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Why there is no doubt we will join the Pac if offered

Buffnik

Real name isn't Nik
Club Member
Junta Member
I posted this on Rivals, but wanted to bring this topic up here because I think our focus has been on the wrong issues in the re-alignment discussion. The Denver Post has completely missed the boat on this aspect of the situation and, therefore, completely misunderstood what's going on.

Here goes:

People shouldn't make the mistake of looking at this as an athletic decision. That's certainly a consideration, but it's not the driver. The main drivers are the academic prestige and research partnerships with Pac 10 members as well as the major increase in alumni donations to CU from our western state alumni. Lots of aerospace and pharmaceutical research companies in the western states that are more likely to give CU research grants if it's a Pac member, too.

Since academics has the power at CU, not athletics, and academics is overwhelmingly in favor of this move (for good reason), it is a 100% certainty that CU will accept a Pac invitation if it is offered.
 
Great post, 'Nik. This is probably the one time we will ever see the athletic and academic sides of the house at CU stand united rather than divided.

Although for these reasons, don't quite understand why we went to B12 in 1994. Athletics must've had much more sway at the higher levels of university at that time compared to now.
 
I should also add that CU's budgets are completely reliant on attracting out-of-state and international students. The CU system is much better positioned to do well in that as a Pac member. Remember, our tuition for non-residents is about the same as going to Stanford. We've got to do all we can to justify that.
 
Great post, 'Nik. This is probably the one time we will ever see the athletic and academic sides of the house at CU stand united rather than divided.

Although for these reasons, don't quite understand why we went to B12 in 1994. Athletics must've had much more sway at the higher levels of university at that time compared to now.

We went with the Big 12 at the time because we were one of the schools involved in creating it to begin with. It was, in many ways, our baby.
 
I still believe BYU would have replaced CU if the Buffs went to the Pac-10 in the first place.
 
We went with the Big 12 at the time because we were one of the schools involved in creating it to begin with. It was, in many ways, our baby.

Yeah, forgot about that.
In 1994 was still a junior and more concerned with Thursday Night Clubs at Potter's and the Walrus (not Wally) than I was about the construction of the Big 12.:smile2:
 
Nik I completely agree, but I never thought there was a doubt we wouldn't accept - it's getting the invite in the first place that has us on pins and needles.
 
Nik I completely agree, but I never thought there was a doubt we wouldn't accept - it's getting the invite in the first place that has us on pins and needles.

Yep, the landscape is very different today than it was in 1994. No doubt in my mind that the Regents accept if the formal offer is presented. Cindy Carlisle might object, though, unless there is someone in CA that her husband can sue.
 
Yep, the landscape is very different today than it was in 1994. No doubt in my mind that the Regents accept if the formal offer is presented. Cindy Carlisle might object, though, unless there is someone in CA that her husband can sue.

Cindy Carlisle might object, if she were still a Regent.
 
Yep, the landscape is very different today than it was in 1994. No doubt in my mind that the Regents accept if the formal offer is presented. Cindy Carlisle might object, though, unless there is someone in CA that her husband can sue.

Maybe Peanuts can represent Bailer when they sue CU for stealing their deserved place in the Pac-16...
 
Since academics has the power at CU, not athletics, and academics is overwhelmingly in favor of this move (for good reason), it is a 100% certainty that CU will accept a Pac invitation if it is offered.

out of curiosity, who specifically do you mean "academics" that are overwhelmingly in favor...i'm on half a dozen academic based email lists at CU that concern topical research, department administration, faculty committee type stuff etc.....and there hasn't been one peep about the Pac 10. which academics? administrators? who?

moving to the Pac 10 will affect my professional life in no way that i can anticipate. just as being in the Big 12 had no bearing whatsoever on my job. when i go to conferences or correspond with colleagues at diff institutions....none of that has any relation to conference affiliation, at all.

i'm not trying to pick a fight or anything, i'm just curious.
 
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out of curiosity, who specifically do you mean "academics" that are overwhelmingly in favor...i'm on half a dozen academic based email lists at CU that concern topical research, department administration, faculty committee type stuff etc.....and there hasn't been one peep about the Pac 10. which academics? administrators? who?

moving to the Pac 10 will affect my professional life in no way that i can anticipate. just as being in the Big 12 had no bearing whatsoever on my job. when i go to conferences or correspond with colleagues at diff institutions....none of that has any relation to conference affiliation, at all.

i'm not trying to pick a fight or anything, i'm just curious.

