Official realignment thread - SEC formally invites OU and Texas to join the conference in 2025

[CarolinaBuff]

Most of the schools I've seen mentioned don't move the needle at all, football wise anyway. What I mean by that is money. Boise has a fine program, no doubt. If they go through a P5 conference slate, I don't think they'll look like themselves. If we add any teams, it needs to be an institution with money and a following. Who that is, I couldn't tell ya?

This. Talk of adding schools like SDSU, UNM, UNLV and Boise is comical.

 

[MtnBuff]

I believe the Pac-12 media money makes up for about 1/3 of CU's athletic budget. The AD has to raise about 2/3 of that money generally. If CSU's AD budget is close to that 2/3 for CU, then they could have a case to join a P5 conference. That would be about $60-65 million minimum at this time without the current media rights deal factored in. For CSU that figure could be closer to $70 million.

A $15-20 million dollar subsidiary for athletics is a great deal when that leads to hundreds of millions of dollars of research money being granted by the government based on who are in those academic alliances based on the athletic conferences such as the Pac-12, Big 12, and Big Ten. I believe the ACC has one while the SEC schools might be more part of an alliance of 60+ southern schools without having their own SEC academic alliance.

Two things here. CSU already subsidizes athletics to the tune of over $23 million per year and they are still well under what it would take to run a P5 athletic program. If you added the PAC 12 media share to their budget they would still be at or very near the bottom of the conference financially.

In 2017-18 the subsidy reached $25.4 million before dropping slighty the following year to $23.7. This is out of an athletic department budget of $54.3 million including $8.1 million servicing the debt on the stadium meaning that their total athletic spending without the stadium was roughly $46.2 million. Subtract the subsidies and they are generating $22.5 million. A pathetically small amount in the world of current college athletic budgets.

That would leave them getting beat up every year on the field and the court which isn't going to generate additional dollars for anyone.

Secondly neither the PAC 12 nor any other P5 conference gives a moments notice to what is "good for CSU" or any other non member school nor should they. We would love to think otherwise but college athletics is business, big business. It isn't a charity or a kumbaya circle. The only reason schools within a conference care about the other schools in their conference is because as a group they facilitate each other making more money and gaining more attention.

https://www.coloradoan.com/story/sp...on-faculty-cuts-athletic-spending/4755811002/

 

[BuffWarHog]

Huge difference though. Washington State is already in the conference as is Oregon State and the conference isn't going to kick them out.

In fact as I mentioned before if the conference tried to kick them out there would be some massive political pressure put on Washington and Oregon to use their influence to keep them.

This is the same kind of issue that would be faced trying to split Okie Lite from OU or Kansas State and Kansas. Unless there is simply no choice they are a package deal

Go back a few years and consider when the PAC was expanding to include CU and Utah. There was significant talk about the conference taking Texas and OU. Before anything official even got out the politics were working full speed to try to make sure that Baylor was included (in place of Colorado was their idea) and Baylor isn't even a state school.

If those schools were not already members of the PAC they would likely face a similar set of problems getting into a P5 conference that CSU faces but they don't have to worry about that.

I dunno. Everyone thought that about Texas and aTm. Then all of a sudden, no one gave a shît.

 

[BuffWarHog]

You couldn't be more wrong. Sure just about anyone can see any game if they want to enough.

The real issue is how many people will make the effort to see them. Your NFL comparison has absolutely no validity because it is culturally a completely different thing. Americans watch the NFL , bet on the NFL, play fantasy NFL, and consume NFL.

College football has some general fans but it is much more about loyalties and rivalries for specific programs. You can put an NFL game on and people all over the country will watch it. Put a college game on and the rating are very dependent on who the teams are and where you take the numbers. Very few college programs are a national brand (exceptions like Notre Dame, Texas, Southern Cal, etc.) Start putting regular Boise games on Saturday afternoon on ABC and million of fans will either be not watching, watching the game on CBS or ESPN, etc. or watching golf.

If this were not true the MWC would have a TV contract that pays them more than a fraction of the worst P5 contract.

