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Here's what I don't understand.

CougPatrol

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Dec 8, 2006
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I'm a business guy, and I understand the initial panic expressed by the remaining P12 programs about getting left behind in the B10 / SEC arms race. What I don't understand, and maybe this is where things are trending now that people have had time to think, is why the remaining P12 schools feel the need to make a knee jerk decision on conference affiliation.

OK, so we're going to fall way behind the B10 and SEC schools. Well, with very few exceptions (USC, UCLA, Oregon, UW), the West coast programs were always going to be behind the B10 and SEC schools in terms of football. Are the states of Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, Utah, and Colorado ever going to be remotely close to Michigan, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, etc.? Trying to keep up with them seems akin to trying to match your wealthy neighbor who keeps buying luxury cars every year. On top of that, there's the other reality as it relates to network TV. The East, Midwest, Southwest, and Southeast markets don't give a rip about West coast sports, and they never will. Never, as in never. I'm an East coast transplant who has lived here for 35 years now, and to this day, none of my East coast friends and family (and they're all diehard sports fanatics) know a damn thing about WSU or the Seattle sports teams.

My point is, regardless of the recent defections, what's wrong with simply assembling the best West coast athletic conference you can and negotiate the media rights accordingly? Yea, we won't make as much money and we'll fall behind the superpowers. OK, but again, that was always going to happen. So we form a league comprised of Stanford, Cal, UW, WSU, Oregon, Oregon State, Fresno State, SDSU, Boise State, Utah, Colorado, and the Arizona schools. Maybe even add UNLV and Nevada. Maybe merge with the WCC in a basketball and baseball agreement? You battle it out to determine who the best in the West is, and have a playoff with another league in a similar situation. The ACC and Big12. Let the B10 and SEC become the defacto minor league professional league and sell YOUR product to the network(s) not covering them.

I'm not just lecturing WSU here. If I'm our new commissioner, this is the argument I'd be selling the entire conference on. Keeping up in college football with the SEC and B10 is a losing proposition, so why not veer in a different direction. Build a really good West coast brand of collegiate athletics and sell it accordingly. When the expansion dust settles, there are going to be A LOT of decent programs left out of the super conferences. Form an affiliation with those schools and have it model a traditional STUDENT athlete concept.

That's what I'd sell.
 
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My point is, regardless of the recent defections, what's wrong with simply assembling the best West coast athletic conference you can and negotiate the media rights accordingly?
When it's "every program for itself is there enough trust for a workable agreement?
 
When it's "every program for itself is there enough trust for a workable agreement?
Probably not, but taking that line of thought out of this, do ever see West coast programs rivaling B10 and SEC programs in terms of fan interest? I mean, it’s not even close honestly.
 
Probably not, but taking that line of thought out of this, do ever see West coast programs rivaling B10 and SEC programs in terms of fan interest? I mean, it’s not even close honestly.
Not a chance. I don't like what's happening, but it's been an interesting exercise to follow. The vast majority of the Pac "leftovers" greatly overestimated their value without SC/UCLA.

I think all the leftover programs coast-to-coast should band together. ESPN still needs inventory. Go it alone and you end up fighting for crumbs. If the leftover P5 programs would band together ESPN, etc. likely would need to overpay their valuations.

I wonder if the valuations are missing the intangible piece as well. Is a WSU worth $100MM/year? No but if you lose too many of the "little guys" the model might suffer long-term. Many have said it but do as many people really want to watch NFL light? Most college fans like the underdog at least at first. Very different underdog on the path college footbal is on.
 
Probably not, but taking that line of thought out of this, do ever see West coast programs rivaling B10 and SEC programs in terms of fan interest? I mean, it’s not even close honestly.

Agree with this. Like I've stated several times...we have a geography problem and a culture problem (and a population problem).

The passion for sports in the West doesn't compare to the other regions.

Just twenty percent of the US lives west of San Antonio.

People don't care enough for college football in the West.
 
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Stanford will be the glue that holds this together. Politically. With the points you raise.
 
I'm a business guy, and I understand the initial panic expressed by the remaining P12 programs about getting left behind in the B10 / SEC arms race. What I don't understand, and maybe this is where things are trending now that people have had time to think, is why the remaining P12 schools feel the need to make a knee jerk decision on conference affiliation.

