(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:30 PM)scoscox Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:17 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Calling BS.

Post the miles to EACH school in the Big East. There are only about 3-5 trips that realistically can be a bus trip without missing significant class time.

You realize there are only ten teams in the big east right? 3-5 trips is half the conference on the high end. St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence are 100% locks to bus to. Nova most likely. Georgetown maybe. That's half the conference.

Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Again, warrior i'd like to specify that we are actually 1 mile further east than UC as the crow flies for uconn, saving them valuable travel dollars

Associate Members:

Big East
Hamden (Quinnipac) - 57 mi
Norfolk (Old Dominion) - 503 mi
Lynchburg (Liberty) - 545 mi
Denver - 1,904 mi

AAC
Annapolis (Navy) - 350 mi
Nashville (Vanderbilt) - 1,030 mi
Gainesville (Florida) - 1,147 mi

EDIT: UConn has been playing Quinnipac, Old Dominion and Liberty already as Big East Field Hockey members; thus, their distance/travel is negligible. However, in Field Hockey, they are now eliminating a guaranteed road trip to one of Vanderbilt/Gainesville for a road trip every year, and adding a trip to Denver every other year (in women's lacrosse). UConn does not sponsor men's lacrosse.

(07-06-2019 12:09 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-06-2019 11:11 AM)Kit-Cat Wrote:  I think its clear the AAC's TV deal with ESPN is in another universe than what the MWC and CUSA have, leagues that are filled with AAC wannabe programs.

Going back to UConn's situation I think they gave the AAC time to see if it could earn P6 status. The AAC wasn't able to upgrade its bowls for the next cycle and the TV deal money wasn't anything better than what could be obtained in the BE.

Travel cost savings, football cost savings, donor interest all then added up to real factors for UConn. The potential to "double dip" on TV money playing in the BE and MAC or CUSA for FB exists.

I don't believe then its totally the TV deal for UConn but it could have been large enough to dismiss ever leaving.

Good points. Surely, if the TV deal had been larger, had been in the "P5 range" as Aresco said it would be last year, say around $15m a school, than it is impossible to imagine UConn leaving.

But given that the deal was "meh", wasn't a game-changer for their finances, then it was easy to make the decision to accede to the wishes of the UConn fan base and stakeholders and return to the Big East.

Totally agree, I don't see why Big East fans are trying to sugar coat this situation.

UConn for sure would have stayed if the TV deal was about 16 mil, I mean they would be crazy not to. But at 7-9 million they still losing a lot of money in a conference they don't want to be in. So if you are going to lose money you may as well lose money and be happy.

And everyone can see between the lines here. UConn is going to cut football within the next 15 years. And if they can be a basketball focused program that is winning it will be fantastic for UConn and the Big East.

(07-18-2019 03:02 PM)scoscox Wrote:  Again, warrior i'd like to specify that we are actually 1 mile further east than UC as the crow flies for uconn, saving them valuable travel dollars

Yes, if they are coming by Uber.

(07-18-2019 03:09 PM)TexanMark Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 03:02 PM)scoscox Wrote:  Again, warrior i'd like to specify that we are actually 1 mile further east than UC as the crow flies for uconn, saving them valuable travel dollars

Yes, if they are coming by Uber.

I assumed they'd be hitchhiking

(07-18-2019 03:07 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Totally agree, I don't see why Big East fans are trying to sugar coat this situation.

Are we the ones doing that? Doesn't seem like it to me. I don't know any big east fans who would disagree with the rest of your post

(07-18-2019 02:48 PM)Cyniclone Wrote:  Here's a point about UConn's move that is probably not even in the top 100 concerns but I just thought of it: UConn women's lacrosse is in the American, having moved there from the Big East when the AAC started sponsoring the sport, creating a series of moves that ensured that four conferences (AAC, BE, Atlantic Sun, Southern) would have the six teams necessary to have an automatic bid to the tournament. Does UConn stay in the American or move to the Big East, and if they move, does the Big East trade Denver or Old Dominion to the American to keep the balance?

