Big Ten Expansion Scenario (realistic or wishful thinking?)

[4BienemyTDs]

Honestly, I have no idea where you are going with this NFL matchup angle.

Media packages are the sum of the value of the properties within it, correct?
The NFL has far more metrics on why they have teams in certain large cities and how successful they are as a whole

College Football is not quite using that metric and is counting on the idea that over the next 5 to 10 to even 20 years the properties within the current conferences, without the ability to remove or contract some teams within these conferences that the subscribers, eyeballs, and sponsors will remain viable and thus the rights will ultimately pay off.

My point is that you cannot say that two properties within the Bay area will pay off, or two properties in Arizona will pay off without thinking about long-term metrics.
Colorado/Denver Metro is and has proven to be a place where Sports can thrive and will likely continue to thrive as the population grows and corporate strength remains intact. I use that standard to put CU in a strong position beyond academics and all other metrics, because Media is pretty simple, if I show your games, I will have subscribers, watchers, and sponsors pay me more than I paid you.

I am just using reasons why there are or are not NFL teams in certain markets and how there are places that just do not justify the idea that college programs in the middle of nowhere will continue to pay off.

 

[The Alabaster Yak]

If the B1G and the SEC want to prevent the top of the PAC, ACC and B12 from forming its own league that would compete directly with them, they should start to consider significant expansion right now. Just pull off the bandaid and go straight to the endgame. There’s 32-40 schools that if they consolidated into a competing college athletics league, would carry a lot of weight and command a lot of attention. It would be cheaper to consolidate half those schools now and let the others die on the vine. Where CU falls into that scenario is anybody’s guess.

The B1G and SEC can't touch the ACC right now, so they would have to add the Pac programs that make sense, which are some combination of Oregon, UW, Stanford, Cal, Utah and CU. There are no Big 12 programs that they would be after, IMO, unless the B1G has a desire to to get into Texas. And then there's Notre Dame. So their options to rip off the bandaid are limited to 6-7 programs right now.

The Pac and ACC should definitely be trying to orchestrate a full blown merger AND do whatever it takes to add Notre Dame as a full conference member. That "Coast2Coast" conference would definitely rival the B1G and SEC as a P3.

 

[MtnBuff]

The B1G and SEC can't touch the ACC right now, so they would have to add the Pac programs that make sense, which are some combination of Oregon, UW, Stanford, Cal, Utah and CU. There are no Big 12 programs that they would be after, IMO, unless the B1G has a desire to to get into Texas. And then there's Notre Dame. So their options to rip off the bandaid are limited to 6-7 programs right now.

The Pac and ACC should definitely be trying to orchestrate a full blown merger AND do whatever it takes to add Notre Dame as a full conference member. That "Coast2Coast" conference would definitely rival the B1G and SEC as a P3.

I've said this before.
Top value programs from the ACC, PAC, and from the B12, 16-20 total is the third super conference.

 

[Not Sure]

I've said this before.
Top value programs from the ACC, PAC, and from the B12, 16-20 total is the third super conference.

The number needs to be closer to 32-36, but overall, I agree. Figure that there are now 32 teams in the B1G and SEC combined. You have to provide competing content, and a 20 team league wouldn’t do that.

 

[MtnBuff]

The number needs to be closer to 32-36, but overall, I agree. Figure that there are now 32 teams in the B1G and SEC combined. You have to provide competing content, and a 20 team league wouldn’t do that.

Disagree completely.

Each of the other is settling around or below 20.

There aren't 32 schools out there that provide value.

 

[Not Sure]

Disagree completely.

Each of the other is settling around or below 20.

There aren't 32 schools out there that provide value.

We aren’t competing against just the SEC or the B1G. We’d be competing against them both. It’s not a three conference landscape. It’s essentially a two conference landscape. The SEC/B1G have 32 teams right now. That’s what we would have to try to duplicate.

Furthermore, there aren’t 32 teams in the SEC/B1G that provide value right now. So it’s really about providing content. You don’t need every team to “provide value”. You need an overall league that provides adequate content.

