College basketball value in large markets

[Carl Spackler]

Carl, I don't question that some people (most likely A-10 sources) are saying this but I remember when the A-10 claimed they had surpassed the BE and that by adding a school in NYC (Fordham) the college basketball world would soon realize this as well.

Saying what fairfield?

THe deal is done. THey've been talking about it for a long time. A-10 had their media day in brooklyn. The A-10 tourney will basically be scheduled head to head with ACC throughout and the A-10 will play early friday games, but no late friday games, adn play saturday day games and final on sunday.

There's a HUGE interest in brooklyn for this, and if the networks get behind to pump it? Who knows.

Swofford and the ACC? Begging to get into NYC. The greenboro contract ran out, and they all left him and the ACC standing on the curb.

 

[whaler11]

I've enjoyed reading this discussion Pudge. I'm sure I'm not the only one.


The current value of college basketball in the large northeastern markets, when it comes to sports broadcasting, will be reality in the not too distant future.

Yet the A-10 with their huge arrival into NYC are getting a contract that amounts to what ESPN could find between their couch cushions.

They already know their reality and the reality is their games on television are almost worthless.

 

[Pudge]

Since every Press Release states that the terms of the contract will not be released, I wonder how you think you know what they are getting?

The funny thing about all this ... as you grump/moan/whine away ... is that this will all be wrapped up in weeks. We'll see that you don't know duck all about Markets. Or Basketball.

Personally, I take comfort from what is happening with the Atlantic 10. It sets up a Platform on two networks without the initials ESPN for Basketball content. The Big East Basketball will get an increment over the A-10 and probably 80% of the ACC. The Big East Football will get an increment over the Brett McMurphy postured figure ... and about 70% of what the ACC gets. The total to UConn will be in the $12-15m range suggested in early August; that will allow us to fight forward as we need. And, it will be significantly higher than we might have gotten 1 year earlier because of the changing Market.

The irrefutable arc of the Big East conference is that most Schools that join the Hoop or the Football get markedly better. Some with big leaps. I don't think a Ben Howland, Jay Wright, Tom Crean, Leonard Hamilton, John Beilein would have chinned themselves up to a higher status ... unless this incredible Conference forced them to compete at their highest level. Don't compete ... and you look foolish for a half decade. And, it made Jim Calhoun ... as much as his internal fire did. I don't know why the BC/Miami/VaTech programs don't get better when they go to an ACC; but I hope/pray that continues.

I fully expect whaler & about 6 others to complain for the next decade. We just saw the Syracuse fanbase have the same phenomena.

 

[whaler11]

Since every Press Release states that the terms of the contract will not be released, I wonder how you think you know what they are getting?

The funny thing about all this ... as you grump/moan/whine away ... is that this will all be wrapped up in weeks. We'll see that you don't know duck all about Markets. Or Basketball.

Personally, I take comfort from what is happening with the Atlantic 10. It sets up a Platform on two networks without the initials ESPN for Basketball content. The Big East Basketball will get an increment over the A-10 and probably 80% of the ACC. The Big East Football will get an increment over the Brett McMurphy postured figure ... and about 70% of what the ACC gets. The total to UConn will be in the $12-15m range suggested in early August; that will allow us to fight forward as we need. And, it will be significantly higher than we might have gotten 1 year earlier because of the changing Market.

The irrefutable arc of the Big East conference is that most Schools that join the Hoop or the Football get markedly better. Some with big leaps. I don't think a Ben Howland, Jay Wright, Tom Crean, Leonard Hamilton, John Beilein would have chinned themselves up to a higher status ... unless this incredible Conference forced them to compete at their highest level. Don't compete ... and you look foolish for a half decade. And, it made Jim Calhoun ... as much as his internal fire did. I don't know why the BC/Miami/VaTech programs don't get better when they go to an ACC; but I hope/pray that continues.

I fully expect whaler & about 6 others to complain for the next decade. We just saw the Syracuse fanbase have the same phenomena.

That's the beauty - we'll see.

I know I turned on NBCS on Monday night and their programming was The Natural back to back in prime time. A 28 year old movie that was on AMC the last two weeks. Yet so many think salvation lies within.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Hey Pudge - did you read that? Somebody wrote on a internet chat board, that on a Monday night, they tuned into NBCS to see what was on.

 

[whaler11]

Hey Pudge - did you read that? Somebody wrote on a internet chat board, that on a Monday night, they tuned into NBCS to see what was on.

Yeah someone who knew in the middle of the busiest sports season of the year they would find someone to mock.

