I think it's silly that anyone would break up a 100+ year league casually, or think about it as a casual event. Eventually the suits will realize that they are breaking part of what made college football valuable to people in the first place which is regionality, rivalry, history, etc. The conference got a deal that was almost 50% higher than their current deal from ESPN, a jump from 20 -> 30 million dollars. Only greedy SOBs would decline that. Pac-10 was definitely salvageable.
Exactly! When I heard that earlier today, I was dumbfounded = how clueless do you have to be to accept that as the Commissioner, anyone on that Board, and/or anyone in ANY position of authority at ANY of the schools. I typically believe whatever you make is yours and any envy is just that = envy. But in this case, I would have taken $25MM and given $2.5MM back to each university as scholarships or something (and then written it off on my taxes.)
Larry Scott did more than F' the PAC 12, he committed incest. Because of his pride, arrogance, and ignorance - he single handedly destroyed perhaps the best athletic conference in the USA. He did not understand the importance of two things: Television Payouts / Broadcast Rights & USC. If any of these two things fail, all of the conference fails.
So true. I don't think GK really understood how bad of shape the entire conference was in after Larry Scott. We could go back to the guy before LS who pushed to change the revenue split from more for USC and UCLA to even. Grudges run deep in these type of associations.
Scott literally saw the SEC grow in popularity with the exclusive ESPN deal and the network came to US with a similar offer just less money cause we dont wanna have to have kickoffs at 11am so we would have lower viewership and instead of taking the mid offer now and a bigger one later he straight said no and look at us now. A simple change like the MAC does with some games on Thursdays and a couple earlier starting games we could have merged with the Big XII and be stronger than ever.
6:05 Gotta disagree with Matt here. Teams in the Pac12 were not snaking over their fellow conference partners for a tad bit more money. They're doing it for A LOT more money, which I can guarantee every team in the BIG10 and in the SEC would do in a heartbeat as well if they could get at least double their money for the foreseeable future.
Yes and no, the deal offered from Apple was so bad that it was life or death to leave, it was not a bit of money vs a lot of money, this way live or die difference not to mention zero TV exposure only streaming on Apple.
@@deanfirnatine7814 Good point. Some people have pointed to the Apple Deal with the MLS but that is different because they (Apple & MLS) are looking at the long term because the average MLS fan is A LOT younger than the average college football fan so they're more likely to jump on to streaming to watch games vs. college football needs reliable high ratings right now, not some time down the road.
I agree with the Big Ten but the SEC really does the Faith Family Football way better than Iowa claims. If they could Ohio State would join the SEC West and leave every other member for a guarenteed playoff spot and 70-80 more million dollars a year.
@@NeverwascooL so your saying SEC schools get 200mil a year...each ? find that doubtful. Each B1G school gets 100mil a year just off the TV rights alone. So no, Ohio State isn't going to just run and jump to SEC, hate to burst your bubble. That's coming from a Penn State fan, who loathes OSU but respects them.
*Spelling* In my 40 years of following the Pac 8-10-12, I have never seen a commissioner who did well by the conference. Bad TV deals, moves to coddle the LA schools, and uneven revenue sharing. USC was over it when the others schools (I'm talking WSU and OSU) began to get an equal share and began to be more competitive. The B1G has long had equal media revenue sharing as has had the SEC. The Big Ten even shares gate receipts. Once a school like Michigan, Ohio State, Iowa etc goes over a threshold, money goes into a pot to go to schools with lesser gate revenue. They are in it together!
The Pac was already a sinking ship before commissioner George. It was the former commish, Larry Scott, who started the demise of the Pac. but all honesty, the Pac started falling apart when they decided to give out equal pay to all the schools, than Tier-pay. We ALL know USC carried the conference, and they treated the flagship school like a division 2 school
MLB and the NFL both share media revenue with all teams. This is 100% reasonable to expect between public institutions especially, which most of the Pac-12 is comprised of. Are you saying that college football should be more cutthroat than actual pro sports leagues? Can you imagine if all the pro sports leagues ate themselves because the owners in LA and NY decided they didn't want to "carry" other teams? It would totally ruin the leagues. The league needs to actually have some continuity and stability or no one (or at least not myself) will care about it.
