Conference Realignment

[Richard7125]

In what world does a Big 12 team want to join the ACC? If you are in the Big 12, SEC, or Big Ten right now, you are considered safe. It's Pac-4/ACC schools who are treading water right now (drowning, in the case of Wazzu and Oregon State).

This is an interesting perspective. The Big12 is clearly the #4 conference. In the past year, their conference has been pieced together with G5 schools and Pac12 left-overs. Their media deal is 75% of the ACC deal. Their conference is stable because none of the other conferences want any of their schools. That being said, there’s nothing wrong being the #4 conference. It actually might be a good thing for the Big12 that none of the other conferences want any of their schools.

 

[Southern psu fan]

There’s a lot going on right now in college football folks I hope somebody knows what they’re doing. I was hoping for 5 power conferences with 4 conference champs in the 4 team playoffs. The other conference champ can sit home and cry about why they didn’t make it but a little crying keeps us hungry for college football. I hate seeing teams like Alabama and TCU make the playoffs when they lose the last game of the season knowing what’s on the line that leaves a bad taste in my mouth

 

[Vespidae]

There’s a lot going on right now in college football folks I hope somebody knows what they’re doing. I was hoping for 5 power conferences with 4 conference champs in the 4 team playoffs. The other conference champ can sit home and cry about why they didn’t make it but a little crying keeps us hungry for college football. I hate seeing teams like Alabama and TCU make the playoffs when they lose the last game of the season knowing what’s on the line that leaves a bad taste in my mouth

There is no plan. It’s the college football equivalent of the Five Families fighting for control of turf before the Commission.

Pro sports have league commissioners, media experts etc who help organize the sport for the benefit of all. CFB doesn’t. It’s literally the Wild West and survival of the fittest.

 

[slugboy]

I’ve deleted politics-leaning comments. If you have an old reply that you’re dying to post, that’ll get recycled too.

For the people who think the ACC was caught napping, this backs up that opinion:

There is the ESPN factor, too. Both the SEC and the ACC have their financial backing from ESPN, which is in a kind of spending freeze. More games or new teams would both cut into the existing funds instead of generate new funds. B10 and B12 have more flexibility because of Fox and CBS.

Structurally, the underlying networks don’t look good. The argument for overpaying for football has always been that it’s a loss leader, and that NFL games will get people to stick around and watch Murder She Wrote afterwards. CBS’s top shows are Ghosts, Fire Country, and Survivor. ABC is showing “Press your Luck” in prime time. I don’t even know what NBC is doing other than bringing back “Law and Order”. College football games don’t seem likely to give a boost to a show about a retired person solving murders. CBS is trying to make Paramount streaming work, NBC is trying to make Peacock work, Fox has FX and Hulu (kinda).

Several factors killed the P12.

1. The B1G poached two of their most valuable brands in USC and UCLA to keep up with the TX/OU acquisition by the SEC
2. The P12’s media rights came up in the wrong year—ESPN is not buying, and no one else is really bidding for new contracts
3. Because of (2), the remaining stable P12 brands went looking for whatever they could get in existing contracts. B12 took the southwestern teams, and B1G took Oregon and Washington at a massive discount to their other teams. Oregon and Washington are making less than ACC teams.

I’m looking more at the state of the industry. I’m not worried—if ESPN folds, life will go on for me—but I think that the state of ESPN is a bigger risk than FSU’s lawyers.

 

[Vespidae]

I’m looking more at the state of the industry. I’m not worried—if ESPN folds, life will go on for me—but I think that the state of ESPN is a bigger risk than FSU’s lawyers.

The reality is the current TV model is dying .. and quickly. Beginning in 2013, cable TV started experiencing a loss of subscribers, and that loss has only grown wider since.

1. New competitors have emerged, challenging the legacy systems. Sling, Hulu, and others offer much less expensive alternatives to cable.
2. Consumers are no longer willing to pay for a plethora of channels that they don’t watch. And that’s where ESPN generates the fees needed to pay for media rights.
3. Few organizations have the clout to stream on their own. So, they will increasingly splinter into skinny bundles available to anyone with an Internet connection.
4. The costs of the legacy bundled cable subscriptions had grown so high that consumers are no longer willing to pay and are forgoing cable services all together. Between 1995 and 2005 cable bills increased three times faster than inflation, a highly unsustainable trend.
5. Americans are more wired today and prefer the ease and convenience of transitioning between devices like laptops, mobile phones, and wearable (watches) that broadband and wireless connections afford. The data backs up this transition. According to Nielsen, between 2014 and 2018, the percentage of broadband-only households has more than tripled. FWIW, with wired campuses, virtually no students are experienced using cable at all.

