Logic Defied, Texas Destined to PAC 10

One week ago, the esteemed purveyors of Barking Carnival assented to the publication of my Pelican Brief, Being Bill Powers (http://barkingcarnival.fantake.com/2010/02/15/being-bill-powers/), which provided a theoretical framework for how the president of The University might view the opportunity to align Longhorn Athletics with another conference for reasons that supersede athletics.

Ha! I kidnapped your pets and held them ransom. But we quibble over details.

More great stuff. Thanks for putting it together.

Texas to left coast is kinds of awesome.

Scipio has promised his treatise on why ASU is actually the sleeping giant of college football.

Not only does he give you conspiracy theories, but he even adds to the mood by giving it to you in small typewriter font, like a good mystery writer….

“Thoughts?”

You don’t have access to a Piper Cherokee, do you?

A very good read. It is not often I read something on this topic that has an interesting scenario that is a little out there but not completely crazy.

One issue I have is with the idea that the Pac-10 would be more flexible is their requirement of unanimity for any expansion. In such a situation, all it takes is one “monk moment” to kill any chance of action. Perhaps one Arizona State administrator does not want to be in a division without the California schools. Perhaps one Cal booster does not want to share money with “redneck Texans”. In short, I do not think even a just Texas/Texas A&M addition would be certain to pass.

Conversely, the Big Ten only requires a 3/4 majority, meaning Iowa could vote no on everything and not have any effect.

Also, I agree that Texas would rather have more of its games not involving a plane trip, but it is unclear exactly who would be in such a conference (short of reviving the SWC). Currently, Texas can only really drive to 3 conference games (A&M, Baylor, RRR). Under your Pac-10 or Big Ten plan, Texas can only drive to 1. In other words, demanding that the conference take Nebraska, Kansas, or Colorado does not help keep Longhorn athletes in class.

I’ve seen the “Prop 4 will make Texas Tech into a Tier-1 university” argument before, but I don’t know how much weight that would carry with the academics at a Stanford or a Michigan.

This might be living in the past a bit too much, but suggesting that the Big Ten has been less wise with its expansion decisions than the Pac-10 does not match actual history. The Big Ten started the whole conference realignment idea 20 years ago and made the most successful and groundbreaking addition of any conference since then. Meanwhile, the Pac-10 rejected Texas joining, no strings attached.

I thought we said no to the Pac 10 initially when forming the Big 12.
Agree on the midwest economy, its not a viable option for us to join. As far as adding all of those teams…no way. We go to the Pac 10 with Perry’s gang and CU and maybe one other. But splitting the Arizonas leaves 8in the west and 7 in the east the way you have have it planned. I also think Pac 10 is the very best for Texas long term.

M – I think this Stanford rejecting Texas thing is something of an urban legend. Besides, the landscape of 2010 is completely different than the mid-1990s. Games were not sold out, nobody wore orange, there were no conference TV packages, etc, there are different university presidents today, etc.

Also, I don’t think getting on a plane is so much of a big deal as it is to cross time zones. A two hour charter flight to Lincoln is a much less grueling trip than a three hour flight to Washington State for a 7pm tipoff that is actually 9pm in Austin. That kind of trip means missing the next morning’s class. The divisional approach allows for keeping the long pacific time zone trips to a minimum and confined to the weekends for all sports, mens and womens.

Mysterious – both Arizona schools in the east plus six Big 12 schools equals eight in the east and west divisions.

I thought we said no to the Pac 10 initially when forming the Big 12.

Don’t know which came first in terms of not going Pac-10, but there were two big differences. One, Bob Bullock. Two, the Big 12 hadn’t been tried. We’re 15 years down the road and no closer to unity among the members.

That’s not to say that the new Big Ten and Pac-10 will be unified either, but we’re going to be plunging into the super-conference pool to see what that is like.

I’ve posted before about why it is that Texas never fires an unpopular football coach until they actually have a losing season (other teams fire coaches after 7 – 5 or even 9 – 3 seasons all the time). At Texas, there are several factions that can veto a firing decision (AD, President, Athletics Council, key boosters), and it takes every faction being in consensus to fire a coach. At other universities, a strong booster (Auburn), or AD (KU) can make the decision on their own. Texas just isn’t structured that way.

