Key tweets, and it's all gone to Hell.

[FfldCntyFan]

Why would they not go? For those questioning why we would stay in our current conference, yet expect ASU and Utes to do the same

1 - the financial gains we would receive (after factoring in exit fees and graduated conference payouts) by leaving the BE tower over the gains they would receive by leaving the PAC.
2 - either (or both) could have a sense of loyalty to the conference that elevated them from lower level to P-5 status.
3 - there well could be non-athletic reasons the schools would prefer remaining aligned with top academic schools and have a California presence.

I don't know what the final result will be, and in all candor I expect it to be UofA, ASU & UU, but until we actually see it we won't know.

 

[noeynox]

The guy who does a podcast from the cab of his truck seemed to think an odd number of teams in a conference works. Was it 15 or 17?

This is what we are left with. Wish casting on the blabbering of a truck driver with an IPhone.

 

[UConnTrumbull]

1 - the financial gains we would receive (after factoring in exit fees and graduated conference payouts) by leaving the BE tower over the gains they would receive by leaving the PAC.
2 - either (or both) could have a sense of loyalty to the conference that elevated them from lower level to P-5 status.
3 - there well could be non-athletic reasons the schools would prefer remaining aligned with top academic schools and have a California presence.

I don't know what the final result will be, and in all candor I expect it to be UofA, ASU & UU, but until we actually see it we won't know.

Exactly. Even the apple deal dwarfs our BE money.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

The change was Washington and Oregon and the B1G being willing to take them on the cheap. If those two had no landing spot other than PAC (and Big XII), they stay in the PAC. If they did, so would Utah, ASU and probably Arizona. The B1G screwed us here. Without Washington and Oregon, that Apple deal is more like $12m a school. It forced the hand of schools that didn't want to move.

The B1G hurt our chances tremendously but Kliavkoff screwed us (an ancillary screwing) when he screwed his employer (the PAC) by completely botching the media negotiations. If he had been upfront with the PAC schools things may have unfolded differently.

 

[noeynox]

Exactly. Even the apple deal dwarfs our BE money.

But you can't beat bus rides. Put a price on that!

 

[noeynox]

The B1G hurt our chances tremendously but Kliavkoff screwed us (an ancillary screwing) when he screwed his employer (the PAC) by completely botching the media negotiations. If he had been upfront with the PAC schools things may have unfolded differently.

Guy makes Aresco look like Delaney.

 

[HuskyHawk]

1 - the financial gains we would receive (after factoring in exit fees and graduated conference payouts) by leaving the BE tower over the gains they would receive by leaving the PAC.
2 - either (or both) could have a sense of loyalty to the conference that elevated them from lower level to P-5 status.
3 - there well could be non-athletic reasons the schools would prefer remaining aligned with top academic schools and have a California presence.

I don't know what the final result will be, and in all candor I expect it to be UofA, ASU & UU, but until we actually see it we won't know.

For the record, the scenario I laid out yesterday is still in play. UConn, Cal, Stanford to the ACC.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

The B1G hurt our chances tremendously but Kliavkoff screwed us (an ancillary screwing) when he screwed his employer (the PAC) by completely botching the media negotiations. If he had been upfront with the PAC schools things may have unfolded differently.

How did Kliavkoff botch the media negotiations? Colorado, Arizona, ASU and Utah are going to regret betting on a linear contract with a declining broadcaster over taking the Apple deal.

 

[JeepCSC]

For the record, the scenario I laid out yesterday is still in play. UConn, Cal, Stanford to the ACC.

Texas schools and Kansas would still be more attractive in 5 years.

 

[aburks41]

For the record, the scenario I laid out yesterday is still in play. UConn, Cal, Stanford to the ACC.

If I’m the ACC, I’m focusing on expanding right now because it will be harder to get your conference picked apart if you are 20 strong vs 15. If you lose 6 schools in the future then you’re down to 9 vs being down to 14.

 

[Seamus84]

For the record, the scenario I laid out yesterday is still in play. UConn, Cal, Stanford to the ACC.

Is adding schools a material change to the the ACC agreement thereby allowing FSU and Clemson to bolt?

 

[FfldCntyFan]

How did Kliavkoff botch the media negotiations? Colorado, Arizona, ASU and Utah are going to regret betting on a linear contract with a declining broadcaster over taking the Apple deal.

Keep fighting the good fight Nelson

 

[auggie22]

GoKU believed that Utah would be the odd man out, and was not enthralled with ASU. But I would imagine these types of situations are fluid and things change. Let’s hope things swing back our way.

What concerns me is that Greg Flugar, who has been in top of this situation, has always indicated that ASU and Utah are ahead of us and that things had to break a certain way for us to get in. He has been saying that for months now. It certainly contradicts what GoKU said.

GoKu said that Utah would be out by their own choice, not the B12.

I am sure our admins were in the loop with B12 leadership as the B1G made an aggressive expansion move. My bet is that forced Utah admins to take action, and at that point we (UConn AD) knew it was unlikely to happen. Maybe we reached out to the ACC to see if their stove was heating up. Either way it feels like the narrative of ASU being reluctant and Utah even more so was grounded in reality but is now purely a scripted way to let the other PAC administrators know they stayed loyal to the very end.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Keep fighting the good fight Nelson

Remember about a week and a half ago when I said that the theory that the Pac 12 would lose one team and then add UConn and we would live happily ever after was insane? Probably not, because you and the rest of this board were busy gargling the marbles of the Kansas fanboy who was pretending to be an insider.

I will give you something else to remember: Utah, ASU, UA and Colorado will regret turning down Apple to hop on the ESPN train that is going over a cliff.

