I favor going to the Big10, but if not, here's a plan when Mizzou drops out. Add nobody, in fact, try to get Baylor to drop out as well. 11 teams, no problem, go to round robin schedule, drop the championship game, that way you get to play Kansas State and Nebraska every year. Our SOS would go up by dropping Mizzou and adding Kstate and Nebraska every year. Shoot, even Kansas adds to the SoS. Playing 10 conference games a year means that you still have two nonconference games. Play two BCS teams, Vanderbilt and Washington, one team from the PAC 10 and one from the SEC. With that kind of a schedule, we should go 10-2 or 11-1 most years, losing to Kstate or Nebraska, and one other game possibly. That's a pretty good schedule right there. If we are lucky enough to go unbeaten, we're in the title game with that SOS.
The Big 12 will eventually (within 10 years) merge with the Big 10, with the latter keeping all its current members and the former jettisoning weaker members Baylor, ISU & possibly K State (like the SWC merger with Big 8). It'll be one of four superconferences, totaling about 50 members.
I don't think it will be a Texas joining the BigX, it will be more like a Football conference and taking the best 12 teams between the two conferences. From the XII you would have: Texas AM(won't happen without them) OU Nebraska Maybe Missouri Maybe Tech Maybe Oklahoma State From the X you have: OSU Michigan Penn State Wisconsin Michigan State Illinois Maybe Minnesota Maybe Northwestern Some combination of 12. Create East and West Divisions and some type of schedule like the XII does now, with a conference championship rotated througout the conference, Chicago, Indy, Detroit, Dallas, Houston, KC, Cleveland, Cinci, Pittsburg, Minneapolis, St. Louis etc. Texas will not become a little fish in a big pond.
I'm not as confident of the potential super conferences as some others are. I think it's a lot less that 50-50 that there could ever be some kind of Big 10-Big 12 merger. This has been covered in other posts, but again, here's the deal. UT staying in the Big XII if Mizzou and/or Colorado head elsewhere is NOT something you want if you're a UT fan. The Big XII has no other team or combination of teams that could be added that would allow the league to remain relevant in major college athletics. UT might be a big frog, but we'd be in an exceedingly small pond. We'd be right back to the last days of the SWC. UT going independant wouldn't work. Neutered Dame is the only program out there that even sort of makes independance work, and the Catholics are finding it increasingly difficult. There are three conference affiliations UT can feasibly consider. Membership in the SEC. Membership in the Big 10. Membership in the PAC 10. UT will NEVER pursue being part of the SEC, for all the reasons that have been covered to death here before. The SEC is not a good fit. UT may seriously consider membership in the PAC 10. It almost happened 15 years ago, and both parties are still interested. The PAC offers UT membership in a much more stable conference, with several schools with real similarities athletically and academically to us. UT would be foolish not to take a look at Big 10 membership. The Big 10 offers us the same advantages as the PAC 10, plus a much better financial package than the PAC. The one thing we cannot do is drag our feet and let a lesser school like Mizzou or Colorado make a move that keeps us in the Big XII. UT is a much more attractive option for a conference looking to expand...we're the most attractive option out there...but neither the PAC 10 nor the Big 10 is going to wait forever for UT to decide what it wants to do. There's nothing imminent yet, but Dodds and other UT officials should know that now's the time to at least start looking at possibilities and listening to other conferences. The Big 10 is NOT going to go to 14 teams. The PAC 10 is going to add 2 teams. UT can make the move by itself to the Big 10, or with Colorado out west. Those are the two viable options. I think the threat of the legislature stopping a move is overrated. Times are different now...there's no Bob Bullock pulling the strings as in the mid-90's. There would be some opposition at the Capitol, but nothing that couldn't be overcome with some arm twisting, if that becomes necessary. Fans of the agricultural college would be happy because aggy could pursue what they've wanted all along, membership in the SEC. The SEC would still be interested in agricultural too. We could maintain our rivalry games with aggy and okie as non-conference affairs...we'd actually have a much better strength of schedule that way. There is no one conference move that's gonna satisfy everyone, especially those that would like to see UT stay where they're at. However, money talks, you know what walks, and sooner, rather than later, UT is gonna have to seriously look at moving to a more stable and profitable conference affiliation. UT's the most attractive bridesmaid out there for the time being, but even the best looking ones lose their appeal if they sit on it all the time.