The Big East announced that UConn would be participating in all of the conference's sports except Women's Golf and Men's Lacrosse (neither of which are sponsored by UConn).

(07-18-2019 02:24 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:44 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:32 AM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  https://mattbrown.substack.com/p/what-we...from-media

The TL;DR here is that the ~$7 million deal isn’t exactly ~$7 million, because schools now also have an increased production cost factor to consider, since they’re producing even more programming to fill those ESPN+ slots…not just football and men’s basketball, but other sports too. Those costs aren’t so high as to torpedo the deal, obviously, but I’ve been told it can cost thousands of dollars to produce say, a women’s basketball game. Depending on what infrastructure existed at the school beforehand, those $7 million dollars might be closer to like, $6.3. Maybe less. The devil is in those details, and it would appear not all of those details have been completely resolved.

So, UConn was not the only one with reservations about the TV deal; Cincinnati clearly had concerns as well, and was concerned enough to include UCF and Temple in the correspondence. Bigger picture, the more alarming aspect is that Aresco couldn't (or wouldn't) answer the direct questions about specificity to costs and payouts with the TV deal.

I don't know if it is fair to say Cincinnati was worried. Per the article Mike Bohn was writing on behalf of the AAC Finance and Television Committees, not on behalf of Cincinnati (and the other ADs were not writing on behalf of Temple and UCF).

Your point is actually worse for the AAC as a whole, because writing "on behalf of the AAC Finance and TV Committee" suggests that this was a concern for the entire committee, and by extension the conference generally, not just a school or two.

Bottom line is, some of us have been raising the issue of possibly significant production costs associated with ESPN+, enough to take a non-trivial bite out of that $7m payout. In response, we've been told by many around here that these costs are extremely minor, that basically all the schools already have the necessary infrastructure and that the game-day production can be handled by a few undergrad film majors roaming the sidelines with steady-cams for internship credit.

True, thanks to Aresco's talent for obfuscation, even in correspondence within the conference hierarchy, we're still largely in the grey about exactly what those costs will be. But this note of concern from the AAC committee to Aresco casts a shadow over the argument that ESPN+ production costs are trivial and not to be worried about.

The committee was worried.

No. The committee who’s job it is to understand the contract—-simply wants to know how much the costs are. Wow. Ya think? Of course there was a concern. That’s their function. Who is the one who is less concerned? The guy that put together the American Digital Network and is intimately aware of the cost of televising women’s basketball games, baseball games, and numerous championship events for the American Digital Network.

(07-18-2019 02:58 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:30 PM)scoscox Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:17 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Calling BS.

Post the miles to EACH school in the Big East. There are only about 3-5 trips that realistically can be a bus trip without missing significant class time.

You realize there are only ten teams in the big east right? 3-5 trips is half the conference on the high end. St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence are 100% locks to bus to. Nova most likely. Georgetown maybe. That's half the conference.

Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Thanks, I want to say I really appreciate this.

I want to be clear, I'm not trying to argue that UConn wont save travel money. I'm arguing that I don't see how they are going to save (significant) money when you factor in the lost media revenue.

The first three are for sure a huge win. But flights don't necessarily operate on distance to equal price. It's actually cheaper to fly to Houston than it is to fly to Omaha which is shorter.

The only trips outside of trips that aren't in metro cities are ECU, Wichita, and Tulsa. That's why I'm not seeing the massive savings here. Yes, they save money by bus trips but do four bus trips truly save money? The media money realistically is going to be 10 million vs 6 million.

(07-18-2019 03:30 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:58 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:30 PM)scoscox Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:17 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Calling BS.

Post the miles to EACH school in the Big East. There are only about 3-5 trips that realistically can be a bus trip without missing significant class time.

You realize there are only ten teams in the big east right? 3-5 trips is half the conference on the high end. St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence are 100% locks to bus to. Nova most likely. Georgetown maybe. That's half the conference.

Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Thanks, I want to say I really appreciate this.

I want to be clear, I'm not trying to argue that UConn wont save travel money. I'm arguing that I don't see how they are going to save (significant) money when you factor in the lost media revenue.

