Interesting comments from Brent Baird (A treasure trove of SEC information IMO) during his conversation with Shane. (First half of the show). Talk of consolidation of Power 5 into 2 conferences, SEC and Big 10 of Course. More than talk, according to Brent, it is now a serious consideration. Even more interesting, IMO, are the comments that a new "league / system" will form around these two conferences, with the implication "Power 5" will be considerably reduced in terms of numbers of teams. Many of us have predicted something like this. The deconstruction of traditional conferences and consolidation will lead to many programs "left out". Speaking personally I find this a particularily distasteful consequence of the destruction of the amatuer status. I recognize that in any given year, around 8 teams, may have a legit shot at a title. Neverthless reducing Power 5 to something like 36 - 48 teams still means a dozen (perhaps more) programs will be sent packing to a lower tier. That will cost some programs, that get left out, dire financial consequences.
IMO, the only way this will work will be that some legacy programs of each will jettison a few lesser ones (say Vandy, USCe, Auburn, Miss St, Northwestern, Purdue, Nebraska, Illinois) in order to bring in more capable programs from the outside (like North Carolina/NC State, Virginia/Va Tech, Clemson, USCw, UCLA, Washington, Oregon, maybe Utah) with the rest suffering the indignancy of being relegated to "AA" status instead of being "AAA". Tough.
If you look at my list, what I am choosing is locations whose states won't be able to support more than one team. Alabama is definitely one of those states. Auburn appears to be the one left out. USCe gets left out (in theory) for Clemson, although that may be incorrect. Nebraska, Indiana, and Illinois are states whose glory days are WAY behind them.
Hate to break it to you but Auburn makes more money on football and both men's and women's basketball than UF does. We rank 12 AU is 9. The 23 universities that make at least $125 million annually from their sports teams
The SEC and Big 10 have the actual financial asset to help fix the mess that Div 1 football is right now - the fan loyalties. It's not the players. They don't need the best players. Their fans want to see FL play UGA, or OSU play UM, regardless of whether they believe those games have the very best players in the country. That's the asset they control. They need to get together, allow an immediate professional pathway (heck even help fund one) like the NBA G league... which would then give them greater legal room to place NIL & portal controls on those players that choose to forgo that pathway. The other conferences would be left with the decision to either follow suit with the chance to join the party, or attempt to exist in the hybrid pro/amateur mess that they live with today - but they'd be left doing so knowing that they are competing outside of the heavyweight division of tv ratings and revenue - even if (for a short while) they were able to attract/pay some better players.
IMO, Alabama is Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee and Georgia. Passionate and resolute but limited in what it beings to the table for national interest. You lose an Auburn but gain a California team or two. That IS the way it will work.
I predicted conference and Power 5 consolidation 2 years ago, with numerous programs getting the axe. Coming soon: Salary Caps, A more defined Free Agency (Transfer Portal), and, I still maintain, some type of affiliation or alignment with the NFL. Maybe even player Unions. Personally speaking, there seems to be animus among the fan base of college football about all these changes, myself included. I am particularily pissed about the "UF recruiting Investigation around Jaden Rashada". Any of you folks notice, that suddenly, the NCAA has "teeth" again? I find this particularily disturbing considering the NCAA was hopelessly inept at preventing cheating under the old 'amatuer" status. Suddenly the NCAA is responsible and will enforce rules? LMAO. Enforce WHAT? "You are not cheating properly?"
No it ISNT the way it will work. It is silly to think that a future SEC is going to drop Auburn in favor of "a California team or two". Just to fit your made up parameters. More likely the parties will find a way to keep a historic national program involved.
College football is now the NFL D League. That was the plan all along, set up a developmental league with no risk of failure for the NFL. The risk is all borne by CFB. Two conferences. Playoffs that make the regular season meaningless. A super bowl junior. Free agency. Soon will come near complete parity among the two conferences and any type of unique offenses or defenses will be replaced by everyone running the same schemes with a few slight wrinkles.
This is basically what most people have expected for a while in some form or another. But I think the "consolidation" may be fairly limited, and I don't think any current SEC or Big-10 teams will ever be kicked out, unless they completely dissolve the SEC and Big-10 conferences, which I don't see happening. There are a small handful of teams I believe the SEC and/or Big-10 would actually want and they would all likely come from the ACC, Big-12 and Notre Dame. The candidates from ACC would likely be UNC, Clemson, FSU, UVA, NCSU, Miami, GT and VT. From the Big-12, I think the candidates would probably be Kansas, Iowa State, Oklahoma State, WVU, Texas Tech, Utah, Arizona and ASU. Of those, I think maybe a small handful would actually get called up. Notre Dame and UNC are no brainers. But beyond FSU, Clemson and maybe UVA, I'm not really sure the SEC or Big-10 would have much interest.
This is years down the road. Plans are being made, yes, but way in the future. Too many TV contracts in all these power 5 conferences. They won't be so quick to let teams out. Case in point, FSU.
They didn’t doo much to lsu for paying big money from a children’s charity to football players yet fsu had a coach talk to a collective and they want to punish?
