(01-23-2016 11:18 AM)billybobby777 Wrote: (01-22-2016 10:35 PM)CougarRed Wrote: (01-22-2016 08:25 PM)billybobby777 Wrote: BYU, Boise, San Diego St, Air Force, UNLV and Fresno St were all offered AAC invites. In that order. I followed this intently from 2011 and 2013. It's all we posted about all day everyday for two years.
SDSU and Boise accepted, then backed out when they failed to take a few more MWC schools with them to form a true "western division".
I followed it too. Boise and SDSU got football only invites to join the Big East. And clearly AF and BYU had similar invites. It was unclear to me whether UNLV or Fresno were ever invited for football only. They were NEVER invited for all sports. Neither were SDSU and Boise.
Oh - and Boise backed out after the TV deal came back at $2M instead of the projected $6M for football only. The $6M projection was made when Boise joined the Big East before the basketball schools left.
So Boise used its leverage to get a sweetheart TV deal from the MWC.
Boise backing out had little to do with the failure to create a Western all sports divisison. SDSU was forced to back out after Boise made its move.
OK, It's fair to say that Boise backed out because of the tv $ not being there for the Big East initially expected, but before they backed out officially around Cheistmas/New Years of that year, there was a mad rush for more western schools. First Aresco publicly said BYU, they refused. Then Air Force, they refused. Then at the last second ESPN or CBS reported that the AAC was talking to UNLV and Fresno St. They didn't budge. Boise announced they were staying in MWC after all. A few weeks later SDSU announced they too weren't coming over here to the AAC. SDSU fans really wanted to come here too. Or at least the many who were posting over here on this board at the time. Cheers!
I think the likely money projections were not looking good in early 2013, but at the actual time Boise left, Kustra was quoted as saying that the Big East (AAC) ddnt have ANY offer on the table. That would indicate nobody knew what the final number would be at that point. I think its fair to say a AAC package with SDSU and Boise was likely to be worth more than the 2 million we got without them. That said, they probably had at least an inkling that it wouldn't be 6 million a team.
While money was certainly a component, the biggest issue was the total package was just a bad deal for Boise. First, it was a football only package. That means that even if the AAC was getting 5 million per all-sports team, Boise would get just 70% of that (3.5 million). Then layer on to that poor 70% football-only deal, the idea that Boise would have to move all its Olympic sports to the Big West, a definite step down from the MW. Worse yet, Boise was going to have to pay a separate million dollar entry fee to the Big West and $900K in annual travel subsidies just to be a part of a lesser Olympic conference. The travel subsidies were the worst part of the deal. Every year, those $900K in Big West travel subsidies would effectively reduce Boise's net revenue from the AAC by almost a million dollars.
So, again, assuming the AAC got 5 million an all-sports team, Boise would get just 70% of that (3.5 million) minus the travel subsidies ($900K) for a total of 2.6 million. That's not great. Worse yet, it doesn't even begin to consider increased travel costs of the AAC. Still, it was more than the 1 million per team the MW was making before.
Then in late December 2012, the MW was finally able to renegotiate their deal (because the shut down of the "Mountain" network was a breach of the contract terms and allowed the conference to reopen the deal). That allowed the MW to increase their payout to nearly 2 million a team. That made th MW and the AAC almost a wash (and that was assuming the AAC was getting 5 million per all-sports team---which was not a given). When the MW came to the table with the sweetheart "bonus" deal for nationally televised games and gave Boise a contract set up that guaranteed that most all their games would be nationally televised, Boise basically was guaranteed at least 3 million earnings without relegating their Olympic sports to the Big West. Well, that was pretty much game over for the western expansion. Boise came back and requested a similar deal from the AAC and was rejected. The western expansion was finished.
Bottom line, it was a bad deal monetarily and it was a bad deal athletically for Boise's Olympic sports.
The keys to a viable AAC western expansion were (and still are)
1) all sports
2) enough western teams to form a reasonable western division
3) effective use of divisions in basketball and non-revenue sports to control travel costs.
4) Better money. That said, the money doesn't have to be massive better as long as 1-3 above are properly handled. In the BE/AAC western expansion, none of the 3 points were handled---which is why is collapsed when there wasn't a huge pay day. Had 1-3 been handled, it could have been successful with just a small initial pay increase and built toward a major payday as a dominant G5 conference (basically about as close to a best of the rest league as there could be) in future contracts.
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Mountain West TV Future
