The Big 12 will be live streaming a news conference today at 5:30 pm Central Time regarding expansion. Will the Big 12 expand by none as has been intimated over the past few weeks (with ESPN and Fox kicking in some money to kill expansion)? Maybe the Big 12 presidents will expand by 2, 4 or kick the can down the road?
This is just my gut feeling, but I believe the Big 12 presidents will vote to expand by 2 despite so much tampering down of expansion expectations over the last month. Whenever the Big 12 presidents have actually met together, they seem to believe that expansion is a positive. It’s only when they separate and are left to their own devices that more negative perceptions about expansion come around. Strictly on a psychological basis, the group dynamics can change a lot of things since the presidents have to confront what is best for the Big 12 conference overall as opposed to solely thinking about their own individual school’s interests.
We’ll see what happens. If the Big 12 decides to expand, it seems that this will come down to a game of musical chairs between BYU (arguably the most valuable school but also the most controversial politically), Houston (helped by a heavy dose of Texas politics) and Cincinnati (the non-controversial and very good across the board candidate but doesn’t have the passionate supporters that BYU and Houston seem to have). If any of the other candidates get into the Big 12 (which I examined Bachelor-style last month), then it would almost certainly entail the Big 12 expanding by 4. (As I noted on Twitter earlier today, my “crazy but plausible” scenario is the Big 12 adding BYU, Houston, Cincinnati… and Colorado State. This would address the disproportionately high number of Big 12 alums that live in the Denver market. I don’t think that scenario is very likely, but who knows what will happen when these Big 12 presidents get into a room.)
Regardless, feel free to use this post as an open thread to discuss Big 12 expansion and the presidential press conference. It’s pretty rare to have such anticipation for a conference realignment event where the outcome is truly up in the air, so enjoy the speculation while you can!
UPDATE (2:24 PM CT): Chip Brown reporting that there were no schools added by the Big 12:
We’ll see whether that means that Big 12 expansion is dead or if the presidents will continue to discuss this further ad nauseum.
UPDATE (2:34 PM CT): Pete Thamel also with a report that there won’t be Big 12 expansion:
UPDATE (2:52 PM CT): Jake Trotter from ESPN with another confirming report that there won’t be Big 12 expansion.:
Soooooo, it looks like this is going to be a pretty boring press conference.
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Iowa to the Big 12
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Chip Brown has spoken
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Go Hawks!
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Clearly Bama’s just SKEEERED
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Chip Brown tweet: No new members were added to the #Big12 during today’s Big 12 Board of Directors meeting, multiple sources tell http://HornsDigest.com .
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When the Big 12 finally goes tits up, would the ACC be interested in TCU? I figure that’s the best shot the Frogs have of staying in a power conference.
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Would any self-respecting conference take the conference-killers? Everywhere TCU goes they leave behind the smoldering ruins of a conference. CUSA and MWC are still around but greatly diminished, much like the B12 may be in 10 years.
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The MWC had its best years with TCU on board; how many other teams in that conference notched a Rose Bowl win? Plus, it’s not like anything the conference did would have stopped Utah from leaving. Then BYU had to do their thing, I suppose. And how was TCU or anyone else supposed to keep CUSA teams from going to the Big East at that point?
As for the ACC, what conference wouldn’t want a presence in Texas? They added BC not so long ago. It’d be hard to find a closer match for TCU than that. Two mid-sized private schools in big, pro-sports heavy markets. Except TCU has been better at football lately.
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If (when) the Big 12 folds, will TCU be the best choice in Texas for any conference? If so, will that conference care? The SEC has A & M. Someone will presumably get Texas. Would the B1G or Pac have any interest in TCU? It is a church based private university that is not in the AAU. Not the type of school for either conference.
That leaves the ACC as the remaining lifeboat, if it become the G4.
What does TCU do for the ACC?
Would Houston be in the running for the ACC? Instead of TCU?
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Oops P4 not G4
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Jake,
I was just joking about TCU’s track record of killing conferences. I don’t believe any P5 conference would worry about that (B12 certainly didn’t). That said, I think TCU is too far away for the ACC to want them. Unless they were part of a package that included UT somehow.
“The MWC had its best years with TCU on board;”
Utah and BYU also contributed quite a bit over that period.
“how many other teams in that conference notched a Rose Bowl win?”
I think Utah’s 13-0 season with a Sugar Bowl win counts as the equivalent.
“Plus, it’s not like anything the conference did would have stopped Utah from leaving.”
Of course not. Nor BYU nor TCU. A promotion is a promotion.
“As for the ACC, what conference wouldn’t want a presence in Texas?”
One that’s 1000+ miles away. The amount of travel required for every other member to get their teams to TCU is very expensive and hard on the athletes. Doing that for a brand like ND is one thing. I don’t think TCU justifies it. It’s not like they couldn’t have added TCU before 2011. Plus the ACC doesn’t have demographic issues since they have the entire Atlantic coast including FL.
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Right Brian. For all the talk about Texas as conference killers, they’ve only been in two conferences. Now TCU’s trail of destruction:
TIAA-gone
SWC-gone
WAC-gone (for football)
CUSA-diminished-only USM still around who played fb against them
MWC-diminished with 3 top teams leaving
Big East-gone
Big 12-at risk?
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I don’t imagine TCU would go to the ACC alone. Maybe along with Texas or OU, or Baylor or Tech or something. Also, I kind of suspect that the ACC will lose a school or two by that time. But 2024 is still awhile from now.
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How about this theory. OU and KU still leave the Big 12, but TX remains 2-4 new schools join and become TX proxies. The conference will be valuable as long as TX is there. It does not matter if the additions are SMU or RICE or Houston, it is still P5 worthy because TX is there. TX and OU preserve the Red River SHootout. Why would this not work for TX
1) SOS for them is the same or better because they no longer need to play Kansas and theoretically, whichever G5 team that joins is going to be better than KU
2) They still play OU even if it is now a non con game (it was before when OU was Big 8)
3) TX gets more power to dictate conference agenda and has does not even have to pretend to play nice because other schools have no options
4) TX keeps LHN
5) TX maintains best and most geographic area for Olympic SPorts
6) If TX leaves, even becomes FB independent, they have less power than they will staying part of Proxy 12.
7) TX can probably get just as much money in Proxy 12 than any other conference.
any thoughts.?
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Jake,
“I don’t imagine TCU would go to the ACC alone. Maybe along with Texas or OU, or Baylor or Tech or something.”
Off the top of my head I can’t think of a scenario that makes sense for the ACC to take TCU. UT and OU already have little brothers they’d try to bring along if they weren’t going alone. That doesn’t mean the scenario doesn’t exist, but I don’t know what it would be.
“Also, I kind of suspect that the ACC will lose a school or two by that time. But 2024 is still awhile from now.”
I have a hard time imagining any school leaving the ACC with over 10 years left in the GOR. The money gap would have to be huge because the penalty would likely be enormous.
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Northwestern crushes Michigan State. Life is good.
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When the Big 12 finally goes tits up, any chance the ACC would be interested in TCU? I figure that’s the best shot the Frogs have of staying in a power conference.
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Oh, hell. Just ignore this one.
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It will be interesting to see what happens with ESPN and Fox now with the Big XII. The conference has made it perfectly clear it doesn’t have the 8 votes needed for any candidate. There isn’t a whole lot of leverage left to try and get the networks to pay you not to expand when you aren’t going to expand in the first place.
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Yes, that’s just more poor planning by the B12. You can’t hold a vote when losing it also destroys your other major option.
Hopefully all they did was table the discussion while they negotiate with the networks so they know what their alternatives are.
My guess is they end up getting about $20M more per year but have to extend the TV deal a few years. However, the GOR isn’t extended along with it. The GOR isn’t necessary in the B12 since they don’t have a conference network and UT and OU will refuse to extend it. In response, the other 8 will try to raise the exit fee.
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My gut says no,expansion bc the announcement is late in the day. All expansion announcements came around the lunch time hour.
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Well nothing could happen today anyway since its not a Tuesday.
I wonder, has the bachelor ever refused to offer the final rose?
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@bullet – Yes! Brad Womack is infamous for not choosing anyone in the final rose ceremony. He is also the only person to ever be a two-time Bachelor. (Womack picked someone on his second time on the show, although the relationship flamed out within a couple of months after the season wrapped up.) Superficial connection to Big 12 expansion: he lives in Austin, Texas.
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It was a more appropriate comparison to the Big 12’s process than you realized at the time!
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On the UConn boards, obviously most people desperately want the Big 12. There are still a goodly number that to this day pretty much cannot understand why the ACC and B1G are not in a bidding war to claim the Huskies before it is too late.
On the Rutgers front the over/under is 17. That is 17 points cumulative total over the last 5 games of the season. Rutgers must have the worst quarterback at any P5 school (and nearly any G5 school). Lost their one really talented offensive player a few weeks ago and that was pretty much it.
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Nouveau riche fan base, Bernie. College administrators have long memories, and Connecticut’s ambulance-chasing attorney general bad-mouthing the ACC after it took Boston College instead of the Huskies (still puppies at big-time football) made any P5 league reluctant to admit Connecticut.
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Go State! Beat the Buckeyes! (just fantasizing for a minute)
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http://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/news/2016/10/14/texas-west-virginia-and-a-big-ten-school-have-sold.html?ana=twt
Data on beer sales in college stadiums so far this season.
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So does this mean that the Big 12 takes a hit on the “brand” or perception that they are trailing all of the other conferences or will it be spun that they are more valuable now? It seems like at this point the conferences are jockeying for position and gauging the interest of potential partners in the future, more than anything else.
In other words, why did the Big 12 even publically think about expanding at all?
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Deflected attention from Baylor?
It was fun? (Can’t spell dysfunction without fun)
Seriously, had BYU altered the conduct code there would most likely be two new members today.
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In this vein, with expansion no longer overshadowing B12 discussion:
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17836024/us-department-education-launch-baylor-probe-title-ix-complaint
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I think this season’s results combined with this result will hurt them a little, but one good season and everything will be fine again. The hit will be if UT and OU bail out in 2025.
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Extort money from their TV partners?
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I expect they publicly thought about expanding because there was a super-majority in favor of expansion.
But UTexas, TTech were joined by some random Big12 President (or several) who didn’t want to fight LGBT activists and allies on campus and in state over BYU, so BYU fell short.
UTexas’s Houston got knocked down by Kansas State, and two fellow thinkers who didn’t want to face Houston competition for talent in East Texas with Houston as a P5.
And then UC didn’t have a #12 to join them, and couldn’t get 8 either.
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I am disappointed for UH, and I do not know if the political winds down here will blow quite so much in their favor in the next go-round. The UT land-buy in Houston for that research campus presented a unique chance to exert pressure on UT’s administration. However, Houston has moved up to be the #8 TV market in the country and the metro area’s strengths aren’t changing. I think UH needs to be careful about making the right trades over the coming weeks and months to solidify potential future support for UT. 2017 is a legislative year, so perhaps UH might push to include language regarding getting a chunk of the Permanent University Fund if they are not in a major conference by a designated time period and if UT is permitted to build their research campus in Houston. Although I’d expect UT and A&M to retch at such a measure, it would force some sort of political concessions from the legislature.
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For as much as we all love realignment, does anyone feel burned out by the Big 12 drama? I do.
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@Mike – I’ve definitely been burned out with the hemming and hawing. It isn’t as if though the Big 12 has been getting inundated with new information. They have been effectively been evaluating the same handful of schools for literally several years and still couldn’t come to a consensus (despite an *overall* message from consultants that expansion would be beneficial).
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Frank, doesn’t Delaney look even more brilliant with his six year Contract with ESPN and Fox? Just imagine how much money the Big 10 can add with Texas and ( or) Oklahoma? Obviously, Kansas is the fallback School. The one question I have is this? If the Big XII is actually the Walking Dead, do you think it is possible that small schools like Boston College, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt and even Purdue give up ( or are made to give up) football. Theoretically speaking, if KU, OU and UT decide they want to join the Big 10, could Purdue could be encouraged to step aside, give up football ( since they cannot compete), and become another College Of Chicago ( still getting CIC money) and let the Confetence add KU, OU & UT for Schools: 14, 15 & 16.
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David Brown,
“Frank, doesn’t Delaney look even more brilliant with his six year Contract with ESPN and Fox?”
I still think 8 years would’ve been better (end in 2025 when the B12 GOR ends). I don’t think going first next time is necessarily best unless we do yet another short deal to also go last.
“Just imagine how much money the Big 10 can add with Texas and ( or) Oklahoma? Obviously, Kansas is the fallback School.”
UT would be huge money. OU would be decent money but it’s not a huge state. KU would add vale for hoops but is as bad as RU in football.
“The one question I have is this? If the Big XII is actually the Walking Dead, do you think it is possible that small schools like Boston College, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt and even Purdue give up ( or are made to give up) football. Theoretically speaking, if KU, OU and UT decide they want to join the Big 10, could Purdue could be encouraged to step aside, give up football ( since they cannot compete), and become another College Of Chicago ( still getting CIC money) and let the Confetence add KU, OU & UT for Schools: 14, 15 & 16.”
Never, at least not in the B10. I do believe PU will be strongly encouraged to spend more on athletics with the new TV deal starting next year, though. They already divert several million to the academic side and are about to get a $9M bump in TV money. They need to start paying their coaches more and become competitive again. Hopefully the new AD leads them this way starting with the hire of a new FB coach.
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I agree I do not think the Big 10 would kick out Purdue ( they did not throw out Northwestern when they were the B10 bottom feeder), But my problem with Purdue is not just sending sports money to the Academic Departments, but this: Already Schools like Northwestern and Iowa are investing big time in upgrading their facilities. Penn State will be next ( The Nittany Lions can be a game changer in Big 10 sports ( see the Peguila Ice Center), and even Rutgers is talking about finally getting out of the RAC ( Rutgers Athletic Center). What you do not want to be is the Boston College of the Big 10. Awful teams and worse facilities and only selling out when Notre Dame, Ohio State, Michigan or Indiana come to town. Maybe for the Boilermakers it’s a realization they are not catching up with Northwestern or Minnesota ( let alone Michigan or Ohio State), and dropping football makes economic sense. By the way, an extra $9,000,000 might help but not that much. Already Penn State sunk $25,000,000 into the Lasch Building upgrade and that is just for football. They along with Populus are creating a Master Plan for upgrading Beaver Stadium, the Jordan Center, the McCoy Natorium and other facilities: I would even bet on Illinois, Indiana, Maryland and Rutgers upgrading before Purdue does.
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Maybe for the Boilermakers it’s a realization they are not catching up with Northwestern or Minnesota ( let alone Michigan or Ohio State), and dropping football makes economic sense.
If they drop football, they lose millions of dollars in Big Ten media money. I don’t see that happening.
There is no reason for Purdue to suck as badly as they do, when Northwestern has had better results. It wasn’t that long ago that Joe Tiller had the Boilers bowl eligible in ten out of his twelve seasons, including a Rose Bowl. They dropped off a bit in his final few seasons, but they were in the upper half of the Big Ten in eight of his first ten years.
It’s not as if this happened decades ago: Tiller retired in 2008. There’s no reason why, with the right coach, Purdue couldn’t be back at that level, especially when they play in the weaker of the two divisions.
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Doubt Purdue goes anywhere voluntarily (nor can I imagine them being booted by the B1G)…looks like they are planning serious facility upgrades
http://www.purduefootballmasterplan.com/ross-ade-renovation/index.html
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Correct, the school announced a $66MM football performance complex and has already broken ground. The real proof will be who they hire and how much $$ they devote to assistant salaries. Our president is not interested in “arms races” but we need to do better than the status quo. We’ll see.
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BoilerTex,
“Correct, the school announced a $66MM football performance complex and has already broken ground. The real proof will be who they hire and how much $$ they devote to assistant salaries. Our president is not interested in “arms races” but we need to do better than the status quo. We’ll see.”
Exactly. This is where that extra $9M per year comes in. There’s no excuse for paying coaches so little anymore. Find a good coach and pay his staff enough that he can keep good assistants around.
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Speaking as someone with degrees from two Big 12 universities (and working on a third), burned out isn’t quite the phrase I’d choose. I’ve already moved on to looking at where my school will end up next, though (see above).
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Wouldn’t Iowa State have more to offer the Big 12 than Texas Christian (alumni and stadium size, basketball programs, nationally prominent wrestling)? It’d be nice if ISU promised to revive baseball as a condition of admitting it, but SU didn’t need to do it for ACC inclusion.
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Iowa State offers nothing to any Power Conference. Iowa is the bigger State School generates more interest and certainly has a better wrestling program then they do, as does Big XII Conference mate Oklahoma State. The greatest wrestler in ISU History ( Cael Sanderson) left Ames because the Cyclones could not compete with what Penn State had to offer, and we see the results almost every year. TCU and even Boston College, Washington State and Wake Forest win more football games then the Cyclones. I would take TCU and any Power Five School over them, as well as non P5 Schools like Central Florida, South Florida, Colorado State, Air Force, San Diego State and even maybe even UNLV over Iowa State.
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As much as I love college baseball, I don’t think any conference commissioner, athletic director, or university president weighs it very heavily in realignment decisions.
But Iowa State is a perennial bottom-dweller football program, the second most popular program in a state of 3 million people. TCU is about the fifth biggest program in Texas, yes, but it’s a state of 27 million people with major media markets. And TCU, you know, wins occasionally. The Clones have us beat when it comes to basketball, for sure, but maybe Jamie Dixon can turn things around. ISU could really be SOL when things go south in the Big 12; TCU’s prospects are uncertain for sure, but the Frogs probably have a couple more options.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17819583/big-12-expansion-goes-psychologically-disadvantaged-great-runaround
Were there any great candidates out there? No, not with the potential toxicity swirling around BYU. But think about some of the recent Power 5 expansion additions: Maryland, Rutgers, Colorado, Utah, TCU, West Virginia, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, even Louisville.
How many of those were or are considered home runs? None. But some have added value, including TCU, a conference nomad which quickly became one of the better Big 12 football programs. If the Big 12 really wanted to give this process its due, it should have looked for the next TCU, projecting 5-10 years out rather than talking in circles. And if the Big 12 is ultimately doomed in the long-term, adding members would have brought a short-term financial windfall, which could help current members who won’t find soft landing spots if the conference dissolves.
In not expanding and, equally important, not extending its grant of rights, the Big 12 possibly signed its own death warrant Monday. It remains the most vulnerable league. The loss of one more heavyweight, Texas or Oklahoma, likely would TKO the conference. “A very bad strategic move,” a source close to the process told ESPN.com. “Painfully incremental decision-making.”
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Were there any great candidates out there? No, not with the potential toxicity swirling around BYU. But think about some of the recent Power 5 expansion additions: Maryland, Rutgers, Colorado, Utah, TCU, West Virginia, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, even Louisville.
Maybe none of those were slam dunks, but I’d argue that they were all better than the B12’s latest slate of candidates.
TCU and West Virginia were more-or-less “compelled” additions: the B12 had to get back to at least 10 members. Likewise, after losing Maryland, the ACC had to get back to an even number, and Louisville was the best available.
When the Pac added Colorado, it was getting a school that has always been considered power conference material, by any definition. Utah was then the 12th school that enabled them to add a conference championship game. The rules have changed now: the ability to stage that game is no longer a reason to expand.
While the jury may be out on Maryland and Rutgers, depending on whom you ask, there’s no doubt the B10 thought they were hitting a home run, or at least a solid extra-base hit, since there was otherwise no particular urgency for them to act.
How many of those were or are considered home runs? None. But some have added value, including TCU, a conference nomad which quickly became one of the better Big 12 football programs. If the Big 12 really wanted to give this process its due, it should have looked for the next TCU, projecting 5-10 years out rather than talking in circles.
When the B12 added TCU, it wasn’t “projecting”: Gary Paterson had already shown that the Horned Frogs could compete with other P5 teams.
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Rutgers helped BTN get on Cablevision which they were not before. That is 3.5 million subscribers @ $5:00 a month. Not to mention Eastern Protection ( along with Maryland) for Penn State. The problem for Rutgers is NJ/NY has always been a pro town ( especially with the Yankees), and the College Alpha Dog was St Johns, followed by Syracuse. However, Rutgers is getting more coverage then ever ( including games @ Yankee Stadium), and with Penn State, Ohio State and Michigan coming to NJ every other year, that will continue. Rutgers has a chance to actually be a success.
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The most popular college football team in NYC is Rutgers, followed by Notre Dame. Syracuse is a distant 6th:
https://new-york-ny.knoji.com/10-most-popular-college-football-teams-in-new-york-city/
That is why the B1G chose them. They are the best entre into the NYC television market.
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Not to sound “politically incorrect” but is Syracuse as an athletic brand have an elevated status in the Jewish community in NY/NYC, simply for the fact its not a Catholic (ND, SJ) or Italian-American affinity (Penn State, JoePa) brand. It may rank lower overall, but be #1 in that sector of the marketplace.
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I don’t consider that politically incorrect, merely wrong — or, at least, not supported by any data I have ever seen or heard of.
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Urban, I have lived in NJ for a long time and knows lots of people who went to Penn State. I have never heard anyone suggest Penn State has any Italian American affinity, notwithstanding Paterno.
Being a distant 6th in NYC is not much of an elevation for SU.
UConn constantly pushes two things. Basketball, which is certainly legit. AND bringing the NYC market. UConn is barely ahead of Michigan in 4th and 5th places, and not much ahead of SU.
Perhaps Ann Arbor is really the 6th borough of NYC, not Storrs, CT.
It seems as though half of the comments by UConn fans relates to bringing the NYC market.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Maybe none of those were slam dunks, but I’d argue that they were all better than the B12’s latest slate of candidates.”
Probably, but I think the point is that none of them were great additions on paper but they all have paid off in one way or another. BYU, UC, UH et al might be schools that would grow into solid members given the finances of a P5 school.
“When the Pac added Colorado, it was getting a school that has always been considered power conference material, by any definition. Utah was then the 12th school that enabled them to add a conference championship game. The rules have changed now: the ability to stage that game is no longer a reason to expand.”
True, but CO and Utah are now 2 of the best teams in the P12 South so it’s worked out anyway.
“While the jury may be out on Maryland and Rutgers, depending on whom you ask, there’s no doubt the B10 thought they were hitting a home run, or at least a solid extra-base hit, since there was otherwise no particular urgency for them to act.”
They’ve worked out financially and UMD has been fine on the field (not in football so much, but other sports). RU might develop over the next decade given the infusion of cash and interest in sports.
“When the B12 added TCU, it wasn’t “projecting”: Gary Paterson had already shown that the Horned Frogs could compete with other P5 teams.”
It’s one thing to compete in 1-2 big games per year, it’s another to play a P5 schedule. It took Utah several years to regain their success once the SOS jumped up, for example. I think that’s the projection he means.
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Which is why ISU is doomed in the next decade — and this Cyclones message board has its head in the sand: http://iowastate.247sports.com/Board/101486/Contents/Big-12-Expansion-Decision-Thread-48317607
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Iowa State is not only doomed in the Next Decade, but are doomed in the present ( just like the past). The other doomed Schools ( Kansas State, TCU etc at least have some recent past memories to enjoy). ISU has lived off of OU and beating Iowa once in a blue moon for a Century.
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Maybe not expanding was a bad move, but I don’t see how any additions the Big 12 could have made would have secured the long-term future of the conference. Would Texas turn down a Big Ten invite because they are getting to play Houston and BYU every year? Doubtful. The best thing the Big 12 can do right now is make as much money as possible for the next decade or so. Maybe standing pat does that; I don’t know the details, and there may be more negotiations with the TV partners.
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Jake,
“Maybe not expanding was a bad move, but I don’t see how any additions the Big 12 could have made would have secured the long-term future of the conference.”
I agree it was unlikely to make a big difference. That said, maybe removing the “psychological disadvantage” would help the stability all by itself. Also, the B12’s experts said going to 12 with 8 games and a CCG would significantly improve their odds of making the playoff. More playoff appearances might also improve the psyche of the members while bringing more money in future TV deals. And if the 2 newbies developed into solid programs they way TCU has, they could add real value to the TV deal by adding new markets or strengthening current ones.
“Would Texas turn down a Big Ten invite because they are getting to play Houston and BYU every year? Doubtful.”
No, but they probably prefer to stay put as long as the money gap doesn’t become large. So if expansion would increase UT’s revenues, then it’s helpful for keeping the B12 together.
“The best thing the Big 12 can do right now is make as much money as possible for the next decade or so.”
Yes. The real question many have is whether the smaller schools should’ve forced expansion to maximize revenues now for themselves in preparation for potentially losing UT and OU in 2025.
“Maybe standing pat does that; I don’t know the details, and there may be more negotiations with the TV partners.”
They will renegotiate their TV deals with ESPN and Fox. They will drop the pro rata clause (or limit it to current P5 members + a few others) in exchange for a pay raise. They also are adding a CCG. The networks will probably try to extend the deal in exchange for a pay raise, but UT and OU will refuse to extend the GOR as part of that deal. Still, the B12 will get a bump of around $5M per year per school (CCG is worth about $30M and the networks pitch in $20M more for not expanding and dropping the pro rata clause). That boost should be enough to keep everyone happy for quite a while.
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Go B1G Red
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/big-12-expansion-conference-should-apologize-oklahoma-texas-mandel-101716
Stewart Mandel think the B12 needs to apologize for how they went about this.
It should apologize to the leaders at BYU, Houston and Cincinnati for dangling a coveted Power 5 golden ticket and inspiring them to publicly grovel for it. It should apologize to fans of Connecticut, UCF, USF and Colorado State for giving them months of false hope. It should apologize to administrators at SMU, Tulane, Air Force and Rice for putting time and effort into delivering needless presentations last month for invitations the league surely knew were never coming.
And it should apologize to American Athletic Conference commissioner Mike Aresco for treating it as a farm league team where the star players could get called up at any moment.
The Big 12 was never under any obligation to expand, so it’s not like it made a right or wrong call Monday when it “unanimously” elected to remain at 10 members. But imagine being a supporter of one of the supposed finalists when board chairman David Boren said at a press conference Monday that he and his colleagues did not even discuss individual candidates at their meeting.
The weakest of the Power 5 conferences spent the past 18 months standing in judgment of all those purportedly inferior programs. The 10-team league hadn’t added new members since 2012 because it didn’t think any of the available candidates were attractive enough. And after compelling presidents and ADs of those schools to desperately court its favor, the conference came to the conclusion that … nope, still not good enough.
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I don’t foresee any scenario where the B12 apologizes, but I agree with Mandel that this was an ugly, ugly process. My take is that expansion never had a consensus. Remember, it was a considered a mild surprise a number of months ago, when the league agreed to consider candidates, as many had expected it to stand pat.
My guess is that the anti-expansion schools said, “Okay, we’ll look at candidates: more information never hurt anybody.” But in the end, they dangled false hope, while landing exactly where they were leaning all along.
By the way, although Frank was wrong, I give him credit for putting a concrete prediction out there. It wasn’t a crazy prediction, either, even though it was incorrect.
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Had BYU adjusted their honor code and still not been admitted, then they might be owed an apology.
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Had Baylor not had its problems, BYU’s might not have been viewed as serious as they were.
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I happen to agree. Especially because there are Schools in the Big XII who complain about BYU’s Honor Code but run a shit show program that is not only inferior to BYU, but Houston, UCF, USF, Air Force, Colorado State and Academically speaking Rice. Yes, Iowa State I am talking about you and your President. There is no major University or Professional team in this Country with the exception ( for now) of the Cubs ( Purdue included) that is as historically inept as Iowa State in football. ISU should be more concerned with their pathetic program then any BYU Honor Code.
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And yet it has expanded its stadium to more than 60,000, and regularly fills it. No college football fan base supports its team more and gets less out of it than Iowa State’s — and its basketball support is solid (for both men and women).