After reading this, I suspect a similar dynamic will play out in a re-alignment. Yes, the Big 10 may not be able to accept Texas with its terms, especially if they involve a TT tag-along. The Pac-10, with its members having blackballing powers, is not a slam dunk to take Texas. Is the Cal administration still mad at Mack Brown? Will Cal and Stanford really accept the cowboy cultures at TT and TAMU? What if TAMU decides to strike its own deal, leaving the package as Texas and TT? Does the broadcast package still have critical mass?

If Mizzou and/or CU don’t get pulled away, nothing happens. If they do get pulled away, Dodds better be talking with his Big 12 compatriots about fixing this conference just as much as he talks with the Pac-10 and Big 10.

Texas and A&M stand out like turds in a punchbowl (due to academics and wealth) in the Big 12. Florida and Georgia similarily don’t belong with the stench of most of the remaining SEC teams (with pardons to a couple of fine institutions). Florida and Georgia need to be associated with peers of higher ethics/class/wealth/funding. If the Big 10 had any vision at all, they would secure geographic strongholds in both Texas and the Southeast, and then Notre Dame would follow along as the 16th team in the conference. You would have a 16 team conference dominating east of the rocky mountains with an unsurpassed combination of academics, wealth, and and athletics. Talk about a superconference which couldn’t be matched….yes, there are hurdles to attract Georgia and Florida, but get to work on it.

“College Station and its #1 booster, Governor Perry”

I laughed.

“Will Cal and Stanford really accept the cowboy cultures at TT and TAMU?”

The accepted the chlamydia cultures (in petri dishes) at ASU and U of A.

that article was way too long. clever sidelines are fine occasionally, but not to the extent of nausea. get to the point, man.

Yeah, well, Sailor had a 2-for-1 special with his Fantasy Barker package, and it was his mistake to not put a word count in the contract. Sorry to make you sick. Try dramamine.

Horninexile, this is fascinating stuff, great job.

Only thing I would say is not to underestimate how motivated and aggressive the Big 10 would be in an expansion situation. If they want to make a big move, Texas is it.

How would the 8 team divisions mix conference games? Obviously 7 games within each then perhaps two random conference opponents from the west division and vice versa? Maybe make it logical like one northern team like Washington, OSU, Oregon, ect and one southern like UCLA, USC, CAL. In baseball and basketball everyone plays eachother and each division gets a home and home.

Mysterious – I would suggest 7 intra-division games plus two inter-division games on a rotating basis. In football, you would play every team in the other division once every four years, with a road trip once every eight years. It would be just often enough to make that roadtrip to Cal or Stanford or U-Dub worth taking.

ah, yes, az, az st, colo, kan, neb, tx, a&m, tech. you and i will see it as the east division. the california schools will see it as the low-rent district.

Excellent post. Well reasoned and written.

And I agree that a revamped, super-expanded Pac 10 is our most likely destination, if you look out the horizon a way. I see nothing happening quickly. However, murmurs from out West are that the Pac 10 has 2012 in its sights. That timing works very well for Texas’ calendar, expiration of various contracts, legislature, etc.

The key is having some pardners who are close by, and you nailed the Tech, A&M, KU, NU package.

My only disagreement would be mere preference; this has been my top option, over the more ambitious Big 10 idea you like better. I understand and respect what you like about it, though.

Thanks for the thoughts.

Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Texas, Texas A&M and Texas Tech will join Arizona and Arizona State in the east division of the PAC 10.

I can’t imagine that Arizona and Arizona State will be too pumped about joining a steroided version of the Border Conference. As far as that goes, I’m not sure the rest of them will feel like part of the Pac-10, given that you wouldn’t get too much crossover in football (probably two games per year max, which means one west coast trip, and a 25 percent chance of it being Corvallis or Pullman. In order to play everyone in basketball, you’d have to go to the Big East model, in which everyone plays once and a few play twice, depending on what TV would like.

Not saying the Big Ten would be much different, but I want to play the easterly teams in football, not Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota.

This revised Pac-10 saves baseball, though.

I just don’t see it. The magnitude of such a rearrangement is just too much to digest. And wouldn’t that just be a slimmed-down Big 12, getting rid of Okies, Baylor, ISU and KSU while stealing AU and ASU from Pac-10? Just as the big boys in the old WAC, instead of booting the weak players, just quit the conference and re-formed as the MWC.