Is the Big 12 really hurting that badly for TV viewers? That's what it's all about, right? Eyes on the tube. To me, you can't just look at current TV contracts. They mean nothing. You have to look at ratings. If the Big 12 as a whole is getting similar ratings as compared to the Big 10 as a whole, it will get similar money next time a contract is drawn up, and all of this discussion is moot. And you can't just say, well New York is close to Pennsylvania, so you can include all 7 Million New York households in the Big Ten. It's not that simple. It's about who is actually WATCHING the football games. Not in just nearby cities, but nationwide.
What I would love to see is someone take all the games televised last year for each conference. List the ratings for each and average them. How does the Big 12 compare with the Big Ten as far as average television rating per game? That is what matters. That would tell us a whole lot about whether it would be worth it to go to the Big Ten or not so much.
The thing is, it's not about where the Big XII is right now with tv markets...it's where the conference is if Mizzou leaves and takes St. Louis with them, if Colorado leaves and takes Denver with them. Those two schools are as good as gone when they get an invite, and both will within the next five years or so. If UT doesn't take advantage of the Big 10's interest in us, Mizzou is their Plan B, and there's no way Mizzou says no. Colorado will be gone fifteen minutes after they get their invite from the PAC 10, which will have to expand in the next few years to twelve teams. If the Big XII adds one of BYU or Utah, that adds Salt Lake City to the Big XII tv markets. The only other reasonable addition would be New Mexico, which would bring Albuquerque. Salt Lake City and Albuquerque are not adequate replacements for St. Louis and Denver in the eyes of the networks. The Big XII's share of the tv markets, and the conference's tv contracts, will be reduced accordingly. Net result...UT stays in the Big XII and becomes the big frog in the much smaller and less relevant Big XII pond. That cannot be allowed to happen. If there was some option out there for forming a conference of like-minded schools within the region, that would be great, but that option doesn't and won't exist. That leaves UT the options of staying in a less relevant Big XII, or moving. There's no door number three. A move to either the PAC 10 or Big 10 has drawbacks, but those drawbacks aren't nearly as much of a problem as UT sticking its' head in the sand and doing nothing. That's the situation we're in. Nothing that happens in the next few years is going to change it. Dodds and company have a very important decision to make if UT is going to remain the high profile, and high profit program it is right now. Again...there are only two options. I don't and never have liked the Big XII, but this isn't about preferences...it's a lot more important than that.
Want to remind folks again about the Big Ten's academic consortium, the Committee On Institutional Cooperation (CIC). Here's a link to the CIC home page: The Link UT's administration may very well consider the CIC to be the most important reason to join the Big Ten. Don't forget, The University of Chicago, a charter member of the Big Ten, is still an important member of the CIC. May be wrong about this, but I read that the CIC oversees 5.2 billion dollars worth of collaborative research among the CIC members. Also, the CIC, with The University of Chicago, and hence, the Big Ten, is the most powerful academic conference. The PAC10, with Stanford, Cal and UCLA at the top, is very impressive. But top to bottom, the CIC/Big Ten is an academic powerhouse. Just imagine what UT's academic administrators would think about joining the CIC. A problem for UT if they were to join the Big Ten that hasn't been discussed is baseball. The Big Ten is very weak in baseball. This is due, in part, to the weather. In any case, Texas baseball would suffer by playing a Big Ten schedule. It would take a decade, but Texas baseball would drag Big Ten baseball back to respectability.
Shark - not sure how much further back baseball can be moved. UT would just schedule more good OOC teams, no worries there. I would have no problem with UT remaining in the Big 12 if the other schools all stayed. That obviously isn't going to happen, though. I'd love for UT to be in the Big 10 for all the reasons stated in Frank's blogs and the points made on this thread.
No offense, but I still think y'all are grossly oversimplifying the situation, and as a result, grossly exaggerating it.
