crashcarson15

On 9/2/2023 at 11:51 AM, BBTV said:

Can someone explain to a non-college sports fan why those two schools were so unattractive to any of the major conferences?  Is it just on-field performance? Or that they’re not worth anything from a TV market / revenue standpoint?

The geography doesn't help, but I also think a big challenge is that Oregon State and Washington State have rarely, if ever, been involved in blockbuster games.

The model/push from the TV networks with the Big Ten and SEC in particular seems to be to more or less manufacture a handful of "big games" each week vs. creating a depth of offerings (which has been the case over time). USC definitely helps the Big Ten's media partners do that, and both Oregon and Washington have been to the playoff since its inception. The Big Ten now has four top-tier media draws (Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State and USC), plus a solid reserve of programs to pit against them to create "big game" inventory in three time slots each week. The SEC will have a similar dynamic, with a bunch of top-tier media draws, a couple of which will likely play each week. Obviously Oregon State and Wazzu don't fit that bill.

Specific to the Big XII, their contract with ESPN had a pro-rata deal to add up to four Power 5 schools to the league. While not super relevant athletically over the last decade-plus, Colorado was a founding member of the conference, and Arizona, Arizona State and Utah are all more natural fits for the league than either of the PNW schools would've been. I don't think Oregon State and Washington State raise the average value of school in the Big XII if the league would try and re-negotiate an 18-team contract, particularly considering that the Big XII is placing some amount of value on basketball (which made Arizona in particular a strong target).

With the ACC, it was difficult enough to get the league to add Cal and Stanford, and the travel concerns that were a significant roadblock would be exacerbated with Oregon State and Washington State. At least with Cal and Stanford, they're strong cultural fits with many of the institutions in the league, and most importantly, both are located in the Bay Area and can be (1) hit in a single road trip for sports other than football and (2) reached direct on commercial flights to SFO by half the league (the other half of the league pretty much being the schools who can't fly direct anywhere to begin with). 

3 hours ago, BBTV said:

I don't see the issue at all with Coach Prime.  Things don't have to be the way they've been forever.  Not every coach has to instruct (or look) like Knute Rockne. Not sure how many other coaches came into a job with a brand already bigger than the school they're now coaching, and I haven't yet read about anything he's done that's objectively wrong (like a scandal, poor coaching decision, etc.)

 

I also don't think Sanders was wrong in his post-game press conference.

I would contend his association with Prime Prep was very much a scandal, just one that's been casually brushed aside.

12 hours ago, PrimalCookie said:

Yeah, I was expecting Cal and Stanford to get at least some interest due to their academic prestige and Bay Area market, although I'm still doubtful the ACC would see any monetary benefit from adding them (which is what all this is really about). As for Oregon State and Washington State, it seems they have no other options but the Mountain West. They'll join the fairly short list of schools that used to be in a power conference and no longer are: UConn, USF, Tulane, Rice, and SMU are the others as far as I'm aware.

 

Edit: Also Sewanee, Chicago, Idaho, and Montana, but those were all prior to WW2.

If there is a monetary benefit, it either comes through:

1. The creation of a late night TV slot for the ACC to offer to ESPN; the SEC isn't going to be offering up 10:30 ET kickoffs, which means Big XII games are the only inventory ESPN could have for the late slot
2. A potential ability to re-negotiate terms of the existing agreement (which could be bad for the league, but also could be a chance for ESPN to secure Florida State if they're concerned about the 'Noles breaking the GoR and going to the Big Ten)

Stanford and Cal to the ACC probably makes more sense than any move to this point to be honest, given the context. It's more stability for the smaller schools in the ACC that probably aren't getting a B1G or SEC invite down the road (which may be most of the league), and the academic-minded schools could love the idea of getting a jump-start on an FBS mini-Ivy to carry them through the inevitable Clemson and FSU departures. Plus, the travel isn't really their concern — most basketball/volleyball/tennis/etc. teams would probably make one trip to the Bay Area every other year to play both schools, which at that point is more a novelty that could actually help recruiting than a chronic issue.