 

[Marty Jackson]

That's the point. They don't replace either school. I'm not saying any school would have or that teh Big East made poor additions. I understand the additions. The point was simply the Bigi East is weaker now. Probably weaker than most want to admit. Notre Dame's recent history is better than Temple's and Memphis is a huge wildcard post-Calipari (and were not that great before him). That leads me into my next point...




The assumption that the Big East will continue to be what it was. I've said repeatedly the Big East WAS the best conference. And I'd concede that recruiting is easier when you can promise the ability the play in an elite conference. Its for the same reason that the SEC overall recruits well in football. But the Big East was not light years ahead of everyone. They weren't placing 6 teams in the Elite Eight. They were merely better than everyone else. But now? They've lost a bunch and now they are probably not the best. Sure, it could still be the best conference in a given year, but likely not as consistently as before. And that logically it could be believed that less recruits end up in the Big East as a result.

I don't buy the idea the Pittsburgh falls apart and some other school rises merely because of a switch of conference. The dominance of the Big East is not static. The conference level exits because of the individual schools being good. Not visa versa. If a good program leaves, the conference does not make another one instantly better. Instead, the overall talent level declines. And it's quite possible that trickles down to the recruitment level and turns a few players away to other schools.

Although Louisville is a terrible example. You want to argue Louisville wasn't as good pre-Big East. Ask the 1980 and 1986 Championship squads. Lousiville has a long record of success. It was in a low point just towards the end of Crum's career and it's gotten better. But they were always good.

Some platitude of not believing in losing is BS. So other conferences fully believe in losing? The Big East's level of competition was high. And that is hard to compete with. But it may not always be that high if good schools leave. And decent schools are not guaranteed to become awesome. Memphis does have some nice pieces in place. But who knows if they can be really good or not. It's not automatic.

nobody knows the the future...
We can all sit here and debate about the future and what will happen. Truth is, nobody knows.
I would like to believe the BE has enough teams to remain a top BB conference. At any give year, there are 4-5 teams that could be Top 10. We easily have 6-7 that are vying for a Top 25 ranking.
Pitt, WV, ND, and Syr are gone...
It's up to other programs to step up now and fill the void. the opportunity is there for Depaul, PC, Seton Hall, SMU, UCF, and USF to leverage the BE conference to grow their programs if they choose.

 

[zls44]

Yet so many think salvation lies within.

NBCSN crawled 500 yards through something so foul I don't even want to comprehend. And they still smell like crap on the other side.

 

[freescooter]

I'm absolutely perplexed at the attitude here. Did you not just watch Jim Calhoun BE climb over 26 years? Pitt & WVU & Georgetown & Marquette ... all have grown in MBB because of this conference. USF just had their finest year.

Are you just dense?

BE Basketball has been launching pad for Programs. It ain't close to the A10. WVU will be severely challenged to match their success in the B12. There's no guarantee. But, Houston is well positioned. If you match conference with a good Program builder & $$$ ... You can rise.

Pudge, Maquette went to the final four 2 year before they joined the Big East...Georgetown was a powr pre-big east and has been a semi-big ime program since 1985...1 Final Four since then...they are basically what they were. You want to argue Pitt, ok. We've previously discssed West Virginia...You wan tot argue UConn, ok...but as many program have gone down hill...Providence, St Johns, DePaul has foundered...It is sort of amazing how you make these things up...

 

[Pudge]

Pudge, Maquette went to the final four 2 year before they joined the Big East...Georgetown was a powr pre-big east and has been a semi-big ime program since 1985...1 Final Four since then...they are basically what they were. You want to argue Pitt, ok. We've previously discssed West Virginia...You wan tot argue UConn, ok...but as many program have gone down hill...Providence, St Johns, DePaul has foundered...It is sort of amazing how you make these things up...

Will you use Crayon next time?

I am not making this up. We (UConn ... Jim Calhoun) are the best example. But Providence & Seton Hall & St. John's have had high-water marks in this conference. When they aren't good (and that generally means they can beat 11 Atlantic 10 schools), they get embarassed in the Big East. Marquette, I would argue, has been far better since their 2004 inclusion than the previous 8 years. (Cream & Buzz Williams are pretty good). This Conference just forces Programs to play at the Nation's highest level in Hoop. Football? Cincinnati, Louisville, USF, Rutgers & UConn are all better Programs than in 2003.

So ... you need to argue that it won't happen in the future? OK ... because the historical evidence is not convincing. (and I don't give a frig about Hot Rod Hundley in 1959 ... that's not nearly as relevant as the Phi Slamma Jamma. Yes, suddenly schools had Black players.)

