're stretching yourself thin for no reason. The same goes for Liberty and ECU. What do they bring? I think that they're just drags on your conference.
RANK: 5
(This post was last modified: 09-19-2014 06:42 PM by nzmorange.)
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