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It is true that the Cyclone fans do support their team no matter what ( another Cub comparison). But unlike the Cubs with Theo Epstein ( or @ Kansas State with Bill Synder) there is no one turning things around in Ames and after the likely end of the Big XII they will be lucky to be in the AAC or MWC. I do hope they win a Title before the Conference ends ( if only for the fans).
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Do you really think the Big 12 will “end”? Even if OU and Texas leave (maybe with a couple of others), wouldn’t the remaining schools who couldn’t do any better for themselves just reload with the best of the AAC and MWC?
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Do you really think the Big 12 will “end”? Even if OU and Texas leave (maybe with a couple of others), wouldn’t the remaining schools who couldn’t do any better for themselves just reload with the best of the AAC and MWC?
That is the most believable scenario. But without OU and UT, they are really a “Little 12,” regardless of what they call it. As Brian put it on the previous thread, do you think they keep their Sugar Bowl tie-in, with the two big schools gone? Do they keep their New Year’s Six auto-bid?
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They have a better shot of keeping their automatic NY6 bowl as a conference of 10 “P5 schools” than as a conference of 8. And as a conference of 7 or 6, fuggeditaboudit. But in shortsighted self-interest calculations, might be easier to live in denial about the risk of UT and OU leaving in the 20’s.
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Go Hawks! Boomer Sooner to B1G
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I could see the Sooners in the Big 10. Of course, the weak Academic part would hurt, but if KU or ( especially) UT came along it would be political cover. I do believe that those schools really would not cry if the Big XII would die because it eliminates the little brother issue ( at OSU and KSU) and lessens the effect of Texas politics ( Tech). I do think that Oklahoma State has the best chance at a Power Conference of the Schools not named KU, OU & UT.
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David Brown,
“I could see the Sooners in the Big 10. Of course, the weak Academic part would hurt, but if KU or ( especially) UT came along it would be political cover.”
NE’s AAU report had data from 2008 listing the schools by AAU criteria. OU was tied for #91 with VT and NCSU, so it’s not terrible. That’s higher than NE was. It’s a long way from making the AAU (last 2 new members were #31 and #37 on the list), and would only be ahead of 1 AAU member currently (#94), but there are 3 in the 80s that OU might be able to catch with a focus on academics.
“I do believe that those schools really would not cry if the Big XII would die because it eliminates the little brother issue ( at OSU and KSU) and lessens the effect of Texas politics ( Tech).”
It’s hard to say because alumni hate to lose all their familiar rivalries. But they certainly know that their little brothers hold them back from getting invitations to certain conferences (esp. B10). We’ve heard some people claim that OU and KU aren’t really tied to their little brothers like UT is to TT, so maybe it isn’t a big factor.
“I do think that Oklahoma State has the best chance at a Power Conference of the Schools not named KU, OU & UT.”
They’re the best program, probably, but who wants the #2 school in a smallish state unless it’s part of a package deal like the P16 plan? One of the TX schools at least offers access to better recruiting and more fans. I don’t think any of the other 7 schools offer enough value to overcome their locations.
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Brian:?I do not think you and I have much disagreement. On the rivalry issue all three Schools lost a big rival: 1:UT lost A&M. 2: OU lost Nebraska. 3: Kansas lost Missouri. The Alumni and fans are surviving. Of the non UT Texas Schools in the Big XII it is TCU that offers the most ( the Dallas/ Fort Worth Market) despite the way they jump from Conference to Conference that offers the most to another Power Conference. Why? Baylor is toxic and Tech is out in the middle of nowhere ( Lubbock). I would choose Houston over those two: If I would rank Big XII Schools by value I would go: 1: UT. 2: OU. 3: KU. 4: OSU. 5: TCU. 6: BU. 7: TT. 8: WVA. 9: ISU. 10: KSU. I only rank the Cyclones higher because of AAU.
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David Brown,
“I do not think you and I have much disagreement.”
Agreed.
“On the rivalry issue all three Schools lost a big rival: 1:UT lost A&M. 2: OU lost Nebraska. 3: Kansas lost Missouri. The Alumni and fans are surviving.”
Losing 1 is bad. Losing all your usual foes is a whole different thing. It takes years for fans to get over it (if they ever do) and the new home needs to provide obvious upsides to placate them.
“Of the non UT Texas Schools in the Big XII it is TCU that offers the most ( the Dallas/ Fort Worth Market) despite the way they jump from Conference to Conference that offers the most to another Power Conference.”
Yes and no. They’re in that market, but do they deliver that market to an outside P5 conference? I’m sure TCU draws good ratings when the team is doing well, but will fans watch TCU vs Duke if TCU isn’t a top 10 team? Will UT and TAMU not dominate the ratings?
On top of that, travel is still a huge concern for any other P5 conference. It doesn’t matter for football, but sending 15 other teams to TX during the week is expensive and time consuming. I’m just not sure the value of TCU trumps the cost for a distant P5 conference (and the same would be true for most P5 members).
“If I would rank Big XII Schools by value I would go: 1: UT. 2: OU. 3: KU. 4: OSU. 5: TCU. 6: BU. 7: TT. 8: WVA. 9: ISU. 10: KSU. I only rank the Cyclones higher because of AAU.”
The problem is that after #3 the rankings are irrelevant because the value isn’t high enough to justify adding them. The only way schools 4-10 go anywhere is if they’re part of a package deal with #1-3 so that the top team can provide the extra value. I’m not even sure KU provides enough value except to the B10 (shorter travel, could use the MBB to help BTN).
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I was rooting strongly for Cincinnati, but at the end of the day, I think this was the smartest choice. My train of thought:
1. If ESPN/FOX are willing to pay to get rid of the clause mandating the pay increase, then that means any teams the Big 12 were looking at likely added far less value than they added. While the Big 12 for now could have forced the network’s hand, the contract will be up in a few years and then what? It’s doubtful those schools would suddenly be that much more valuable in a few years and even more doubtful you would be able to deny them a full equal share at that point. That means less per team next time most likely vs. what they get would get with the current 10.
2. The Big 12 needs whatever breaks it can get in revenue to survive. If Texas/Oklahoma are falling behind, there is far less emotional attachment to the Big 12 than other powers have for their conferences. That means don’t expand now if you think there is a decent risk it will hurt revenue down the line.
3. Further, expanding means difficult divisional questions that would separate teams from others they’d like to play (most likely the Texas schools from each other) and would also reduce negative feelings about leaving teams you play all the time (making it easier to part ways).
4. It’s not like the Big 12 can’t come back and offer teams later if the contracts are better off with them at that time. There is a small risk someone else is gone, but that doesn’t seem to be a huge issue right now.
5. Finally, I buy the lack of a CCG is hurting Big 12 schools sometimes (although it would have helped eventually too), but I don’t think I buy only 10 teams is (on a per team basis). While it may have a few less playoff teams, it is also dividing money fewer ways and that’s a point most seem to miss (in other words, missing once in awhile with 10 might be better than an extra trip with 12/14, particularly if it means your school is more likely to make it with less competition).
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This was it. 5 years ago, the CUSA schools (now mostly in the AAC) were only making a million or so less than a Washington St. Now its $25 million for the AAC vs. the bottom of the P5. There’s a real question whether the AAC and MWC can sustain their level of spending. So the Big 12 really needed to take schools now or never have another chance. In 8 years, the gap will have become enormous. The exposure gap is pretty big as well. It will make recruiting much more difficult. Only Houston and BYU cracked the top 50 in recruiting last year. Not sure many, if any other, non-P5 cracked the top 60.
The Big 12 thought Louisville would be available later. BYU, Houston and Cincinnati may still not be in a P5, but may be a shadow of themselves in 8 years relative to the P5. Whereas, they might be quite good in the P5.
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I do think that if a lower division school can put together a good program they can still one day make a P-5 ( or 4) Conference. The likes of a UCF or USF that is on the rise could one day surplant a Boston College or Wake Forest in the ACC. Boise St, UNLV or San Diego State to the PAC is possible as well.
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Nobody is ever getting “surplanted”.
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I agree with @ccrider55: no conference is kicking out a Wake Forest type of school, to promote a G5 school.
There have been very few promotions from mid-major to power five (or its equivalent), and they have all been due to existential threats. We don’t have promotion and relegation the way they do in Association Football. Schools are going to get promoted only where there are losses that have to be made up, e.g., Texas and Oklahoma leaving the Big 12.
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The only way to kick a school out of a conference would be to disband the conference. . .
The Pac-12 will NEVER accept SDSU or Boise State. UNLV is a possibility (as is Nevada) but both have A LOT of work to do, both on the gridiron and academically, before they will be considered.
BTW, if Texas and OU want to maximize their chances of getting into the playoffs regularly, they are much better off in the Pac-12 than any other conference. Moreover, the Pac-12 is much more open to taking the weak sister tag-alongs than any other conference. They would likely be in a division with each other, OSU, TTech, UofA, ASU, CO, and Utah. The other division would likely consist of the original Pac-8.
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David Brown,
“I do think that if a lower division school can put together a good program they can still one day make a P-5 ( or 4) Conference.”
I agree that it’ll always be possible, but it gets harder as the top conferences consolidate power. If the B12 ever splinters, there may be a push towards 16+ by several of the remaining P4. That would be the last chance for a while for a G5 team to move up. The next shot might be in the mid-2030s when the ACC GOR expires.
“The likes of a UCF or USF that is on the rise could one day surplant a Boston College or Wake Forest in the ACC. Boise St, UNLV or San Diego State to the PAC is possible as well.”
I think schools being supplanted is very unlikely. For that to happen, court decisions would have to force the top level of the NCAA into full pay for play mode at which point economics would drive some schools to drop down to a lower level that is affordable.
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“The Big 12 thought Louisville would be available later.” – Bullet
If I remember correctly, the ACC originally preferred UConn to Louisville, but pressure from ESPN led to the ACC going with their second choice.
ESPN might have been thinking long-term. If the ACC had added UConn, that would have left both Cincinnati and Louisville available for the Big 12. Frank pointed out that Cincinnati would be a wonderful 11th team for the conference, but there was no obvious candidate for Number 12. Louisville, which would fill in the geographic gap between the Great Plains and Cincinnati, would have been the obvious candidate there.
So, by pressuring the ACC to add Louisville, ESPN ensured that both UConn and Cincinnati would stay out of the P5 and kept the Big 12 from expanding.
If the ACC added Louisville instead of UConn because of their concerns about Big 12 expansion, it was a very shrewd move.
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I believe that the pressure to pick Louisville came from football schools, primarily FSU and Clemson
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This was it…the Big 12 really needed to take schools now or never have another chance.
That is, assuming your predictions of gloom and doom are true. I don’t believe they are.
If I remember correctly, the ACC originally preferred UConn to Louisville, but pressure from ESPN led to the ACC going with their second choice…So, by pressuring the ACC to add Louisville, ESPN ensured that both UConn and Cincinnati would stay out of the P5 and kept the Big 12 from expanding.
I would need a lot of convincing, to believe that ESPN: A) Wanted this; and B) If so, were capable of projecting that many chess moves ahead.
Rather, I think ESPN simply wanted the ACC to have the best football product it could. Compared to UConn, Louisville offered roughly comparable hoops, but much better football. I think the ACC’s football-oriented schools wanted that too.
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I just don’t see it that way. Schools further down have always had disadvantages and you always see them rise (at least temporarily). Extra money makes it a easier, but you still have the scholarship limits in place and you have scheduling issues and such that are going to make it likely for a G5 conference team or two a year to rise up. What I mean by that is that while it might be tougher to rise, schedules are lighter overall which means if a good G5 conference team gets a good out of conference win, their path to a great season is actually easier than most the bottom teams from power 5 conferences.
None of this means that none of the potential expansion targets wouldn’t be better off in the Big 12 (they probably would), but it’s not like we are going to lose the top of the Group of 5. The team pecking order there might shift around a little, but there will always be choices if the Big 12 decides later 12 is better.
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Most talk about Raiders, but this may be a boost to UNLV’s potential consideration by a power conference?
http://m.reviewjournal.com/business/stadium/gov-brian-sandoval-signs-football-stadium-bill-video
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I think ESPN and Fox made it clear what their opinion of G5 schools was.
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I think a true power conference will take what a for profit commercial entity suggests into their deliberations, and then do what is in the conference’s best long term interest.
Not saying UNLV is gold, but the state seems to have shown an investment interest in growing the brand.
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UNLV has to start winning a lot in football and improving their academics significantly before the P12 might be interested. I don’t think the B12 wants to extend that far west anyway.
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They even managed to tick off the Longhorn governor.
Greg Abbott @GregAbbott_TX 57m
57 minutes ago
The Big 12 owes a lot of people an apology. It punted on expansion & shanked its future. @UHouston deserved better.
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the Big 12 was never going to expand because the whole point of expansion is to increase fees for Tier 3 media rights which the Big 12 is not unified on(no network package).
I called this in Mid-August. At no point did expansion make sense. If the Big 12 breaks up in a half decade it will be because:
1. Oklahoma gets jumpy about not making as much as other Big power 4 schools
2. OSU can land on its feet with OU departure
3. Texas becomes independent like UND but in the Pac 12
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Go Bucks.
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It’s interesting to see how the hometown papers of the spurned schools are reacting to this news. For instance, here’s the Hartford Courant:
In case it’s not obvious, the last paragraph above should have been “undented”. Only the first part of the block quote is from the article.
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The University of Connecticut has for the past several years tried to changes its image including pushing itself as a “New York School” ( although it is part of the Hartford TV Market ( unlike Rutgers which actually is in the New York TV Market)). The jealousy towards Rutgers is insane ( only matched by their dislike of Boston College). The one thing they have in their favor is Wonen’s College Basketball ( although certainly not as popular as Men’s ( let alone football)). The Huskies are headed down the Louisiana Tech path ( great times in the 1970’s( including Championship ladies basketball and Terry Bradshaw) and Conference USA in 2016).
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Fairfield County is part of the New York TV market and heavily follows the University of Connecticut. Also, it’s interesting that a team that has won 4 MEN’S College Basketball titles, (including two in the past six years) only brings women’s college basketball to the table. I guess UConn fans should be jealous of Rutgers and BC teams which never win anything and are already roughly as good as Louisiana Tech is currently.
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From Bowlsby in the press conference. He believed “many” were additive.
“But we reside in very fertile recruiting grounds. We have great coaches. We have great venues and great traditions. I think we’re always going to be concerned about revenue. As we went through this process, we certainly looked at schools from the vantage point of, Are they additive? I think there are many of them that are additive.
Having said that, in the end, I think the additive nature of them was probably offset by some of the things we might have to give up, like some of the traditional rivals, the full round-robins, the double rounds in basketball.”
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[Quote]:Right Brian. For all the talk about Texas as conference killers, they’ve only been in two conferences. Now TCU’s trail of destruction:
TIAA-gone
SWC-gone
WAC-gone (for football)
CUSA-diminished-only USM still around who played fb against them
MWC-diminished with 3 top teams leaving
Big East-gone
Big 12-at risk?[/End Quote]
TCU is not a conference killer, UT has been noted by Nebraska AD and Arkansas AD as well as Texas lawmakers. which openly talked about UT’s desire to join the PAC as reason’s why they bolted from the SWC and the Big 12. It was also the SAME Texas AD that did it both times. Deloss Dodds.
There is a conference killer in this country and it’s
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in Austin
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Almost Everyone who is not located in Austin, Lubbock ( Texas Tech) or a UT grad knows what UT is about. The problem is that a lot of other Schools ( see Iowa State, Kansas State, Baylor and TCU ) know that without Texas (and to a lesser extent Oklahoma) they are becoming the University of Connecticut in importance nationally so they will do whatever those Schools want ( especially UT) even if it hurts them long term
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It’s a pretty big reach to put the demise of the SWC on the University of Texas. Doesn’t SMU bear at least some of the blame?
The Big 12 is still alive, at least as of 11am this morning, so the count of conferences “killed” by UT stands at zero.
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I have to agree. I am not a Longhorn fan (in fact, root for the Aggies over them), but I have always seriously disagreed with most the accusations against them. They considered conference options just like the rest of the Big 12 and unlike some teams they choose to stay. So if they left, they would be blamed for the Big 12 failure and when they stayed they are still blamed?
I get people get riled up with the Longhorn Network, but all that really amounts to is the school keeping its 3rd tier rights, something most conferences did until just a few years ago (SEC only abandoned when they wanted to start the SEC Network in fact).
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Its primarily the Oilers, Cowboys, OU and UGA (lawsuit against the NCAA). SMU hastened the end and made it uglier. Pre-Oilers, Rice used to fill their 70,000 seat stadium. SMU often filled the 68k (at the time) Cotton Bowl.
It was inevitable once the NCAA monopoly was gone and perhaps even before that. Adding Houston may have added a few years to it as they added some competition. They also woke up A&M and SMU.
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You obviously haven’t read what Pearlman said once the exit fee was settled. He said he and the UT president always had a good relationship.
The former Nebraska AD is a jerk. He also is the one who managed to get A&M into debt and refused the offer to join Texas in the Longhorn network.
Arkansas wanted Texas to join them in the SEC. They still listen when people talk to them about joining the Big 12. Obviously its not as profitable and stable so they wouldn’t do it, but it makes a lot of sense for them if all other things were equal.
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Now that the Big 12 has signed its death sentence, everyone feels that OU, KU, TX and one or tow others are gone by 2025. While I think OU and KU are gone, I have a gut feeling that Texas stays. Here is why.
1) OU and TX have an agreement to play Red River every year even if OU in BIG.
2) TX now has full control of BIg 12 with no dissenting votes. All schools new and old become Texas Proxies. Texas can exert more power to then get an unequal revenue distribution on all rights as they give legitimacy to the confernence.
3) No other school besides OU and KU who are already gone will have a lifeline to a new conference. Ok State, and K State would only have a lifeline if Big Brother took them.Therefore TX has power.
4) TX gets to keep Olympic Sports in the region and they do not have to worry about travel costs for the Olympic Sports
5) TX will not have to play nice in the sandbox as they would if they went to the ACC, BIG, SEC or PAC.
6) TX football does not suffer because the conference is essentially the same less OU (but TX still will play OU every year anyway), and in fact, their SOS will be improved because they will not have KU anymore and whomever is added is going to be better thank KU.
7) Basketball may suffer marginally but not too much if a solid bball program is added.
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Lots here from a the Iowa St AD
http://cyclonefanatic.com/2016/10/williams-what-the-big-12-is-banking-on/
I didn’t listen to the interview that this was based on to validate he actually said what he’s attributed as saying, so beware.
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http://247sports.com/Bolt/Iowa-State-AD-Without-Texas-Oklahoma-Big-12-is-Mountain-West-48346796
Here’s more from Pollard.
“(Big 12) commissioner (Bob) Bowlsby was kind of forced into having to go through this process.” Pollard said in an interview with iHeartRadio. “When you know that the athletic administrators think that the best solution is the solution we currently have, why would we then want to say no we’d rather have 12 members?
“Because we want to add more schools to this league that are going to be like Rutgers or Boston College in their conferences? Which have no fans coming to the games, and they’re getting outscored 170 to whatever it was. In Boston College’s case, haven’t won a game in two to three years in their conference. That totally dilutes your value.”
Right. Diluting the B12’s value is ISU’s job.
The Cyclones athletics director thinks the best is yet to come for the conference, and the criticism of the Big 12 in recent years has been unwarranted.
“I think it’s fair to say that a lot more money will be coming into the Big 12 over the next eight years,” Pollard said. “The league is really strong. Everybody just wants to beat it up.”
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A good read. (I also did not listen to verify, but ….)
the “money quote” for me:
Pollard: “I have people who say that Texas and Oklahoma are going to bolt, well if Texas and Oklahoma don’t want us to add any members, I guarantee you that if we add members and forced it on them, they would bolt. That’s a part of this process that people aren’t thinking about.”
One commenter summarized as follows: “… the people that allow us to feed at their table [TX and OK] are more likely to continue to allow us to feed at their table because we didn’t invite other people to that same table.”
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Sorry, this was supposed to be a “reply” to Mike above.
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Another way to put it is Iowa State is a lap dog University if there ever was one. Schools like Nebraska and even Texas’s “Little Brother” A&M bailed when the got the chance because they know who Schools like ISU are puppets and who pulled the strings in the Big XII. I feel sorry for the fans who backed a University that for a Century has had no interest in winning, and still does not ( losing to Northern Iowa). No one expects ISU to
Compete with OU and UT on a consistent basis, but acting like getting a few crumbs from the Sooners and Longhorns is so great, think about this: Your competitor in Iowa City has been to Rose Bowls as has gulp Northwestern, Purdue and Washington State. If there is a School that belongs in Confetence USA ( at best) ISU is it.
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Did someone at ISU steal your girlfriend?
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Iowa St. has beaten Iowa 10 of the last 19 times they played after being dominated for many years, only coming within 10 points twice in 15 years. They aren’t the same ISU from prior to the Big 12.
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And for decades, U of I wouldn’t schedule Iowa State in anything. It wasn’t until the late ’60s, under pressure from the state legislature, that Iowa relented, beginning a men’s basketball series in the early ’70s and finally facing them in football in 1977 (the schools’ first game in that sport since the Cyclones surprised the Hawkeyes in 1934). ISU’s development in athletics has been stunted by such longtime treatment.
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Another way to put it is Iowa State is a lap dog University if there ever was one. Schools like Nebraska and even Texas’s “Little Brother” A&M bailed when the got the chance because they know who Schools like ISU are puppets and who pulled the strings in the Big XII.
ISU’s Pollard acknowledged the reality, which is refreshing. Their position isn’t really much different from that of Wake Forest in the ACC, Washington State in the Pac-12, or Purdue in the Big Ten. But those other leagues are more cohesive, meaning that those schools are unlikely ever to face the kind of crisis the lower-end Big 12 schools have to deal with.
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And all things being equal — geography, etc. — Iowa State would be more attractive to a P5 conference than Wake Forest.
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ISU is weaker then those Schools ( especially Washington State and Purdue). Not only because the Cougars and Boilermakers have been to the Rose Bowl, but The Washington Huskies and Indiana Hoosiers would miss their interstate rival. In fact, with UW in the National Championship hunt and WSU going for the Rose Bowl, this year’s Apple Cup at WSU may be the most important ever. No one except the fans cares if ISU does
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That’s why Iowa State probably will be the biggest victim of conference realignment a decade from now, through no real fault of its own.
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At least they have fans. ISU has averaged 54,838 over the last 4 years with last year topping 56k. Washington St. is 31,326 with last year under 30k. Purdue used to have fans. Their 4 year is 41,330 while last year was only 37,508.
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Last year Iowa St. drew about 500 fans more per game than Washington ST. and Wake Forest, COMBINED.
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ISU grads also generally are able to manage the difference between “then” and “than”…
Sorry. Personal pet peeve.
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Can ISU’s big-time fan support give them safe harbor in a power conference in the event of a Big 12 implosion? The only realistic candidate to accept the Cyclones would be the ACC (perhaps as a partner for WVU, whose stadium was designed by the same architects of ISU’s facility).
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Good news for the PAC12
http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Closing-Bell/2016/10/18/Pac-12.aspx
Pac-12 Networks has picked up about 4 million homes thanks to Dish’s decision to move the channel from a sports tier to a broader tier nationally.
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People think it is good news but only at the margins. Dish lost a whole lot of subscribers in Q2, and still no carriage on Direct TV, Charter and Cablevision.
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One possibility for FBS realignment could be the Sun Belt and C-USA schools combining somehow and then re-dividing geographically. Once Idaho and NMSU leave the SBC for football after the 2017 season, they’ll each cover similar territory from extreme western Texas northeastward to West Virginia and then along the East coast to Miami.
Both leagues are decidedly a step below the American. Neither commands much in TV money. The Sun Belt is limited to a handful of games on ESPN TV networks with the remainder going on ESPN3 and/or American Sports Network (a new syndicated “network” not too different from Raycom). Income from these media is pretty negligible. C-USA, in its current form, is on several different platforms (ESPN networks, BeIn, CBSSN, and ASN), and their per-school media income is barely more than the SBC’ s.
I can’t help but wonder whether there is any discussion happening among college presidents at both leagues for having more common sense leagues. It would be one thing if one league offered significantly more revenue than the other, but that is no longer the case.
So how much sense does it make for Appalachian State, in western North Carolina, to be in the same conference with Texas State and two Louisiana schools but not with Charlotte, Old Dominion, Marshall, and Middle Tennessee? How much sense does it make for UAB not to share a league with Troy and South Alabama? WhY shouldn’t Texas State be with other Texas schools rather than two Georgia schools and two Carolina schools (App State and Coastal)?
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The budgets at the CUSA schools are bigger. When you look at who CUSA invited last time, it ran pretty much along budget lines and was not in relation to football success.
Now with their reduced contract, neither earns much and both earn about a half million less than the MAC.
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One big happy family.
Even though the Big 12 announced its decision not to expand was unanimous, sources told ESPN on Tuesday there were schools that ultimately agreed to go along with the plan when it became obvious the conference would not reach the supermajority to expand.
In a 714-word league memo covering the league’s talking points, obtained by ESPN, the first two items instructed officials to: “Indicate the Board arrived at a “Unanimous Consensus” and “The Board was unanimous in its desire and commitment to stay at 10 members.”
The internal Big 12 memo also suggested conference officials not “indicate that TV influenced (its) decision” and that the Big 12 was not “psychologically disadvantaged” because it didn’t expand.
[snip]
The conference also provided a number of “message points,” which recommended not discussing individual schools and also quashing any conversation that the Big 12 is “dysfunctional.”
[snip]
Among the talking points in the memo, officials of the 10 member schools were told to emphasize that the vote was reached via “unanimous consensus” and that “expansion is no longer an active agenda item.” In addition, it recommended school officials to say the Big 12 was “exhaustive in our research” and that it would not “publicly discuss consideration details.”
As for the “don’ts,” officials were told to avoid saying that expansion “is dilutive” and that any of the candidates “were not deemed Power 5 worthy.” They also were told to avoid mentioning any “expansion candidate/school by name.”
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17827297/big-12-reaches-united-decision-decline-expansion-earlier-divide
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Pretty sloppy that leaking. Maybe some president didn’t like the talking points?
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It’s a pretty good rule that when you’re given a messaging list of “do’s” and “don’ts,” a lot of the “do’s” are false, and a lot of the “don’ts” are true.
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The Big 12 adding 4 teams would have been interesting from a realignment standpoint. Probably would have had lots of repercussions among the G5.
But adding more than 2 was pretty risky from a dilution standpoint as well as creating separation between members (you see each other more with 12 than with 14).
I would have liked to see them add two. Bowlsby did say “many” were additive. There is no question BYU athletically is a top half P5 school. Houston proved they could more than hold their own competitively while in the SWC. Cincinnati did well in the Big East.
I think Boren and Bowlsby created an environment with their comments that does make the Big 12 “psychologically disadvantaged” and that expanding was the only way to undo that. They really did a dis-service to the conference. Its doubly bad as this is appears to be the worst year in football for the conference in over a decade. The messy too public process was not good for the conference either.
I also think having a conference championship game with 10 teams and a round robin will hurt them. They will lose 2nd (or 3rd) NY6 bowl bids because of it. With the 14 team conferences, your top teams are not very likely to play each other twice in the same season. And often not at all. So you pile up losses at the top.
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bullet,
“The Big 12 adding 4 teams would have been interesting from a realignment standpoint. Probably would have had lots of repercussions among the G5.”
Fun for us, not so much for the schools involved.
“But adding more than 2 was pretty risky from a dilution standpoint as well as creating separation between members (you see each other more with 12 than with 14).”
Four could’ve made sense if it was strategic planning for losing OU and UT soon. I just don’t think there was a cohesive group of four that made sense for the B12.