 

[hoopsfan22]

Arizona, ASU, and Utah are going to get paid $32 million a year in a stable conference. Apple was only offering $20 million a year to stay in an unstable conference. Isn't this decision a no-brainer?

 

[Ha Who]

Exactly. Even the apple deal dwarfs our BE money.

Sure, after the Big grabs teams. Okay I’ll drink your Kool-Aid

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Remember about a week and a half ago when I said that the theory that the Pac 12 would lose one team and then add UConn and we would live happily ever after was insane? Probably not, because you and the rest of this board were busy gargling the marbles of the Kansas fanboy who was pretending to be an insider.

I will give you something else to remember: Utah, ASU, UA and Colorado will regret turning down Apple to hop on the ESPN train that is going over a cliff.

Cable boxes will die. I remember a meeting in late winter 1998 (at one of the larger cable companies in the country) being told by them that cable boxes would die, their time frame then was 8-12 years (but at the time they had no idea that Williams Communication was a farce while claiming to build fiber optic infrastructure throughout the US).

We are more than twice that far out and we are still close to a decade from the ultimate death of cable boxes. The current technology us still lacking and the infrastructure is not yet capable of supporting streaming only television service. A broadcast deal with a streaming provider like Apple will, in time be an exceptional way to go for a conference, both financially and in distribution. Today it isn't there yet.

 

[Ha Who]

Arizona, ASU, and Utah are going to get paid $32 million a year in a stable conference. Apple was only offering $20 million a year to stay in an unstable conference. Isn't this decision a no-brainer?

Now I want your Kool-Aid of logic

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Arizona, ASU, and Utah are going to get paid $32 million a year in a stable conference. Apple was only offering $20 million a year to stay in an unstable conference. Isn't this decision a no-brainer?

This depends on the timeline of the B1G taking more PAC schools.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Is adding schools a material change to the the ACC agreement thereby allowing FSU and Clemson to bolt?

No. But ACC would need to talk to ESPN, and possibly get more money.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Arizona, ASU, and Utah are going to get paid $32 million a year in a stable conference. Apple was only offering $20 million a year to stay in an unstable conference. Isn't this decision a no-brainer?

The Big 12 contract does not reach $32MM/year for several years, and Apple's deal was starting at $20MM before any linear deal, and there were subscription incentives which could have made the contracts equivalent or the Apple contract better.

ESPN is going to lose its butt on this big guarantee linear contracts as the cable industry continues to collapse. Maybe ESPN sticks by these deals, or maybe ESPN, as a division of a publicly traded company, has to come back and renegotiate these deals in a few years. Apple is Apple, and is going to win. Those schools backed the wrong horse.

 

[JMick]

No. But ACC would need to talk to ESPN, and possibly get more money.

The only way the ACC sticks together at this point is if they can get ND on board by bringing in Stanford. So we are screwed there too.

 

[mike012]

I had figured Apple would make a lucrative offer to keep the Pac around. So that Apple could get football and prove Apple TV works for future conferences and sports to see.

 

[XStorrsion]

For the record, the scenario I laid out yesterday is still in play. UConn, Cal, Stanford to the ACC.

This group isn't fending off the pillagers (B1G, SEC, XII) by adding two California schools that none of those conferences wanted.

Map for emphasis of how much of a misfit it would be to add them three time zones away.

 

[aburks41]

Zags just reported the Big 12 is voting on ASU and Utah today

 

[upstater]

No. But ACC would need to talk to ESPN, and possibly get more money.

The problem here is that ESPN knows it's already paying a premium for a lot of schools that don't merit it. That's a very tough ask of ESPN.

On the schools' part, most of them know there is a huge danger without that ESPN contract. If it were me, I would take it all the way to 2036. By the time college sports reconfigure, I'd have about 4 more years to find my spot.

So, what I'm saying is that this buys them time. Jumping out of a contract in 2031 can leave them exposed.

Essentially they are telling the SEC and B1G, "Do your worst to us, because you're going to have to wait until 2040 to get your dream of college sports off the ground."

There is no way I vote for ANY dissolution if I'm 2/3rd of the schools in the ACC.

I may end up like Cal and Stanford, granted, but at the very least, I know I won't end up like Cal and Stanford in 2031.

 

[RedStickHusky]

This group isn't fending off the pillagers (B1G, SEC, XII) by adding two California schools that none of those conferences wanted.

Map for emphasis of how much of a misfit it would be to add them three time zones away.

yeah but you could make a nice logo/icon for a "coast-to-coast conference" - think C2C...

 

[JeepCSC]

This group isn't fending off the pillagers (B1G, SEC, XII) by adding two California schools that none of those conferences wanted.

Big XII's GOR ends sooner.

 

[upstater]

Zags just reported the Big 12 is voting on ASU and Utah today

“[Big 12 Commissioner] Brett [Yormark] deserves some credit and [former Commissioner Bob] Bowlsby got those four teams and if you look at it now, it doesn’t seem like the greatest adds, but it stabilized us for a little bit.”

Well, someone had to say it. The amazing thing is looking at the schools that might've said this. TCU, Baylor, Oklahoma St, Iowa St, Kansas St, Texas Tech, WV, looking down their noses at the additions.

College sports are really lead by some of the most myopic illiterate people out there.

 

[Seamus84]

While I don’t agree with Nelson’s take on NU and Vandy (I have personal experience at both schools), I can see a day when the top academic universities with large endowments and uncertain futures - Stan, UC, Duke, WF, BC, GTech, etc - say enough is enough (reliance of football) and explore another model.