The first three are for sure a huge win. But flights don't necessarily operate on distance to equal price. It's actually cheaper to fly to Houston than it is to fly to Omaha which is shorter.

The only trips outside of trips that aren't in metro cities are ECU, Wichita, and Tulsa. That's why I'm not seeing the massive savings here. Yes, they save money by bus trips but do four bus trips truly save money? The media money realistically is going to be 10 million vs 6 million.

Not to mention—part of your travel budget is hotels and food. Hotel and meal costs for a three day travel trip for a weekend baseball series will be unchanged. That’s a big part of the travel budget that isn’t changing, Additionally, about one third of the games for most sports are OOC games—-which aren’t changing at all. Also, 4 or 5 UConn sports (almost 20-25% of their programs) didn’t play in the AAC to begin with. So those aren’t changing either. Hard to see how they are going to squeeze two million savings out the remaining part of the travel budget once you see how much of it won’t change at all. That sounds like little more than a best case public relations number that in no way will represent the real world savings.

(07-18-2019 03:30 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:58 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:30 PM)scoscox Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:17 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Calling BS.

Post the miles to EACH school in the Big East. There are only about 3-5 trips that realistically can be a bus trip without missing significant class time.

You realize there are only ten teams in the big east right? 3-5 trips is half the conference on the high end. St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence are 100% locks to bus to. Nova most likely. Georgetown maybe. That's half the conference.

Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Thanks, I want to say I really appreciate this.

I want to be clear, I'm not trying to argue that UConn wont save travel money. I'm arguing that I don't see how they are going to save (significant) money when you factor in the lost media revenue.

The first three are for sure a huge win. But flights don't necessarily operate on distance to equal price. It's actually cheaper to fly to Houston than it is to fly to Omaha which is shorter.

The only trips outside of trips that aren't in metro cities are ECU, Wichita, and Tulsa. That's why I'm not seeing the massive savings here. Yes, they save money by bus trips but do four bus trips truly save money? The media money realistically is going to be 10 million vs 6 million.

How are you getting ten million? It’s going to be at least a few years before the AAC makes close to 7 million somewhere near 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 (backloaded deal as all are) and the Big East deal will be redone around that time where it could exceed that figure potentially.

When it was signed it was supposed to be between 40-50M a year and appeared to have pro-data pay increases for expansion up to 12 as it said it was set to pay 500M for ten and up to 600M for 12. Towards the end of the deal you can expect around 5M per team in tv dollars and likely a bigger slice of the NCAA tournament money too.

When the new deal is signed I expect they will get an increase as well between natural rights fee increases, more bidders, and the addition of UConn to go with Gtown, Nova, Butler, And others.

It’s not that UConn would be rolling in cash but I’ll be surprised if they make 3-4M less than they would by staying if we are looking purely at tv dollars and not factoring in entry/exit fees.

(07-18-2019 04:07 PM)1845 Bear Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 03:30 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:58 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:30 PM)scoscox Wrote:  You realize there are only ten teams in the big east right? 3-5 trips is half the conference on the high end. St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence are 100% locks to bus to. Nova most likely. Georgetown maybe. That's half the conference.

Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Thanks, I want to say I really appreciate this.

I want to be clear, I'm not trying to argue that UConn wont save travel money. I'm arguing that I don't see how they are going to save (significant) money when you factor in the lost media revenue.

The first three are for sure a huge win. But flights don't necessarily operate on distance to equal price. It's actually cheaper to fly to Houston than it is to fly to Omaha which is shorter.

The only trips outside of trips that aren't in metro cities are ECU, Wichita, and Tulsa. That's why I'm not seeing the massive savings here. Yes, they save money by bus trips but do four bus trips truly save money? The media money realistically is going to be 10 million vs 6 million.

How are you getting ten million? It’s going to be at least a few years before the AAC makes close to 7 million somewhere near 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 (backloaded deal as all are) and the Big East deal will be redone around that time where it could exceed that figure potentially.

When it was signed it was supposed to be between 40-50M a year and appeared to have pro-data pay increases for expansion up to 12 as it said it was set to pay 500M for ten and up to 600M for 12. Towards the end of the deal you can expect around 5M per team in tv dollars and likely a bigger slice of the NCAA tournament money too.

