Conference Realignment

[orientalnc]

I don’t think ND will ever join a conf, unless they get to a point where in-conf games increase and they can’t schedule any games with their traditional rivals or can’t get enough decent P4 matchups for SOS with other schools and miss the playoffs because of that.

ND stated last year that they planned to remain independent as long as they have a path to the CFP. That could change if the P4 become the P2 and teams have a full slate of in-conference games. But, I don't see that happening in the near future.

 

[UgaBlows]

ND stated last year that they planned to remain independent as long as they have a path to the CFP. That could change if the P4 become the P2 and teams have a full slate of in-conference games. But, I don't see that happening in the near future.

Yes, even then i believe there will always be a path for a 1-2 (or more if the playoffs expand) at-large highly ranked teams (G5 or independent) to get into the playoffs, it just depends on if ND could stand losing the ability to play USC, Stanford, etc

 

[MacDaddy2]

Something tells me they add 2 more befor eits said and done. Im guessing they will add Hawaii. And probably Idaho. if they expand to 10 i could see Nevada and New Mexico.

They are not adding Hawaii.....

 

[MacDaddy2]

As my daddy often told me…”We can’t all be winners, son. “

Can someone please tell me the infatuation with UVA. Check their all time winning percentage in football as well as their last five years.

 

[ChicagobasedJacket]

Can someone please tell me the infatuation with UVA. Check their all time winning percentage in football as well as their last five years.

Academics and the state of VA.

 

[SunBum]

ND stated last year that they planned to remain independent as long as they have a path to the CFP. That could change if the P4 become the P2 and teams have a full slate of in-conference games. But, I don't see that happening in the near future.

Their loss to Northern Illinois may have effectively ended their playoff hopes this year since they don't have a 'path' through a conference title. If it holds true, I wonder if that would have them re-think things?

 

[orientalnc]

Can someone please tell me the infatuation with UVA. Check their all time winning percentage in football as well as their last five years.

Well, to start with, they are a great university with even greater history. They are not attractive to the Big Ten because of their football success (or lack of same), but because they fit beautifully in the mold of a B10 member. And, they would cement a huge market for the conference TV contracts. And, with UNC, block the SEC.

 

[orientalnc]

Their loss to Northern Illinois may have effectively ended their playoff hopes this year since they don't have a 'path' through a conference title. If it holds true, I wonder if that would have them re-think things?

It didn't help, but I don't think it blocked them. It's early yet.

 

[iceeater1969]

Can someone please tell me the infatuation with UVA. Check their all time winning percentage in football as well as their last five years.

Best guess is have rich and powerful alumni. 2.5 hiur drive to DC.

(Best lawyer i ever worked with in my career was UVA grad.
He quickly made partner at top K street law office. In 98 same office advised uwhTHE CORRECT k street lobby frim to """pay""" so we could get ""PROPER ADVICE"" presidential border crossing permit. )

At some point DC maybe involved in College Sports. But as a school that will regularly excel in ft ball and have sidewalk fan appeal , they are a dog.

Oh, college presidents can get to be a broad of directors on really money making company if the have right contacts.

 

[Techster]

I know they suck big hairy-balls, but UNC (who also sucks all-time in FB) and Uva will likely be a duo that moves together. UVA is a state charter school, has money, AAU, academic prestige, and success in other sports, they won’t be left behind. The SEC and BIG will both be after that pair most likely.

UNC has had a standing offer from the SEC for decades. UNC's old AD admitted as much on a radio show years ago...I may have posted that interview on this forum at some time.

UNC and UVA both got offered by the B1G along with GT back in 2013. IMO, GT was the bigger domino in the ACC at the time given how much more important carriage fees and markets were at the time. Atlanta is the biggest market in the ACC, and would have cost the ACC a ton of money in carriage fees. I've speculated that UNC was desperate to keep GT in the ACC, and from what I've heard they were the ACC member that put the most pressure on Peterson to stay, because it would have forced UNC to leave the ACC given the revenue gap it would have cost the ACC to lose the Atlanta market's carriage fees.

