“We understand that we share geography, we share culture, we share a culture of academics.”
Make light if you will, but I don’t see these comments from a fairly new, possibly cautious president as meaningless or clueless — in fact, I see the opposite.
“Geography” — the conference footprint isn’t likely to be meaningfully altered through expansion. SDSU, perhaps UNLV … less likely to venture as far as Texas.
“Culture” — religious institutions (like Gonzaga) need not apply.
“Culture of academics” — doctoral degree-granting universities with genuine research credentials on the table; state universities that feature bachelors/masters degrees but offer few if any PhD. programs, thanks for stopping by.
This all aligns with most of John’s reporting. Shouldn’t surprise anyone. What we see is pretty much what we’re gonna get.
I didn’t say “unimaginable.” I said “less likely.” As John (below) notes, getting to Dallas is less onerous for several conference members than Seattle (let alone Pullman … something everyone should experience. Once.).
More salient point: university presidents are naturally cautious. Very, very cautious. It’ll take some persuasion for some to embrace adding members two time zones away.
It is the President’s job to make sure higher education and athletics both prosper. Good luck to the new president in her role on the CEO committee. She won’t have the luxury of any learning curve thanks to her predecessors.
Great stuff John! She seems like a great person! But she needs to look at OSU’s endowment (smallest in the pac 12 at $819.6 million). She needs football and basketball to be a university at the D1 level going forward. In other words, money/football makes it that and the small endowment level states that fact glaringly. I get the prestige of being an academic first university league. But, as an engineering and ag school she needs to really really focus on athletics to maintain that “academic” prowess at the D1 level. She literally can’t afford not to. She needs to run it like a business. “We share a culture of academics”. Ok. But going broke won’t help share those values. Pay attention to the straw that stirs the drink… a lot more, and little less about the kumbaya of shared values.
My dad used to say that everything has an expiration date and I firmly believe that's going to apply to the current state of college football. I think that eventually, you'll have a 30-40 team Super Conference and that the academic blue-bloods will tap out. Oh, places like Stanford, Cal, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, etc...will still play football but most likely at the NAIA or club level. So, instead of having football players that are students, you'll have students that occasionally play football.
The framework that you outlined is probably correct. But just so we know the actual reality of what you just said, let’s put some real numbers to your 30-40 team Super Conference (s), and see the ramifications it holds.
Presently, the athletic divisions of NCAA are split into D1 FBS, D1 FCS, D2 and D3.
D1 FBS has 134 teams in 10 conferences, further split into two clusters: Power 5 & Group of 5. 69 teams and 5 conferences are in Power 5, 64 schools in Group of 5 with 5 conferences. These schools get 85 scholly players. Division 1 FCS has 125 teams with 15 conferences. D1 FCS schools can offer 63 schollies.
D2 is 169 teams playing in 17 conferences. They can offer up to 36 schollies, frequentlysplit into partials to cover more players. D3 has 246 teams with 28 conferences. There are no athletic scholarships in D3 ball. Many D2 teams are not readily recognizable to many college fans. Most assuredly the D3 schools are pretty incognito for the most part. Texas high school football may well have better fields and facilities than D3 colleges.
Now the question becomes “What will happen to the 29 or so teams in D1 FBS Power 5 ball that do NOT go into the Superconference?” Logic would dictate that they would join the now called Group of 5 schools and add 2 additional conferences which means that D1 FBS Group of 7 would have 93 schools playing with 85 scholarship players. Some of the schools could drop down to D1 FCS (like Idaho) but in all liklihood they stay put.
As for what divides these programs… money and scholarships.
You do realize that Stanford (along w/ USC and ucla) are in the top 10 of overall championships in NCAA as well as top 25 academics. Also, Northwestern and Vandy are in strong athletics conferences and are not going anywhere. It is more likely that the remaining PAC and BIG 12 schools not named Stanford or maybe UW, without elite overall athletics or academics, will fade into a second tier while the top tier will consist of an academically elite power B10 vs the more athletic focused SEC. If you watch the Olympics, both USC and Stanford typically perform within the top 5 countries in medal counts
So we (Oregon State University) hired a highly educated and accomplished engineer as President of our University, Sounds to me Tom, like you would have been much happier had we hired Steven A. Maybe we could get the Alabama president once the job of covering up for the basketball coach and his convicts is completed. C'mon, Man!