“I would have liked to see them add two.”
Reading between the lines it sounds like with BYU off the table UT and/or OU vetoed expansion. The others could have forced it, but at the cost of knowing the kings would leave in 2025.
“I also think having a conference championship game with 10 teams and a round robin will hurt them.”
I think it will help them a little. It hurts the B12 to be the only P5 without a CCG. That extra data point will help them more than hurt them.
“They will lose 2nd (or 3rd) NY6 bowl bids because of it.”
I think it would average out over time. Some years the loser will drop down a level, but the committee has been pretty good about not punishing the CCG losers in their final rankings too much.
2014:
ACC: #4 FSU nipped #11 GT, GT dropped to #12
B10: #5 OSU crushed #13 WI, WI dropped to #18
P12: #2 OR whipped #7 AZ, AZ dropped to #10
SEC: #1 AL whipped #16 MO, MO stayed #16
B12 (not a CCG): #6 Baylor beat #9 KSU, KSU dropped to #11
2015:
ACC: #1 Clemson beat #10 UNC, UNC stayed #10
B10: #5 MSU nipped #4 IA, IA dropped to #5
P12: #7 Stanford beat #20 USC, USC dropped to #25
SEC: #2 AL beat #18 UF, UF dropped to #19
After the contract bowls replace any champs they lost to semifinals, then the top teams plus the top G5 champ get in no matter what. 25% of the CCG losers didn’t drop at all in the rankings. 38% dropped only 1 spot. None dropped more than 5 spots.
On the other hand, winning the game could elevate a team into the CFP or the NY6.
“With the 14 team conferences, your top teams are not very likely to play each other twice in the same season.”
It depends on your scheduling. With 9 games, you have a 43% chance of the top 2 teams playing if you do an equal rotation. It’s even higher in the B10 (50%+) due to the parity-based scheduling. Conferences with only 8 games, including a locked rival, play each other a lot less frequently (28% chance).
“And often not at all. So you pile up losses at the top.”
On the other hand, B12 teams also can’t ever miss any of the bad teams so you get several easy wins built in.
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Interesting data on the ccg losers. They tend to drop like a rock in the regular polls.
You don’t really have a 43% chance of the top two teams playing because the very fact that they play makes the loser less likely to win their division.
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I was just doing the easy math. Let’s go to actual data.
SEC:
24 CCGs, 6 rematches (25%), 8 game schedule
The original winner went 5-1 in the CCG.
Scheduling math says they should have had rematches about 39% of the time.
B12:
15 CCGs, 6 rematches (40%), 8 game schedule
The original winner went 4-2 in the CCG.
Scheduling math says they should have had rematches 50% of the time.
P12:
5 CCGs, 4 rematches (80%), 9 game schedule
The original winner went 4-0 in the CCG.
Scheduling math says they should have had rematches about 67% of the time.
B10:
5 CCGs, 2 rematches (40%), 8 game schedule
The original winner went 0-2 in the CCG.
Scheduling math says they should have had rematches about 35% of the time.
Totals:
49 CCGs, 18 rematches (37%), mix of schedules
The original winner went 13-5 in the CCG.
Scheduling math says there should have been rematches about 45% of the time.
So yes, you are slightly less likely to have a rematch than the schedule math predicts. But it isn’t a big effect.
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bullet,
“Interesting data on the ccg losers. They tend to drop like a rock in the regular polls.”
For comparison:
CFP rankings (again)
2014:
ACC: #4 FSU nipped #11 GT, GT dropped to #12
B10: #5 OSU crushed #13 WI, WI dropped to #18
P12: #2 OR whipped #7 AZ, AZ dropped to #10
SEC: #1 AL whipped #16 MO, MO stayed #16
B12 (not a CCG): #6 Baylor beat #9 KSU, KSU dropped to #11
2015:
ACC: #1 Clemson beat #10 UNC, UNC stayed #10
B10: #5 MSU nipped #4 IA, IA dropped to #5
P12: #7 Stanford beat #20 USC, USC dropped to #25
SEC: #2 AL beat #18 UF, UF dropped to #19
AP Poll
2014:
GT rose from 12 to 10
WI dropped from 11 to 17
AZ dropped from 8 to 12
MO dropped from 14 to 16
KSU dropped from 9 to 11
CFP: -1, -5, -3, 0, -2 = -11 overall
AP: +2, -6, -4, -2, -2 = -12 overall
2015:
UNC dropped from 8 to 10
IA dropped from 4 to 6
USC dropped from 24 to 27
UF dropped from 18 to 19
CFP: 0, -1, -5, -1 = -7 overall
AP: -2, -2, -3, -1 = -9 overall
On average a team dropped 2 spots in the CFP and 2.33 spots in the AP. And only the AP ever rewarded a team for a close loss.
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Bowlsby did say “many” were additive.
Depends what you mean by “additive”. Given the pro rata clause in the TV contracts, legacy Big 12 teams could have seen their revenue go up, but it wasn’t going to last, unless they consigned the newbies to permanent second-tier status.
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Unless you believe their TV deal would take a jump in 2025 like many TV deals do. You could keep the newbies on partial payments until the current deal ends so that the current members never see a decrease in revenue.
Easy example assuming a pro rata payout increasing by $1M per year
(assume it starts at $25M in 2017):
2017 – 10 @ $27.3M + 2 @ $10M, bank $7M
2018 – 10 @ $28.3M + 2 @ $12M, bank $5M
2019 – 10 @ $29.3M + 2 @ $14M, bank $3M
2020 – 10 @ $30.3M + 2 @ $16M, bank $1M
2021 – 10 @ $31.3M + 2 @ $18M, spend $1M
2022 – 10 @ $32.3M + 2 @ $20M, spend $3M
2023 – 10 @ $33.3M + 2 @ $22M, spend $5M
2024 – 10 @ $34.3M + 2 @ $24M, spend $7M
2025 – 12 @ $35.3M (new deal)
That’s $2.3M per original school per year added to the payout by expansion (and don’t forget the CCG bump of $2.5-3M that’s coming). Or they could pay the newbies a little more and themselves a little less (increase by $3M per year instead of $2M gets the newbies to $31M in 2024 and gets a $1.6M per year bump for the original 10).
All they need is for their next TV deal to increase from $33M per school to $35.3M (7% increase) and they can continue to increase their payouts as shown. That seems plausible.
By the way, I’m not claiming these are the correct numbers for the B12. I just used a round number in the ballpark to show proof of concept.
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I’m not claiming these are the correct numbers for the B12. I just used a round number in the ballpark to show proof of concept.
However, I have to think the B12 does not believe those are the real numbers, or else they likely would have expanded.
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Marc Shepherd,
“However, I have to think the B12 does not believe those are the real numbers, or else they likely would have expanded.”
The pro rata number everyone threw around was $25M per school, so that’s where I started. An annual $1M escalation starts as a 4% escalation clause which is within what other deals have had. So other than $25M for 2017 not being exact, my numbers aren’t bad.
The speculation is in how they’d pay the newbies, so I gave the info for 2 different plans.
The question is in 2025, how much would a 12 team B12 be worth. Considering the jump the B10 made adding inventory and markets should boost the B12 a little at least. If 2024 was $32M per team, jumping to $35.3M per team isn’t crazy. The B10 is looking at an increase of over $9M when the new deal starts.
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http://247sports.com/Article/The-Purdue-Boilermakers-should-do-their-diligence-on-Bo-Pelini-48338197
Bo Pelini is apparently interested in the PU job.
“He would definitely be interested in this job,” a source who coached under Pelini told 247Sports this week. “I think he would make a more immediate impact more than any other guy I believe. He would change that culture real quick.”
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He is an intriguing choice I hadn’t thought of. Most people seem to think P. J. Fleck is hot enough to punch his ticket at a better school than Purdue; and Les Miles is too old for a total rebuilding job, at a school with no recent history of winning.
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As a Boilermaker, I would prefer Tom Herman, but Pelini is good enough
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I think Tom Herman is aiming a lot higher. The last three Houston Cougars head coaches who parlayed success there to a better offer, were Jack Pardee (NFL Houston Oilers), Art Briles (Baylor) and Kevin Sumlin (Texas A&M). They all got better jobs than Purdue.
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Yes, no way we get Herman. I am holding out hope for Fleck.
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Is Fleck sufficiently religious? Maybe he can row on the Brazos.
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Was Baylor really a better job than Purdue? I recall Baylor being at the bottom of the Big 12 standings year after year after year before Briles got there. Meanwhile, Purdue under Joe Tiller made it to bowl games most of the time he was coach, including one appearance in the Rose Bowl. Yes, Baylor has always been in Texas (prime recruiting territory), but when Briles was hired, Texas was still rolling strong, Oklahoma was competing year in and year out for national championships, and I think Mike Leach was still at Texas Tech.
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Baylor was pretty good under Grant Teaff from 1974 until he retired in the mid 90s. Then they made a series of really bad hires. Purdue, of course, did nothing from 1967 until Tiller got hired around 2000 or so and then returned to where they were once he left.
Indiana is a basketball state.
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Thought this guys take was interesting. Fox and ESPN took the extraordinary step of publically saying no. And not just anonymously.
http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/lack-of-big-12-expansion-shows-who-really-holds-the-power-in-college-football.html
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The “take” is that BXII expansion was killed by ESPN and FOX. The networks run CFB. This is a view expressed a few times on these boards.
One quote:
“The uncomfortable reality of college football is that the networks have an active role in not just covering the teams or broadcasting games, but deciding “who’s in” and “who’s out” from a very literal sense of the words.”
I also thought it interesting that ESPN has the rights to BYU games right now for $6-9M per year. (I did not know that prior to reading this). So, the obvious point is that ESPN gets nothing new in the inventory but has to pay $16+M more.
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I wonder if any of the candidate schools would consider a lawsuit against the networks. I don’t know if they could find sufficient grounds or not, but these public statements telling the B12 not to expand are quite different from anything the networks ever said before.
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Seems the appropriate place to note what I thought was just a misspelling by FtT. Perhaps not?
“I believe the Big 12 presidents will vote to expand by 2 despite so much tampering down of expansion expectations over the last month.”
“Tampering” down?
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Really interesting essay by a very knowledgeable poster on the Orangebloods message boards about the Big 12 expansion process.
https://texas.forums.rivals.com/threads/conference-realignment-thoughts.270243/
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“I read some of the posts on this, but frankly not all of them. I am going to give my view on what happened to start this, why did UT behave the way it did, and what happened. As a number of people have a hardon for u of h, I will address that too
I. Background: The big 12 lost some teams, doesn’t have a conference game, and is not as strong as it once was. Leaving Baylor or tcu out of the playoffs two years ago was painful. Therefore, the question as to if the big12 should “do something” is totally legitimate. Adding teams is a rational way to do something. At worst, you create a conference championship game that is on at the same time as the others, and it sways voters on a key day.
With all that said, it’s very unlikely that a team that is not Baylor would be left out with either zero or one losses. Really really hard to leave out OU or UT. Baylor is obviously it’s own worst enemy, not only because the school has been exposed as corrupt, but because of an awful out-of-conference schedule. So, here, UT and OU don’t have a big problem. Baylor’s problem is baylor’s problem, not UT or OU.
II. What happened? As far as we can tell, a lot of the noise started in the state of Oklahoma. It’s almost like Boren woke up on the wrong side of the bed one day, starting making public statements, and eventually got to Gundy to make some. We all know the substance of his non-economic argument, and he is not wrong. See my second paragraph. The interesting thing is that Boren was making an economic argument that adding teams was accretive. So, the president of OU is saying that if the big 12 adds some teams, every single big 12 member will get millions more.
From everyone in the big 12’s perspective (including UT), this is totally out of left field. So, everyone crunches their own numbers, which they have done before, and start calling around to figure out what the hell Boren is talking about. It turns out Boren won’t listen to anyone, he doesn’t even have any numbers. so people start demanding to see the numbers
It turns out, Boren had dinner with somebody talking about TV deals, and he had too much wine (figuratively). At this dinner, two critical errors were made. First, Boren thought that the pac12 network was worth 10mm a team per year. It turns out it’s just a few million per year, as TV is generally saturated at this point, and the whole cable model is melting down. So, he is off by say 7mm on point 1. Second, Boren forgot that he sells OU 3rd tier rights for about 5mm per year (I forgot the exact amount). OU has a quasi local network where it sells its shitty games and basketball and baseball, just like the LHN. So Boren is running around with a memo written on his Commodore 64 saying adding teams is like 10mm a year accretive, when the reality is that adding teams is about 2mm dilutive for OU (math is add pac12channel economics of 3mm, lose tier 3 deal of 5mm, for a net of negative 2). The numbers are actually better for other big 12 members (other than UT) because only ut and OU have significant 3rd tier deals.
So, basically, nobody knows what Boren is talking about. Everyone calls OU’s athletic and media department and it turns out that OU’s athletic department doesn’t know either. But, UT (and bowlsby) have figured out the pac12 deal which was forecast at 10ishmm a couple of years ago is a dud, and it’s coming in at 3 mm, but At this point, Boren is so far in front of this, he has Boone and Gundy spooled up, he is planting stories in papers and whatnot.
Bowlsby can’t talk any sense into Boren, so OF COURSE the big 12 has to study it. So, the studying stArts. By this time, people have boren’s Commodore 64 report, which is immediately ripped to shreds by every single school (but it’s all done privately….so you GUYS NEVER HEAR ABOUT IT). Well, Boren thinks everyone is lying to him. So, a couple of regents who are friends with OU regents call them, and provide the real numbers that refute the Commodore 64 report. They haul the AD/lawyers/media experts in and realize Boren is just wrong, and they are ultimately forced to bitch slap him publicly, as he is still tweeting wrong stuff.
At this point, the studying has started, and they do in fact study it. It’s a media circus. We have schools In far off states issuing press releases. I have no idea how people expect blwsby to manage this circus.
One major thing that we all “discovered” was that we could ram more teams into the main TV deal according to the contract…and they need to gross up to keep each big 12 team at par. Initially, I guessed that ramming BYU in was something the networks could live with, as they have actual viewers…so the networks were sorta chilling and waiting. But, when the narrative changed to adding awful schools, the networks realized they stood to loose tens of millions (on a NPv basis, probably over 100mm), they threatened to go nuclear and just not pay anything incremental.
So, there ended up being no economic argument for a deal. All of the adds were dilutive. And maybe a new team could have agreed to take a lower amount, but I surmise the numbers just didn’t work (I don’t actually know)
III. UT’s perspective
UT realizes that the conference is not optimal, but there is no serious proposal on the table on how to fix it. Playoffs, expansion of playoffs to 8 teams, LHN, over the top subscribing to TV, cable problems, all make this complicated….today and in 5 years. The grant of rights is a show stopper. UT is just in wait and see mode. Plus, our team sucks, so it’s no time to go rocking the boat.
UT is stuck until the GOR is a few years away. I am not sure we care about adding teams in The interim. UT has two rules: 1. Adding a team should be accretive, and it sure as hell cannot be dilutive. 2. If you want us to blow up the LHN, you need to make us whole and more.
UT does not give two shits about byu or Houston or whatever. Sure, maybe somebody here or there has a hardon because of BYUs weirdo beliefs or wants UofH. But the other teams under consideration were hilarious. From UT’s perspective, if we play for 5 years in Cincy or whatever, it doesn’t upset anything long term. It just doesn’t matter. Pay us and we fly to Cincy, but there is no way we are paying for a 5 way chilimac in Ohio when Texas Chili Parlour is just down the street on Lavaca.
By the way, we have a great relationship with OU. Boren stoked up all this acrimony over UT, but OU’s regents effectively apologized via the public bitch slap. Boren is a politician, and will get over it, just like any politician recovers. I know I am supposed to hate OU, but I love having them in the conference, I love playing them. Whatever we do in 5 years, it would be a tragedy if it doesn’t include them, and my prediction is that we use our muscle to bring them with us (if it’s an academically superior conference). UT and OU are good…zero worries.
IV. Houston
UH was a commuter school with open enrollement, and now it’s trying to be big time. Good for them. They have a long way to go. I wish them luck, and frankly the state should give them money to accomplish this. They need to copy UTD and build near elite science, math, engineering and business degrees. They also need more elite alumni to step up and give big gifts. It would be an enormous boost to the city and state to make a competitor school to UT and A&M. Right now, I have my money onUTD, but it’s a race UH should have won years ago. The good news is both can be in the winners circle.
I don’t see anything special about Houston. I don’t see how the governer pressuring UT to let Houston it mattered when all the other schools could obviously block Houston. The networks did not want to pay tens of millions for them, because nobody nationally cares about UofH. Nobody in the big 12 has either fiduciary or moral duty to UH, and there was no leverage to ram them in.
Had adding teams been accretive, then maybe we would have gotten to Houston, but because it wasn’t accretive, I am not sure Houston was ever even considered. Nor was south north eastern Florida or whatever that community college in Florida is called.
V. For the record, this is what happens when people lead with their mouth, and don’t do their work.
People like to make fun of UT for hiring consultants, lawyers, IMG, but the upside is that we generally show up to a meeting knowing what we are talking about, and people listen carefully to every word we say. We don’t issue public statements to embarrass people. Our mouth does not write a check that our ass can’t cash.
I think bowlsby has a tough hand, but is doing a fine job. He is very smart and well spoken. Boren simply went bananas. Could you imagine being Ryan right now, with Donald Trump going crazy? What can you actually do other than let it play out? Bowlsby is a professional and took it like a man.”
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But here is where the Texas perspective falls short. 1) Boren is right, the Big 12 is psychologically disadvantaged and generally disadvantaged. Perception is reality and this is what people outside of Texas perceive, so to ignore it is at your own peril.
2) The name of the game is eyeballs. What can generate the most eyeballs for your program to create as much of a national buzz while still staying true to your core markets. When the Big brought in WV it made a mistake. This was not a like minded school in a Big 12 region. Problem is you need to do something to help them. This is why you add Cincy or UConn. Get more Eastern Time Zone Content.
3) The population centers and narratives about places are drawn in the Eastern and Pacific Time Zones. This is where the BIg 12 is lacking. It needs Eastern Time Zone content. Expansion into that time zone is going to be naturally accretive.
4) The Big 12 is geographically disadvantaged, It is in flyover country and only in 5 states. Smallest footprint of all. People outside those states do not talk Big 12. You need more areas where people have a vested interest in the conference. THis is where Boren is right and also he is right that Houston would have been a huge mistake. Look at the BIG, yes Rutgers football sucks but it has people in NJ talking about BIG football because they now have a vested interest in the conference even if their team sucks. The lack of states and especially populous states outside of TX kills the Big 12. This is why expansion to Ohio, Conn and FL makes sense. BYU lesser so. You need to create the eyeballs and the vested interest.
5) Competitive balance and recruiting are important. Open up new recruiting areas, not just for new members but for everyone. In this case Cincy should be a no brainer. Right now, TX is the recruiting ground for the entire conference. If you don’t get your players from TX you don’t have a team. if you add Houston and BYU you dilute the state of Texas even more. This is obviously a concern as the talent pool gets tighter with more lines in the pond. If you get Cincy or a Florida school you expand the footprint to talent rich markets which only bolsters the strength of the conference long term.
The numbers point to expansion being additive and beneficial and Boren is absolutely right, it needs to be the right schools which is not Houston. Texas is being disingenuous with the additions because they are supporting dilutive candidates. The facts back this up.
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The flaw in this is, of course, that Bowlsby came out and said we needed to expand. He also called many schools “additive.” It takes a pretty negative view of him to view additive as good for 8 years and then a disaster after that.
Clearly the networks weren’t in love with the alternatives, but that could well be their own needs. ESPN already has all these schools cheap. Maybe BYU in the Big 12 increases its value enough to offset the extra money. Hard to see the others going up so much in value. As for Fox, they just added roughly 30 Big 10 games to their inventory. Maybe they don’t want anymore inventory.
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The flaw in this is, of course, that Bowlsby came out and said we needed to expand.
The flaw in your flaw, is that Bowlsby has selfish interests of his own, and like everyone else, what he says publicly might not be the whole story. He is just one of many actors on this stage.
Clearly the networks weren’t in love with the alternatives, but that could well be their own needs.
That’s true, but conferences, more than ever, are primarily economic constructs, built mostly with football money. This is especially true of the Big 12, which was created for economic reasons to begin with; and compared to their P5 counterparts, does not have much tradition to fall back on.
But university presidents and conference commissioners have to at least pretend to be interested in other factors than just making money. Networks don’t have to pretend, as they are explicitly profit-seeking entertainers, and have never claimed to be anything else. So, when they say none of the schools are accretive, I am inclined to believe them.
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Well none of the schools are accretive to ESPN because ESPN is paying a lot less and already has them! Fox probably doesn’t need them. Their interests do NOT coincide with those of the Big 12.
As for what Bowlsby’s “selfish interests” are, you will have to speculate since I can’t think of any.
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Well none of the schools are accretive to ESPN because ESPN is paying a lot less and already has them! Fox probably doesn’t need them. Their interests do NOT coincide with those of the Big 12.
The B12 is mainly an economic cooperative created to collect and distribute TV money. Over time, it cannot be worth much more than the value of its assets to the broadcasters.
The Big Ten, with its decades-long history of academic cooperation, could argue with a straight face that it has more value than just its TV contracts (although they nevertheless dominate). The Big 12, which lacks that history, cannot.
As for what Bowlsby’s “selfish interests” are, you will have to speculate since I can’t think of any.
A school like Texas or Oklahoma is considering the possibility that they might be better off in a different league. Bowlsby, on the other hand, is most definitely not better off if they leave: his power will be diminished.
On top of that, his personal reputation can’t help but take a hit, for failing to keep it together, even if he was faced with an impossible task. As it is, the league looks foolish for putting on a Bachelor-like spectacle that ended with no one being selected. He is the face of the league, and is tarred with how that process was managed.
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“He is the face of the league, and is tarred with how that process was managed.”
He is the figurehead of the league. He should have applied for the UT AD position if he wanted to wield the actual power.
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I fail to see how falsely saying they were additive helps his reputation given that he lead the process.
Now there can be differences of opinions between ESPN, Fox and the Big 12 TV consultants on what these schools values will be in 2025. But Bowlsby is clearly saying that the value is there, whether it be through TV, marketing, sponsors, NCAA bb credits, increased playoff bids, home attendance, whatever sources of revenue he has identified.
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I fail to see how falsely saying they were additive helps his reputation given that he lead the process.
Now there can be differences of opinions between ESPN, Fox and the Big 12 TV consultants on what these schools values will be in 2025. But Bowlsby is clearly saying that the value is there, whether it be through TV, marketing, sponsors, NCAA bb credits, increased playoff bids, home attendance, whatever sources of revenue he has identified.
What I am saying, is that if the merits are arguable, he will probably take the side that also happens to coincide with his own career and reputational interests.
It’s not as if the Big 12 has the chance to get Ohio State (an obvious win), or that Northern Iowa is the best school available (an obvious non-starter). Instead, we’ve got a bunch of middling schools that might be additive, but could be dillutive, depending on your assumptions.
In that situation, I would expect Bowlsby’s Bayesian priors to favor expansion, and to give more weight to the arguments for addition, assuming those arguments can be rationally made. But “rational” does not mean “correct”.
It is not like university presidents to turn down free money. That they elected not to expand tells me that they saw no clear winners. They saw assumptions that, if believed, would be additive; but the reliability of those assumptions was sufficiently doubtful that they were not willing to act.
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Ok, I understand what you are saying.
But Bowlsby was originally anti-expansion. When they started getting data he clearly became pro-expansion. So something in those consultant’s reports convinced him.
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So again, this was George Costanzas’ Yankee supervisor Wilhelm’s “Big Project” (at the end of the episode, Mrs. Wilhelm had to remind Mr. Wilhelm to take his meds).
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http://www.campusrush.com/college-football-regular-season-alabama-ohio-state-2052322210.html
7 terrible ideas for CFB.
I’ll qualify what comes next by saying that I was at a baseball game as I mulled this over, and one reason I love baseball is its postseason randomness. Wild-cards play one-game playoffs to get in—and plenty of times go on to win it all.
…
I want more of that randomness in college football, and I want it to matter.
Why would chaos be the goal? That’s a great way to lose fans and money. The worst thing about postseason systems is their failure to accurately determine the best team. That’s not a strength.
She seems to be saying she just wants the best teams to not be so good and thus lose more. In a competitive environment, you’re always going to get some dominance. There are easier ways to achieve chaos than her ideas anyway.
Her ideas:
1. Give us the eight-team playoff. … That in and of itself is enough to capture more interest, and to make the eventual champion play in three playoff games certainly increases the odds of chaos. It’s also fun to see those teams that pop up in the top 10 every few years after a great run get a shot at a legitimate postseason. Teams No. 3–15 I often find are the most interesting and fluid, year to year.
2. Also, mandate a spot for a Group of Five team in this eight-team shebang. Houston having one bad Saturday shouldn’t doom it.
3. Mandate some nonconference games. I love that in recent years, Power Five conference commissioners have spoken out against their schools lining up September as a parade of bunny opponents. But let’s take it one step further: Why not mandate one nonconference game a year in the same vein as the NFL does in its scheduling? … This would take some reorganizing—either turning the Power Five into the Power Four or Power Six—but it would be great to force, say, the top five teams in each conference to schedule one of their nonconference games against a team from an assigned other conference that finished in the same place the year before. I say five teams because to make everyone do this we’d have to standardize the size of each conference. For example: Ole Miss finished third in the SEC (ranking teams irrespective of division) in 2015. Under this system, it’d have been mandated to play Ohio State, which finished third in the Big Ten, this year.
4. Schedule inter-division conference games by record. Let’s take my second suggestion a step further and mandate the No. 2 team, say, in the SEC West, have to play the No. 2 team in the SEC East the following year. That’d force the SEC to have more than one intra-division game a year in order to ensure all of its teams actually played one another, but let them handle that. Why shouldn’t the best two teams in a conference play not only in a championship game, but also the following year?
5. And in that same vein, mandate conference championship games. This seems so obvious it’s almost an afterthought, but yeah. The best two teams in a conference should play each other, and I’m not sure what argument there is against that.
6. Put a cap on coaching salaries. College football is all about the coach. Urban Meyer and Nick Saban are the best in the business, and it’s no surprise their teams are also at the top of the game. Alabama and Ohio State would do anything to keep these guys, but as much as the idea of the coach as an institution is adorable, it’s also—sorry—boring. Not that capping salaries would encourage movement, but it would at least incentivize some coaches to listen to other offers if they felt restless or up for a new challenge—and it would also make those of us who feel a little nauseated when we see that a coach is a state’s highest-paid employee feel a bit better, as a bonus.
7. Did I mention an eight-team playoff?
#1 is given without any good supporting argument. An increase in chaos is not a reason to expand the playoff.
#2 is likely to happen if #1 occurs, but her argument is weak. UH wouldn’t get in over an undefeated Boise this year anyway.
#3 and #4 would require the schools to yield power that they will never yield. Maybe two conferences will strike a deal to do something, but the schools would never try to have the NCAA impose such a thing.
#5 seems moot with the B12 adding a CCG next year, but it also fits the description above.
#6 is illegal.
#7 is a repeat.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/big-12-expansion-texas-longhorns-oklahoma-sooners-conference-future-mandel-mailbag-101916
Stewart Mandel still doesn’t understand the B10 or realignment very well.
Stewart: With the Big 12 deciding not to expand, it seems the league is poised to collapse in favor of four super conferences. The Big Ten and SEC can each take two to get to 16, the Pac 12 can take four, and the ACC can take one (or two depending on what ND does). Care to speculate where teams land?