 

[The Alabaster Yak]

There are two schools of thought on the value of future conference expansion, and it obviously depends on how people consume live sports going forward.

Scenario 1: Linear broadcast wins out and FOX, NBC, CBS, ESPN, ABC all still own big time college football rights
- In this scenario, all that matters is brand and big time rivalry games that generate big ratings. The amount of inventory doesn't matter after a certain point because there becomes too many lowly rated games that get relegated to obscure channels or streaming apps like ESPN+ where the production costs start to outweigh the revenue on those games

Scenario 2: Streaming eventually wins out
- In this scenario, inventory is almost all that matters since it become less about advertising revenue and pure ratings for big games, and more about the sheer number of subscribers and the monthly/annual fees Apple/Amazon/ESPN+/Peacock/etc can make if they can get exclusive rights to big time CFB.

If the leagues think Scenario 1 is more likely, then there isn't much reason to expand beyond 20-24 teams. If they think Scenario 2 is the way of the future, then it behooves them them to gobble up as many of the current P5 properties as they can. I think this is the most likely scenario to play out, but it won't until 2030 or so.

 

[Creebuzz]

Media packages are the sum of the value of the properties within it, correct?
The NFL has far more metrics on why they have teams in certain large cities and how successful they are as a whole

College Football is not quite using that metric and is counting on the idea that over the next 5 to 10 to even 20 years the properties within the current conferences, without the ability to remove or contract some teams within these conferences that the subscribers, eyeballs, and sponsors will remain viable and thus the rights will ultimately pay off.

My point is that you cannot say that two properties within the Bay area will pay off, or two properties in Arizona will pay off without thinking about long-term metrics.
Colorado/Denver Metro is and has proven to be a place where Sports can thrive and will likely continue to thrive as the population grows and corporate strength remains intact. I use that standard to put CU in a strong position beyond academics and all other metrics, because Media is pretty simple, if I show your games, I will have subscribers, watchers, and sponsors pay me more than I paid you.

I am just using reasons why there are or are not NFL teams in certain markets and how there are places that just do not justify the idea that college programs in the middle of nowhere will continue to pay off.

Gotcha. NFL makes choices on team locations in strong and growing markets. Having multiple teams in one market rarely makes sense. And I agree that CU ticks a lot of the boxes, except the last 20 years of brand-killing ineptitude in sports. All of CU’s woes in realignment are self-inflicted shots to the foot. CU lies at the geographic point where the B1G, PAC, and Big 12 should all desire it. In fact, to my knowledge, CU is the only single school to have actually received offers to join all three at one point or another.

Your previous post, though, read like this guy spoke it:

 

[Not Sure]

Also, at some point we will have a serious push for a 16-game season. It’s only a matter of time. A 16-game season coupled with two 32-team leagues means a lot of top end matchups along with some dogs. Like the NFL, which is what we’ve been saying all along is the ultimate endgame. What will get lost are what we call G5 games now. Probably won’t see a lot (if any) games where a P2 plays anybody outside of that group of 64 teams. The inter-sectional games would be epic, though.

 

[Victory]

Gotcha. NFL makes choices on team locations in strong and growing markets. Having multiple teams in one market rarely makes sense. And I agree that CU ticks a lot of the boxes, except the last 20 years of brand-killing ineptitude in sports. All of CU’s woes in realignment are self-inflicted shots to the foot. CU lies at the geographic point where the B1G, PAC, and Big 12 should all desire it. In fact, to my knowledge, CU is the only single school to have actually received offers to join all three at one point or another.

Your previous post, though, read like this guy spoke it:

View attachment 59445

Is that true we once received an offer from the B1G? I haven’t been able to find evidence of that.

 

[Creebuzz]

Is that true we once received an offer from the B1G? I haven’t been able to find evidence of that.

That’s the word, but I do not believe you will find it written anywhere. CU was pretty set on joining the PAC 10 back in 2010.

