(04-10-2014 09:41 AM)TheRevSWT Wrote:  While I like the news, I'm not gonna celebrate dodging a bullet until pen is to paper.

This whole thing is so fluid right now, come this time tomorrow it wouldn't surprise me to have Montana & Montana State on the "invited" list.

I don't think the situation is fluid and don't think it has been fluid.

Let's backtrack.

We've got an AD quote stating the league has voted to expand by 12. That could be interpreted at least three ways.

1. We are going to 12 and know who #12 is but ain't sayin'
2. We have voted to go to 12 by X date no matter who we have to take.
3. We have agreed that 12 is the right number and we have agreed to seriously talk with schools to see who, if anyone, is the right fit (ie. capable of the move, wants to move, is acceptable to all 11 or at least 9 of 11)

I think the fluidity has been a combination of speculation and rumor by people assuming the correct reading is #1 or #2, when the evidence I think suggests the correct reading is #3.

The Liberty Sun Belt tour is ample evidence that all the prior claims of Liberty being imminent were baseless. You don't go campaigning if that were true.

The claims of UMass being expelled suddenly changing the dynamic are specious. I know that AState leadership was aware of the UMass situation within a day or two of the MAC extending the full offer to UMass, it is implausible that the rest of the league was unaware. Therefore any impact UMass might have had on the situation took place nearly a month prior to the public announcement but the "insider" claims acted as if the news was new to the Sun Belt and significant enough to adjust the thinking on realignment when any adjustment would have happened nearly a month earlier and been reflected in the "insider" information, even if the cause of the change were not revealed.

Likewise, it is not plausible that the reported claims that JMU thinking changed upon the UMass announcement are accurate. If JMU were actively engaged with the MAC, they would have had some awareness of the MAC's action and even if the MAC held some fantastic hope of acceptance, the probability would be that if the Sun Belt is in active pursuit of JMU that the Sun Belt would have dashed that for JMU by giving indication that UMass was in active pursuit of Sun Belt membership thereby revealing UMass's choice.

The evidence strongly suggests the smoke has merely been hot air.