Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln

With the whirlwind of speculation going on around the resignation of Jim Tressel, what are the bigger lessons for college football programs?

Based on the SI article out yesterday, it looks like one answer is insulate your head coach. I couldn't tell you if the Vest is a control freak, but from the outside looking in, it sure seems like he is. For his new gig selling insurance...or used cars, he needs to learn to delegate.

I am not making light of those decisions or the outcomes. They are very bad on both accounts. However, it isn't hard to make the argument that had Tressel trusted an assistant coach or a director of football programs, he'd still have Gordon Gee picking up his lunch tab on a regular basis. His pleas of ignorance can only work if he has plausibility deniability. You have to have the pretense of not being in the loop to make it work.

The sin of omission is viewed very differently than the sin of commission. When you are the loop, there is no one to kick the smoking gun toward when the police show up. Gene Smith and Gordon Gee are about to prove that point pretty convincingly in front of the NCAA.

I am sure we'll see more about this in the coming days, but it isn't hard to see why blue chip players thought Columbus was such a cool place to play football. Being treated like royalty is hardly unique in a college football town. Being treated like Vince Neal on the Girls,Girls,Girls tour is something entirely different. Not to say it doesn't happen other places (it does), but when you add that context it makes those decisions more understandable.

TD

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Ed. note: After re-reading this, it appears I could be condoning these actions. I am not. I am simply saying Pat Dye and Jim Tressel got into trouble when they took matters too much into their own hands.

Expansion Wrap Up

Let's say you throw a party for kids in the neighborhood. And let's say that kids who attend the party receive $10 million per year for the next 20 years. While kids that don't attend the party lose $20 million a year for the next 20 years. What do you think will happen?

Of course, parents are going to want their kids there. Not just one kid mind you...but multiple kids. And don't forget cousins, grandchildren and nephews.

That's among the reasons why I said last month, that I didn't see a 16-team league happening.

In the end, I think the Big 10 will expand by 1 team and the Pac 10 will go to 12. And most of the 16 team talk is brilliantly aimed at getting the Big 10 the best possible team to reach out to them for inclusion.

From there, all the leagues will take a deep breath. Because the contractual complexities of moving to 16 teams in one or more conferences are just too great. And University presidents are too risk adverse.

Regardless, Andy Katz's article about the mysterious Trilateral Coalition / Black Hand stopping the Pac 10 expansion is the best read of the entire Bay of Pigskin roller coaster ride.

Two schools who faired better than most think in expansion are:

• Iowa - The Hawkeyes and Huskers have only played six times since World War II, and only twice since Reagan's first term in office. This despite Lincoln being located only 60 miles from the Iowa state line. Right now, Iowa and Nebraska are on comparable footing in football. This is the perfect time for them to become rivals. More than likely, Iowa vs. Nebraska will become the season ending game for both programs, and that's the sort or big time match-up Iowa needs to raise demand for tickets. There's nothing like a heated border war to ignite the fan passion. Also, Iowa State can't sell area recruits on getting to face Nebraska every year. It's another hit to the Cyclones...which is also a win for Iowa.
  
  
• Colorado - They are taking a lot of heat for leaving the Big XII, but it makes total sense to me. When the Buffs were at their best, they were recruiting heavily out of Los Angeles. The rumors are that the Buffs will be in the same division with UCLA and USC which means a yearly game in LA. They are trading in division games against Nebraska and 4 teams that hardly get anyone in that part of the world excited for USC, UCLA, Arizona, Arizona State and likely Utah. That's a towering home run from a ticket sales and fan interest standpoint. TV money is great, but you have to recruit players and sell tickets to win games, and they are better positioned to do that than ever.

What's your overall thought on Expansion? Bottom line for me...I'm glad we ended up where we did at the BCS level, but I don't think we're done at the mid-major level. See next post for more info.

PWD

It's Official: Colorado Joins the Pac 10

The Pac 10 conference announced today that The Colorado Buffaloes are joining their conference. This announcement was made moments ago. (Source: ESPN). This is on top of the likely news within the next 48 hours that Nebraska is joining the Big 10.

According to ESPN (and this was also discussed last night by Pete Thamel of the NYTimes):

Texas and Texas A&M officials are scheduled to meet [today] at an undisclosed location to discuss the future of their athletic programs and the Big 12 amid speculation the league could be raided by rival conferences and broken apart.

Things are moving very quickly. One of the big problems with expanding to 16 teams is...how do you keep fans happy when they are fewer titles to go around? Well, the Pac 10 may have dreamed up a very obnoxious answer to that question (ht - blutarsky):

The coach said it's possible the Pac-16 would push for two automatic bids to the BCS, one for each division champion. That potential bonanza could open the possibility of the two division champs from one league playing for the national title, and it would eliminate the need for a conference championship game.

"The Pac-10 doesn't believe in a championship game," the coach said. "And coaches in the Big 12 don't like it anyway."

If they move in that direction, the Pac 10 is essentially not a single conference at all. It's a modified version of the Pac 8 meets the Southwest Conference in a marriage for TV purposes only.

