(07-27-2020 10:54 AM)megadrone Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

Honestly the AQ tag probably is dependent on Syracuse, Pitt and WVU -- that's the combination as WVU has the rabid fan base and Syracuse and Pitt both had pedigrees that no one else in the Big East could match. Lose Syracuse and Pitt and AQ is gone for football.

In the BCS era, the AQ tag was not measured by fan bases, brand strength or results from decades before. It was measured by on the field results from several years back to that date. Only WVU was a sting based on recent results. That is why the BCS was blown up, because by metrics along the newly configured BE still met the metrics to be an AQ.

(07-27-2020 07:55 AM)orangefan Wrote:  

(07-26-2020 03:56 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(07-26-2020 08:38 AM)orangefan Wrote:  Members voting against the contract may also have been gambling that they could benefit from realignment opportunities created by the market shift.

It wasn't a gamble, and the "realignment opportunities" existed because of the shuffling that started with Nebraska joining the Big Ten.

The ESPN offer was rejected by Big East presidents in May 2011. By August 2011, the Big 12 knew Texas A&M was leaving and they were talking about Pitt and other possible replacements. In September, the ACC invited Pitt and Syracuse to join. In October, the Big 12 invited WVU to join.

Were Pitt, Syracuse, WVU, and maybe others talking to those conferences even before the ESPN offer was declined? Maybe so.

My thesis is that the new Pac 12 TV deal, $20 million+/school/year plus a conference network, which was announced on May 5, 2011, is what triggered the ACC and SEC to begin looking seriously at expansion. If the Pac 12 deal had been, say, $15 million per school with no conference network opportunity, the SEC and ACC would not have had as strong a reason to expand. Of course, the Big East turned down ESPN on May 26, 2011, at which point the ACC and SEC were likely already plotting.

Yeah, even though it seems under market now that it's several years later, the Pac-12 contract was far larger than what they had before 2010, when there was just a game or two a week on ABC/ESPN and everything else was on Fox's RSNs. The Big 12 also got a big raise after UT turned the Pac down.

I agree, the SEC was probably already talking to TAMU and other schools by that point. The Big Ten wanted more and it's likely they were talking to at least a few ACC schools then, given that it was only another year before they invited Maryland. And the ACC was probably considering several Big East schools and asking consultants whether any of them would get the ACC a raise from ESPN.

It's important to note, even under the new 2011 ESPN contract with better financial terms, that each and every single one of the (then) Big East programs (whether that is a Syracuse, a West Virginia, a UConn, etc.) would still have jumped ship to other conferences not just due to the higher financial packages, but the value in long-term stability as well.

The Big East, ever since losing Miami, Boston College and Virginia Tech, was always going to be open for possible raids. The door was opened. The allure and stability of being in a full power conference (and one that didn't have permutation and mixture of full, partial and football-only members) was always going to tempt and, ultimately, pull teams out of the Big East. Even if the group decided to extend with ESPN, and the Big East was still able to hang on to TCU (and, likely, others to get to 12 for a CCG), each of the programs would still have both eyes set on the greener lawns across the street and next door.

Ultimately, the defections and eventual split guaranteed the elimination of uncertainty for many programs (whether their league would still be a BCS/Power designate, whether their league would/could fall apart in any given season, whether their school would have any alternatives, etc.). Every member of the Big East (2005-2012) may not have a seat at the power conference table, but everyone does know where they sit today (which was not the case for several years leading up to it), and a majority of members did find better passage out.

I’m no lawyer but isn’t it somewhat dubious for ESPN to be talking to a school or schools in one conference that they own rights to about a deal to move them to another conference that they also own rights to?

It’s like having the same law firm serve as counsel for two opposing parties.

(07-27-2020 01:56 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  I’m no lawyer but isn’t it somewhat dubious for ESPN to be talking to a school or schools in one conference that they own rights to about a deal to move them to another conference that they also own rights to?

It’s like having the same law firm serve as counsel for two opposing parties.

