The Big 12 expansion groundswell

[TripletDaddy]

My mailbox was full today! I had 3 advertisements, 1 bill and a flyer!

B12 here we come!

[LiveCoug]

B12 here we come!

Atta boy!

[Uncle Ted]

That looks like an empty mailbox!

That looks like aTm's mailbox (as in no invite from the SEC).

[USUC]

Much ado about nothing?

COLLEGE STATION – The Longhorn Network, more than a month before its scheduled start, already has at least one rapt audience: rival Texas A&M.
A&M has added a closed-door session concerning the Longhorn Network to its regents’ regularly-scheduled meeting on Thursday and Friday, a person with knowledge of the situation said Monday. The agenda item is dubbed “Big 12 Conference.”
The execution session will be informational only, including concerning UT’s plans to air a Big 12 football game on the ESPN-owned network, and to potentially air high school games, the insider said. No action will be taken, the person added, the regents will simply be informed of the latest by lawyers concerning the deep-pocketed network.
The insider said A&M is committed, for now, to making a 10-team Big 12 work, and that the threat of a potential move to the Southeastern Conference is not in the immediate future. The Aggies nearly bolted the Big 12 for the SEC last summer, after Nebraska left for the Big Ten and Colorado for the Pac-12, before last-hour financial pledges for the remaining members by Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe kept the league intact.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...#ixzz1SWQupvky

[Uncle Ted]

Much ado about nothing?

COLLEGE STATION – The Longhorn Network, more than a month before its scheduled start, already has at least one rapt audience: rival Texas A&M.
A&M has added a closed-door session concerning the Longhorn Network to its regents’ regularly-scheduled meeting on Thursday and Friday, a person with knowledge of the situation said Monday. The agenda item is dubbed “Big 12 Conference.”
The execution session will be informational only, including concerning UT’s plans to air a Big 12 football game on the ESPN-owned network, and to potentially air high school games, the insider said. No action will be taken, the person added, the regents will simply be informed of the latest by lawyers concerning the deep-pocketed network.
The insider said A&M is committed, for now, to making a 10-team Big 12 work, and that the threat of a potential move to the Southeastern Conference is not in the immediate future. The Aggies nearly bolted the Big 12 for the SEC last summer, after Nebraska left for the Big Ten and Colorado for the Pac-12, before.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...#ixzz1SWQupvky

"execution session." Yes, A&M should be executing someone.

Some more BYU-love posts on Orangebloods:

If Texas ends up in a super conference, more than likely it'll be one of our own making. We'll get together with Notre Dame and BYU, then decide whom else we want. The money would be even more absurdly phenomenal than we're already making.

Punt A&M, bring on ND, BYU and Arkie.

[KillerDog]

Lots of smoke out there concerning aTm possibly jumping to the SEC. Be interesting to see who the SEC wants as 12th team and what the Big 12 would do if this happens.

I thought the SEC already had 12 teams. Wouldn't aTm be their 13th? I can see aTm making the jump to the SEC but I can't figure why the SEC would want aTm to make the jump.

[New Mexican Disaster]

I thought the SEC already had 12 teams. Wouldn't aTm be their 13th? I can see aTm making the jump to the SEC but I can't figure why the SEC would want aTm to make the jump.

Presumably because it gets them into the state of Texas

[Donuthole]

I thought the SEC already had 12 teams. Wouldn't aTm be their 13th? I can see aTm making the jump to the SEC but I can't figure why the SEC would want aTm to make the jump.

Hack.

[Paperback Writer]

I thought the SEC already had 12 teams. Wouldn't aTm be their 13th? I can see aTm making the jump to the SEC but I can't figure why the SEC would want aTm to make the jump.

As NMD stated, to open the door wider to Texas prep recruiting. That's one thing that has hurt Arkansas when they bolted the SWC for the SEC and they have recently mitigated it by playing games against A&M in Cowboy Stadium. Arkansas, LSU, Ole Miss, Tennessee, etc. are eager to gain greater access to Texas recruiting.

There's also increasing the number of TV sets and getting Texas A&M into the SEC would bring a lot of TVs in the Houston and Dallas markets. The SEC could then re-negotiate their TV contracts with the networks.

The other school rumored to be going to the SEC with Texas A&M is Clemson.

That said, I don't think Texas A&M leaves the Big 12 unless Texas does something drastic and goes independent, which I don't think will occur since the Longhorns have other sports to schedule besides football and there will no longer be a Big 12 if they leave.

This is all posturing to try and place some limits on the Longhorn Network which is a big threat to Texas A&M. The Aggie concern is the extent that ESPN will go to to protect their investment in the Longhorn Network. ESPN is already buying a Big 12 games from FoxSports to add content (a 2nd football) game to the Longhorn Network. Where will it stop? Airing high school games is also a big worry. Just imagine the scenario where Mack Brown walks into a prep coaches office and starts talking about putting his team on TV for the whole country to see - and that it could happen if their 5-star QB who is leaning towards Texas A&M gets a heightened interest in the Longhorns. There's even talk that airing prep games on the Longhorn Network is against NCAA rules.