Obviously, the travel would be a nightmare for Stanford and Cal, but any scenario at this point is a nightmare for them and keeping a seat at the big kids' table might be worth the sacrifice vs. having to put their non-revenue sports somewhere else (and at least you can fly direct or direct+bus to a lot of the league from SFO).

On 7/28/2023 at 1:44 PM, jlog3000 said:

Is being a full independent considered an option for any of the remaining Pac schools, should they don't get a different conference home? Also, would the ACC consider do a Big TEN by grabbing a few Pac schools for expansion?

Stanford has the money to go independent if they want to and just eat the costs, but they also probably have the money to ask into the Big Ten and take like,  no TV share and just be there for vibes and to park their hyper-successful Olympic sports.

Cal is broke because it turns out building a football stadium right on top of a fault line isn't a great idea. They're the school with the most uncertain outlook in all of this, IMO.

19 minutes ago, MJWalker45 said:

Are the mustard pants a school decision, or is it a limitation of what adidas and Under Armour offered?

To some degree there's always going to be a mismatch when you have an overly metallic helmet paired with non-metallic pants, but I thought the pants from the Champion-era fauxback they did in 2019 did a much better job of matching the helmet than the more mustardy shade does. Would prefer to see the school do this shade of gold across the board.

Yeah, I really don't mind the green pants. Would probably prefer gold pants, but would also prefer gold pants that match the helmet better.

On 7/1/2023 at 11:02 PM, tBBP said:

I'll say this for UCF and that uniform specifically: at least they're using actual brassier metallic gold.

 

All that said...as much as I've personally always wanted to see what straight gold and white looked like together—which that uniform does give me, for what that's worth—there ain't no way that's gonna fly on the field. It's gonna need the black—well, the jersey numbers will, anyway—for both legibility and readability.

 

(Did they not learn from Florida State's kerfuffle back in 2015??)

Notre Dame has been doing it for a few years in basketball, albeit with (I think) a darker gold:

They have a navy version as well. I'm not a huge fan, partially for readability's sake and partially because I just don't like flat gold lettering for ND (football jersey numbers have always been white-on-navy, for example).

The helmets are a mess, but within the City Connect confines … I actually like the Pirates' set, probably because they look like the Pirates. The color blocking has historical significance with the franchise, the hat and jersey could both pretty easily be mixed-and-matched with other elements of their uniform set, and there's nothing really over-the-top about the design.

I still like the Angels and Marlins sets above anyone's because I think they're both really nice jerseys that could serve as primary designs, but beyond that, give me sets like the Pirates and White Sox that fit really well with the existing brand over maybe better looks that don't fit with the overall brand.

On 6/21/2023 at 4:37 PM, dont care said:

That and their “arena” is a college arena, not an NBA level arena with suites, and amenities that an nba arena has

There are plenty of things that keep Louisville from being a top expansion/relocation candidate, but the KFC Yum! Center itself is a pro-style arena and not one of those reasons. 

12 hours ago, aawagner011 said:

New field design for Louisville.

 

I wonder if this is foreshadowing new uniforms. Otherwise, it would be very odd to move away from that font which has been so closely associated with the athletic program. Maybe they’ll keep the regular bird on the helmet.

 

I do not like this change. Louisville has a nice Cardinal head logo and its font was very distinct (at least the wordmark, I never liked it when applied to numbers). Moving to the full body logo feels very retro, something you’d love to see on a throwback ball cap at the bookstore, but past its time for a main logo. This feels similar to the Maryland change that I discussed a few pages ago.

This does bring the football field in line with the logo and wordmark Louisville currently uses on its basketball court.

The :censored:ty thing about the A's leaving Oakland is that the market really hasn't had the chance to show itself over the last 30 years given the stadium situation, but Oakland is also one of the like, 15 markets in MLB that is perfectly expendable for any number of other places if the stadium situation is bad. This is probably true of every pro sports league (well, except the NFL, where like, every team is expendable), but it's exacerbated in baseball because (a) 81 home dates and (b) baseball stadiums don't lend themselves to other uses the way NBA and NHL arenas do.