— Foster, Wilmington, North Carolina
…
IF the league comes apart in 2025, when its current TV deals and Grant of Rights expire, and IF the conference landscape looks generally similar to what it does now, the biggest question would be whether Texas and Oklahoma bind together or act on their own. If the latter, Texas goes to the Big Ten and Oklahoma the SEC. Those two leagues are the clear alpha dog conferences, and those two schools are the only ones with the leverage to essentially pick their spot.
Good enough so far. I won’t say he’s right or wrong, but it’s a reasonable stance. Of course he didn’t say what would happen in the first scenario at all.
As for the other schools, Oklahoma State would go wherever Oklahoma does. Texas Tech in the Big Ten seems like an odd fit, but if that’s what it takes to get Texas, Jim Delany’s successor would likely do it.
OkSU would like to go wherever OU goes, but who beyond the P12 wants a second school from OK? As for TT, Delany’s successor can suggest whatever he wants. He’d need a gun to get the COP/C to approve TT under any circumstances.
After that … I’m not sure any of the others would land in a current Power 5 conference. The ACC would be more likely to take Connecticut than West Virginia, and if the Pac-12 can’t get Texas or Oklahoma it either stays put or grabs a couple of closer schools like Boise State. So Baylor, TCU, Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State and West Virginia would be in much the same boat as the schools trying to get into the Big 12 now. Perhaps there would be some sort of marriage between the Big 12’s leftovers and the best of the Group of 5.
Perhaps a harsher view on KU than many have, but still reasonable. I don’t see the P12 taking any western schools in the next 20 years or so. Maybe someone will become academically suitable in the future, but for now I think it’s UT and friends or bust.
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It amazes me that so many people think the four remaining power conferences would agree to land conveniently on 16 members. The power leagues, however you define that phrase, have never had the same number of schools at any time. They act independently, according to their own needs and priorities.
The only big prizes are Texas and Oklahoma. I don’t see any league making a deal without one or the other, or both. The remaining P5 conferences don’t have pressing needs that any other B12 school satisfies.
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Will you guys stop making such logical and informed statements?
{checks to see if the dudes twitter account has melted}
Ahh, see? The B12 is the most successful conference in history…
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I do not see the Big 10 taking Texas Tech. The Academics ( not to mention being a Middle Of The Road Big XII team) is why. If Texas demanded another Texas team, Houston ( sports ) or Rice ( Academics) would be far superior choices. I suspect the ideal combination would be Texas ( sports AND Academics), and either Rice ( think how much they can contribute to the CIC ( like Johns Hopkins), Kansas ( Basketball & Academics) or Oklahoma ( football).
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UT probably won’t be able to get another Texas school into the Big Ten. If they want to bring a partner with them, they’ll need to knock on the Pac-12’s door again.
Rice clears the Big Ten’s academic hurdle with room to spare, but the Big Ten is a sports league after all, and Rice isn’t good enough in the revenue sports. You may note that Rutgers isn’t good either, but Rutgers brought a useful state market along with them. Rice brings none of that, assuming you are already getting UT.
But anyhow, I don’t see Texas arguing for Rice or Houston, as it was willing to kick them to the curb when the Big 12 was formed. We know about the famous “Tech problem,” but I can’t see the Big Ten going for that. They will want #16 to bring distinct strengths, as Oklahoma and Kansas do, but Tech does not.
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I watched Rice this weekend and I saw the Quarterback is a NASA intern, and the School was # 13 overall in Academics. While I agree that Rice is inferior to OU and KU in sports the kind of Research money they would bring to the CIC would be nice.
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There’s no denying Rice academics, but that’s not what drives the expansion bus.
Empirically, the league’s behavior is that the academics need to be “good enough”; and then, athletic and marketing considerations determine which schools get in.
After all, Rice is not bound by a GOR: the Big Ten could’ve had them at any time, and never even sniffed in that direction.
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Rice is excellent academically, but is a bad institutional fit for the Big Ten. Rice has 6600 students, NW has the fewest in the B1G at 21k.
This research ranking:
https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/profiles/site?method=rankingBySource&ds=herd
Has Rice ranked 128th by R&D expenditures. Nebraska is 80th, Oklahoma 83rd, Rutgers 31st, Maryland 43rd.
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The B1G might take another Texas school with UT but I doubt A&M will leave the SEC, and that is the only other Texas school that the B1G would consider inviting. .
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I am not familiar with the details the Nebraska “removal” from the AAU, but I know that it related partially to fact that the medical school was on a different campus, so those research dollars did not count. Further agricultural research does not count as much. Very tough for the Cornhuskers.
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In the research funding ranking, most ag research funding does not count at all, since it’s mostly formula research grants rather than competitive research grants. And, of course, given the existence of the formula agricultural land grant ag research funding, there’s much less urgency in developing competitive research grant funding for ag research.
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“I am not familiar with the details the Nebraska “removal” from the AAU, but I know that it related partially to fact that the medical school was on a different campus, so those research dollars did not count.”
The medical center is a peer institution within their University of Nebraska system that is located in a different city. Of course the medical school shouldn’t be counted as UNL, those dollars and brain power have little to nothing to do with the UNL campus.
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The medical center is a peer institution within their University of Nebraska system that is located in a different city. Of course the medical school shouldn’t be counted as UNL, those dollars and brain power have little to nothing to do with the UNL campus.
The multiple campuses of state university systems are usually more interrelated than this comment would suggest.
The Kansas medical school is also in a different city than the main university. It’s just an administrative distinction that the state of Kansas considers that school to be part of KU, and the state of Nebraska does not.
Granted, the AAU can define its membership criteria any way it wants, and Nebraska knew the rules.
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Jersey Bernie,
“I am not familiar with the details the Nebraska “removal” from the AAU, but I know that it related partially to fact that the medical school was on a different campus, so those research dollars did not count. Further agricultural research does not count as much. Very tough for the Cornhuskers.”
http://www.chronicle.com/article/Ouster-Opens-a-Painful-Debate/127364/
Here’s a good article about it if anyone wants a refresher.
The unprecedented move was fraught with intrigue and politics not typical of staid and collegial academic associations, say several presidents in the AAU with knowledge of the process who asked not to be named because of the group’s confidential proceedings.
“There were a lot of people who didn’t want them disassociated,” said one public-university president. “I don’t think you’ll see another vote anytime soon on eliminating a member. The wounds are too great over this episode. I anticipate a lot of future debate over the criteria.”
The AAU’s two-phase membership criteria focus primarily on an institution’s amount of competitive research funds and its share of faculty members who belong to the National Academies. Faculty awards and citations are also taken into account.
Presidents say that in recent years discussions about membership in the association have become much more quantified, with an increasing emphasis on a rankings methodology developed by the membership committee and senior AAU staff. Last April the association as a whole adopted revised criteria that compared AAU institutions with nonmembers on research dollars and eliminated the assumption that current members would automatically continue on.
“It was very clear that the easiest path to scoring high on the criteria is to have large medical schools or large science and engineering faculties,” said Nancy Cantor, chancellor of Syracuse University, which was reviewed along with Nebraska and has decided to leave the AAU voluntarily in the coming months (see a related article).
The membership committee was responsible for drafting the new criteria, and presidents who recall last spring’s meeting said there was little discussion of the new method among the full membership before it was adopted. “Many of us didn’t realize the full impact of that new criteria,” Ms. Cantor said.
Another university leader said that, given that the association is made up of presidents who regularly criticize university rankings, “there’s concern by some of us that too many membership decisions are being made purely by the numbers.”
“That’s why this vote [on Nebraska] was so divided,” said the president, who leads a private institution. “I think that it shows the membership itself is divided about what it means to be a top research university.”
…
“The greatest debates within AAU tend to be reserved for who is in and who isn’t in,” said the public-university president.
A year ago, the AAU invited its first new member in nearly a decade, the Georgia Institute of Technology. Some presidents don’t want the group to get too big, and so as it adds members, they believe those at the bottom of the rankings should be pruned.
“At 100 members, it’s no longer a private group,” said another public-university president. “The advantage of this association, compared to others in higher ed, is that we’re all supposed to be alike. If that’s no longer the case, then we lose the benefits of membership”
…
What particularly hurt Nebraska in those metrics is that as a land-grant institution in a farming state, it gets a large share of its research dollars for agriculture. The entire University of Nebraska system had $13.2-million in federally financed farm-related research in 2008, or about 10 percent of its total federal research dollars, as compared with a nationwide average of about 3 percent.
The AAU, however, does not give such research the same weight in its membership criteria because much of federal support for agricultural work is awarded through formulas and earmarks rather than peer-reviewed grants. As a result, presidents of land-grant institutions say that the AAU metrics are stacked against them. They maintain that differences between states in climate, soil, and crops necessitate formula-driven funds.
Large public institutions like Nebraska are also hurt in the AAU rankings by a process the association calls “normalization,” which seeks to determine per-faculty research rewards by dividing total research dollars by the number of faculty members at an institution.
For Nebraska, that means the total research dollars are divided by a significant portion of faculty devoted to agricultural research, even though their research rewards are not considered as valuable under AAU metrics. The normalization process tends to help smaller members with smaller overall research budgets, like Brandeis and Rice Universities.
…
In his e-mail to the campus and in interviews with The Chronicle, Mr. Perlman said what put Nebraska at a particular disadvantage was the lack of an on-campus medical school.
While other AAU members, such as Cornell and Pennsylvania State Universities, for instance, lack medical schools on their main campuses, Nebraska’s medical school is also under a totally separate administrative structure from the Lincoln campus, an arrangement that is unlike the ones at those other institutions. As a result, its research dollars are not counted by the AAU, even though, as a medical school, it can’t belong to the association on its own.
A medical school both improves an institution’s absolute number of research dollars and improves its score on the ratio of research output to tenure-track faculty, since medical schools often rely heavily on researchers who are not tenure-track faculty, Mr. Perlman said
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A lot of AAU schools don’t have medical schools. Texas didn’t have one until this year. Texas A&M is a big ag school that didn’t have one until just a few years ago, and they are a relatively new admit to the AAU.
Syracuse has intentionally de-emphasized research in recent years. Their research expenditures (at least at the time they dropped out of the AAU) were relatively tiny. Something like $36 million as I recall.
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A lot of AAU schools don’t have medical schools.
I think you mean, “a handful.”
Texas didn’t have one until this year. Texas A&M is a big ag school that didn’t have one until just a few years ago, and they are a relatively new admit to the AAU.
As explained in Brian’s post, it wasn’t just the lack of a medical school, but also the way the agriculture faculty was counted. In essence, the ag professors brought the average down, while getting zero credit for their own research, which was deemed to be non-competitive.
The Texas A&M Medical School awarded its first degrees in 1981, which was long before the AAU revised its membership criteria and began to consider kicking members out.
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https://missouri.rivals.com/news/zero-trust-inside-mizzou-s-move-to-the-southeastern-conference
Zero Trust: Inside Mizzou’s move to the Southeastern Conference
A read that’s worth you time.
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I agree with Gee that if the B1G adds two more teams it should be Kansas and Missouri.
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Kansas maybe, but the train has left the station on the other one.
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Then, I suppose, the other would have to be Oklahoma.
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Would the B1G overlook Oklahoma’s lack of AAU membership? I think that an UT & OU combination would result in “flexibility” by the B1G, but that might be the only way for the B1G to ignore the Oklahoma “AAU issue”.
Would the B1G take UT and Kansas over UT and Oklahoma? That decision might show how serious this AAU problem is for B1G presidents.
Kansas will be there and available to the B1G for a long time, if there is no Big 12. It does not seem likely that the PAC 12 would go that far east for Kansas, so even with a king basketball program, Kansas does not have a lot of potential safe landing spaces.
Certainly the SEC or ACC are not going to Kansas.
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Would the B1G overlook Oklahoma’s lack of AAU membership?
That is the big unknown of expansion. To date, Notre Dame is the only known exception that the Big Ten was willing to make. However, at the time they admitted Nebraska, they knew the school’s AAU membership was under review, and it was at least possible that it wouldn’t have that status for very much longer.
If you can argue that Nebraska’s non-AAU status was priced into its stock when they got the invitation, then maybe that exception is also open to another “reasonably good” non-AAU state flagship with a blue-chip football program, like Oklahoma.
Would the B1G take UT and Kansas over UT and Oklahoma? That decision might show how serious this AAU problem is for B1G presidents.
Kansas will be there and available to the B1G for a long time, if there is no Big 12.
Yes, but conferences these days practically always expand to even numbers for football. The Big Ten’s addition of Penn State stands as the most notable exception, but that was before divisional play — as divisions with unequal numbers are awkward.
This would seem to imply that if the Big Ten takes UT and OU, there will never be a time for Kansas, unless there is another school available whom they really want, for which the Jayhawks are the obvious complement, much as Rutgers was to Maryland. It’s like Noah’s Ark from now on: they have to enter two by two.
I do agree that if the Big Ten doesn’t take Kansas, no other P5 league is likely to be interested, either.
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Texas to the B1G might require OU to be invited as well, but I can’t see Texas insisting on KU being part of the deal, though I’d be happy to see KU and Mizzou brought in for a 9 team B1G West of :
Texas Oklahoma Kansas Nebraska Missouri Iowa Illinois Minnesota Wisconsin
That’s be a pretty salty bunch
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Too many thinking like a fan, not a president. From that article speaking to the 2010 P16 proposal:
“LOFTIN: “Scott told me that it wasn’t an easy sell because other than A&M and Texas the other schools really didn’t have the reputation academically that they really wanted. Colorado did. Utah didn’t.”
I just don’t see Sooners making a home in the B1G. Remember Delaney pointedly stating that going forward academics were priority.
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Texas to the B1G might require OU to be invited as well, but I can’t see Texas insisting on KU being part of the deal…
I’m sure that OU would be UT’s preferred partner, as they could keep the Red River Rivalry as a conference game, and still schedule big-name non-conference opponents. UT has no history with Kansas that they care much about.
…though I’d be happy to see KU and Mizzou brought in for a 9 team B1G West of :
Texas Oklahoma Kansas Nebraska Missouri Iowa Illinois Minnesota Wisconsin
That’s be a pretty salty bunch
That’d be one heck of a division, though I wonder how the legacy Big Ten teams would feel about hardly ever playing their traditional conference mates anymore.
Assuming 9 conference games, it would take 16 years to cycle through a home and home cycle with the East teams. If Illinois locks its game with Northwestern, they’d never play the rest of the league again (barring a CCG rematch).
Anyhow, I have trouble imagining Mizzou leaving the SEC.
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Jersey Bernie,
“Would the B1G overlook Oklahoma’s lack of AAU membership?”
Unknown, obviously. OU does slightly outrank NE on AAU metrics, though, so it would essentially be admitting another NE.
“I think that an UT & OU combination would result in “flexibility” by the B1G, but that might be the only way for the B1G to ignore the Oklahoma “AAU issue”.”
I’d agree. I don’t think OU and KU provide quite enough value as a pair to get in.
“Would the B1G take UT and Kansas over UT and Oklahoma? That decision might show how serious this AAU problem is for B1G presidents.”
I don’t think they would because OU provides so much more financial value (football king, national fan base, rivalries with UT and NE, 1M more people in state). KU and OU are very similar academically other than AAU status. Is that enough reason to take KU?
“Kansas will be there and available to the B1G for a long time, if there is no Big 12. It does not seem likely that the PAC 12 would go that far east for Kansas, so even with a king basketball program, Kansas does not have a lot of potential safe landing spaces.
Certainly the SEC or ACC are not going to Kansas.”
Expansion is running in pairs now. The question becomes KU and whom. The only partners in their area are UT, OU, ISU and MO. ISU is not an option and MO is off the table, and we’re assuming UT and OU are already gone. That means they need an eastern partner, but the ACC schools are unavailable. I don’t believe the B10 would stoop to an all-hoops expansion of KU and UConn, so KU lacks a partner.
On the other hand, the SEC has MO and could use the MBB power of KU to counterbalance UK. The SEC would need to find a partner but they’re options are a little wider (TCU, OkSU, WV, other).
Or maybe conferences will drop divisions and make adding singletons possible again. All they need is to change the CCG rules.
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ccrider55,
“I just don’t see Sooners making a home in the B1G. Remember Delaney pointedly stating that going forward academics were priority.”
The chance to get 2 kings and add the ability recruit students from TX would have massive appeal to the COP/C. The average of the academics of those 2 are more than good enough to get in. OU is NE just without any time in the AAU. OU outranks NE on many of the metrics the AAU uses to evaluate schools. If OU is the condition for getting UT, I think they might do it. They wouldn’t take OU and KU, probably.
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“Or maybe conferences will drop divisions and make adding singletons possible again. All they need is to change the CCG rules.”
Brian has it right. When expansion happens they need to get rid of the division requirement. Then everyone in a 16-team conference can have three locked rivals yearly with six other conference games. Each team would play every other team in the conference home and home over a four-year period. Every player would visit every school in the conference at least once.
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Marc Shepherd,
…though I’d be happy to see KU and Mizzou brought in for a 9 team B1G West of :
Texas Oklahoma Kansas Nebraska Missouri Iowa Illinois Minnesota Wisconsin
That’s be a pretty salty bunch
“That’d be one heck of a division, though I wonder how the legacy Big Ten teams would feel about hardly ever playing their traditional conference mates anymore.
Assuming 9 conference games, it would take 16 years to cycle through a home and home cycle with the East teams. If Illinois locks its game with Northwestern, they’d never play the rest of the league again (barring a CCG rematch).”
At 18, you almost have to do pods or drop divisions entirely. I don’t think there are great pods, so I’d go back to 1 conference. Play 10 games with 3 locked rivals and 7 games to rotate through the other 14 teams (50%). Teams can still get 7 home games if they insist, or they can play some neutral site OOC games. But with 6 kings in the conference, they already have several major games built in and they’ll be from other regions.
“Anyhow, I have trouble imagining Mizzou leaving the SEC.”
It’ll never happen, agreed.
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Interesting article.
A little self-justification there. Missouri’s president Deaton claimed he resigned his position as head of the Big 12 the day after Boren made his wallflower comments on September 11. What I remembered was he was double dealing by being head of the council while negotiating with the SEC. And the article itself demonstrated that with its timeline saying he resigned October 4th.
People in the Big 12 remember Lawrence Phillips and while a great coach, class is not something we associate with Tom Osborne. He was a whiny, bad loser (on those rare occasions that he lost). That “class” comment drains a lot of credibility from anything Alden says. Now I can’t really dispute his characterization of Deloss Dodds. Although contrary to the perception spread, Dodds didn’t have anything against the Big 12 North schools. He was a Kansas St. athlete, coach and administrator before he moved to Texas. The Big 12 was his baby and he really wanted it to succeed. I suspect the Pac 16 idea was more of President Powers.
The administrators don’t mention the reason for the hostility against Mizzou in the boardroom in 2010 was due to their governor bad-mouthing Texas Tech and Oklahoma St. And the vitrol at the exit was different than with any of the other schools as they created havoc with their late exit. Even Chuck Neinas, interim commissioner and former Big 8 commissioner was bad-mouthing them. The Big 12 offered them a deal on the exit fee if they delayed a year. The Big 12, Big East and CUSA were all asking them to delay. The SEC was fine with it. But they wouldn’t and that generated a lot of the vitrol. They cost everybody a lot of money and time. They even cost FSU who lost their WVU ooc game and had to schedule an FCS school at home. Lots of chaos for everyone.
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Nice find, Mike.
One little tidbit of interest to me was Larry Scoot talking about Utah.
LOFTIN: “Scott told me that it wasn’t an easy sell because other than A&M and Texas the other schools really didn’t have the reputation academically that they really wanted. Colorado did. Utah didn’t.”
Utah isn’t AAU, but they were a top 50 school on the AAU rankings that NE released when they got booted. That would seem like a pretty decent academic reputation.
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And they got into the PAC when the aTm/UT gambit disappeared. OU/OkSU didn’t the next year.
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Brian:
Another interesting item: “EXCERPT FROM THE 100-YEAR DECISION: “When that news broke, that day’s meeting essentially ended. It wasn’t just an elephant in the room; it was the entire zoo.”
GOTTLIEB: “Look, Chip had it right. They were gone and then ESPN was like if that deal blows up, we’ve got to go back and rework all of our contracts and FOX has the Pac-12 contract and it was a, there’s a term for it, not sunken costs, it was a loss leader. This idea like we’re gonna lose money on this Longhorn thing, maybe forever. Maybe eventually we’ll make money on it, but we’re gonna lose a whole hell of a lot more money if all of a sudden OU and Texas and Oklahoma State and somebody else goes to the PAC 12. Chip Brown had it right. At the last second that thing got blown up.”
Two things. First, it appears ESPN stopping the current round of B12 expansion (if in fact they and fox arrange a financial boost through the CCG or otherwise) isn’t the first time they’ve thwarted realignment. And second, although it hadn’t officially been revealed it’s obvious the groundwork for the LHN had occurred already. And inspite of the “surprise” expressed at its payout level I’d bet that was the price asked to scuttle the P16.
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Geaux Tigers!
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If the B10 had to take Rice to land UT, they would definitely do it. Sure, Rice is tiny, but they are in a major metropolis in a fertile state (and of course, has the academic side completely covered). OU is a king but isn’t AAU and is in a low population state and not actually in TX. Plus, I don’t think the B10 wants to load up completely with kings (UMich and OSU want reasonable paths to the playoffs and the B10W schools, if they add a king, would likely prefer an easy win as well rather 2 tough games).
However, I doubt that UT would go to bat for Rice.
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I was the person who mentioned Rice, and the odds are slim that the Big 10 would take Rice. Certain things would have to happen for this to occur. 1: OU and OSU go to the SEC ( taking OU off the Board). 2: UT agrees to come but wants a Texas School as a partner ( instead of say KU). 3: The Big 10 refuses to accept Tech, Houston, TCU or Baylor ( all highly likely). The idea of getting BTN on in Texas ( including Houston) is a plus for Rice ( not to mention Recruiting that Schools who recruit Nationally like Nebraska, Michigan and Ohio State would like). Rice also excels at baseball ( something the Big 10 does not). My gut feeling is that if the Big 10 expands it will be KU with OU. After years of dealing with Schools like Iowa State, Kansas State, Baylor and Texas Tech who vote to give UT everything it wants, I cannot see UT taking marching orders from Ann Arbor and Columbus, while I can see OU following Nebraska and taking the financial windfall from the Big 10 ( especially if OSU remains with UT in the Big XII ( or whatever it is called)).
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If the B10 had to take Rice to land UT, they would definitely do it.
Yes, but the odds of UT insisting on this are pretty close to zero, since UT didn’t go to bat for Rice when the Big 12 was founded. If OU wasn’t available (or the Big Ten didn’t want them), then it would be UT and Kansas.
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Kansas also gives an easy win in football for the Western Division teams, while actually adding value to the BTN through it’s BBall.
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Richard,
“If the B10 had to take Rice to land UT, they would definitely do it. Sure, Rice is tiny, but they are in a major metropolis in a fertile state (and of course, has the academic side completely covered).”
To be fair, their sports teams aren’t any worse than RU has been so far. They’d win the baseball title a lot.
“OU is a king but isn’t AAU and is in a low population state and not actually in TX. Plus, I don’t think the B10 wants to load up completely with kings (UMich and OSU want reasonable paths to the playoffs and the B10W schools, if they add a king, would likely prefer an easy win as well rather 2 tough games).”
Adding UT and OU would provide balance on paper, something the B10 is lacking at the moment. OU also might be a condition of getting UT (so they can keep the rivalry in conference), so basically getting another NE but with better football seems reasonable for the prize that is access to TX. The B10 provides plenty of easy wins already (IL, PU, RU, etc). Adding OU and UT would take the B10 to a SOS level more like the SEC.
“However, I doubt that UT would go to bat for Rice.”
Me too. They’ll still play OOC.
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Interesting to see Rice mentioned again when we’re 1-6 and had trouble putting away a bad FCS team Saturday.
As others have noted, Rice is way too small to be considered for the B1G. I looked up the size of the FBS private schools a while back and it was staggering to me how much bigger schools like Northwestern, USC, BYU and others were. When my daughter went to Notre Dame I thought it was about the same size as Rice, not more than double.
As for sports, basketball and football would be crushed for years. We could win in baseball most years. And be mid-pack in the irrelevant sports.
For the academic side, Rice is selective and elite, yes, but does not have the breadth of B1G schools. Another factor of size that is often overlooked.
Our relationship with UT has always been cordial and supportive as an institution. But they’ve thrown us to the curb in sports and will not hesitate to do it again.
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Good read from Powermizzou
Sure seems to point to B10 strategy of taking Neb with thought that B12 would then crumble & they could get MU & KU. If so, Delaney’s only misjudgement was knowing just how much $$$ ESPN would throw down to keep B12 from crumbling & therefore losing TX to the PAC.
One point that seems to always get missed (and wasn’t in article)…Loftin’s book states that B12 ADs & admins knew as early as ’09 about TX plan to take their friends to PAC. This was b4 B10 announced expansion in play, & WAY b4 MO governor’s dumb comments. Seems Deloss & others very successfully demonized Mizzou as the catalyst. Pretty interesting that apparently (from the article) Tom Osbourne is about the only person to call Deloss out on this B.S. & stick up for MU.
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How good a track record does “Powermizzou” have? From other Big Ten insider comments, I thought their preferred strategy was to grow into Virginia and North Carolina. Of course, that was before the ACC extended its grant of rights into the 2030s, but the league certainly seemed to have its eye trained on the South, until the GOR foreclosed the possibility.
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Can’t speak to tract records. Think it is a great read as its full of first hand accounts from actual administrators. The rest just my opinion (& I am NO insider).
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How good a track record does “Powermizzou” have?
IMHO – They are biased, but I would consider them responsible. Its their version of Chip Brown.
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If the Big 10 wanted Missouri they could have had them ( the Tigers basically threw themselves at the Big 10 and the Conference said NO).
M
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When the Tigers “threw themselves at the Big 10,” the league had only one vacancy. No one, except the odd Tiger fan, has ever suggested that the Big Ten should have taken Missouri over Nebraska.
From that point forward, any expansion had to be in pairs. By the time Maryland was available, Missouri no longer was. Had Missouri not joined the SEC, I think there’s a more than fair prospect that they and Maryland would have been numbers 13 & 14.
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Remember Andy?
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Loftin’s account contradicts what the Colorado AD said in the article.
The Big 10 did publically announce they were looking to expand in December 2009.
I don’t recall seeing a date when the Pac 16 talks started. Maybe Loftin is correct, but he is known to lie and has the 60s Aggie obsessive hatred of Texas so he’s not the best source.
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UK spending some of that SECN money:
http://www.ukathletics.com/news/construction-of-new-baseball-stadium-approved-10-20-2016
For 49M I really expected a larger capacity.
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cc- you’re right. LSU spent $43mm in 2009 for the Alex Box Stadium. Alex Box has a capacity of around 11,000 (counting SROs). Suites and club seats, a large concourse, chair backs, large playground areas, and a great scoreboard with probably the biggest TV screen in college baseball are a few of the amenities. I know stadium costs inflation factor is much higher than other construction projects, but $49mm sounds pretty high for 2500 seats and grass berms.
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Maybe they’ll have a roll out parquet floor for some quick basketball games between innings.
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Would need to add seats…
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That’s what the berms are for – giant student section.
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The Big Ten now counts Fresno State as a “Power Five” opponent, which meets the league’s requirement to play at least one of these every year in the non-conference schedule.
Apparently, the Bulldogs’ 34–38 record over the past six seasons, including 1–6 this year, is sufficiently impressive. Previously, the Big Ten agreed to count Army, Navy, Air Force, Notre Dame, BYU, Cincinnati, and UConn, as “Power Five” opponents.
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How the bleep is Boise State not a “Power 5 opponent”? Also at least give half of the MAC their due as BigTen killers.