Anytime the Longhorns start shoving their weight around (and it is considerable) the Aggies pull out their "we'll go to the SEC card" because they know Texas won't join the SEC. The Longhorns counter with, "we'll just form our own conference" which is kind of laughable. Will be interesting to watch what happens because this is typical Texas politics.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I thought the SEC already had 12 teams. Wouldn't aTm be their 13th? I can see aTm making the jump to the SEC but I can't figure why the SEC would want aTm to make the jump.

They would get into Texas like NMD said and I think the SEC would figure there's a solid possibility that it would force UT's hand to also join. UT is one of the top 3 athletic programs in the country, it's a huge prize. Worst case scenario is that they would have the second biggest program in Texas, which is still very good. They'd have to find a fourteenth team in the SEC East and that would either be Miami, FSU, Georgia Tech or Clemson -- I'm wondering which team would be willing to leave the academically superior ACC. They would probably like to expand their footprint into North Carolina, but the only desirable programs are UNC and Duke (academics and basketball) and neither would leave the ACC. They could bypass North Carolina and just go for Virginia Tech.

[Mormon Red Death]

Let's say the crazy happens and TAMU leaves for the SEC. Why would the big 12 add another team? Besides 12 (which gives you the $$ making champ game) 9 is the optimal amount of teams for a conference. Each team gets 4 home and 4 away games + 4 OOC games. Basketball scheduling also becomes better with only 16 league games and you can reward the regular season winner of the conference with them playing the winner of the play in game.

[Uncle Ted]

As NMD stated, to open the door wider to Texas prep recruiting. That's one thing that has hurt Arkansas when they bolted the SWC for the SEC and they have recently mitigated it by playing games against A&M in Cowboy Stadium. Arkansas, LSU, Ole Miss, Tennessee, etc. are eager to gain greater access to Texas recruiting.

Arkansas' program has suffered since it left the SWC for SEC. They dropped from winning about about 70% of their games in the Holtz and Hatfield days to winning about 50%. They did have a pretty good season this last time but the near future doesn't look bright. Their Texas recruiting dropped off from about 60% to 10% of the team after making their move to the SEC. I think they would very much like to have better recruiting out of Texas again.

There's also increasing the number of TV sets and getting Texas A&M into the SEC would bring a lot of TVs in the Houston and Dallas markets. The SEC could then re-negotiate their TV contracts with the networks.

The other school rumored to be going to the SEC with Texas A&M is Clemson.

Yes, the A&M would be a big bargaining chip for the SEC for TV contracts.

That said, I don't think Texas A&M leaves the Big 12 unless Texas does something drastic and goes independent, which I don't think will occur since the Longhorns have other sports to schedule besides football and there will no longer be a Big 12 if they leave.

I can't see Texas going independent unless USC or some other big program goes independent as well. At the point the independents might as well form up into a conference with whoever is left out of the Big 12 break up. The other sports have to go somewhere.

This is all posturing to try and place some limits on the Longhorn Network which is a big threat to Texas A&M. The Aggie concern is the extent that ESPN will go to to protect their investment in the Longhorn Network. ESPN is already buying a Big 12 games from FoxSports to add content (a 2nd football) game to the Longhorn Network. Where will it stop? Airing high school games is also a big worry. Just imagine the scenario where Mack Brown walks into a prep coaches office and starts talking about putting his team on TV for the whole country to see - and that it could happen if their 5-star QB who is leaning towards Texas A&M gets a heightened interest in the Longhorns. There's even talk that airing prep games on the Longhorn Network is against NCAA rules.

Anytime the Longhorns start shoving their weight around (and it is considerable) the Aggies pull out their "we'll go to the SEC card" because they know Texas won't join the SEC. The Longhorns counter with, "we'll just form our own conference" which is kind of laughable. Will be interesting to watch what happens because this is typical Texas politics.

I don't think the idea of Texas forming a new conference is all that laughable if they can get ND, BYU, OU, OSU, KU, KSU, Tech, Missouri, and some other big program to join. If A&M left they could disband the Big 12 and drop Baylor and Iowa St in the process. A&M (and Rick Perry) would get all the blame for the breakup.

[byu71]

A&M (and Rick Perry) would get all the blame for the breakup.

Speaking of Perry, I don't know much about him so thought I would ask a Texas guy such as yourself about him.

Is he that good that the Almighty himself would call him and tell him to be President?

[Babs]

Speaking of Perry, I don't know much about him so thought I would ask a Texas guy such as yourself about him.

Is he that good that the Almighty himself would call him and tell him to be President?

Bear in mind that Texas is God's gift to the rest of the country.

FWIW, he's been governor for like twelve years now. Four terms or some such nonesense. He's likely to finally lose this time around, so he figures he'll just become president instead.

[Uncle Ted]

Speaking of Perry, I don't know much about him so thought I would ask a Texas guy such as yourself about him.

Is he that good that the Almighty himself would call him and tell him to be President?

The good thing about Perry is that he does a good job poaching jobs from california and other places and keeping the coyote population down. Other than that I don't care much for the aggie yell leader.