The unofficial online home for fans of the UAB Blazers. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

Made me chuckle. What say you?

Top 11 G5 candidates for expansion

Seems about right.

Agree with BlazinHam

Anyone knows what is the tv viewership for some UAB games?

(07-06-2022 09:09 PM)HiddenDragon Wrote:  Anyone knows what is the tv viewership for some UAB games?

It was pretty good for the JSU game last year.

(07-06-2022 09:09 PM)HiddenDragon Wrote:  Anyone knows what is the tv viewership for some UAB games?

Boca Bowl
https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2018-co...v-ratings/

Indy Bowl
https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/college...v-ratings/

thats all I can find

Enrollment: At least 20,000. The school has to be big – no SMU.
Alumni Base: Where are the national eyeballs? In a streaming world, this is a big deal.
Media Market: This matters more than anything else.
US News & World Report Latest Ranking: How good is your school? This matters more than you might think.
AAU Member: Are you part of the Association of American Universities? This is a big deal to the Big Ten. To cut to the chase, no one on this list is.
Tier 1 Research: Are you an elite research school with all the stuff that comes with that? This one can be bent a little bit – Notre Dame isn’t, and Nebraska was, but isn’t now.
Stadium Size: Not a dealbreaker, but having a big house is nice.

If we step back I don’t know that UAB is crazy appealing just yet. We are a good fit for a possible G5 super conference situation but we need a season like UTSA just had. UTSA is not an amazing athletic university but just 1 breakout season has catapulted them in the court of public opinion

(07-07-2022 09:44 AM)Golden-Ticket Wrote:  If we step back I don’t know that UAB is crazy appealing just yet. We are a good fit for a possible G5 super conference situation but we need a season like UTSA just had. UTSA is not an amazing athletic university but just 1 breakout season has catapulted them in the court of public opinion

This is probably the most frustrating thing. If expansion were happening 5 years from now I'm confident UAB would be in the top crop of expansion targets with San Diego State, Boise, and SMU.

I agree. Hell maybe this year can be our breakout. Fairly good schedule with enough challenges to earn respect if we overcome them. LSU coming in week 8-9 and not week 2 is great too

(07-06-2022 05:54 PM)BlazinBham Wrote:  Well, if I had to make my own list based on many considerations other than just FB success, I’d go.

1. Memphis, big 12 or acc
2. UAB, big 12 or ACC
3. SMU, big 12
4. SDSU, PAC 12
5. Boise state, pac 12
6. Temple, ACC
7. UTSA, Big 12
8. Utah State, pac 12
9. Colorado state, Big12
10. Fresno state, pac 12
11. USF, ACC or big 12

With all the talk about tv rights and viewership, nothing makes more since than to scoop up a school from Memphis and Bham.

This whole Birmingham TV market thing needs to go. No one in Birmingham is watching UAB games on TV

(07-07-2022 09:47 PM)mixduptransistor Wrote:  

(07-06-2022 05:54 PM)BlazinBham Wrote:  Well, if I had to make my own list based on many considerations other than just FB success, I’d go.

1. Memphis, big 12 or acc
2. UAB, big 12 or ACC
3. SMU, big 12
4. SDSU, PAC 12
5. Boise state, pac 12
6. Temple, ACC
7. UTSA, Big 12
8. Utah State, pac 12
9. Colorado state, Big12
10. Fresno state, pac 12
11. USF, ACC or big 12

With all the talk about tv rights and viewership, nothing makes more since than to scoop up a school from Memphis and Bham.

This whole Birmingham TV market thing needs to go. No one in Birmingham is watching UAB games on TV

The market is there. Folks can’t watch UAB on TV if they are not on it. I don’t consider streaming the same as being on broadcast television or cable sports stations.

(07-07-2022 09:47 PM)mixduptransistor Wrote:  

(07-06-2022 05:54 PM)BlazinBham Wrote:  Well, if I had to make my own list based on many considerations other than just FB success, I’d go.

