ACC Big East merger

[Kolumbo]

Positive comments on the Pitt bourd. I was checking out their board to see details on the Jeff Capel post-game where Pitt and FSU almost came to blows

OT: Coach K idea on acc future

pittsburgh.forums.rivals.com

 

[uconndogs]

What would the Big Ten do with Kansas?

The ACC is what it will be for the next decade or so. Maybe someone joins but no one is leaving….you’ll note that FSU and Clemson have gotten pretty quiet.

Big state school and marquee hoops, but yeah, Kansas might very well be a pass.

It does look like the GOR is going to hold, but at some point I have to believe that the Big or maybe the SEC take UNC and Virginia off the table, much like they did with USC and UCLA.

 

[RedRabbit84]

Big state school and marquee hoops, but yeah, Kansas might very well be a pass.

It does look like the GOR is going to hold, but at some point I have to believe that the Big or maybe the SEC take UNC and Virginia off the table, much like they did with USC and UCLA.

Why would the SEC, an ESPN property, take those two schools from an ESPN property? Why would ESPN spend more for what they've already got? Why would ESPN let them go to Fox and the B1G? Given the changing landscape of media consumption, does Fox even have the resources? Every shift thus far has been adding inventory that wasn't already "claimed" by the two major media players. Why would this round be different?

 

[uconndogs]

Why would the SEC, an ESPN property, take those two schools from an ESPN property? Why would ESPN spend more for what they've already got? Why would ESPN let them go to Fox and the B1G? Given the changing landscape of media consumption, does Fox even have the resources? Every shift thus far has been adding inventory that wasn't already "claimed" by the two major media players. Why would this round be different?

Because the SEC would believe those schools would add value to future media deals whether that be with ESPN or other media outlets. It would be the SEC‘s decision as a conference, not ESPN.

 

[RedRabbit84]

Because the SEC would believe those schools would add value to future media deals whether that be with ESPN or other media outlets. It would be the SEC‘s decision as a conference, not ESPN.

What media partners beyond Fox or ESPN has the capital to play big league college sports? If they had the money, wouldn't they still be in the game?

See, on one hand you guys blame ESPN and Fox, but on the other there's posts like yours where you say it's up to the conferences. News flash: it's never up to the conferences. It's up to media partners, of which the pool is VERY limited.

 

[ZooCougar]

What media partners beyond Fox or ESPN has the capital to play big league college sports? If they had the money, wouldn't they still be in the game?

See, on one hand you guys blame ESPN and Fox, but on the other there's posts like yours where you say it's up to the conferences. News flash: it's never up to the conferences. It's up to media partners, of which the pool is VERY limited.

What school are you a fan of?

 

[ZooCougar]

Why would the SEC, an ESPN property, take those two schools from an ESPN property? Why would ESPN spend more for what they've already got? Why would ESPN let them go to Fox and the B1G? Given the changing landscape of media consumption, does Fox even have the resources? Every shift thus far has been adding inventory that wasn't already "claimed" by the two major media players. Why would this round be different?

Isn’t that EXACTLY what the ACC/ESPN did when they raided the Big East.

They are betting that a school is worth more in ratings in a new conference than they are in the present conference.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Isn’t that EXACTLY what the ACC/ESPN did when they raided the Big East.

They are betting that a school is worth more in ratings in a new conference than they are in the present conference.

The early raids were typically driven by TV contracts. ESPN had signed one with the ACC, and the Big East was going to be negotiating a new one in 2004 or 2005. The Big East was coming off a bad contract because Miami had been in NCAA enforcement purgatory when the Big East negotiated the deal from the 90's, and Rutgers and Temple were both terrible. The rest of the schools were in competitive lulls other than Virginia Tech, which was rural and didn't have a big following. ESPN didn't want to pay the Big East a market deal in 2005, so it thought it could raid the league and slit its throat, getting the league to take less by raiding 3 schools.

ESPN convinced the BCS to start forcing the Big East out, and then the anti-trust suit hit. There is a 100% the Big East would have been kicked out of the BCS if Connecticut and other states didn't threaten the BCS with an anti-trust lawsuit. That threat kept the Big East as a major conference despite only adding Louisville, Cincinnati, USF, Marquette and Depaul. The Big East crushed it for the next 5+ years in both football and basketball.