 

[MtnBuff]

We aren’t competing against just the SEC or the B1G. We’d be competing against them both. It’s not a three conference landscape. It’s essentially a two conference landscape. The SEC/B1G have 32 teams right now. That’s what we would have to try to duplicate.

Furthermore, there aren’t 32 teams in the SEC/B1G that provide value right now. So it’s really about providing content. You don’t need every team to “provide value”. You need an overall league that provides adequate content.

SEC and B1G are the elephants in the room. They are the ones with the mega contracts and the money per school that goes with them.

We need to be able to provide content but that content needs to have value. Nobody wants to watch Oregon State play SMU, Nobody wants to watch Wake Forest play West Virginia. Teams that don't provide high ratings and justify the revenue share they get drag the other schools down.

The SEC/B10 can afford the limited number of teams they have that don't justify the share they receive because they have some others that are huge producers. The PAC12, ACC, B12 doesn't have any of those.

It also would not surprise me to see in the next decade or so those two conferences shed a few programs.

The size of the pie can be extra large but it doesn't matter if the slices are all razor thin.

We are looking at schools in the big two conferences getting close to $100 million per year. We don't survive and compete in a conference getting $25 million per school.

The only solution is to skim the most valuable programs, create a high dollar package, and leave the rest behind. There aren't 32 teams left that are high value.

 

[Buffnik]

For CU, the most important connection for recruiting students (also leads to alum connections) is California by far.

That's why the Pac was much more appealing than the Big 12 or Big Ten - TX and IL are very important, but each are about 1/3 as important as CA.

Now that the B1G has both Chicagoland and SoCal, CU doesn't have a lot of reason to love the Pac-12. If we don't get a B1G invite in this round, our best short-term situation is probably a Pac which adds SDSU and SMU. A Pac-10 as it is would be no better than the Big 12 was for us and all the reasons we left.

https://www.colorado.edu/oda/sites/default/files/attached-files/overallprofilefall22.pdf

 

[4BienemyTDs]

The number needs to be closer to 32-36, but overall, I agree. Figure that there are now 32 teams in the B1G and SEC combined. You have to provide competing content, and a 20 team league wouldn’t do that.

Wait, are we Competing, like the old AFL-NFL, or aren't we all still able to get into the CFP if we have a viable 3rd conference?

48-60 teams are perfect for College Football.

My previous points about metrics and the NFL say that tough decisions would need to be made for a third conference, and if a Media property was smart, they would put up a lot of money to help FORM the third conference and not allow the existing conferences with the uneducated College Presidents make decisions.

Idiots are out losing money on the XFL or USFL or 3 on 3 basketball, and yet here is a superleague right in front of your eyes and somebody could make it work, somebody like Mark Cuban.

 

[MtnBuff]

Wait, are we Competing, like the old AFL-NFL, or aren't we all still able to get into the CFP if we have a viable 3rd conference?

48-60 teams are perfect for College Football.

My previous points about metrics and the NFL say that tough decisions would need to be made for a third conference, and if a Media property was smart, they would put up a lot of money to help FORM the third conference and not allow the existing conferences with the uneducated College Presidents make decisions.

Idiots are out losing money on the XFL or USFL or 3 on 3 basketball, and yet here is a superleague right in front of your eyes and somebody could make it work, somebody like Mark Cuban.

A combination of the top teams from the ACC/B12/PAC creating a conference of about 20 (max 24) along with similar SEC and B12 gives you about 60.

The biggest issue is who gets the money. Be it from a network package model or streaming any teams that are affiliated with a conference have to justify their share.

If you want a conference payout of say $50 million per team then adding teams that only add about $20 million in value means that every other team in the conference gets enough less to cover the overpayment. If that means that your conference teams get $40 million each instead of $50 million each that puts you another $10 million behind the B1G schools who aren't going to give up any of theirs to support your conference and who are already far ahead of you getting $70, $80, $100 million each already.

So sorry but MWC schools, AAC schools, etc don't bring enough revenue value to the table. Neither do some of our current partners like Oregon State and Washington State. Schools like Houston and SDSU don't help you.

It is in the interest of the media companies to have a third conference but only if that conference provides them with content that draws enough viewers to generate advertising.

