The topic on everybody’s mind these days in college football is conference realignment. I thought Missouri claiming to be southeastern was crazy and then USC and UCLA became midwestern. Last but not least, Stanford found itself in the Atlantic Coast Conference. HUH?
If there is one takeaway from the last few years, it is that geography no longer matters. The all mighty dollar rules all and football is king. Let’s leave the oh my god what about the tennis team having to travel cross country comments at the door. That ship has sailed and you know it.
The splintering of large conference football from small conference football is more of a when not if at this point. Don’t confuse me for being a proponent of this, the writing is simply on the wall.
The question becomes what is the best step forward for the numerous g5 schools with thriving football programs? The Memphis’s, the Boise States and of course my beloved Green Wave. If you include Liberty in the above, please leave my blog and never come back again.
There has been speculation of the ACC potentially adding schools if Clemson and FSU leave. There has been talk of an SEC loophole that allows founding members to rejoin. Some folks even think the big 12 is on the table. I’ll be the first to tell you that all of this sounds great, but where is the shred of realism in all these hypotheticals.
The PAC 12 (2?) (6?) made a massive splash in the middle of the night adding 4 schools from the Mountain West (SDSU, Colorado State, Fresno State and Boise State). They are revitalizing their conference that was founded in 1915 after its unexpected death this past off-season. This is real, not a Twitter postulation.
I like to deal in facts when it comes to conference realignment and the fact is the new PAC 12 NEEDS, not wants, two more schools to be recognized as an FBS conference by the NCAA.
I was shocked by the response of fans across the nation to this potential expansion. A lot of we need to wait for a better option, this new option is not what you think it is. First off this option is a better option and second G5 schools are playing a weaker hand than fans seem to think.
The goal is and needs to be getting off the sinking ship that is the American Athletic Conference. Some say this newly formed PAC 12 is a lateral move at best. Let me explain to you why this is untrue.
As I told you before, it is all about the dollars so let’s talk about the dollars. An AAC media deal was struck in 2020 for 12 years at roughly $7 million per school. I have read this has gone as high as $9 but when signed it was $7. Source below.
The members of the AAC when this deal was signed were Cincinnati, Tulsa, Memphis, UCF, SMU, Houston, Navy, Tulane, East Carolina, Temple and South Florida. Of these 11 schools, 7 currently remain and if Tulane and Memphis were to leave as proposed, you’d have a minority share of the teams that signed this deal remaining. It is a fair statement that the 5 or 6 best assets will have departed depending how you view USF and the Tampa market. This “power 6” version of the AAC commanded a tv deal that paid out less than half of what the most recent pac 12 media deal did.
The new pac 12 is not the old pac 12 and yet brands matter. I expect the next AAC media deal to go off a cliff next go round as the conference more closely resembles the C-USA than the one that signed the original deal. The C-USA receives roughly 750,000 per school from their media deal. This is the kind of potential cliff we are talking about.
Some will say that the new PAC 12 is just the Mountain West plus. The Mountain West TV deal distributes around $5 million per school which is less but nearly comparable with the best form of the AAC from 4 years ago. In fact, the newly formed pac 12 conference already includes five of the top 30 media markets in the country if Seattle is attributed to Washington state and Sacramento to Fresno. If you are able to add the two best AAC assets to the best 4 MW assets with the legacy PAC 12 branding to form a “best of the rest” conference, you will generate outsized tv deal interest. Don’t just take it from me, the article from the Seattle Times spoke to experts who echo the same thing. I’ll save you the reading time and say $11 million a school is the goal and realistic target.
Beyond the newly formed PAC-12 being better, the concept that g5 schools have leverage in conference realignment is comical. Please examine SMU’s ACC media deal before telling me that we are negotiating from a position of strength.
There may be some fantasy deal out there for Tulane in the future if we wait, there also may not be. This expansion is real with real sources linking Tulane as a top candidate for the spot.
Think about the conference you personally would want to watch.
Is it this?
Or this
The fact remains a bird in the hand will always be better than two in the bush.
Tulane Football Blog 
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