When the new deal is signed I expect they will get an increase as well between natural rights fee increases, more bidders, and the addition of UConn to go with Gtown, Nova, Butler, And others.

It’s not that UConn would be rolling in cash but I’ll be surprised if they make 3-4M less than they would by staying if we are looking purely at tv dollars and not factoring in entry/exit fees.

One thing widely overlooked on the Big East deal—Fox had to pay a significant premium to get the C7 to go with a new network platform. Additionally, they needed to pay premium big enough to cover the costs of splitting from the Big East football schools.

If you look at the actual ratings delivered by the Big East content—and compare it to other content—there is no reasonable argument to expect any increase at all. In fact, there is a better argument to be made for a reduction than an increase. What happens if the next BE real is actually lower?

(07-18-2019 03:19 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:24 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:44 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:32 AM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  https://mattbrown.substack.com/p/what-we...from-media

The TL;DR here is that the ~$7 million deal isn’t exactly ~$7 million, because schools now also have an increased production cost factor to consider, since they’re producing even more programming to fill those ESPN+ slots…not just football and men’s basketball, but other sports too. Those costs aren’t so high as to torpedo the deal, obviously, but I’ve been told it can cost thousands of dollars to produce say, a women’s basketball game. Depending on what infrastructure existed at the school beforehand, those $7 million dollars might be closer to like, $6.3. Maybe less. The devil is in those details, and it would appear not all of those details have been completely resolved.

So, UConn was not the only one with reservations about the TV deal; Cincinnati clearly had concerns as well, and was concerned enough to include UCF and Temple in the correspondence. Bigger picture, the more alarming aspect is that Aresco couldn't (or wouldn't) answer the direct questions about specificity to costs and payouts with the TV deal.

I don't know if it is fair to say Cincinnati was worried. Per the article Mike Bohn was writing on behalf of the AAC Finance and Television Committees, not on behalf of Cincinnati (and the other ADs were not writing on behalf of Temple and UCF).

Your point is actually worse for the AAC as a whole, because writing "on behalf of the AAC Finance and TV Committee" suggests that this was a concern for the entire committee, and by extension the conference generally, not just a school or two.

Bottom line is, some of us have been raising the issue of possibly significant production costs associated with ESPN+, enough to take a non-trivial bite out of that $7m payout. In response, we've been told by many around here that these costs are extremely minor, that basically all the schools already have the necessary infrastructure and that the game-day production can be handled by a few undergrad film majors roaming the sidelines with steady-cams for internship credit.

True, thanks to Aresco's talent for obfuscation, even in correspondence within the conference hierarchy, we're still largely in the grey about exactly what those costs will be. But this note of concern from the AAC committee to Aresco casts a shadow over the argument that ESPN+ production costs are trivial and not to be worried about.

The committee was worried.

No. The committee who’s job it is to understand the contract for the presidents wanted to know how much the costs are. Wow. Ya think? Of course there was a concern. That’s their function. Who is the one who is less concerned? The guy that put together the American Digital Network and is intimately aware of the cost of televising women’s basketball games, baseball games, and numerous championship events for the American Digital Network.

Huh? Committees don't raise an issue with the commissioner during media negotiations just because the issue is under the purview of their committee. They do so when they think there is cause for concern, and if the situation with producing ESPN+ content was as cut-and-dried simple and easy as you've claimed it to be, it stands to reason that the schools would all realize this, and therefore no concerns would be raised in the committee and to the commissioner.

Spin away if you like, but this memo belies those claims and suggests the issue of production costs is more complicated, and likely more costly, than you think.