I don't know that Las Vegas will necessarily work for MLB, but I think it'll probably be as fine as any other place would be and will be a neat park to visit.

8 hours ago, See Red said:

 

That would be Kevin Ollie, who won with Calhoun's guys and proceeded to run the program into irrelevance .

 

Dan Hurley built this buzzsaw.  Nothing random about it.

Yeah, like, this UConn team was very comfortably the best team in the country outside of the like, four weeks in the middle of the season where they entirely forgot what they were doing. Finished at No. 1 in KenPom by more than 2 points despite having a 2-6 run in the middle of the season — without that stretch, they would've been a clear No. 1 overall seed and favorite in the tournament, and all our parity narratives would've been at least a little different. Extremely good basketball team, in contrast to 2014, which just kinda went on a random heater.

Man, I just don't know how you can be a baseball fan and not love this tournament. It's been a shining example of everything that makes baseball great — atmosphere, passion, tension, culture.

Nah, if you're gonna make any changes to the First Four, it should be to go the other way and make all four games between at-large teams, not conference champions. Two conference champions leave every year without playing in the actual tournament proper, and that's never sat well with me. The romanticism of the tournament isn't about a 16 vs. 16 matchup in Dayton, it's about getting the chance to play on Thursday or Friday, experience the environment, upset a 1-seed, etc. Everyone likes to talk about the positive of how it means two 16-seeds get to win a game in the tournament, but the downside of the two 16-seeds who are in the tournament but not really in the tournament is greater, IMO.

Restructure the tournament shares so going to the First Four isn't a financial benefit, and give every team that earned its way into the tournament an actual spot. (You'll also get the side effect of better matchups in Dayton.)

It’s wild how entrenched some baseball fans are against Rob Manfred that they’ll argue against literally anything MLB does these days. The pitch clock improves the in-stadium experience so much (speaking as a baseball guy) and I’ve come around on shift restrictions. Big bases are great.

At the end of the day, most sports have put rules in place over time to counteract “bad” tendencies that have entered the game — a shot clock and 3 seconds in basketball; illegal formations in football; offside and icing in hockey; etc. Hell, volleyball is only a couple decades removed from entirely changing how the sport is scored. The difference with baseball is it took like, 150 years for the game to evolve into a flawed meta.

4 hours ago, floydnimrod said:

I don't know why we have to be gatekeepers of who gets in the Hall of Fame. I love the whole Hall of Fame process and I find it fascinating, especially as it shifted into electing guys that I saw play. I want Rolen in there. Wagner and Helton, too. Put all the borderline guys in. Celebrate the game before it's dead. We could induct Kenny Lofton and Alex Ochoa tomorrow and I couldn't give less of a :censored:.

I don't know whether either of them should be in the Hall or not, but guys like Jim Edmonds and Kenny Lofton being one-and-done on the ballot is one of the worst byproducts of the BBWAA's dick-measuring contest the last decade on Bonds, Clemens, etc.

I'm happy that Scott Rolen got through his first year and got a fair shot at his candidacy. I think it's very cool and fine that he's going into the Hall.

The issue with splitting FBS in half is that the NCAA more or less tried that 40 years ago, and dozens of schools realized that it's better to be on the outside in FBS than competing for a championship in a lesser division (particularly in the current bowl game and TV economy). Realistically, the 12-team playoff is as good as it's likely to ever get for the non-power schools — they actually get national championship access as a collective, but they're not diluting the power schools' access in a significant way that would freeze them out.

Also, to be very clear, the playoff takes the top six conference champions, irrespective of conference. Would we expect the 2020 scenario where a Pac-10 champion is unranked and two Group of 5 champions make the playoff to happen regularly? Maybe not, but there's not this explicit shut-out of the Group of 5 schools. No playoff format is suddenly going to make people in Akron care more about the Zips than Ohio State. The big schools are the big schools because they're the big schools. That'll largely always be the case (with the current format providing the groundwork for a couple power "mid-major" programs — a la Gonzaga — to develop).