Again, I just don’t see it.

Great post and thanks for the link! I’ll reiterate what M said, though – a larger superconference actually has much (if not exponentially) more of a chance of happening in the Big Ten compared to the Pac-10 because of the Pac-10’s unanimous vote requirement. You can probably be assured that Texas could get the unanimous votes required today, but that’s not a slam dunk with Texas A&M and there’s absolutely no way that Stanford, Berkeley and UCLA will even consider Texas Tech. In a perfect world, the Pac-10 would love to add Texas and Colorado for a 12-school conference. Those are really the only 2 schools that I could see as locks in getting all 10 votes from the current Pac-10 members. You might be able to muster up support for Texas A&M (contingent upon Texas coming along) and Utah. So, that’s really the 14-school proposal that you might see in the Pac-10: add in Texas, Texas A&M, Colorado and Utah.

For the Big Ten, I think they are extremely open to adding both Texas and Texas A&M (much more than I originally thought when I started writing my series of blog posts). For school #14, it’s up in the air as to whether it would be Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas, Syracuse or Maryland. My thinking right now is that the Big Ten would pair up Penn State with an East Coast school (preferably Maryland). That establishes strong beach heads for the conference in the Southwest and East Coast while having the base in the Great Lakes region. That’s about as close as you can get to a national footprint with a 14-school conference.

I don’t think either conference would be interested in a 16-school conference (at least as of today). The Big Ten actually has more incentive to go past 12 schools simply because of the variable nature of the Big Ten Network revenue – the conference sees a direct revenue increase with each new market that’s brought into the fold (unlike every other conference that solely depends upon TV rights fees from third parties like ESPN). That’s why I think that the conference inviting Texas and Texas A&M at the same time looks like a much more likely possibility from my view of things.

Frank The Tank-

Lets say the Big 10 does what you say, Maryland and the Texas two. Can they really let the national brands of Nebraska and Kansas (to a lesser degree Missouri, I know OU won’t even be considered) sit on their western flank for someone else (like the SEC, or PAC10) to snap up?

I agree with JR69…i just don’t think it happens.

It’s a really cool fantasy, and one I would prefer over similar Big10-based alignments, but it’s just too radical a change.

I think the WAY more likely scenario is that we stay in a modified version of the Big12, at least for the duration of the next TV contract..

Not as fun an option to ponder, but has much higher probability.

A month or so ago, someone posted a great piece on what we could do to strengthen the current Big12. There were some good ideas around more equitable revenue sharing, etc.

For starters, I’d like to see a conference LOGO that doesn’t look like it was designed by a graphics arts undergrad from KSU.

This convo was captured with a hidden microphone at the last Big 12 Conference board meeting:

KSU guy: “I think it would strengthen the conference if we started sharing all revenues equally.”

Baylor guy: “That’s what I’ve been saying for 14 years.”

Texas guy: “Moving on, next on the agenda…”

Forbid it almighty God!

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Mike said:
February 23rd, 2010 at 12:47 pm

Frank The Tank-

Lets say the Big 10 does what you say, Maryland and the Texas two. Can they really let the national brands of Nebraska and Kansas (to a lesser degree Missouri, I know OU won’t even be considered) sit on their western flank for someone else (like the SEC, or PAC10) to snap up?
<<

Or even worse, Nebraska and Oklahoma stay in what's left of the Big 12 (with some MWC throw ins) and do what they did in the Big 8: stake through an easy regular season and who ever wins their match up gets to play for the national title. It would be hard for the voters to ignore an undefeated NU or OU like they do Utah.

Everyone wants Texas, but not at the cost of completely redefining their conference. Nebraska, Kansas and Tech in the PAC-10? Complete fantasy.

If Texas elects to move, it would struggle to require the new conference to take anyone beyond A&M.

Everyone wants to downplay the geographical issues, but they will ultimately doom a near-term move by Texas.

The distances and time zone issues associated with a Texas/A&M move to the PAC-10 are prohibitive and the Big 10 distances, while more manageable, are also burdensome.