Actually, the way it worked was based on TV appearances. The schools that made more TV appearances received more money. It just happened to be that UCLA and USC were on TV each weekend that they received more money. The money received from TV appearances was capped at like 20% the equal revenue share other schools received.
The downfall of the conference is because of the misguided attempt to make a Pac-12 network that was on random channels, at random times. They never had their media deals in place where the marquee games could be easily seen, it's that simple, it was a doomed strategy from the outset.
This...100 times over. SEC had their own network, and affiliated through ESPN, and NBC / CBS ?? ( not sure, some SEC will help me out there) B1G has their own network, affiliated through Fox. Pac trying to dink n dunk with tech corpos, not getting expansive views with the exception of " marquee " schools like USC / UCLA etc. being the only Pac schools covered at least here in the east. Not sure about this next part, ( someone from the Left Coast can help out ) but the report over on the Right Coast was that UCLA HAD to do this move or cancel all of their sports for the next year as they were out of operational money for sports programs. Either way, Pac mismanagement, unable to secure long term profitable TV deals, fraternizing with Tech corpo snake oil salesmen, telling them streaming was the future ( it may be, but not right now) yeah, easy to see why Pac is done. There was even a report when this broke in '22 that even Mountain West has a better TV deal then Pac. the only thing as a PSU fan I'll miss, will be the traditional meaning of the Rose Bowl ( that only occurs now 3 of 4 years )
I'm a Cal fan, I live about 15 minutes away from Berkeley. That said, I might as well live in Timbuktu. For some reason, I can watch Northwestern, Ole Miss, and Iowa all weekend long, but we NEVER see a Pac-12 game - ANY Pac-12 game - on TV. It's pulling teeth just to get highlights. The Pac-12 made their product impossible to watch - therefore no one watches it. Ultimately what killed college football was the horrible BCS. It was the worst thing to ever happen to the sport, murdering a century of tradition all over the nation, all for the sake of money. It's disgusting. There should be no playoffs. It's freaking COLLEGE!
Well, now thanks to market forces being exerted on an amateur sport, the Pac-12 doesn't even exist, much less it being broadcast in the bay area. It's all part of the hungry beast that was unleashed in the 1984 ruling of NCAA v. Oklahoma Board of Regents. Also, Cal had I believe one of the lowest ticket revenues of any team in the Power 5, or definitely in the bottom third I think. For me, the best correlate for the value of a team is ticket revenue, because it sidesteps the commissioner's missteps and all that. No commissioner can prevent a fan from attending a game. If Cal had about double the ticket revenue, maybe they would be getting an invite to the media buffet.
If you're a Cal fan, then you should know that the Bay Area is not a "football" town--the weather is too good, the income is too high, and the IQ is also too high, all 3 impediments to building a football culture. Since I mostly watch Cal and Pac-12 big OCC games, when I heard of the breakup, I was sad....for 5 minutes, then thought how nice it would be for Cal to go independent--playing Notre Dame and Navy every year. (Just a dream, bc finances won't be there).
As w WSU fan this last week has been painful to watch. I understand these bigger conferences want the bigger media markets that some of these other teams bring in. But seeing teams that I truly believe are regularly, less talented than us get invites to these conferences, impacts me in a way that I never would have anticipated. The idea that this coming season could be the end of the Apple cup breaks my heart.
I am an Oregon fan and I am so sorry what is happening to you and OSU, reading Oregon fan boards we are going to go French Revolution on the admin if they end the Civil War, they say they will not, they better keep their word. I am praying somehow you two get into the Big 12.
@@kek3908 The stab in the back came from Washington. They could have been truthful to WSU and given them time to plan their exit. Same with Oregon & OSU.
Boomhauer has motor mouth, and punctuates everything with dang old and I tell you what. Matt has mush mouth and can't annunciate any consonants without his nose buzzing. Gold and blue dude had it too RIP. They got people in jolly old England with the same speech thing
The Pac 12's academic standards really hurt recruiting. The conference minimums were higher than some of the schools' regular standards and higher than almost every school in the SEC (sans three).
Yes and Stanford and Cal blocked most expansion attempts, they blocked BYU and TCU before they ever joined the Big 12 and then in 2021 when the Big 12 was on life support the Pac 12 could have had Oklahoma St, TCU and Baylor and Stanford and Cal blocked it again. If anyone is left without a home I hope its those two.