I should have said "academic administration officials". It's an alumni donation, attraction of students (domestic and international), and attraction of corporate partners thing. That stuff probably doesn't directly effect your day-to-day life and isn't something that most profs would think about much, I would guess. But it does significantly impact the funding for your departments, facility improvements, quality of your students, quality of the profs CU can attract, and pay scales. If faculty members at CU who don't get involved with politics and administration are blind to this stuff, it makes it much more clear how deep the disconnect is and why so many members of CU faculty don't seem to appreciate the importance of athletics to a university.
 
I was never worried about Baylor. That's just such a bunch of noise that it never gave me any cause for concern. I mean c'mon, Baylor over CU? That's crazy. What I'm worried about is that UT might decide to actually go with us. I am really, REALLY hoping they decide that they won't be able to dominate and control the Pac the way they did the Big 12, and decide to make a go of it in what remains of the B12. That would put us back into a boat with UU going to the Pac. The idea of being tied at the hip to those jackasses in Austin makes me want to vomit.
 
out of curiosity, who specifically do you mean "academics" that are overwhelmingly in favor...i'm on half a dozen academic based email lists at CU that concern topical research, department administration, faculty committee type stuff etc.....and there hasn't been one peep about the Pac 10. which academics? administrators? who?

moving to the Pac 10 will affect my professional life in no way that i can anticipate. just as being in the Big 12 had no bearing whatsoever on my job. when i go to conferences or correspond with colleagues at diff institutions....none of that has any relation to conference affiliation, at all.

i'm not trying to pick a fight or anything, i'm just curious.

I always suspected that Nik was full of ****, but he makes it sound so fancy and all.

If he's wrong about the whole academics thing, I might just give up the atheism thing that he talked me into.
 
I dont have any doubt academics are a part of this but imho all of this expansion stuff everywhere is more tied to money than anything.
 
I always suspected that Nik was full of ****, but he makes it sound so fancy and all.

If he's wrong about the whole academics thing, I might just give up the atheism thing that he talked me into.

Our friends at Bailer have been praying for you to do just that.....
 
Our friends at Bailer have been praying for you to do just that.....

I'm pretty sure I have a better chance of towing my Nik-inspired atheism through the pearly gates than Kenneth Starr does of getting a favorable judgment from the Almighty.
 
I always suspected that Nik was full of ****, but he makes it sound so fancy and all.

If he's wrong about the whole academics thing, I might just give up the atheism thing that he talked me into.

Buffnik's broadest point has merit, though i don't think that the direct, causal relation between athletic revenue and its secondary benefits with renewed alum giving, grants, etc. are realized in the academic sphere in the way people imagine. or want to imagine. i think that the issue of beneficial influences here is a circumstantial, contingent one in geographical terms (more CU alums in CA, say)...not necessarily a de facto justification for conference affiliation per se as automatically beneficial for the job of academic X. i'm defending the term "academic" here as much as anything. the people making these decisions are closer to the PR arm at CU than classroom peeps or researchers. economists and politicos, not the chair of the English Department.

like i say, i'm not trying to get difficult with Buffnik (he's a great poster).....i just think a lot of this is overstated much of the time on this board or the ambiguous, but nefarious all-for-evil characterization of faculty against athletics positioned as a straw scapegoat for X or Y. and, speaking generally, higher education is one of those topics that everyone thinks they are an expert because they went to college. which, to me, is like saying because you flew in a plane to O'Hare...you know how to fly a plane to O'Hare. There's a difference and very few people would truck someone (not saying Buffnik is doing this, he isn't) who didn't have your job telling you how the better to do it and what your self-interest really ought to be. but, in the higher ed game it happens all the time. dinner parties, whatever, someone is always telling you how wrong higher ed is, how to fix it, and why me Mick Ronson simply doesn't "get it".
 
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so much noise from texass about all this i thought i'd post this link from a bruin board for a pac - 10 perspective for a change

http://ucla.rivals.com/showmsg.asp?fid=688&tid=134171315&mid=134171315&sid=1012&style=2

i know my opinion means ish here, that being said..to take baylor over cu is like picking the fat chick over paris hilton. She may not be the best looking chick but she's hot and and brings waaaaay more to the table financially.

:lol:
 
I'm pretty sure I have a better chance of towing my Nik-inspired atheism through the pearly gates than Kenneth Starr does of getting a favorable judgment from the Almighty.

There is so much wrong with that sentence I can't stop chuckling.
 