Let’s be honest. OSU and WSU have the most to lose from a PAC-12 diaspora and I would expect nothing less than hope and optimistic talk from either of them. Color me skeptical until this deal is actually done.
One thing is clear, the PAC12 PR team needs to be cut loose. They’ve allowed roughly nine months of negative press to spiral out of control. It comes across as a league that takes its fans for granted. We’ve endured major networks (and trolls on crap news sites) attacking our teams and conference for far too long. Even if we walk away with a decent GoR agreement, we’ll still have been given a black eye and looking weak. As an alumni, I’m pissed at how this has been handled. I expect better. There’s really no excuse for poor public relations after this long.
Seems like a very intelligent president focused on students with an appropriate mindset for athletics’ place within an institution of higher ed.
Trouble is, that’s the exact wrong mindset for conference negotiations and positioning to compete at a high level, particularly in football. You need a good ole boy football fanatic parroting their AD and holding their commish’s feet to the fire.
So as an alum, I’m proud of her words. As an OSU football fan they are very troubling.
You and Wilner have been taking a lot of heat lately from other podcast shows and media
sources for not reading the tea leafs... One leaf would be the out of the blue inclusion of
ION TV. This would indicate how bad the negotiations are going along with most of the
media outlets leaving the table. I just don't see the Pac accepting anything in the mid 20's
which would put them out of any real competition with the other conferences. I've been a Duck fan since the 60's, In some ways it would be fun to see Oregon play in a different conference
Pres knows the forthcoming deal could be the last for the Beavers as a power member.
I don't see the conference dissolving in this year. But without some new major members, or interesting deals, long term viability is in doubt with the way the other big conferences are expanding.
Remember, I am in Texas. Where I am reminded, whenever the subject comes up, that the PAC 12 is about to dissolve in to nothing more than a tofu and granola memory.
When reading her comments, they sound like they come from an elitist country club. If the schools will not accept lessor standards for expansion then the PAC 12 is on the path to irrelevance. We can join Harvard and Yale fans around the bonfires and make sure guards in place to keep the riff raff out of the compound.
Once again JC, nicely reported. BUt it's hard to be optinmistic with a bunch of boiler-plate answers like she gave. Regardless of what's being said about the current negotiations, including Pac 12 shools being poached and expansion within the remainig Pac10 schools, the Pac 12 is not holding aces in spite of the attraction of the west coast's viewing audiance. I suspect George K. is getting his negotiating skills tested in a big way. The slope may prove too steep for the Pac 12 to even come close to achieving media parity with other conferences.
John, it reminds of the Movie “To Big To Fail”. Great movie. Not sure if you have seen it, but it’s about the 2008 financial crisis. The scene specifically is where the ceo of Merrill Lynch says “you see what’s going on here… we’re next. Make the call.” And by doing that the weaker got whipped out. The moderately strong banks and bigger survived. Mega banks became the norm. ASU and Arizona… have to be making the call and back channeling with the Big 12. Oregon and UW are calling Warren Buffet (the big 10) and getting the dial set to pivot if the revenue sharing isn’t pushed their way as the two most valuable brands (all be it for a lesser amount to enter the B1G). And the scene I’m most afraid of happening is where John Mack, Jamie Dimon, and Lloyd Blankfien, are leaving the fed and John is taming about the number of people the gov (in this case the PAC12) and how they didn’t see this coming. Jamie replies “someone dropped the ball”. Blankfien replies “they didn’t drop the ball. They dropped the ball, kicked the coach in the balls, and took a shit in the quarterbacks mouth.”