OK, so we're going to fall way behind the B10 and SEC schools. Well, with very few exceptions (USC, UCLA, Oregon, UW), the West coast programs were always going to be behind the B10 and SEC schools in terms of football. Are the states of Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, Utah, and Colorado ever going to be remotely close to Michigan, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, etc.? Trying to keep up with them seems akin to trying to match your wealthy neighbor who keeps buying luxury cars every year. On top of that, there's the other reality as it relates to network TV. The East, Midwest, Southwest, and Southeast markets don't give a rip about West coast sports, and they never will. Never, as in never. I'm an East coast transplant who has lived here for 35 years now, and to this day, none of my East coast friends and family (and they're all diehard sports fanatics) know a damn thing about WSU or the Seattle sports teams.

My point is, regardless of the recent defections, what's wrong with simply assembling the best West coast athletic conference you can and negotiate the media rights accordingly? Yea, we won't make as much money and we'll fall behind the superpowers. OK, but again, that was always going to happen. So we form a league comprised of Stanford, Cal, UW, WSU, Oregon, Oregon State, Fresno State, SDSU, Boise State, Utah, Colorado, and the Arizona schools. Maybe even add UNLV and Nevada. Maybe merge with the WCC in a basketball and baseball agreement? You battle it out to determine who the best in the West is, and have a playoff with another league in a similar situation. The ACC and Big12. Let the B10 and SEC become the defacto minor league professional league and sell YOUR product to the network(s) not covering them.

I'm not just lecturing WSU here. If I'm our new commissioner, this is the argument I'd be selling the entire conference on. Keeping up in college football with the SEC and B10 is a losing proposition, so why not veer in a different direction. Build a really good West coast brand of collegiate athletics and sell it accordingly. When the expansion dust settles, there are going to be A LOT of decent programs left out of the super conferences. Form an affiliation with those schools and have it model a traditional STUDENT athlete concept.

That's what I'd sell.


You must have watched this. Lol...




Edit: I really like this guy's idea that the ACC, P10, and B12 to agree together to never play a B1G or SEC team again. That would be very interesting and a great tactic to fight these guys.
 
Last edited:
You must have watched this. Lol...




Edit: I really like this guy's idea that the ACC, P10, and B12 to agree together to never play a B1G or SEC team again. That would be very interesting and a great tactic to fight these guys.
Honestly, I hadn’t watched it, but I obviously agree with that take.

So there’s going to be 2 super conferences of 40 or so programs? Ok, well FU then. We’ll take the remaining 70 programs and the other media networks and form our own league. Our top-25 will be better than your 20-40 programs.
 
Honestly, I hadn’t watched it, but I obviously agree with that take.

So there’s going to be 2 super conferences of 40 or so programs? Ok, well FU then. We’ll take the remaining 70 programs and the other media networks and form our own league. Our top-25 will be better than your 20-40 programs.
That would be interesting. If the superconference teams could only play each other, they’d be forced to play power against power and beat each other up.

I think it would take a while for the novelty to wear off, but it might make an impact in the long term. Of course, it works both ways…the tier 2 teams would have more possible opponents, but less interest in general
 
That would be interesting. If the superconference teams could only play each other, they’d be forced to play power against power and beat each other up.

I think it would take a while for the novelty to wear off, but it might make an impact in the long term. Of course, it works both ways…the tier 2 teams would have more possible opponents, but less interest in general
I guess for me, in this situation, we’d still be in a league competing against 70 other D1 programs. I wouldn’t care that it was “tier 2” if we were playing high level ball against most of the best programs out West.
 
I'm a business guy, and I understand the initial panic expressed by the remaining P12 programs about getting left behind in the B10 / SEC arms race. What I don't understand, and maybe this is where things are trending now that people have had time to think, is why the remaining P12 schools feel the need to make a knee jerk decision on conference affiliation.

OK, so we're going to fall way behind the B10 and SEC schools. Well, with very few exceptions (USC, UCLA, Oregon, UW), the West coast programs were always going to be behind the B10 and SEC schools in terms of football. Are the states of Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, Utah, and Colorado ever going to be remotely close to Michigan, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, etc.? Trying to keep up with them seems akin to trying to match your wealthy neighbor who keeps buying luxury cars every year. On top of that, there's the other reality as it relates to network TV. The East, Midwest, Southwest, and Southeast markets don't give a rip about West coast sports, and they never will. Never, as in never. I'm an East coast transplant who has lived here for 35 years now, and to this day, none of my East coast friends and family (and they're all diehard sports fanatics) know a damn thing about WSU or the Seattle sports teams.