Put an NFL game on, any NFL game and I be like “ooh, they’re showing Hot Rod on FXM. I’m in.”

 

[Bison]

Two things here. CSU already subsidizes athletics to the tune of over $23 million per year and they are still well under what it would take to run a P5 athletic program. If you added the PAC 12 media share to their budget they would still be at or very near the bottom of the conference financially.

In 2017-18 the subsidy reached $25.4 million before dropping slighty the following year to $23.7. This is out of an athletic department budget of $54.3 million including $8.1 million servicing the debt on the stadium meaning that their total athletic spt onending without the stadium was roughly $46.2 million. Subtract the subsidies and they are generating $22.5 million. A pathetically small amount in the world of current college athletic budgets.

That would leave them getting beat up every year on the field and the court which isn't going to generate additional dollars for anyone.

Secondly neither the PAC 12 nor any other P5 conference gives a moments notice to what is "good for CSU" or any other non member school nor should they. We would love to think otherwise but college athletics is business, big business. It isn't a charity or a kumbaya circle. The only reason schools within a conference care about the other schools in their conference is because as a group they facilitate each other making more money and gaining more attention.

https://www.coloradoan.com/story/sp...on-faculty-cuts-athletic-spending/4755811002/

That Coloradoan article left out one very important piece of information about those stadium bond payments. CSU has been meeting the bond obligations every year before the coronavirus hit. All CSU has to do is have the stadium make more money than what is owed for the annual bond payment and they had $50M in reserve last time I checked. They could afford $1.5M to $2M in annual losses up to the date that the bonds are paid off. Once the bonds are paid off, that can be reallocated to increasing the football coaching salaries to get them closer to P5 level pay if they chose to. CSU could then turn to a massive renovation of Moby Arena if not a brand new arena on campus to increase their athletic budget to get them closer to where CU is at right now. If CSU can show that they are making those football stadium bond payments annually after the coronavirus passes, that's going to help them make a case for a P5 invite. This decade is going to be critical.

 

[SINKRATZ]

That Coloradoan article left out one very important piece of information about those stadium bond payments. CSU has been meeting the bond obligations every year before the coronavirus hit. All CSU has to do is have the stadium make more money than what is owed for the annual bond payment and they had $50M in reserve last time I checked. They could afford $1.5M to $2M in annual losses up to the date that the bonds are paid off. Once the bonds are paid off, that can be reallocated to increasing the football coaching salaries to get them closer to P5 level pay if they chose to. CSU could then turn to a massive renovation of Moby Arena if not a brand new arena on campus to increase their athletic budget to get them closer to where CU is at right now. If CSU can show that they are making those football stadium bond payments annually after the coronavirus passes, that's going to help them make a case for a P5 invite. This decade is going to be critical.

Dude, did you read the article? They are meeting the bond payments because the school has been subsidizing the AD to the tune of $24M a year. That figure has doubled in the last 10 years. The school doesn’t want to keep doing that, and those bond payments are about to increase another $4M this year.

 

[Not Sure]

Those bond payments don’t pay down the principal, IIRC. Just covering the interest payments doesn’t make the obligation go away. CSU hoping for some kind of windfall once the bond matures is delusional.

 

[MtnBuff]

That Coloradoan article left out one very important piece of information about those stadium bond payments. CSU has been meeting the bond obligations every year before the coronavirus hit. All CSU has to do is have the stadium make more money than what is owed for the annual bond payment and they had $50M in reserve last time I checked. They could afford $1.5M to $2M in annual losses up to the date that the bonds are paid off. Once the bonds are paid off, that can be reallocated to increasing the football coaching salaries to get them closer to P5 level pay if they chose to. CSU could then turn to a massive renovation of Moby Arena if not a brand new arena on campus to increase their athletic budget to get them closer to where CU is at right now. If CSU can show that they are making those football stadium bond payments annually after the coronavirus passes, that's going to help them make a case for a P5 invite. This decade is going to be critical.