Crazy how much could have changed had GT moved to the B1G.

 

[MountainBuzzMan]

UNC has had a standing offer from the SEC for decades. UNC's old AD admitted as much on a radio show years ago...I may have posted that interview on this forum at some time.

UNC and UVA both got offered by the B1G along with GT back in 2013. IMO, GT was the bigger domino in the ACC at the time given how much more important carriage fees and markets were at the time. Atlanta is the biggest market in the ACC, and would have cost the ACC a ton of money in carriage fees. I've speculated that UNC was desperate to keep GT in the ACC, and from what I've heard they were the ACC member that put the most pressure on Peterson to stay, because it would have forced UNC to leave the ACC given the revenue gap it would have cost the ACC to lose the Atlanta market's carriage fees.

Crazy how much could have changed had GT moved to the B1G.

This post is having me come around to un-equal revenue sharing. But add in carriage fees based on population density. FSU Can suck it

 

[orientalnc]

This post is having me come around to un-equal revenue sharing. But add in carriage fees based on population density. FSU Can suck it

The problem isn't carriage fees in Tallahassee. If FSU is the TV draw they claim, then the viewers are anywhere ESPN programming is available. But, currently FSU's market is all of Florida. That might change, but right now they have a large TV market.

 

[yeti92]

The problem isn't carriage fees in Tallahassee. If FSU is the TV draw they claim, then the viewers are anywhere ESPN programming is available. But, currently FSU's market is all of Florida. That might change, but right now they have a large TV market.

But they split that market with Miami, and all the NC schools split their market, and UVa and VT split their market.

 

[Techster]

This post is having me come around to un-equal revenue sharing. But add in carriage fees based on population density. FSU Can suck it

FSU has a large fanbase...they may actually have the largest national fanbase in the ACC.

However, their "attributable TV market" in terms of carriage fees would be interesting to break down given the presence of Miami and the delineation of TV markets by cities.

The three biggest TV markets in Florida are Tampa/ST Pete (#12 overall), Orlando/Daytona (#16), Miami/Ft Lauderdale (#18). They also have multiple other markets that rank in the top 60 US markets. If you want to say Florida as a whole, that would easily be the biggest TV market overall in the ACC. I'm not sure how that works with carriage fees if there's multiple TV markets in a state. Does the ACC/FSU get credit for the entire state, or is there a breakdown of which Florida markets are attributed to the presence of FSU...and which are attributed to Miami? Do all the markets go into a "pot" and FSU and Miami get credited? I'm sure there's a breakdown of this somewhere.

 

[orientalnc]

But they split that market with Miami, and all the NC schools split their market, and UVa and VT split their market.

I understand your point, but the ACC is the ESPN partner, not FSU or Miami. So all of Florida is an ACC market.

 

[iceeater1969]

When we collapsed the standard engineering company organization to a silo by sr partener ( like law office) , we cut everones base pay, had a large bonus pool from overall corporate split amount all, a silo bonus pool for direct profits, and a hero pool awarded by sr partners.
Still a team, but definitely unequal distributions. The teams members motivated the duds off the team. A star silo would generally make double. A hero got stock which years later during company sale when earning were giant. The sale was valued at 7 times earnings.

Anyway, tv money is at based on how much ad buyers think how many viewers watch and what they saw. Very unequal.

Gold flows down hill to the guy with best product. All will get base pay but some will get rewarded for better performances.

 

[RamblinRed]

ND has made it very clear it will not join a conference for Football as long as they have a legitimate way to the CFP.
As bad as the NIU loss is, if they were to go undefeated the rest of the way they would definitely make the CFP. Even a 2 loss ND is probably a 50/50 bet for the CFP.

This is not one of their stronger schedule years, but they still play 8 P4 teams and no FCS opponents (which they never play).