Pac 12 schools are mostly public institutions, and they are for education primarily. I don't understand why they would stoop low on academic standards just for football. It's possible to not sell your entire mission as a university to football, and that's what they were doing.
Is nobody gonna talk about how much harder it’s going to be for teams to win a championship with a million teams in their conference?? Is nobody gonna talk about how teams will only be able to play half of the teams from their conference each year or fewer making records and standings so much more controversial?? Am I the only one who just thinks 16+ teams in one conference is simply TOO MANY???
In which case there will be 11 that end their seasons as losers when they instead could have gone home as cotton bowl/rose bowl/orange bowl etc. champions
As a WSU fan I hope the Apple cup dies and UW and WSU never play each other again. It’s a microcosm of how the state feels about each other. UW talks bad about WSU and thinks that they are more than what they are. Frankly this is just a sign that college football is dying and greedy money hungry programs and destroying the broader landscape.
I don’t know man I feel like it’s only the loud minority that hates wsu I know a lot of UW fans including myself that want WSU to win every weekend except the one we play together, it’s about state pride
As a student at Arizona (lifelong Phoenix resident) we have always felt a disconnect from the coastal schools and for years I felt Big 12 fit us better
When the B1G adds ND, FSU, Clemson, and UNC the SEC will never be able to catch up to them financially. So Bama, UGA, and all the other valuable SEC schools may eventually head to the B1G to maximize their revenue and remain relevant. Then Sankey can run the D1 College Football Super League as it's first Commissioner.
The B1G makes more money and has a lot better exposure because they negotiated a better TV deal. After ND joins the B1G the SEC will never be able to catch up to them financially.
They don’t stay up and watch late night PAC 12 games. My dad was raised in Oregon but born in Southern California and grew up a USC fan. I was born and raised in Alabama. Had the luxury of getting to stay up late and watch those late night games. Oregon states crowd was the most exhilarating when they’d place USC in 2000s.
It wasn't the Pac12 didn't like WAZZU or OSU. Rather, they both have small stadium seating capacity that makes both of them difficult in selling to other conferences..
The leadership in the P12 has been terrible for years primarily because the university presidents didn’t expect excellence. Recently, the previous media deal (P12 Network ONLY on Dish network? WTF?) soured the school’s view of the conference and then, when the B10 hired high quality consultants to hammer their new deal, the new commish hired his law school buddy way too late in the process to get any type of decent deal done. There’s a lot of other ins, outs and whathaveyous that play a part, but the bottom line is that the schools accepted crappy leadership because they didn’t value athletics as much as they should and it rotted from the inside out.
I'm a Sooner fan born and raised, but I got to say, it was hard to watch OU play in the 2022 season, because all those games they lost except for 2 was a wining game that they just fail short of. Man those 5 losses by 1 score really made a hell of a thriller. I used to set back and know OU was going to win and they would, but 2022 really gave a mystery box week to week. So with OU moving to the SEC, even with OU getting better talent why and getting the coaching worked out, it will always be a thrill to play in the SEC.
@@anderch11 Have you seen OU record against SEC Teams. Even Alabama knows the challenge when playing OU. One thing Nick Saban has respect for OU and that says a lot for the Sooners. Perhaps you should go learn some history. There is a reason why the SEC wanted OU and Texas. Boomer!
OU is solid. But Big 12 has good teams that may not be as good as UGA, Alabama or even LSU at the end of the season, but were better overall than the bulk of the SEC. OU’s opponents only get slightly stronger in the SEC. The Sooners will still be great.
I'm pretty sure the Pac 12 fell apart because everyone involved in the negotiations was too stoned and half of them couldn't make it to the meetings because their homes were blocked by homeless encampments.
I’m sick and tired of college football’s traditions, rivalries, and regional identities being destroyed for the sake of money. Soon college football will be just as soullessly corporate as the NFL.
