Being Bill Powers

A most thoughtful analysis based on the way the real decision makers would think. I like all of that.

Personally, I have always liked the idea of A&M to the SEC. But I always look at A&M through the lens of when I was there, not as it is now. A&M was a good academic institution back in the day – it is a great one now. I doubt I would get admitted nowadays.

Do we think the Big 10-11 is ready to go “all in” and go to 16? That is the next logical step in the disjointed evolution of D1 college athletics, but are they ready to go that way?

First off, great reading. I really enjoyed the thoughts.

My gut feeling is that the Big 10 adds three schools, Texas, Texas A&M and Missouri. Their conference is under tremendous pressure to produce in the athletic field, as the perception (rightly or wrongly) is that much like their ability to compete nationally, their regional economy is dying a slow death. Adding Texas, arguably the best athletic program in the country right now, would do wonders for them, and give them the added benefit of having a foothold in recruiting the state of Texas. I know there’s those who think it’s a terrible idea to give Big 10 teams access to the state’s recruiting ground, but those people are lazy in the analysis. What’s the difference between losing three stars to Iowa versus losing them to Kansas? I mean it sure sucks for Kansas, but it’s impact on Texas and our recruiting would be, at best, minimal. For those who would scream, “What about Michigan and Ohio State?” – Texas gets 90 to 95 percent of who they want from this state, no matter who we’re recruiting against. If anything, based upon the Jordan Hicks recruitment, I’d think Ohio State and Michigan would be better served to be worried about us cherry picking in their states, than vise versa.

Adding A&M might not be a great marriage of culture for the Big 10, but as you point out, it’d be very difficult for any conference to turn their R&D money, and strong athletic potential. Not to mention that if you throw A&M in the package you wrap up the remaining 10% of Texas that would have refused to watch the Longhorns play in the Big 10 out of spite. Plus it would certainly help smooth out the process in the Capitol Building.

Missouri adds television sets, some strong athletic programs, brand recognition, and a gateway to the Texas schools. Not just in terms of travel, but as you so keenly pointed out, to avoid the 12 vs 2 mentality that might fester. Missouri can serve as the common denominator between the existing Big 10 and the two Texas schools. Kind of like when you’re working with someone and you wind up complaining about the funny smelling guy on the third floor. Missouri would be the funny smelling guy.

Whatever happens I feel like it’s going to happen soon. I’m not so sure the Big 10 can chance the Pac 10 moving first on this. A bold move on the Pac 10’s part could result in the Big 10 negotiating their new tv deal with one hand tied behind their back. Whatever leverage they might gain through expansion could easily be lost if there’s another sexy new conference offering up west coast eye balls.

Extremely well done. Barking Carnival just moved from a 3* regional sports blog to a high 4* national sports commentary blog. I appreciate the time and effort you made with with this insightlful and entertainingly serious article.

I’m less frightened of the future and the changes that inherently come wth it now.">)

Great in-depth look at what should happen, and I think has a legitimate shot at unfolding.

We are headed towards a BCS elte of perhaps 64 teams with four of these 16-team Super Conferences. TV will demand that the number of teams be limited – the NFL template is what they desire, fewer teams which makes it easier to sell certain programs to the casual fan.

The second tier of college football can survive, and really even thrive — if it regionalizes. I go back to the late Jim Wacker’s idea that when everything eventually shakes out, that there could be a new SWC.

When MIke Alden, the current Athletics Director at Missouri, was the AD at Texas State he began the process to move the school to Division I football. Wacker came in and he continued the process with the belief that the BCS process would unfold as it is, and that it would create an opportunity for the smaller schools.

Waclker envisioned a new SWC with teams like Texas State, Baylor, Rice, UTEP, North Texas, Houston, Texas Tech, mabye a La. Tech or Northwestern State. It would be a league that had built in traditional rivalries, that had reasonable travel, and would be able to compete for the lower level bowl games.

As the elite in college football continue to consolidate, I would love to see something like this happen.

Beowulf feels naked without his emoticons.

Interesting white paper here, horninexile. The time zone issue is equally irrelevant as travel distance to the west coast, imo. It’s moving in the right direction because you’re gaining time headed West. Did you compare R&D expenditures of Pac 10 schools like Cal, Stanford, and UCLA to Big 10 heavyweights? Seems like a lot of the same arguments could be made on Powers’ behalf to go to the Pac12 or BigPac16.

What happens to Texas baseball in the Big 10? That’s the elephant in the room.

Great stuff. Couple of quick things:

Would the possible Big 10 expansion to 16 teams be too much to handle for the power elite of the conference? Would UM, OSU etc… allow such a dramatic shift? Would they lose control so to speak?

Agree with your thoughts on the Texas legislature. We’re always hearing about our education system here and how we lag behind other states on top tier public education like the CA system. Well here’s your solution boys. With us and aggi. In the big 10 it elevates our stature as a state.

Last thought, I don’t know what if anything this would get us but what about bringing Rice with us. Offering the 3 best institutions in the state to the Big 10 and we would be allowed other consessions and still have the shift west you alluded too.

I can’t see the Big 10 going to 16, at least initially.

Texas, A&M and Mizzou makes the most sense

Speaking of university presidents mucking up a good thing, how about the legacy of Maynard Hutchins? In 1939, he decided that athletics were not important to an elite university and dropped Chicago out of the Big 10.

I seem to remember something about a huge scandal involving basketball and ringers, and Chicago decided to dump athletics to preserve its academic reputation.

Or something. Maybe someone else has the story.

What happens to Texas baseball in the Big 10? That’s the elephant in the room.

Texas could be a catalyst to increase the profile of baseball in the Big 10. There are several programs that have tradition and genuine commitment to baseball — specifically Michigan, Ohio State and Minnesota. They have updated facilities and (relatively small) fan bases that care about the sport.

When a UT research team wins a research contract from the National Science Foundation or the Department Energy or the National Institute of Health, etc., approximately one-half of the grant goes to the university’s bottom line for "overhead."

And, until about six years ago, 10% went to the state. Fortunately, they put an end to that, but that was also one more reason to cut the amount of funds UT receives from the state.

Tangled web, blah blah blah.

I was with you until you started talking about Kansas to the Big 10 after you had just mentioned how important R&D and academics are. I’m still with you though.

Also based on 2007 R&D numbers:
Nebraska – 51
Missouri – 76
Kansas – 84

I am actually surprised at how relatively high Nebraska is.

Would academic rankings also play into this? If so, the other 3 don’t look very appealing. With enough research money, I suppose those rankings could go up (http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/national-universities-rankings/)
UT – 47
A&M – 61
Kansas – 96
Neb – 96
Mizzou – 102

Already voted a Barking Carnival “Instant Classic” posting, and after the mandatory 1-week waiting period, soon to voted into the Sports Blog Entry Hall of Fame.

Thoughtful piece—good job. I don’t pretend to know enough about the politics and strategery that goes on behind the thought process, but from a strictly fan standpoint, I have to think the allure of Southern California, Tempe, San Fran, Seattle, etc., has to have more cache than the dreary midwestern states.

From a recruiting standpoint, for every one Jordan Hicks you can pull out of the midwest, there are ten of them growing on palm trees in California.

A 16-team schedule with a guaranteed date at OU? Our administration wonders where the directional cupcakes fit in.

What say you about the Big 10 landing both Texas and Notre Dame? You would think if the Big 10 can manage that, their name brand cache jumps up considerably. Add A&M for Texas consolidation and Kansas and/or Mizzou for the St. Louis market…that’s a helluva conference.

Why isn’t Colorado mentioned as a candiate to go to the Big 10? They bring market, senators, and better academics and research money than the other 3 mentinoed.

Ranking – 77
R&D – 22 (2nd in the big 12 to A&M)

Thanks for the Being Powers Malkovich take on a fascinating subject.

The commentary on this blog about the potential for a move is far more credible than that in the Statesman because of this kind of perspective. Bohls and Golden scoff at such a move for purely athletic reasons (the coaches won’t like the travel, etc.). They don’t seem to get that coaches aren’t making the decision and that there is far more at stake than athletics (e.g. economic role of R&D grants, political power).

Like beowulf, I feel reassured by the description of Powers as a smart, forward-thinking leader willing to take a reasonable risk to take advantage of coming trends. Reminds me of Texas Senators Sam Rayburn and LBJ in that way,

CBDU: If it were all about academics, Rice would be a player. But as much as the academics fit, we’re talking about the Big Ten, not the CIC or the Association of American Universities.

The Big Ten wants academic fits that are athletic powerhouses and bring TV viewers. Texas clearly qualifies. I’m not saying A&M and Missouri are powerhouses, but they work academically and A&M sews up a significant percentage of the college sports viewer in Texas that the Longhorns may not, while Missouri delivers the college fans in the St. Louis market and a piece of Kansas City. Maybe it’s just me, but I lived briefly in St. Louis and never found Illinois sports to be a big piece of that market. What talk there was was of MU. In any event, the Big Ten would own it now.

This move works for Texas because of the media revenue bump. A&M and Missouri will jump for it as well. The Pac-10/Big 12 contracts right now, combined, still fall far short of what the SEC and Big Ten already command. If, say, Texas and Colorado went west, it’s a boost to the Pac-10 but does not put the league in the class with the Big Ten.

To sum up, the football trips are better in the Pac-10, but the money is much better in the Big Ten. Add the academics, and it’s an easy call for Powers.

But I agree, he won’t move first. Fortunately, he won’t have to. If Texas and A&M can go together, it will help fade the legislative heat, and if Missouri goes with them, the league will have been shown to be incapable of sticking together no matter what.

And, one more thing. What about prop 4 (or 5, or whatever number). Soon, some university in Texas that is not UT or A&M is going to start getting funneled money to make them academically competitive. I think it is a good thing. There are too many top tier students in Texas to be supported by only 2 top tier universities (someone pointed out to me that NC, for instance, has more schools/students at tier 1 universities than Texas with almost 1/3 of the population).

The first two schools that come to mind are UH and Tech. I would think that if UT and A&M were heading off for greener academic pastures, the Texas legislature would want which ever school they plan on funding to go with them.

Mizzou, Kansas, Texas, and Nebraska to the Big 10 leaves a lot of football teams flying over Oklahoma.

Heh. 0u: the flyover program.

With the The Big 10 Network that league is already positioned to compete for TV dollars with the SEC, and the addition of Texas and Texas A&M would make much more sense than moving to the Pac 10.

Very insightful and well-written post. As someone who has been paying little attention to the jabber about the Big 10/Pac 10 expansions to date, it was an excellent primer and I will now take much more interest in this going forward.

Nice job, horninexile, though you may be overestimating what Clipper would call the “synergistics” of the R&D angle. You get a boost there when your institutions fall within a single state and governmental structure (California, NY, etc.). Otherwise the bureaucracy involved (which is huge no matter where you are) tends to eat up any efficiencies.

 The distances involved are also crucial: Berkeley to LA is around 375 miles; Ithaca to Boston, 330. Austin to State College is 1550 miles. That’s a different kind of travel investment.

But good work. My guess is that this has already been printed out in the Tower.

Very nice work.

I had hoped that someone would take a stab at the academic side of the realignment options, and you brought up a lot of interesting points that I hadn’t thought through: the “Big 16” concept was a good expansion on the athletic side, but I really liked the review of the ‘federal’ angle of politics and the influence that it plays on allocation of research grants.

If the Big Ten ends up at 16 schools, is there a better five to add than UT, USC, UCLA, Cal and Stanford? Those four schools are the Pac 10, and the additional revenue from adding Colo and Utah would be a rounding error when compared to the revenue from a Big Ten Network in Texas and California. Travel isn’t really a big issue, since they all fly to games now. And if academics really are a factor, and the CIC is no joke, then adding these five is the best possible scenario. And as a bonus, AM is nowhere to be found.