In ten years, maybe less, there will be no ESPN. There will be Saturday Ticket which you can buy and stream on any device you want for $150 a year. Theres going to be a massive change and whats about to happen to Washington State Is to going to be common.

 

[Northeast Stinger]

The reality is the current TV model is dying .. and quickly. Beginning in 2013, cable TV started experiencing a loss of subscribers, and that loss has only grown wider since.

1. New competitors have emerged, challenging the legacy systems. Sling, Hulu, and others offer much less expensive alternatives to cable.
2. Consumers are no longer willing to pay for a plethora of channels that they don’t watch. And that’s where ESPN generates the fees needed to pay for media rights.
3. Few organizations have the clout to stream on their own. So, they will increasingly splinter into skinny bundles available to anyone with an Internet connection.
4. The costs of the legacy bundled cable subscriptions had grown so high that consumers are no longer willing to pay and are forgoing cable services all together. Between 1995 and 2005 cable bills increased three times faster than inflation, a highly unsustainable trend.
5. Americans are more wired today and prefer the ease and convenience of transitioning between devices like laptops, mobile phones, and wearable (watches) that broadband and wireless connections afford. The data backs up this transition. According to Nielsen, between 2014 and 2018, the percentage of broadband-only households has more than tripled. FWIW, with wired campuses, virtually no students are experienced using cable at all.

In ten years, maybe less, there will be no ESPN. There will be Saturday Ticket which you can buy and stream on any device you want for $150 a year. Theres going to be a massive change and whats about to happen to Washington State Is to going to be common.

I confess I don’t keep up with this in any in-depth way because it gives me a headache to have to do work on something that used to be just recreation.

But I’m a little confused. I don’t use cable, use FireStick and utube tv. I get lots of channels I don’t want, so bundling still seems to be a thing. Hulu also bundles (90 or so channels) and carries ESPN, ACC etc.

Forgive me if I’m not paying careful enough attention to your argument but ESPN seems to be bundled with lots of streaming services and those services don’t seem to be going away.

I get that ESPN is having financial difficulty.

 

[Root4GT]

I think their football prowess fits right into the current level of play. UCF is the largest school in Florida and has pretty good recent success. Cincinnati has elevated itself to a quality program and WVU is as good as most any other ACC school. I think they would bring whatever current revenue stream they are receiving and doubt they would dilute the existing payouts of ACC schools. It might also open up grounds for a renegotiation of the current deal the ACC has with ESPN that could garner more money for the entire league.

How good they are at football is minor. It’s about bringing subscriptions and viewers. None of them do that. Besides WVU who was in the Big 12 already the other two joined as the Conference was desperate when Texas and Oklahoma jumped to the SEC. Had the PAC 12 collapse occurred before the Big invited Cincinnati, UCF and Houston I doubt they would have been offered. BYU would have been behind Utah on the invite list. AZ, AZST and Colorado are all much more valuable to the Big 12

 

[Vespidae]

I confess I don’t keep up with this in any in-depth way because it gives me a headache to have to do work on something that used to be just recreation.

But I’m a little confused. I don’t use cable, use FireStick and utube tv. I get lots of channels I don’t want, so bundling still seems to be a thing. Hulu also bundles (90 or so channels) and carries ESPN, ACC etc.

Forgive me if I’m not paying careful enough attention to your argument but ESPN seems to be bundled with lots of streaming services and those services don’t seem to be going away.

I get that ESPN is having financial difficulty.

Streaming isn’t profitable for pretty much anyone. As more people shift away from cable, it accelerates the decline in revenue for existing providers.

 

[BilldGopher]

Holding on to my Comcast remote as long as I can....very happy CFB consumer.

 

[CuseJacket]

 

[CuseJacket]

 

[Root4GT]

No one cares about softball players. LOL

 

[BilldGopher]

Meanwhile at the B12...

Arizona, Arizona State, Utah join Big 12: Programs follow Colorado departing Pac-12 before 2024 season

The Big 12 has swiped the entire group of 'Four Corners' schools from the Pac-12

www.cbssports.com

 

[airspace]

I'm guessing ASU goes to the BIG. Saw something where Stanford has hinted that they want to stay independent which I find interesting along with maybe ND and some others staying independent. It seems Nebraska fans would like to go back to Big 12 now that TX is gone, if that happens, ASU to BIG happens, then that would allow Utah to go to Big 12 with Nebraska to make it even 16 teams. We're now down to what happens to Stanford and CAL and once that is settled is it then off to the east to dismantle the ACC? I'm guessing yes. People might say Nebraska is not going to give up the bigger $ being in the BIG 10, answer, they may not have any choice. Nebraska lost their AAU membership, for those on here that may not know, AAU is a requirement of the BIG 10 to become and be a member of BIG 10.