Then the next TV contract was on its way in 2012 or so, and rumors were that the Big East was expecting a similar deal to the ACC's for the football schools. So ESPN struck again, raiding the league. Ironically, this raid went very sideways for ESPN, and it ended up wildly overpaying for Pitt, Louisville, Syracuse, WVU and Rutgers compared to what it would have cost to just hold the Big East together. The basketball schools left to a different network, costing ESPN a lot of content and putting a credible competitor in business for weeknights in the winter. UConn, USF and Cincinnati drew the short straws.

The next major raid? When the Pac 12 was coming back to market. The Pac 12 was talking to Apple, so ESPN and Fox raided UCLA and USC, and then picked over the carcass of the Pac 12, once again paying a lot more to raid the league than it would have cost to keep it together. There is not a TV contract coming up for negotiation to trigger a new round of realignment. If anything happens in the near-term, it will be because the conferences are jockeying to impose or defend against a P2 from forming.

22 years ago, ESPN/ABC was the only show on town for college sports. Now there are a lot of players, and fewer conferences. ESPN's constant raids have flipped the dynamic where now ESPN needs to dance if the SEC tells it to dance, because ESPN is in big trouble if it ever loses all that content. CBS/Paramount, NBC/Peacock, Fox, Hulu/ABC/ESPN, Apple, Amazon and Warner/Max all want live content, and ESPN's litany of stupid decisions going back decades have shrunk the market.

While counting on ESPN to be smart is generally a bad idea, ESPN does have an incentive to try to keep the Big 10 or SEC from doing something really stupid that will kill the overall product.

 

[RedRabbit84]

What school are you a fan of?

Not relevant. I'm not here to cheer on my team, I use a different message board for that. I'm here to discuss realignment, and while I know the flavor of the week around here is to try and dunk on the ACC, I don't think things are as bad as you'd like to believe. I presented honest questions to which you'd rather laugh at than answer. It's fine. I'm familiar with you on here and how you operate.

 

[RedRabbit84]

The early raids were typically driven by TV contracts. ESPN had signed one with the ACC, and the Big East was going to be negotiating a new one in 2004 or 2005. The Big East was coming off a bad contract because Miami had been in NCAA enforcement purgatory when the Big East negotiated the deal from the 90's, and Rutgers and Temple were both terrible. The rest of the schools were in competitive lulls other than Virginia Tech, which was rural and didn't have a big following. ESPN didn't want to pay the Big East a market deal in 2005, so it thought it could raid the league and slit its throat, getting the league to take less by raiding 3 schools.

ESPN convinced the BCS to start forcing the Big East out, and then the anti-trust suit hit. There is a 100% the Big East would have been kicked out of the BCS if Connecticut and other states didn't threaten the BCS with an anti-trust lawsuit. That threat kept the Big East as a major conference despite only adding Louisville, Cincinnati, USF, Marquette and Depaul. The Big East crushed it for the next 5+ years in both football and basketball.

Then the next TV contract was on its way in 2012 or so, and rumors were that the Big East was expecting a similar deal to the ACC's for the football schools. So ESPN struck again, raiding the league. Ironically, this raid went very sideways for ESPN, and it ended up wildly overpaying for Pitt, Louisville, Syracuse, WVU and Rutgers compared to what it would have cost to just hold the Big East together. The basketball schools left to a different network, costing ESPN a lot of content and putting a credible competitor in business for weeknights in the winter. UConn, USF and Cincinnati drew the short straws.

The next major raid? When the Pac 12 was coming back to market. The Pac 12 was talking to Apple, so ESPN and Fox raided UCLA and USC, and then picked over the carcass of the Pac 12, once again paying a lot more to raid the league than it would have cost to keep it together. There is not a TV contract coming up for negotiation to trigger a new round of realignment. If anything happens in the near-term, it will be because the conferences are jockeying to impose or defend against a P2 from forming.