As a fan of the Big12, I've been through three sets of poachings (Nebraska/Colorado, Mizzou, and UT/OU). What I'm hearing out of the Pac12 (and their fans) sounds so much like what happened here. Fans unrealistic to the impending doom talking about tradition and "culture of academics", "geography".... burying their heads in the sand. First, OSU is no bastion of higher education. They're an average state school, maybe lower than Colorado, Arizona and ASU. Geography means nothing, especially if you're looking to add SMU. The remaining members best bet is to be proactive and find their best partner, now. Adding SDSU and SMU is a waste. Garbage. Leverage dies with each day. If I were OSU and WSU, I'd approch the Big12 now. They've said they want a Pacific time zone team and if Washington and Oregon bolt for the B1G, the four corners immediately move to Big12 and WSU is left standing all alone. Proactive now or join the MWC later.
How does the PAC 12 Network factor into the media deal? Is there any chance of the conference moving towards a more traditional partnership? Could the network be sold out right and run by a 3rd party?
“We understand that we share geography, we share culture, we share a culture of academics.”
Make light if you will, but I don’t see these comments from a fairly new, possibly cautious president as meaningless or clueless — in fact, I see the opposite.
“Geography” — the conference footprint isn’t likely to be meaningfully altered through expansion. SDSU, perhaps UNLV … less likely to venture as far as Texas.
“Culture” — religious institutions (like Gonzaga) need not apply.
“Culture of academics” — doctoral degree-granting universities with genuine research credentials on the table; state universities that feature bachelors/masters degrees but offer few if any PhD. programs, thanks for stopping by.
This all aligns with most of John’s reporting. Shouldn’t surprise anyone. What we see is pretty much what we’re gonna get.
You are correct.
Boom. This guy gets it
I’m confused how you can interpret the geography one way and then in nearly the same breath ignore the academics
SMU (#72) isn’t in Lubbock. It’s in Dallas with an easy direct flight to every Pac12 city and would sit middle of the pack in academics
SDSU (#151) and UNLV (#285) would make up the lowest ranked schools in the PAC, and UNLV by a laughable metric.
SDSU and SMU makes too much sense for the conference, the question is if they add more G5 or begin exploring other options.
SMU is closer to Utah, Arizona schools, and Colorado… than the four corners are to Seattle.
I didn’t say “unimaginable.” I said “less likely.” As John (below) notes, getting to Dallas is less onerous for several conference members than Seattle (let alone Pullman … something everyone should experience. Once.).
More salient point: university presidents are naturally cautious. Very, very cautious. It’ll take some persuasion for some to embrace adding members two time zones away.
Depending on where you're at, you're almost better off driving to Pullman, takes less time.
"The president said the mission of higher education and the money in college athletics are sometimes at odds."
No truer words were ever spoken.
It is the President’s job to make sure higher education and athletics both prosper. Good luck to the new president in her role on the CEO committee. She won’t have the luxury of any learning curve thanks to her predecessors.
The work of the original CEO Group was problematic.
what work? don't You you mean free ride?
Great stuff John! She seems like a great person! But she needs to look at OSU’s endowment (smallest in the pac 12 at $819.6 million). She needs football and basketball to be a university at the D1 level going forward. In other words, money/football makes it that and the small endowment level states that fact glaringly. I get the prestige of being an academic first university league. But, as an engineering and ag school she needs to really really focus on athletics to maintain that “academic” prowess at the D1 level. She literally can’t afford not to. She needs to run it like a business. “We share a culture of academics”. Ok. But going broke won’t help share those values. Pay attention to the straw that stirs the drink… a lot more, and little less about the kumbaya of shared values.
You may be right. 30 years from now... it will be dramatically different. Maybe even 7-8.
My dad used to say that everything has an expiration date and I firmly believe that's going to apply to the current state of college football. I think that eventually, you'll have a 30-40 team Super Conference and that the academic blue-bloods will tap out. Oh, places like Stanford, Cal, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, etc...will still play football but most likely at the NAIA or club level. So, instead of having football players that are students, you'll have students that occasionally play football.