Mike – it’s a tough choice. I don’t think they’re worried about the SEC or Pac-10 as threats to pick either of those schools up (the SEC doesn’t have much incentive to expand while the unanimous vote requirement in the Pac-10 will still be an issue for those schools) – it’s really a question of whether they’re worthy of being school #14 over any of the Eastern options. As pure sports-related moves, Nebraska and Kansas add a ton of value. I actually love the thought of Kansas basketball (even though football is by far the driving factor) as that really gets the perception of Big Ten basketball back to an elite level (even though I think that the national media is way too harsh on the conference considering how many NCAA Tournament bids that consistently get).

However, I think that what horninexile has noted in his posts about politics and population trends point to the Big Ten wanting to solidify its presence on the East Coast as opposed to the Plains States. Maryland has the benefit of being directly in the DC market and having access to a lot of federal research, which is fantastic for the CIC. Penn State also is the big whale out there (just like Texas is the big whale in the Southwest), but just as adding A&M with UT completely locks up the state of Texas, adding another Eastern school could effectively lock up the Eastern Seaboard. At that point, that 14-school Big Ten would control the dominant markets in the Midwest, East Coast and Southwest. Only the Southeast and West Coast would be geographic gaps for the Big Ten, which the conference will be satisfied to leave to the SEC and Pac-10.

Industry consolidations tend to happen in waves. M&A is the method by which one group unhappy with its position in a market can leapfrog into a better position. Market laggards look for ways to jump ahead. Market leaders anticipate the moves of market laggards and initiate moves to protect their position.

The PAC 10 is unhappy with its TV deal. It needs 2 for a conference championship game. The PAC 10 does not want to be the 3rd or 4th best conference in terms of market share, it wants to be 1st or 2nd. They don’t get there without Texas, and Texas doesn’t accept an inconvenient travel burden just to get 1/12th of the 3rd best TV deal.

If the PAC 10 wants Texas, it will need to put together the kind of package that makes it #1. Texas alone doesn’t get it done. With Nebraska and Kansas in tow, you get three giant brands of college athletics.

If it were just the Big 10, and everybody else were in a happy place, and whatever the Big 10 made did not upset another’s happy place, then the Big 10 could be choosy. But the Big 10 leaders should see the very realistic possibility that Texas and gang go west, Oklahoma joins the renegade south, and the Big 10 is a stagnant #3. At that time, it would have no choice but to try and raid the ACC for quality. Let’s face it, other than Notre Dame, the other possibilities (Rutgers, Syracuse, Pitt, etc.) will not move the markets.

Frank – I think there’s still a misunderstanding of how the CIC works. It really has been overplayed. The current set up has very little direct impact. There is some cooperation on the margins and some joint projects, but it is more about perception – an exclusive club that communicates academic prestige.

Maryland is not going to join the Big 10 just so it can serve as a base for CIC lobbying of DC agencies. Maryland has its own economic problems, and though there are similarities between Detroit and Baltimore, they also have major differences. Maryland likes the fact that so much federal money ends up in the Beltway. Maryland has absolutely no incentive to change that.

The opportunity for the Big 10 to align with the plains states is to lobby for a macro shift of resources away from the high-cost coasts. There is nothing for the Big 10 to gain by aligning with the east coast. You don’t align with the east coast and then convince politicians to move R&D investments from the east coast to the midwest. What you do is align with the other power bases in the middle U.S. to make the case for a concentrated, gradual shifting of resources for greater economic parity and stability.

Nebraska is the first domino, either becoming the 12th member of the Big 10+ or moving with Colorado to the Pac 10. They are just as restless as CO and MO, grumpier, the biggest prize of the three, and the financial penalties for leaving conference wouldn’t hurt them as much as CO. Perhaps it might even be a surprise of NE and Utah to the Pac 10. Once the Big 12 is fractured, UT is in an easier position politically to make its move (same for schools like Kansas.) One caveat: If the Pac 10 does grab NE, are they smart enough to not extend to them veto power over future expansion? NE’s string of bitter and petty behavior suggests they might love to keep UT from coming along next, financial self-interest be damned.

Interesting theory about Tech, but I doubt that hope and promises for future achievements would be enough to swing them in. Plus all too often that school and its students have behaved embarrassingly. The high toned Pac 10 doesn’t want 30,000 tortilla-tossing Blounts. That’s only allowed in Berkeley trees. Substituting Utah for them in your lineup is more likely, though UT would likely push for Tech. Politics, travel, possibly more likely to vote with UT (and Lucy possibly won’t yank the football away from Charlie Brown this time) and most importantly, an easier schedule than if Utah is involved.