22 years ago, ESPN/ABC was the only show on town for college sports. Now there are a lot of players, and fewer conferences. ESPN's constant raids have flipped the dynamic where now ESPN needs to dance if the SEC tells it to dance, because ESPN is in big trouble if it ever loses all that content. CBS/Paramount, NBC/Peacock, Fox, Hulu/ABC/ESPN, Apple, Amazon and Warner/Max all want live content, and ESPN's litany of stupid decisions going back decades have shrunk the market.

While counting on ESPN to be smart is generally a bad idea, ESPN does have an incentive to try to keep the Big 10 or SEC from doing something really stupid that will kill the overall product.

Overall, I think you're right. Where we disagree is where you say ESPN has to dance is the SEC says. Quite the opposite. ESPN is still putting out the checks the SEC is relying on. Could the SEC go elsewhere? Possibly, but where? Fox is so bad off they're basically having a fire sale of their inventory outside of sports (again, selling a large chunk to ESPN's parent company) and if CBS had the money, they would've never gotten outbid to begin with.

And it makes zero sense for ESPN to pay more for what it's already got, especially when you can monetize what you've got more with things such as rivalry week and say, an ACC/SEC challenge in basketball. They don't need to move schools from one conference to another to get the benefit of those schools playing each other, and if they played each other regularly you lose the appeal that makes it valuable to begin with.

I genuinely think the next round of shifting is going to be more basketball driven, which even to me would've been inconceivable two years ago. That's good news for a school like UConn. Not sure why the quickness to belittle my points when they're all good news for your program.

 

[ZooCougar]

Not relevant. I'm not here to cheer on my team, I use a different message board for that. I'm here to discuss realignment, and while I know the flavor of the week around here is to try and dunk on the ACC, I don't think things are as bad as you'd like to believe. I presented honest questions to which you'd rather laugh at than answer. It's fine. I'm familiar with you on here and how you operate.

So you’re BC fan. Got it. Thanks Mike.

 

[CL82]

Not relevant. I'm not here to cheer on my team, I use a different message board for that.

Seriously? What are you afraid of?

We're pretty easy going here.

 

[ZooCougar]

Seriously? What are you afraid of?

We're pretty easy going here.

He’s like these people on Reddit CFB talking and not having a flair. Can’t take these people seriously.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Seriously? What are you afraid of?

We're pretty easy going here.

I would have asked "what message board is that?".

 

[UConnDan97]

Seriously? What are you afraid of?

We're pretty easy going here.

... I'm guessing "BC"...

 

[RedRabbit84]

I'm not afraid of anything, I'm just not interested in shifting the conversation from realignment to school affiliations. My counter question is why do you care so bad? It's utterly irrelevant to the conversation at hand. All I'll say on the topic is I couldn't really care any less about BC and think UConn would've done more with their place in the ACC.

 

[ZooCougar]

I'm not afraid of anything, I'm just not interested in shifting the conversation from realignment to school affiliations. My counter question is why do you care so bad? It's utterly irrelevant to the conversation at hand. All I'll say on the topic is I couldn't really care any less about BC and think UConn would've done more with their place in the ACC.

Because it informs your bias.

 

[Huskybite]

... I'm guessing "BC"...

Pitt

 

[HuskyHawk]

I think this is all moot. Here's my prediction.....

The BiG and SEC will soon take some combination of UNC, Virginia, FSU, Clemson (maybe) and Kansas (maybe). That throws the ACC up in the air and raises the bigger question of whether the Big12 and ACC can even compete with the BiG and SEC financially for talent. Depending on answer to that question it could separate the P2 from everyone else.

The next logical step from that is how institutions such as Miss. State sit at the table. I think I know where that ultimately ends....

I'll say what I've been saying. The ACC isn't losing schools to the SEC or B1G (because they don't want any of them) not to the Big XII, because it's in worse shape than the ACC. FSU didn't start whining because it really wanted to play Oklahoma State and TT.

Nobody is dumping Miss State or Northwestern or Vandy unless and until FBS tier 1 breaks away from the NCAA. That's the seismic event that could happen. Why would it? Because I think most of these schools have very little desire to keep pumping money into football programs that lose money (which is most of them). It would move the very top tier of FBS outside the conference structure altogether. Then the conferences can realign in a way that reduces travel cost and time for student athletes.

