Every school would love to spend $5 million on the HC and another $2-3 million on coordinators. But they cannot, and not simply because they are budget conscious. Those are stark numbers to balance for the vast majority of schools.
Look, I understand the budget needs and demands and I'm fine with us not blowing money on coaches. I am in support of Tucker getting a big raise if we get back into the title chase to keep him however and think that is a wise investment.
But the on-field results which leads to fan engagement which leads to season ticket holders/donors is what is going to improve our financial situation in the long-run.
In 2009 the Big Ten TV contract paid out about $20 million per school, the SEC was $17 million. Next was the Big XII at $6.6 million, The ACC at $6.2 million, and the Pac-10 was at $5.3 million, Notre Dame was around $5 million (the Big East still had football back then and paid out just under $3 million per football school), the MWC was around $1.3 million, with the WAC at $444k.
The SEC had Alabama #1 (BCS NC) and Florida #3 in the top ten, with LSU 17th, and Ole Miss 20th.
The Big XII had Texas at #2, with Nebraska 14th, and Texas Tech 21st.
The Big Ten had #5 Ohio State, Iowa #7, Penn State #9, and Wisconsin 16th.
The ACC had #10 Virginia Tech, #13 Georgia Tech, #19 Miami, and #24 Clemson.
The Pac-10 had #11 Oregon and #22 USC.
That year Boise State finished 4th (WAC), TCU was 6th (MWC), Cincinnati (BigEast) 8th, BYU (MWC) 12th, Pittsburgh (BigEast) 15th, Utah (MWC) 18th, West Virginia (BigEast) 25th.
Lots of things have changed since then, but the revenue gap from TV has always been there between the SEC/Big Ten and everyone else. The Pac-12 were able to leapfrog everyone in 2010 with the expansion of CU/Utah, the CCG, and the market at the time; but the Big Ten, SEC, and Big XII played catch-up within the next few years and now the ACC is getting ready for their turn.
Money didn't affect the ability for teams to perform on the field, draw national interest back then and it still doesn't do it today. More people were talking about Boise State and TCU then were talking about Oregon, USC, Tennessee, Michigan, Texas A&M, Colorado, Washington, UCLA, Arizona State, etc. In fact, the on-field success of those teams so threatened the power conferences that they quickly cherry-picked the best programs in a "can't beat 'em; make 'em join you" free-for-all that reset the landscape of college sports.
All of those underachieving programs went on to improve their financial position by leveraging their on-field success/popularity into bigger paydays. Boise State joined the MWC and nearly joined the Big East (at the time a BCS-AQ conference); TCU joined the Big XII, Utah the Pac-12, Pittsburgh (along with Louisville and Syracuse) the ACC, and West Virginia the Big XII; with the exception of Cincinnati (who lost their coach to Notre Dame).
Now, you put great coaching at a program with great resources and you end up with dynasties like Bama, Clemson, Oklahoma, and Georgia. But that isn't the only route to doing it and no matter what, it has to be backed-up by on-field performance.
My whole point is that conference distributions have not been highly correlated with individual program success. But there has been a track record of success leading to higher distributions down the road; but you can't put the cart before the horse.
