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Economic Forces May Do What the BCS Won’t

Posted by srr50 on June 16th, 2008 under Football

And that is create four 16-team Super Conferences with a play-off system. I have thought for a long time that we will see another “downsizing” in the BCS conferences into Super Conferences, pushed mostly by TV money. But rising gas prices, unheard of coaches salaries, and the rush to build facilities to keep up with the Jones’ (Texas), have college athletic expenses exploding.

 

Soon some schools will have to finally take a realistic look in the mirror and decide how much longer they can throw good money after bad.

And the BCS powers will take a look at their bottom line, at the TV money out there and encourage some of their “smaller” brethren to move on.

Tim Stephens of the Orlando Sentinel agrees with me, and while his Super Conference Divisions don’t make sense the general idea does.

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10 Responses

  1. Mr. North Dallas said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 10:34 am

    Oh man, bro, I LOVE this idea. College football is so uncool without a playoff. My bros and I were talking about this the other day over Belvedere and sodas at Clear Ultra Lounge. Which brings up another way that NCAA football could be so much better: they need to hook daddy up with an air-conditioned suite, with a hot tub and leather lounge seats in it and some lovely ladies, and serve Belvedere (or, at the very least, Grey Goose). It wouldn’t hurt to install a big wall of plasma screens showing sports and just bright lights and stuff. And maybe get rid of that band full of goofy-looking nerds that plays all that old-timey shit. What they need to do is set up a DJ booth so they can spin some dance tunes for the ladies in our luxury game-watching lounge. And would it kill the NCAA to hook us up with a tray of body shots up here? We’re at a college football playoff game, bro. You know?

  2. P. Diddy said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 11:03 am

    Should have been drinking Ciroc, fool.

  3. WhoooTex said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 12:15 pm

    GAAAAAAAAAH

    The Big Ten is the athletic front for a prestigious academic consortium. It’s this consortium that makes schools like Ohio State and Michigan State academically passable, and schools like Michigan, Penn State, and Wisconsin academically elite. Access to the CIC’s research funding is why the Big Ten’s schools are so far superior to most of the SEC, save for Vanderbilt and Florida.

    The CIC is never gonna take shit schools like Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, or Nebraska. Missouri? In a heartbeat.

    I’m not against the superconference model or a playoff, but you’re more likely to have the Big Ten and Pac-10 sit out and just play the Rose Bowl than you are to see the Big Ten take a handful of mediocre academic institutions. I know in our case, the geography is whacked, but IF the BT ever were to expand* I think they’d want Notre Dame (even though it’s not a research school from my understanding), Missouri, and Texas to start. 3 excellent schools. That gives them 14. They could add Syracuse (50th in US News rankings, FWIW) and Rutgers or Pitt (tied at 59th) to get to 16 without taking any truly piss poor schools. Pitt won’t happen because Penn State won’t allow it.

    Think I’m crazy? Well, I do drink cobra blood every morning. Trying to run a conference that includes an Austin-to-Syracuse span may be infeasible– but I’m telling you, market forces or not, you can’t underestimate the importance of the CIC in this decision.

    * Delaney has said the conference isn’t interested and doesn’t WANT a conference title game.

  4. WhoooTex said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 12:16 pm

    Oh and the next writer who assumes Texas = south = SEC without regard to our academic standing gets a shiv in the McRibs.

  5. dedfischer said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 1:48 pm

    I didn’t want to say it out loud, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen Cal, Stanford, Texas Tech and Notre Dame printed in the same sentence. We’re going to own the PAC 16 in meat judging.

  6. Fasterhornkillkill said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 3:13 pm

    This thing is nuts.

    If the Big 12 dies, Texas will wind up in either the Big 10 or the Pac 10. WhoooTex is right, the author totally ignored the academic snobbery factor that academics use in making these decisions.

    Before the formation of the Big 12, Texas had plans to join the PAC-10 with Colorado, and A&M was rumored to be heading to the SEC. The Chancellors went to brief Lt. Gov Bob Bullock, a Baylor grad, listened and then famously said, “Nah, that aint gonna happen.”

  7. dedfischer said:

    June 16th, 2008 at 3:56 pm

    If I remember correctly, I think Rob Junell was our meal ticket into the Big 12. I believe he was the chairman of the appropriations committee at the time.

  8. callkevin said:

    June 18th, 2008 at 3:06 am

    Bullock was a Texas Tech Grad–he went to Baylor for Law School.

  9. Bob in Houston said:

    June 18th, 2008 at 2:47 pm

    srr, I have to wonder that if there is a shot to go 4-8 at least once a decade if *any* major school is going to go for the superconference. I assume you think the money will be an appropriate balm.

  10. srr50 said:

    June 18th, 2008 at 4:56 pm

    “I assume you think the money will be an appropriate balm.”

    Only up to a point. I believe that at some time the Super Conferences become much like the NFL where “parity” exists. You will always have a few regular 10 or 11 win teams in a Super Conference structure, and in order to avoid having too many 4-8 or 5-7 teams, I also assume that you will have several non-conference games against cream puffs.

    But there will be a “middle class” area where teams are consistenly going 7-5 or 8-4, and they will be programs not used to being that mediocre over a longer period of time.

    We all know the angst caused by our wandering in that Purgatory during the 1980’s and 90’s.

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