The NFL has the networks over the barrel. They have to have NFL content and because there is no alternative the NFL pretty much is able to tell them this is what you get and this is what you pay for it. If you say no somebody else will buy it and you get left out.

With only two super conferences those conferences are in a similar position. Adding a third option gives the media companies some degree of balance in negotiating rights fees.

 

[4BienemyTDs]

A combination of the top teams from the ACC/B12/PAC creating a conference of about 20 (max 24) along with similar SEC and B12 gives you about 60.

The biggest issue is who gets the money. Be it from a network package model or streaming any teams that are affiliated with a conference have to justify their share.

If you want a conference payout of say $50 million per team then adding teams that only add about $20 million in value means that every other team in the conference gets enough less to cover the overpayment. If that means that your conference teams get $40 million each instead of $50 million each that puts you another $10 million behind the B1G schools who aren't going to give up any of theirs to support your conference and who are already far ahead of you getting $70, $80, $100 million each already.

So sorry but MWC schools, AAC schools, etc don't bring enough revenue value to the table. Neither do some of our current partners like Oregon State and Washington State. Schools like Houston and SDSU don't help you.

It is in the interest of the media companies to have a third conference but only if that conference provides them with content that draws enough viewers to generate advertising.

The NFL has the networks over the barrel. They have to have NFL content and because there is no alternative the NFL pretty much is able to tell them this is what you get and this is what you pay for it. If you say no somebody else will buy it and you get left out.

With only two super conferences those conferences are in a similar position. Adding a third option gives the media companies some degree of balance in negotiating rights fees.

Tougher choices need to be made, and you have competing interests. TV is looking for a good deal for some valuable properties, while conferences that were put together for location, convenience, and academics are making monumental decisions with huge dollars in mind.

Since college football has taken itself to this point, who knows what the hell can happen?

That is why I am saying that a third-party conference developer for the P3 remaining partner would be critical.

The P12 has no leadership or creativity, the B12 is clueless but more aggressive and more willing to go for it, and the ACC is just stuck.

Amazon has the power to do it, and instead of just creating a media package, go all in and create the full infrastructure for a 16-20 team conference

 

[Not Sure]

24 teams won’t cut it. You guys keep thinking we would be one of three. We wouldn’t. We would be one of two. There would be top programs and cannon fodder. Both are needed. Not every team can be (or should be) a marquee team.

 

[MtnBuff]

24 teams won’t cut it. You guys keep thinking we would be one of three. We wouldn’t. We would be one of two. There would be top programs and cannon fodder. Both are needed. Not every team can be (or should be) a marquee team.

If you take the top value programs to make a 20 team conference we are in.

What you are suggesting is that we give away $15-20 million dollars a year (and the other top value teams do the same) to subsidize the programs that nobody outside a small local market wants to see. That is just ridiculous. Go to 32 teams and you have at least 10 of those teams that are a significant drag on per team revenues because the media partners aren't going to pay much for them.

The cannon fodder teams within the conference will take care of themselves, teams will win and teams will lose. Who is Nebraska in the B1G? Difference is that fans will be watching Kansas or Arizona lose instead of not bothering to watch San Diego State lose.

 

[White_Rabbit]

The unfortunate fact of the matter is we're a lot closer to SDSU than we are to a Michigan. I mean go look at the ratings SECBuff linked in the other thread, Michigan can play little sisters of the deaf and blind state and draw 5 million viewers. Lets take a gander at CU's ratings when they weren't stuck on the P12N which was often

CU vs TCU 1.25M
CU vs Air Force 808k
CU vs Minnesota 690k
CU vs ASU N/A
CU vs Oregon 962k
CU vs USC 525k
good lord did we play Utah on the P12N? I'm not even mad as a CU fan, but if I were a Utah fan I'd be pissed