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I would add UCF, USF, Houston and San Diego State
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Because nobody has asked for an exemption for Boise yet.
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Not sure, but doesn’t the PAC count them?
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Probably. I’m sure the B10 would, but a school has to ask for the exemption. We just don’t schedule schools like Boise much so it may take a while before someone bothers to ask.
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MSU played them in ’12, and is scheduled to again in ’22 and ’23. They have games with all the P5 conferences scheduled through ’23, several years with two (plus BYU frequently).
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ccrider55,
“MSU played them in ’12, and is scheduled to again in ’22 and ’23. They have games with all the P5 conferences scheduled through ’23, several years with two (plus BYU frequently).”
So maybe MSU will bother to ask in a few years. Or maybe MSU plans on scheduling a P5 team in addition to Boise so they won’t ask.
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I reckon the latter. They seem willing to have 6/6 home/away game schedules on occasion, which would give them a bit more scheduling flexibility.
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It sounds stupid, but it’s a losable game for MN in many years.
Does anyone really have a problem with lower tier B10 schools playing someone like Fresno instead of a P5? We still want lots of B10 teams to get bowl eligible, right? With 9 conference games, I’m okay with the lower teams taking an easier path. The big 7 (OSU, MI, PSU, NE, WI, IA, MSU) and anyone else who wants to compete for the B10 title should play a P5, but RU and PU and IL don’t need yet another hard game.
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The question is whether the networks who bought into the expected future value of Big Ten schedules have a problem with it.
Agreeing to count Army demonstrates strongly that it’s about brand value, not about competitive strength. Indeed, while Fresno State is currently #123/128 in Massey’s Composite … Kansas is 120, Iowa State is 106, Rutgers is 102, Purdue is 100. The bottom of the P5 overlaps the middle of the MAC, CUSA and Sunbelt, never mind the middle of the American or MWC.
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BruceMcF,
“The question is whether the networks who bought into the expected future value of Big Ten schedules have a problem with it.”
I really doubt that they do. A former visitor here with TV experience said the money in TV deals was for the big conference games and then just inventory. TCU/MN pulled a 1.7 on a Thursday night game opening weekend with no competition, so it’s not like the network is missing out on much by getting Fresno instead.
“Agreeing to count Army demonstrates strongly that it’s about brand value, not about competitive strength. Indeed, while Fresno State is currently #123/128 in Massey’s Composite … Kansas is 120, Iowa State is 106, Rutgers is 102, Purdue is 100. The bottom of the P5 overlaps the middle of the MAC, CUSA and Sunbelt, never mind the middle of the American or MWC.”
I think the B10 would approve any decent G5 program because they know teams like RU are horrible. They’ll just put internal pressure on the 7 biggest brands not to avoid true P5 teams, but those 7 aren’t a problem generally anyway.
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The big stadium schools face their own market pressure to include a “real” P5 H/H agreement in the mix, to avoid the value of their season ticket packages dropping too far in the years they have 4 rather than 5 Big Ten home games … that leaves two Go5 buy games in both 4 and 5 conference home game years.
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Does anyone really have a problem with lower tier B10 schools playing someone like Fresno instead of a P5? We still want lots of B10 teams to get bowl eligible, right?
I don’t have a problem with it substantively, but the optics aren’t that great when you claim to have a P5 scheduling requirement…and then make all of these exceptions.
I wasn’t in favor of playing 9 conference games, either, as I felt it would result in fewer bowl-eligible Big Ten teams.
Agreeing to count Army demonstrates strongly that it’s about brand value, not about competitive strength.
In Army’s case, there is no doubt about it, since no one would claim they’ve played P5-equivalent football at any time in the recent past. But the service academies always draw well on TV, even when they’re terrible.
On the other hand, if brand value is what’s driving it, is Fresno State a big draw? It’s the first I am hearing that.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I don’t have a problem with it substantively, but the optics aren’t that great when you claim to have a P5 scheduling requirement…and then make all of these exceptions.”
Agreed.
“I wasn’t in favor of playing 9 conference games, either, as I felt it would result in fewer bowl-eligible Big Ten teams.”
It will, but it’s one of the reasons for the big jump in TV money.
“In Army’s case, there is no doubt about it, since no one would claim they’ve played P5-equivalent football at any time in the recent past. But the service academies always draw well on TV, even when they’re terrible.
On the other hand, if brand value is what’s driving it, is Fresno State a big draw? It’s the first I am hearing that.”
I don’t think it’s brand value at all. I think the B10 will approve almost anyone if the right school asks (they wouldn’t approve Fresno if OSU asked, for example).
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2016/10/20/title-ix-sexual-assault-explained
Explaining Title IX and how sexual assaults are prosecuted on college campuses.
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http://sports.yahoo.com/news/the-one-move-that-could-save-the-big-12-160138736.html
Dan Wetzel says the one move that could save the B12 now is to push for expanding the playoff to 8 teams with the P5 getting autobids. That would make the B12 the easiest place for UT and OU to succeed and the money will be good enough (hopefully).
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It might be the only way Iowa State and Kansas State remain P5 schools.
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I would include Baylor as a School that will NOT be in a Power 5 Conference if UT leaves ( I think the Big XII could survive without OU, if UT remains). If the Conference goes away, I do not see he Big XII picking up the best Schools from the AAC & MWC, rather I see ISU & WVA in the AAC, Baylor and KSU in the MWC, KU in the Big 10 and the others dependent on what happens with OU and UT. For example: If OU goes SEC or PAC, OSU goes with them: If OU goes Big 10, then it’s MWC. Same for Tech and UT ( Just substitute ACC for SEC). TCU which is the strongest non UT team in the Big XII would have the choice of AAC or MWC ( I suspect AAC because of SMU). I suspect that OU and either KU or OSU will be gone ( most likely KU), and UT will remain in the Big XII ( joined by Houston and whatever School UT wants).
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Dan Wetzel says the one move that could save the B12 now is to push for expanding the playoff to 8 teams with the P5 getting autobids.
This would require the other four P5 conferences to do the B12 a favor, and why would they?
I would include Baylor as a School that will NOT be in a Power 5 Conference if UT leaves…
Even without the sexual assault scandal, no other P5 league would ever have wanted Baylor.
(I think the Big XII could survive without OU, if UT remains). If the Conference goes away, I do not see he Big XII picking up the best Schools from the AAC & MWC, rather I see ISU & WVA in the AAC, Baylor and KSU in the MWC, KU in the Big 10 and the others dependent on what happens with OU and UT…
I cannot imagine Texas remaining in the Big 12 if Oklahoma leaves. They’re not going to stick around in a league that has no other anchor school except them. Without OU, the TV value of the league will plummet, and the Longhorns will not be able to avoid seeking another home.
So now…the question is what the remaining eight will do. My hypothesis is that, even without UT and OU, the Big XII is a better brand name than any other mid-major. Therefore, the remaining eight will do the acquiring, rather than being acquired themselves.
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The problem with the Big XII being a better brand as a Mid-Major is the assumption that only OU and UT leave. I think the probability is KU goes and OSU and to a lesser extent TT is also possible ( depending on what OU and UT do). Keep in mind the AAC has Houston, UCF and USF, and the MWC has Air Force, Boise State and San Diego State ( all better football brands then many Schools in Power 5 Conferences). Those reasons are why I could see the AAC and MWC gaining Schools if and when OU & UT depart. The odds are in favor of KU leaving as well
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Key is how many. If only OU, Texas, or OU, Texas and KU leaving, I could see the remaining being able to raid both the MWC and AAC. (For one thing, in that second scenario they are still only losing two schools from the top of the FB value ladder.)
If it’s five or six rebuilding, it gets trickier. It may depend on how long they get to ride on existing contractual arrangements before the new status kicks in across the board. But if the balance falls the wrong way and there aren’t American schools accepting invites, then all those trips to the Great Plains to play in a Go6 conference might make the American look more appealing to WVU.
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There are certainly scenarios where the Big 12 is pillaged so thoroughly that only the crumbs remain. But no other power conference wants Texas Tech or Oklahoma State. We know the Pac-12 would have accepted them, as the price of also getting Texas and Oklahoma. UT’s unwillingness to share Tier 3 revenue scuttled that deal, but it was something the Pac-12 was willing to entertain.
Does the SEC want two Oklahoma schools? Doubtful. Does the SEC want OU plus a second Texas school, when that school is not UT? Doubtful. If the Big Ten takes Texas and Oklahoma, it’s game over: there’d be nothing left that any other P5 conference wants.
Even without UT, OU, and Kansas, the Big XII still has numerous schools that are better football brands than anything in the AAC. We would be in a Big East scenario: that league kept losing schools, and replenishing from the next layer beneath them.
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I disagree with this. There are Schools in the AAC like UCF and USF that have to possibility to be major players down the line. You also have Schools in the Big XII that you know are not getting any better ( Baylor ISU, KSU, and TCU). That is what the Big 10 saw in Rutgers but did not see in Missouri. As we have seen with the various problems in Columbia, not selecting the Tigers worked out fine. As far as Conferences selecting OSU or TT in order to get OU and ( or) UT ( in the case of the PAC) is concerned of course they would. The last thing other Conferences want is both OU and UT in the Big 10.
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David Brown,
“I disagree with this. There are Schools in the AAC like UCF and USF that have to possibility to be major players down the line.”
But that’s not what he said. He said they were bigger brands now. He would also probably point out that you can only have about 3 big brands in a state and FL already has 3 major brands. UCF and USF are likely to be Baylor/TCU/TT level brands at most (maybe 1 replaces Miami eventually).
“You also have Schools in the Big XII that you know are not getting any better ( Baylor ISU, KSU, and TCU).”
But the brand “Big XII” is better than any G5 brand so they’ll be the hunters.
“That is what the Big 10 saw in Rutgers but did not see in Missouri.”
The B10 never considered them both at the same time. There wasn’t a partner for MO when NE was added and then MO was off the table when RU was added.
“As far as Conferences selecting OSU or TT in order to get OU and ( or) UT ( in the case of the PAC) is concerned of course they would.”
Maybe. The SEC isn’t going to take schools they don’t want.
“The last thing other Conferences want is both OU and UT in the Big 10.”
No, the last thing they want is to dilute themselves with schools of no value. Besides, this highly depends on where UT and/or OU want to go.
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There are Schools in the AAC like UCF and USF that have to possibility to be major players down the line.
There is also the possibility that they never will. As we have just seen, the Big XII did not consider that chance sufficiently certain that they were willing to bet their future on it.
You also have Schools in the Big XII that you know are not getting any better (Baylor, ISU, KSU, and TCU).
Leaving aside Iowa State, no G5 conference has a trio of football brands as good as Baylor, KSU, and TCU. Even poor Iowa State is a more desirable school than most of the mid-majors.
Now, I cannot say for sure that the balance of power won’t have shifted dramatically by the time the decision is made, but I do know that such shifts are relatively uncommon.
That is what the Big 10 saw in Rutgers but did not see in Missouri. As we have seen with the various problems in Columbia, not selecting the Tigers worked out fine.
As Brian pointed out, there was no time when the Big Ten was in a position to choose between them. Given what has happened in Columbia, the Big Ten may very well be thanking its lucky stars that it dodged a bullet, but I don’t think they saw that coming. Anyhow, the Rutgers athletic department has not exactly been a garden of roses, either.
In fact, had they ever been in a position to make that choice, I think there’s a fair chance that they would’ve taken Missouri.
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Marc Shepherd,
“This would require the other four P5 conferences to do the B12 a favor, and why would they?”
Money. The other reason would be to avoid ever missing the playoff.
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If those arguments were sufficiently persuasive, then the remaining P5s would be doing what they always do: acting in their own interest, not the Big 12’s. The question is whether they reach that point on the Big 12’s timeline. I haven’t heard anyone with decision-making authority suggest that they’d tear up the playoff contracts before the final year scheduled, which is 2025–26.
Now, a few years before that, they’ll be talking about whether they want to revise the structure or sign up for more of the same. But that’ll be the same time that the Big 12’s grant of rights is approaching expiration, and the same time that the Big Ten is taking its football rights back to market.
If a couple of the major conferences think they can get Texas and Oklahoma, and the interest is mutual, there’s a pretty strong incentive to delay expanding the playoff till after the last rites have been given to the Big 12.
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And risk increased federal scrutiny if several of the weaker Big 12 schools — with decades of tradition in big-time athletics (including football, unlike Temple) — be tossed out through no fault of their own?
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Marc Shepherd,
“If those arguments were sufficiently persuasive, then the remaining P5s would be doing what they always do: acting in their own interest, not the Big 12’s.”
Exactly. It would still be good for the B12, but they’d all benefit in this hypothetical.
“The question is whether they reach that point on the Big 12’s timeline. I haven’t heard anyone with decision-making authority suggest that they’d tear up the playoff contracts before the final year scheduled, which is 2025–26.”
That’s the problem. Theoretically they could try to change it after 6 years I suppose, but absolutely nobody in charge seems to want 8 teams right now. I’m not sure they’ll want it then, either. Especially if looks like it’ll be the P4 when the new deal starts.
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vp19,
“And risk increased federal scrutiny if several of the weaker Big 12 schools — with decades of tradition in big-time athletics (including football, unlike Temple) — be tossed out through no fault of their own?”
I don’t see that as much of a risk. TX, OK, KS and IA all have schools that would be in the P4. That leaves only WV to fully complain. Besides, making wise additions isn’t something the feds should punish. Kicking someone out would be more likely to draw scrutiny.
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And risk increased federal scrutiny if several of the weaker Big 12 schools — with decades of tradition in big-time athletics (including football, unlike Temple) — be tossed out through no fault of their own?
There is no legal right to be in a power conference. I do think the potential for Congressional scrutiny is the reason why the playoff system is designed so that literally any FBS school could make it, even if the path for a non-P5 school is an arduous one, with no room for error. Giving them a microscopic chance is far better than designing the system to fully exclude them.
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http://www.doublet973.com/story/33449202/tech-talk-interview-dr-lawrence-schovanec
8 minute interview with Texas Tech president.
Said it wasn’t as much about Fox and ESPN as reported as they were ambivalent to 10/12/14, but did make a comment that the networks had a certain “level they wanted to provide.” Reporter didn’t followup (did that mean they told the Big 12 they would pay $X but no more)
Said Tech could support adding “some” of the schools, but everyone voted to stay at 10 (doesn’t contradict ESPN report that pro-expansion presidents could read the tea leaves).
Said ADs and coaches were strongly in favor of 10.
Mentions possible discussions and alliances with other leagues.
Candidly says nobody knows what will happen in 8 years.
Mentions 64 team power 5 and how its relation to NCAA is talked about.
Technology could dramatically affect things.
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Here is a Sporting News take on the Big 12 not expanding. http://www.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/news/byu-cincinnati-big-12-expansion-denied-cougars-college-football-week-8/h9z0p4pjmuvr16oilf2m14bxr
The author is a huge supporter of the Big 12 adding BYU and Cincinnati.
Interesting sentence:
It might be better than the SEC bringing in Texas A&M and Missouri. It’s definitely better than the Big Ten bringing in Maryland and Rutgers.
To me this is just another sports writer who does not understand expansion. The SEC expansion to Texas to get A & M was huge. The B1G stopped the ACC control of the East Coast and now largely owns the DC to NYC market.
Why would Cincinnati and BYU be better than those moves?
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Jersey Bernie,
“The author is a huge supporter of the Big 12 adding BYU and Cincinnati.”
Once he failed to mention the Honor Code issue, you knew he was clueless. He also didn’t mention the travel to UC or Nippert Stadium’s still small capacity. All he looked at was W/L in CFB and MBB lately. That’s not how presidents decide on expansion.
“To me this is just another sports writer who does not understand expansion. The SEC expansion to Texas to get A & M was huge. The B1G stopped the ACC control of the East Coast and now largely owns the DC to NYC market.”
It’s beyond not understanding, it’s delusional. The only move that would top getting TAMU is a move getting a king from a top recruiting state. Any conference would take TAMU and MO over BYU and UC without even pausing to think about it.
“Why would Cincinnati and BYU be better than those moves?”
It wouldn’t.
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The Sporting News Article was designed to stir up discussion. No one in their right minds thinks Cincinnati and BYU are better then A&M and Missouri. You can argue Houston would have been a better choice then Cincinnati and maybe BYU. Maryland and Rutgers are in the Big 10 so they can as mentioned blunt the ACC in the Northeast and actually be the Top Dog Conference in the NY Market. One thing about the Big 10 is they look far into the future, and although Rutgers sucks now, and it may take a Decade Rutgers will payoff in the long run. What killed Rutgers for a long time, was a lack of identity. Most people do not know even know that Rutgers is the State University Of New Jersey. Now although they are still in New Jersey, they are expanding their reach, as they become more and more part of the Big 10, and the New York TV Marke ( which their Home Campus is big part of ( unlike Connecticut. Sorry UConn you are not in Fairfield County)). they are finding their identity. They have to step up to the plate no more not caring if anyone knows who they are, and scheduling garbage games ( especially at the RAC ( Rutgers Athletic Center)). This match will be great for the Big 10 and Rutgers ( despite what the critics say). Rutgers will be better then any addition except perhaps A&M going forward.
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“No one in their right minds thinks Cincinnati and BYU are better then A&M and Missouri.”
Yes. BYU/UC or Houston/UC were marginal expansions, relative to either A&M/Mizzou or MD/Rutgers, with the only question being whether they were above or below the line.
But it being the Big12, with some and maybe all of the former SWC schools lined up demanding UH and the former Big8 schools reportedly lined up opposing UH, BYU/UC could be above the line for 6 schools, UH/UC above the line for 5 schools, and both end up short of 8 votes.
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The Sporting News Article was designed to stir up discussion.
True, but that could be said of most news articles; it still does not distinguish good ones from bad ones. You can stir up discussion while saying something that makes sense.
One thing about the Big 10 is they look far into the future, and although Rutgers sucks now, and it may take a Decade Rutgers will payoff in the long run.
The Big Ten can afford to look far into the future. The Big 12 is simply trying to figure out if it will still exist in 10 years.
What killed Rutgers for a long time, was a lack of identity.
I believe you have it backwards. The lack of an “identity” didn’t prevent Rutgers from being good at sports. Being bad at sports meant that no one outside the state paid attention to them. No one hands you an “identity”; you claim it by being doing things that are worthy of attention.
Until about 35 or 40 years ago, Rutgers was playing a pseudo Patriot League schedule. It takes a long time to build up a power football program out of nowhere. Rutgers’ first bowl appearance ever was in 1978. Their regular-season opponents that year were Penn State, Bucknell, Princeton, Yale, UConn, Villanova, Columbia, UMass, Temple, Holy Cross, and Colgate. (Remember, UConn and UMass weren’t I–A then.) They went 9–2 against that schedule, with losses to Penn State and Colgate.
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I really miss defense.
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You haven’t watched Michigan or Wisconsin or OSU play this year, it seems.
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Let’s look at the CFP contender pool. For now I’ll define it as all undefeated teams plus 1-loss P5 teams or independents. 2-loss P5 teams could come back into it later in the season.
14 current contenders (-0 from last week)
ACC (2):
0 losses – Clemson
1 loss – UL
B10 (3):
0 losses – MI, NE
1 loss – OSU
B12 (2):
0 losses – Baylor, WV
1 loss – none
P12 (2):
0 losses – UW
1 loss – Utah
SEC (3):
0 losses – AL
1 loss – UF, TAMU
Other (2):
0 losses – WMU, Boise
Top 2-loss options:
WI, TN, OU
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This scenario is not very likely, but it’s worth asking if an undefeated Baylor or WV would be chosen over a 1-loss team that won a CCG?
You can’t blame West Virginia for its non-conference scheduling: they played Missouri and BYU. When they planned it, that line-up probably looked good. Too bad neither team is having a particularly good year. (Their third non-con game was Youngstown State.) Baylor, of course, played its usual joke of a non-conference schedule: Northwestern State, SMU, and Rice.
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Marc Shepherd,
“This scenario is not very likely, but it’s worth asking if an undefeated Baylor or WV would be chosen over a 1-loss team that won a CCG?”
It depends on the 1-loss team and the conference (Utah would have the weakest argument right now). Only Baylor, WV and OU are ranked in the B12, so neither Baylor nor WV would have a great resume. Baylor scheduled 3 cupcakes OOC and would be punished more than WV for it. I think the committee will always favor an undefeated P5 champ over a 1-loss P5 champ for making the playoff, but the B12 champ would be the #4 seed (aka “fodder for AL”).
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 63
2. MI
3. Clemson – 1
4. UW
5. UL – top 1-loss team
6. Baylor
6. NE
8. OSU
9. WV
10. TAMU
Others of note:
11. WI – top 2-loss team
13. Boise – top G5 division leader
21. WMU – MACtion
By conference:
SEC – 6 = 43%
ACC – 6 = 43%
B10 – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
P12 – 3 = 25%
Other – 4 (Boise, WMU, Navy, UH)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 60
2. MI – 1
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. UL – top 1-loss team
6. OSU
7. NE
8. Baylor
9. TAMU
10. WV
Others of note:
11. WI – top 2-loss team
13. Boise – top G5 division leader
20. WMU – MACtion
24. PSU
By conference:
SEC – 6 = 43%
ACC – 5 = 36%
B10 – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
P12 – 3 = 25%
Other – 3 (Boise, WMU, Navy)
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Did Franklin save his job last night?
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I didn’t think last night was a must-win for Franklin. He needs to show improvement over two straight 7–6 campaigns, but he was on track to do that, even with a loss. Given the roster he inherited, I don’t think they were ready to fire him, unless the wheels came off in the second half of the season.
This is a program that hadn’t beaten a ranked team since 2013, and hadn’t beaten a top-10 team since 2008. That streak isn’t entirely on Franklin, but sooner or later he needed a signature win, and now he has one.
All of PSU’s remaining five games are winnable: @Purdue, Iowa, @Indiana, @Rutgers, MSU. Even a 3–2 finish would improve on last season. With the two toughest games being at home, 5–0 is not totally out of the question.
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From Sports business daily:
“Amid possible Big 12 expansion, ESPN “opted to restructure its deal, agreeing to pay the conference more money,” while Fox “decided to stand pat,” according to Smith & Ourand of SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. The result is that the Big 12 will “see a little more money from ESPN” — about $10M…”
10M/8yrs/10teams=125k/team yearly
Not quite the buyout price I’d anticipated. I guess some may be hidden in the still to be decided CCG price.
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Did they specify that it was $10M total and not $10M per year?
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Not a subscriber:
Matt Sarzyniak
Matt Sarzyniak – @mattsarz
@ArtDirectorBYU @theDudeofWV This one mentions the $10M. Another person mentions it was a total, not per year. https://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Issues/2016/10/24/Colleges/Big-12.aspx …
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17871778/fifth-big-ten-divisional-tiebreaker-now-overall-win-percentage
The B10 has removed the CFP rankings from the list of divisional tiebreakers due to how late the rankings come out during CCG week. The new #5 is overall W% with #6 a random draw. So if the B10 ever has a 3-way 8-1 tie in a division where the three went 1-1 round robin, it’ll either come down to OOC W% or a random draw.
I’d rather see the B10 use stats from the round robin games to eliminate the bottom team and then use head-to-head to determine the champ. Weight road games so a win = 1.25W and a loss = 0.75L (2 road games = 1.25-0.75, road win and home loss = 1.25-1.25, home win and road loss = 0.75-0.75, 2 home games = 0.75-1.25). If they all played 1 home and 1 away, then go to total MOV. If it’s still tied, then weight the PF and PA (1.25 x road pts scored and home pts allowed, 0.75 x road points allowed and home points scored) to find a weighted MOV.
OOC games should never be a factor in the conference race, and neither should random draws unless absolutely nothing else will work.
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OOC games should never be a factor in the conference race, and neither should random draws unless absolutely nothing else will work.
I agree. There is no equity in the scheduling of OOC games. I mean, imagine if Minnesota is one of the teams, in the year that Fresno State is their best OOC game.
Doesn’t the Committee have a metric it uses called “Strength of Record”? Even though we won’t have the actual CFP rankings, it would seem they could calculate this, and use it as a tie-breaker. Whatever its flaws, this stat would be a much better metric than a random draw — and probably a reasonable proxy for what the Committee would eventually do, if their rankings came out soon enough.
Brian’s suggestion is fine too — anything to avoid a random draw, which I think would be a PR disaster if it ever happened.
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I prefer the skilled execution of RoShamBo…
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Tweets from Greg Flugaur citing his source (BTM):
“OU made it known to UT they will not sign an extended GOR if it’s included in a bump in payouts from FOX/ESPN in return of no EXP”
…
“B10 & ESPN’s relationship is warming up…”
“B10 is working on possible angles to make ESPN happy in 2022/23 when B10 targets Texas”
…
“LHN is dead in the eyes of this current leadership in Texas.”
…
“More Concussion lawsuits are expected for the Big Ten Conference”
And some other tweets:
As our OU Contacts have told us since Spring of “15”…and again Saturday night…Oklahoma will not sign extended Big 12 GOR.
…
Oklahoma is serving as FOX’s proxy in B12 internal negotiations. Oklahoma & FOX interests continue to intertwine.
…
From Dude “If ESPN has bought its way out of pro rata clause but Fox hasn’t the door opens for the Big 12 to expand at the expense of Fox”
…
No..door is shut Dude. OU is FOX’s proxy. Expansion of Big 12 is over…you still don’t get it..
So even the twitterverse is saying expansion is over until the 2020s.
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“B10 & ESPN’s relationship is warming up…”
“B10 is working on possible angles to make ESPN happy in 2022/23 when B10 targets Texas”
Almost half of UT’s conference games are deadweight, as far as the Networks are concerned. I mean, what’s the market for UT vs. Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, or WV? In the Big Ten, they won’t play King vs. King every week, but I don’t think the league has a quartet of opponents as bad (for ratings) as those four.
In contrast, UT’s only guaranteed blockbuster in the B12 is OU. Other games could be a big deal, or not, depending on the standings in any given year, but OU is their only bankable game. It’s indicative of how far it’s fallen, that it was shown this year at 11am ET on FS1. Indiana at Ohio State at 3:30pm on ESPN out-rated it.
In the Big Ten, they’d be playing Nebraska annually, and at least one of Michigan, Ohio State, or Penn State. And that’s on top of Oklahoma, which I assume would remain on their schedule whether the Sooners get a B10 invite or not.
It’s probably not hard to get ESPN to warm up to that schedule.
“LHN is dead in the eyes of this current leadership in Texas.”
I’ve long suspected this would be the end result. The LHN contract goes through 2032, but at some point well before that, it may be apparent to all parties that it has failed. If so, they could tear up the contract, and replace it with an alternative that’s better for both sides.
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And while it is hardly against a football king, it has been reported (and posted on this board) that UT found it very important to play in NYC and Washington DC. The RU – UMd pair are a major attraction for UT.
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I wonder how you get UT to go to the NYC Area and the same for Washington/Baltimore as often as they like? Certainly bringing the Sooners along instead of the Jayhawks would help because UT wants to continue the Red River Rivalry, and bringing OU frees up a game for UT ( it also strengthens the Western Division).The BEST way I see it working is a 13 Game Schedule. A Hypothetical 11Game Conference Schedule for UT could be: 1: Illinois. 2: Indiana. 3: Iowa. 4: Minnesota. 5: Nebraska. 6: Northwestern. 7: Oklahoma. 8: Wisconsin. Rutgers or Maryland could be a permanent crossover game for UT. You could also have IU/PU, IL/OSU, Minn/UM crossovers. That would also give UT two non Conference Games.
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i did forget 2 Eastern teams playing UT. One in Austin and one away
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You get UT to NYC/DC area annually by either eliminating divisions entirely and giving UT RU and MD as protected rivals or simply placing the Longhorns in the Eastern Division.
