Well, the college football landscape continues evolving, but not in the ways I was expecting. So much for Superconferences as Texas and the nine other remaining Big 12 schools decide to stick together. As always, the issues revolve around money, but also involved are the conservative sentiments of never wanting to upset the status quo no matter ridiculous it may be. Heaven forbid the powers that be make changes that actually effect the game in a positive way; just take the cash instead.
Texas leads the charge to keep the Big 12 intact and vows "More Money!" in the process. It has long been a goal of Texas to have their own television station comparable to the Big Ten Network, but now in the new deal, the Big 12 will get its own network. Texas still wins out though because through some wacky logic, Texas (and Oklahoma and Texas A&M) get a bigger share of the Big 12's profits than the other schools in the Big 12. That was one of the reasons Nebraska cited as why they left the conference and it's also one of the reasons why Texas didn't make the jump to the Pac-10, because they would not have gotten that preferential share among a sixteen team league. And now since there are two less schools in the Big 12, that means slices of the pie don't have to be cut as thin, allowing all of the remaining schools to potentially make more money assuming Big 12 profits stay constant, which very well should happen in such a football-crazy part of the country. The ten team Big 12 does lose out of its lucrative Conference Championship Game sponsored by Dr. Pepper, but it should more than make up for it money-wise by creating their own television network and being able to sell advertising there.
In another bit of news/speculation, it is likely that Utah will become the next team to join the Pac-10. Expansion is not over. The Pac-10 looks to keep adding, not stopping at eleven teams and moving up to twelve to ensure a Conference Championship Game. The move will put Utah in a better standing for the BCS, now playing in a BCS conference rather than going undefeated and only getting a shot at some lesser bowl. The move does not help the Mountain West Conference though. They added Boise State last week, but now by losing Utah, the MWC is in much the same position as where they were with only two strong teams (Boise and TCU) instead of three.
Winners and losers of this second round of conference shake-ups:
Winners
Texas - They don't join the Pac-10 where they would get an equal share of conference profits, instead they stick to familiar territory where they can make bank on a new television network devoted to Big 12 coverage. They also get out of playing a conference championship game, one more opportunity to trip up National Title hopes.
Pac-10 - They are not the big winner they could have been, but they did accomplish what they set out to do, which was to expand to twelve teams and secure a Conference Championship Game.
Losers
Mountain West - They looked to be winners six days ago, but now that it appears Utah is on the move, they are right back in BCS purgatory. They could have had Utah, Boise State, and TCU battling each other, improving each others' strength of schedule, and made an even bigger run to BCS glory, but it was not meant to be.
And the biggest losers...
Everyone who wants to see a real National Champion, rather than just a team who computers say is pretty good.
--from Eric
No comments:
Post a Comment