As noted, an interior division is going to be a tough sell to the AZ schools. However the rest would be tempted to get back to a de facto Pac 8.

But I ultimately think that Texas ends up in the Big 10+++++. Would be the best top to bottom and most prestigious conference academically. The argument that it won’t happen because of the Rust Belt seems superficial, half of our current conference is Rust Belt. Regardless of location, the Big 10+ schools are still superior institutions, potential upcoming funding difficulties may dent but are unlikely to change that. I don’t see a greater total cultural difference between Texas and the Upper Midwest tha between Texas and the West Coast. You can name similarities and differences for each pairing. They differ in specifics but overall neither is a perfect fit and either would work.

Way too dynamic to know for sure where UT ends up, but I’m confident that it will be one of these 2 conferences. Independence is unrealistic and would be a huge mistake, the status quo was never a good solution, and the SEC would be unending frustration with UT unable to get them to reign in their corruption and shenanigans for long.

One final thought, I wonder what the Big 10+’s ultimate wish list is? If I were their commish, it would be FL, UGA, UT, USC, and UCLA. Coast to coast academic super conference with the winner virtually guaranteed a spot in the bogus nat’l champ game. Highly unlikely, but that would be my first pitch.

Speculator -

Some really good thoughts. You are right that there are some sore feelings at Nebraska about Texas, but I would note that Harvey Perlman and Bill Powers are former law school deans and have great respect for each other. Also, picking Nebraska jumps right over Iowa State and amounts to a 12-university slap in the face to Senator Grassley. He is the one guy that no university wants to mess with based on past performance.

The reason I don’t give cred to these coast-to-coast superconferences is that no program wants to have a really good team go 6-6 despite having one of the top 15 teams in the country. Texas has lost two games in two years. We like that kind of winning percentage and don’t wish for NFL parity.

Great post. This is what I have always felt is most likely and the best fit. I don’t like the idea of Texas being forced to absorb the throwaway schools in another conference while we lose all of our regional opponents. We should force any merging conference to meet us halfway. Its better for travel and state politics, and as I was saying, why should we replace Texas Tech on our schedule with Indiana?

As for the unanimous pac ten requirement, I wouldn’t worry too much about that. All that matters is that we get the big dogs on board. Once we have them, if any of the pipsqueaks start to complain, they can be threatened with being left out of a new combo-conference formed by merging the most desirable big 12 and pac ten schools. This is actually the best case scenario for Texas anyways, so let the likes of a Cal or Washington State whine. As long as we have the USC and UCLAs, the smaller dogs won’t have as much leverage as it appears.

Bringing A&M and Tech makes a move to the Pac 10 much more palatable IMO. But why Kansas/Neb instead of BYU/Utah?

Because Kansas basketball and Nebraska football are two of the most valuable brands in all of college sports.

“Kansas basketball and Nebraska football are two of the most valuable brands in all of college sports.”

Maybe in the top 50 but not in the top 25.

Basketball does not contribute tv money even if it is Kansas.

NU football cannot bring tv money because it inhabits a media waste land.

Having a bunch of winning seasons would qualify Bosyee for “most valuable brands”, but it just ain’t so. Same for NU. History counts for very little, while tv markets rule. See ND and CBS.

Mr. Bixby, if basketball does not contribute TV money, then why does the Big 10 network carry so many basketball games?

There’s a big difference between network TV and cable TV. Network TV value is based on populations because it is available to everyone whether or not they have cable. Cable TV value is based on subscribers.

Whether or not you live in the Big 10 footprint, you might be able to subscribe to the Big 10 network, simply by purchasing a premium package.

There are a lot of Nebraska football fans that do not live in Nebraska. Many graduated from NU and took a job in Chicago or LA or Atlanta or somewhere with the kind of jobs that a farm kid goes to college to get. Same for KU basketball fans. They are everywhere and they are rabid. Add them to your conference and your premium subscriptions increase far more than they would if you add Pitt or Rutgers.