On 12/29/2022 at 2:58 PM, MJWalker45 said:

I know a bunch of Big Ten fans will happy to see him go if it happens, since he dragged his feet in getting football back on the schedule in 2020. I think whomever comes in will have to be a mix of him and Jim Delaney if they want to stay in front of the other leagues money-wise. 

The hatred of Kevin Warren from most Big Ten fans is pretty ridiculous to me — schools like Indiana or Minnesota who’d be irrelevant in the conference realignment carousel (see like, Kansas) are now gonna make like, a gazillion dollars because of moves and TV contracts he’s signed. He’s solidified the league as the clear No. 2 conference in college athletics financially and has provided a lot of stability to a bunch of schools that wouldn’t have it if they were in the ACC, Big 12 or Pac-12.

Fun fact: The ACC has won more football national championships since 2013 (3) than the Big Ten has since 1971 (2.5). I’d actually be really interested in a documentary or long form on the mythology of the Big Ten / how they’ve leveraged what’s mostly the Ohio State brand into this power position.

I say this a lot about high school sports where I think it's really true, but college sports would probably be better on the whole if football conference affiliation was split off entirely from other sports. Football is unique in that it's a once-a-week, big-money endeavor — the death of the original Big East is obviously the biggest example, but this landscape where the Big XII will have teams in West Virginia, Florida and Utah and the Big Ten will have two California schools and a New Jersey school is just unnecessary for pretty much every other sport.

The MVFC works pretty well as a proof-of-concept IMO by not forcing a school like Youngstown State into a conference for other sports where they aren't within 6 hours of another league member (compare this to the Horizon League, where 8 of the other 10 members are within ~5 hours of YSU).

I can't necessarily endorse the concept of schools lighting money on fire to play at the FBS level, but the idea of a football-only conference of misfits is a hell of a lot smarter than an all-sports conference of misfits.

It's automatically better than their previous set insofar as it's actually a coherent uniform set — no gold on some uniforms and not on others, no weird color mismatches, script styles, treatments, etc., between uniforms. I also really like the single-color lettering on a navy jersey, given that the "TC" logo isn't outlined (I always thought it was awkward to have single-color treatment on the hat, then outlined on the jersey).

I'm a big fan of the road pinstripes and think the road jersey is pretty solid, but for the most part do think this feels a little unfinished (which just seems like modern jersey trends at this point). I think the color balance on the home jersey is a little off, where red is presented as the dominant color on the home jersey on its own. The whole thing is fine, mostly.

SMU is, functionally, infinitely richer than any of Fresno State, Hawai'i, UNLV, etc., is in a market and recruiting territory that actually matters (that the league doesn't already have access to), and actually has money that's interested in interscholastic sports. It also gives the Pac-12 the option of having the occasional game in the noon ET time slot as part of a TV contract.

On 9/10/2022 at 6:01 PM, FiddySicks said:

Nothing better than Notre Dame getting exposed as frauds right at the beginning of the season rather than towards the end of the season like usual. Kills that whole bull narrative that they’re good as early as possible. 

I get that it's rooted in the whole "people hate Notre Dame thing", but arguing that a program that went 54-10 over the last five seasons isn't good is just such a weird way to consume college football to me. Reducing the sport to Alabama, Clemson, Georgia, Ohio State and occasionally LSU as the only teams that matter misses like, 90% of what makes college football interesting.

On 9/3/2022 at 12:27 AM, Dilbert said:

Might just give Notre Dame some incentive to join a conference

From a Notre Dame perspective, I think this playoff field bolsters independence rather than offers incentive to join a conference (remember that ND's athletic director was one of the four guys who drew up this plan). Six at-large berths means ND will always have a very clear path to making the playoff and, if the program remains at its current level, will make said playoff frequently.