Depends on how the NDA reads. For example, it may allow ESPN to share confidential information with any “partner” but leaves the term partner undefined or severely broad.

(07-26-2020 08:38 AM)orangefan Wrote:  https://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Dail...-East.aspx

This contemporaneous (May 26, 2011) article says the 2011 deal was worth only $11 million per year. My guess is that the discrepancy is due McMurphy forgetting the fact that TCU had been added to the Big East and a 10th member was anticipated to be invited (with ESPN supposedly encouraging it to be UCF). 8 x $14m = $112m. $112m / 10 = $11.2m.

I don't think the rejected deal was especially close to being finalized. That's probably why there were different numbers floating around for the value of the deal.

Quote:In 2011 the recently deals signed by the SEC and ACC were valued at $17m/school/year and $12.9m/school/year, respectively. I'm sure ESPN argued that the $11m was in line with these numbers given the relative value of the conferences.

Right, terms like "ACC-type money" were thrown around. Did that mean that Syracuse would get the same money as North Carolina, or that the annual value of the contract was the same?

Quote:However, on May 5, 2011, the Pac 12 had reached terms with ESPN and FOX on a new TV deal that would pay its members over $20m per year AND which left enough game inventory with the conference to create a conference TV network.

Yes, the legend has it that the initial vote on the ESPN contract draft was 12-4 to continue negotiating with that draft as a basis. Then, after the PAC-12 deal was announced, it was 16-0 to tell ESPN to scrap that deal and start over.

Quote:The SEC and ACC contracts were therefore already well under market, a fact that caused both promptly to begin exploring expansion.

Not sure about that--the process had already kicked into high gear when the Big Ten took Nebraska. The Big 12 was destabilized, which led to the PAC-16 scheme; which had a lot of people convinced that 4x16 was the inevitable endgame of the process, and everything else was about making sure you got your preferred picks for #13-16, or making sure you were one of the 4.

Quote: The Big East may have been gambling that by waiting, it could capitalize on the market shift demonstrated by the Pac 12 contract. Members voting against the contract may also have been gambling that they could benefit from realignment opportunities created by the market shift.

The league as a whole definitely felt that the April ESPN offer undervalued the league, and their school.

(07-27-2020 07:55 AM)orangefan Wrote:  

(07-26-2020 03:56 PM)Wedge Wrote:  [quote='orangefan' pid='16918009' dateline='1595770711']
Members voting against the contract may also have been gambling that they could benefit from realignment opportunities created by the market shift.

It wasn't a gamble, and the "realignment opportunities" existed because of the shuffling that started with Nebraska joining the Big Ten.

The ESPN offer was rejected by Big East presidents in May 2011. By August 2011, the Big 12 knew Texas A&M was leaving and they were talking about Pitt and other possible replacements. In September, the ACC invited Pitt and Syracuse to join. In October, the Big 12 invited WVU to join.

Were Pitt, Syracuse, WVU, and maybe others talking to those conferences even before the ESPN offer was declined? Maybe so.

Quote: Quo Vadis Said: Another factor at play was the posture of the hoops only schools. One look at the 2011 proposal would show that the great bulk of the new money would go to the football schools. In the expiring deal, football schools were getting about $3.2 million and the hoops schools were getting about $1.3 million. But in the 2011 proposal, football schools would go up to around $12 million, whereas hoops schools would increase to only $2.4 million.

As it turned out, when the C7 later left, they signed for over $3m a year, so they were worth more on their own than as part of the hybrid model.

I don't know that the football-basketball split had been established. I don't know how serious or tongue-in-cheek it was, but one of the C7 ADs (Providence?) suggested that since the league started as a basketball league, it should be 70-30 in favor of basketball. (I've always interpreted that as his way of saying "take your 70-30 and stick it where the sun don't shine")

(07-27-2020 10:59 AM)CliftonAve Wrote:  In the BCS era, the AQ tag was not measured by fan bases, brand strength or results from decades before. It was measured by on the field results from several years back to that date. Only WVU was a sting based on recent results. That is why the BCS was blown up, because by metrics along the newly configured BE still met the metrics to be an AQ.