Big 10 PREFERS AAU but it is not required. If a school is moving in the right direction academically (research is big one), the Big 10 would look favorably upon them. Nebraska lost their AAU and they are not going any where. They will tell you that the Big 10 has really improved them. Fans (some) might want the Big 12, but academicians want the Big 10 because of the stability it offers and rubbing shoulders with the various members of the Big 10. The academic collaboration is real and a benefit to all (Big 10 Cancer Consortium).

I can see FSU, Clemson not so much (but who knows). If either was offered, and if they were SMART, they would jump on it for the academic side for what the Big 10 can do for you as an institution. Ohio State generates about $200 million in sports revenue, research generates between $1.2 to $1.5 Billion (GT does quite well in research).

MSN

According to Action Network's Brett McMurphy, American Association of Universities (AAU) accreditation is "not a requirement" to join the Big Ten. While it's preferred, a source said academic achievement can be determined in a "variety of ways."

 

[RamblinRed]

First off, this is a sad day for college football. Losing a storied conference is not something to celebrate.

Second, i'm not worried about the ACC in the short term at all. At the end of the decade, maybe, but not right now.

What has happened over the last 2 weeks have shown a number of thing to be evident.
First, PAC made alot of mistakes and is now gone because of them. With a big assist from the B1G taking USC and UCLA and then B12 jumping them in line for TV contracts (basically B12 locked up the last of the content needed by the linear channels - ESPN, FOX, CBS, ABC, NBC now all have as much content as they need).

Second, we now have a much more real valuation of what college football programs are worth in this current environment - about $30M for a good program. B1G picked up OR and WA at a nice price. $30M to start and then a $1M increase each year until the next TV contract when all B1G schools will get a full share. That means in 7 years WA and OR will be making less than what the ACC is getting now (with much larger travel costs). That also explains why the ACC chose not to expand with PAC teams - they would have reduced the per team payout. B1G basically picked up WA and OR on the cheap after passing on them a yr ago.

Third, it appears the bubble has burst. Much like the financial crisis of 2008 where alot of the Mortgage models had as an assumption that home prices could never decrease (which was horribly wrong) - the idea that media deals are always going to increase is false. It is clear the ESPN does not have money to go bidding for schools. They likely could have had the PAC for less money than the B12 is getting, but they couldn't even afford that, or chose not to.

These 3 things also have huge implications for conference realignment in the short-to-medium term.
I think it makes it much less likely SEC will expand anytime soon, unless whoever they bring in is willing to come in at less than a full share. Since their primary contract is with ESPN, and ESPN is currently not in a great financial place, it makes it unlikely that the SEC can expand and keep their per school payouts at the current levels.

This is also something for teams that are whining (ahem, FSU) to think about, are you really as valuable as you think you are? They obviously believe they are worth $50-60M per year. But what we have seen this week suggests that is probably too high. I think they are worth more than WA and OR, but not $20-30M more - their viewership numbers do not support that (Their six year viewership avg is 33% higher than OR, and their 2020 viewership was 1/2 of Oregons). Probably worth more in the $40M range - which is basically what they are getting in the ACC.

 

[CEB]

Mentioned this a bit before, and still Not a Lawyer, but if FSU peaced out like “just sue us” I’d be immediately suing FSU, the new conference that took them, and the media companies with a deal with that conference. And two of those aren’t based in FL in the first place. Seems like your have room for an immediate injunction against all of them - the media companies if they were paying a conference for something the ACC has the right too, the conference for taking that money and distributing it to FSU, and FSU for trying to ignore the contract directly. Seems like a huge headache for the non-FSU parties to get involved in.

The Leach/state of Tx example doesn’t seem relevant cause Leach was in Texas as an employee of a Texas institution, vs a national web of contract relationships. And “we want this moved to FL so the legislature can get us out of it” doesn’t seem like it would fly in a suit filed against FSU in a different state or in federal court…?