Are you comparing ratings with other content on fs1 or content on other networks? Compare like with like

(07-18-2019 06:03 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 03:19 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:24 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:44 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:32 AM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  https://mattbrown.substack.com/p/what-we...from-media

The TL;DR here is that the ~$7 million deal isn’t exactly ~$7 million, because schools now also have an increased production cost factor to consider, since they’re producing even more programming to fill those ESPN+ slots…not just football and men’s basketball, but other sports too. Those costs aren’t so high as to torpedo the deal, obviously, but I’ve been told it can cost thousands of dollars to produce say, a women’s basketball game. Depending on what infrastructure existed at the school beforehand, those $7 million dollars might be closer to like, $6.3. Maybe less. The devil is in those details, and it would appear not all of those details have been completely resolved.

So, UConn was not the only one with reservations about the TV deal; Cincinnati clearly had concerns as well, and was concerned enough to include UCF and Temple in the correspondence. Bigger picture, the more alarming aspect is that Aresco couldn't (or wouldn't) answer the direct questions about specificity to costs and payouts with the TV deal.

I don't know if it is fair to say Cincinnati was worried. Per the article Mike Bohn was writing on behalf of the AAC Finance and Television Committees, not on behalf of Cincinnati (and the other ADs were not writing on behalf of Temple and UCF).

Your point is actually worse for the AAC as a whole, because writing "on behalf of the AAC Finance and TV Committee" suggests that this was a concern for the entire committee, and by extension the conference generally, not just a school or two.

Bottom line is, some of us have been raising the issue of possibly significant production costs associated with ESPN+, enough to take a non-trivial bite out of that $7m payout. In response, we've been told by many around here that these costs are extremely minor, that basically all the schools already have the necessary infrastructure and that the game-day production can be handled by a few undergrad film majors roaming the sidelines with steady-cams for internship credit.

True, thanks to Aresco's talent for obfuscation, even in correspondence within the conference hierarchy, we're still largely in the grey about exactly what those costs will be. But this note of concern from the AAC committee to Aresco casts a shadow over the argument that ESPN+ production costs are trivial and not to be worried about.

The committee was worried.

No. The committee who’s job it is to understand the contract for the presidents wanted to know how much the costs are. Wow. Ya think? Of course there was a concern. That’s their function. Who is the one who is less concerned? The guy that put together the American Digital Network and is intimately aware of the cost of televising women’s basketball games, baseball games, and numerous championship events for the American Digital Network.

Huh? Committees don't raise an issue with the commissioner during media negotiations just because the issue is under the purview of their committee. They do so when they think there is cause for concern, and if the situation with producing ESPN+ content was as cut-and-dried simple and easy as you've claimed it to be, it stands to reason that the schools would all realize this, and therefore no concerns would be raised in the committee and to the commissioner.

Spin away if you like, but this memo belies those claims and suggests the issue of production costs is more complicated, and likely more costly, than you think.

Television finance committees dont raise questions regarding possible costs involved in a proposed television contract? You think that’s spin? Claiming they don’t when we can read the actual memo is the literal definition of spin. Secondly—explain to me how FCS/D2 schools with tiny budgets do it if it’s so expensive. These FCS/D2 schools don’t have “millions” to spend on video streams that are only watched by a few hundred people.

(07-18-2019 05:55 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 04:07 PM)1845 Bear Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 03:30 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:58 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:33 PM)TrojanCampaign Wrote:  Post the numbers then and don't argue.

They still realistically have to fly to 6/10 games for basketball. And unless I'm mistaken the Big East has associate members correct? So make sure you include flights to Denver, Colorado in your estimates.

Distance from UConn (Storrs) to:
Providence - 50 mi
South Orange (Seton Hall) - 120 mi
New York City (St. John's) - 141 mi
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 234 mi
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 366 mi
Greenville (ECU) - 648 mi
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 795 mi
Indianapolis (Butler) - 861 mi
Chicago (DePaul) - 916 mi
Milwaukee (Marquette) 1,018 mi
Orlando (UCF) - 1,220 mi
Memphis - 1,241 mi
Tampa Bay (USF) - 1,275 mi
Omaha (Creighton) - 1,369 mi
New Orleans (Tulane) - 1,457 mi
Tulsa - 1,497 mi
Wichita - 1,539 mi
Dallas (SMU) - 1,697 mi
Houston - 1,776 mi