I find it rich that an sec/Alabama fan is telling me to embrace the change… shut up dude, the only reason we are even in this spot right now is because of two extremely greedy and overrated conferences! Used to have prima Donna teams now we have prima Donna conferences
Dude says big 10 teams have 1 or 2 real games a year, Ohio State plays at Michigan, Penn State, at Notre Dame, and at Wisconsin, and they only have 2 non power 5 opponents next season, I would argue that they have a tougher schedule then at least half of, and probably the majority of the SEC
exactly. Statistically Ohio State plays the #9 schedule in the country. Michigan State is #2. and i’d argue #1 considering Iowa is a 9+ win team in 2023.
The SEC hype train has been carried by the water boys at ESPN for over a Decade. The B1G really outmaneuvered the house of mouse when they snagged television rights deals with Fox, NBC and CBS. More eyeballs and more premium games on more networks, and now one network can’t set the narrative anymore. While Alabama has been consistent, the SEC has always been Bama, whatever flavor of the year peaks at that time, and then 4 more overrated schools that keep the top 2 in contention in the event of a loss. The 12 team format will be a game changer in College Football, especially if home games are played on campus.
The B1G is more competitive this season but a few years ago it was OSU beating up on everyone else and winning the conference every season because the rest of the B1G was horrible. Now it's the SEC that's a 1 team conference because it's UGA and everyone else. UGA has a cakewalk to the playoffs because nobody will challenge them. The SEC definitely isn't as dominant or competitive as they used to be.
As a Boise State fan, I always root for the Utes, unless they play BSU of course. My favorite Ute game was when they took Bama out behind the woodshed and scored 21 points in the first 6 minutes of the game. I wish you guys were in the MW still. I need to get a Utes hat.
I think the University President who asked the Big 12 was ASUs President. Not 100% sure but that would be my guess based on his earlier comments of wanting the stay with the Pac 12 schools. I don't think it was Arizona's because they and Colorado were already penciled into the Big 12 with some rumblings of Big 10 but I don't think that was anything serious. ASU didn't want to leave and I felt he believed the Pac 12 had more leverage than it did. That President really sounds like the one from ASU not Arizona to get the other 8-9 teams into the Big 12 (again, thinking they had leverage).
It really does sound like something Michael Crowe would do because he's a pompous D-bag. Just listen to the way he speaks negatively about the Big12 and their existing members after being given a lifeline by them. He is a snake.
As a Oregon fan since birth, I don't know if i can support NCAA after this swap. The PAC 10/12 was my favorite and the best team usually faced the best BIG 10 team end of year. Traditions are dead out west now.
Whoever the pac 12 president who made that statement about leaving WSU and Oregon State in the Pac is the worst sort of backstabber...who we really don't need in the Big 12..."I warned them all to take WSU & Ore State Beavers but the networks are pulling the strings behind the curtain"...💯🤔🐦🙈
Sad days as a west coaster, PAC 12 fan. You have it right it’s the commissioner fault but Larry Smith the previous commissioner started the dominos. USC has carried the conference for decades. Once they left, the days were numbered. 10-15 years away from a super conference.
The A hole was Arizona from what I have heard. As an Oregon fan I am furious over this fiasco, how was our leadership so bad they could not get any TV deal just a joke of a streaming deal with Apple? I feel horrible for Oregon State and Washington State, those two schools do things the right way and always have, they are literally family for Oregon and Washington fans. I do not feel sorry for Stanford and Cal because they said no multiple times to adding teams such as BYU and TCU before they went to the Big 12 and then when the Big 12 was near death in 2021 we could have had TCU, Baylor and Oklahoma State and they said no again. This whole thing sucks. As for Oregon State when they are even half way decent they pack the stadium, they won ten games last year, when was the last time Colorado or Arizona did that? I am an Oregon fan and your dead wrong, we give Oregon St and WSU a good ribbing but we want them to WIN, we respected and wanted Utah to win, under Chip Kelly we respected UCLA, we even respect our hated rival Washington. We did not respect USC because of the way they behave and the same for Stanford and Cal. You are also wrong about Oregon wanting to leave for a few years not true, they had no intention of leaving until that horrific Apple offer is all the conference had to offer, then it was run for the lifeboats. Just because talking heads say Oregon wanted to leave does not make it true. I have lived all over and change is not always good and the direction college football is going in is not good long term.
Great comment. As a Boise State fan, good luck in the battle this upcoming season. It should be a good game. Are you stoked to have Gabriel as your qb?