They also have an agreement with the ACC that if they were to join a conference for football it has to be the ACC. That of course could always be negotiated, but they would have to likely pay money to the ACC to go elsewhere. They are a party to the ACC GoR in all sports but Football. General rule of thumb is that media contracts are 80% for football, 20% for basketball.


The best case scenario for the ACC would of course be ND joining ACC in football. Likely wouldn't completely close the future gap, but it will get it closer and would likely put significant distance between the ACC and B12 in terms of money.

Also, keep in mind that all this talk about money gap has almost nothing to do with where things are right now and alot to do with where they will be in 5 years.
For FY 2023 ACC paid an avg of over $44M per member, SEC paid out an avg of $51M per member.

Money differences between the schools in the conferences are NOT primarily driven by the media contracts. They are driven by the difference in alumni/fanbase size. The B1G and SEC are made up primarily of large, state schools that have alumni and fanbase sizes much larger than most of the schools in the B12 and ACC.

How 'good' a schools football program is a secondary (maybe even a tertiary) consideration for the media contracts. The primary consideration is how many fans you have and what media markets you bring to the table (especially in terms of the B1G, SEC, and ACC who all have networks where the partner gets to charge a higher carraige rate if you have a school in a market).

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

ND has made it very clear it will not join a conference for Football as long as they have a legitimate way to the CFP.
As bad as the NIU loss is, if they were to go undefeated the rest of the way they would definitely make the CFP. Even a 2 loss ND is probably a 50/50 bet for the CFP.

This is not one of their stronger schedule years, but they still play 8 P4 teams and no FCS opponents (which they never play).

They also have an agreement with the ACC that if they were to join a conference for football it has to be the ACC. That of course could always be negotiated, but they would have to likely pay money to the ACC to go elsewhere. They are a party to the ACC GoR in all sports but Football. General rule of thumb is that media contracts are 80% for football, 20% for basketball.


The best case scenario for the ACC would of course be ND joining ACC in football. Likely wouldn't completely close the future gap, but it will get it closer and would likely put significant distance between the ACC and B12 in terms of money.

Also, keep in mind that all this talk about money gap has almost nothing to do with where things are right now and alot to do with where they will be in 5 years.
For FY 2023 ACC paid an avg of over $44M per member, SEC paid out an avg of $51M per member.

Money differences between the schools in the conferences are NOT primarily driven by the media contracts. They are driven by the difference in alumni/fanbase size. The B1G and SEC are made up primarily of large, state schools that have alumni and fanbase sizes much larger than most of the schools in the B12 and ACC.

How 'good' a schools football program is a secondary (maybe even a tertiary) consideration for the media contracts. The primary consideration is how many fans you have and what media markets you bring to the table (especially in terms of the B1G, SEC, and ACC who all have networks where the partner gets to charge a higher carraige rate if you have a school in a market).

Last year the CFP committee made it abundantly clear they more about TV ratings potential than rewarding on field records and championships. Notre Dame is a top 10 TV ratings team that draws eyeballs to the TV set. It's likely a 3 loss ND squad has a legit shot at the 12 seed.

 

[RamblinRed]

While I thought that FSU 'deserved' to get a CFP bid, the committee made it clear that their job was to try to pick the 4 'best' teams and without Jordan Travis it was obvious FSU was not one of those.
If Travis had not gotten injured I believe FSU would have gotten a bid.

 

[WreckinGT]

While I thought that FSU 'deserved' to get a CFP bid, the committee made it clear that their job was to try to pick the 4 'best' teams and without Jordan Travis it was obvious FSU was not one of those.
If Travis had not gotten injured I believe FSU would have gotten a bid.

ESPN was already pushing for FSU to be left out before Travis got hurt and if we are being honest, it's really really unlikely that the committee actually thought the 4 teams selected were all better than UGA. They just make up whatever they want as they go.