(02-20-2021 12:59 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote: We’ve done plenty of fantasy drafts in the past; I’m thinking a bit more analytical. You’re right though someone has to act as a moderator and receive by PM everyone’s proposed actions. And then, as a group, reveal each proposal, determine the probability of success, and then roll some dice to determine if each move fails or succeeds.
I also think the participants acting as representatives for given leagues, should interact and potential joint proposals—ex. The Big 10 and SWC conspiring to take Big 8 members at the same time.
I’d be interested in moderating something like this and JR I think you’d make a great representative for the SEC.
Now to find:
PAC 10
Big 8
SWC
ACC
Big 10
Eastern Independents
Southern Independents
shmolick is a Penn St guy and probably a good Eastern Indy. We’ve got a few UNC fans who could represent the ACC core. Nerdlinger would probably be game for something like this too.
Well here we are with one key move to consider. In he 80's FSU applied to the SEC several times. If the SEC had taken them and stuck to 11 what would have changed when the 90-2 alignment happened?
Well for one thing the ACC would not have landed a premier football program and because of that things might have changed with regards to the Big East. Perhaps it's the Big East that convinces the 8 member ACC to join them.
Virginia, North Carolina, Duke, N.C. State, Wake Forest, Clemson, Georgia Tech and Maryland merge with the Big East when it is clear that football is going to be the primary factor moving forward.
The SWC would still have had too little potential and too many schools for the Big 8 to merge with. So the SEC moves to 12 with Arkansas in 1992. Clemson feeling even more alienated in the new merger joins the SEC in 1992 as well.
A&M , Texas, Baylor and Texas Tech join the Big 12 initially as they did. But the SEC needing even numbers for a division takes closer looks at Virginia Tech, West Virginia, Houston, and T.C.U. all of which expressed interest in 1990-2.
T.C.U. is ultimately added to the SEC to get into Texas's largest market.
So the SEC sits at 14 at the end of 1992.
Alabama, Arkansas, Florida State, Louisiana State, Mississippi, Mississippi State, T.C.U.
Auburn, Clemson, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
I will assume that Penn State joins the Big 10 right on schedule. And that for the time being the Big 12 thrives. I believe the Big 10 would have snagged Maryland away from the Big East the same way the SEC snagged Clemson, and remember there are still no GOR's and that Maryland would have gone for the same reason that Clemson did. Yes the basketball was fine but the overall athletic fit still not what the Terps would want and with Penn State already in the Big 10 the lure was the same.
The ACC additions of the late 90's are gone because they are merged with the Big East.
Boston College, Connecticut, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, Syracuse, West Virginia
Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami, North Carolina, N.C. State, Virginia, Virginia Tech
The Big East still loses adds Louisville to fill departed Maryland's position.
Things rock along like this until the troubles start in the Big 12. Only this time when trouble starts there are no decent backfill schools. The composition never changed in the merger that led to the Big 12 so it is reasonable to assume the same problems would arise again.
So with contract clauses promising raises for raids the same forces are in play heading into 2010. Only this time the Big 10 takes Nebraska and Oklahoma to move to 14, and then pick up Missouri and Kansas to 16. Colorado still heads to the PAC 10 and Utah joins them. Then Texas decides late to work a deal with ESPN and the SEC gets a renegotiation without 2 new markets when Texas and A&M decide that with T.C.U. already in the SEC it suits their business model and their monetary and exposure needs to join the Frogs in the SEC.
With the Big 12 and ACC as part of history Notre Dame joins the Big East in full as we move to a P4 model and the CFP is born. Cincinnati joins with them.
So the Big East becomes:
Boston College, Cincinnati, Connecticut, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, Syracuse, West Virginia
Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami, North Carolina, N.C. State, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest
The Big 10 is:
Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue
Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Northwestern, Oklahoma, Wisconsin
The SEC becomes:
Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana State, Mississippi, Mississippi State, Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Christian
Auburn, Clemson, Florida, Florida State, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
The PAC is still at 12 with the same schools. Kansas State Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Baylor, and Iowa State help form the AAC which picks up Tulane, the service academies, Temple, East Carolina, the Florida twins, Houston, and Memphis, SMU, and maybe Tulsa.
IMO a scenario like this would have been much better for the game as a whole. So if ESPN in an effort to cobble together a conference that gave them East Coast leverage had stayed out of FSU's affairs everything may have turned out much differently, and realignment would have been more organic and less contrived. The changes wouldn't have been major other than the survival of the Big East which would have been best for its region and the ACC as essentially a whole division within it would have at the core been as healthy as ever in a basketball first conference with an assemblage of decent and competitive football schools. The Big 10 would have grown in ways that pleased the Northern Midwesterners and given expansion into the East, and the SEC would have been more compact in its two divisions than now. Not much changes for the PAC.