Flight Time from UConn (Storrs) to:
New York City (St. John's) - 35 Mins
Philadelphia (Villanova/Temple) - 47 Mins
Washington D.C. (Georgetown) - 1 Hour, 7 Mins
Greenville (ECU) - 1 Hour, 29 Mins
Cincinnati (Xavier/Cincinnati) - 1 Hour, 40 Mins
Indianapolis (Butler) - 1 Hour, 56 Mins
Chicago (DePaul) - 2 Hours
Milwaukee (Marquette) - 2 Hours, 4 Mins
Orlando (UCF) - 2 Hours, 16 Mins
Tampa Bay (USF) - 2 Hours, 25 Mins
Memphis - 2 Hours, 38 Mins
Omaha (Creighton) - 2 Hours, 54 Mins
Dallas (SMU) - 3 Hours
New Orleans (Tulane) - 3 Hours, 4 Mins
Tulsa - 3 Hours, 7 Mins
Wichita - 3 Hours, 11 Mins
Houston - 3 Hours, 31 Mins

Thanks, I want to say I really appreciate this.

I want to be clear, I'm not trying to argue that UConn wont save travel money. I'm arguing that I don't see how they are going to save (significant) money when you factor in the lost media revenue.

The first three are for sure a huge win. But flights don't necessarily operate on distance to equal price. It's actually cheaper to fly to Houston than it is to fly to Omaha which is shorter.

The only trips outside of trips that aren't in metro cities are ECU, Wichita, and Tulsa. That's why I'm not seeing the massive savings here. Yes, they save money by bus trips but do four bus trips truly save money? The media money realistically is going to be 10 million vs 6 million.

How are you getting ten million? It’s going to be at least a few years before the AAC makes close to 7 million somewhere near 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 (backloaded deal as all are) and the Big East deal will be redone around that time where it could exceed that figure potentially.

When it was signed it was supposed to be between 40-50M a year and appeared to have pro-data pay increases for expansion up to 12 as it said it was set to pay 500M for ten and up to 600M for 12. Towards the end of the deal you can expect around 5M per team in tv dollars and likely a bigger slice of the NCAA tournament money too.

When the new deal is signed I expect they will get an increase as well between natural rights fee increases, more bidders, and the addition of UConn to go with Gtown, Nova, Butler, And others.

It’s not that UConn would be rolling in cash but I’ll be surprised if they make 3-4M less than they would by staying if we are looking purely at tv dollars and not factoring in entry/exit fees.

One thing widely overlooked on the Big East deal—Fox had to pay a significant premium to get the C7 to go with a new network platform. Additionally, they needed to pay premium big enough to cover the costs of splitting from the Big East football schools.

If you look at the actual ratings delivered by the Big East content—and compare it to other content—there is no reasonable argument to expect any increase at all. In fact, there is a better argument to be made for a reduction than an increase. What happens if the next BE real is actually lower?

The Big East, like all conference content packages, was paid what the market dictated its value was. Fox did not pay extra for the C7 to separate; it determined the basketball value they held was worth more to them than what the entire (then) Big East package was being shopped around as. The "costs" of splitting was determined when C7 allowed the football schools to keep $100 million as part of the divorce; the C7 got to keep the Big East logos and brand, as well as keep access to MSG for the BET. The AAC, similarly, was offered a deal that paid around $2 million annually for both football and basketball content by NBC (which ESPN then matched).

Moving forward, and especially related to its "content assets", the Big East is in excellent position for its next contract with Fox. Obviously, it has UConn now on board, which will increase the number of conference games and provide an additional member to showcase on the network; what it also does is increase the content at MSG for the BET, and provide an opportunity to extend the Gavitt Games with the B1G (likely by including more members). The Big 12 challenge also has been locked-in, so the opportunity for more big matchups is there. There's a reason why several college basketball personalities mentioned $6 million after UConn joined (just like these same pundits continued to push UConn to return to the Big East these past few years).