Agree with Vasher.
I mean come on, I like University of Chicago but Stanford has the number one B school in the country. Time zone really benifits us as we gain time when we travel out there. Weather is better and what are you going to do about Baseball? All our conference home games will have to be played in March and April because we are not going to Anne Arbor or Chicago for a three game weekend set.
Now Cali and Arizona on the other hand, hell thats where spring training is. We are wise to listen to both, but the future is to go with Colorado to the Pac 10. We might not have to bring A&M either as Bob Bullock no longer resides in the capital. They can go to the SEC and we will have a Georgia vs Georgia Tech rivaliry.
Lost in all of this is the fact that the rust belt is dying a slow or fast death. Depopuation to places like the Southwest region of the US means we cannot latch on to this region for long term success. Do you want Cincinatti or San Diego? Think Flint Michigan. I agree its not all about football, but the Pac 10 has perks too. And we have to think about other sports as well. Baseball, Golf, ect. Our golf team sucks now, but you can kiss the Ben Crenshaws of the world goodbye the minute we try to play a tourney in Michigan or Penn in early spring. However, I hear the bent greens out west are much more pleasnt.

Great analysis. In addition to all the obvious benefits enumerated, I get almost giddy at the idea of leaving the land thieves to fend for themselves.

BlowU would be welcomed into the SEC with open arms. They are their kind of people!

How attractive is OU to another conference right now? They have a national name, but only regional appeal. They dominate their state, but their state doesn’t have many TVs, nor athletes that other teams could come recruit. If the SEC expanded, they would be, perhaps, the most logical choice, but are they really desirable to the SEC? How would they make the per/school revenue package in the SEC better?

Ag_in_Tx. So is A&M. Let’s get real.

You’re fortunate to get to piggyback Texas in these deals, if it actually occurs as suggested it might here.

I think AM would be welcomed into the SEC as well, which should negate any fears that people have that we will “have to take them with us.” They’ll be fine financially without us. Pride-wise? Not so much.

The ou powers that be drool over the prospect of being in the SEC.

I meant in light of this thread – A&M and OU are not even close. A&M is a major research institution pushing the frontiers of knowledge in many fields in the areas of basic research and applied research, as is Texas. OU is an overgrown teachers college, like most of the SEC.

And I think OU to the SEC would do the same thing for OU that Arkansas going to the SEC did for Arkansas – make it all that much harder to recruit Texas and thus ultimately degrade the program. And I think we all can agree that would be a good thing.

Ag_in_TX is correct, I dislike AM but they are a very good school. In the SEC they would be on par with UF in terms of research and UGA in terms of lame US News rankings. So they’re would not a complete outlier. They would benefit from being the only SEC school in Texas, and while that would hurt UT in recruiting, it would soften the blow of not being in the Big Ten (or 16 if I had my way.)

Why would the SEC want OU? Does having them in the league improve their TV contract? I don’t think so. Does it give them access to more players? No, and it opens up their areas to OU recruiting. It seems like it just invites in a tough program to no net benefit. Although I am sure A-I-T is right, and OU would prefer to be in the SEC to staying in a Big East quality Big 12 (with concommitant TV revenue).

I think with UT in the BT and AM/OU in the SEC, the recruiting of those 3 schools in Texas would remain the same, big time schools in big time conferences. TTU, Baylor, KU, Mizzou, OSU, KSU and maybe Neb (depending on where they went) would all take big hits, and replaced with some BT and SEC hacks.

So what if the landscape looks like this in ten years:

PACIFIC CONFERENCE
Arizona
Arizona State
Cal
Oregon
Oregon State
Stanford
UCLA
USC
Washington
Washington State
Colorado
BYU
Kansas
Utah
TCU
Colorado State

CENTRAL CONFERENCE
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Michigan
Michigan State
Minnesota
Northwestern
Ohio State
Penn State
Purdue
Wisconsin
TEXAS
Notre Dame
Texas A&M
Missouri
Nebraska

SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE
Alabama
Arkansas
Auburn
Florida
Georgia
Kentucky
LSU
Mississippi
Mississippi State
South Carolina
Tennessee
Vandy
Oklahoma
OK St
Louisville
UCF

ATLANTIC CONFERENCE
Boston College
Clemson
Duke
Florida State
Georgia Tech
Maryland
Miami
North Carolina
NC State
Virginia
Va Tech
Wake Forest
Rutgers
Pittsburgh
Syracuse
Cincinnati

8-TEAM PLAYOFF SYSTEM

Jan 1 – Cotton Bowl – Central Winner vs At-Large
Jan 1 – Capital One Bowl – Atlantic Winner vs At-Large
Jan 1 – Sugar Bowl – SEC Winner vs At-Large
Jan 1 – Fiesta Bowl – Pacific Winner vs At-Large

Jan 8 – Rose Bowl – Fiesta Winner vs Cotton Winner (Pac 10/Big 10)
Jan 8 – Orange Bowl – Cap One Winner vs Sugar Winner (Atlantic and SEC)

Jan 16 – National Championship Game

All predicated on the premise of the 16-team superconference future and assuming that university presidents/regents will be the driving force in aligning schools and conferences. A couple of things may be problematic in this structure (e.g. Louisville and UCF to the SEC, leaving West Virginia out of the mix) but on the whole it could work, and could dovetail very nicely with an 8-team playoff structure (which ain’t happening in less than ten years anyway).

I’d love thoughts on the viability of a structure like this, and any logical adjustments to how conference alignments could shake out.

TTR: the state of Oklahoma is roughly the same population size as Kentucky, Alabama, Louisiana, and South Carolina, and bigger than Arkansas and Mississippi. So adding OU would increase their TV contract by the same amount as OU would take from it, making it a wash. The SEC might feel threatened by a super conference and make the move just to keep up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_population

Erik,

Many from the SEC would argue that there already is a super conference.. the SEC.

I am not one to chant SEC SEC SEC, beyond when I was a 11 year old kid cheering it in our final SWC game as we were defecting.

I wouldn’t rule out the SEC making additions or moves if other conferences did, but I think it is more unlikely than likely.

For a number of reasons, but none more than the current schools likely would play greedy and not want to share any of the big TV money we already have.

Like us all I am definitely going to be keeping my eye on all these conference change talks and am interested to see how it all shakes out.

Erik, that’s one side of the equation. Here’s the other- since 1988, only 78 players from that state went on to be drafted by the NFL. Compare that to 178 from Alabama, and 150 from South Carolina. Smaller state Mississippi produced 137 HSers that went on to be drafted. OU gets around this problem by recruiting Texas, but the SEC must realize that taking them in may be letting the fox into the hen house.

sayo,

the problem you have with those 4 big divisions like you listed is that the central and southeastern conferences are going to pummel themselves and have all the talent.

The Pacific and Atlantic are so soft and their top team(s) can walk out of their after barely breaking a sweat.

Blake,

I couldn’t agree more; even though I dislike every team in the SEC, I watch it more than any other conference. But the SEC is known for making the first move, not reacting. And assuming they are all greedy, which they are, I think adding AM and OU increases the total revenue for each school: while Oklahoma isn’t a huge state, Texas is. Really huge. The ideal point for the SEC may be 13 teams, but if that sits funny with people, I think OU is one hell of a consolation prize. You could move Bama to the East, where they would still play Tenn every year, make their buddy Auburn, and make TAMU/Tenn and OU/UGA buddies, or vice-versa. Those two games will help market any future TV deals, and the marginal returns of adding AM and OU would still be greater than zero. I think.

TTR: In my exchange with Blake I’ve touched on this somewhat, and I agree, OU is not a slam dunk for the SEC. But I think AM is, and 13 is such a weird number in college football, if the SEC decides to take 14 teams, you really can’t hammer them too hard for taking OU. I don’t see any of the ACC teams deflecting (not yet anyways) and TTU and OSU are out of the question. This is the frickin SEC, they won’t settle.

If we left OU to fend for themselves in the post-apocalyptic Big 12, I don’t think it’s a given that they would agree to continue playing us every year. They are a prideful folk up in OK, justified or no.

Yes, adding TAMU and OU gives the SEC a bunch of TV sets. So does adding TAMU and Utah, or TAMU and Boise State. Conversely, adding OU, and say, UH, to the SEC adds very few TV sets. The point is that tradition aside, TAMU is far more attractive to the SEC than OU.

TTR: Agreed, but do you think it’s realistic to assume that the SEC would close shop at 13 teams? If you do, then yes, AM and done. If you don’t, who do you think they’d add at 14? Louisville or WVU maybe, and maybe OU.

I like the idea of having 0U with the other cheaters in the SEC. That way, they can all beat up on each other and only one will advance to the MNC. USC usually finds a way to eliminate themselves. I’m not too worried about the PAC 10 or the ACC. The Big 10 champ would play in the MNC more often than not. And we should win the West on a regular basis, giving us a good shot at the MNC by beating tOSU in the title game.

If we left OU to fend for themselves in the post-apocalyptic Big 12, I don’t think it’s a given that they would agree to continue playing us every year. They are a prideful folk up in OK, justified or no.

Those pricks need the RRR much worse than we do, for recruiting. I don’t think there’s any way they give that game away, false pride or not.

If there is a conference restructuring, and if TAMU goes (with Texas) to the Big 12, the best offering for the SEC is OU and NU. Two programs with great histories, mediocre TV numbers, and a need to recruit out of state. The SEC might just pass.

I for one hope the Big 12 makes a preemptive move to expand into the first 16-team superconference which would hopefully quash all of this Big 10/Pac 10 speculation. The no-brainer move is to add BYU and Utah to the North. In one fell swoop you would have the #31(and rising) TV market, a school w/great academics and a national following(BYU), an intense rivalry, and last but not least the Big 12 North becomes a legit football conference again after being on life support the last five years.

Who do you add to the South? I say take the available schools that deliver the largest markets – in this case UNLV and New Mexico(Albuquerque-Santa Fe #44). Who here would bitch about a road game in Vegas every other year? Granted the South would be diluted in terms of football – but is that necessarily a bad thing? Another available market/school would be Memphis(#50). Consider them a back-up plan.

Some here would say adding the #31, 42 & 44 markets is no big deal – but if you’re the Big 12, what else can you do? If you were the Big 12 commish right now, what would you do?

Tkr: I wouldn’t approach it from a big 12 perspective. We need to do what’s best for Tejas and continuing to “get by” with our tv contract while other conferences bank is untenable.

IMHO, we need to say goodbye to the big 12 and do what’s best long term for Texas in money, academics and competition. That requires unconvential thinking on our part to ignore geography and what has been to appreciate what a substantial move this would be if finalized.

Biggio,

It just seems like there is a “grass is always greener” mentality that has evolved w/this discussion that will ultimately get us nowhere. We already have the #1 athletics program(in terms of overall success and $$$) – but it has not always been that way. I’m not saying the Big 12 was the vehicle for theat success, but it certainly didn’t hurt.

On another note, should the Big 12 just sit back and allow itself to become another Big East, or worse? Aren’t we in a perfect bargaining position?

Proposition 4
(HJR 14 – #2)

The proposed amendment would appear on the ballot as follows: “The constitutional amendment establishing the national research university fund to enable emerging research universities in this state to achieve national prominence as major research universities and transferring the balance of the higher education fund to the national research university fund.”

Proposition passed, ostensibly creating more r&d $ for the state by pooling resources to go after federal dollars. If anything this should benefit even UT, as it should open up money that they would not have otherwise had access too, not being a part of the higher education fund. This does not appear to affect the permanent university fund of which UT and A&M are the major recipients.

At the same time It will probably free up more money to create the second tier of public schools in Texas, in terms of research, to become more clearly defined, and thereby gain more educational prominence in the region and therefore more research dollars. Houston, TxTech and North Texas, and maybe even Texas State, should benefit, each becoming a prominent regional research university.

I would like to see Texas look into a partnership with Baylor Medical College. This would make us an unquestionable juggernaut in the research world. I remember Rice university thinking of some sort of partnership there but I’m not sure anything ever came of it. If we could bring in those dollars under the University of Texas System we might be right at the top of those rankings.