Geez Matt, do some homework before you post. OSU football finished in the top 25 last year after hammering SEC Florida in their bowl game. OSU are ranked in the top 20 again this year as well. Regarding their fan based it is very loyal. Games are sold out, they just completed a $160M extension to the stadium. They travel to away games well and sports are also followed on Media/TV. OSU has a larger Alumni base than UO. Oregon has benefitted from the marketing and money machine called Nike. 3 or 4 teams headed to the B12 finished well behind the Beavs in Football. They beat Oregon, Utah and USC one of the 2 times they meet the last 2 years. OSU Basketball made it to Elite 8 in 2021, Baseball has made it to the College World Series 7 times since 2005 and been National Champ 3 times. It has strong non-revenue sports like Gymnastics, Wrestling, Woman Basketball which all stand out too. Academically its one of the US largest research schools
That breakup is still honestly the worst implosion of a conference in the history of college sports. Cuz its not like SMU and UH were small time in the SWC.....
What people fail to realize is that conference realignment has been in the DNA of college football almost from the start. The Pacific Coast Conference left two teams (Wyoming and Idaho) in the cold to form the Pac-8. What changed is coast to coast travel became cheaper and easier. So regional logistics is no longer a barrier for conferences when thinking of adding teams. Then, when you factor in conference size no longer being limited with the advent of conference championship games and splitting conferences into separate (but definitely not always equal) divisions, these seismic shifts became inevitable. Especially when the TV revenue was clearly in favor of two conferences above all others. "Super Conferences" are not new (hell, the first conferences were seen as such just for existing), they've just changed in how we see them.
Their old commissioner scrooged them because he was cooking the books and living like a king when he lied about Comcast overpaying the Pac12. That's why they still owe them $50M. He was making more money then the teams were, he bought some huge expensive buildingbin San Fran, and he bought a private jet he claimed he needed for travel to do his job. He totally fleeced them, then after doing it Michael Crowe, AZ State's President, rehired him as commissioner.
Pac 12 isn’t the sec. Obvious I know but I’m talking about travel. Oregon goes over 1000 miles just to play Arizona. Also I do root for other Pac-12 schools only because it strengthens Oregon.
I believe the reason for leaving WSU and OSU behind had to do with the numbers. The Big 12 already had 13 members, counting Colorado. If they took all of the Pac-12's remaining 11 members, that would have given the conference 24 members. Dropping 2 still left a conference that would have been too large at 22, but the expectation was that Washington and Oregon would join the B1G, so the unnamed Pac-12 President was most likely thinking that 20 schools might be doable. We'll see how the B1G manages with 18 schools.
That's not a bad plan but I think the Big12 is waiting for the ACC to implode so they can grab Pitt, Louisville, Duke, Syracuse, and maybe GT, Wake, and/or BC. Then they will solidify their presence on the East Coast and make WV happy because they keep bitching about all the travel because most of the others are across the country.
As you said, iron sharpens iron, so I’m glad that Ohio State is going to have more than just Michigan, Penn State, and the flavor of the year to overcome. To win championships, you have to be forged into championship caliber teams. Bring on USC and bring on Oregon. Maybe we don’t go to the playoffs most years, but we should be more likely to win when we get there.
Well said, Oregon has played Ohio St twice now in Ohio and Michigan once there with no reciprocal games in Autzen, no longer. Now can we together in the Big 10 force the SEC to quit playing and do some home and homes as well?
With expansion to 12 teams, OSU, Michigan, Oregon, USC, Penn State can all probably get in with 2 losses. My guess is the B1G will get 3 teams in the playoff every year almost locked, same with the SEC. Big 12 and ACC probably have 2 spots locked up, and then the rest will be best of the rest
The SEC is the most cutthroat shady. He stab you in the back conference. There is short of the old Southwest conference. SEC is now at the top of the list.