Mick - I'm often telling business associates at dinner parties that I hope that some day there's an opportunity for me to buy a college or university. Then I let them go on about all the things that are wrong with higher education. And then I say... "Exactly! And how often do you see one closing its doors? It's, by far, the best business model on the planet." :smile2:

P.S. Thanks for the kind words. You're right in that I don't have any inclination to tell the researchers and profs how to do their jobs. Job #1 of the politicians, business people and financial planners in the university community is to make is so the researchers and profs are free of that crap and can best fulfill the true purpose of a university. And I don't think most faculty are negative toward university athletics. My impression is that most don't give it much thought beyond maybe having a sport or two they enjoy watching or liking/disliking a particular student who happens to also be an athlete. All I'm saying is that athletics benefits all departments and the university community as a whole in significant ways whether everyone realizes it or not, I wish some were more aware of this, and I believe (in a few cases I know) that the administrators whose jobs are to worry about these things are acutely aware of how conference academic prestige and geographic footprint has a huge bearing on the future of CU.
 
I posted this on Rivals, but wanted to bring this topic up here because I think our focus has been on the wrong issues in the re-alignment discussion. The Denver Post has completely missed the boat on this aspect of the situation and, therefore, completely misunderstood what's going on.

Here goes:

People shouldn't make the mistake of looking at this as an athletic decision. That's certainly a consideration, but it's not the driver. The main drivers are the academic prestige and research partnerships with Pac 10 members as well as the major increase in alumni donations to CU from our western state alumni. Lots of aerospace and pharmaceutical research companies in the western states that are more likely to give CU research grants if it's a Pac member, too.

Since academics has the power at CU, not athletics, and academics is overwhelmingly in favor of this move (for good reason), it is a 100% certainty that CU will accept a Pac invitation if it is offered.

When you think about how poorly we've done in the Big 12. How bad the alignment is. How the CCG never came to Denver. It's safe to conclude the whole thing largely benefited the South at the expense of the North. Probably why NU is agreeing to leave. In the end it was a lopsided conference that came up short on the revenue and competition front. It was was feeling pretty stagnant around here.
 
When you think about how poorly we've done in the Big 12. How bad the alignment is. How the CCG never came to Denver. It's safe to conclude the whole thing largely benefited the South at the expense of the North. Probably why NU is agreeing to leave. In the end it was a lopsided conference that came up short on the revenue and competition front. It was was feeling pretty stagnant around here.

Supposedly UT could have saved it if they had agreed to equal revenue sharing and the championship game rotating between Dallas and KC. I still think CU would have left for the Pac, though.
 
Supposedly UT could have saved it if they had agreed to equal revenue sharing and the championship game rotating between Dallas and KC. I still think CU would have left for the Pac, though.

Im pretty sure Big 10 has total revenue sharing of some kind. That was always NDs turn off. Im guessing the Pac 10 is every man for himself like the Big 12?
 
Im pretty sure Big 10 has total revenue sharing of some kind. That was always NDs turn off. Im guessing the Pac 10 is every man for himself like the Big 12?

I believe their current deal is weighted toward the team that makes the national tv appearance, gets into the bowl game, or makes the ncaa tourney. In fact, I think it's more unbalanced than the Big 12.

I think that's fair, though. Achievement should be rewarded. As long as they evenly split the television contract for a conference that captures California and Texas plus major US cities like Denver, Phoenix, Seattle and Portland... then I say it's all good. Network is all of us working together. Winning and drawing national appeal is excelling more within that cooperative. Just my 2 cents.
 
I believe their current deal is weighted toward the team that makes the national tv appearance, gets into the bowl game, or makes the ncaa tourney. In fact, I think it's more unbalanced than the Big 12.

I think that's fair, though. Achievement should be rewarded. As long as they evenly split the television contract for a conference that captures California and Texas plus major US cities like Denver, Phoenix, Seattle and Portland... then I say it's all good. Network is all of us working together. Winning and drawing national appeal is excelling more within that cooperative. Just my 2 cents.

I suppose the next questions is how long until the Pac 10 network comes along. Should be interesting if the rumors of Texas wanting their own tv channel are true.

With NU probably 90% for sure leaving followed by MU at 50% I'd say Texas doesn't have much choice now but to go somewhere. Inviting more Texas schools hurts the Big 12 with something more like an east west alignment.

Can you imagine if the SEC walked in and let UT, A&M, OU, and OSU in at the last minute? That's be a pretty bad ass conference.
 
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