I am a fan of the Texas, A&M, and Rice to the Big 10 idea. From a research perspective it works and keeps the big 11 + 1 perception away. Even better if Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri come along for the ride.

At this point Colorado likely bolts for the PAC 10. Who also probably adds Utah and BYU as well. I wonder if the pac 10 would be interested in perhaps inviting a Texas Tech as a way to get into recruiting in Texas.

Oklahoma would be on the outside looking in. Poor sooners. They could try to piece together some sort of conference based in Texas with them as the major power. Maybe something along the lines of adding Houston, TCU, SMU, UTEP, North Texas, Tulsa, ULL, and Tulane. (Also keep an eye on Texas State if they get a big chunk of that research money and Tech miraculously parlays their chunk of the prop 4 money into a pac 10 invite.)
Not sure if that is good enough for an automatic invite, and it leaves Iowa State as a geographical outlier, but there is really no place for them to go unless they join the MAC.

Great piece. Thanks for the efort.
I thought Nebraska and Kansas were out of the equation because they are not members of an academic organization (name escapes me) that all other Big 10 schools, and Texas, are.

TKR- I believe we’re number in the revenue in spite of the big 12. Think of similiar revenue and the additional tv money on top of the increased academic prestige and research monies if we jump ship. The fact is the current member states of the big 12 will never have the major markets to bring in the tv contracts Texas should have.

The problem with sitting back is if Missouri bolts or CU to a lesser extent, the conference loses the largest media markets outside of Texas. If that happens, I can see Texas at the helm of s slowly sinking ship of a conference watching the other big boys rake in the negotiating deals. In this case, I believe that we strongely believe or almost know with certaintly that Missouri will leave we should be the school stepping to the front of the line and reaping the rewards.

This piece is really groundbreaking. It really could change the thinking of how alignment should take place. But I like it for a couple of reasons:

(1) The Big 10 wants to deliver the final coup de grace. The SEC is already proving to be an unstoppable shitstorm of great football and the Big 10 hasn’t been invited to the big football dance in a couple of years. It knows it needs to do something big. Adding 1 school (Missouri, Syracuse, Pitt, Rutgers) isn’t going to move that many heads and it doesn’t add that much value to the existing members. It ain’t going to shake any mountains. With 1 more school, the Big 10 is just another “me too” in a crowded field (SEC, Big 12). But adding several schools would cement its role as The preeminent conference or at a least a very formidable competitor to the SEC. The Big 10 needs to shift the power away from the SEC quickly, before things roll out of control. Bringing in Texas, Mizzou, Nebraska, and Kansas would create a superconference unlike anything the world has every seen. The Big 10 would now have arguably the best football (at least a strong second) and for sure, the most dominant basketball. These schools (minus Texas) could all be brought up to speed in time academically (it’s kind of like integrating the retarded kid into normal public school classes—it takes time).

(2) Moves by the PAC-10 and Big10 would create three formidable conferences in football. The Nat’l Championship is already between Big12/Big 10/PAC-10 and the SEC every year. If the Big 12 falls through, there is only the Big10/Pac 10 vs. SEC every year. That’s one less competitor in the field. That would be HUGE for the Big 10. By creating these superconferences, it could cement that possibility long into the future. Fewer conferences might also make it easier to have playoffs, if that ever occurs. The

(3) A super conference makes sense. Colorado is already a weird school in the Big 12 (it’s kind of more of a western school, don’t you think). Perhaps it would fit better with its hippy brethren in the PAC-10 west. Additionally, Iowa State/K-State and Baylor ain’t going anywhere. The rich only get richer in this world and these programs have been broke as hell for a long time. Why not cut them free and let them sail out for better waters (or a more appropriate conference, such as the MAC, C-USA, or whatever conference wants them). These are truly mid-schools in Big time leagues. They only hurt the Big 12. Seriously, who thinks Iowa State/K-State/Baylor will ever be able to consistently compete with the big boys? They simply don’t have the funding, recruiting, fan base, or resources to do so. They don’t fit.

1. I’m a Sooner fan and agree that any change in the Big12’s alignment will have a significant negative impact on OU.

2. I’m a researcher with national funding and have some clarifications.
- The fact that I live on the West Coast and work at a Pac 10 institution doesn’t impact my ability to collaborate with researchers at Univ. of Iowa or Univ. of Florida. In fact, for program project grants, collaboration outside of the institution are not frowned upon at all. When I was at UT, this was also the case.
- There are center grants that need local support, but local means on the same campus, not conference.
- $418K example is a little off. “Direct cost” would be $418K, and “indirect costs” (now called F & A) are some percentage of the 418K that the university has negotiated with the government. At Harvard, this percentage was about 78% or so a couple of years ago (yes, Harvard gets ~ $320 for not much), at Yale it was 67% , at my current institution it is 54%. I don’t know what it is at UT now.

3. TV dollars are the primary factor for conference expansion/realignment. The researchers at UT are held in high regard. If UT has a difficult time recruiting faculty (though it is much better than it used to be), the reason is location. Austin still isn’t NYC or Seattle or SF. UT typically has to pay more for the same talent, which is OK as they are able to do it.

BTW, in biomedical research, my field, the Texas medical schools, especially Southwestern and Baylor, are superior to all of the Big 10 schools save Michigan (yes, Minnesota may be better than NW in this arena).

I also agree with the original poster that the TV money and athletics in general are a small part of the pie financially. When you think about it, they have more potential to cause embarrassment than to generate revenue.

As a Mizzou fan, when all the Big 10 stuff started my first thought was that we are doomed unless the B10 are idiots and don’t take Texas.

The B12 has always been doomed and it was a marriage of convenience. UT and to a lesser extent A&M were the drivers of the bus and even then it was only a matter of time until the weight of at least 8 schools being in economic wastelands started pulling the conference underwater.

Say what you want about the B10 but for the most part it is not really shrinking more than it is not growing. How do you change that? Add Texas and problem solved. On top of this you get recruiting etc. The B10 on basic cable in every city in Texas would make it watched more than VS and probably FSN.

Texas is in the driver’s seat and I see no way the B-12 stays together. TX will one day be at an economic disadvantage or at least relying too much on donors instead of TV revenue.

I keep thinking (hoping) the B-10 expands to 14. if you could (and you probably can’t) leave A&M, the geography fanatics could be satisfied with MU, OU, Tex and then you have the SEC surrounded on two sides with televisions.

Anyway this Tiger fan wants you to either hide your head in the sand and have the B10 take us (doubtful) or have you demand the B10 go to 14 teams and let them pick us out against KU, Neb, A&M, Pitt. I like our chances of being one of the 2. We have 6m televisions which is our only chip. That and a propensity to act just like Tex Tech – competitive but not threatening in most sports.

Great piece.

I was just looking at the data for university funding and found the 2006 (not 2007) data.

http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/profiles/data/ess_ranking.cfm#E003658

It seems skewed, because it lists “U. TX Austin” as 33rd and “TX A&M U. all campuses” as 24th. What’s with UT getting only one campus and TAMU getting all included? If UT included all, they would easily be #2 (with just UT Austin and UTMB they would be #2 ahead of Wisconsin Madison and [way] behind Johns Hopkins).

So if only the College Station campus of TAMU is counted, are they still the big academic draw?

Hugh,

Never admit to acting like Tech.

That is all.

Assuming Money is number 1, then the academic ties (which is a big deal to the Big Ten presidents), I don’t think they would want to go only south. The biggest and closest conceivably available television markets are New York and Texas. UT fits beautifully from an academic standpoint. I think the Big Ten then looks to a Syracuse or Rutgers. They don’t sound sexy from a football standpoint but Rutgers is ok and could only benefit from this in football, Syracuse boosts basketball and again, New York televisions. Outside candidates, to me, would be Missouri (St, Louis and K.C., but there is already some Big Ten presence, iffy academics) Nebraska (iffy on the academics, television OK for Nebraska as a “national” draw ), or maybe Pitt (Great academics, strengthens Pennsylvania and maybe some New York draw) Television draw in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Houston, Detroit, Dallas, Cleveland, etc. is simply an overwhemling advantage. However it goes, I now think the final number of teams is 14.

I have a hard time seeing a 16 team conference for the Big 10. That would certainly challenge the status quo i.e create a voting block of “new schools” that might switch the balance of power in the conference. I also don’t see Nebraska and Kansas being added to the mix, right now they are two of the schools dragging down the TV ratings of the Big 12 why would the Big 10 agree to take them as a throw-in? The addition of four votes in the senate, just seams like more trouble than its worth.

The major institutions with upside for the Big 10 are Texas, Notre Dame, ATM, Missouri and Colorado in that order. Its more likely CU would go to the Pac 10 for a number of reasons, university culture, recruiting, location. But, if you get Texas, and ATM and then add one more of the three remaining schools that would be a excellent conference, with a ton of future potential.

One more thing, while the “rust belt” is currently struggling economically, they do have a number of inherent resources absent in much of the Southwest. At the top of the list is water. They also have good access to transportation routes, and major markets. It may take a few years for the politics of the midwest (i.e. economic dependence on Chevy and Ford) to catch up with reality (i.e. the necessity to lower taxes and union work restrictions to attract companies), but when they do you can expect a much stronger more diverse economy.

The Big 12 needs to give Iowa State, Baylor, and Kansas State the boot. They are like Temple was in the Big East – no market penetration, and no major success in the big revenue sports. However, it may not be possible to boot them unless Texas and Colorado move conferences.

If they do, the remaining Big 12 will probably do best by dissolving the conference, and starting a new one. Take BYU and Bosie St in the west, and you lock up the TV markets in Utah, Idaho, and half of Arizona and Nevada. Take Cincy and Louisville in the East, and you have a solid block between the Big 10 and SEC. Throw in TCU and Houston for competitive reasons, and to maintain part of the Texas market.

The worst thing that CUSA or any other non-AQ conference could do would be to rush to pick up teams booted from the Big 12. If the teams were not successful when they had BCS money pouring in, they will not be successful without it. They would be much better off acquiring up and coming nonBCS teams.

What makes you think that BYU, for example, would want to be part of a conference that stretches to Louisville?

The only way that works out is if there really is a framework to establish superconferences, and even then, they’d be much more likely to end up in the west than something central.

Just wanted to thank horninexile (is it because he’s an exile that he has he time for 2000 words?) for an informative and fun POV. It certainly appears that although we probably fit in better “culturally” with the PAC10 that the Big 10/11 is a better fit academically and their financial model is more stable for L-T cash flow for the University as a whole. I’d prefer the PAC 10 from a fan perspective, but very much understand the allure of the Big10.

Couple of questions and then I’ll be happy to read and learn. What school might be thrown from the equation if ND wakes up and realizes it’s not the 1940’s and decides now is the time to join a conference. Would the Big 10 just forgo the Tejas idea altogether? Or could the Super conference still work getting rid of presumably a Kansas or Nebraska?

What if ND moves to the Big 10 and they close up shop and the Pac 10 can’t sway the Buffs? What then? Status quo on a ship taking on water or at least an alignment with the Pac 10, a consortium if you will, going into the next TV contract. Pitch Comcast, who’s expressed interest in competing with ESPN, to step up and be real players in the college sports world? They need a rebranding of the NBC franchise and much like Fox did with the NFL, perhaps a major foray into college sports is the angle to go in. We promise to give them juicy interconference games (in all sports) and more favorable season long scheduling like USC/OU or Oregon/Texas. The idea being that the two big conferences currently out in the cold would get a better TV contract with pooled resources. If we don’t want to join their conference outright perhaps join them at the negotiating table. Just a thought.

Both of your questions can be answered (IMO) with the idea that the Big 10 will not stop at 12 teams but eventually will want to reach 16.

I don’t see any way OSU gets into the SEC unless Boone throws weight around and promises another huge donation if we get included with OU.