The framework that you outlined is probably correct. But just so we know the actual reality of what you just said, let’s put some real numbers to your 30-40 team Super Conference (s), and see the ramifications it holds.
Presently, the athletic divisions of NCAA are split into D1 FBS, D1 FCS, D2 and D3.
D1 FBS has 134 teams in 10 conferences, further split into two clusters: Power 5 & Group of 5. 69 teams and 5 conferences are in Power 5, 64 schools in Group of 5 with 5 conferences. These schools get 85 scholly players. Division 1 FCS has 125 teams with 15 conferences. D1 FCS schools can offer 63 schollies.
D2 is 169 teams playing in 17 conferences. They can offer up to 36 schollies, frequentlysplit into partials to cover more players. D3 has 246 teams with 28 conferences. There are no athletic scholarships in D3 ball. Many D2 teams are not readily recognizable to many college fans. Most assuredly the D3 schools are pretty incognito for the most part. Texas high school football may well have better fields and facilities than D3 colleges.
Now the question becomes “What will happen to the 29 or so teams in D1 FBS Power 5 ball that do NOT go into the Superconference?” Logic would dictate that they would join the now called Group of 5 schools and add 2 additional conferences which means that D1 FBS Group of 7 would have 93 schools playing with 85 scholarship players. Some of the schools could drop down to D1 FCS (like Idaho) but in all liklihood they stay put.
As for what divides these programs… money and scholarships.
You do realize that Stanford (along w/ USC and ucla) are in the top 10 of overall championships in NCAA as well as top 25 academics. Also, Northwestern and Vandy are in strong athletics conferences and are not going anywhere. It is more likely that the remaining PAC and BIG 12 schools not named Stanford or maybe UW, without elite overall athletics or academics, will fade into a second tier while the top tier will consist of an academically elite power B10 vs the more athletic focused SEC. If you watch the Olympics, both USC and Stanford typically perform within the top 5 countries in medal counts
OSU president seems like a wonderful woman, but I don't think she has a clue about athletics and its impact vis-a-vis the conference. She's not alone.
I don't think most university presidents are athletics-first hires.
She is intelligent. Unlike your comment
Thanks
So we (Oregon State University) hired a highly educated and accomplished engineer as President of our University, Sounds to me Tom, like you would have been much happier had we hired Steven A. Maybe we could get the Alabama president once the job of covering up for the basketball coach and his convicts is completed. C'mon, Man!
The conference will hold together until it doesn't.
Let’s be honest. OSU and WSU have the most to lose from a PAC-12 diaspora and I would expect nothing less than hope and optimistic talk from either of them. Color me skeptical until this deal is actually done.
Not really framing this as "hopeful" talk. She sounds very pragmatic to me.
This deal should have been done 2-3 months ago. Since it hasn’t the Pac-12 looks like the kid who try’s really hard to be liked, but nobody likes.
Not sure how anyone who has not negotiated a deal could say that. With all due respect... how long did the last deal take to negotiate?
One thing is clear, the PAC12 PR team needs to be cut loose. They’ve allowed roughly nine months of negative press to spiral out of control. It comes across as a league that takes its fans for granted. We’ve endured major networks (and trolls on crap news sites) attacking our teams and conference for far too long. Even if we walk away with a decent GoR agreement, we’ll still have been given a black eye and looking weak. As an alumni, I’m pissed at how this has been handled. I expect better. There’s really no excuse for poor public relations after this long.
Seems like a very intelligent president focused on students with an appropriate mindset for athletics’ place within an institution of higher ed.
Trouble is, that’s the exact wrong mindset for conference negotiations and positioning to compete at a high level, particularly in football. You need a good ole boy football fanatic parroting their AD and holding their commish’s feet to the fire.
So as an alum, I’m proud of her words. As an OSU football fan they are very troubling.