Dude, did you read the article? They are meeting the bond payments because the school has been subsidizing the AD to the tune of $24M a year. That figure has doubled in the last 10 years. The school doesn’t want to keep doing that, and those bond payments are about to increase another $4M this year.

Their financial situation is getting worse, not better.

Those bond payments not only increase with time but staying on schedule the don't pay off for another what 20, 25 years?

Meanwhile the cost to attempt to continue to participate in FBS level football and D1 sports continues to rise much faster than any gains they are making meaning they fall further behind.

Their dream is that some P5 conference comes in and hands them $30+ million per year but it's not happening. They don't add close to that value to any conference.

The only ones who can come anywhere close to making a P5 initiation make sense are their delusional fans. It isn't going to happen.

Edit: Did a little digging. Bond payoff is scheduled for 40 years from 2019.

 

[MtnBuff]

Those bond payments don’t pay down the principal, IIRC. Just covering the interest payments doesn’t make the obligation go away. CSU hoping for some kind of windfall once the bond matures is delusional.

They are paying towards principle but the projected payoff is 40 years so they aren't paying it down fast. At that point they then have a 40 year old stadium which isn't anything like Folsom or the other timeless facilities that have very long lifespans.

If they don't pay off that principal and at some point have to refinance when the rates are higher it is going to hurt.

At this point I wouldn't even be sure we will have college football in 25 years much less 40.

CSU is far from alone in this but they look like a program that is built on dreams and an exaggerated image of who they are and that stadium has the look a becoming a huge white elephant down the road.

 

[ahoelsken]

3 schools that will never be in the Pac: BYU, Boise, and Air Force. Those are all non-starters. SDSU makes some sense academically (at least more than Boise) but makes little sense in expanding the footprint. CSU and UNM are better academically, but their fanbases are non existent and their athletic spending miniscule in comparison to P5 schools.

Frankly, of the schools listed, only UNLV makes any sense, and even then, I'm not sure.

CSU doesn't bring the conference anything they don't already have with CU, and they draw very little attention locally even if they're good. Let's make it four schools who will never be in the Pac and add them to that list.

 

[ahoelsken]

That Coloradoan article left out one very important piece of information about those stadium bond payments. CSU has been meeting the bond obligations every year before the coronavirus hit. All CSU has to do is have the stadium make more money than what is owed for the annual bond payment and they had $50M in reserve last time I checked. They could afford $1.5M to $2M in annual losses up to the date that the bonds are paid off. Once the bonds are paid off, that can be reallocated to increasing the football coaching salaries to get them closer to P5 level pay if they chose to. CSU could then turn to a massive renovation of Moby Arena if not a brand new arena on campus to increase their athletic budget to get them closer to where CU is at right now. If CSU can show that they are making those football stadium bond payments annually after the coronavirus passes, that's going to help them make a case for a P5 invite. This decade is going to be critical.

Did JoeyB from ramnation hack your account or something? JFC dude. They're not ever joining the Power 5.

 

[Big Iron Buff]

Eh, I think that’s a stretch. I’ve never heard anyone brag about graduating from a conference because there’s an extremely wide gap between Washington State and Stanford. Or Duke and Florida State. Or Northwestern and ****braska.

Speak for yourself. I always flex my RMAC ties during job interviews.

"Yeah, yeah, bachelor's and master's from Colorado School of Mines, it's ok I guess, but being tied to such prestigious academic institutions of the RMAC such as Adams State, Chadron State, Fort Lewis, New Mexico Highlands, and Western Colorado University is what I'm truly proud of and cherish."...."You've never heard of Western Colorado University? Maybe you remember it as Western State?"... "No? Maybe Wasted State?"... "Yeah yeah, they're the same thing. Changed their name because they became too prestigious. They didn't want the coldest location in the continental US to get over ran with enrollment from hip bikini babes and Chads diluting their academic excellence."

Maybe I'm a dumb **** and out of touch, but WTF does academics have to do with conference athletics in 2021? Literally the only conference in the country that carries water as a whole is the Ivy League. Even then, I'd be like" which one? Pennsylvania? Oh neat." Nobody cares. I know it's D2, but conference has had zero bearing on the reputation of Mines being a top tier engineering school. Just another weird thing that boomers seem to be holding on to.