Frankly, the Big East would be in trouble if fans stopped going to games in 2013 after the separation. In this regard, Creighton was an invaluable addition due to their fans' ability to travel to games and sellout every home game. The Big East averages over 10k per home game, in addition to 18k per game at MSG for the BET. If fans were coming and traveling to games, that would be much more indicative of a market that simply did not care about these programs; however, that is clearly not the case. When UConn arrives, it is likely that the conference average actually improves, due to the many games that they play at XL (which seats 15k).

(07-18-2019 03:17 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:48 PM)Cyniclone Wrote:  Here's a point about UConn's move that is probably not even in the top 100 concerns but I just thought of it: UConn women's lacrosse is in the American, having moved there from the Big East when the AAC started sponsoring the sport, creating a series of moves that ensured that four conferences (AAC, BE, Atlantic Sun, Southern) would have the six teams necessary to have an automatic bid to the tournament. Does UConn stay in the American or move to the Big East, and if they move, does the Big East trade Denver or Old Dominion to the American to keep the balance?

The Big East announced that UConn would be participating in all of the conference's sports except Women's Golf and Men's Lacrosse (neither of which are sponsored by UConn).

Ah, probably should have looked that up. In that case, the AAC either has to get Denver or ODU from the Big East to maintain six teams, or grab a team from somewhere else. Maybe someone else is starting a program?

(07-18-2019 06:27 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 06:03 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 03:19 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 02:24 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-18-2019 09:44 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  I don't know if it is fair to say Cincinnati was worried. Per the article Mike Bohn was writing on behalf of the AAC Finance and Television Committees, not on behalf of Cincinnati (and the other ADs were not writing on behalf of Temple and UCF).

Your point is actually worse for the AAC as a whole, because writing "on behalf of the AAC Finance and TV Committee" suggests that this was a concern for the entire committee, and by extension the conference generally, not just a school or two.

Bottom line is, some of us have been raising the issue of possibly significant production costs associated with ESPN+, enough to take a non-trivial bite out of that $7m payout. In response, we've been told by many around here that these costs are extremely minor, that basically all the schools already have the necessary infrastructure and that the game-day production can be handled by a few undergrad film majors roaming the sidelines with steady-cams for internship credit.

True, thanks to Aresco's talent for obfuscation, even in correspondence within the conference hierarchy, we're still largely in the grey about exactly what those costs will be. But this note of concern from the AAC committee to Aresco casts a shadow over the argument that ESPN+ production costs are trivial and not to be worried about.

The committee was worried.

No. The committee who’s job it is to understand the contract for the presidents wanted to know how much the costs are. Wow. Ya think? Of course there was a concern. That’s their function. Who is the one who is less concerned? The guy that put together the American Digital Network and is intimately aware of the cost of televising women’s basketball games, baseball games, and numerous championship events for the American Digital Network.

Huh? Committees don't raise an issue with the commissioner during media negotiations just because the issue is under the purview of their committee. They do so when they think there is cause for concern, and if the situation with producing ESPN+ content was as cut-and-dried simple and easy as you've claimed it to be, it stands to reason that the schools would all realize this, and therefore no concerns would be raised in the committee and to the commissioner.

Spin away if you like, but this memo belies those claims and suggests the issue of production costs is more complicated, and likely more costly, than you think.

Television finance committees dont raise questions regarding possible costs involved in a proposed television contract? You think that’s spin? Claiming they don’t when we can read the actual memo is the literal definition of spin. Secondly—explain to me how FCS/D2 schools with tiny budgets do it if it’s so expensive. These FCS/D2 schools don’t have “millions” to spend on video streams that are only watched by a few hundred people.

Television finance committees do raise these exact types of questions; usually, however, they are asked and answered before the clients agree to sign a contract. In this case, it is clear that there is a lot of uncertainty with regards to costs and production (as Aresco said, it's not until 2021). For schools that are banking on keeping as much financial pace with the P5 (like a Cincinnati, Houston, UCF, USF and Memphis) as possible, it is incredibly relevant. Any extra revenue matters.

(07-18-2019 03:02 PM)scoscox Wrote:  Again, warrior i'd like to specify that we are actually 1 mile further east than UC as the crow flies for uconn, saving them valuable travel dollars

Which has a shorter google drive time from the airport?