MEGA Conference Realignment and lawsuits Megathread: Stories, Tales, Lies, and Exaggerations

[Squid Bumciorek]

That is incorrect ... there HAVE been commentaries by some that "AAU is not 100% required ... case by case evaluation ... FSU has been vetted and approved by FOX and the Big 10".

If FSU was actually close to AAU, then the discussion of whether or not they need to be AAU to be in the B1G would be a moot point. B1G would have pushed the AAU to accredit FSU (being on the verge of AAU status as you assert) so the B1G could continue to claim that only elite research universities, plus ****** Nebraska, are allowed in. Just last year a party school like ASU got AAU status while FSU got passed over for USF. If you apply some logic- FSU clearly isn’t close to AAU status or they would have been approved like ASU was to pave their way into the B1G.

So one of two things is true. Either

1. the B1G didn’t push the AAU to accredit FSU because the B1G isn’t that interested in them OR

2. B1G asked but AAU schools saw that FSU was so far from AAU status that if they tried to do the B1G a favor and admit FSU, it would be making a mockery of the AAU accreditation process.

You might think the B1G doesn’t care about AAU, but many of the B1Gs member schools are top research institutions and they do care. they are more concerned about maintaining the perception of academic eliteness (as the vast majority of school presidents do) than they do about letting in a ****** university in Tallahassee to play football.

 

[CaneinBroward]

If FSU was actually close to AAU, then the discussion of whether or not they need to be AAU to be in the B1G would be a moot point. B1G would have pushed the AAU to accredit FSU (being on the verge of AAU status as you assert) so the B1G could continue to claim that only elite research universities, plus ****** Nebraska, are allowed in. Just last year a party school like ASU got AAU status while FSU got passed over for USF. If you apply some logic- FSU clearly isn’t close to AAU status or they would have been approved like ASU was to pave their way into the B1G.

So one of two things is true. Either

1. the B1G didn’t push the AAU to accredit FSU because the B1G isn’t that interested in them OR

2. B1G asked but AAU schools saw that FSU was so far from AAU status that if they tried to do the B1G a favor and admit FSU, it would be making a mockery of the AAU accreditation process.

You might think the B1G doesn’t care about AAU, but many of the B1Gs member schools are top research institutions and they do care. they are far more concerned about maintaining the perception of academic eliteness (as the vast majority of school presidents do) than they do about letting in a ****** university in Tallahassee to play football.

or 3. the B1G is being pulled along by its TV partners who will be paying them at the rate of $100M pr school per year which already includes the dead weight of Indiana, Purdue, Rutgers, Maryland, etc. And those TV partners are telling them if they want to continue receiving that level of payout per school with future expansion, it needs to be schools the TV partners approve - regardless of AAU status.

And frankly, I'm going with option 3 based on the fact the B1G went ahead and started the elimination of the PAC 12 by wooing USC and UCLA away. Then, they finished the job by bringing over Oregon and Washington. If they would voluntarily put the shiv in the back of their bowl partner of 80+ years - ignoring collegiality and embracing the underhandedness of such a coup, why do you think they would be sticklers for the AAU "requirement" if their TV partners tell them to?

 

[Squid Bumciorek]

or 3. the B1G is being pulled along by its TV partners who will be paying them at the rate of $100M pr school per year which already includes the dead weight of Indiana, Purdue, Rutgers, Maryland, etc. And those TV partners are telling them if they want to continue receiving that level of payout per school with future expansion, it needs to be schools the TV partners approve - regardless of AAU status.

And frankly, I'm going with option 3 based on the fact the B1G went ahead and started the elimination of the PAC 12 by wooing USC and UCLA away. Then, they finished the job by bringing over Oregon and Washington. If they would voluntarily put the shiv in the back of their bowl partner of 80+ years - ignoring collegiality and embracing the underhandedness of such a coup, why do you think they would be sticklers for the AAU "requirement" if their TV partners tell them to?

So you think that if the B1G schools refuse to bring in FSU because they only want AAU schools, that Fox Sports will threaten to lowball them and they will actually believe the threats. Well, that’s certainly an opinion.

Seems more likely the sides would compromise instead of Fox trying to force the B1G into doing stuff it doesn’t want and creating bad blood - the B1G and Fox would agree on a different Florida school with a national following that IS an AAU school.

 

[Rickd]

Point us to the commentary outside of Warchant and Genetics saying FSU has been approved by FOX and the Big Ten.

So you think that if the B1G schools refuse to bring in FSU because they only want AAU schools, that Fox Sports will threaten to lowball them and they will actually believe the threats. Well, that’s certainly an opinion.

Seems more likely the sides would compromise instead of Fox trying to force the B1G into doing stuff it doesn’t want and creating bad blood - the B1G and Fox would agree on a different Florida school with a national following that IS an AAU school.

Your entire premise is based on "if" the B10 presidents only want AAU schools. And that is a position you have taken personally. It takes a 70% vote for approval of a new member for the B10. Personally, I am hoping Miami IS the selection, but I believe that the case can be easily made that FSU brings a tremendous value to the B10 and is academically superior to at least half a dozen B10 schools. It is nowhere near being a "Nebraska" for sure. So far on that topic people are just shouting their own personal beliefs and nobody has any actual idea of how much FOX and the programming $$ is driving the next decision(s).