I love the change to the new b1g especially them ending divisions so I don’t have Ro listen to the western division teams complaining about how they get no respect because of how soft their division is now they can prove how good they are and we can find out if the western teams can actually win in a divisional free conference, I’m also excited about the new big12 conference that’s based off the b1g
I ran into someone who works in the USC Athletic office. So I asked, did you guys think this through? (Moving to Big Ten) Being and ex Athletic Director for a High School I told him travel was always a big deal. As this isn't just Football we are talking about every sport (21?). He said yes, it's an issue we talking about. It's not just cost it's time. If you look at the Pac-12 map it's a skip and a hop for teams and fans. Anyway he did mention (but didn't divulge much) that the AD (Athletic Director} was fired. I think that speaks volumes talking from my experience with fired AD's. That decision probably didn't go over well. Anyway money will solve everything.
Pac-12 refusing to merge with the Big 12 was a massive mistake, and what eventually led to the Big 12 and B1G tearing the league apart. That refusal can be compared to Blockbuster refusing to buy Netflix back in 2000. We all know what happened to them. This is the same story all over again
There are Oregon State fans out there! I’ve seen the decline of the conference myself. However, you are correct, money talks and bullshit walks. Greed is a powerful thing and will eventually lead to destruction as in this case.
You're absolutely right, Matt. You've got to play the best to be the best. I'm English, fairly new to college football. I love the great games (Bama Tennessee, Bama LSU, Ohio State Michigan, Ohio State Georgia). Meaningful games, worth playing. Worth watching. But Bama, Austin Peay? Probably Bama's worst performance last year, still put up 50 plus to single figures. Pointless. Told us nothing about a team right on the cut off for the CFP. condensing the talented schools into four or even three conferences will make for more meaningful games, less argument about rankings and a better product in the long run.
A lot of fans are undermined in the process. There will be less interest in the sport overall. Longtime college football traditions are dying. It’s no longer set apart from pro football.
18 teams in the B1G If they have conference semi finals will they play 11 (8 conference) games to decide the four teams.Then the semi finals would be the 12th game with the rest of the conference playing the team closest to their record they haven't played. So each team will play 9 conferences.
Now the SEC when recruiting, especially with sports like baseball, basketball, etc, can negative recruit against the Big10 even more. All they’ve gotta say is yeah you go to one of these schools you’re gonna be playing In California then a few days later have to fly across the country then fly right back and still manage to keep up with school work and somehow get enough sleep.
@@JoeyAugustine I’m assuming you’re being sarcastic since the SEC regularly gets the most overall nfl draft picks and also first round picks. And no actually you don’t travel like that in the nfl since you play one game per week. Baseball will have a weekday game and a series on the weekend. Basketball also has a weekday and weekend game.
@@LexicalNoScope I mean Alabama had top picks name me someone from Texas A&M Vanderbilt ole miss Mississippi State? Ohio state has more first round picks then the SEC does. When standford joins you have 5 west coast teams. How much does baseball bring in? It’s all about the money and the B1G has the most money traditions. B1G will probably go to 4 divisions
I totally agree about the Tennessee game. I hated that we lost that game but man, what a game. Those games are the reason that the SEC is so exciting to watch. Any team in our conference is more than capable of beating any other team on any given Saturday. Except maybe Vanderbilt. 😂
This whole Cash war started because PAC-10 schools found out the Big-10 network was literally printing money, to the point schools where like Indiana were making than top PAC-10 schools. So yes, to your point, the Big-10 schools stick together.
Im a UW husky fan and I love this move. I'm tired of being basically irrelevant to the broader college football community because of the lack of exposure. So many of our games are night games when the east coast is in bed. Michael Penix Jr. is a legit Heisman Trophy candidate and HE NEEDS EXPOSURE. As a west coast native, longtime WA resident, I rooted for my state when they aren't playing UW. WSU is like a little brother to me. I hope they find a good home, it would be cool if WSU and OSU got to follow UO and UW to the Big10 but I'm not so sure they are wanted. But if they want a Super conference.....?🧐
While the TV will be a boost and it was a good move, the constant travel will have the West Virginia effect and you guys will struggle to win games. I would fight hard to get Cal-Stanford in B1G as that will give you more localized games to at least not have team travel so much. Oregon State and Wazzau won't get any interest with the B1G so I left them out.
@@volbound1700The Pac12 teams are already used to the travel because the Left Coast is so spread out. WV is probably crying about travel because they are poor and they can't afford private flights like the big boys can. That makes travel a lot easier when the team can just board a plane and leave without screwing around and wasting time. Waiting around and checking into flights is what makes it miserable and time consuming.