I thought I'd toss in there Cal's and Stanford's since nobody watches them

Stanford vs USC 2.96M
Cal vs ND 2.91M
Stanford vs UW 532k
Stanford vs Oregon 672k
Stanford vs Oregon St 1.08M
Stanford vs ND 2.15M
Cal vs UW 1.32M
Cal vs UO 738k
Stanford vs UCLA 1.26M
Cal vs USC 2.04M
Stanford vs Utah 1.04M
Stanford vs BYU 453k
Cal vs UCLA 3.27M

I mean CU was terrible last year, but Stanford was 3-9 and Cal was 4-8. Stanford is good at avoiding being on the P12N apparently

Lets do Oregon St and Wazzu since Mtn called them out directly

Oregon St vs Boise St 1.25M
Wazzu vs Wisconsin 3.92M (lol almost more than CU's entire year)
Wazzu vs Oregon 2.27M (now they're definitely over CU)
Oregon St vs Stanford 1.08M
Wazzu vs USC 1.84M
Wazzu vs Utah 470k
Oregon St vs UW 1.13M
Oregon St vs ASU 484k
Wazzu vs UW 2.38M
Oregon St vs Oregon 3.56M
Wazzu vs Fresno St 2.4M
Oregon St vs Florida 2.45M

are we sure we're subsidizing them and not the other way around?

 

[The Alabaster Yak]

The unfortunate fact of the matter is we're a lot closer to SDSU than we are to a Michigan. I mean go look at the ratings SECBuff linked in the other thread, Michigan can play little sisters of the deaf and blind state and draw 5 million viewers. Lets take a gander at CU's ratings when they weren't stuck on the P12N which was often

CU vs TCU 1.25M
CU vs Air Force 808k
CU vs Minnesota 690k
CU vs ASU N/A
CU vs Oregon 962k
CU vs USC 525k
good lord did we play Utah on the P12N? I'm not even mad as a CU fan, but if I were a Utah fan I'd be pissed

I thought I'd toss in there Cal's and Stanford's since nobody watches them

Stanford vs USC 2.96M
Cal vs ND 2.91M
Stanford vs UW 532k
Stanford vs Oregon 672k
Stanford vs Oregon St 1.08M
Stanford vs ND 2.15M
Cal vs UW 1.32M
Cal vs UO 738k
Stanford vs UCLA 1.26M
Cal vs USC 2.04M
Stanford vs Utah 1.04M
Stanford vs BYU 453k
Cal vs UCLA 3.27M

I mean CU was terrible last year, but Stanford was 3-9 and Cal was 4-8. Stanford is good at avoiding being on the P12N apparently

Lets do Oregon St and Wazzu since Mtn called them out directly

Oregon St vs Boise St 1.25M
Wazzu vs Wisconsin 3.92M (lol almost more than CU's entire year)
Wazzu vs Oregon 2.27M (now they're definitely over CU)
Oregon St vs Stanford 1.08M
Wazzu vs USC 1.84M
Wazzu vs Utah 470k
Oregon St vs UW 1.13M
Oregon St vs ASU 484k
Wazzu vs UW 2.38M
Oregon St vs Oregon 3.56M
Wazzu vs Fresno St 2.4M
Oregon St vs Florida 2.45M

are we sure we're subsidizing them and not the other way around?

WSU is a program that gets ratings, most of which comes from being in the 10:30 ET slot a lot. It’s also not a coincidence that their best games are again Wisconsin, Oregon, SC and Washington. Fresno is curious, but I’d bet that game was Pac 12 After Dark with no competition.

Cal and Stanford play USC, UCLA and Notre Dame. That’s why their ratings are where they are. Obviously their market matters and helps, but not nearly as much as it should. Their ratings are mostly about opponent

 

[Victory]

I was thinking of the super league idea where you’d buy access like NFL Sunday Ticket. Here are the 46 teams I came up with + criteria:

State Flagships + AAU
Rutgers
Penn State
Maryland
Virginia
North Carolina
Florida
Ohio State
Texas
Indiana
Michigan
Missouri
Colorado
Texas
Illinois
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Iowa
Washington
Oregon
Cal

State Flagships + Non-AAU:
South Carolina
Kentucky
Georgia
Alabama
Mississippi
LSU
Tennessee
Oklahoma
Nebraska