Imagine the SEC applying this thinking and expanding to 16. You'd have a league whereby the SEC East and SEC West champs both earned a BCS slot automatically, but there would be absolutely no "settling it on the field" in that scenario as the two division champs wouldn't meet in Atlanta. Bizarre.

See Also:
-- Texas A&M and the SEC in talks? - SI.com
-- Scrambling to save the Big XII - NY Times

PWD

Why the 16 Team Mega Conferences won't happen Part 2

Simply put, I don't believe the Big 10 can make the TV revenue numbers work. To grossly oversimplify the math, the Big 10 members currently pull in $22 million each. That's $242 million total. To move to 16 teams and keep the per team revenue the same, you'd need to increase the total size of the pie to $352 million.

You would think that risk adverse university presidents wouldn't make a move that risky without thinking they could increase their yearly revenue share by at least 20 percent. That requires increasing the Big 10's total revenue to over $422 million.

That's a 75 percent increase in total revenue for the Big 10 simply by adding teams like Pitt, Syracuse, Missouri, Rutgers and UConn. Why not mention Notre Dame? Because if they could get Notre Dame, they wouldn't keep adding teams.

TV Revenue is based on eyeballs. Let's look at some numbers.

• Currently there are about 303 million people in the US.
  
• The Big 10 state by state footprint includes 67 million people. That's 22% of the nation's population.
  
• Adding Missouri, UConn, Pitt, Syracuse and Rutgers would increase their coverage by 37.5 million homes. Or about 56 percent.

Why are those numbers important? Well...I posted population...not number of households but the above percentages still give you an idea of the size of the footprint a 16 team league would get you. And again...there is no need to take on the risk of going to 16 teams if Notre Dame wants to be the 12th. In that case, you just stop at 12.

But I digress. About 3 weeks ago, Dennis Dodd pointed out this math:

Cable television analyst Mike Reynolds of Multichannel News estimated that the Big Ten is getting a subscription fee of 70 cents per month per subscriber within that eight-state Big Ten region. Outside of that area, he says, the fee drops to 10 cents.

Take the state of Missouri as an example of the profit potential for the Big Ten. The state had an estimated 2.2 million households in 2008. Let's assume that almost all of those have satellite or cable or both. If the Big Ten added the University of Missouri, it could potentially increase those subscriber fees from 10 cents per person to 70 cents. That's the difference between a gross of $220,000 and $1.54 million per month.

*UPDATE: I blew the math big time. Here's the better math. Adding Missouri changes the Big 10 revenue opportunity to $15 million in the state of Missouri. However, they need to add $22 million for the league to break even. The math isn't terrible for the Big 10 in theory (unlike what I wrote in the 2 paragraphs I'm striking below). But it's not clear that residents of New York, Connecticut and New Jersey will put the same value on the Big 10 Network that residents of Michigan and Ohio do.

Ok. So, adding Missouri changes the Big 10 Network's revenue opportunity in Missouri by roughly $1.3 million? Again, I don't get it. Missouri needs to add $22 million to the Big Ten pie to pay for themselves. Why is adding $1.3 million in net new TV fees a good deal for the rest of the league's media partners?

To make the math work, you'd basically have to double the value of the TV deal in the *existing 8 states* to $1.40 per household *and* double the non-Big 10 states fees to $0.20 per household to get to numbers that make sense for expansion.

As point of comparison, the NFL Network charges Comcast $0.40-0.45 per household (update: per month) for viewers of the most important sport in the United States (as of 2009). That's down from the $0.70 asking price that the NFL Network put in front of Comcast.

Now...can you get the massive revenue needed if Notre Dame is one of the 16? Maybe. But like I said earlier. Why go to 16, if you get Notre Dame in the fold. You're in a less risky position to just stop at 12.

Like I said...I don't think the 16 team Super Conference is coming. Not right in the next 2 years anyway.

PWD

Why the 16 Team Mega Conferences won't happen Part 1

I just don't see the Big 10 expanding to 16 teams any time soon, and if they don't do it. No one will. In my opinion, most of their talk about 16 teams is aimed at:

• Making Notre Dame Nervous - The only way for a 16 team conference to really work would be moving to a 10 game league schedule. You really wouldn't play the other side of the league often enough to call yourself a conference unless you went to 10 games. Ten league games for the Big 10 would mean extremely little scheduling flexibility for Midwestern teams in booking Notre Dame. Also, a 16 team Big 10 would eliminate the Big East. Currently, Notre Dame is guaranteed 4 games a year against Big East foes. Combine that with three more Big 10 teams, and it becomes hard to see how they would book a full slate of 12 games. There are only so many service academies.
  
  
• Making Nebraska Nervous - If the Big 10 takes Missouri and the Pac 10 takes Colorado, the team left standing in the Big 12's game of musical chairs is Nebraska. Texas and Texas A&M can do pretty much anything they want due to TV demographics and fan support. Nebraska doesn't have that luxury.

In the end, I think the Big 10 will expand by 1 team and the Pac 10 will go to 12. And most of the 16 team talk is brilliantly aimed at getting the Big 10 the best possible team to reach out to them for inclusion.

From there, all the leagues will take a deep breath. Because the contractual complexities of moving to 16 teams in one or more conferences are just too great. And University presidents are too risk adverse.

More on the Revenue side in a little bit.

PWD