I wouldn’t say Nebraska is unhappy making the money that they make. They just aren’t winning.
With the exception of WVU, the Big 12 truly is a regional conference. If Kansas and WVU find an escape hatch, it becomes an even tighter footprint. Since the TV money won’t be enough, drivable rivalries will be important to enhance the gate.
Should UH, Memphis, and whoever else exit the AAC, they will poach C-USA, and so forth down the line just like last time this happened.
Regardless, no P5 money to be had, but the Big 12 name may lend a bit ore cache, at least in the shorter term.
1 Like
That’s a line from a Peter Sellers movie, “Being There.”
That’s way outside the box.
A prospective new “Big American Conference” (we’re BAC) could primarily consist of current members from the Big 12, the American and maybe the Mountain West.
I wonder if Mike Aresco will somehow become the guy to pull this off. In order to do so, he would likely have to take over the top job at the Big 12, recharacterize it as the BAC, and negotiate a new broadcast rights deal for those 7-8 (Big 12) teams and the 4-5 (top AAC) teams and a few others as may become available.
Yes, the remainder of teams in the current American would be left to rebuild their conference.
There are 4 years left on the Big 12 deal
2021-22
2022-23
2023-24
2024-25
3 or less of those will be without UT and OU depending on when they leave
1 Like
If UH, UC, and UCF leaving AAC, will their new contract with espn be voided? I remember something about if certain schools leaving, the contract would be voided. I don’t remember which schools but I’m sure we’re one of them.
Yeah. Even just UConn leading voided the contract and ESPN wanted to re-negotiate. (I don’t know whatever came of that, but ESPN’s hand was pretty weak there and it may not have gotten far because if they open re-negotiations we might get more with a rival network.)
I don’t think the Big 12 contract contains that provision, though. It’s never come up and that’s what the GOR was there to take care of.
“the idea of this round of conference realignment as a larger ESPN play against Fox makes this idea of the AAC poaching Big 12 members maybe make more sense than the numbers would suggest on first glance”
2 Likes
This is what I’ve wanted all along. Its the most realistic of the good scenarios for us. And creates a pretty strong conference from about 1through 10.
and Fox won’t sit still to watch espn capture 80% of the college football market…so potentially a bidding war between the two….that’s where grabbing a couple of current p5s who might be unhappy in thier world becomes a reality…. set the payout to a pac-12 level and there might be additional options for a Big American Conference as someone else coined in another post.
I’ve got an idea. Let the B12 ADs fight like gladiators for a spot in the American.
“Stubhub, gimme 50 yard-line on the Rhoades fight.”
2 Likes
The only way the Big 12 survives is if they can TRUST each other to stay together and not have teams make their own deals with other conferences.
Trust, however, is not something that a shell-shocked Big 12 has a lot of at this point (or ever truly had).
Further, they’ve never had much in common, strategic vision wise, other than all of them agreeing to be lapdogs of UT (a) and OU.
A couple more defections, and the rest, including the conference itself, is history.
1 Like
I think pretty much all they need to do to survive is invite some combination of Cincinnati, Memphis, UCF and Houston. Then the AAC is less stable than they are.
Couldn’t you say the same thing about any conference outside of the P4 now?
The MWC doesn’t trust each other, look at what Cincinnati is starting to post right now basically vying for a shot. With the uncertainty around right now if each university isn’t doing its due diligence to try and improve its standing right now than they are failing.
You think the AAC thinks Houston wouldn’t leave for a PAC invite the minute it came?