 

[whaler11]

In 2003 UConn beat the MAC teams on their schedule. They even used to beat Western Michigan back then - and WMU had a first round pick on their defense!

 

[frankthetank]

This is one of the strangest arguments that I've seen on a message board as it looks like everyone is talking past each other.

Will the Big East still be a good-to-great basketball conference? Yes. Will it be better than what it was this past decade? Very unlikely.

The fallacy of the argument that just because Pitt, WVU and others rose up in the basketball ranks during their time in the Big East means that the new conference members will do the same is that such rise was dependent upon schools like Syracuse being members (as opposed to simply the Big East label). It was the critical mass of a large number of great basketball teams playing each other at the same time that created an aura around the Big East, but now a number of those great basketball teams are going away (which means that the same critical mass isn't there anymore).

There is also a major difference between the ACC raid of Miami/VT/BC that didn't take any good basketball schools away (and who were replaced by a legit basketball power (Louisville) and 3 other schools with historical basketball tradition (Marquette, Cincinnati and DePaul)) versus the losses over the past year where the Big East lost 4 upper tier basketball programs. The Big East was able to clearly and unambiguously improve in basketball after the 2003 ACC raid, which isn't going to be the case after these latest defections. At the same time, the BCS era of the last 15 years, despite being about football, has fundamentally changed how basketball works since schools such as St. John's, Georgetown and Villanova no longer have anywhere near the advantages in facilities and TV coverage that they had in the 1980s and early 1990s. The SMUs and UCFs of the world can't leverage those Catholic schools in the future in the same manner that Pitt and WVU were able to do in the past.

To be clear again, the Big East will still have an excellent basketball conference. However, no one should kid themselves that the latest Big East expansion was anything other than a triage measure (as opposed to actually believing that Temple and Memphis could replace the value of Syracuse and Pitt). The defections over the past year directly impact Big East basketball much more than the ACC raid of 2003, so it's far too simplistic to believe that the Big East label in and of itself will overcome all of that.

 

[freescooter]

This is one of the strangest arguments that I've seen on a message board as it looks like everyone is talking past each other.

Will the Big East still be a good-to-great basketball conference? Yes. Will it be better than what it was this past decade? Very unlikely.

The fallacy of the argument that just because Pitt, WVU and others rose up in the basketball ranks during their time in the Big East means that the new conference members will do the same is that such rise was dependent upon schools like Syracuse being members (as opposed to simply the Big East label). It was the critical mass of a large number of great basketball teams playing each other at the same time that created an aura around the Big East, but now a number of those great basketball teams are going away (which means that the same critical mass isn't there anymore).

There is also a major difference between the ACC raid of Miami/VT/BC that didn't take any good basketball schools away (and who were replaced by a legit basketball power (Louisville) and 3 other schools with historical basketball tradition (Marquette, Cincinnati and DePaul)) versus the losses over the past year where the Big East lost 4 upper tier basketball programs. The Big East was able to clearly and unambiguously improve in basketball after the 2003 ACC raid, which isn't going to be the case after these latest defections. At the same time, the BCS era of the last 15 years, despite being about football, has fundamentally changed how basketball works since schools such as St. John's, Georgetown and Villanova no longer have anywhere near the advantages in facilities and TV coverage that they had in the 1980s and early 1990s. The SMUs and UCFs of the world can't leverage those Catholic schools in the future in the same manner that Pitt and WVU were able to do in the past.

To be clear again, the Big East will still have an excellent basketball conference. However, no one should kid themselves that the latest Big East expansion was anything other than a triage measure (as opposed to actually believing that Temple and Memphis could replace the value of Syracuse and Pitt). The defections over the past year directly impact Big East basketball much more than the ACC raid of 2003, so it's far too simplistic to believe that the Big East label in and of itself will overcome all of that.

Frank,
that is an excellent summary of what I think we've all been trying to say. I've highlighted what to me are the critical points. Pudge, the floor is yours...

 

[freescooter]

Will you use Crayon next time?

I am not making this up. We (UConn ... Jim Calhoun) are the best example. But Providence & Seton Hall & St. John's have had high-water marks in this conference. When they aren't good (and that generally means they can beat 11 Atlantic 10 schools), they get embarassed in the Big East. Marquette, I would argue, has been far better since their 2004 inclusion than the previous 8 years. (Cream & Buzz Williams are pretty good). This Conference just forces Programs to play at the Nation's highest level in Hoop. Football? Cincinnati, Louisville, USF, Rutgers & UConn are all better Programs than in 2003.