In my opinion, it should come down to one main thing:

Does adding this university to our conference make us a better conference as a whole?

****ty academics or not, will it help improve TV revenue, help our enrollment, which will ultimately add to the success of our university/add funding for our academic research?

 

[MtnBuff]

Speak for yourself. I always flex my RMAC ties during job interviews.

"Yeah, yeah, bachelor's and master's from Colorado School of Mines, it's ok I guess, but being tied to such prestigious academic institutions of the RMAC such as Adams State, Chadron State, Fort Lewis, New Mexico Highlands, and Western Colorado University is what I'm truly proud of and cherish."...."You've never heard of Western Colorado University? Maybe you remember it as Western State?"... "No? Maybe Wasted State?"... "Yeah yeah, they're the same thing. Changed their name because they became too prestigious. They didn't want the coldest location in the continental US to get over ran with enrollment from hip bikini babes and Chads diluting their academic excellence."

Maybe I'm a dumb **** and out of touch, but WTF does academics have to do with conference athletics in 2021? Literally the only conference in the country that carries water as a whole is the Ivy League. Even then, I'd be like" which one? Pennsylvania? Oh neat." Nobody cares. I know it's D2, but conference has had zero bearing on the reputation of Mines being a top tier engineering school. Just another weird thing that boomers seem to be holding on to.

In my opinion, it should come down to one main thing:

Does adding this university to our conference make us a better conference as a whole?

****ty academics or not, will it help improve TV revenue, help our enrollment, which will ultimately add to the success of our university/add funding for our academic research?

If academic reputation really mattered that much Nebraska would have had a hard time getting into the MAC much less the B1G.


They can push all the talking points they want, when it comes down to it the dollars, actually the millions of dollars, are what gets their attention.

Now there are some compatibility considerations in play. The PAC12 would never admit BYU or Baylor to the conference. At the same time Oklahoma is not exactly an academic powerhouse (getting better but still nothing notable and Texas is known as being very hard to work with and both come from very Red states with Republican governance but the PAC schools would look at those two, realize that they probably mean at least another $5-10 million per year per school and roll out the welcome mats.

Whenever someone tries to make a point of emphasizing that it isn't about the money, you can bet it's probably all about the money.

 

[Buffnik]

If academic reputation really mattered that much ****braska would have had a hard time getting into the MAC much less the B1G.


They can push all the talking points they want, when it comes down to it the dollars, actually the millions of dollars, are what gets their attention.

Now there are some compatibility considerations in play. The PAC12 would never admit BYU or Baylor to the conference. At the same time Oklahoma is not exactly an academic powerhouse (getting better but still nothing notable and Texas is known as being very hard to work with and both come from very Red states with Republican governance but the PAC schools would look at those two, realize that they probably mean at least another $5-10 million per year per school and roll out the welcome mats.

Whenever someone tries to make a point of emphasizing that it isn't about the money, you can bet it's probably all about the money.

In the P12, we do have schools like Stanford drawing a lot of water. For them, it's really not about the money because their endowments and annual donations make athletic revenue almost insignificant. It's really more about reputation for them.

 

[Medford M.]

I would take UNLV in a heart beat.

 

[MtnBuff]

In the P12, we do have schools like Stanford drawing a lot of water. For them, it's really not about the money because their endowments and annual donations make athletic revenue almost insignificant. It's really more about reputation for them.

Stanford is under less pressure than the huge majority of schools because of the endowments but they still don't want to turn down millions.

They are also probably less reliant than most schools on athletic success to keep the big donations coming in but it still doesn't hurt when they are winning football games.

They aren't a Baylor or a Nebraska but they still make certain allowances to try to insure that they have a chance to be competitive on the field. Admission standards for athletes along with some flexibility in terms of scheduling make this possible.

I would still venture to say that they worry about $5 million dollars or more in athletic revenue. Not as much as most other schools but they care about money.