Dont forget that the PAC had the opportunity to include Texas, OU, OSU, and Texas Tech (I believe was the 4th team.) And the PAC turned them down. So not surprised the PAC is where it's at. The PAC has been doing USC wrong for a long time when they were basically the reason the PAC was relevant. Other teams stepped up once in awhile, but never to the level USC was/is at. Disappointed with how things turned out, but fully aware why it turned out this way. At least now they're going to a conference who cares about their teams.
It is definitely all about money. In yesteryear I was a big PAC 8 fan. It was well set up. Each team had a natural rival (Cal - Stanford, UCLA - USC, Oregon - Oregon State, Washington - Washington State) and all were in Pacific Coast states. As soon as they went to the PAC 10 I knew that the money grubbers had won and I pretty much lost interest in the conference.
It was easier to watch Rutgers football on TV than to watch Stanford football on TV while living in Palo Alto. That was the Pac 12's death-knell moment. Not immediately convening an emergency meeting of athletic directors to fix that absurdity only hastened the demise.
SEC = College football is a religion! Big10 = We love all football (NFL, NCAA)! Big12 = College football is what we love! ACC = College football is really fun! PAC12 = Why is it called football?
Oregon/Oregon state fans are identical to SEC team fans. Tailgates are the same. They share the same passion. Don’t let the cali transplants fool you. True Oregonians love their college football.
Say what you want, but this upcoming final pac12 season is going to be really interesting with all the "beef" going on between the schools. Expecting a lot of fights to break out this year.
It's supposed to be one of the best Pac12 seasons in recent history because half the teams in the conference have an opportunity to win the conference. They are all talented so the conference is going to be a meat grinder. If the Pac12 would have been like this 5 years ago then the conference probably would have been able to sign a decent TV deal. Unfortunately they waited too long to get competitive.
Change isn't growth if it makes people want to tune out because the product is unrecognizable. There should be some level of comfort and familiarity that comes along with football season, even if we expect different results. Conference alignment is like men's fashion: it has always evolved gradually, but it's weird and cringe if you try to flip it on its head overnight.
Most people don't like change but they can adapt. That's why I think CFB will be better because of the more exciting matchups. CFB was starting to turn into a blowout festival and that's difficult to watch.
I've lived in 4 different cities across the western US, 3 of which hosted a (former) PAC school, and I'm pretty bummed they are breaking up. Part of the lack of unity you talk about, I think comes from how isolated the schools out west are, most are thousands of miles away from each other, and take 2+ days of grueling driving through deserts to reach. The way I see it, this is only getting worse for fans out west
True. They're also breaking up three key rivalries in each of the 3 states that involve at most 4 hours of driving each though. That's just for Seattle to Pullman. Cal/Stanford and UO/OSU are 1-2 hours apart each. Also, they had unity for over 100 years. You are close to your neighbors, but if everyone on the block is excessively greedy, are you really going to be friends for long?
This definitely affects the West more than any other part of the USA. So that's a valid concern. I currently live in Florida and as an OU fan this this is amazing for me. I've moved too many places to count from Cali to Florida and everywhere in between (IA, NE, OK, TX, LA etc) so the impact of change is not nearly as much of a factor anymore in my life.
completely agree on your last point as an OSU fan. I’ve never been to a competitive game. It would suck to go to my first competitive game and we lose but it’s more entertaining. Recently with the Georgia game even though we lost rewatching both teams go at it is very entertaining. you know what game wasn’t all that entertaining fucking iowa at home. or some random irrelevant school that hasn’t had a 8 win season in decades
No, Larry Scott the Ex Commissioner of the Pac-12 Conference started the conf in downward spiral! Even when he was getting over 5 million a year! PAC-12 was the number one conf in the top 25 this season!
I really think my Aztecs would have exploded in the PAC had it survived. Everyone cries for OSU/WSU, and they should, but we got absolutely effed too. Almost got our shot.
If theses schools have more and more competition it should help out the CFP more because more likely their won’t be teams who win 11 and 12 games every year which would force the CFP to focus more on a eye test in their rankings. College football will only get more entertaining from there.