If FSU walks, there is nothing the ACC needs to do. The ball is in FSU’s court to try to take their media rights with them. The ESPN agreement is with the ACC. The GOR gives all of the individual schools’ rights to ACC for the purpose of packaging and providing content to ESPN. The ACC receives payments from ESPN and in turn, distributes to each conference member. ACC controls the money, not the individual schools.
If FSU walks away, the ACC still owns the rights to their broadcast, still gives those rights to ESPN, still receives payment from ESPN, but when it’s time to distribute money, FSU no longer gets a cut.

FSU somehow needs to secure their media rights before leaving. How they do that is anyone’s guess. They can’t really just walk away and “take” anything with them. The ACC has their money already.

I suppose there is a scenario where they deny access to ESPN for programming, and ACC would have to pursue them but the circumstances to reach that point are ridiculously implausible

 

[CEB]

I'm guessing ASU goes to the BIG. Saw something where Stanford has hinted that they want to stay independent which I find interesting along with maybe ND and some others staying independent. It seems Nebraska fans would like to go back to Big 12 now that TX is gone, if that happens, ASU to BIG happens, then that would allow Utah to go to Big 12 with Nebraska to make it even 16 teams. We're now down to what happens to Stanford and CAL and once that is settled is it then off to the east to dismantle the ACC? I'm guessing yes. People might say Nebraska is not going to give up the bigger $ being in the BIG 10, answer, they may not have any choice. Nebraska lost their AAU membership, for those on here that may not know, AAU is a requirement of the BIG 10 to become and be a member of BIG 10.

My gut reaction is that Nebraska would be full on stupid to leave for the B12. Then there is a side of me that would absolutely love to see a school make a decision based on geography, tradition, commonality with other members, etc. At a time when everyone is seeing ONLY $$$$, it might be a refreshing first step toward common sense.
Cynic in me says I don’t think Nebraska will get there willingly. No idea of the BIG would force their hand though

 

[BilldGopher]

My gut reaction is that Nebraska would be full on stupid to leave for the B12. Then there is a side of me that would absolutely love to see a school make a decision based on geography, tradition, commonality with other members, etc. At a time when everyone is seeing ONLY $$$$, it might be a refreshing first step toward common sense.
Cynic in me says I don’t think Nebraska will get there willingly. No idea of the BIG would force their hand though

Have Nebbie family on Mrs. Billd's side and have gone to Lincoln 3 times since they joined the conference. No doubt how U Texas operated was a big motivator to leave the Big 12 but in general the fanbase is fine where they are. Because they still think they are a national powerhouse (not), their focus is on re-elevating the program in the strongest available conference, which is the B1G.

Agree with CEB they are going nowhere.

 

[RamblinRed]

FWIW, the original ACC Grant of Rights is available online. The only thing that changed in the 2016 update is the end date of the GoR.
It's beauty is in its simplicity. It is only 3 1/2 pages long.

https://wwwcache.wralsportsfan.com/asset/colleges/ncsu/2022/07/05/20361238/ACC-Grant-of-Rights-1-DMID1-5vgd1w2if.pdf

The key part is right at the beginning


"Each of the Member Institutions acknowledges that the grant of Rights during the entire Term is irrevocable and effective until the end of the Term regardless of whether the Member Institution withdraws from the Conference during the Term or otherwise ceases to participate as a member of the Conference,"

Basically this means that if a program choses to leave not only does it lose the money it would receive from the ACC media deal, they also forfeit any media rights money from their new conference.
It's basically a poison pill provision that makes any school that leaves not valuable to a new conference because that conference would not receive any media money from the new addition - it would all go to the ACC, since the ACC holds the media rights for that school.

Also, quite importantly, there is no mechanism within the GoR for a school to exit the GoR. Not like a coaching contract where they have to pay some sort of an exit fee. There is nothing there.
If you want to leave, you are going to have to go to court to try to force a way out. Good luck on that since every school has twice signed off on it willingly.

There is also nothing in it about needing a certain number of schools to vote to end it.

Finally, it has a provision that any new school has to agree to the GoR to join the conference.


Also, I guess the UNC AD had a meeting with the UNC athletic department yesterday where he said they have no plans to leave the conference, just to make it stronger.

 

[DvilleJacket]

This is really making me not care much for college football anymore. GC bout sucked the love out of it for me but Key gave me a glimmer of hope. Can you imagine being a Oregon State or Washington State fan right now? I could see Stanford being independent. No way in hell you should have teams on the west coast being apart of the big ten! No more Rose bowl! ACC should've added West Virginia when they had a chance and recently jumped on UCF and Cincinnati. Techs only shot at an invite is the Atlanta market