I also don't think the inability to get a bye is a big deal and, if the playoff doesn't re-rank between rounds based on the actual rankings vs. seeding, I think you could make a strong case that being the No. 5 or No. 6 seed is better for a team like ND than being the No. 3 or No. 4 seed. 2021 Notre Dame would have been seeded at No. 6 as an at-large, needing to beat No. 11 Utah at home and No. 3 Cincinnati to make a semifinal. Had ND been the ACC champion though, for example, they would've been seeded at No. 4 and bracketed to match up with No. 5 Georgia in a neutral quarterfinal. I would much rather try and win the first two games than have to win one against Georgia.

If we operate in the idea where the lion's share of power will be concentrated in the B1G and SEC (plus Clemson), there's at least one non-elite program getting a bye every year. That team is likely to be the No. 4 seed, even if it goes undefeated, and would represent a favorable matchup for whoever finishes at No. 5 (which would likely be an unbeaten ND team's seed). Trying to beat a non-power champion, then a weaker power champion, is probably more appealing to ND than being matched up with whichever of Alabama or Georgia doesn't win the SEC in a quarterfinal.

On 8/24/2022 at 4:55 PM, McCall said:

I had thought they might reduce the divisional games down to 13/opponent, but then I read that it would be 14 and the league opponent games would all be 6 instead of 8 at 6 and 1 from each division at 7. Now it turns out it is in fact 13 and 6/7. I would've taken those 2 extra league games and applied them to the interleague rival, so it would be 6 games, 3 at each home park instead of just 2. I'd have imagined they'd prefer the Yankees-Mets, Dodgers-Angels, Cardinals-Roy... Cubs-White Sox for 6 games instead of 4. Doesn't really make sense.

 

EDIT: Looking through the schedule, I hate the Yankees, but wouldn't MLB rather have them and the Mets play 3 games at Yankee Stadium AND 3 games at Citi Field as opposed to just 2 at each place? Instead, they're playing an extra game at Texas and at Detroit.

I would assume the setup is for scheduling purposes — if you went to a plan of 13/division, 6/league and 3/interleague (6/interleague rival), you'd only be set up for four 4-game series / eight 2-game series the entire season, with everything else being 3-game series. Doing it this way allows them to have a healthy mix of 2-, 3- and 4-game sets inside the division, plus the flexibility for a pair of 2-game sets in interleague and some additional 2- and 4-game sets against league opponents. I'd guess there's scheduling advantages to that.

On 8/10/2022 at 9:52 PM, Burmy said:

Everyone loves March Madness...except for college football status-quo defenders, it seems.

The biggest problem with "March Madness, but make it college football" is that the teams that would benefit most are ones like 2021 Ohio State, 2020 Oklahoma, 2019 Alabama, 2018 Georgia, etc. — teams that already have elite talent and make the playoff regularly, but stumbled a couple times too many during the regular season. If you bloat the field of the playoff, it reduces the value to a program of actually making the program, and now you're asking your upstart to win multiple big games against teams with more talent just to make a "final four".

Let's take Cincinnati in 2021 and turn the tournament into a 24-team, March Madness style tournament. This means 4 regions of 6 teams, each seeded 1-through-6. We avoid any rematches and teams from the same conference in the same region, where possible.

Applying these restrictions and roughly trying to stay on the "S-curve" gives Cincinnati the following region:

No. 1 Cincinnati – BYE

No. 4 Oklahoma vs. No. 5 Clemson

No. 2 Ohio State – BYE

No. 3 Utah vs. No. 6 Louisiana

Cincinnati making the current four-team playoff is a huge deal for the program — but because we've made our tournament "March Madness", we suddenly put Cincinnati in a spot where there's a really good chance they become a one-and-done team. At the very least, we're forcing them to beat two top-5/10 overall talent teams that had disappointing seasons just to make the "final four" that, in real life, they qualified into with a really good season. Obviously, not all upstart teams get the access in the current system that Cincinnati does, but FCS having a 24-team playoff hasn't kept that division from having dominant teams that win year-in, year-out, and I don't think anything material would change at the FBS level other than an illusion of hope. There's a middle ground here that improves the current system without a radical change.