 

[Not Sure]

UNLV would be a nice geographical fit, but so would CSU. Which is another way of saying I don’t think they add much value.

 

[Gramburglar]

I would take UNLV in a heart beat.

And have the conference HQ relocated to Las Vegas.
I would love to have Nevada Reno in the conference too, but that’s more of a selfish long weekend roadie staying in Lake Tahoe.

 

[ahoelsken]

Eh, I think that’s a stretch. I’ve never heard anyone brag about graduating from a conference because there’s an extremely wide gap between Washington State and Stanford. Or Duke and Florida State. Or Northwestern and ****braska.

I don't know about the rest of you guys-but when I was in staffing and saw "University of Nebraska-Lincoln" under education on somebody's resume, they were a quick no

 

[hokiehead]

I don't know about the rest of you guys-but when I was in staffing and saw "University of ****braska-Lincoln" under education on somebody's resume, they were a quick no

I've worked with three UNL grads over the last five years or so. Two of them are very bright and outstanding in their roles, the other holds his own. Only three data points, but at least for Engineering and Computer Science, Nebraska - Lincoln seems to be academically sound based on that. If I was in a hiring role right now, a degree from Nebraska would not be a negative for the applicant.

Not sure what roles you're hiring to fill though, or my data set was simply not representative.

I also worked with one dude who got his degree from UN-Omaha. That guy was an idiot.

 

[Not Sure]

I've worked with three UNL grads over the last five years or so. Two of them are very bright and outstanding in their roles, the other holds his own. Only three data points, but at least for Engineering and Computer Science, ****braska - Lincoln seems to be academically sound based on that. If I was in a hiring role right now, a degree from ****braska would not be a negative for the applicant.

Not sure what roles you're hiring to fill though, or my data set was simply not representative.

I also worked with one dude who got his degree from UN-Omaha. That guy was an idiot.

 

[ahoelsken]

I've worked with three UNL grads over the last five years or so. Two of them are very bright and outstanding in their roles, the other holds his own. Only three data points, but at least for Engineering and Computer Science, ****braska - Lincoln seems to be academically sound based on that. If I was in a hiring role right now, a degree from ****braska would not be a negative for the applicant.

Not sure what roles you're hiring to fill though, or my data set was simply not representative.

I also worked with one dude who got his degree from UN-Omaha. That guy was an idiot.

I'm joking-any excuse to make fun of that state and that godforsaken football team. I'm sure they have some solid programs, but I'd rather hire out of other schools for all three of those if I'm hiring intern types.

 

[hokiehead]

You're alumni of an AAU school -- you have justification to be more snobbish than i do.

 

[Not Sure]

You're alumni of an AAU school -- you have justification to be more snobbish than i do.

*an alumnus


and yeah, that’s a total UBL.
Don’t care.

 

[MtnBuff]

I'm joking-any excuse to make fun of that state and that godforsaken football team. I'm sure they have some solid programs, but I'd rather hire out of other schools for all three of those if I'm hiring intern types.

Hey they are a world leader in French Fry Technology and Manure Mound Methodology.

 

[MtnBuff]

You're alumni of an AAU school -- you have justification to be more snobbish than i do.

Do consider that some individual graduates of Nebraska are large enough to be considered a plural in themselves.

 

[MiamiBuffs]

In the P12, we do have schools like Stanford drawing a lot of water. For them, it's really not about the money because their endowments and annual donations make athletic revenue almost insignificant. It's really more about reputation for them.

Its about name recognition. Its like Coke advertising. It doesnt change anyones mind. Just keeps the name reminder reminding.

 

[ahoelsken]

Hey they are a world leader in French Fry Technology and Manure Mound Methodology.

You forgot about Runza making. You're off your game tonight @MtnBuff

 

[MtnBuff]

You forgot about Runza making. You're off your game tonight @MtnBuff

You are correct. I also neglected Mobile Home Architecture and Truck Stop Management.

 

[ahoelsken]

You are correct. I also neglected Mobile Home Architecture and Truck Stop Management.

Yes you did!