Smaller non A-Q is much more likely. We would be really good, but it is a running in the special Olympics kinda deal.

Michigan fan and alumnus here.

I think the general crux of this post is prescient. We are headed towards the age of the superconference, only there will still be classes within the superconference. There isn’t a conference that will approach the TV revenue of the Big 10 or SEC. The SEC will have the higher TV contract, but the Big 10 is positioned to surpass that deal significantly in the future — its simply the difference between an equity stake and a licensing fee. If you own it, you may have more downside, but the payoff is enormous. Rights fees are likely a salary — they’re set, and the SEC isn’t going to get more than its TV contract dictates until it expires.

Texas IMO will go to the Big 10. First, the PAC 10 requires a unanimous vote for expansion. The odds that every single PAC 10 will agree to go from 10 to 14 or 16 schools strains credulity. There will certainly be a dissenting vote or 2 in the Big 10, but the Big 10 only needs 8 of 11 yay votes.

I agree that Texas A&M comes along with Texas. The Big 10 will then make one last run at the Irish, and if ND says no, they would be sticking with an inferior TV deal (Northwestern made more TV money from the Big 10 network than ND did with NBC — cable drives the bus now).

If ND refuses to jump, the Big 10 will add three more schools. I agree that Missouri is a virtual lock for one spot. But Kansas and Nebraska are unlikely to get invites. For the same reason that Missouri and A&M will be added to keep some geographical presence for UT, the Big 10 will fortify its eastern borders for PSU. They are not going to ever take the chance that PSU gets fed up with being the only East coast school.

My guess? Pitt is a virtual lock. They have a massive endowment — top 10 nationally — and academics are huge here. Plus, this ensures that no other conference gets a foothold in Pennsylvania.

The other spot? I think its a tossup between Rutgers and Syracuse. Rutgers seems to fit the model better, and undoubtedly gives the Big 10 the state of New Jersey, with the chance to someday get into NYC. Think of Cuse as the safe stock — good bball team, decent market (Buffalo) but Rutgers as the small IPO — speculative, but huge potential payoff.

How it could shake out

East
Penn State
Rutgers
Pitt
Ohio State
Michigan
Michigan State
Indiana
Purdue

West
Texas
Texas A&M
Missouri
Iowa
Minnesota
Illinois
Wisconsin
Northwestern

As for the concern that the divisions are slightly unbalance with UM, OSU and PSU, this won’t be a problem. In fact, the 2nd place team in the East would be in great position to grab an at-large BCS bid each year because they wouldn’t take a loss at the end of the year.

I would expect the Big Money conference (probably Big 16) to get the 2 BCS bid cap lifted and add the Cotton Bowl and/or Holiday Bowl to its lineup.

The title game could occur as far east as the Meadowlands and as south as Dallas.

I don’t buy that time zone is that big a deal. It can be dealt with by structuring the tv deal so that the time slots work out for all concerned. Given the amount of money on the line, its kind of silly to act like it is some huge hindrance.

On the whole, I would prefer to keep our traditional rivals and opponents rather than taking on years of playing Northwestern, Indiana etc. Why should we have to deal with those type of teams? Why should we give up on playing ou rregional opponents like Tech while taking on teams like Iowa and Purdue? it would be one thing if we were joining a super conference, but that’s not what you are proposing. You are proposing we just take the Big Ten warts and all. I’m not sure that we don’t have more leverage than that.

Another problem with the Big ten is that it may well be the next Big 12. That part of the country is dying. And you can talk about the importance of not letting it die, but that really isn’t apropos of anything. The fact is that those states are declining in population and certainly in GDP regardless of your opinion of the matter. And there is no particular reason to think that any economic rebirth in new industries in this nation is going to happen in places like Cleveland or Flint.

I would prefer the Pac Ten. But what I really suggest is using the power of the massive Texas market, which is both big, rich, and chock full of college football fans, to try and start a new conference. Ideally, the southern Pac Ten schools could be convinced to break off from the Washington and Oregon schools. Take the Big 12 south, drop Baylor, add Colorado, and take those teams, and you have a great conference that Texas actually belongs in from a regional perspective. Short of that, just take that same Big South minus Baylor plus Colorado arrangement, and attach it to the Pac Ten as a whole.

I will say that I prefer the Big Ten to staying the Big 12, but I think we can find a better fit.

This 16-team idea is intriguing, but I believe the Big10 will take Colorado over Kansas in this scenario. Comparing Kansas with Colorado & Nebraska,
1. Colorado has nearly double Kansas’s population, and while Kansas has more people than Nebraska, Nebraska football will get more TV viewers even in Kansas, I reckon.
2. Nebraska is a slightly stronger research university that Kansas (which is far below the other Big 10 schools), and Colorado is far stronger in research than Kansas.
Plus, with Kansas, you have the same state legislature problem with KSU that Texas has.

Even if Colorado goes to the Pac10 (and if they think like UT and consider the research aspects, they wouldn’t; remember that the Pac10, like pretty much all other athletic conferences besides the Big10/CIC & Ivy League, has no academic component and sharing of research resources, plus most Big10 schools are as close to Colorado geographically as the current Pac10 schools), the Big10 would round out to 16 by taking an Eastern school, not Kansas, because the Big 10 just won’t take a non-AAU school that’s significantly weaker than any current Big10 member in research.

In this case, I foresee a division in to quadrants

West:
UT
TAMU
Colorado
Nebraska

North:
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Iowa
Northwestern

Central:
Illinois
Missouri
Indiana
Purdue

East:
Michigan
MSU
OSU
PSU

Where the divisions would rotate between East-West & North-South every year.
East would be formed by East+Central and West as West+North
North would be North+East and South as West+Central
Central will play North in interdivisional games every year as well as East quad vs. West quad interdivision.

Remember that the trio of Minnesota-Iowa-Wisconsin can never be broken up.

This way, almost all current annual rivalries are maintained and each school will still play every other school at least half the time. NU/UT/TAMU will always be in separate divisions from OSU/PSU/Michigan. I considered flipping NU and Missouri before, but as an NU alum, I know that no one on either side of the Northwestern-Illinois rivalry really cares, and NU actually has a fiercer rivalry with Iowa than Illinois (while Wisconsin’s as much of a foe as Illinois). Plus, Illinois may actually want Missouri more as an annual rival.

The key weakness in this plan is that Missouri & Nebraska are weaker than pretty much all Big 10 schools in research, and Nebraska is a low-population state to boot. However, taking those 2 connects Colorado with the rest of the Big 10, and those are the 2 best research schools on the Great Plains (discounting Iowa State, which is out of question because they bring no extra BTN subscribers).

If Delany is ambitious, and wants to build the Big10 brand as the top collection of research schools between the Rockies and Appalachians, he’ll go this route. More likely, though, at least initially, is taking UT+TAMU & a 14th school from ND/Maryland/Rutgers/Missouri/Pitt, in roughly that order of desirability (Pitt jumps up a few notches and ND drops some if research is stressed above anything else).

Great work. One of the best pieces I’ve read in awhile and a good discussion thread. Thanks.

I am old enough to remember the days of the demise of the SWC and all the hand-wringing that preceded it. Things turned out pretty good in hindsight. And as far as Bullock’s role, I think he may have been more influential in getting Texas and A&M to take Tech and Baylor with them to the Big 12. Bullock went to Tech undergrad and Baylor law.

Great ideas on the super conferences. If I had a vote, I would say let’s go with the aggies and maybe Missouri and Kansas to the Big 10. My biggest concern is baseball, but I suspect we could wire around that.

Michigan fan perspective here:

I doubt very much that the Big Ten will expand to 16 teams. Picking up teams for the conference is difficult and getting all the teams you proposed would be a stretch. Furthermore, expanding to 16 teams would probably reduce the amount of TV revenue per team, which would prove problematic as the athletic directors in the Big Ten have a lot of influence with regard to conference expansion and some teams will have athletic budget issues should the TV revenue stream be diluted. Remember, there’s a reason that the Big 12 has a terrible TV deal. It’s because outside of Texas, there isn’t a very large population base. I’d be willing to bet that the Big Ten will only approve teams for expansion should their addition to the Big Ten have the ability to boost TV revenue per team. As such, here is a quick rundown of your proposed teams:

1. Texas would easily and probably unanimously be admitted (I say probably because Penn State wasn’t even unanimous).

2. Texas A&M lends virtually nothing to the Big Ten that we don’t get by taking Texas. However, if both Texas and Texas A&M were a package deal, the Big Ten would probably accept it, considering that the amount of revenue Texas alone would bring in would probably be worth two schools. That said, the Big Ten would almost certainly prefer an arrangement in which Texas goes to the Big Ten, Texas A&M (along with Oklahoma) goes to the SEC, and the rest of the Big 12 gets screwed. And for the record, should the Big 12 fall apart, the Big Ten would establish a larger presence in the current Big 12 North area from a TV standpoint, increasing the conference revenue without adding teams to share it with.

3. Missouri would be an acceptable addition along with Texas and Texas A&M, should the Big Ten expand to 14 teams. However, Missouri is not necessarily superior to expansion targets in the Big East, namely Pitt and Syracuse. Academically and athletically, Pitt would be a much better addition than Missouri (Pitt is a premier research institution and is superior to Missouri in football and basketball; in addition, Pitt gives Penn State a real rival). However, the TV money that Pitt would produce would be rather less than Missouri. Syracuse is also a better choice than Missouri academically, and perhaps a tad better athletically. The potential revenue that could be gained from Syracuse is fairly high, although it depends on how much traction Big Ten television would gain in New York City. Simply put, Missouri might or might not be the Big Ten’s choice school (and make no mistake, we can grab any of these schools without much difficulty at all).

4. Nebraska is well below the rest of the Big Ten academically and their football team alone is probably not worth our while.

5. Kansas is in the same boat as Nebraska, when you substitute basketball for football. SInce football produces more money than basketball for BCS schools, Kansas has less than a chance than Nebraska does.

Also, to briefly address your statements about the value of adding Senators in the CIC blueprint, I don’t think that will be a high priority. I think that it’s fair to question whether CIC footprint senators will actually decide that it’s worth their while to campaign for CIC wide academic projects. I don’t see Ben Nelson, for instance, spending a lot of effort to get Michigan or Texas a bunch of research money just because Nebraska will be working with them. Furthermore, I don’t see Arlen Specter working to get CIC universities a bunch of research funding when there’s an Ivy league presence in his state already and a major East Coast academic center in Philadelphia. Instead, I think that the Big Ten will simply prioritize academics to try to strengthen the CIC without compromising athletics.

Finally, for fun, potential divisions (assuming a 14 team conference with Texas, Texas A&M, and Pitt (who beats out Missouri with its massive endowment and research funding):

East
Michigan
Ohio State
Penn State
Michigan State
Pitt
Purdue
Indiana

West
Texas
Texas A&M
Illinois
Iowa
Minnesota
Wisconsin
Northwestern

BTW, the Big10 already gets more TV money per school than the SEC. I remember back when the SEC signed their gigantic TV deal, people were saying they had the richest TV deal by far, but that’s because they have more schools than the Big10 and their deal stretches for longer. Their annual per-school take in TV money is actually less than the Big 10 (though both conferences are far beyond anyone else right now). Also, it’s not quite accurate to say the Midwest is in terminal economic and population decline. While Michigan has lost population and the implosion of the auto industry has hit Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana really hard, the rest of the Big 10 states have held steady in population and have done no worse than most of the rest of the country economically. It’s only from the vantage point of Texas (whose economy along with the Plains states have held up better than the rest of the country) that the Great Lakes states look worse off. Remember that a lot of the economic activity and population growth in the west and south was driven by the housing bubble, and now that’s popped and will be gone for several generations, people & money are actually moving out of places like Florida and California. Furthermore, real estate on the coasts is still highly inflated and I foresee problems down the road there as well. Meanwhile, Chicago has had one of the most diversified metropolitan economies in the country for a while now; it really takes a broad recession (like the current one) for the pain to be felt here.