 

[CaneinBroward]

So you think that if the B1G schools refuse to bring in FSU because they only want AAU schools, that Fox Sports will threaten to lowball them and they will actually believe the threats. Well, that’s certainly an opinion.

Seems more likely the sides would compromise instead of Fox trying to force the B1G into doing stuff it doesn’t want and creating bad blood - the B1G and Fox would agree on a different Florida school with a national following that IS an AAU school.

It's not lowballing. It's business. $100M per year is a ton of money. You can't just plug in any school to get a ROI for the TV partners.

I'm not saying Fox News threatens the B1G with taking away the deal or something like that. Just that they won't increase the total payout. If it's currently $1B overall, well it stays at $1B overall if the B1G chooses to add say USF and its AAU status. If they choose to add FSU (or some other school with TV approval), it goes up to $1.1B or higher.

I'm just saying the B1G has shown it has no standing as a principled, pious upholder of "collegiate" athletics when it went after USC and UCLA. They are no better or worse than the SEC and its reputation as being more of a football factory instead of upper education institution. If the B1G wants to keep its payouts per team and wants to expand, I think they would "overlook" such AAU requirements. Just like they won't kick out Nebraska since they lost their AAU status, I would fully expect to hear FSU and Clemson "are well on the road to getting AAU status and are welcome to join the B1G".

 

[Empirical Cane]

If FSU was actually close to AAU, then the discussion of whether or not they need to be AAU to be in the B1G would be a moot point. B1G would have pushed the AAU to accredit FSU (being on the verge of AAU status as you assert) so the B1G could continue to claim that only elite research universities, plus ****** Nebraska, are allowed in. Just last year a party school like ASU got AAU status while FSU got passed over for USF. If you apply some logic- FSU clearly isn’t close to AAU status or they would have been approved like ASU was to pave their way into the B1G.

So one of two things is true. Either

1. the B1G didn’t push the AAU to accredit FSU because the B1G isn’t that interested in them OR

2. B1G asked but AAU schools saw that FSU was so far from AAU status that if they tried to do the B1G a favor and admit FSU, it would be making a mockery of the AAU accreditation process.

You might think the B1G doesn’t care about AAU, but many of the B1Gs member schools are top research institutions and they do care. they are more concerned about maintaining the perception of academic eliteness (as the vast majority of school presidents do) than they do about letting in a ****** university in Tallahassee to play football.

NU seeks to protect academic, athletic future in Big Ten, pledging closer UNL-UNMC ties • Nebraska Examiner

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln took a significant step Monday toward securing its academic and athletic future in the Big Ten Conference.

nebraskaexaminer.com

 

[JD08]

NU seeks to protect academic, athletic future in Big Ten, pledging closer UNL-UNMC ties • Nebraska Examiner

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln took a significant step Monday toward securing its academic and athletic future in the Big Ten Conference.

nebraskaexaminer.com

Nebraska working to take the AAU argument out of the equation.

 

[TooColdToHold]

Your entire premise is based on "if" the B10 presidents only want AAU schools. And that is a position you have taken personally. It takes a 70% vote for approval of a new member for the B10. Personally, I am hoping Miami IS the selection, but I believe that the case can be easily made that FSU brings a tremendous value to the B10 and is academically superior to at least half a dozen B10 schools. It is nowhere near being a "Nebraska" for sure. So far on that topic people are just shouting their own personal beliefs and nobody has any actual idea of how much FOX and the programming $$ is driving the next decision(s).

The people that are just shouting their own personal beliefs are those claiming FOX would pressure the league to take non AAU schools. That is just pure speculation. What is a known fact is that the Big Ten wants to be made up of all AAU schools.

 

[Squid Bumciorek]

NU seeks to protect academic, athletic future in Big Ten, pledging closer UNL-UNMC ties • Nebraska Examiner

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln took a significant step Monday toward securing its academic and athletic future in the Big Ten Conference.

nebraskaexaminer.com

Some people refuse to accept the fact that most university presidents care far more about academics than they do about football. Fox Sports gives Wisconsin 100 million per year for football? That’s nice. Wisconsin also spends 1.524 billion dollars in R&D each year, 75% of the money (about 1.1 billion) comes from grants. It makes the Fox Sports tv money look like pocket change. Professors at research universities want to conduct research with other professors at research universities. Schools academic reputation, which correlates with the quality of students applying, puts a lot of emphasis on the research output.

Fox Sports is not going to intimidate the University of Michigan (1.771 billion per year in research and development, around 1.4 billion from research grants) into voting FSU into the B1G if Michigan thinks FSUs lack of AAU status diminishes the academic prestige of the conference.

 

[hesskilla]

Your entire premise is based on "if" the B10 presidents only want AAU schools. And that is a position you have taken personally. It takes a 70% vote for approval of a new member for the B10. Personally, I am hoping Miami IS the selection, but I believe that the case can be easily made that FSU brings a tremendous value to the B10 and is academically superior to at least half a dozen B10 schools. It is nowhere near being a "Nebraska" for sure. So far on that topic people are just shouting their own personal beliefs and nobody has any actual idea of how much FOX and the programming $$ is driving the next decision(s).