My point is, regardless of the recent defections, what's wrong with simply assembling the best West coast athletic conference you can and negotiate the media rights accordingly? Yea, we won't make as much money and we'll fall behind the superpowers. OK, but again, that was always going to happen. So we form a league comprised of Stanford, Cal, UW, WSU, Oregon, Oregon State, Fresno State, SDSU, Boise State, Utah, Colorado, and the Arizona schools. Maybe even add UNLV and Nevada. Maybe merge with the WCC in a basketball and baseball agreement? You battle it out to determine who the best in the West is, and have a playoff with another league in a similar situation. The ACC and Big12. Let the B10 and SEC become the defacto minor league professional league and sell YOUR product to the network(s) not covering them.

I'm not just lecturing WSU here. If I'm our new commissioner, this is the argument I'd be selling the entire conference on. Keeping up in college football with the SEC and B10 is a losing proposition, so why not veer in a different direction. Build a really good West coast brand of collegiate athletics and sell it accordingly. When the expansion dust settles, there are going to be A LOT of decent programs left out of the super conferences. Form an affiliation with those schools and have it model a traditional STUDENT athlete concept.

That's what I'd sell.

I'm a business guy too and I appreciate what you are trying to do. Accept the hard realities and make the best of things. Unfortunately, selling a JV product doesn't work.

The second order consequences from this would be devastating. Look at what happened to Idaho when they dropped down. Same thing would happen to any P12 team tied to a West coast circle jerk. Anyone who could get out would if the best argument is a take our ball and go home approach.
 
That would be interesting. If the superconference teams could only play each other, they’d be forced to play power against power and beat each other up.

I think it would take a while for the novelty to wear off, but it might make an impact in the long term. Of course, it works both ways…the tier 2 teams would have more possible opponents, but less interest in general
It only really works if you can get the entire remaining fbs schools to boycott those 2 conferences. Big12, pac10, and acc can say boycott, but sec/big will just load up on the sunbelts of the world for non-con money games
 
It only really works if you can get the entire remaining fbs schools to boycott those 2 conferences. Big12, pac10, and acc can say boycott, but sec/big will just load up on the sunbelts of the world for non-con money games
Yeah, you'd have to get ~80 largely unaffiliated teams/universities to agree and stick to a plan for years. That's a pretty tall order when you can't even get 12 regionally affiliated teams to do it.
 
There's only one team on that list that surprises me. And it's not Louisville.
 
I was talking to someone at work yesterday and I mentioned that for whatever reason, people have tended to watch WSU more than you might guess based on what we hear from the pundits. Unfortunately, tv market rankings are more important than anything else.

TV ratings might not be the end all be all but they are more important than the chattering heads think.

Look at the CFP. Regionalized matchups excluding most of the country have led to ratings falling off for both the playoff and bowl season. At some point, you diminish the value of the sport by having less people interested.

Simple question for everyone, if college football reduces itself to two super conferences and WSU is excluded will you bother to watch college football? I know my interest in the sport as a whole will fall off. Same thing happened when the Sonics left with me for the NBA.

If too many people check out the financial model collapses because cable providers aren't going to want to pay steep fees for channels they can't sell advertising on.
 
I'm shocked that WSU has higher viewership then teams like Big 12's Ok St, etc.

But then I shouldn't be shocked because of what Mike Leach did at WSU, and WSU being the DARLING of ESPN's GameDay, and the rest of the nation.

If WSU wins 10,11 games, Alamo Bowl, Rosebowl, Play off birth, etc, the next 1,2,3 years, and if Dickert wins big time recruiting battles, and if WSU men's bball continue to either make deep NIT runs, NCAA appearances, and if Kyle Smith continues to win recruiting battles, and if WSU continues to send players to the NFL, NBA, and if WSU/UW become a packaged deal, and if Pac 12 stays together, does well, does smart things, etc.

If all those things happen, WSU would probably expand their viewership, bandwagon fanbase, etc, continue to be the DARLING of ESPN, and SEMI HARD TO LEAVE OUT, not get a seat at the expanded playoffs, P3 semi super conference table.

WSU could position themselves nicely.
 
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