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You get UT to NYC/DC area annually by either eliminating divisions entirely and giving UT RU and MD as protected rivals or simply placing the Longhorns in the Eastern Division.
As Brian noted (below), it is pretty hard to make it work with static divisions. Texas in the East would exacerbate a divisional split that is already very imbalanced. Texas in the West would make it very hard for them to play RU/MD with any decent frequency, unless everyone else’s goals are second to making the Longhorns happy. It would be a very poor start to the newly expanded league, if Texas has, or is perceived to have, a bunch of extra privileges. Inevitably, I think you have to eliminate divisions or implement rotating pods.
Even then, I am not sure you can get Texas to the East coast every single year without breaking something else, but you can get them there reasonably often. Two years out of four would be more than they have today.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Even then, I am not sure you can get Texas to the East coast every single year without breaking something else, but you can get them there reasonably often. Two years out of four would be more than they have today.”
You can’t get them there every year without locking them with both RU and UMD. But it they really want that much east coast access, they can use some OOC games to get it. They could play a big name team in a neutral-site game held in NYC or DC/Baltimore. They could play lesser teams in 2 for 1s with the road game in NYC or DC/Baltimore. About all they’ve done so far is play ND.
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I cannot imagine that RU and UMd would be very happy about locking in UT, to go along with Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State and maybe even Penn State if they come back for real (like they did last week). That is nuts.
There is no practical way to get UT to the east coast every year, or even every other year, unless the divisions are changed fairly dramatically. If it is UT plus OU, then presumably those two could be in a division with RU and UMd, Penn State and three other schools. There is no way that PSU (or RU or UMd) want to give up playing each other. Maybe Nebraska is thrown in there to renew its rivalries with UT and OU. That also puts all six “new schools” in one division.
I also agree that as attractive as UT might be, I am not sure that the B1G will be so accommodating that all schedules will be based around the Longhorns.
UT must want to go to DC and NYC not for recruiting territory, but for exposure in media major markets. They do not need northeastern recruiting territory.
The B1G is the only school where UT gets to play in the super major markets of NY, DC and Chicago. (And arguably Philly due to the PSU/South Jersey RU presence)
The PAC offers LA and SF, but that is not nearly the same. There is no way that the SEC or ACC provide competitive media exposure, if that is what UT wants.
Of course a lot of things can happen in the next seven or eight years.
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Marc:
“The LHN contract goes through 2032, but at some point well before that, it may be apparent to all parties that it has failed. If so, they could tear up the contract, and replace it with an alternative that’s better for both sides.”
What would that be? BTN is getting any joiner’s T3. P1?N – same. ACCN? ESPN owned but I doubt they’ll let UT get an unequal share. SECN – same.
UT has 15M reasons to continue the contract (unless they can be bought out at close to full price) until ’32. ESPN doesn’t have to bid on a Texas included B1G 16, P16, or (unlikely) 16 team SEC or ACC, which makes the LHN a good strategic expenditure for as long as possible.
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ccrider55,
The LHN contract goes through 2032, but at some point well before that, it may be apparent to all parties that it has failed. If so, they could tear up the contract, and replace it with an alternative that’s better for both sides.
“What would that be?”
Rebrand LHN as BTN-Texas? Get ESPN to pay off UT’s buy-in to BTN? Get to keep LHN as long as BTN gets first dibs on any games and it’s bundled with BTN by providers? In return ESPN gets out of the deal, perhaps at a discount or perhaps with something else (B10 inventory?)
“BTN is getting any joiner’s T3.”
Are they? Probably, but not necessarily right away.
“UT has 15M reasons to continue the contract (unless they can be bought out at close to full price) until ’32.”
BTN in TX at $1/month would yield at least $90M per year. There should be available cash to pay off the LHN deal even if the cable markets dies.
“ESPN doesn’t have to bid on a Texas included B1G 16, P16, or (unlikely) 16 team SEC or ACC, which makes the LHN a good strategic expenditure for as long as possible.”
They sort of do have to bid, though. They can’t really afford to let someone else have all of one of those conferences. Most likely they’ll continue to do splits with Fox and maybe others in the future.
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“Rebrand LHN as BTN-Texas?”
Are we going to dedicate a channel to PSU, UM, OSU, UNL, etc?
“Get ESPN to pay off UT’s buy-in to BTN?”
They are going to enable a 51% fox owned competitor network?
“Get to keep LHN as long as BTN gets first dibs on any games and it’s bundled with BTN by providers?”
You cool if Michigan and/or PSU start and keep theirs? How does Iowa, Illinois, Minn, etc feel about that?
“BTN in TX at $1/month would yield at least $90M per year. There should be available cash to pay off the LHN deal …”
Or ESPN could pay their own debts, or UT could forgive the debt (assuming ESPN is cool with B12 going away and doesn’t enforce the contract) and join as an equal member after the buy in.
When
“They sort of do have to bid, though.”
Not until UT joins one of them.
“They can’t really afford to let someone else have all of one of those conferences.”
Which of the (future) P4 conferences do they not already broadcast? ACCN and SECN (like the LHN) are both 100% ESPN owned. That’s where the mothership would most benefit. BTN is Fox and P12N independent. Where’s their incentive?
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ccrider55,
“Are we going to dedicate a channel to PSU, UM, OSU, UNL, etc?”
BTN could consider copying the P12 model, but my guess is OTT will replace that in the near future. But even if they don’t start other regionals, it would be a way to let the LHN deal expire that still helps the BTN. I wouldn’t let UT extend the deal unless other regionals are started.
“They are going to enable a 51% fox owned competitor network?”
The buy in has been about $100M for everyone so far. ESPN owes UT over $200M. If they can significantly reduce what they have to pay, it may be a wise business decision for them. BTN is already out there and successful. At some point cutting their losses may seem wise.
“You cool if Michigan and/or PSU start and keep theirs?”
As long as they don’t get priority over BTN for any games, yes. Why should I care if they show games that would be only available online otherwise? The money model would have to be a little different from LHN, but the idea of a dedicated network doesn’t bother me.
“How does Iowa, Illinois, Minn, etc feel about that?”
I don’t know, but I could see them as part of regionals as well. Don’t just let the big boys have them, but include some smaller brands in each one (Here’s a sample 4 region plan – OSU, IN & PU; PSU, RU & UMD; MI, MSU, NW & IL; NE, WI, IA & MN).
“Or ESPN could pay their own debts,”
You asked earlier why ESPN would agree to help out BTN. BTN helping to cover what they owe UT would be a decent reason.
“or UT could forgive the debt (assuming ESPN is cool with B12 going away and doesn’t enforce the contract) and join as an equal member after the buy in.”
Why would UT forgive the debt if they can get someone to agree to cover it (at least partially)? UT knows that they are coveted and they would try to leverage that for the best possible deal for themselves.
“Not until UT joins one of them.”
Obviously. But ESPN can’t prevent that from happening.
“Which of the (future) P4 conferences do they not already broadcast?”
If they didn’t bid on the future home of UT, that one.
“ACCN and SECN (like the LHN) are both 100% ESPN owned. That’s where the mothership would most benefit. BTN is Fox and P12N independent. Where’s their incentive?”
$$$. They can’t really control where UT goes. If the president and BoT decide the B10 or the P12 is the right home for the university, ESPN will just have to deal with it. The new conference and ESPN (and maybe Fox) would then have to negotiate what to do with LHN.
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Brian:
“Obviously. But ESPN can’t prevent that from happening.”
They can until ’32. And potentially save 100-200M each year. Not in total, yearly.
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ccrider55,
“They can until ’32. And potentially save 100-200M each year. Not in total, yearly.”
They can’t stop UT from changing conferences. They can insist on upholding the LHN contract. Those are very different things.
And I really don’t buy that they could save that much annually when you consider everything. Are you subtracting the savings from paying the B12? What about potentially paying less or nothing instead of the $15M for LHN? Yes they’d have to pay the B10 more, but so would Fox assuming they keep splitting the deal.
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“Obviously. But ESPN can’t prevent that from happening.”
They can until ’32. And potentially save 100-200M each year. Not in total, yearly.
You are ignoring the revenue side. Yeah, they’d pay less for the status quo. They’d also be paying for a lot of dog-food games that don’t attract a lot of viewers.
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Brian:
Yes, it’s a balancing act. However if aggregating assets didn’t create increased value of individuals within the group we’d have a hundred something independents. As we haven’t seen any actual moves toward dissolving the LHN by either side (muttering and grousings not withstanding), it’s not a stretch to say it’s serving a purpose.
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Yes, it’s a balancing act. However if aggregating assets didn’t create increased value of individuals within the group we’d have a hundred something independents. As we haven’t seen any actual moves toward dissolving the LHN by either side (muttering and grousings not withstanding), it’s not a stretch to say it’s serving a purpose.
Until the GOR approaches expiration, what could they do? The GOR means that even if a better option exists, they can’t seriously consider it.
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” They’d also be paying for a lot of dog-food games that don’t attract a lot of viewers.”
It’s the games they are paying for now…? Aren’t they? What am I missing?
Repost in right place…
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ccrider55,
“Yes, it’s a balancing act. However if aggregating assets didn’t create increased value of individuals within the group we’d have a hundred something independents.”
Yes, but you seem to be neglecting that they could stop paying for some teams while paying others more in this scenario. Paying 50 teams $20M is no different from paying 40 teams $25M, is it? If it gets the network equal or better games and ratings, consolidation for the same cost doesn’t hurt them at all.
“As we haven’t seen any actual moves toward dissolving the LHN by either side (muttering and grousings not withstanding), it’s not a stretch to say it’s serving a purpose.”
It’s serving a purpose now, but that doesn’t mean it’s the best way to serve that purpose or that priorities won’t change. If LHN holds UT back from something they want more, then they’ll consider renegotiating. If ESPN thinks they could cut their losses or make larger gains elsewhere, then they’ll consider renegotiating. Both sides need to be unhappy and there has to be an alternative both prefer. When the B12 GoR expires, those conditions might occur.
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ccrider55,
“It’s the games they are paying for now…? Aren’t they? What am I missing?”
I think his point is that if the end result gets them better games, it would be worth paying more. Combine that with not having to pay the schools that get left behind and it can make good financial sense to do it.
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If you leave very many schools behind some of the upper middle will lose some status as they loose more. Plus, leaving enough behind risks their joining and forming a reasonably viable, if not fully equal competitive alternative conference that would draw some media attention.
There is a reason we’ve never actually booted a school, and only lost a few as the number of top D1 conferences has shrunk. The lesser are essential for the group at the top as opponents, and as frames of reference.
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ccrider55,
“If you leave very many schools behind some of the upper middle will lose some status as they loose more.”
The B12 schools wouldn’t disappear, just drop to G5 status.
“Plus, leaving enough behind risks their joining and forming a reasonably viable, if not fully equal competitive alternative conference that would draw some media attention.”
The entire AAC makes less per year from TV ($18M) than any single member of a P5 conference. Every P5 CCG is worth more than the annual AAC payout.
“There is a reason we’ve never actually booted a school, and only lost a few as the number of top D1 conferences has shrunk. The lesser are essential for the group at the top as opponents, and as frames of reference.”
There are also specifics reason that schools get added to P5 conferences. Many of the current B12 members don’t have anything the other P5’s want. If UT and OU leave the B12, some/many of the B12 members will be left behind.
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Brian:
Agreed. My point was simply regarding “better” games. Too many better games will mean more losses. Going to 9 conf games plus a mandated P5 will add a few. If 50-80% of B12 is relegated that will cause more tough conf games for the joined conference(s), and increase the strength of some ooc games.
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ccrider55,
“Agreed. My point was simply regarding “better” games. Too many better games will mean more losses.”
Yes, you can’t have everyone be kings. But a better game for TV can also mean an equally bad team but in a bigger market so the ratings are better.
“If 50-80% of B12 is relegated that will cause more tough conf games for the joined conference(s), and increase the strength of some ooc games.”
It will do that, certainly. The trade-off is more playoff appearances and major bowls for the conference as well as more money.
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UT has 15M reasons to continue the contract (unless they can be bought out at close to full price) until ’32.
If you’re UT, you calculate the present value all of your media deals in both leagues. Let’s say that, by 2025, the Big Ten will be distributing as much money per school, or more, as the Big 12’s distribution plus the LHN’s $15 million. On top of that, the LHN’s $15 million per year ends in 2032, and everyone knows it won’t continue at that price. The Big Ten’s media deals have no such end date.
I believe UT is sophisticated enough to understand that you don’t cling to $15 million a year that ends in 2032, if someone is offering you a better deal that has no end date.
Now, I realize that there are many intangibles on both sides of the ledger, beyond the mere present value of the media properties. But it is not difficult at all to imagine a scenario where it’s in UT’s financial interest to let go of the LHN, if they get an overall better deal in its stead.
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“But it is not difficult at all to imagine a scenario where it’s in UT’s financial interest to let go of the LHN…”
But you have to take both parties interest. When a scenario is in their UT’s financial interest to let go, it’s in ESPN’s interest to enforce current contract (and vice versa).
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But you have to take both parties interest. When a scenario is in their UT’s financial interest to let go, it’s in ESPN’s interest to enforce current contract (and vice versa).
You can have a contract where both sides are losers. ESPN is unhappy, because they overpaid. UT is unhappy, because they know it isn’t going to endure.
In this scenario, ESPN would pay more, but they wouldn’t mind, because they’d get games with much larger audiences. UT would give up the LHN, but they wouldn’t mind, because they’d get paid more, and wouldn’t have to worry about it going away in 2032.
Let me stipulate that this is not a prediction per se, just an illustration of what I can very easily believe will happen.
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“ESPN is unhappy, because they overpaid.”
Did they? The B1G upcoming contract is what, 400-450M/yr. 2011 estimate by a media source when asked was the P16 deal would have been above that – half a decade ago. 15M/yr to delay that kind of bargaining power from the B1G in current and future negotiations is money well spent.
“UT is unhappy, because they know it isn’t going to endure.”
That was their choice. And they are still cashing the checks…
“Let me stipulate that this is not a prediction per se, just an illustration of what I can very easily believe will happen.”
I understand, but disagree about the ease. You need to have it be in everyone’s best interest. UT, ESPN obviously, but also Fox and the member schools of the B1G need to benefit. That is difficult when they have directly competing interests. What is a benefit for one is a cost for another.
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“ESPN is unhappy, because they overpaid.”
Did they?
For argument’s sake, I am taking as given what multiple media have reported, i.e., that both sides consider the LHN a failure. If they don’t actually believe that, of course, that makes the discussion moot.
“UT is unhappy, because they know it isn’t going to endure.”
That was their choice. And they are still cashing the checks…
All contracts involve a bet on the future. It is not terribly uncommon to realize, after the passage of time, that you bet wrong.
I think it is fair to guess that UT believed they were creating an enduring asset, which (like most sports media properties) would be renewed in 2032 for a lot more than when they started. If that is no longer true, it would obviously affect their bargaining position. How could it not?
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ccrider55,
“Did they?”
Yes, by all accounts they did.
“The B1G upcoming contract is what, 400-450M/yr. 2011 estimate by a media source when asked was the P16 deal would have been above that – half a decade ago. 15M/yr to delay that kind of bargaining power from the B1G in current and future negotiations is money well spent.”
But if you’re playing that game, you also need to factor in that they could stop paying the B12 at the current rate. Basically they’d just be paying for UT and OU, not for Baylor, ISU, LSU, KU, etc. Would the B10 deal increase so much that new B10 > old B10 + B12 + LHN? I doubt it.
“That was their choice. And they are still cashing the checks…”
Yes, but if you know the checks will stop coming on a certain date, then you start planning for the future as that date approaches.
“I understand, but disagree about the ease. You need to have it be in everyone’s best interest.”
It doesn’t have to be in their best interest, it just has to be the best available option. Sometimes you have to pick the least distasteful outcome.
“UT, ESPN obviously, but also Fox and the member schools of the B1G need to benefit.”
There are many non-financial considerations for UT and the B10 in terms of benefits. ESPN and Fox also have some but they’ll clearly focus more on the bottom line.
“That is difficult when they have directly competing interests. What is a benefit for one is a cost for another.”
ESPN and Fox are reaching a point where everything is a trade off. Any new inventory they add means they need to drop something else. ESPN may benefit from having UT and OU in the B10 because they don’t have to pay or show the smaller B12 schools as much. Add in cutting their losses on LHN so they can afford to keep the ACC happy and it may work out for them just fine.
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““Did they?”
Yes, by all accounts they did.”
By all accounts meaning strictly LHN income and carriage? If the goal was a conference realignment vaccine it is working very well.
“Sometimes you have to pick the least distasteful outcome.”
A conference like the B1G doesn’t “have” to make a least distasteful decision. I thought you were a proponent of “sometimes the best move is no move” philosophy?
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ccrider55,
“By all accounts meaning strictly LHN income and carriage? If the goal was a conference realignment vaccine it is working very well.”
I believe they could’ve offered UT less and for a shorter time period and still gotten the deal, so they overpaid. UT has said they cared about the exposure much more than the money.
“A conference like the B1G doesn’t “have” to make a least distasteful decision.”
I was speaking in terms of ESPN making a decision.
“I thought you were a proponent of “sometimes the best move is no move” philosophy?”
I am. I don’t want further B10 expansion (or any expansion). The only time I’d want the B10 to add UT and OU is if the alternative was them joining the SEC instead.
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” They’d also be paying for a lot of dog-food games that don’t attract a lot of viewers.”
It’s the games they are paying for now…? Aren’t they? What am I missing?
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Marc Shepherd,
“Almost half of UT’s conference games are deadweight, as far as the Networks are concerned. I mean, what’s the market for UT vs. Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, or WV? In the Big Ten, they won’t play King vs. King every week, but I don’t think the league has a quartet of opponents as bad (for ratings) as those four.”
PU, IL, IN and RU? Would MN, NW or UMD be much of a draw for UT fans (solid programs, but far away and not big brands)?
“In contrast, UT’s only guaranteed blockbuster in the B12 is OU. Other games could be a big deal, or not, depending on the standings in any given year, but OU is their only bankable game. It’s indicative of how far it’s fallen, that it was shown this year at 11am ET on FS1. Indiana at Ohio State at 3:30pm on ESPN out-rated it.”
This is the price the B12 pays for having 2 networks sharing their inventory. Fox had first choice and took this game. They out it on FS1 to try to build the network. The B10 is going to face the same issues going forward except for probably having more games protected from FS1 treatment (top pick must be on broadcast perhaps).
“In the Big Ten, they’d be playing Nebraska annually, and at least one of Michigan, Ohio State, or Penn State. And that’s on top of Oklahoma, which I assume would remain on their schedule whether the Sooners get a B10 invite or not.”
Divisions:
W – UT, OU, NE, WI, IA, MN, NW, IL
E – OSU, MI, PSU, MSU, UMD, IN, PU, RU
9 games = 7 in division + 2 crossovers (25% play)
You could split each division into 2 tiers of 4 and rotate the schedule so everyone plays one top tier and one lower tier team.
Or maybe use tiers to recreate parity-based scheduling.
E1 – OSU, MI, PSU
E2 – MSU, UMD, IN, PU, RU
W1 – UT, OU, NE
W2 – WI, IA, MN, NW, IL
9 games for UT = 7 in the W + 1 E1 (33%) + 1 E2 (20%)
9 games for IL = 7 in the W + 1 E1 (20%) + 1 E2 (28%)
9 games for OSU = 7 in the E + 1 W1 (33%) + 1 W2 (20%)
9 games for PU = 7 in the W + 1 E1 (20%) + 1 E2 (28%)
Those percentages drive us back to the preference for dropping divisions and scheduling as 1 big group with a few locked rivals instead.
9 games = 3 locked + 6 rotating through the other 12 (50%)
Or use the above tiers as pods, rotating E2 and W2 every 2 years. E1 plays 2 of W1 and E2 plays 2 of W2 for crossovers.
“It’s probably not hard to get ESPN to warm up to that schedule.”
Anything that gets them out of the LHN would delight them.
“I’ve long suspected this would be the end result. The LHN contract goes through 2032, but at some point well before that, it may be apparent to all parties that it has failed. If so, they could tear up the contract, and replace it with an alternative that’s better for both sides.”
UT would give up on that money, though. Maybe if it’s mixed into the overall B10 deal ESPN wouldn’t feel so bad about it. Perhaps ESPN would pay UT’s BTN buy-in with half that money while UT keeps getting it’s other half to give to academics?
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I mean, what’s the market for UT vs. Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, or WV? In the Big Ten, they won’t play King vs. King every week, but I don’t think the league has a quartet of opponents as bad (for ratings) as those four.”
PU, IL, IN and RU? Would MN, NW or UMD be much of a draw for UT fans (solid programs, but far away and not big brands)?
I posit that UT would find it more useful to play in Chicago, NY Metro, or DC Metro, than at the Big 12 sites that I mentioned, even though the programs themselves are obviously not big brands. Minnesota, Illinois, and Indiana are more populous states than Kansas, Iowa, and West Virginia; by virtue of that fact alone, if no other, those games would probably draw larger audiences.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I posit that UT would find it more useful to play in Chicago, NY Metro, or DC Metro, than at the Big 12 sites that I mentioned, even though the programs themselves are obviously not big brands. Minnesota, Illinois, and Indiana are more populous states than Kansas, Iowa, and West Virginia; by virtue of that fact alone, if no other, those games would probably draw larger audiences.”
You were talking from the networks’ perspective. I can see benefits for UT playing in those markets, but the ratings for the bottom B10 teams are not high.
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Let’s say for argument’s sake the Big 10 takes UT and OU, I wonder if the Big 10 would be willing to let UT keep the LHN Network say for one football game and 2 basketball games per year and in return BTN gets Texas carriage and when the contract ends, LHN gets folded into BTN? Keep in mind, Johns Hopkins is keeping their ESPN Contract for lacrosse & Notre Dame their NBCSN Contract for hockey. For this to work, the Big 10 has to provide games that the Networks want. From a Penn State perspective you could lock in Wisconsin ( always a great game) and do home and home with OU, UT and Nebraska over 6 years OSU could do the same with Illinois, and Michigan with Minnesota. I guarantee that PSU/Nebraska, OSU/OU and UM/UT for 2 years ( then switching) is compelling games. As for the other Big 10 Games, Maybe Nebraska ( who likes and recruits in the Northeast) gets Rutgers, and Texas gets Maryland. The others can be divided say Iowa/ Michigan State and Oklahoma/Northwestern?
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“Let’s say for argument’s sake the Big 10 takes UT and OU…”
I’d rather not, but ok.
“I wonder if the Big 10 would be willing to let UT keep the LHN Network say for one football game and 2 basketball games per year…”
It’s ESPN’s network. You’d be forcing fox to forfeit inventory for ESPN’s benefit…
“…and in return BTN gets Texas carriage…”
Carriage? How when the LHN is still there and carrying the inventory that drives it.
“…and when the contract ends, LHN gets folded into BTN?”
Why not just wait until then? UT would still need to buy in. The network and infrastructure is ESPN owned, not UT’s to “fold” how they choose.
That’s the misunderstanding about the various nets. ACCN, SECN, and LHN are simply media rights deals like T1, with a dedicated channels (much as contracts requiring a certain number of games to be on ABC, big Fox, ESPN, etc). Ihey are simply contracts with a media company. BTN in part, and P12N in whole are property of the schools in their conference.
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Let’s say for argument’s sake the Big 10 takes UT and OU, I wonder if the Big 10 would be willing to let UT keep the LHN Network say for one football game and 2 basketball games per year and in return BTN gets Texas carriage and when the contract ends, LHN gets folded into BTN?
I can’t comment on the legal calisthenics that would be required to make this happen.
Philosophically, the Big Ten needs to decide how far it will bend over backwards to get Texas. The Big 12 is not an “all share all” league, and there’s a perception this has hurt them. The Big Ten doesn’t want to compromise their structure, just to get a prima donna in the room.
I am thinking, as you are, that any accommodation of the LHN would need to be short-term. The end state would need to be a model where Texas is on the same terms as every other Big Ten school. Now, would all of the various parties agree to what you’ve described? Or is that giving too much of the store away? I just don’t know.
Keep in mind, Johns Hopkins is keeping their ESPN Contract for lacrosse & Notre Dame their NBCSN Contract for hockey.
Those cases are readily distinguishable. There was never a scenario where the Big Ten would televise every JHU home lacrosse game, or every ND home hockey game. So, they might as well allow those deals to persist. Big Ten teams get another media outlet, and there is still more inventory in those sports than BTN knows what to do with. As affiliate members, JHU and ND aren’t buying into BTN, and enjoy none of its benefits.
Beyond that, the Big Ten made those deals to rectify clear weaknesses. Without JHU, they couldn’t have played men’s lacrosse at all, and the Big Ten’s nascent hockey league was considered fairly weak. Affiliation deals are always one-offs, and don’t really affect the conference’s culture very much.
In the revenue sports, the Big Ten would naturally prefer to get stronger (who wouldn’t?), but they are not operating from a position of fundamental weakness. They are going to be a lot more careful about admitting Texas on terms not available to the legacy members, just to accommodate a school whose “me, me, me” attitude has brought the Big 12 to the brink of dissolution.
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ccrider55,
“It’s ESPN’s network. You’d be forcing fox to forfeit inventory for ESPN’s benefit…”
Not quite. The move still adds inventory to BTN. Besides, what if the LHN and BTN could both show the game? LHN would provide homer announcers while BTN would be more neutral.
“Carriage? How when the LHN is still there and carrying the inventory that drives it.”
Because BTN would have the rest of the UT inventory.
“Why not just wait until then?”
Because that leaves UT in limbo, so they may feel compelled to sign some other deal. The B12 deal ends in 2025. The LHN deal lasts until 2032. Why not add the value of UT to the B10 now and pick up the residual value later rather than putting it all off and hoping UT doesn’t end up elsewhere?
“UT would still need to buy in.”
In some way, shape or form, yes.
“The network and infrastructure is ESPN owned, not UT’s to “fold” how they choose.”
All deals are negotiable.
“That’s the misunderstanding about the various nets. ACCN, SECN, and LHN are simply media rights deals like T1, with a dedicated channels (much as contracts requiring a certain number of games to be on ABC, big Fox, ESPN, etc). Ihey are simply contracts with a media company.”
1. You really think we don’t understand that here?
2. All contracts are negotiable. All of them.
“BTN in part, and P12N in whole are property of the schools in their conference.”
Yes, but that’s just a different contract. There’s no fundamental difference between a media company owning something a a consortium of universities owning something. Ownership is ownership.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Philosophically, the Big Ten needs to decide how far it will bend over backwards to get Texas. The Big 12 is not an “all share all” league, and there’s a perception this has hurt them.”
I think this perception is a touch overblown. The B12 switched to equal revenue distribution a while ago. The difference is that tier 3 rights are owned by the B12 while they are owned by all the other conferences. So yes, UT makes more from their tier 3 rights than ISU while OSU and PU get equal shares from BTN. But a much bigger difference can be found in ticket sales revenue and no conference shares that equally. OSU made $56M on ticket sales last year while PU made $11M. There is no such thing as an “all share all” league. But all the P5 leagues now share all conference-owned media rights equally.
“I am thinking, as you are, that any accommodation of the LHN would need to be short-term.”
Yes. It might have to happen for legal reasons. You shouldn’t reject the concept of adding UT over a relatively minor item like this. What’s 7 years of the LHN versus having UT in the B10 for 100 years?
“The end state would need to be a model where Texas is on the same terms as every other Big Ten school.”
Agreed.
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““The end state would need to be a model where Texas is on the same terms as every other Big Ten school.”
Agreed.”
Hard to end there if you’re not even able to start there.
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Brian:
“1. You really think we don’t understand that here?”
No, but people keep talking about what it takes to getUT to give up/fold what isn’t theirs. As long as it serves ESPN it doesn’t matter what UT wants until ’32.