1. Memphis, big 12 or acc
2. UAB, big 12 or ACC
3. SMU, big 12
4. SDSU, PAC 12
5. Boise state, pac 12
6. Temple, ACC
7. UTSA, Big 12
8. Utah State, pac 12
9. Colorado state, Big12
10. Fresno state, pac 12
11. USF, ACC or big 12

With all the talk about tv rights and viewership, nothing makes more since than to scoop up a school from Memphis and Bham.

This whole Birmingham TV market thing needs to go. No one in Birmingham is watching UAB games on TV

You really don’t understand markets. Sure they may not watch in overwhelming numbers to see us play Old Dominion on Stadium, but when we played BYU… Birmingham tuned in big time! So a better conference can believe that if you give UAB a decent opponent the metro area will tune in. Let UAB have some national success… even more eyeballs will be tuned in. This market is not against UAB, they are just accustomed to winning and big games, give them that and they will watch UAB too!

UAB, when good, has delivered eyeballs in the Bham market on ESPN or equivalent. This was true in the Watson Brown years and during the return on the rare occasion UAB played on a metered network. There is a limited sample size but the numbers are representative of a g5 program in a market that supports college football. The numbers are not good enough yet to put the Blazers near the top of a list like this, and we have never seen UAB good long enough to get a true picture of viewership other than *potential*

The move to the AAC can answer that question. Keep winning, put on a show when the opportunity presents itself and leverage it to get some better opponents … that is how Houston, UCF and Louisville got to where they are today after being, for a brief time, on par with or worse in numbers than UAB back early 2000s.

We are far better than we have been in the past, and we are far better positioned than at any point in the past. That said, UAB fans have their rose colored glasses clamped on tightly with regard to moving up further anytime soon. We have not even played in the AAC as yet, let alone proven ourselves capable at that level.

There's no reason that we can't be in the top half of that league, but at this point we just have potential at that level. "Potential" is a French word that means "Ain't done much yet".

This sort of stuff always brings out a lot of both wishful thinking and doomsday nightmares with fan bases. Truth nearly always falls short of best case or worst case.

I won’t be at all surprised that when everything settles down, and that might be a while, not all that much will have fundamentally changed. Rich will get richer and poor will have to figure out how to make do and except for a few clear losers not much will really change.

My best guess right now is the sec and big ten get whoever they are want, probably taking a few years, whatever is left behind in the power 5 groups together, no more than a handful of G5s move up to that next tier and everyone else just keeps going on.

The biggest schools already have autonomy. They can do whatever rules they want, for the most part. Everyone else can decide whether they want similar rules or can afford it. Either way isn’t going to change that the biggest schools get all the best players anyway.

I actually think that if there is a breakaway, it might include all 10 FBS leagues plus the big east and A-10 and a couple of others.

(07-08-2022 01:11 PM)BlazinBham Wrote:  When we’ve all skipped a game every few seasons or so, because we expect it to be a blowout. If a diehard fan is that uninterested in who we play, imagine how a casual fan feels.

Now bring current baylor, Texas tech, OK state, UCF, Cincy, Houston, WVU to town. Put it on ESPN on a Thursday or Friday night. You’ve got a decent viewership from Bham

The only game in the AAC that will have that type of draw for us is a highly ranked Memphis. They likely won’t be in AAC by the time we get there, anyways

I think the latest realignment news makes it unlikely Memphis is going anywhere anytime soon.

Agree - unless the Big 12 gets raided. Then Memphis is likely to move there.

Yep, they are staying put.

(07-08-2022 03:02 PM)DuelingDragon Wrote:  I won’t be at all surprised that when everything settles down, and that might be a while, not all that much will have fundamentally changed.

You're 100% right. Our (former) peer schools in Memphis, Cincinnati, Louisville, and the like will just keep growing the gap as they've been doing for the past 15 years

And I mean more than just athletics. Remember when Dr. Garrison was talking about AAU membership? Never hear about high aspirational goals for UAB from our leaders anymore. It's just about barely keeping up with the rising tide these days