I agree that in a multiple team expansion that the Big 10 is likely to split the difference and add a couple schools to the West and a couple to the East. Frankly, it would be non-sensical to add only Big 12 schools and surrender the East Coast to a 14 team ACC.

Further, there are a lot of Michigan and PSU grads in NYC (in fact more Michigan law students take the NY bar then the MI bar), so the Big 10 has a presence in the East Coast already. Any multiple team expansion will make a deeper push into NY.

If Texas signs up, I think the Big 10 may take a run at Maryland — why not dream big, at that point, the difference between the Big 10 revenue and ACC would be substantial, and if football is going to drive the bus, MD may want to be reunited with its former rival of the 80s — PSU.

I think the SEC is lurking. While Texas isn’t going to the SEC because of its academic standards, the SEC may be covertly planning its expansion. Any expansion must give the SEC a foothold in Texas, so what if the SEC preemptively invites Oklahoma and Texas A&M, knowing that the Big 10 intends on inviting A&M with Texas?

Would A&M ditch Texas for the SEC?

Seth, I do agree with you that 14 is much more likely that 16 (at least initially). If ND accepts, they’re in (despite being weak in research). I would say, however, that Rutgers & Maryland are stronger candidates than Pitt, simply because, while they are all on the same tier research-wise, those 2 bring more extra BTN subscribers. One school I hadn’t considered before coming to this blog is Colorado, but that’s another school that’s on the Pitt/Rutgers/Maryland/general Big10 level in research and brings at least enough BTN subscribers to not be a charity case. If Texas insists on another Big12 school as the 14th school, they could be it instead of Missouri or Nebraska, especially since most Big10 schools as are far away from them that the Pac10 schools.

BTW, Syracuse is actually on the same level as Missouri when it comes to research (which is what the Big10 presidents will consider, not undergraduate admission selectivity, when it comes to academics).

horninexile, very thought-provoking points you make; they are succinct, on-topic, and well-written. I congratulate you and am impressed with your effort here. I have no desire to repeat your words, nor enter into any great discussion about them. I have no negatives to argue because I agree with every word you wrote.

You did not, however, dwell much on problems that would form in the athletic departments regarding other sports such as golf, tennis, track and field, rowing, baseball (an obvious vexing problem for schools with excellent baseball programs), etc. Most of these smaller sports have limited funds, limited scholarships, and limited travel budgets. How do you propose an easy fix for this situation?

all of this is utter bullshit and I’m mortified that so many smart posters are not opposed and actually welcome this proposed sea change to college football. This is a collosal mistake that will make the game more like the NFL with the small town flavor of the game gone forever. We don’t want or need 4 Titanic teams every year, we need diversity from coast to coast.

more importantly, Texas does not need to suck off anyone and join some other conference. They should be joining US!

if the big 12 is to dissolve, the new conference should be called the SOUTHWEST CONFERENCE and take in a couple of teams from the SEC and Pac 10 and NOTHING from the big 10 , a place which is neither Southern or Western in culture, climate or history.

wtf? why not join the damn Big East?

Very interesting, educational and entertaining article. I just don’t see the Big 10 making the move to 16 teams though.

FWIW, an argument could be made that KU is a better addition to the Big 10 than MU. Larger Endowment (and one of the top 3 or 4 in the Big 12), better ranked academics per the US News and World Report, would deliver the Kansas City Market (there is no debate, KC is a KU town), an equal football program, a more marketable, recognizable and sellable national “brand” and one of the top 2 or 3 basketball programs of all time. KU is a member of the AAU (American Association of Universities) and has been since 1907.

MiamiWolv: Pitt’s endowment is not even Top 25 in this Wikipedia listing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universities_in_the_United_States_by_endowment

As a Colorado fan, I had always assumed that if we switched conferences it would be to the PAC-10, this is the first discussion I’ve seen considering that CO might be a fit for the Big 10 expansion. Quite honestly a move to either the Big 10 or the PAC 10 would generate a lot of good will with the academic side of the school, and from an academic perspective the Big 10 might even make more sense. Either case is better than being stuck in a conference competing with KSU’s admission standards.

However from a “fit” perspective I think the PAC-10 is the most likely scenario. In the one of the recent articles in a local papers the CU-Boulder Chancellor was openly speculating on how a move to the PAC 10 would fit with improving the connection to our alumni base and help potentially raise significantly more in alumni donations. California has the highest concentration of CU alumni after Colorado, and none of the rest of the Big 12 states with the possible exception of Texas are not even close.

California is also our primary recruiting area. Recruiting Cali kids to play mid-western teams might be a tougher sell, and it would be tough to build up a presence in the already saturated Big 10 recruiting areas. This isn’t an issue for Texas because you guys sit on top of the greatest recruiting gold mine in the country. While a lot of kids may not be opposed to going away for school, its a big plus to be able to say their family and friends will be able to see them play on tv or go to the occasional game without getting on a plane.

Colorado has gotten a rep for not being the best traveling team, but come on, the closest conference school is what like 5 – 6 hours away by car? Austin, Lincoln and maaaybeee Lawrence and Columbia are the only places most CU fans really want to go visit for away games unless its a big game. Moving to the PAC 10 probably significantly helps this issue, again primarily from our built-in West Coast alumni base. I know I’d be out most years for the games in southern California simply due to the number of college buddies I have out there to visit along with the game, and I have family in Northern California and Washington…like many other folks who have fueled the population growth in Colorado over the last 20 years. I’m not sure the same could be said for a move to the Big 10. CO also has a reciprocity agreement with a number of western states (which I’m pretty sure includes all of the PAC 10 states) that allows students to attend at a reduced rate compared to the normal out of state tuition.

I do think there is a LOT of smoke going on for the conference realignment stuff and CU is more likely to make a move this time around, if only because nobody wants to be part of the group of teams stuck with no options if TX and/or TAMU bail and take their TV market revenue with them. CU has a a higher risk of this occurring due to TX and TAMU probably needing to stay linked, but unlike some of the other Big 12 schools will hopefully have options. Too bad the Big 12 isn’t being more proactive and looking to create a new channel with the PAC 10 rather than sitting around to be picked apart by the more proactive conferences.

The arrogance of the Longhorn fans is truly astounding. Discussing elite academics while half the team are drunks and potheads who probably couldn’t SPELL “University of Texas” without 3 or 4 mistakes. Sergio Kindle can’t even drive without getting shitfaced first, and then can’t drive without plowing into an apartment building, not to mention the rest of the potheads and general thugs on the team in Austin. I bet that less than 10% of the players on Texas football team last year would meet the academic requirements of the Big 10.

Texas has won only 2 conference titles in the Mack Brown era, and yearly the schedule the biggest patsies they can find in nonconf, and got stomped in the most recent MNC game, and yet thinks it’s football program is “atop” the Big 12? I’m sure your much smaller neighbor from the North, with about 1/5 the enrollment, 3 times as many conference titles, and the head to head advantage in the Brown era (6-5) have something to say about which team is “atop” the Big 12.

As for academics, for Texas to compare itself (favorably I might add) with Ivy League schools, MIT, etc is laughable. R&D dollars are not the end all be all in academics. There are probably 100, or more, colleges and universities with academics superior to UT, yet have less R&D money.

Lastly I find it amusing, as a college sports fan, to see the speculation and endless whining on the part of Longhorn fans, who perceive some sort of “bias” against them in the Big 12. Trust me there is no bias. You guys just aren’t as good as you think you are. I for one would love to see the Longhorns jump to the Big 10. Their market share in Texas would dwindle significantly and they could easily be replaced by other teams. Texas has brought nothing to the Big 12 but petulant whining and crying for special treatment since day one. The Big 8 threw a life preserver to you bastards after you ran the old Southwest Conference into the ground and all you’ve done is whine and bellyache since day one.

Please leave the Big 12.

Let me guess a Husker fan? I would think an OU fan would tap the brakes at least somewhat on shit talking for the time being based on the last five years. You guys calling someone else whiney is fairly comical. I hope when Dr Tom tries to get the Big Ten to throw you a bone he checks to see if they will allow partial qualifiers. The Big XII helped Texas no doubt. To say that wasn’t a two way street is ridiculous. The Big Eight would be lucky to be on Versus at this point.

I’m was with you until you put ILL and NW in the B10 West division. That would make the east too loaded with OSU, PSU, UM, MSU , Wisc, Minny, Purdue and IU.

Instead, move Wisconsin and Minnestota (Iowa’s natural rivals that wouldn’t want to be split into separate divisions anyway) to the West and ILL and NW to the East. That allows for better balance between divisions and better geographic alignment.

B10 East
OSU-UM
PSU-MSU
PU-IU
NW-ILL

B10 West
Texas-Texas A&M
Missouri-Kansas
Iowa-Minnesota
Nebraska-Wisconsin

Kansas, Missouri and Minnesota are tradionally weak football programs and align with the B10 East bottom of Illinois, NW aand IU.

The B10 East would be stronger at the top, but the West would be deeper.

Texas to B10, Oklahoma and A&M to the SEC. Done.

What is CIC and what does it do exactly?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_on_Institutional_Cooperation

Your horniexile was very informative . Granted this is my first post but I get the feeling that this could be a smoke screen putting the athletics of Texas out front whereas this is all about the academics and their affiliation with the CIC and the Big 10. It was commented that we are not wanting in the athletic dept( big score board et cetera) so what does this have to do with the benefits of the Big 10. " Mack Brown would not have come to Texas but for the Bi12 " Please ! Not leave North Carolina for Texas that is a real stretch.
  The University of Texas is 2nd. only to MIT in federal grants so Texas isnt doing too bad in this regard. Perhaps it is best to go to the Big 10 but more info. is needed . Can we just jump ship from the Big !2 ? No contractual problem?

Nice long article. But the Big 10 is not trying to open it’s own Football Conference. They are looking to add a couple teams, not a complete conference.

Think about it again. Big 10 has the largest amount of money, best deal with ESPN. (why because the Big 10 does have the largest fanbase, and more large .

Im a PSU fan, we live dead center in the State of PA. Penn State has a great deal of power within the state. WHY? Because they have the larges economic impact on the state.

How? Well PSU’ main campus has around 65,000 studends, 45 of home are under grads.
They also have a law school on campus. They share with the local hosiptal a medical research facility at the local hospital. PSU funded. They also have a piece of Hershey medical. Do to a long time student fund raiser every year (come up in 2 weeks and come to the Largest student run Fund raiser. The money goes to the chirldres part of the above mentions hospital. Virtually every studen, a great many of the professors, parents.

On average they raise 8 million a year (over 3 days). A share goes to Research to help children with cancer. Part goes for research, part goes to help families cover the bills. The children smed 3 days at PSU, they are entertained, they get to go off with differen athetes from the the 29 sports PSU offers (that isn’t counting the 43 club sports. There are 24 parts of Pennsylvania that houses Penn State students.
Two law buildings, One building that is for those who like to use their hands. (Hi tech building, That part has some of the best companies in the country sponsoring research at Penn College (Willamsport (home of little Leaque) , they also have a number of majors for those who like to be outside while working and studing.

As I stated above they are not about to bring in 12 other teams. For one thing there is a criteria that a University must have to be in the Big 10. At least one would like be dropped
Big 10 requires neighboring Universite state wise. But they would likely drop that for a couple of good strong academics and sports.

BTW having it’s own TV Network sure has mad it much easier to raise money for building needs, And improvements on facilities. Not to mention bringing in top Professors. And most in Big 10,

Come on up and take a visit.

OK, so maybe we’re making too much of the Big 10 academics.

A lot of great thoughts here and a great article. I think that these things are great to think about, but it’s important to keep these things in perspective. We’re talking about a 3-4 year process and millions of dollars. This decision to go or not to go through expansion is going to be a cautious, pro-active one and not a wide-sweeping, reactive one. The most likely answer is that the Big 10 won’t expand.