Forbes has Nebraska as the #4 most valuable college football team. That value includes brand value, not the purchasing power of a state with 1.7 million residents.

KU basketball is easily one of the top basketball brands in the country. (Kentucky is probably #1.) There are KU boosters who have purchased 100 season tickets for football just to improve their seat selections for basketball. They sell out every single game. Every single game is televised, including the exhibitions against Washburn and Pittsburg State.

The (Big 10) network currently reaches approximately 40 million households nationwide and is available to up an estimated 73 million households in the United States and Canada. The network is now available in 19 of the top 20 media markets in the U.S. though agreements with more than 250 cable, satellite and telco affiliates, including AT&T U-Verse, Cablevision, Charter, Comcast, Cox, DIRECTV, DISH Network, Insight, Mediacom, Time Warner Cable and Verizon FiOS.

http://www.bigtennetwork.com/corporate/index.asp

If the network is already “available” in 19 of the top 20 media markets, then the key to growth is to add subscribers. THIS is why Kansas and Nebraska should be coveted by any conference looking to expand the financial pie faster than it expands seats at the table.

If the network is already "available" in 19 of the top 20 media markets, then the key to growth is to add subscribers. THIS is why Kansas and Nebraska should be coveted by any conference looking to expand the financial pie faster than it expands seats at the table.

And it is a big reason why Texas is the most coveted program out there.

There is no fucking way my Pac10 conference takes Nebraska…it makes no sense whatsoever in any aspect….not to be rude or anything…Texas and CU seem to be the logical choice if it goes to 12…I could very much live with that!

Well, CU would have to add a lot of sports I guess…anyone but F AGGY…

Oh…never mind…

McGill University will get a Big 10 invite for Iowa State.

There is no chance in hell that Michigan, OSU and PSU would ever go for an Iowa State. Grassley can scream as loud as he wants, but unanimity isn’t required for a Big 10 invite, so its highly unlikely that Iowa State would be able to bully Iowa for the decisive vote.

If that happened, I promise that some other Big 10 schools would switch their vote to no.

Iowa State is akin to letting a homeless man live in your living room. They would be the ultimate free rider.

Also no chance that the PAC 10 could get an unanimous vote on a 16 team conference.

Arizona and Arizona State would never vote for this proposal. Their alumns — outside of Arizona — are heavily concentrated in California. Both schools recruit heavily out of the Golden State. I think they’d be interested in playing Texas A&M, and would love to play Texas, but not at the expense of losing annual games with USC and UCLA.

IMO, the impetus for a 16 team superconference only works with the Big 10. They have the viable cable network to make it potentially more profitable at 16 teams than 12.

Rather then selling Texas on adding a bunch of travel partners, the Big 10 should pitch Texas on joining a national conference. How about adding Texas, Texas A&M, Miami, Syracuse and Uconn?

You’d add value to baseball (Texas schools and Miami) and lacrosse (Syracuse) for spring programming. Cuse and Uconn have big followings in NYC, and would juice up the basketball league. Miami recruits a lot of students from the northeast and Chicago anyway, and its president has pined for the ACC to create a consortium like the CIC. You’d add major markets galore, and have inroads to Texas, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

If Forbes ranks NU that high then Forbes’ credibility is at risk.

NU fans are definitely scattered all over the US as they could not possibly find gainful work in Nebraska. That said, they were a small school until recently and their alumni base is not so big.

Unlike ND, their national attraction has dwindled with their win – loss record and there is no recovery in sight.

Their national tv appeal is grossly overstated.

Nebraska doesn’t need a big alumni base, as essentially anyone who’s spent some of their childhood in that state becomes a Husker fan (must be something in the water).

In any case, I do believe the biggest threat to the Big10 getting Texas is a Pac16. Unlike you, I don’t think what happens to TTech will have much influence on where UT and TAMU go (the Big8/12 will still be around, it’ll still have OU for a little while, until the SEC picks them up, and thus it’ll still keep it’s BCS spot; in fact, Texas leaving makes it easier for TTech to make the BCS, since they wouldn’t have to beat out Texas any more, just OU (and OSU, TCU, Houston, BYU, etc.), and I definitely don’t think Texas cares if Kansas, Nebraska, or Mizzou come along with them (though if I was Delany, I would pick Nebraska as the 14th team if ND still holds out). Think about it: a plane trip to Iowa City or Champaign-Urbana is less than half an hour longer than plane trips to Columbia or Lawrence.