How hard was it to give up the screen name @blackvern?

 

[DTP]

Some people refuse to accept the fact that most university presidents care far more about academics than they do about football. Fox Sports gives Wisconsin 100 million per year for football? That’s nice. Wisconsin also spends 1.524 billion dollars in R&D each year, 75% of the money (about 1.1 billion) comes from grants. It makes the Fox Sports tv money look like pocket change. Professors at research universities want to conduct research with other professors at research universities. Schools academic reputation, which correlates with the quality of students applying, puts a lot of emphasis on the research output.

Fox Sports is not going to intimidate the University of Michigan (1.771 billion per year in research and development, around 1.4 billion from research grants) into voting FSU into the B1G if Michigan thinks FSUs lack of AAU status diminishes the academic prestige of the conference.

Sure does make that TV money look like pennies in comparison.

 

[Rickd]

Some people refuse to accept the fact that most university presidents care far more about academics than they do about football. Fox Sports gives Wisconsin 100 million per year for football? That’s nice. Wisconsin also spends 1.524 billion dollars in R&D each year, 75% of the money (about 1.1 billion) comes from grants. It makes the Fox Sports tv money look like pocket change. Professors at research universities want to conduct research with other professors at research universities. Schools academic reputation, which correlates with the quality of students applying, puts a lot of emphasis on the research output.

Fox Sports is not going to intimidate the University of Michigan (1.771 billion per year in research and development, around 1.4 billion from research grants) into voting FSU into the B1G if Michigan thinks FSUs lack of AAU status diminishes the academic prestige of the conference.

It isn't "intimidation" ... it is simply business discussions and decisions. The Big 10 presidents made the decision to expand into a national conference, with a huge focus on adding excellent football programs, along with their media partners, who have given them the richest TV media contract in history. From all comments that have been made the PRIME FOOTBALL VIEWERSHIP programs have been prioritized by the Big 10 (Media partners working WITH university presidents). It remains to be seen how it will shake out as there is "gossip" that ESPN might make a defensive move to try and add FSU to the SEC.

 

[Rickd]

How hard was it to give up the screen name @blackvern?

Have no idea what you are talking about. No idea who @blackvern is / was.

 

[Rickd]

Sure does make that TV money look like pennies in comparison.

Absolutely ... but it would be really difficult to divert federal research grant money to a football program.

 

[TooColdToHold]

Have no idea what you are talking about. No idea who @blackvern is / was.

He was a poster who claimed to be a Miami fan but always talked glowingly about FSU and somewhat negatively about UM.

 

[Rickd]

He was a poster who claimed to be a Miami fan but always talked glowingly about FSU and somewhat negatively about UM.

Don't see how that "attitude" applies?? I've been to Miami games since 1990 and hope we kick FSU's butt big time this October. They are delusional with the belief that they have a CFP team. As far as P2 opportunities at this moment in the REALIGNMENT DISCUSSION (thread topic) ... THEY are the leaders in the pecking order based on the prime media metric ... VIEWERSHIP over the past 20 seasons. You know, that time period in which we have ONE 10 win season and they have TEN. Hope Mario changes the dynamics beginning with the UF game.

 

[TheEye]

Boy, FSU really milking this $#!t, ain’t they? I don’t see any conferences breaking their backs to snatch them out of our conference.

They have to do all the legwork to make themselves free and clear and then when they are good and depleted, their future home will dictate ALL the terms.

 

[OrangeBowlMagic]

Boy, FSU really milking this $#!t, ain’t they? I don’t see any conferences breaking their backs to snatch them out of our conference.

They have to do all the legwork to make themselves free and clear and then when they are good and depleted, their future home will dictate ALL the terms.

Fact 1: fsu is not doing what they’re doing without a clear, definitive home in a P2 league.

Fact 2: your athletic department will be dead if you don’t get into the P2 very, very soon. (In comparison to the other P2 schools)

This isn’t my opinion. This isn’t message board rhetoric. These are facts. So if you think fsu is “milking” things, great. The fact is, they’re aggressively pushing to get out of a dead league and get into one of the only 2 that matter. Is Miami doing the same in silence? We’ll see. But fsu is doing exactly what they need to do for survival.

 

[OrangeBowlMagic]

I accept my role as the TIM COOK leading this thread into 2.0 and the new DECADE

@OrangeBowlMagic the OG STEVE JOBS. The visionary. THANKS for all that you did for us

 

[TooColdToHold]

Fact 1: fsu is not doing what they’re doing without a clear, definitive home in a P2 league.

Fact 2: your athletic department will be dead if you don’t get into the P2 very, very soon. (In comparison to the other P2 schools)

This isn’t my opinion. This isn’t message board rhetoric. These are facts. So if you think fsu is “milking” things, great. The fact is, they’re aggressively pushing to get out of a dead league and get into one of the only 2 that matter. Is Miami doing the same in silence? We’ll see. But fsu is doing exactly what they need to do for survival.

Please explain how #1 is a fact. As of now that is pure speculation.