On paper, yes. In reality, no matter what the metrics said, the Mountain West was never getting recognized as an "AQ conference." And after losing Pitt and Syracuse, neither was the Big East.

(07-27-2020 01:56 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  I’m no lawyer but isn’t it somewhat dubious for ESPN to be talking to a school or schools in one conference that they own rights to about a deal to move them to another conference that they also own rights to?

It’s like having the same law firm serve as counsel for two opposing parties.

Yes, it is. ESPN tried pretty hard to never be caught quite exactly specifically doing that, for that reason. They could talk about hypothetical valuations of a league if they added School A and B or A and C. Hypothetically.

(07-25-2020 06:39 PM)Michael in Raleigh Wrote:  

Quote:In 2011, ESPN offered a new nine-year deal to the Big East worth $1.17 billion or an average of $130 million annually. However, the Big East's presidents voted to turn down the deal that would have earned football members nearly $14 million a year.

https://www.espn.com/college-sports/stor...ights-deal

Would the Big East have stayed together even if the Big East signed that deal?

At the very least, I think TCU would still have not joined and opted for the Big 12. But would that deal have been enough to keep Syracuse, Pitt, and West Virginia? Would all the other dominoes have still fallen the way they fell?

What if my schlong was bigger than John Holmes and I did not have his drug problem......... oh the possibilities........

Yea I wonder "what if" too.....

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

(07-27-2020 03:33 PM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

AQ still goes away, replaced by "contract bowls". Which the Big East wasn't able to secure after losing Miami and the Orange Bowl slot.

That's assuming that ESPN would have accepted UCF, SMU and Houston as equal-value replacements for Syracuse, Pitt, WVU. Which is a risky assumption--ESPN doesn't make a habit of playing hardball about haircuts, but this would be a different case.

EDIT: The Big EAst /AAC would have kept AQ until the end of the contract cycle. But that's just how that goes

(07-27-2020 03:33 PM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

Yes, it would have remained AQ under the BCS contract, but problem was, the BCS era was coming to a close. And no way would the other five AQ leagues have allowed the rump Big East to be a Power league under the new CFP contract, at least not IMO.

(07-27-2020 03:40 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 03:33 PM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

AQ still goes away, replaced by "contract bowls". Which the Big East wasn't able to secure after losing Miami and the Orange Bowl slot.

That's assuming that ESPN would have accepted UCF, SMU and Houston as equal-value replacements for Syracuse, Pitt, WVU. Which is a risky assumption--ESPN doesn't make a habit of playing hardball about haircuts, but this would be a different case.

EDIT: The Big EAst /AAC would have kept AQ until the end of the contract cycle. But that's just how that goes

The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

I'm not so sure that ESPN engineered ACC expansion. Could they have done so to punish the Big East? It's possible.

But the ACC had been wanting to establish a stronger presence in the NE corridor, and they had wanted to kill off the Big East as a geographic rival, so expansion via Pitt and Syracuse fit their own agenda too.

Plus, even though Swofford had celebrated the "massive" 2010 ESPN contract, once ESPN offered essentially the same deal to the Big East just nine months later, he had to realize that the ACC deal was already an underwater deal, and that the only way to increase its value was to expand.

Of course, ESPN was also happy that expansion at Big East expense meant that higher-value programs in Syracuse and Pitt would be staying within the ESPN family rather than going to market.

So it was a situation where both the ACC and ESPN had the same interests in play.

(07-25-2020 10:36 PM)Michael in Raleigh Wrote:  That dates back well before the ACC's first raid on the Big East in 2003, 12 years before Pitt announces it was leaving. That's pretty telling.

Evidently, from the very beginning, the hybrid was a house built on a foundation of sand.

Oh absolutely. The football schools should have split in the mid-90’s. That’s the next thread that needs to happen. Would UConn have even moved up? The fact the Big East football experiment stuck around allowed them a cozy landing spot.