With that said, I’ll lay out my perspective as a Jayhawk and Gopher fan.

The engine that drives the Big 12 athletically is Texas and to a lesser extent, Nebraska. The two top institutions in terms of endowment, academic excellence and donors are Texas and Texas A&M. The only two teams that are really up to all of the Big 10 standards are Texas and Texas A&M. Like the original poster said, this package deal would make Texas’ departure more realistic.

Looking at the rest of the Big 12 (now 10, ironic), you have four institutions with some bite, three that aren’t realistic and three without any teeth. Nebraska, Mizzou and Kansas have selling points. Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Colorado and Baylor are long shots. Iowa State, Kansas State and Texas Tech are dead in the water.

Iowa State, Kansas State and Texas Tech are dead, because in each case they are second (or third) fiddle in their states. In addition, they account for three of the four lowest endowment totals in the Big 12. Each has some great individual programs, but none are holistically on par with any Big 10 institution.

Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Colorado and Baylor are long shots for interesting reasons.

Oklahoma gives you a great football team and fan base, but little else. Academically, they aren’t in the top half of the Big 12. In addition, their endowment is in the middle of the pack. Lastly, there could be some complications in them parting with Oklahoma State at the state level.

Oklahoma State would have fallen in my ‘toothless’ category if it weren’t for T. Boone’s money. His donations have single-handily increased their athletic budget and revenues to the top tier of the Big 12. Their endowment is 11th in the Big 12 and their academics aren’t near the Big 10 level.

Colorado’s main selling point is academics. It’s up there with Baylor and has some great research money coming in. Colorado used to be a juggernaut in the early to mid-nineties. Their football team was top tier and their basketball team was competitive. Both teams are in shambles and are in the seller of the Big 12. Athletically, they bring little to the table, but the potential is always there.

Baylor has better athletics than people give them credit for— they just are typically hopeless in football and have been historically bad in men’s basketball (they are getting better in both, though). Their other sports are excellent— track and field, baseball and women’s basketball are very competitive. They are obviously strong academically and boast the third strongest endowment in the Big 12 (if you include their medical school). They may be the dark horse of this whole mix up, because they are very well connected politically.

Now for the viable candidates (I personally don’t see the Big 10 making a run at them if they’re cherry picking from more than one conference):

Nebraska is the most viable candidate athletically. With the exception of their doormat basketball team, they offer exceptional athletics from top to bottom. The Huskers are a national football brand and are on the upswing. Of the remaining candidates, only Kansas generates higher athletic revenues. They rank second in Big 12 titles, behind Texas.

Kansas offers an elite basketball program, strong revenues and a strong Midwest presence. Kansas City is a KU town, not a Mizzou town. In addition, KU travels extremely well and has strong alumni bases in Chicago, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Denver and Dallas. Their non-revenue athletics aren’t as strong as Nebraska’s, but they out earns them by $11mm in revenues ($86mm in ’08— 11th in the nation).

Mizzou doesn’t deliver as much athletically. Their football team has had some success the past four years or so, but doesn’t have much of a travelling fan base (bowl committees have snubbed them the past three years). Their basketball team is on the upswing, but is probably stuck perennially in third-fifth place in the Big 12. They also rank dead last in Big 12 titles, with six (the only revenue title was last year’s basketball tourney title). There is potential for improvement, because both of their coaches are buiding up their programs nicely. Their main ace in the hole is geography: they have access to KC and St. Louis and are right next to the current Big 10 footprint. Truth be told, their sports teams are second or third fiddle in each town.

Academically, they are all on the same tier— middle of the road. None have elite engineering schools, but the KU business school is pretty strong. Their endowments all hover around $1-1.2 billion, which is middle of the pack in the Big 12 and would put them low or last in the Big 10. None of them are the size of a typical Big 10 school enrollment-wise. Each calls itself a research University, but none are on the same tier as the Texas twins. All in all, they aren’t exceptional candidates academically.

So the real question becomes, do you grab a third Big 12 team? As I stated earlier, they are going to go about this decision very cautiously and proactively. It doesn’t seem like the case can be made for any of the remaining schools. If I were in their shoes, I’d look at other candidates. Pittsburgh makes the most sense to me (high endowment, competitive programs, and great academics), but Syracuse would be an acceptable consolation prize.

That’s why I think, if the Big10 can convince the UT (& TAMU) to come along, that the 14th school will be one of ND/Rutgers/Maryland or maybe Pitt, if the Big10 is really concerned with research and doesn’t care about TV revenues taking a hit.
One of Mizzou/Nebraska/Colorado will be the 14th team only if UT insists on it. Of those 3, Colorado’s the most attractive in terms of of population & research (but also the farthest away).

Remember that the Big10 is looking to expand for solely 2 reasons:
1. To increase subscribers to the BTN.
2. To increase new sources of research funding (including research collaboration, etc.)

Shame on you, TaylorT… :)

Yes there are contractual problems. You need to go to Allbuffs.com to read the thread on this subject. The problem is this 5 year rollover contract that will be expiring in a year and a half. The big 12 requires its members to give two years notice before they leave the conference. If a member leaves without two years notice they will forfeit anywhere between 80 and 100 percent of their revenue for the last two years. Even if you give two years notice you forfeit 50 percent of the revenue for the last two years. The problem I have with the BTN is their contract is with Dish Network which means if you don’t have Dish you are not getting the game unless it is a national game.

Gopher86 – Thanks for the feedback and input. Well done. Makes me curious what you get when you mix a Gopher with a Jayhawk.

It will be interesting to see how long things play out. When Penn State joined the Big 10, it was probably a long process. In 2010, things could potentially move much faster. There are TV contracts expiring and there could be a musical chairs phenomenon where a deal is reached quickly subject to a longer implementation phase.

One point to clarify is that Baylor College of Medicine is completely independent of Baylor University and has been since 1969. The Baylor that is in the Big 12 may have good academics but it is not strong in terms of research funding. It is dead last by a long shot.

As I’m planning to explore in a follow-on thread, I may be out on a limb with the Kansas and Nebraska additions to the equation. However, I came to that hypothesis by wondering how it would be possible to leave those two national brands – Nebraska football and KU basketball – stranded outside a major conference. Perhaps the PAC 10 would try to pick up Nebraska with Colorado, but I would be hopeful that the Big 10 would lay claim to all of the best assets in the middle of the country, with the notable exception of Oklahoma, which has some blemishes on its brand.

??? The BTN is on DirectTV, Dish, Comcast, AT&T, + pretty much all the cable systems in its home states. If Texas (or Nebraska, or Missouri, or Colorado) join the Big10, you can be sure that virtually every cable provider in those states will have the BTN on their basic tier.

BTW, considering that the take in TV money for each Big10 school is nearly double Texas’s take (which gets more TV money than any other Big12 school), whichever school who leaves the Big12 will make back the forfeited money in short order.

Sportsjesus, UT-Austin, A&M, Kansas, Nebraska and Missouri are all members of the Assocation of American Universities. I believe this has been cited as a requirement for CIC membership.

http://www.aau.edu/about/article.aspx?id=5476

Iowa State and Colorado are also members. K-State, OU, O-State, Tech and Baylor are not.

horninexile – Thanks for the Baylor clarification!

The Nebraska football and Kansas basketball brands are definitely two of the most valuable in the country. Both help their schools pull in top 20 athletic revenues.

It’s just a pity that the TV contract is so bad. It’s gotten to the point where Nebraska does pay-per-view to allow their fanbase to watch their games. Mike Alden (MU’s AD) broke down why pay-per-view is being used and how ridiculous the Big 12 TV contracts are ( http://www.columbiatribune.com/weblogs/behind-the-stripes/2009/sep/18/talking-tv-with-mus-mike-alden/ ). It’s no wonder you’re starting to see smoke from NU & MU (Osborne HATES how the Big 12 is set up now).

If you want to do an expansion piece, I know someone who would be a great source of information on KU’s athletic department history and current role in the Big 12.

If you are a member of the Big 10 you are in the CIC, not vice-versa. The CIC is only for the Big 10 with the exception of the University of Chicago which was invited back in after leaving the Big 10 .The CIC is academics period and nothing to do with the athletics.

I wrote an article on BR about where Texas might end up. I would interested to see what anyone on this site thinks of it.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/346875-on-the-brink-of-history-texas-choice-of-conference-is-the-key/

The Big 10 will definitely wait for the PAC 10’s decision.

If Colorado jumps, the Big 12 will fracture. There is no viable replacement for CU, especially if Utah is the other expansion target.

At this point, the Big 10 will be primed to make their move. They will have the most leverage, given that the loss of Colorado will have all Big 12 teams considering their options.

Being a Buckeye fan it’s great to hear thoughtful Longhorn fans point of view . Up here we wonder how it would feel if the situation were reversed ? It would suck ! But times are changing fast . I have great respect for Texas and would love to see them join the Big 10 . From My point of view i don’t see them adding more than 1 team . And that team should be Texas ! No offense to A+M . But if it’s both or nothing then i believe the B10 will look east maybe Missuo but i think their a long shot . As for a super conference maybe in the future. Right now money wise it doesn’t make sense . Neb and Okla are great football schools but they just don’t bring enough fanny’s in front of the TV. Only Texas 24m none of the others mentioned would add to the bottom line. But it’s about so much more than just that . Check out (frankthetank.wordpress.com) this guy has done his homework .I was on burntorange the other night and all they could talk about was going to the crappy B10 . Who by the way finished this year with 3 teams in the top 10 and 4 total in the top 15 in the BCS and as of today had 2 top10 and 4 total top 15 basketball teams . pretty crappy ? Although the commits about baseball are certainly true . The Big 10 would not be competitive . I’m sure all the talking heads could work that 1 out. Ohio State has 34 varsity sports and not all compete in the Big 10. One more thought , think about a fall Saturday afternoon in the future when any given weekend 4 Big 10 stadiums would be filled with over a 100.000 fans . Mich 110.000 / Penn St 108.000 / OSU 105.00 / Texas 102.000 . I find that impressive .

Great Article. Thank you.

I really like your thoughts around scheduling between east & west.

The only potential changes that I’d offer is to consider the upside of some eastern schools vs Kansas and Missouri. Consider shifting Wisconsin, Purdue, MN, or Indiana to the west.

If political influence & access to larger markets are important, then Rutgers and Syracuse must be in the conversation. Both great schools. Two incremental states (Senators & Many House Reps). Not to mention an incredible concentration of corporate headquarters, media, and international finance.

There are not many states with more clout than NJ and NY. This would also allow the conference to really break into the large NE markets, which are traditionally dominated by pro sports.

Imagine the political power of a conference with states like TX, NY, NJ, MI, OH, PA, IL working together? I looked at the numbers, and that footprint would cover ~150 million people – or about 45% of the country in 2020, and a considerably higher share of total GDP.

bigacademics said:
February 16th, 2010 at 1:31 pm

“If you are a member of the Big 10 you are in the CIC, not vice-versa. The CIC is only for the Big 10 with the exception of the University of Chicago which was invited back in after leaving the Big 10 .The CIC is academics period and nothing to do with the athletics.”

Actually, if I am not mistaken, the University of Chicago has never left the B10 and is a founding member of the conference. They are a non-athletic member of the B10 and have been.

I am not sure the B10 will expand beyond 14 teams. I am all for Texas and A&M. If ND gets smart, they are in. If not, I’m not sure where they go for #14. Mizzou, Nebraska and KU make sense to the west. However, I don’t think the B10 will look away from the east and would seriously consider Pitt, Rutgers or Syracuse.

Of course, if they DO end up going to a 16-team conference, I see Texas, A&M, Mizzou/Kansas with Pitt and Rutgers/Syracuse on the east.

I look forward to seeing Texas in the B10 in the next couple of years!

Awesome. My favorite blog.

the article is garbage. The Big8 has been around for decades and still exists embedded in the Big12, so how can anyone claim they have “weak ties” to each other?