You and Wilner have been taking a lot of heat lately from other podcast shows and media
sources for not reading the tea leafs... One leaf would be the out of the blue inclusion of
ION TV. This would indicate how bad the negotiations are going along with most of the
media outlets leaving the table. I just don't see the Pac accepting anything in the mid 20's
which would put them out of any real competition with the other conferences. I've been a Duck fan since the 60's, In some ways it would be fun to see Oregon play in a different conference
and start new rivals.
Pres knows the forthcoming deal could be the last for the Beavers as a power member.
I don't see the conference dissolving in this year. But without some new major members, or interesting deals, long term viability is in doubt with the way the other big conferences are expanding.
Not sure how you draw that conclusion. A lot of leaps there.
Remember, I am in Texas. Where I am reminded, whenever the subject comes up, that the PAC 12 is about to dissolve in to nothing more than a tofu and granola memory.
When reading her comments, they sound like they come from an elitist country club. If the schools will not accept lessor standards for expansion then the PAC 12 is on the path to irrelevance. We can join Harvard and Yale fans around the bonfires and make sure guards in place to keep the riff raff out of the compound.
I don't think the goals of the typical university president line up with the fans. The vast majority of the academics don't want to be the NFL.
Disagree. She is thoughtful and somewhat more educated than anyone here on the thread.
Once again JC, nicely reported. BUt it's hard to be optinmistic with a bunch of boiler-plate answers like she gave. Regardless of what's being said about the current negotiations, including Pac 12 shools being poached and expansion within the remainig Pac10 schools, the Pac 12 is not holding aces in spite of the attraction of the west coast's viewing audiance. I suspect George K. is getting his negotiating skills tested in a big way. The slope may prove too steep for the Pac 12 to even come close to achieving media parity with other conferences.
I didn't hear boiler plate. Thought she was candid. Was surprised that she talked openly about the revenue sharing discussions.
John, it reminds of the Movie “To Big To Fail”. Great movie. Not sure if you have seen it, but it’s about the 2008 financial crisis. The scene specifically is where the ceo of Merrill Lynch says “you see what’s going on here… we’re next. Make the call.” And by doing that the weaker got whipped out. The moderately strong banks and bigger survived. Mega banks became the norm. ASU and Arizona… have to be making the call and back channeling with the Big 12. Oregon and UW are calling Warren Buffet (the big 10) and getting the dial set to pivot if the revenue sharing isn’t pushed their way as the two most valuable brands (all be it for a lesser amount to enter the B1G). And the scene I’m most afraid of happening is where John Mack, Jamie Dimon, and Lloyd Blankfien, are leaving the fed and John is taming about the number of people the gov (in this case the PAC12) and how they didn’t see this coming. Jamie replies “someone dropped the ball”. Blankfien replies “they didn’t drop the ball. They dropped the ball, kicked the coach in the balls, and took a shit in the quarterbacks mouth.”
I hope she also touched on “Oversight and diligence” of the Pac 12 network and other aspects that fall under their leadership charges.
Yawn……
Get some sleep. If you're yawning amid this, I'm a little worried about you.
As a fan of the Big12, I've been through three sets of poachings (Nebraska/Colorado, Mizzou, and UT/OU). What I'm hearing out of the Pac12 (and their fans) sounds so much like what happened here. Fans unrealistic to the impending doom talking about tradition and "culture of academics", "geography".... burying their heads in the sand. First, OSU is no bastion of higher education. They're an average state school, maybe lower than Colorado, Arizona and ASU. Geography means nothing, especially if you're looking to add SMU. The remaining members best bet is to be proactive and find their best partner, now. Adding SDSU and SMU is a waste. Garbage. Leverage dies with each day. If I were OSU and WSU, I'd approch the Big12 now. They've said they want a Pacific time zone team and if Washington and Oregon bolt for the B1G, the four corners immediately move to Big12 and WSU is left standing all alone. Proactive now or join the MWC later.
How does the PAC 12 Network factor into the media deal? Is there any chance of the conference moving towards a more traditional partnership? Could the network be sold out right and run by a 3rd party?