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 03:40 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 03:33 PM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

AQ still goes away, replaced by "contract bowls". Which the Big East wasn't able to secure after losing Miami and the Orange Bowl slot.

That's assuming that ESPN would have accepted UCF, SMU and Houston as equal-value replacements for Syracuse, Pitt, WVU. Which is a risky assumption--ESPN doesn't make a habit of playing hardball about haircuts, but this would be a different case.

EDIT: The Big EAst /AAC would have kept AQ until the end of the contract cycle. But that's just how that goes

The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

Thanks a lot Judy Genshaft

The principle schools involved in the 1991 moves—BC, Pitt, Cuse, Miami, and WVU—seemed as though they were acting haphazardly without any real direction rather that intentionally with the goal of a long lasting stable football conference. It seemed like they were caught flat footed and off guard—perturbed that the likes of Penn St, Florida St, and South Carolina had the audacity to leave the ranks of the independents and inconvenience them so.

They grabbed the best warm bodies They could until something better came along.

They did the same thing in 2005 and I dare say that Pitt, Syracuse, and UConn never truly planned on giving up their chummy basketball friends for a permanent split that put them with nouveau riche programs like Cincinnati, Louisville, and USF and not with basketball blue bloods Georgetown, Villanova, and St John’s.

Bidding their time for an ACC or Big Ten invitation was the plan all along.

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 03:40 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 03:33 PM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:32 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 10:25 AM)HartfordHusky Wrote:  They really thought they could do better when the deal was turned down. In hindsight, had they signed the deal I think the exit penalties for the departing members would have been higher but I don’t think a GOR was ever on the table. I think most of the departing football members would have left anyway and I’m not sure what options ESPN would have had. I do think the C7 would have stayed and possibly WVU as long as ESPN had to mostly abide by the contract.

I think a realistic outcome is that Cuse and Pitt leave for the ACC. I think Rutgers and UMD still end up in the Big Ten. The ACC still takes UofL but WVU stays in the Big East and Houston, Memphis, UCF, and SMU are the only additions and the Big East gets an AQ tag.

If Rutgers, Pitt, Syracuse and Louisville all still leave, there is IMO no way the Big East gets AQ/Power designation in the CFP.

If the Big East contract that it turned down with ESPN remained intact even with departures, I think it would have been recognized as an AQ just based on the disparity of contract value alone. It would have been much closer to the now P5 in contract value than the current G5.

AQ still goes away, replaced by "contract bowls". Which the Big East wasn't able to secure after losing Miami and the Orange Bowl slot.

That's assuming that ESPN would have accepted UCF, SMU and Houston as equal-value replacements for Syracuse, Pitt, WVU. Which is a risky assumption--ESPN doesn't make a habit of playing hardball about haircuts, but this would be a different case.

EDIT: The Big EAst /AAC would have kept AQ until the end of the contract cycle. But that's just how that goes

The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

If Maryland and Rutgers still join the Big Ten, putting it at 14 schools, then even if Pitt and Cuse weren’t invited in 2011, I think the ACC would’ve still taken those two and Louisville or WVU in 2012 to also get to 14 teams and keep step with the B1G and SEC (and add solid FB schools to keep FSU and Clemson happy).

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

I very seriously doubt that a conference made a permanent long term decision just out of spite for another conference. As I point out in one of my prior posts in this thread, the move to 14 for both the ACC and the SEC was likely driven by the Pac 12 TV contract announced in early May, 2011. That contract demonstrated that the then current TV deals for the SEC and ACC were well under market and would have placed both at a serious financial disadvantage until around 2023. Expansion provided the opportunity to reopen their TV deals at an increased base payouts and to develop conference TV networks.

With respect to the ACC, it is clear that by 2012, it understood that it needed to use the loss of Maryland as an opportunity to add a strong football program. It's not clear to me that they had reached this point yet in 2011. For instance, UConn was rumored to be the top runner up in 2011 behind Syracuse and Pittsburgh, ahead of both WVU and UL.