This idea of UT going to the Big 10 will collapse under the weight of its own outlandish foolishness.

h34tx – your attitude is garbage, as proven here and on virtually every post you make on shaggy.

You stated, “However, an expansion of the Big 10 to include 14 universities would not necessarily be good for Powers’ legacy if it devolves into a 12+2 mentality. If Texas is to join the Big 10, it will be in Texas’ interests to see the nexus of Big 10 markets gravitate westward. If Texas and A&M are in the expansion, the 14th university needs to be Missouri, not Pittsburgh or Syracuse or Rutgers. An even better scenario would involve adding Kansas, Nebraska and Missouri along with Texas and A&M to form a Big 10 superconference.”

This is precisely why it will not happen. The Big Ten does not want a coalition of universities. They want any university added to become a Big Ten university. They have stated this in several of their releases. The expansion to 12 would happen if they were dissatisfied with Penn State’s assimilation to the Big Ten. You are suggesting adding a faction of three or five universities. A “12+2 mentality” is far less likely than an “11+5 mentality” developing given your scenario. This is exactly what the Big Ten does not want. If Texas Politics demand that A&M join UT in the Big Ten, the 3rd university added is much more likely to come from the Pittsburgh / Syracuse / Rutgers pool than the Kansas / Nebraska / Missouri pool.

After reading thru the join the Big 10 comments, it is apparent that if you are for the jump you are smart and caring for the University and if against the move you are a fool and get attacked personally. Of late the fans dont want to drive to Happy Valley but the intellectuals wish to drive on the internet and chat with their counterparts.

“the article is garbage. The Big8 has been around for decades and still exists embedded in the Big12, so how can anyone claim they have "weak ties" to each other?

This idea of UT going to the Big 10 will collapse under the weight of its own outlandish foolishness."

The Big 12 is an athletic conference, first and foremost. It doesn’t have the academic underpinnings that the Big 10 has. If you’re an conference created for athletic purposes (more specifically, football purposes), what happens when the top athletic team in your conference (and arguably the nation) goes away and brings his second tier brother with him? What happens when you try to renegotiate the Big 12 media contract in 2016 and you have little to no Texan viewers (Tech and Baylor would be pulling the load)?

The answer is that you fall further behind the SEC and Big 10, you lose ground in the arms race and you wither on the vine:

Assume you have ten teams sitting in the center of the country (no Texas or A&M). Who do you reload with? BYU and Utah maybe? Do you take a chance on TCU or Boise State? How many of these teams are going to be in the Pac-10? Is Colorado going to jump? Is the SEC satisfied with 12 teams? Is the Big 10 (now presumably 13 or 14) satisfied with their lot? Now you’re in a situation where the first person who can jump gets a sweetheart deal at a power conference, while those that wait die a slow death of Big East-esque irrelevance. At what point do you jump on a deal?

As much as the Big 12 North teams hate the deal that Texas gets with revenue sharing, they have to bend over and take it or face some dire consequences down the line. If you’re a weaker school (ISU, Tech, KSU, Baylor, OSU), you are hoping no one leaves and if you’re a school with some sort of out (MU, NU, KU, CU, OU) you’re VERY nervous right now.

University of Chicago was a founding member but dropped out when did not field football team. They were invited back to Big 10. This is probably is of no consequence unless the Big 10 (CIC) should vote to add non-fielding athletic colleges.

This post got some dap on the Inside Texas podcast this week…. BC is officially BIG TIME

Who would the Big Ten rather have? Texas or Notre Dame? Why can’t we be like Tom Brady and court both the supermodels if they’ll have us?
With regards to Jordan Hicks. He wasn’t a true Ohio kid, I believe he was born in the Carolinas and moved to the Cincy when he was a little older. So he didn’t actually have any real ties to the state of Ohio.

The Big Ten is very unlikely to add 5 teams and increase to 16 total. 1 is still the most likely number. Texas or Notre Dame are the top two choices and after that I don’t see anyone else that the Big 10 really wants. They’ve looked at expanding 4 times since Penn St joined and haven’t done anything because they are very selective. As far as Jordan Hicks goes, he was two years behind me at my high school and already had family in Cincinnati before his immediate family moved there.

As a Wolverine fan who lives in new mexico, I am following this very closely. Something to note….the Pac 10 will not invite BYU…the most liberal universities in the US are in the Pac 10 and they do not want BYU and their following…A couple different sites, which i have lost track of, have stated as much. If Texas comes to the big 10, I highly doubt it will be with Texas A&M. They are looking for one school right now. Texas has passed ND on the pecking order so they are taking their best shot. As for the baseball arguement, overall, the Big 10 is not the Big 12, but we have had some teams make super regionals and even the CWS. Michigan a few seasons ago eliminated top ranked Vandy, so the quality of baseball is not that bad.
My Prediction:
Texas to the Big 10
CU and possibly a school like Boise St or New Mexico to the Pac 10. I have a feeling that if BYU does not go, Utah wont go.
Big 12 will get Arkansas and a MWC team of their choice. Its been well known that Arkansas wants out of the SEC.
Look for the SEC to invite one of the other Florida schools or OU.
Big 12 will then bring in TCU to replace OU.
ND will join a conference eventually. The Big East

If you take away nothing else from this thread, know that Texas and Texas A&M will not be separated.

for the right price anyone can be seperated….

and it should be noted that schools (or stanford) have shot down Texas in the past…without A and M as a tag along. The Big 10 would have except the had a by law put in after admitting Penn St that they could not add another team for some set time. Texas has offered to leave A and M before…what changes that now?

What changes that now? Well, let’s just say that the Texas program in ’95 was kind of like the Michigan program today.

true…but this is about alot more than football….A and M does not really bring anything to the Big 10 it does not already have or will have if Texas joins…and as it was pointed out, in 95, there was no where for A and M to go..now they are in a BCS conference so its not as big a deal to leave. besides, i thought A and M wanted into the SEC….if they were to move why not try there? have to believe they would look there first….

Texas will take A&M with it because it can. In the early ‘80s, you could make a lot of money with Burt Reynolds headlining your movie. If he wanted you to find a part for Dom DeLuise, then that’s what you did. Otherwise, Burt Reynolds was going to star in somebody else’s movie and make somebody else a bunch of money.

i think the arguement we have over A and M is due to an opinon of who needs who..the big 10 doesn’t need texas to advance in everything (other than football and baseball). Texas would be just fine in the big 12, except if the big 12 loses mizzou and/or cu…then UT would need the big 10….in no way does the big 10 need or want A and M…its a great school, and has its benefits, but it just does not give anything to the big 10…my point is this…the Big 10 would LOVE to have UT…but at no point would it need UT…UT would love to have the big 10…at some point UT may NEED the big 10…no other major conference gives the advantages the big 10 does…both athletically and academically…financially, the big 10 is still tops…

Think outside football. As described above, the Big 10 needs Texas and Texas A&M to lobby for higher growth of federal R&D invested in the middle of the country relative to the coasts. The kind of money is at stake that makes TV contracts look small.

Keep in mind that the current Secretary of Defense was president of Texas A&M just three years ago. The federal goverment invests $84 billion in R&D.

The federal government invests $84 billion in defense R&D.

By the time anything gets done odds are there will be a new Sec of Defense

I would think just on the sports/Big Ten Network level that adding A&M in addition to UT basically wraps up the entire state of Texas as viewers and doesn’t give the SEC an in to the state that the Big Ten just added. Not to mention the fact that A&M meets all the academic qualifications it seems the Big Ten appreciates. Is Big 10 + the entire state of Texas not enough for Notre Dame to see the light? Jeez what is their problem?

Great write up.

I do wonder why you talk so much about the Texas and A&M partnership, but leave out the Iowa and Iowa State.

I would encourage you to research the Virginia Tech role in ACC expansion, and look at the number of ISU legislators in the State Senate. There is no way ISU is going to allow the Big 10 to take Mizzou, Nebraska and Kansas without a huge fight. I don’t see KSU allowing the Jayhawks to go that easily as well.

State Governments run Universitys as you have very well pointed out. They are the people who tell University Presidents what to do.

Iowa state legislators won’t have much of a say because U of Iowa is already in the Big 10. However, your post triggers an issue that could be a major impetus, which I plan to discuss in a follow-on thread…Sen Chuck Grassley. That righteous dude could be the troll by the bridge, so to speak.

The Iowa legislature won’t force the Big10 to take Iowa St. because, frankly, the Big10 would be just fine if they dropped Iowa for one of Mizzou/Nebraska/Rutgers, and everyone involved knows that.

As for A&M, it’s not about whether the Big10 needs A&M or not, but what it would take to get Texas. Adding TAMU along with UT still increases the pie for everybody, so if the Texas politicos force A&M to come along, I doubt the Big10 objects.

“But the SEC is known for making the first move, not reacting”

This isn’t true at all. Keep in mind that ALL of the conference re-alignments started with PSU joining the Big Ten.

True. I don’t quite understand where the “SEC is the biggest, baddest, most aggressive, proactive, blah, blah, blah” meme started from. In expansion, they expanded only after the Big10 did. In leaving the CFA to sign their own network deal, they did so only after ND left the CFA (and the Big10 & Pac10 were already negotiating their TV deals separately), and it was only when CBS blew them away with the money they were offering to break from the CFA (they didn’t proactively seek out CBS). In the last round of TV negotiations, they got their mega deal from ESPN only after the Big10 established the BTN, forcing ESPN to pay out to keep the SEC from starting thier own cable network (and even with that deal, they make less money per school from TV than the Big10 does).

If anything, when it comes to conference management and maneuvering, the Big10 has been the most proactive & aggressive force on the college football landscape in recent history.

The Iowa legislature has no power over the Big Ten. The only thing they can do is threaten to force Iowa to pull out of the Big Ten, which they would never do because it would damage Iowa academically and athletically. Furthermore, Iowa is easily replaceable.

The Texas legislature also cannot force the Big Ten to admit (or not admit) Texas. However, they can screw over Texas unless an acceptable home can be found for Texas A&M. As adding the Texas market would be huge for the Big Ten, the Big Ten may well be willing to take in both schools.

“Iowa state legislators won’t have much of a say because U of Iowa is already in the Big 10. However, your post triggers an issue that could be a major impetus, which I plan to discuss in a follow-on thread…Sen Chuck Grassley. That righteous dude could be the troll by the bridge, so to speak.”

Ummm. Virginia was already in the ACC and that didn’t stop the state government from forcing the ACC to take VaTech over Syracuse.

Texas Wahoo, the story I read says that the Virginia governor only had leverage because Duke and North Carolina were opposed to any expansion, making the Virginia vote key to having the necessary votes to proceed. That was an unusual circumstance and is unlikely to repeat.

However, there will be some other unusual circumstance, one can be certain. Expect the unexpected.

There is zero chance that Texas will join the Big 10 . If Powers even agreed , the legislature would stop it.

As a Michigan fan and alum, I’ve also been closely following the discussion of Big Ten Conference expansion since the initial stories came out a few weeks ago about the B10 looking at adding additional programs.

First off, let me say that I’m all for the idea of inviting Texas to join the Big Ten. I was at the Rose Bowl game back in 2005 and thoroughly enjoyed mixing wit the UT fans (except for the final score, it was also a great game to attend).

The comments on this and other blogs have been consistent in stating that if UT is given an invitation, then Texas A&M would also have to be invited as well. Considering that’s a given, then that means the Big Ten would have to become a fourteen- or sixteen-team conference.

If it does end up at 14 teams, my opinion is that the first school on the expansion list is Notre Dame. Admittedly, ND’s academic profile doesn’t match up to most of the Big Ten programs (not in AAU, not a research university, etc.) and the school doesn’t expand the geographic footprint. That said, the reasons for asking the Irish to join the B10 back in 1999 are just as valid a decade later in terms of what they bring regarding athletics, popularity and television viewers. Would ND say yes to this sort of set up? I think they’d be awfully tempted, but IMHO, if Notre Dame thought it could maintain its football independence even with an expanded Big Ten, then they would do that despite the additional revenue they’d be getting.

