I generally agree that Mike Aresco seems to be getting overrated by a lot of AAC fans lately for his populist anti-P5 bluster when there were some tangible things that he could have done previously.
Most prominently for me is that he failed to secure the one thing that could have distinguished the AAC from the rest of the G5: create a true coast-to-coast football conference. Marinatto was certainly a disaster overall, but he was onto something by inviting Boise State and San Diego State as football-only members. Who knows whether it would have worked in the long-term, but it was a legitimate bet to shake up the system as opposed to falling into the safe and staid regionalism that firmly cemented the AAC's "meh" place within the G5. At the very least, the MWC wouldn't have had any claim whatsoever to be an AAC peer.
Yet, when Aresco came in, he chased the ghost of BYU (who anyone with a rudimentary understanding of that school's mentality should have known that they were NEVER going to join) instead of raiding the MWC of its other assets when the then-Big East had the chance. Aresco had the chance to have a legit western flank to have a national conference that would have at least been the clear #6 football conference and a legit power in basketball (imagine a hoops league with UConn combined with the programs and fan bases of SDSU, UNLV and New Mexico to the west compared to the AAC now) and BLEW IT. STRAIGHT UP BLEW IT. In the meantime, the MWC reinforced itself and got CBS and ESPN to open back up their TV contracts to get Boise State (and in turn, San Diego State) back. This is despite the fact that the whole reason why Aresco was hired by the then-Big East was BECAUSE of this experience at CBS and ESPN.
Aresco was never going to prevent any Big East member from leaving for one of the P5 and the Catholic 7 were destined to break off once Syracuse, Pitt and Notre Dame decided to leave. I can't blame him for that. However, messing up the coast-to-coast conference proposal was ENTIRELY on him. That was the one chance for the AAC to actually present something different to the marketplace and he blew it.
On the other hand, I completely disagree with the characterization of Tulane (who seems to take a lot of criticism around here). They are an AAU school in a good TV market, GREAT football recruiting territory and will have new facilities. From a university president standpoint, they hit a TON of metrics that have proven to be critical in conference realignment. If they can become merely competent in football, they can actually zoom up the list of the most likely schools to get poached from the AAC if the Big 12 or ACC ever expand.
I've seen a lot of people underrate private schools in conference realignment discussions simply based upon their enrollment sizes. That's a BIG mistake. P5 university presidents may prefer large flagships with big enrollments with all things being equal, but they'd generally take private schools over less academically-inclined directional or "city" public schools that might be much larger. There aren't any directional public schools in the P5 and the only "city" public school in the P5 is Louisville (and it took top tier athletic revenue and budget numbers for them to get in... and they were literally the *last* school that got in).