Large “other” schools (mostly state schools):
Clemson
Florida State
USC
UCLA
Pitt
Michigan State
Purdue
Texas A&M
Notre Dame
Stanford
Mississippi State
Arizona State
Georgia Tech
Virginia Tech
North Carolina State
Oklahoma State
Baylor

Private academic schools (likely left out):
Duke
Northwestern
Vanderbilt

Left out:
TCU
Wake Forest
Boston College
Syracuse
San Diego St
Washington St
Oregon St
Iowa St
Kansas St
Central Florida
Cincinnati
West Virginia
Houston
Texas Tech
BYU

Why do it like this? Our strength is that we’re a state flagship AAU school. Only 20 of those. The next step down is a state flagship and those are mostly SEC schools. Then you have the “other” category. I initially didn’t have Ok St and Baylor bc BU is trash but in all fairness they would likely make the cut. So, 46 teams.

This isn’t organized in divisions, just by criteria.

Will this ever happen? Idk, the conferences plan their media deals so they don’t expire at the same time so contractually I’m not sure how this happens. Certainly won’t happen until B1G deal is up in 2030. We’re probably stuck waiting for B1G to add us vs this being a reality.

But we better f’ing hope this happens and with this criteria in mind when the time comes.

 

[Dark Bohner]

People have time on their hands.

 

[White_Rabbit]

WSU is a program that gets ratings, most of which comes from being in the 10:30 ET slot a lot. It’s also not a coincidence that their best games are again Wisconsin, Oregon, SC and Washington. Fresno is curious, but I’d bet that game was Pac 12 After Dark with no competition.

Cal and Stanford play USC, UCLA and Notre Dame. That’s why their ratings are where they are. Obviously their market matters and helps, but not nearly as much as it should. Their ratings are mostly about opponent

I'm just throwing the numbers out there, I'm sure there can be some reasons for everything. Obviously you're right, some of this is the opponent driving things, time slot, channel, etc. I will say,, I spotted Wisconsin getting some not so great ratings in other weeks, so I don't want to completely take that away from Wazzu.

Fresno was their bowl game

Now I mean, a real study of this would need to account for many years, controlling for variables like time slot and channel, etc. If memory serves CU did ok in the exercise Andy Staples did, but he did say Wazzu just does oddly well despite everyone thinking they're a major drag. Pirate years, P12 after dark, etc factors in, but still credit where it's due, their fans tune in to a decent degree.

 

[skibum]

Wait, are we Competing, like the old AFL-NFL, or aren't we all still able to get into the CFP if we have a viable 3rd conference?

48-60 teams are perfect for College Football.

My previous points about metrics and the NFL say that tough decisions would need to be made for a third conference, and if a Media property was smart, they would put up a lot of money to help FORM the third conference and not allow the existing conferences with the uneducated College Presidents make decisions.

Idiots are out losing money on the XFL or USFL or 3 on 3 basketball, and yet here is a superleague right in front of your eyes and somebody could make it work, somebody like Mark Cuban.

Now that would be a serious move.

I don't know who makes it. NBC or CBS maybe. I don't think it would be a vanity project for someone like Cuban.

But it'd sure be interesting.

To lay it out more explicitly:

Someone with serious media backing literally creates a new conference whole cloth. They recruit enough members of the ACC to kill off that grant of rights along with the top echelon of the Pac - and then go.

It'd be a pretty efficient way to jettison the bottom half of the conferences.

 

[4BienemyTDs]

Now that would be a serious move.

I don't know who makes it. NBC or CBS maybe. I don't think it would be a vanity project for someone like Cuban.

But it'd sure be interesting.

To lay it out more explicitly:

Someone with serious media backing literally creates a new conference whole cloth. They recruit enough members of the ACC to kill off that grant of rights along with the top echelon of the Pac - and then go.

It'd be a pretty efficient way to jettison the bottom half of the conferences.

Exactly
This thing is muddy with old conferences and loyalty without regard to real or future value