If not Notre Dame, then who is the 14th team? Clearly, if the confernce wants to penetrate largest available television markets, you’re either looking at Missouri (not Nebraska or Kansas) or one of the Big East programs (Syracuse, Rutgers, Connecticut) in order to reach New York and, to some degree, Boston (neither of which strike me as big college towns, but they do have their share of B10 alumni). While Pittsburgh would be a logical candidate as a rival to Penn State, its already within the Big Ten Network envelope (keep in mind that the ACC originally wanted Syracuse and Boston College—plus Miami—when it expanded, but that was nixed by the Virginia legislature that strong armed UVa into supporting Virginia Tech). Side Note: During a Q&A session I attneded with former Michigan head football coach Lloyd Carr about four years ago, he was asked about a 12th team joining the conference. He thought UConn was a good choice—strong in basketball, growing football program, eastern location.

I’ve seen several divisions mentioned, but a 14-team conference along an east-west axis would include the following (if Notre Dame or one of the Big East teams mentioned avoe was admitted):

West – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Northwestern, Texas, Texas A&M, Wisconsin
East – Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame or Syracuse or Rutgers or Connecticut, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue

If the conference goes to 14 teams with the additions of Missouri, Texas and Texas A&M, then that east-west split may look like this:

West – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Texas, Texas A&M, Wisconsin
East – Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Northwestern, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue

Although I have read posters saying there might be nine conference games, that might not be desireable because that’d mean an uneven number of home/away conference games each year. The Big Ten tried this in the early 80s over a two year period (when it really had only ten teams), but the experiment didn’t last.

In that case, Texas would play six games in the West Division plus two in the East on a rotating basis (probably with one of those games being against either Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State). That would also mean UT would have room for four non-conference games, including the annual game with Oklahoma in Dallas.

Sixteen teams just seems harder to swing and there are all sorts of scenarios for five additonal clubs:

1. UT/ATM/Mizzou plus ND plus one BE
2. UT/ATM/Mizzou plus two BE
3. UT/ATM plus ND plus two BE
4. UT/ATM plus three BE
5. UT/ATM plus three Big XII

IMHO, scenarios 1 and 3 would be the most likely. I’d be hard pressed to imagine Notre Dame turning down the prospect of belonging to a 16-team conference that spans from the northeast to Texas—that’s just too good of a lineup. FWIW, I could see Pittsburgh now joining the field as a possible team in the larger conference lineup.

Assuming Scenario 1, then the east-west division matchup goes something like this:

West – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Northwestern, Texas, Texas A&M, Wisconsin
East – Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue plus one Big East team (Syracuse, UConn, Rutgers or Pitt).

Assuming Scenario 3, then the east-west division matchup goes like this:

West – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Texas, Texas A&M, Wisconsin
East – Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue plus two Big East teams (Syracuse, UConn, Rutgers or Pitt).

I won’t go into the other scenarios—they’re fairly easy to draw up based on the basic geography and taking into account the existing rivalries between the schools.

We’ll see how this plays out. Obviously, we’ll know more come this summer when Colorado makes its decision on whether or not to stay in the Big Ten.

One last note—if Texas joins the Big Ten and plays a game in Ann Arbor at the Big House, make sure to have lunch at Zingermann’s Deli. Its one of the best in the country.

The Big 10 would never take Iowa State. The Iowa state legislature doesn’t have the power to stop the Big 10.

The VA legislature had leverage on VA only because UNC and Duke were opposed to expansion. If Duke or UNC supported expansion, the VA legislature would have been powerless.

I’m an Aggie hoping we get into a 14 team Big 10. I’m not as big a fan of a 16 team league because, even with a 9 game conference schedule, you’d need 8 years to see every team in the other division home and away (and I’d prefer an 8 game conference schedule).

As an out of state graduate, it’d be great to see my team on TV more than once a month (yes, they’re in a down cycle, but teams in the bottom of the Big 10 and SEC are easy to find on TV).

On the 14th or more team:
-Pitt might make academic sense but it doesn’t add a new tv market. If you’re adding a school with academics but no TV market, get Rice and let the Texas schools play closer to home every other year, or get Tulane and get a great road trip for everyone in the conference (along with presence in the strong but small LA & MS recruiting area). Either of these schools would get along well with Purdue and Northwestern. Adding one of these schools would also allow everyone to say academics really matters. And hey, someone has to come up last most years.
-Nebraska and Kansas don’t add much in the way of TV markets
-Missouri and Colorado would be good, and make the Texas schools feel more connected to the conference
-With the Texas market added to the Big 10’s already strong TV lead, one or more of the ACC schools might be willing to jump. Florida State, Virginia, Georgia Tech, or Maryland might be willing to go, bringing bigger TV markets than Missouri or Colorado.

I read FranktheBlanks analysis on the merits of joining the Big 10. He obviously spent alot of time on this but he should have spent some some critical thinking. Quail hunters would bless this as a covey rise that a blind could not miss. He really thinks a good speech over comes the true facts. Regardless of all the pretty talk the dog just does not like the dog food and wont eat it.

horninexile, this is the best reasoned post I have read on the topic.

I think this is very near how our move to the Big 10 will go down. The more you look at this the more you see that sports is only the tip of a gigantic iceberg.

The Big 10 is in the rust belt. The future of this country resides in Texas more than any other state in my opinion. I live in Chicago and I see how mismanaged the old entrenched economic systems are up here and it will take decades to get out from under that. Texas is almost a clean slate relative to the systemic issues facing the rest of the country.

The Big 10 can leverage its academic and research might into the future by adding Texas and ATM. [Laugh all you want but ATM would immediately be in the top tier of engineering schools in the Big 10].

If the CIC grant level is 40 billion a year, I think it easily gets to 50 billion with Texas and ATM. This would be a symbiotic relationship across the board, financially, athletically, academically and politically. How many jobs does several billion on additional research at UT and ATM add in Texas? That is how you get the lege on board.

When the UT system starts getting another 2 billion a year in research grants what are all the pointed headed professors going to say about Mack Browns salary then? Because the resurgence of Texas football is what ignites the discussion that benefits the academics most of all.

This thing started out as a football TV contract but its really about positioning the University of Texas as a regional economic catalyst for the next 25 years.

Buuzak -where in the world did you pull the 40 billion in federal grants come from and the Big 10 DOES NOT split up the grant money! Each university applies for their own grants and only 1 % is between any 2 universities. This statement came directly from the CIC. Please please please check this out before you say my statement is wrong . Make a call.

bigacademics, I think my math is wrong and from the OP the number is 8 billion in the big 10. My understanding is that UT is around 1.2 to 1.4 billion in grants a year. I saw that number somewhere but clearly its wrong. So I fucked up.

I think it tells you something that even cutting my estimate down by 80% doesnt change the basic premise in the slightest.

Incremental TV revenue in this deal will be a rounding error. Texas is going to the Big 10 and kindred with like minded academic institutions and a symbiotic approach to gaining grants is the main reason.

Bullzak - The total grants to the Big 10 is 6 billion. Each school applies for and gets its own grant . The competition between Michigan and Michigan State is fierce and no love lost there. Of the 6 billion 3.5 is federal grants. Texas I believe gets around 600 million now from federal grants. I dont know total Texas grants but will find out.

???

Whether researchers at Michigan and MSU cooperate or not will depend more on their personal relationships and how their skill sets fit than anything that happens in sports. Almost none of them would be from Michigan originally, and maybe 5% of them even follow football.

Richard You hit the nail on the head . The folks wanting to join the Big 10 are the academics and not the athletics. The athletic dept. actually contributes money to the acad. But still they are outraged at money the athletic dept brings in

horninexile said:
February 17th, 2010 at 10:34 pm

Think outside football. As described above, the Big 10 needs Texas and Texas A&M to lobby for higher growth of federal R&D invested in the middle of the country relative to the coasts. The kind of money is at stake that makes TV contracts look small.

THIS IS A MORONIC COMMENT—- Do you really believe Texas does not try for R & D because the grant pertains to the Big 10 area.

bigacademics…there’s two sides to communication, clarity of writing, and reading comprehension. I’ll meet you halfway and try to clarify the comment.

R&D grants and generally open competitions and university faculty openly compete for any grant they believe they have a reasonable chance to receive. Very seldom do university administrations get involved in individual grants.

At the federal level, there are programs established to try to reverse macro trends between states that receive substantial R&D dollars and those that do not. Google “epscor” to see what I mean. Also, it is well known that federal R&D investors are influenced from time to time by members of congress, especially senators. When a senator calls and advocates for a project, it doesn’t mean that it will happen, but it does have an impact. In a competition between two competing research grant proposals, both with strong merits, the one with a senator calling directly will have a greater likelihood of success.

The comment above relates specifically to the potential for similarly positioned universities (middle-U.S., lagging west coast and east coast R&D expenditures on per capita basis) to advocate for macro-level changes over a long period of time. As stated in the original blog entry, the Big 10 universities do not seem to have engaged in this type of concerted effort over the past decade even as their region is slipping behind. Michigan is lobbying for all kinds of federal support to keep it from falling further into a financial abyss. Universities can be a small but important part of a long-term, macro solution. Part of that problem could be remedied if the federal government started investing more R&D dollars in regions that are more cost competitive and in more need of federal stimulus. It simply costs more to do business in Boston or California, and that holds true for the federal government as well.

Capiche?

Well well well….seems like the article was a lot of hot air, as I observed in an earlier posting. Texas isn’t going anywhere, but I wish their whiny asses would.

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Got you link from Buckyville.com a badger fan site. Your comments make much sense. As mentioned above another good blog source is Frank the Tank blog (he’s an Illinois fan and a lawyer) but he seems ok.

Travel costs for non-rev sports are minor as most don’t really follow a full conference schedule. Travel costs are basically driven by the actual flight and not mileage. For a fan yes, for a school no. Anywho, Texas is closer to Minneapolis than State College so its not that big of a deal for Big Ten schools.

I don’t know the economic package the Pac-10 would provide from a research side but it is probably less than the BigTen. Arizona, ASU, WSU and OSU are probably below the lowest of the BigTen with UCLA, CAL and Stanford equal and maybe slightly above Michigan and Wisconsin.

I expect that the BigTen will take Nebraska and Missou from the Big12. I expect aTm and UT to be a package and I can see Texas having trouble ditching Tech. Maybe ditch Tech and keep Baylor. Its got a strong Medical school, correct? Baylor would definitely not fit in the Pac10 but it could work in the Big10. There is lots of specualation that adding Rutgers would give the BigTen the NYC market but as a former resident of NJ I don’t think it would by itself. FranktheTank has some good TV #’s for RU and it appears they do not provide NYC. Rutgers plus ND maybe with the subway alum.

Best case for BigTen: Nebraska, Mizzou, Texas, A&M and NotreDame.
What I expect: Nebraska, Mizzou, Rutgers, Syracuse and either Boston College or Pitt.

The shame is Pitt is logical expansion choice for the BigTen but I don’t believe will get a fair shake as it doesn’t add any TV that PSU provides. Kansas is out as I expect K-state to be a package. That is why Nebraska and Missou can go to the Big Ten. They don’t have to take a little brother with them as Kansas would. After losing out on notre Dame and Texas I expect the BigTen to push east and try to win the NE by taking Boston College and Rutgers/Syracuse in the hopes you get the whole NE. UConn could drop football or more likely go with Pitt and W. Va to the ACC.
I think ND stays independent to keep a “National schedule” for which I cannot blame them. Texas and A&M cannot ditch Tech or Baylor and the BigTen can’t take three of four imo so they go to the Pac10 with Colorado and Utah (not BYU). OU and OSU go to SEC, the SEC takes Clemson and either Florida State or Miami.

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