So ... you need to argue that it won't happen in the future? OK ... because the historical evidence is not convincing. (and I don't give a frig about Hot Rod Hundley in 1959 ... that's not nearly as relevant as the Phi Slamma Jamma. Yes, suddenly schools had Black players.)

The point is that Marquette was a good team before they joined the Big East. They've been a good team since joining the Big East. Cincinnati was a good team before joining the Big East. They had 14 consecutive NCAA tournament trips before joining the Big East. Louisville went to the final four the year before joining the big East and had 7 trips in the previous 10 years including an Elite 8 as well as the Final Four. They were the top programs not in a major conference. That was the very reason they were brought into the Big East..You could make a case that UConn and UConn alone was the one program that really moved to the next level as a result of the Big East. All the others either were or had been good to very good before the Big East. On the other hand, programs that were nothing when they joined, Rutgers, USF, have moved up marginally. USF's first NCAA bid in its Big East history hardly demonstrates they are ready to become an elite program. Wake me when Rutgers actually wins something, ok? And you dismiss the decline of Providence, Seton Hall, St Johns (yes, the johnnies are no where near what they were a decade ago). Not sure that any of them have their high water marks in the Big East. Hell, St Johns was the eastern power forever. Providence was New England basketball from the middle 1950s through the 80s. Programs like BC, UConn, Holy Cross, UMass had moments, but it was the Friars who played and won on a national level for most of that period. West Virginia improved but it wasn't like they were starting at ground zero either. They had NCAA tournament appearances and conference Championships in the late 80s and early 90s before coming in in 1995.

Somehow, Pudge, you have this idea that all these programs were barely playing above the NESCAC. It smply isn't the case. Most of them were good to excellent programs that remained good to excellent programs.

 

[Pudge]

I agree with Frank. We are basically talking past each other. (it's whalers fault - he fights in every thread like some Mercenary. Doesn't matter his position; he's jumping in)

Also, I'm clear that the future is unknown. I don't think you can argue that many many Programs have used the competitive arenas of the Big East to rise to the top. And we've beaten the also-rans & poorly structured into submission. There has been a significant gap between almost all the BE Program's & the A-10 for 15 years. Arguing history skips over the true excellence of the last 30 years simply doesn't make sense. Joe Mullaney & Bob Cousy is just a wholly different game than anything post -1975. And, yes, Rutgers did have one of my favorite teams of all time with Phil Sellers & James Bailey. I think the BE tag has the potential of being a platform for a rising UCF, SMU or Houston. But they could 0-18 like DePaul. I expect Memphis & Temple to be marginally better. Pastner has the chance to really rise in the Coaching pedigree.

Yes, we lost 4 top two quartile programs. They were not replaced. But 2 could easily be right there. I don't like reading that SU was the flagship. Not true - they lost too many Thursdays at the BET & too many first bracket games in the March tourney. I do expect 1 of the three new Programs to surprise. I'm glad we still have the Catholics. Marquette & Georgetown will be good for awhile. Top 6? Sure. And maybe better. I guarantee you we won't ever have an awful year like last years PAC 12.

 

[whaler11]

I agree with Frank. We are basically talking past each other. (it's whalers fault - he fights in every thread like some Mercenary. Doesn't matter his position; he's jumping in)

Also, I'm clear that the future is unknown. I don't think you can argue that many many Programs have used the competitive arenas of the Big East to rise to the top. And we've beaten the also-rans & poorly structured into submission. There has been a significant gap between almost all the BE Program's & the A-10 for 15 years. Arguing history skips over the true excellence of the last 30 years simply doesn't make sense. Joe Mullaney & Bob Cousy is just a wholly different game than anything post -1975. And, yes, Rutgers did have one of my favorite teams of all time with Phil Sellers & James Bailey. I think the BE tag has the potential of being a platform for a rising UCF, SMU or Houston. But they could 0-18 like DePaul. I expect Memphis & Temple to be marginally better. Pastner has the chance to really rise in the Coaching pedigree.

Yes, we lost 4 top two quartile programs. They were not replaced. But 2 could easily be right there. I don't like reading that SU was the flagship. Not true - they lost too many Thursdays at the BET & too many first bracket games in the March tourney. I do expect 1 of the three new Programs to surprise. I'm glad we still have the Catholics. Marquette & Georgetown will be good for awhile. Top 6? Sure. And maybe better. I guarantee you we won't ever have an awful year like last years PAC 12.

Uh you aren't responding to what people post and then continue to misrepresent what they have said - but sure blame me.

For example you are still pretending that anyone has compared the play in the A-10 to the Big East in this very post.