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““The end state would need to be a model where Texas is on the same terms as every other Big Ten school.”
Agreed.”
Hard to end there if you’re not even able to start there.
Of course you can. Nebraska, Maryland, and Rutgers did not get equal shares, to begin with; furthermore, their buy-ins all occurred on different schedules. The league even gave Maryland special dispensation, to help them out with their ACC exit fee.
There’s no reason, fundamentally, why UT’s phase-in could not feature a gradual phase-out of the LHN, as long as the end state is equality in a reasonable number of years.
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Marc:
You’re talking about differing valuations respective to when buy in started, and terms of loans that will be paid back.
Have we found an issue where the PAC holds to a more principled position?
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You’re talking about differing valuations respective to when buy in started, and terms of loans that will be paid back.
Have we found an issue where the PAC holds to a more principled position?
As I understand it, UT told the PAC that: 1) It wanted its own network, which it would not share; and 2) That would be the permanent state of affairs. The PAC said no. I am pretty sure the B10 would say no, too.
We are talking now about a transitional period, after which UT would be a B10 member on the same terms as every other member. We could argue all day about whether all the parties would agree to that. But there is no argument that it’s the same arrangement that the PAC declined. That deal (had they accepted) was not transitional, as this one would be.
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The PAC deal was ALL rights in to join. True, there was not yet a LHN, and I can’t be sure if they’d do a transition deal as you’re suggesting. My point is that ESPN is a co-decision maker in something like this. Other than UT ending up in a ESPN conference (ACC, SEC) I don’t see them benefiting long or short term by enabling further conference consolidation.
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ccrider55,
“Hard to end there if you’re not even able to start there.”
Not at all. NE, RU and UMD all didn’t start even and will end there. They agreed to 6 years of buy in and then will get equal shares. Understanding that an existing deal prevents UT from entering the same way as everyone else, it’s not that hard to have a temporary plan for those 7 years (if the deal can’t be bought out) that changes once the LHN deal ends.
My guess is that the deal would be bought out in some form or fashion, though.
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ccrider55,
“No, but people keep talking about what it takes to getUT to give up/fold what isn’t theirs.”
People say that because they believe UT wants the LHN deal more than ESPN does at this point. If given an out on the $200M+ they still owe UT, many believe ESPN would take it in a heartbeat.
“As long as it serves ESPN it doesn’t matter what UT wants until ’32.”
Unless something else will serve ESPN better. We just saw Fox and ESPN basically threaten the B12 not to invoke the pro rata clause although the B12 had the legal right to do so. This would be swapping roles with UT telling ESPN they should agree to an ending of the LHN deal. It’s not like ESPN wants LHN on principle, so you can always find a financial way to get out of the deal.
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My point is that ESPN is a co-decision maker in something like this. Other than UT ending up in a ESPN conference (ACC, SEC) I don’t see them benefiting long or short term by enabling further conference consolidation.
What Brian and I are trying to say, is that once you get to 2025, there are only 7 years left. That’s a short enough time that both parties will be thinking, “What is the landscape after 2032?”
I have not found a single article which suggests ESPN is happy with the deal it made, which (if true) means it is unlikely to be renewed in its present form, and they’d probably be happy to entertain discussions about abandoning it, as long as they make more money out of whatever structure replaces it.
Seven years is a pretty short time in the sports rights business. It will be better to negotiate in 2025, when they still have some leverage, than to stick their heads in the sand until 2032, when they’ll have none.
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Locked 1 Locked 2 Locked 3
Texas Oklahoma Maryland Illinois
Oklahoma Texas Penn State Nebraska
Nebraska Rutgers Iowa Oklahoma
Minnesota Iowa Wisconsin Michigan
Iowa Minnesota Wisconsin Nebraska
Wisconsin Minnesota Iowa Illinois
Illinois Northwestern Wisconsin Texas
Northwestern Illinois Michigan State Purdue
Purdue Indiana Ohio State Northwestern
Indiana Purdue Michigan State Ohio State
Michigan Ste Indiana Michigan Northwestern
Michigan Ohio State Michigan State Minnesota
Ohio State Michigan Indiana Purdue
Penn State Maryland Rutgers Oklahoma
Maryland Penn State Texas Rutgers
Rutgers Nebraska Penn State Maryland
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School is the first of 4 in each row, then read as their locked rival #1, lr #2, lr #3
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Some of those pairings are awfully ugly. You’re giving Ohio State the “gift” of one locked king and two locked patsies, while Oklahoma gets three locked kings. You’re locking Nebraska with Rutgers, a pairing desired by neither school (nor the rest of the league that wants more frequent NY-metro appearances).
This is why I am pretty sure the “lock three” formula would not be adopted. There’s no way to do it without producing pairings that make no sense (Nebraska–Rutgers) or are blatantly unfair (the Ohio State / Oklahoma imbalance). The other problem with eliminating divisions, is the possibility that a team goes 9–0 while missing all of the kings on its schedule.
Brian’s pods are better:
E1 – OSU, MI, PSU
E2 – MSU, UMD, IN, PU, RU
W1 – UT, OU, NE
W2 – WI, MN, IA, NW, IL
Every two years, E2 and W2 switch places. You would need to lock MI–MSU when W1 is paired with E2. Maybe there are a few others you treat similarly, like NE–IA, PSU with at least one of RU/MD. But it doesn’t have as much cruft as the “lock three” plan, and nobody can reach the CCG without playing their share of the kings.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Some of those pairings are awfully ugly. You’re giving Ohio State the “gift” of one locked king and two locked patsies, while Oklahoma gets three locked kings. You’re locking Nebraska with Rutgers, a pairing desired by neither school (nor the rest of the league that wants more frequent NY-metro appearances).”
His choices are perhaps less than ideal. That doesn’t invalidate the concept, though.
“This is why I am pretty sure the “lock three” formula would not be adopted. There’s no way to do it without producing pairings that make no sense (Nebraska–Rutgers) or are blatantly unfair (the Ohio State / Oklahoma imbalance).”
I think one could do a pretty good job if they follow these simple steps:
1. Have each school submit an ordered list of the other B10 schools with a value assigned to each opponent. It’s fairly simple for a computer to then produce the maximum total point value with 3 locked rivals per school. Since we can’t do that, we have to substitute what the B10 has said is important and what we think the schools want.
2. Start by locking all the obviously important rivalries.
3. Add in lesser rivalries and important objectives next.
4. Fill in the remaining spots.
Example:
Step 2 (obvious)
UT – OU,
OU – UT, NE,
NE – OU,
IA – WI, MN,
WI – IA, MN,
MN – IA, WI,
NW – IL,
IL – NW,
PU – IN,
IN – PU,
OSU – MI,
MI – OSU, MSU,
MSU – MI,
PSU –
RU –
UMD –
Step 3 (fairly clear)
UT – OU, NE,
OU – UT, NE,
NE – OU, IA, UT
IA – WI, MN, NE
WI – IA, MN,
MN – IA, WI,
NW – IL, MSU,
IL – NW, OSU, PU
PU – IN, IL,
IN – PU, MSU,
OSU – MI, IL, PSU
MI – OSU, MSU,
MSU – MI, NW, IN
PSU – RU, UMD, OSU
RU – PSU, UMD,
UMD – PSU, RU,
Step 4 (arguable)
UT – OU, NE, UMD
OU – UT, NE, PU
NE – OU, IA, UT
IA – WI, MN, NE
WI – IA, MN, NW
MN – IA, WI, IN
NW – IL, MSU, WI
IL – NW, OSU, PU
PU – IN, IL, OU
IN – PU, MSU, MN
OSU – MI, IL, PSU
MI – OSU, MSU, RU
MSU – MI, NW, IN
PSU – RU, UMD, OSU
RU – PSU, UMD, MI
UMD – PSU, RU, UT
Those aren’t terrible, especially when you remember they’d play everyone else 50% of the time so imbalance in SOS averages out to a large extent.
“The other problem with eliminating divisions, is the possibility that a team goes 9–0 while missing all of the kings on its schedule.”
There would be 6 kings among 16 teams. My locked rivals list leaves only 5 teams without a locked king. For those 5 teams, they have 6 games to spread among 12 teams that includes 6 kings. While theoretically possible to avoid all 6, all the B10 would need to do is pair schools for scheduling purposes (1 from top 8 and 1 from bottom 8) to guarantee nobody avoids all the kings.
“Brian’s pods are better:”
Woo hoo!
“But it doesn’t have as much cruft as the “lock three” plan, and nobody can reach the CCG without playing their share of the kings.”
I think smart scheduling would avoid that either way. The locked 3 plan has the advantage of simplicity for the fans to understand, too.
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The locked 3 plan has the advantage of simplicity for the fans to understand, too.
I think even the existing system is beyond what most fans understand. They get that you play everyone in your own division. But the average fan has no idea how the remaining 3 games are chosen.
Your 3-locked plan is much better than @urbanleftbehind’s, and yes, it is simple. But then, someone needs to explain to Oklahoma fans why they are stuck playing Purdue every year. In contrast, if you tell Oklahoma fans that their only locked games are Texas and Nebraska, they will get that. They won’t care that some schools have a different number of locked games. They will only care about themselves.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I think even the existing system is beyond what most fans understand. They get that you play everyone in your own division. But the average fan has no idea how the remaining 3 games are chosen.”
Perhaps because the B10 has never even tried to explain it. Most fans get it once you explain the parity-based schedule to them.
“Your 3-locked plan is much better than @urbanleftbehind’s, and yes, it is simple. But then, someone needs to explain to Oklahoma fans why they are stuck playing Purdue every year.”
Because they already had 2 locked kings so I gave them an easier game for balance. It also gets PU a locked king game.
“In contrast, if you tell Oklahoma fans that their only locked games are Texas and Nebraska, they will get that. They won’t care that some schools have a different number of locked games. They will only care about themselves.”
And you can do that, but it’s slightly more complicated.
Here’s are some options to better suit you:
1. You could stop after step 3 when 6 schools have 3 locked rivals and 10 only have 2 and rotate from there.
2. You do only part of step 4 (say locking MI and RU so RU gets a king and MI gets to their fan base in NYC) so it’s an 8 and 8 split. The 8 with 2 locked games rotate among themselves to get their 3rd game and then everyone rotates equally for the rest of the games.
3. You could get away with only 2 locked rivals except for PSU and maybe NE. If you can convince PSU that with 5 kings rotating through 50% of the time they don’t need OSU locked then everyone could stop at 2 locked rivals. That gives you the simplicity I want without any bad pairings locked. The math isn’t as nice though (9 = 2 * 100% + 13 * 54%).
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I really think down the line we are going to see 13 Game Schedules. Maybe 10 Conference Games: 7 in the Division. 1 locked in rivalry game and two crossover games plus 3 non Conference games. As a Penn State fan, we could be locked into Nebraska, Michigan State could do the same with Wisconsin, Ohio State/Illinois, Michigan/ Minnesota, Texas can start out with home and home with either Maryland or Rutgers and Oklahoma takes the other then switch. Purdue can take Iowa and Indiana Northwestern. Does that give us a tougher schedule? Yes, but we like playing Nebraska and Wisconsin annually so playing one or the other every year is not bad. Plus we want to be able to have 7 home games, Pitt on the schedule, and be able to play OU, UT and whichever School is not locked in UNL or UW on occasion.
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I was reading Frank’s Tweets and it looks the Big XII took chump change not to expand. In other words take as much money as we can get now because we will be taking a hit later on. Basically ISU, KSU, BU, TCU and WVA are rearranging boat chairs on the Titanic, while KU, OSU and. TT are hoping to join OU & UT in the lifeboat.
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David Brown,
“I really think down the line we are going to see 13 Game Schedules.”
I think that’s quite a ways off. The presidents don’t want to push the season into finals time and starting earlier is dangerous with the summer heat. Once they’ve gotten used to the playoff money and the arms race continues to drive up costs, maybe then the presidents would listen to the argument that only the CCG teams would be playing in that extra week so it shouldn’t have a huge impact on student-athletes (same concept as the NCG being a week later only impacts 2 teams).
I could see double-bye years turning into 13 game seasons the same way we went from 11 to 12. The after a few years the 13th game becomes permanent by pushing back CCGs. After all, Army and Navy already play that weekend.
“Maybe 10 Conference Games: 7 in the Division. 1 locked in rivalry game and two crossover games plus 3 non Conference games.”
The B10 and P12 would probably go to 10 conference games. The B12 can’t. The ACC and SEC would move to 9 conference games, but probably not 10.
With 14 teams:
1 group: 10 = 3 locked + 7 rotating (70%)
Divisions: 10 = 6 in division + 4 crossovers (57%)
With 16 teams:
1 group: 10 = 3 locked + 7 rotating (58%) = 5 locked + 5 rotating (50%)
Divisions: 10 = 7 in division + 3 crossovers (38%)
Pods of 4: 10 = 3 in pod + 7 rotating (58%)
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A hypothetical Penn State Schedule with Texas and Oklahoma ( or Kansas) might look like this: 1: Maryland. 2: Michigan. 3: Michigan State. 4: Ohio State. 5: Purdue. 6: Rutgers. 7: Indiana ( new). If we have the 9 Game Conference Schedule it would be rare that we face Nebraska or Wisconsin. I suspect that whatever system they come up ( pods included) we will be playing Maryland, Rutgers , Michigan State and Ohio State every year. The Terps and Scarlet Knights want us, the Big 10 loves to pair us up with Sparty and the closest to a hated rival we have is OSU, so I am sure Sandy Barbour and company will insist the Buckeyes remain on the Schedule. If the Big 10 goes to pods the School we may lose annually is Michigan. Obviously Ohio State will continue to play Michigan and Michigan will play State. So all the Eastern Heavyweights will play 2 heavyweights. We miss UM and vice versa same for OSU and MSU. To be honest I would not really complain about Michigan ( there has to be compromises) but in return I would like to see more of Nebraska or Wisconsin.
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David Brown,
“A hypothetical Penn State Schedule with Texas and Oklahoma ( or Kansas) might look like this: 1: Maryland. 2: Michigan. 3: Michigan State. 4: Ohio State. 5: Purdue. 6: Rutgers. 7: Indiana ( new).”
That would be the East division, yes. But PU would be the new one, not IN.
“If we have the 9 Game Conference Schedule it would be rare that we face Nebraska or Wisconsin.”
Why those 2 in particular? The B10 has always rotated schedules outside of locked games. You’d face them just as often as UT and OU.
“I suspect that whatever system they come up ( pods included) we will be playing Maryland, Rutgers , Michigan State and Ohio State every year. The Terps and Scarlet Knights want us, the Big 10 loves to pair us up with Sparty and the closest to a hated rival we have is OSU, so I am sure Sandy Barbour and company will insist the Buckeyes remain on the Schedule.”
UMD and RU, sure. OSU probably. The MSU game has always been a pairing of convenience so it will go away as soon as it isn’t useful. But if the system dropped to 2 locked games per school, PSU probably wouldn’t get OSU locked anymore as RU and UMD need that game more.
“If the Big 10 goes to pods the School we may lose annually is Michigan. Obviously Ohio State will continue to play Michigan and Michigan will play State. So all the Eastern Heavyweights will play 2 heavyweights. We miss UM and vice versa same for OSU and MSU. To be honest I would not really complain about Michigan ( there has to be compromises) but in return I would like to see more of Nebraska or Wisconsin.”
It all depends on the pods. The B10 really doesn’t work well for pods in my opinion because there are too many rivalries to neatly separate the schools and not lock multiple games.
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I don’t have a strong feeling about whether we will eventually get to 13 games, but I wonder if the other leagues would be in any hurry to help the Big Ten with its scheduling woes in a 16-team league.
Another intriguing question is whether other leagues would agree to allow the Big Ten to stage a CCG without divisions. Within the last year, the Big Ten led the charge to oppose relaxing that rule, when it was for other people’s convenience, but not its own. It would be interesting to see the debate, once the shoe is on the other foot.
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Well we know the ACC wanted it last time around, and if I recall correctly the ACC had a second vote from the P5 on their side as well so including the B1G that would be a majority of the P5 if the other votes stayed the same. Now perhaps they change their minds to get back at the Big Ten, but I see the locked three scenario happening at some point in time. You keep the most important yearly games, and the rest of the schools actually feel like they are in the same conference instead of not seeing each other on the schedule for years at a time.
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Yes indeed, it was the B12 that was partnered with the ACC on that rule change. For many months, both leagues claimed (in the media) that all the other leagues were for it. None of the other leagues actually said anything, either way, until Jim Delany led the charge to torpedo it at the eleventh hour.
In a peculiar last-minute compromise, they actually gave the B12 everything it wanted: they can stage a CCG with fewer than 12 teams; with or without divisions. The right to dispense with divisions was granted only to leagues with fewer than 12 teams. I never did understand how that particular exception served any regulatory purpose normally associated with the NCAA (e.g., amateurism, athlete safety, academic/athletic balance, competitive fairness). But somehow, they went ahead and did exactly that.
I believe they did so, because otherwise they would basically have been telling the B12: “expand, or live with a permanent disadvantage in the playoff rankings”. Of course, if the B12 had expanded, the G5 were going to be the victims. They were probably the ones who lobbied hard for that particular exception, which I am sure Jim Delany would have been just as happy not to allow, since he and the other P5 leagues are hoping to benefit from the B12’s instability at some point in the future.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/17885705/ncaa-calls-north-carolina-procedural-arguments-merit
The NCAA fires back at UNC’s claims of why the NCAA shouldn’t punish them.
The NCAA says the University of North Carolina’s argument that the governing body lacks jurisdiction in the school’s multiyear academic fraud scandal is “without merit.”
In a Sept. 19 filing released by the school Tuesday, the NCAA enforcement staff pushed back against the school’s procedural arguments in response to five serious charges by saying all the arguments lacked merit. UNC had argued that its accreditation agency — which put the school on a year of probation that expired over the summer — was the proper authority to handle such a matter instead of college sports’ governing body.
UNC also argued that there was an expired four-year statute of limitations and that a March 2012 ruling in an earlier case should have precluded some of the current charges.
In addition, the school said some material from an outside investigator’s report into academic irregularities on the Chapel Hill campus shouldn’t be used because interviews weren’t performed to NCAA protocols.
“Indeed, its response rests almost entirely on these procedural issues and touches only minimally on the underlying substantive facts,” the enforcement staff’s reply states.
After noting that many of the procedural issues had been addressed with the school previously, the documents states: “The parties explored each at length throughout this case and each is without merit.”
North Carolina is scheduled to appear before an infractions committee panel in Indianapolis on Friday in what amounts to a pretrial hearing. The focus will be the procedural arguments and not the facts of whether violations occurred, including lack of institutional control.
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http://www.jconline.com/story/sports/college/purdue/2016/10/11/glance-purdue-athletic-department-budget/91744464/
Some details on the finances at PU and the B10 payouts.
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Coaches pay.
http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/salaries/
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would this be like the merging of 1/2 the MWC and 1/2 the AAC into a 6th power conference?
http://www.ew.com/article/2016/10/25/australian-bachelor-couple-megan-marx-tiffany-scanlon
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We often talk about the top G5s combining (sometimes with the remainder of the B12). But can you really assemble a P5-level conference from those schools?
AAC – USF, UCF, Temple, UC, UConn, ECU, Navy, Memphis, Tulsa, UH, SMU, Tulane
MWC – Boise, WY, UNM, CSU, AF, USU, SDSU, HI, UNLV, SJSU, Fresno
B12 – KU, TT, OkSU, Baylor, TCU, KSU, ISU, WV
Ind. – BYU, Army, UMass
Top 50 in W% over the past 20 years (12):
2. Boise, 12. TCU, 19. BYU, 21. KSU, 25. WV, 31. TT, 32. OkSU, 35. UC, 38. AF, 41. Fresno, 44. Navy, 49. USF
Skipped G5s (4): 26. Marshall, 28. Toledo, 42. NIU, 45. USM
But a lot of that winning is due to weak schedules. How would they rank if they played a typical P5 schedule every season?
http://mcubed.net/ncaaf/teams/teams2.shtml
This link has average rankings for 1960-2015 for teams. Since I don’t want to do the work myself, I’ll use this as a surrogate.
Top teams:
18. Boise, 23. WV, 29. BYU, 37. TT, 40. OkSU, 45. UH, 55. SDSU, 60. AF, 63. USF, 66. Baylor, 70. TCU, 71. WY
P5 teams lower than that (12; 3 from B12):
72. IL, 73. UK, 76. KSU, 79. KU, 87. OrSU, 91. ISU, 92. WSU, 97. NW, 98. Duke, 105. IN, 110. Vandy, 116. WF
Quick stats for this new group compared to P5 conferences:
1. Top 10s
New – 0
P5 average – 1.8
2. Top 25s
New – 2
P5 average – 4.2
3. Top 50s
New – 6
P5 average – 7.6
Then look at what markets you might get. The top 5 combine to provide Salt Lake City as the only major market. Then you get into Houston, San Diego, Tampa and Dallas but all with secondary schools. I just don’t see how this coalition provides P5 status except if it’s grandfathered in as the B12, but to do that they’d have top further weaken it by keeping all the old B12 members.
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Historically, you can’t have a power conference without at least one powerful team. None of these schools has ever sniffed a national championship, except for Army (won it in a very different era) and BYU (a fluke year). It’s hard to imagine a sixth power league without an indisputably great anchor program.
The Big East was considered a “power league” because it once had Miami, which at the time was considered an elite program (it has fallen on hard times since). After the Hurricanes left for the ACC, everyone recognized that it was only a matter of time before the BE would be demoted — as it eventually was.
Top 50 in W% over the past 20 years (12):
2. Boise, 12. TCU, 19. BYU, 21. KSU, 25. WV, 31. TT, 32. OkSU, 35. UC, 38. AF, 41. Fresno, 44. Navy, 49. USF
Skipped G5s (4): 26. Marshall, 28. Toledo, 42. NIU, 45. USM
But a lot of that winning is due to weak schedules. How would they rank if they played a typical P5 schedule every season?
And conversely, would Kansas and Iowa State seem quite as bad, if they’d played a Mountain West schedule all these years?
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I certainly think it’s possible Kansas and Iowa State would suck in the Mountain West. In the case of KU it goes to hoops. Basketball is always going to be superior to football. It’s like Kentucky. There is a reason why Bear Bryant left UK: Hoops rule. ISU is worse. ISU could have dominated at wrestling ( see Sanderson, Cael), but chose not to. No one holds the leadership at ISU responsible for 100 plus years of bad football. Even Schools that were traditionally awful at football (like Kansas, Purdue, Northwestern and Washington State) made Major Bowl games down through the years ( unlike ISU). I have seen comments blaming The University Of Iowa not playing ISU for the plight of the Cyclones ( ignoring the past 40 years of bad football. Meanwhile Louisville which was shunned by Kentucky made something of themselves. So did Northwestern and Kansas State which over the years were worse then ISU). Kansas because of hoops will at worst end up in the MWC, ISU will be lucky to end up in the MWC.
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Unless there are some real belt-tightening changes in the OH and MI state higher ed scene, the MAC stays at its current membership? I could see IA State landing there, but would the MAC avoid a legacy P5 addition because of perceived accumulated advantages?
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I fail to see how the Mountain West or Mid-American wouldn’t pursue a school whose football attendance in recent years averages in the mid-50s, and whose men’s basketball program has risen to prince status from the Johnny Orr era onward (despite several coaching changes), if it was denied sanctuary in a P5 conference.
Then again, I’m still trying to understand why David “I capitalize every other word” Brown (is he of German descent?) has this vendetta against the good people of Ames.
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The concern the MAC might have is travel. Would adding ISU and a partner actually make them more money, or would the extra travel eat up any gains? And who would that partner be?
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There is no doubt whatsoever that any G5 league would love, love, love, to have Iowa State. But as I have noted, I think the most probable scenario is that the B12 cast-offs stay together as a unit.
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Marc Shepherd,
“But as I have noted, I think the most probable scenario is that the B12 cast-offs stay together as a unit.”
Agreed. But who do they add to get back to 10/12?
Assume the remainder of the B12 is ISU, KSU, OkSU, TT, TCU, Baylor and WV (only UT, OU and KU leave). They need to add at least 3 schools and more likely 5.
Options:
All the prior B12 options plus NIU (get into Chicago a little).
For 10 – add BYU (FB only), Boise (FB only) and UC
A – ISU, KSU, OkSU, UC, WV
B – TT, Baylor, TCU, BYU, Boise
For 12 – add BYU (FB only), Boise (FB only), NIU, UH and UC
A – ISU, KSU, OkSU, UC, WV, NIU
B – TT, Baylor, TCU, BYU, Boise, UH
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Assume the remainder of the B12 is ISU, KSU, OkSU, TT, TCU, Baylor and WV (only UT, OU and KU leave).
Practically the only way they lose exactly those three schools, is if Texas becomes an independent in football — as conferences are fairly likely to add schools in pairs from now on.
I know there has been discussion (mostly on fan boards) about UT joining the ACC with a Notre Dame type of deal, but I have seen scant evidence that either the school or the league would want this. If you look at UT’s non-conference scheduling across a spectrum of sports, they seem to have almost no interest in playing ACC schools. This is in contrast to ND, which had a long history of scheduling in that region, long before they joined formally.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Practically the only way they lose exactly those three schools, is if Texas becomes an independent in football — as conferences are fairly likely to add schools in pairs from now on.”
I started with those 3 as the most likely choices to be gone. Obviously people can suppose TT and/or OkSU and/or KSU are also gone. I started with the largest possible B12 remnant to make it seem the most attractive to other G5 schools. If 6 schools leave, I’m not sure the remainder could backfill all those spots successfully.
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Part of whether it survives as six depends on sequence. If one pair leaves, and then the Big12 backfills, and then another pair leaves, the first set of schools on the way has already got the ball rolling on being, at the very least, the sole Best of the Rest conference in the new Go6. Four should be available at that point which would cement that.
Strategically, if they lose two, they SHOULD add BYU and Boise FB-only and two from the AAC to go to 12, since if they are already a Go6 member when they invite BYU, BYU would be far more likely to turn the invite down.
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It’s power conference or Indy for BYU.
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How many schools in G5 leagues may not be playing football at that level in 7 or 8 years?
UConn athletics is estimated to need a contribution from the university of nearly $40 million in the next year or two. The State of Connecticut simply cannot subsidize UConn sports at that level and more for years to come. How long before UConn students decide that they are really a basketball school with a minor football program?
There are now serious conversations about needing to downgrade football and then try to join the Big East, or A-10, with their profitable basketball program.
Downgrading football will not make UConn sports solvent, but will save a lot of money.
Will other G5 schools simply give up and downgrade their programs due to the cost of football?
Does anyone know whether there is likely to be serious financial pressure on Cincinnati or other G5 schools that were looking at the Big 12 as a liferaft?
Certainly all of the Big 12 schools will do quite well financially until the GOR expires. It seems likely that the remaining Big 12 schools, even if there are only six or seven, will be in much better shape than almost any of the P5 schools (Boise and BYU probably excepted).
If that is true, P5 schools will still hope for Big 12 acceptance after UT and OU bolt.
Here is a new article from the Hartford Courant indicating that CT Gov Malloy reached out to ESPN for help in getting UConn into the Big 12. There is also a denial that there has been a $10 million deal from ESPN to the Big 12. There have also been insanely dumb articles in the Courant saying the ESPN owed it to the state, since CT has given ESPN tax incentives to stay.
http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-football/hc-uconn-espn-big-12-1028-20161027-story.html
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Jersey Bernie,
“How many schools in G5 leagues may not be playing football at that level in 7 or 8 years?”
I don’t think many will drop down, if any. What they will do is stop trying to spend as much as the P5s once they accept that they aren’t going to be added to any P5 conference.