No one ever asked the fans. I live in Oregon and I don't believe that anyone wanted this. The force behind this is mainly USC who repeatedly undermined the PAC because they thought they were too good for the PAC. They have always been that way. I disagree with most of what you said. The PAC started in 1908. They are one of oldest conferences. They have many beloved traditions. What they didn't have was good leadership. Larry Scott made many poor decisions and the school presidents stuck with him. He thought the Pac-12 network was going to be great and he did not want any other media to be part of the PAC which was a huge mistake. It was a series of errors by the leadership, not a lack of support by fans. I do agree that entertainment in this part of the world always has to compete with the environment. People spend a lot of time in the outdoors here which does pull people away from sports. Football is not the king here like it is in the south, people like a variety of sports and activities. That doesn't mean that PAC-12 sports are not important and loved by the fans here.
As someone who’s not from the US who moved here. And an sec fan myself, I didn’t enjoy the move. Pac-12 was my favorite shit to watch. Bryce love, CMC, Mariota. All those guys made me fall for the game, and to see them go head to head, cornwells, Wazzu, All those major rivalries were my favorite. Pac-12 at night, when it would be like 9:30 pm and I’d wake up from a nap or get out of work and come home to those games was special, was to me. Just perfect. And was a top 3 P5 division this year, never understood why they broke up. But that commish of the pac 12 is just an idiot, and ruined everything. Rest in paradise pac-12 and soon big 10 and ACC
They need to keep regional conferences for all of the non football teams and maybe basketball teams. Since there is no reason for the Cal volleyball team to have to play a home and home game against Duke and Georgia Tech.
At least this last year of the Pac 12 has been the funnest football to watch in the game. And I truly believe if all of these teams would have known they were going to a 12 team playoff - wouldn't have pulled the rip cord. The CFP committee has zero respect for the Pac 12 - which made it impossible for them to get a natty with how it was structured. The whole thing is a mess BECAUSE how rigged the 4 team playoffs were.
When I watch a Pac-12 game and during what would normally be a commercial break and all I get is a fucking Watermark screen that tells me somebody should be fired that's valuable advertising airtime just sitting there going to waste.
The fatal mistake of the Pac12 was not moving tp prime time game scheduling. Building national fan and recruiting bases, appealing to pollsters and most importantly TV audiences and commensurate TV contracts.
Dude stop with that sec schools respect each other crap, y’all will shafting asking why does Vanderbilt,Mississippi st and other bottom feeder sec schools get the same share we all get when we bring in most of the revenue. The sec schools would leave each other and take a dump on each other if another conference was the more dominant and had a bigger media rights deal and they went to schools and said we think bama or whoever should be in our conference, bama and whomever that conference wanted would leave like a thief in the night and not look back. Schools are a business and they are all for themselves so stop with this high horse way of thinking when it comes to sec schools.
Outside of realigning, I honestly think that we are closer to having football (or at least the “Big 3 conferences”) break away from the NCAA and start their own organization
Either the Super 2 Conferences will break away if they merge together to create their own new division of CFB. Or after the B1G adds ND, FSU, Clemson, and UNC the SEC won't be able to catch up to them financially. So the valuable SEC schools might eventually head to the B1G to maximize their revenue and remain relevant. Then the B1G will become a new division of CFB. Unfortunately the Big12 will probably be left behind due to the huge and growing financial and talent gap. They won't be able to keep up and they will fall behind because they don't have large enough fan bases to compete against the big boys consistently.
Seriously, UT spent two decades being snakes in the Big 12. They are the main reason aTm left in the first place. God forbid they start winning, I think even the SEC homers would have trouble rooting for the Longhorns after a while.
If I was a CSU, Boise, SD State I would be calling the PAC 12 and trying to get into an FBS conference. This could be a big opportunity for level 2 schools to get to level 1.
Stay where your are Boise St. should have never left the Big Sky. Where you have a shot at a national championship. You will never get this in the big greedy so called Power Conferences. Go Broncos
The buyout to leave the MWC is $36M and they would probably make the same amount of money in a new Pac12 made of G-5 schools because the TV networks don't want to pay them more to play the same teams. The Playoff Committee is already making changes to remove 1 of the auto-bids into the playoffs because even if the Pac12 rebuilds it won't be considered a P-5 conference. Not that P-5 means anything anymore because it's the Super 2 Conferences and all the leftovers.