It sure doesn't seem the exit fees are anywhere near that way when you look at the actual bylaws. If the tv revenue doesn't go down- it's $500k per school. With Memphis and Houston hoops money credit- CUSA would be looking at 1 million dollars TOTAL. Not $30 million by any stretch of the imagination.

(05-03-2012 03:19 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 02:19 PM)attackfrog Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 01:57 PM)CommuterBob Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 01:49 PM)nert Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 07:57 AM)CommuterBob Wrote:  They took 4 months to figure out the Alliance wouldn't work, so now they're restructuring to rebuild and grow.

Amazing.

many of us immediately recognized the issues about the lost BB credit $$, the autobid that would be lost, the lost exit fees from departing BigEast-bound schools, and the lack of significant per-school TV money/interest when they first announced they were looking into this "idea".

Not only that, most posters also recognized the astronomical odds against a C-USA/MWC champion being granted an auto-bid to a BCS bowl or the NCAA likely approved extra a pre-bowl game

Why did it take them 4 months to figure that out?

I think they knew the issues, but thought they could get the TV deal to cover those losses. I suspect that the TV partners said no and the NCAA said no to the extra game they wanted to go to a 2-round playoff within the Alliance. Basically, I think the NCAA is going to grant a 15th game for the NCG, but they didn't want a school to possibly play a 16th game. There were ways around that, but I don't think they were appealing to the TV partners. So the idea isn't dead, but it's postponed.

I think this is closest---but I dont see the merger coming. The original Alliance announcement was basically a hurried written-on-the-back-of-a-napkin-idea announced as a hail mary to try to convince Boise, SDSU, Houston, and SMU to stay. It was later enlarged to include the Big East in yet another Hail Mary. Over the last 4 or 5 months the plan was fleshed out and more completely investgated. That was when they discovered that the hoped for TV dollars were not going to be there---at least not to the extent that it was worth giving up the income from NCAA credits and exit fees.

If you look at CUSA's 6 new additions and its current layout--its clear they are not going to be merging. The CUSA school map has nice georaphically stable divisions and some good schools with alot of upside. Essentially, CUSA now looks far more like a finished product than a work in progress. I dont see any future merger in the picture--maybe at most just a loose working partnership.

The quotes indicated they were hoping for $2-$3 million a school, maybe more, when they 1st started this. Last I saw they were talking maybe $2 million.

Its a big increase over the $1-$1.5 they are getting now, but not enough to offset what they would lose. I've seen as high as $7.5 million apiece for the exit fees. That would be $30 million + Memphis taking its NCAA credits with them.

That $7.5 million number is a full 5-year TV distribution plus the $500K, which some reporters assumed that the bylaws referred to. But they glossed over the "change in value" portion of the text. In other words, if the TV contract for the conference doesn't change in value with the departure of the member, they don't owe anything aside from the $500K.

(05-03-2012 03:41 PM)CommuterBob Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 03:19 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 02:19 PM)attackfrog Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 01:57 PM)CommuterBob Wrote:  

(05-03-2012 01:49 PM)nert Wrote:  Amazing.

many of us immediately recognized the issues about the lost BB credit $$, the autobid that would be lost, the lost exit fees from departing BigEast-bound schools, and the lack of significant per-school TV money/interest when they first announced they were looking into this "idea".

Not only that, most posters also recognized the astronomical odds against a C-USA/MWC champion being granted an auto-bid to a BCS bowl or the NCAA likely approved extra a pre-bowl game

Why did it take them 4 months to figure that out?

I think they knew the issues, but thought they could get the TV deal to cover those losses. I suspect that the TV partners said no and the NCAA said no to the extra game they wanted to go to a 2-round playoff within the Alliance. Basically, I think the NCAA is going to grant a 15th game for the NCG, but they didn't want a school to possibly play a 16th game. There were ways around that, but I don't think they were appealing to the TV partners. So the idea isn't dead, but it's postponed.

I think this is closest---but I dont see the merger coming. The original Alliance announcement was basically a hurried written-on-the-back-of-a-napkin-idea announced as a hail mary to try to convince Boise, SDSU, Houston, and SMU to stay. It was later enlarged to include the Big East in yet another Hail Mary. Over the last 4 or 5 months the plan was fleshed out and more completely investgated. That was when they discovered that the hoped for TV dollars were not going to be there---at least not to the extent that it was worth giving up the income from NCAA credits and exit fees.

If you look at CUSA's 6 new additions and its current layout--its clear they are not going to be merging. The CUSA school map has nice georaphically stable divisions and some good schools with alot of upside. Essentially, CUSA now looks far more like a finished product than a work in progress. I dont see any future merger in the picture--maybe at most just a loose working partnership.

The quotes indicated they were hoping for $2-$3 million a school, maybe more, when they 1st started this. Last I saw they were talking maybe $2 million.

Its a big increase over the $1-$1.5 they are getting now, but not enough to offset what they would lose. I've seen as high as $7.5 million apiece for the exit fees. That would be $30 million + Memphis taking its NCAA credits with them.

That $7.5 million number is a full 5-year TV distribution plus the $500K, which some reporters assumed that the bylaws referred to. But they glossed over the "change in value" portion of the text. In other words, if the TV contract for the conference doesn't change in value with the departure of the member, they don't owe anything aside from the $500K.

So based on that wording, the only way choosing the exit fee income and NCAA credit money over a new contract would make sense is if the new tv contract numbers for the new merged conference were actually going to be lower--not higher.

I dont know. Perhaps I may be reading too much into that decision. At any rate, it will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Could be that a merger and 24-school conference just creates a lot of difficulties and hassles and is only worth it if it also creates a very large pot of new revenue.

(05-03-2012 06:02 PM)Wedge Wrote:  Could be that a merger and 24-school conference just creates a lot of difficulties and hassles and is only worth it if it also creates a very large pot of new revenue.

I've seen them say that part of it is that they want to create an entity that can't be left behind if FBS splits.

I think they would have done a better job creating a gap vs. the SB and MAC if they didn't take so many startups. I think they have narrowed the gap.