(07-28-2020 08:33 AM)orangefan Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

I very seriously doubt that a conference made a permanent long term decision just out of spite for another conference. As I point out in one of my prior posts in this thread, the move to 14 for both the ACC and the SEC was likely driven by the Pac 12 TV contract announced in early May, 2011. That contract demonstrated that the then current TV deals for the SEC and ACC were well under market and would have placed both at a serious financial disadvantage until around 2023. Expansion provided the opportunity to reopen their TV deals at an increased base payouts and to develop conference TV networks.

With respect to the ACC, it is clear that by 2012, it understood that it needed to use the loss of Maryland as an opportunity to add a strong football program. It's not clear to me that they had reached this point yet in 2011. For instance, UConn was rumored to be the top runner up in 2011 behind Syracuse and Pittsburgh, ahead of both WVU and UL.

Also driven by the conference network. Even though the Big 10 did it with 11 for a number of years, the SEC and ACC seemed to think they needed 14 to have enough inventory to feed both the network and their Tier I and II contracts.

(07-28-2020 08:33 AM)orangefan Wrote:  

(07-27-2020 05:55 PM)CitrusUCF Wrote:  The entire premise of this entire thread rests on the idea that ACC expansion to 14 was inevitable. It wasn't. It was engineered by ESPN (per the BC president) to punish the Big East for going to the open market.

There's all sorts of scenarios that could play out (maybe the Big 12 goes back to 12 if they can get WVU + Pitt + UL together). Who knows, the most likely result is that WVU, Pitt, and UL are still in the Big East, with Syracuse having gone to the ACC to replace Maryland. I very much doubt the Big East with those three plus potentially TCU, UCF, and Houston, would have lost AQ/Power status.

I very seriously doubt that a conference made a permanent long term decision just out of spite for another conference. As I point out in one of my prior posts in this thread, the move to 14 for both the ACC and the SEC was likely driven by the Pac 12 TV contract announced in early May, 2011. That contract demonstrated that the then current TV deals for the SEC and ACC were well under market and would have placed both at a serious financial disadvantage until around 2023. Expansion provided the opportunity to reopen their TV deals at an increased base payouts and to develop conference TV networks.

With respect to the ACC, it is clear that by 2012, it understood that it needed to use the loss of Maryland as an opportunity to add a strong football program. It's not clear to me that they had reached this point yet in 2011. For instance, UConn was rumored to be the top runner up in 2011 behind Syracuse and Pittsburgh, ahead of both WVU and UL.

I didn't say a conference did that. I said ESPN did. The BC president admitted ESPN told the ACC to raid the Big East and that the result would be more money. So the ACC did. Whether there are potentially business reasons that would justify the expansion from the ACC's perspective (besides simply an increased ESPN payout) doesn't change the fact that ESPN engineered the death of the Big East for defying ESPN and going to the open market.

I started drafting a comment about the Pitt/Cuse move to the ACC being an ESPN hit job but the more I thought about it I think the ACC really was trying to make a self preservation move.

I think they thought by hitting the Big East it would make it easier for the other P5s to look to the weakened BE to restock and keep wandering eyes off of the ACC inventory.

The SEC needed to find at least 1 more member after the TAMU add. Knee capping the BE made programs like WVU and Louisville ripe for the picking.

The SEC ultimately went to the Big 12 for member 14 and now the Big 12 was on the clock to add a school. They too failed to break the ACC so they too went to the BE grab bag to rebuild.

It wasn’t until a year later that someone from the ACC broke ranks for the Big Ten and the ACC once more dig into BE grab bag.

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I also think the Pitt/Cuse move was some gamesmanship by ESPN to try and keep the Big Ten from acquiring ND. A lot of folks were of the opinion that if the Big Ten brought in 3 more eastern schools they could entice ND to be their 16th. Taking Pitt and Cuse our of the conversation made that harder to accomplish and ultimately the ACC was able to benefit by grabbing ND.