The Big 12 expansion groundswell

[Jeff Lebowski]

Bwahahahaha….

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[Jeff Lebowski]

Sorry, I forgot to add: SWISH!

[Uncle Ted]

Sorry, I forgot to add: SWISH!

LOL... BamaFan dropped this over at Utefans.

[Jeff Lebowski]

LOL... BamaFan dropped this over at Utefans.

Did LAU tell him to leave again?

[Omaha 680]

Pretzel logic. Condescend to the SEC from the Big 12? Aside from football, the SEC has had some strong research institutions. And no wacky religious schools. The B1G invited Nebraska before the AAU kicked it out. The B1G's due diligence is always shoddy.

I guess this belief could explain the confidence among Ute fans.

[Omaha 680]

Bwahahahaha….

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LOL hurt feelings. This combined with the Pac commish's whining yesterday (which Pac fans including Wilner somehow saw as a show of strength?) tells you all you need to know about the state of the conference. Get your affairs in order, PAC members. Over/under on remaining conference life is 18.5 months.

[Uncle Ted]

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This new P12 commish doesn’t seem much better than the old one.

[Uncle Ted]

Did LAU tell him to leave again?

They have entered the anger phase of the grief cycle. A year ago they were saying there were not teams in the Big12 worthy of being in their conference. Now, it’s all U$C fault for not raiding the Big12 when they had the chance.

[UVACoug]

The only thing stopping this is congressional hearings. Some dude who went to Mississippi State freaking out about rumors that his school is getting the boot.

It’s the only thing I thought that was going to keep the P12 together, California, Oregon and Washington politics. Now that UCLA is gone who knows. I can’t imagine when the ACC explodes that the politicians who are approving massive amounts of funding for state run schools are going to be cool with UNC being left out in the cold, or the donors that have pumped in 50mm are going to be happy.

It seems inevitable though 30-40 teams that are quasi NFL teams with loose affiliations with academic institutions and 100 D1 schools that will get 2-3 auto bids into the big bowl games.

And destroy all fan interest and fail. This makes no sense at all.

[UVACoug]

That's true in the short term; if Utah is in the Pac 12/Big12/ACC/Independent/Big Sky I am not going to watch the SEC because (a) they suck and (b) I have no affiliation with any of the schools. Same goes for the Big X.

But in the long term it changes who kids cheer for. I've raised my kids correctly and they love the Utes; but if they were in a second tier conference (which they are inevitably now that they aren't in the BIG X/SEC) I could see them loving the Utes AND loving some Big X team (like USC, ). The diehard 40-70 year olds aren't switching allegiances--we've already cast our lots. But the kids will in a heartbeat.

Or they just watch the NFL. The main reason college football and college basketball make money, despite the fact that they produce a inferior product when compared to the NFL and NBA, is because of their affiliation with colleges. Cut that tie, and they just become the minor leagues. How many people watch minor league baseball? Or D-league basketball?

[Moliere]

And destroy all fan interest and fail. This makes no sense at all.

I’ll be honest that I don’t think this is destroying college football, at least anymore than has already been happening over the past three decades. So basically, it’s not really destroying it at all since college football is as big now as it has ever been and is growing like crazy. Maybe that’s not the perception on the west coast but it certainly is happening in the south. People will still watch. As a BYU fan I still watch the playoff and even random games on saturdays. BYU has zero shot at a national championship yet I still watch. Utah has a 0.01% chance at a championship yet they still have fans.

[UVACoug]

I’ll be honest that I don’t think this is destroying college football, at least anymore than has already been happening over the past three decades. So basically, it’s not really destroying it at all since college football is as big now as it has ever been and is growing like crazy. Maybe that’s not the perception on the west coast but it certainly is happening in the south. People will still watch. As a BYU fan I still watch the playoff and even random games on saturdays. BYU has zero shot at a national championship yet I still watch. Utah has a 0.01% chance at a championship yet they still have fans.

Fan interest will be destroyed if you eliminate all but 40 teams from having a chance to compete, and then cut all the ties that those 40 teams have with their sponsoring Universities (as fusnik believes is inevitable).

[beefytee]

So basically, it’s not really destroying it at all since college football is as big now as it has ever been and is growing like crazy. Maybe that’s not the perception on the west coast but it certainly is happening in the south.

i wouldn’t say it is growing like crazy anywhere. The only thing that is growing is the contract sizes because cable is desparate for any content. Ratings aren’t going up. Attendance isn’t going up. Like you mentioned, it is becoming regionalized to the south and to a lesser extent the Midwest.

[Moliere]

i wouldn’t say it is growing like crazy anywhere. The only thing that is growing is the contract sizes because cable is desparate for any content. Ratings aren’t going up. Attendance isn’t going up. Like you mentioned, it is becoming regionalized to the south and to a lesser extent the Midwest.

I'm definitely biased living in a region that is crazy about college football and it helps I'm in SEC and Big12 country. There doesn't seem to have been a loss in interest, anecdotally. There's so much money floating around college football down here that it's crazy. Jimbo Fisher can raise $100MM just by snapping his fingers.

[fusnik]

And destroy all fan interest and fail. This makes no sense at all.

Is there really fan ‘interest’ outside of 40-50 programs? Not real fan internet to move the needle television/streaming wise.

Nobody cares about Indiana v Minnesota or Vanderbilt v Mississippi State or Cal v Wazzou.

People cared about Oklahoma and Texas against regional opponents yet Oklahoma and Texas decided to be second rate citizens in a conference that neither of them will win over the next 8-10 years.