If the end result is that non-conference games are against real teams and guaranteed playoff spots per conference makes it so that AD's are willing to schedule aggressively, then it's an upgrade from what we have right now.
Scheduling Big 12/ACC isn't going to move the needle in Seattle anyways unless they're tugging at nostalgia by inviting Cal/Stanford's 10 fans up or playing ASU/Utah.
You can't ask fans for more money and then insist on playing FCS/G5 for non-con every year.
I'm normally not a fan of Congressional action on stuff like this, but I think this is an instance where Congress needs to step in and shut all this shit down.
The B1G and the SEC are the only ones that can come up with something to properly fix all the transfer and pay for play issues. Together they have enough leverage to say Fuck You to the networks and still be able to pay players and mostly keep all their sports intact, and make the transfer situation something that is actually logical for the player and school.
This is them saying 'we aren't waiting for NCAA to put in guardrails any longer' imo.
Even if they combined, they still only have 30 teams to form a new entity. They don't have enough starting roster positions to satisfy the number of athletes out there right now and would either need more schools than what they currently have, as a combined entity, or they formally declare themselves free of the NCAA entirely and are a self-declared minor league system with "programs" which license the university name and logos for their teams. They can't fix the transfer and pay issues for all 134 D1 schools by pairing up and ignoring everyone else.
We've already known this would happen for some time now, but UW is going to end up as a semi-pro team with no actual ties to the university other than the stadium being on-campus.
This is not an improvement of the sport and long-term I don't see any way that this ends up being sustainable outside of the tiny city / big school areas where they don't currently have an NFL team in proximity. I seriously doubt that UW can survive and compete in that kind of environment over the long haul.
They are talking about getting assured playoff slots. Whether that’s 5 or 6 per league is up for debate. If they get that they can schedule all the real non con tests they want without repercussion for dropping an early game. The league schedule is what will matter and placing top 5 or 6 to get the playoff slot. They aren’t discussing a full exodus from the NCAA … yet. 5 from the SEC, 5 from the B10, 2 from the B12, 2 from the ACC, 1 G5 and 1 at large seems about right to me.
That we've had a major sports league for so long which has had around 50+ teams around the same level for several decades and 100+ in the league overall is sneaky astonishing. One problem I think they have now is to me it's much more appealing to either have what we have with regional conferences with programs that don't make a lot of sense in the same conference by a lot of metrics or just have a true pro sports like model where programs like Alabama and Ohio State and Texas and Michigan etc just play every week. This weird in between where a lot of Big 10 schedules are more watered down than they were before expansion and don't make sense regionally sucks.
Comments
If the end result is that non-conference games are against real teams and guaranteed playoff spots per conference makes it so that AD's are willing to schedule aggressively, then it's an upgrade from what we have right now.
Scheduling Big 12/ACC isn't going to move the needle in Seattle anyways unless they're tugging at nostalgia by inviting Cal/Stanford's 10 fans up or playing ASU/Utah.
You can't ask fans for more money and then insist on playing FCS/G5 for non-con every year.
This was always the plan
I'm normally not a fan of Congressional action on stuff like this, but I think this is an instance where Congress needs to step in and shut all this shit down.
The B1G and the SEC are the only ones that can come up with something to properly fix all the transfer and pay for play issues. Together they have enough leverage to say Fuck You to the networks and still be able to pay players and mostly keep all their sports intact, and make the transfer situation something that is actually logical for the player and school.
This is them saying 'we aren't waiting for NCAA to put in guardrails any longer' imo.
Even if they combined, they still only have 30 teams to form a new entity. They don't have enough starting roster positions to satisfy the number of athletes out there right now and would either need more schools than what they currently have, as a combined entity, or they formally declare themselves free of the NCAA entirely and are a self-declared minor league system with "programs" which license the university name and logos for their teams. They can't fix the transfer and pay issues for all 134 D1 schools by pairing up and ignoring everyone else.
We've already known this would happen for some time now, but UW is going to end up as a semi-pro team with no actual ties to the university other than the stadium being on-campus.
This is not an improvement of the sport and long-term I don't see any way that this ends up being sustainable outside of the tiny city / big school areas where they don't currently have an NFL team in proximity. I seriously doubt that UW can survive and compete in that kind of environment over the long haul.
They are talking about getting assured playoff slots. Whether that’s 5 or 6 per league is up for debate. If they get that they can schedule all the real non con tests they want without repercussion for dropping an early game. The league schedule is what will matter and placing top 5 or 6 to get the playoff slot. They aren’t discussing a full exodus from the NCAA … yet. 5 from the SEC, 5 from the B10, 2 from the B12, 2 from the ACC, 1 G5 and 1 at large seems about right to me.
That we've had a major sports league for so long which has had around 50+ teams around the same level for several decades and 100+ in the league overall is sneaky astonishing. One problem I think they have now is to me it's much more appealing to either have what we have with regional conferences with programs that don't make a lot of sense in the same conference by a lot of metrics or just have a true pro sports like model where programs like Alabama and Ohio State and Texas and Michigan etc just play every week. This weird in between where a lot of Big 10 schedules are more watered down than they were before expansion and don't make sense regionally sucks.