Grassley won’t have much influence, unless Iowa’s the deciding vote, and even then, if the Big10 had to take Iowa St. as the 14th team instead of Nebraska or Mizzou to get Texas, they’d likely do it (it’s no worse academically than the latter 2).

If UT wants to maximize it’s revenues, the Big10’s the easy answer; with Texas, the Big10 would be far and away the richest conference. You’d literally have to add Oklahoma, FSU, Miami, and the SoCal schools to the SEC for them to equal the Big10 in TV money (and while the SEC may add the first 3 eventually to get close, they’ll never add USC). However, UT would have to be OK with getting the same TV money as Northwestern and Indiana.
If Texas joins the Pac16, that conference would be as rich as the Big10 is now. (It wouldn’t be more rich because, even though it would have a slightly bigger population footprint, they’d all be west of the Mississippi, while the Big10 has heavy representation in the Northeast, California, and Florida & Arizona due to retirees there). As the Pac10 has unequal TV revenue sharing now, that would likely continue , so with more members but unequal revenue sharing, Texas would be at the top of college football in TV money along with USC, and the Big10 schools, with TAMU, UCLA, and the SEC schools (and OU, if they’re in the Pac16) close behind, but wouldn’t get as much as they would if they were in the Big10.

What it will come down to is whether Texas wants to maximize its absolute TV revenues or whether it would prefer to have a relative advantage in TV money over conference members even if it mean less absolute money.

Also, there’s no way Nebraska joins the Pac16 if the Big10 opens a spot for it. Academically, Nebraska, Mizzou, Kansas, and Iowa St. are all about the same (AAU, but below all current Big10 schools), so it comes down solely to TV money/athletic appeal when choosing between them.

Oh, and football brings in the money and will be the big determinant. You see a gazillion basketball games on the BTN mainly because there’s no better way to monetize those games (and they play more basketball games than football games). As an analogy, if the Longhorn network ever got off the ground, you’d see a ton of baseball games on there, and maybe only a couple football games, but no one out there would be deluded enough to think that baseball is more important to the success of that network than football.

Finally, don’t underestimate Delany; the Big10 usually hasn’t moved to gain small amounts of revenue (no weeknight games, generally eschews games in primetime, didn’t rush to create a conference basketball tournament, aren’t in a rush to create a football championship game), but when it comes to high stakes, the Big10 has made the right decisions up to now; they kicked off the first wave of expansion back in 1990 and of all the independents out there then, nabbed the 2nd biggest one in PSU. They’ve made a play for the biggest one (ND) several times. They were the first to start a TV cable network. Maybe Delany will be outmaneuvered, but I wouldn’t bet money on it.

Richard – excellent analysis. On some points we will have to agree to disagree.

The risk of the grumpy old troll, Senator Grassley, has nothing to do with how he might bully Iowa’s vote on realignment. The risk is how he might wield the investigation powers of the Senate Finance Committee to catch specific universities for activities that put at risk their tax-exempt status. Texas runs a very clean ship, but other universities have blurred the lines to the point that they have created real risk to the tax exempt status of the university.

What if Michigan has a research program with Big Pharma that has questionable boundaries? What if the Ohio State athletic department pays bonuses on profits (a red flag for a non-profit corporation)? What if Minnesota’s tech transfer department is stifling the commercialization of potentially life-saving intellectual property, developed with government grants, in order to negotiate a bigger up front payment from a company?

Senator Grassley is a huge issue for any and all research universities, especially those with big budget athletics. He doesn’t directly impact conference votes. He can simply go on a timely, coincidental crusade to open the books of universities that just so happen to think that Iowa State is not worthy of their company.

Again, the $5 million gift from Texas athletics to Texas academics was very strategic. The press release stipulated that the gift came from licensing revenues. These are exactly the kinds of revenues that Senator Grassley has questioned publicly whether they should continue to be tax exempt. Texas is building a defense for keeping these revenues free from taxation.

I don’t care if everyone that lives or ever lived in Nebraska has three tv sets, it still does not compute. Big Red N caps are about as common in malls these days as boysee caps. Nuff said.

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No need to use that language dude.