UT is not leaving the Big XII. Money is intrinsically worthless; you can trade it for things that have value. UT does not have more things on the table that need more dollars, such that it can afford to turn down short term gain (increased Big X revenue* years until things get better for the Big XII). Most other schools are not in that position, thus Mizzou's deliberations. Here is the gorilla in the room. The Big XII deal with FSN expires in 2011, and the deal with ABC for game of the week at 3:30 in 2016. In two years, the Big XII is flexible but hamstrung in negotiations because the big moneymaker is not on the table ("How much will you give us for our games...by the way, ABC gets dibs."). The best and worst part of that is the fact that the Big XII will probably never get to negotiate a deal in which a network pays us for our games. That's not a bad thing. TV as we know it is a dying medium. Broadcasting hardware is basically gone, and now the network is built around communication rather than distribution. Anybody who can pay for bandwidth can "broadcast". This has lots of effects, and a radical change in the advertising model and "pay for service" model. Advertising is more difficult and keeping your show for paying customers only is even more difficult. The venue that still lends itself to advertising is the live action broadcast. You don't have to have commercials- you sell space on the field (watch a soccer game). There is no commercial to TiVo/fast forward through, and the ads are constantly displayed. Match that with your own distribution system (which is a few servers, cameramen, bandwidth and Craig Way) and you have just negated the need for ABC. Meanwhile, the Longhorn faithful tune in to mackbrowntexasfootball.com or bigxii.com or whatever and tune into the game. There will be logos on the field.
Flask, you've got to look at this the way network execs do. Population isn't as much a consideration as market name and total tv sets. St. Louis has a lot more cache with network bosses than Salt Lake City. Denver has much more appeal than Albuquerque. Who knows how many people in Metro St. Louis watch Mizzou's games on average, but they are the University of MISSOURI, and as such, the network assumption will be that if they move to the Big 10, St. Louis automatically becomes a Big 10 city. Colorado State can beat Colorado eight out of the next nine years, but will never be considered Colorado's primary college team. If the Buffs move to the PAC 10, network execs will assume Denver is a PAC 10 city. Nobody's acting like Chicken Little around here, saying the sky's falling, but there's better than a 50-50 chance that the Big XII could lose two of it's bigger tv markets in a few years, or sooner. UT does NOT need to be left holding the bag as a power in a watered down Big XII. That's too close to the situation the Horns were in in the final days of the SWC. Nobody says anything is imminent yet in terms of movement from one conference to another. I just think the sentiment is that UT's administration needs to check into other conference options that might be available, in a serious way, and make sure that UT isn't left behind if changing conferences becomes a necessity. It never hurts to see what your options are, and thank goodness, UT seems to have some attractive options out there...right now.
Damned typo's! What I meant to say was that if the Big 12 came to an end or we had a choice, I prefer the PAC 10 then going independent to the Big 10. Better academics, better travel destinations.
We're not going independent. No way no how. We'd stay in a moribund and hostile Big 12 before going independent. I think a lot of people are waiting to see how the Comcast/NBC thing shakes out. That could have gigantic implications on what Notre Dame does (especially if NBC continues to die off as a broadcasting concern), and what the company might do in terms of trying to challenge ESPN as a content provider. One thing they have over ESPN is that they've got the delivery system. ESPN, of course, has 30 years of branding and alliances set up.
Really? Stanford is arguably the best college in the entire country. Many herald it over Harvard. Berkley too. UCLA, USC, Washington are all very good schools. There are not 5 like that in the Big 10. NW and Michigan. Ohio State is not. Penn St., better than tOSU is not. The academics in the Big 10 are good, better than average and for sure better than the Big 12. But let's be real here. They are not as good top or top to bottom than that of the Pac 10. Columbus is worse than either of the Oregon locations. Would you like to compare the beauty of the two states? Can you offer anything that compares to Seattle? What about Los Angeles? How about San Francisco? One can fly to Vegas and have a very doable road trip to either of the Arizonas and both in LA. Game. Set. Match. Better academics, better destinations. Don't have to deal with the cesspool and bottom feeders in Columbus.
Shark - yes, the northern teams get screwed by the weather for baseball. Of course all of us in the south are screwed by the weather for hockey.
Shark, great picture, is that a Sousaphone player dotting the I just like in football? Also, what are they wearing on their feet? Did they actually march on the ice?