 

[CL82]

Because it informs your bias.

Exactly. It helps us understand the points he's trying to make and helps us to communicate with him more effectively.

It's a weird. I don't think I've ever seen a fan so embarrassed of his rooting interest that he wouldn't admit to it! It's kind of sad when you think about it.

 

[Hogoff]

Not relevant. I'm not here to cheer on my team, I use a different message board for that. I'm here to discuss realignment, and while I know the flavor of the week around here is to try and dunk on the ACC, I don't think things are as bad as you'd like to believe. I presented honest questions to which you'd rather laugh at than answer. It's fine. I'm familiar with you on here and how you operate.

Which message board?

 

[RedRabbit84]

I'm not embarrassed, nor scared. I'm trying to stay on topic, and y'all are... Well, I've seen this here before. "Chill" isn't exactly the word I'd use to describe UConn fans.

Look, I honestly don't care if UConn makes it into a power conference or dies on the vine. Truthfully, it makes zero difference to me either way. But from what I've heard, what's out there publicly regarding the desire for the A4 to control the tournament, and from what any layman can piece together about the state of media rights across the board... I think UConn has a better chance than ever at getting in.

If you guys would rather crap on that idea and worry more about who I cheer for on Saturdays, that's really weird to me... But you do you, I guess.

 

[ZooCougar]

I'm not embarrassed, nor scared. I'm trying to stay on topic, and y'all are... Well, I've seen this here before. "Chill" isn't exactly the word I'd use to describe UConn fans.

Look, I honestly don't care if UConn makes it into a power conference or dies on the vine. Truthfully, it makes zero difference to me either way. But from what I've heard, what's out there publicly regarding the desire for the A4 to control the tournament, and from what any layman can piece together about the state of media rights across the board... I think UConn has a better chance than ever at getting in.

If you guys would rather crap on that idea and worry more about who I cheer for on Saturdays, that's really weird to me... But you do you, I guess.

Trying to throw us off with “y’all” huh. Been done here. Definitely BC.

Also you aren’t saying anything that people here haven’t already been saying.

 

[CL82]

I'm not embarrassed, nor scared. I'm trying to stay on topic, and y'all are... Well, I've seen this here before. "Chill" isn't exactly the word I'd use to describe UConn fans.

Look, I honestly don't care if UConn makes it into a power conference or dies on the vine. Truthfully, it makes zero difference to me either way. But from what I've heard, what's out there publicly regarding the desire for the A4 to control the tournament, and from what any layman can piece together about the state of media rights across the board... I think UConn has a better chance than ever at getting in.

If you guys would rather crap on that idea and worry more about who I cheer for on Saturdays, that's really weird to me... But you do you, I guess.

Wow, that's a whole lot of words instead of just saying "BC" (or whatever.). One wonders why it's so important to you to hide your rooting interest that you'd rather resort to lengthy word salad. Aren't fans supposed to be proud of their teams?

 

[KryHavok]

"Chill" isn't exactly the word I'd use to describe UConn fans.

From 1/16/25:

I do try to be respectful though, cause it's y'all's house.

From 8/25/24:

That said, I recognize I'm in someone else's house, and I'm not here to bash UConn either.

Mate, relax. Yes, you're in us all's house, but you don't need to come across as abrasive or defensive either. We have Big 10 posters here that don't ruffle feathers, and we get Big12 posters that are more annoying than an arse zit. You've posted that you've been reading our threads for a long time, then you should know that we continue to get crapped on by other fansbases despite us having great success in basketball and decent results in football (just forget 2013-2021), with the goalposts of success always being moved. @ZooCougar is a passionate UConn fan, and @CL82 is one of the most easy going posters here. They don't bite (much, or at least not without reason), but they don't suffer fools either. If you don't want show your team colors, no problem, but it does suggest you're hiding something (then again, we use anonymous handles to mouth off for sports, which is good so that we don't end up like that idiotic Philly fan who got fired and banned for mouthing off to a female Packers fan).

As for your assertion that you see UConn is "in" somewhere, well, I hope you're right, but we've lived through too many door slams to be fooled. As some posters have said, I'll believe we're in when I see a different conference logo on our fields and uniforms.