“UConn athletics is estimated to need a contribution from the university of nearly $40 million in the next year or two. The State of Connecticut simply cannot subsidize UConn sports at that level and more for years to come.”
http://dailycampus.com/stories/2015/12/11/uconn-still-allocates-over-71-million-to-athletics-amid-budget-troubles
This article says the university faces a $41M budget gap, not the AD. The AD received $17M in subsidies from the school in 2014.
According to the documents, which were provided by the Huffington Post, almost $10 million from student fees goes toward athletics every year. This represents nearly 30 percent of the General University Fee, a $2,882 expense that every full-time UConn student pays.
So now we’re down to $9M.
Institutional funding to athletics is paid out of money UConn receives from what Jordan called auxiliary expenses, or funds that are not associated with tuition or academics.
“We do segregate tuition and state tax money,” Jordan said. “Those two sources are only used for academic purposes.”
And it’s not coming from taxes or tuition.
A large part of athletic expenses is financial aid for students, Jordan said, which accounted for about $12.4 million in 2014, up from about $11 million in 2013. Athletics is the only department that counts student aid scholarships as an expense.
If you move financial aid for athletes into the same pile as financial aid for all other students, then the student fees are more than covering the cost of athletics.
“How long before UConn students decide that they are really a basketball school with a minor football program?”
A long time.
“With very few exceptions, no school does athletics to make money,” Jordan said.
According to the documents, most of the revenue from ticket sales is from the football, men’s and women’s basketball teams and a small amount from both ice hockey and soccer teams. Donor contributions and guarantees from participation in away games is also centered on those sports.
“There is no expectation when you field a swimming team that you do it to make money,” Jordan said.
Jordan argued that the benefit of athletics is not its direct income but as a way to boost UConn’s profile as a school and drive enrollment and donations. UConn is ranked as the 19th best public university by the U.S. News and World Report.
According to the ranking, the Division 1 sports are a “major focus for students.”
“Athletics is an important part of UConn, its culture and what we’re known for,” Jordan said. “It is a way that people get introduced to UConn.”
Sports are cheap advertising for the school. If they help bring in out of state students, they’re well worth the expense.
“There are now serious conversations about needing to downgrade football and then try to join the Big East, or A-10, with their profitable basketball program.”
There are those discussions, but they’re mostly driven by hoops people that want to get into the Big East and don’t care about football. They could also just spend less and still be in the AAC.
“Downgrading football will not make UConn sports solvent, but will save a lot of money.”
It also costs them donations and students, so the net savings aren’t what they appear.
“Will other G5 schools simply give up and downgrade their programs due to the cost of football?”
Probably not. They’ll just let the gap between the P5 and G5 grow.
“Does anyone know whether there is likely to be serious financial pressure on Cincinnati or other G5 schools that were looking at the Big 12 as a liferaft?”
There will always be some pressure, but it’s never been a huge story at UC to my knowledge. I think some of the AAC members will reassess their budgets in the next few years as the odds for expansion have diminished.
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UH president’s e-mails got discovered in FOIA and she was quoted as saying she didn’t know how long the university could continue the current level of subsidization. And several schools have bigger subsidies than UH, notably UConn.
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Here is a Hartford Courant article that says that the estimated athletic subsidy for UConn is $39.2 million for 2017. The key issue (other than G5 status) is that UConn has been getting funding from the settlement related to the dissolution of the Big East. That money is stopping. I do not know which numbers are correct, but
http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-huskies/hc-jacobs-column-power-five-1024-20161023-column.html
“Benedict talked a lot about buckets of revenue, ticket sales, priority to seating, fundraising, a Nike apparel deal, an IMG multimedia rights deal. He talked about how UConn can do anything that a Power 5 school can do. The massive problem is the Power 5 conferences are distributing $30 million to their schools. UConn got $10 million last year, mainly because of money from the dissolution of the Big East. The TV money from ESPN is a couple million a year and the Big East money is going to dry up in 2018. Even the SNY money for UConn women is folded into the American distribution.
In releasing its sales pitch to the Big 12, UConn showed an athletic budget of nearly $80 million a year, the most of non-Power 5 schools. The school showed $27 million in subsidies in 2014, $28 million in 2015 and estimates of $35.2 million in 2016 and $39.2 million in 2017. Much of the money will come from student fees. Good grief. Those numbers are either the best argument to drop football and join the Big East or attack on all fronts to infiltrate the Power 5 structure. I vote the latter course for the next few years.”
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There is one thing that is apparent in all of this: The key University is Texas. What UT does will determine what happens with every other scenario. 1: Big XII remains intact @ 10 Schools. 2: Big 10 expands to 12. 3: UT goes to the Big 10 with OU: KU remains and Schools like Boise St, and Cincinnati are added: 4: UT goes to Big 10 with KU. OU and OSU to SEC: Probable end of Big XII. 5: UT, OU, OSU and either KU or TT to Pac. Again probable end of Big XII. If the Big XII ends I could project ISU and WVA in the AAC. KSU and Baylor in the MWC, TCU in either Conference depending on where KU ends up ( Big 10, PAC or worst case scenario with KSU in the MWC). Note: I have been very critical of Iowa State on this blog, but I do not see them dropped down to a MAC level:, The 50k + attendance certainly puts them on a different level then Kent State or Bowlng Green. Which is why it will be Big XII or MWC for the Cyclones.
(
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“Which is why it will be Big XII or MWC for the Cyclones.”
Though you projected them AAC in one of your scenarios, so I take that to be Big12, MWC or AAC for the Cyclones. Their attendance is too big to leave them out of the “best of the rest” conference of their choice, whichever of the two that might be.
The MAC angle would rather be whether, if it’s either BotR East or BotR West, there was some interest in a travel partner, where Northern Illinois at 4.5hrs drive away could come up in conversation.
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I am not so keen on Northern Illinois for the Big XII. There are schools that I would select for the Big XII first. 1: Houston. 2: Cincinnati. 3: UCF. 4: USF: 5: BYU. 6: Boise State. 7:,Colorado State. 8: San Diego State. Throw in the fact, that no one knows how many ( if any) Schools would leave the Big XII? If it would be UT and OU alone ( say to the Big 10) you could add 4 Schools. Which would keep the Conference intact. That would work out perfectly for UT ( keeping the Red River Rivalry as a Conference Game) and the Big 10 ( basically balance out the Divisions). A brutal different Scenario for the Big XII, could be this: UT and Kansas ( instead of OU). We know UT wants Eastern exposure ( like the Cowboys playing in the NFC East). In exchange for the Longhorn Network being folded into BTN, and accepting KU instead of OU ( which works well with the AAA Issue), UT gets sent East and Purdue West. I know this strengthens the East ( MSU, OSU, PSU, UM and UT) at the expense of the West. But If UT would go for that, the idea of adding UT, expansion of BTN into Texas and what it would do for basketball on BTN ( UT is traditionally good at hoops, so it’s not just about KU). Under that scenario it becomes OU and OSU in the SEC.
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We know UT wants Eastern exposure ( like the Cowboys playing in the NFC East). In exchange for the Longhorn Network being folded into BTN, and accepting KU instead of OU (which works well with the AAA Issue), UT gets sent East and Purdue West.
I am doubtful that the Big Ten would do something so obviously non-competitive, just to kow-tow to one school.
Beyond this, I’m not sure it’s in the Longhorns’ interest, either. Their path to a playoff berth or a strong NY6 bowl is so much easier in the west. Even with a geographic split, they’d get reasonably frequent games against RU and MD, although not every year.
Possibly worth noting: UT’s future non-conference schedule has just one game planned in the East: a visit to USF in 2022. (It’s a 2-for-1: the Bulls are visiting Austin twice.) If it matters to them that much, their schedule doesn’t show it.
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@Marc Shepherd
UT has a home and home with Maryland in 2017-18, with the ’17 game in Austin and the ’18 game played at Landover, MD.
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David Brown,
“I am not so keen on Northern Illinois for the Big XII.”
For the current B12, no. For a B12 without all of its top brands? Then access to Chicago and a bridge from ISU to UC to WV makes more sense. They wouldn’t be the first school I’d suggest, but they could be #4 or #5. It also depends who else is willing to join.
“There are schools that I would select for the Big XII first. 1: Houston. 2: Cincinnati. 3: UCF. 4: USF: 5: BYU. 6: Boise State. 7:,Colorado State. 8: San Diego State.”
1. Would UH want in for sure?
3 and 4. I’m really not sure UCF and USF want into a league that far away with no major brands. Nor am I sure the B12 would want the travel. Without major brands, the B12 would never get any real traction in FL.
5. Would BYU accept? Maybe for FB only, but I doubt they want full membership in a non-P5 league.
6. FB-only makes sense, but otherwise Boise is a lot of travel for no brand. It’s also a low-ranked school and presidents care about that.
7. I’ve always thought CSU was overrated. Denver is a pro town that even CU couldn’t really bring to the B12. CSU is a lot of travel for very few eyes.
8. The B12 isn’t expanding to the pacific time zone. I don’t think SDSU would really be interested anyway.
“Throw in the fact, that no one knows how many ( if any) Schools would leave the Big XII? If it would be UT and OU alone ( say to the Big 10) you could add 4 Schools. Which would keep the Conference intact.”
Intact but vastly reduced in value and appeal to other schools.
“A brutal different Scenario for the Big XII, could be this: UT and Kansas ( instead of OU). We know UT wants Eastern exposure ( like the Cowboys playing in the NFC East). In exchange for the Longhorn Network being folded into BTN, and accepting KU instead of OU ( which works well with the AAA Issue), UT gets sent East and Purdue West. I know this strengthens the East ( MSU, OSU, PSU, UM and UT) at the expense of the West. But If UT would go for that, the idea of adding UT, expansion of BTN into Texas and what it would do for basketball on BTN ( UT is traditionally good at hoops, so it’s not just about KU). Under that scenario it becomes OU and OSU in the SEC.”
There’s a lot here to discuss.
a. UT and KU for academic reasons is possible, but UT would really prefer OU and might make that a condition of joining.
b. Do they want eastern exposure? From 1997-2016, they’ve played the following eastern teams OOC: UNC (2), RU (2), UCF (2), FAU (2). Going forward, the only eastern team on their schedule is UMD (2). That’s a very small amount of eastern exposure for a king who can schedule almost anybody.
c. ESPN would also have to agree on folding the LHN into BTN. I’d need to hear details on how that happens to fully believe it, but it’s certainly possible. Either way BTN could still expand into TX as BTN would have plenty of UT games to show, especially in MBB and baseball.
d. I highly doubt UT would want to be in the East. Some eastern exposure is one thing, but rarely playing KU and NE and other CST teams to play RU, UMD and IN annually? I don’t think so. Besides, the B10 couldn’t tolerate that much imbalance. The whole point of these new divisions was to honor geography so UT would have to be in the West.
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UT has a home and home with Maryland in 2017-18, with the ’17 game in Austin and the ’18 game played at Landover, MD.
Sorry…missed that one. However, as Brian noted, the core point remains true: they haven’t often gone out of their way to play Eastern teams, which you’d think they would, if the cared about it as much as some folks say.
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I am not at all sure that UT wants eastern exposure. They specifically indicated that they wanted exposure in NYC and DC. The business and political capitals of the US (as well as NYC being by far the number 1 media market in the US).
I believe that games against second level Florida schools are irrelevant. I would think that games against USF are of no use for the stategic purposes of UT, which certainly does not need to worry about being exposed to Tampa or central Florida area high schools.
There are enough players in Texas and Louisiana to stock several top twenty schools without ever going further than that from Austin.
While UT has not gone out of its way to try and schedule UMd or RU in the past, perhaps they have decided that this was now important going forward. Obviously I could not even speculate as to the real motivation of UT.
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Texas and Maryland have a home-and-home set for later this decade (although UMd’s “home” game will be held at FedEx Field).
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Jersey Bernie,
“Here is a Hartford Courant article that says that the estimated athletic subsidy for UConn is $39.2 million for 2017. The key issue (other than G5 status) is that UConn has been getting funding from the settlement related to the dissolution of the Big East. That money is stopping. I do not know which numbers are correct, but”
I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the number jumped that much with the end of the BE money and increased expenses lately (FCOA, trying to get into the B12, etc).
http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-huskies/hc-jacobs-column-power-five-1024-20161023-column.html
I’m going to respond to some other quotes from that article in addition to the ones you pulled.
In fairness to Cincinnati, to BYU, to Houston, to Boise State, to UConn, to USF and UCF and a dozen other schools, things need to change.
Why is it fair for those schools to get paid more? The market has spoken about their value so far. Is it just because they want to be big time? Well, it took the P5 schools 100 years to get to the revenue levels they have now. They built the fan base for the sport. They invested over years and years and now these other schools want to reap the rewards without paying the price. Why is that fair?
The 65 Power 5 schools that commandeer the great majority of revenue in college sports want no change beyond cherry-picking a school here and there to corral more revenue. About 63 percent of the 350 Division I schools have no FBS football and through 2014 NCAA autonomy legislation has the freedom not to do powerful things the Power 5 does. Those schools can better control their losses.
The G5 could control their costs better than they do. They don’t have to do FCOA, but many are. They could cut costs in other areas. Some G5s spend much less than others on football.
This leaves 63 schools, known as the Group of 5, trying to play big-time football without the big-time revenue. Can 18 percent of the NCAA Division I membership make a lot of noise? Sure. Can those five conferences push through NCAA legislation to help level the football field? Certainly, not on their own. And with the majority of those 63 not all-in for Power 5 membership, one has to wonder how many would have the stomach for an open fight.
More importantly, should they win that fight? Nobody is forcing the G5 to do what they’re doing. They can all choose to drop to I-AA or D-III or drop football or just cut their football expenses. What is the basis for claiming they deserve more money? The TV networks are agnostic. They pay whoever brings them eyeballs. If the G5 aren’t getting paid much, it’s because not many people watch them. They could jack up their fees for playing OOC against the P5 (it’s starting to happen already). They could even make deals with specific P5 conferences (X games for Y dollars).
This leaves 15-20 schools that could put together a huge all-fronts battle to gain some kind of equitable distribution before they spend themselves into oblivion.
They get a bigger chunk of post-season revenue now than they ever have. At what level is the revenue split “equitable”? Does he expect the G5 schools to get paid the same as the P5?
The Power 5 conferences essentially can act as a cartel, restricting membership, doling out hundreds of millions of dollars to long-standing weaker conference cronies while more competitive athletic programs are left on the outside. Worse, when they do see fit to add a school, they cut deals in which the newbies receive a significantly smaller share for years.
Is he claiming it’s one big cartel or 5 separate cartels? Of course each conference can choose their own members. Why wouldn’t that be true? Conferences are more than just athletic alignments, and they don’t have a duty to maximize revenue through their membership. As for lesser deals for newbies, they make perfect sense in a world where the conference owns a network (fully or in part). Why would a new member be gifted something everyone else had to pay for? It’s also true just for the brand. The P5 conference brands have value and new members don’t bring the same cachet. Why shouldn’t new members pay for the privilege of getting to use a brand they didn’t help build? They can always say no if they don’t like the terms of their offer.
Can’t there be a meeting of the minds among the NCAA, the Power 5 and networks for some kind of revenue sharing formula from its vast goldmine based on money invested into football, into athletic programs to help mitigate Group of 5 losses?
Talk about collusion. That would be all kinds of illegal. But besides that, who is “it” with this vast goldmine? The NCAA has large revenues but it redistributes almost all of that back to the schools/athletes or pays for championships with it. They aren’t storing billions of dollars like Scrooge McDuck. The Power 5 are really 64 independent entities that all struggle to balance their own budgets. Many of them are also using significant subsidies for athletics, so they don’t have millions to spare. The networks are businesses that pay for content. They aren’t charities that can just choose to give away hundreds of millions to the G5. They owe it to their investors to make good deals.
The G5 seem to neglect the fact that the P5 freely split NCAA tournament money with all D-I schools based on appearances. The differences come from football where the G5 product isn’t competitive. A few schools are, but the inventory they provide just isn’t that valuable. Who should be paying them more for games people don’t watch?
Under the guise of eliminating a pro rata agreement and a new conference title game, ESPN is negotiating to pay the Big 12 not to expand. Think about that. Gov. Malloy doesn’t have to jump ugly in public, but a strong message of cooperation should be clear. You want tax breaks from the state? Give the state flagship university some breaks.
Isn’t quid pro quo illegal? ESPN doesn’t owe CT anything. They are providing lots of well-paid employees that boost the tax base and keep businesses healthy. That’s why CT gave them tax breaks.
Now to your quote.
Benedict talked a lot about buckets of revenue, ticket sales, priority to seating, fundraising, a Nike apparel deal, an IMG multimedia rights deal. He talked about how UConn can do anything that a Power 5 school can do. The massive problem is the Power 5 conferences are distributing $30 million to their schools. UConn got $10 million last year, mainly because of money from the dissolution of the Big East. The TV money from ESPN is a couple million a year and the Big East money is going to dry up in 2018. Even the SNY money for UConn women is folded into the American distribution.
In releasing its sales pitch to the Big 12, UConn showed an athletic budget of nearly $80 million a year, the most of non-Power 5 schools. The school showed $27 million in subsidies in 2014, $28 million in 2015 and estimates of $35.2 million in 2016 and $39.2 million in 2017. Much of the money will come from student fees. Good grief. Those numbers are either the best argument to drop football and join the Big East or attack on all fronts to infiltrate the Power 5 structure. I vote the latter course for the next few years.
Budget = $80M
AAC payout = $10M
That’s the first problem. Why spend that much when you know your income is so much less?
P5 payout = $30M
Difference = $20M
Subsidy = $28-39M
Even with the P5 payout UConn would require a large subsidy. And they’d have to spend even more money if they got into a P5 conference to get their facilities up to snuff and have competitive salaries and things.
They should start with the basic problem that they need more tickets sold, higher ticket prices and more donations. Until they fix their own house, why should anyone else worry about them?
For example, take ISU which has a very similar budget to UConn.
Averaging over the past 3 years:
Ticket sales: ISU = $14M, UConn < $10M
Donations: ISU = $17M, UConn < $7M
CFB attendance: ISU = 54,700, UConn = 28,900
Why should UConn get paid more when ISU fans are more invested? Sure, being in the B12 provides better opponents but ISU is also terrible. UConn has also been terrible going 11-26 the past 3 years and that's with a G5 schedule.
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Brian, I agree with pretty much all of your criticism of Jeff Jacobs, the author of the article. Jacobs is crying and demanding someone, SOMEONE, do something about the system.
He totally ignores the fact that the P5 set up works fine for at least 80% and probably 90% of NCAA schools. It keeps March madness in place, allows smaller schools to get major financials payoffs in other sports, etc.
Jacobs wants a political and legal attack on the P5, and presumably the NCAA. He should be glad that he is not getting what he wants.
If the G5 really managed a major attack on the P5 within the NCAA (which is ridiculous), the P5 could pack up and leave and take with them the Big East, A-10 and maybe a couple more basketball leagues) and then those 90 or 100 schools would have their own basketball tournament and keep the money for themselves. That would financially really hurt many small schools, so I would expect that those smaller schools would want to follow the P5 also.
Bottom line, when the dust settled, I would expect a few dozen schools, (led by UConn?) would need to set up their own basketball tournament. That is a virtually impossible scenario. Even the basketball powers withing UConn would never go down that road.
I do believe that Jacob’s approach is interesting for a reason not in the article. Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah is a big proponent of Congressional intervention, but he has little support.
It has been suggested on this board that the P5 should collapse into a top end league of 24 or 32 schools (or some such number) and essentially try to get new TV deals which are not split with another 30 or 40 schools. I do believe something like this would allow the ideas of Jeff Jacobs to get legs. A large number of states would have to be pushed out of the P5 and there might well be a critical mass of political pressure against those teams.
(No, I do not believe that the ACC ever kick out Wake Forest, the PAC ever kick out Washington State, etc. I only mention this as it relates to the Hartford Courant article)
As to his theory (shared by others in CT) that ESPN is obligated to help UConn, that is nuts. Connecticut is bleeding jobs and employers, due to high taxes. If they were really stupid enough to “retaliate” against ESPN, there are probably 30 other states that would welcome ESPN with open arms. ESPN does not need to be in Connecticut, they choose to be there.
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Yes, re the relocation of ESPN from CT as retaliation for untoward State interference, and we all know which state gets the lion share of relocated corporate campuses these days.
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Jacobs, like so many in the Northeast, really isn’t cognizant of how big-time college athletics is run. True, there are many excesses, particularly in the SEC — the monwy Alabama spends on assistant football coaches frankly sickens me — but the environment has drastically changed from when Yale regularly filled up the Yale Bowl (and even from when Syracuse was a national power at Archbold Stadium). If Connecticut had possessed the academic heritage of Rutgers, it might be where RU is today, in the Big Ten.
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Jersey Bernie,
“Brian, I agree with pretty much all of your criticism of Jeff Jacobs, the author of the article. Jacobs is crying and demanding someone, SOMEONE, do something about the system.”
Everyone in the comments on that article also chastise him, including UConn fans saying he’s making them look bad.
“I do believe that Jacob’s approach is interesting for a reason not in the article. Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah is a big proponent of Congressional intervention, but he has little support.”
And he’s been pretty quiet since Utah joined the P12. That’s the other reason this is hard to do. Most states have a P5 school or no G5 schools. Why would they waste government effort on something that’s working just fine for many of their constituents?
“It has been suggested on this board that the P5 should collapse into a top end league of 24 or 32 schools (or some such number) and essentially try to get new TV deals which are not split with another 30 or 40 schools.”
A few have suggested it. I don’t think it has a chance of happening unless the schools are forced to fully pay players. Only then might the P5 conferences dissolve as one group continue to make big money from sports (AL, UF, OSU, etc) and the others re-focus on academics (NW, Duke, Vandy, etc).
“I do believe something like this would allow the ideas of Jeff Jacobs to get legs. A large number of states would have to be pushed out of the P5 and there might well be a critical mass of political pressure against those teams.”
If they did it voluntarily, I agree that Congress would likely get involved. If it’s forced by the courts demanding that players get paid so many schools drop out of the top group, Congress might still get involved but perhaps to overrule the courts.
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Isn’t it always interesting that schools said to focus “on academics” invariably are private institutions? You’re going to tell me that our top public flagships such as Cal-Berkeley, Michigan and the like aren’t great places of learning?
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vp19,
“Isn’t it always interesting that schools said to focus “on academics” invariably are private institutions? You’re going to tell me that our top public flagships such as Cal-Berkeley, Michigan and the like aren’t great places of learning?”
Did I say that? No I didn’t. But many of the large public schools have so much invested in athletics at this point that they literally can’t afford to drop sports (millions in debt to service). Many private schools are rich enough to do whatever they want and they do tend to be more focused on academics than athletics. You should note that I didn’t list elite public schools like Cal nor private athletic powerhouses like ND and USC.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17905245/jury-rules-favor-ex-penn-state-assistant-mike-mcqueary-defamation-case
McQueary given $7 million!!!! That’s just, wow!
To me, the person who looks worst in the Sandusky mess after Sandusky himself, is McQueary. He heard it. And he didn’t do anything for a day or so. And then he went to Paterno instead of the police.
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Jurors awarded McQueary $1.15 million on the defamation claim and $1.15 million on the misrepresentation allegation that two administrators lied to him when they said they took his report of Sandusky seriously and would respond appropriately. They also awarded $5 million in punitive damages.
I think the amount will be reduced on appeal. I won’t say everything PSU did was fine, but he never got hired again because nobody ever thought he was a good coach. If he hadn’t played for JoePa he probably wouldn’t have gotten a job at PSU, either. After the change in HC, it’s common for the old staff to not be renewed so that’s not an issue.
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And he’s tainted by his connection with Sandusky and his own cowardice. That is on him and Sandusky, not PSU.
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I was rooting for a USFL type verdict. A judgement blasting PSU for how things were handled, then awarding McQueary only $1 because he failed as a man.
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Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports on <a href="http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/why-bringing-the-big-12-championship-game-back-is-bad-for-the-conference/"?Why bringing the Big 12 Championship Game back is bad for the conference.
He ignores the main reason why it’s good: they’ll get paid for it.
But I agree, there’s a decent chance they’ll regret it, at least from a competitive standpoint. (They won’t mind the cash.) When they had a CCG before, the underdog won in 3 out of the first 6 games played. If that happens again, a lot of Big 12 fans will be tearing their hair out.
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Sorry…biffed the link. Here it is again: Why bringing the Big 12 Championship Game back is bad for the conference
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Marc Shepherd,
“Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports on why bringing the Big 12 Championship Game back is bad for the conference.
He ignores the main reason why it’s good: they’ll get paid for it.”
He ignores other points, too.
1. A 13th data point can be helpful. The B12’s data analysis firm showed it is more likely to help than hurt. Even if it’s a 50/50 deal then getting more money for the same chances at the CFP seems wise.
2. More people will pay attention to a CCG than just more conference games, keeping the B12 more relevant in the final week. It also means they can have major rivalries the same week as everyone else and thus provide better competition for eyeballs.
3. Rematches can happen in all conferences, it’s just guaranteed in the B12. These games have always been pure money grabs and rematches are one of the negatives. As I showed a few days ago, P5 teams are 13-5 in their CCG rematches against a team they already beat. That will be lower in the B12 presumably since they always take the top 2 teams, but perhaps it’s a sign that the first win wasn’t dominant if the loser wins the second time. Maybe both teams are playoff worthy.
4. I’m not sure how much this really hurts their chances of getting 2 teams in. With no CCG, there was essentially no chance of it ever happening. In almost every year no conference is going to get 2 teams in anyway. Would having divisions increase the odds of getting in two teams? We don’t know because it’s never happened.
I think the best odds may be when the first game is a close home win for A and the CCG is a close win for B. Two 12-1 teams that split a pair of close games could make the playoff if several champs are weak. Is an 11-1 division runner-up that lost to the champ really more likely to get in than a 12-1 CCG loser who beat the champ during the season? As long as the CCG is close, I think having the win over the champ and losing the CCG is better than just having the loss.
“But I agree, there’s a decent chance they’ll regret it, at least from a competitive standpoint.”
But will they regret it any more than the other P5 conferences regret theirs? Every conference risks upsets that knock out a top team. But all the rest have the advantage of a 13th game if the B12 doesn’t play a CCG. This levels the playing field for the committee.
“When they had a CCG before, the underdog won in 3 out of the first 6 games played. If that happens again, a lot of Big 12 fans will be tearing their hair out.”
The B10 already had 7-5 WI upset NE. Other upsets will happen. There’s no reason to think the B12 is more prone to it than others.
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“When they had a CCG before, the underdog won in 3 out of the first 6 games played. If that happens again, a lot of Big 12 fans will be tearing their hair out.”
The B10 already had 7-5 WI upset NE. Other upsets will happen. There’s no reason to think the B12 is more prone to it than others.
I don’t think so either, but once the B10 never operated without a CCG, once the rules allowed it to have one.
When the stated reason for adding the game is to increase your chances of making the playoff, there will be a lot of complaints if it winds up having the opposite effect. I get the reasons why it should be beneficial in theory, but the theory doesn’t always play out as expected.
It reminds me of the ACC’s decision to choose a very unnatural division structure, so that they could have an FSU–Miami rematch in the CCG. It has never happened. That’s what happens sometimes, when you tempt the Football Gods.
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Marc Shepherd,
“When the stated reason for adding the game is to increase your chances of making the playoff, there will be a lot of complaints if it winds up having the opposite effect. I get the reasons why it should be beneficial in theory, but the theory doesn’t always play out as expected.”
I think they’ve been pretty open about also chasing the money with the CCG. And, as you know, there’s no way to ever know if the CCG hurts them because we can’t see what would’ve happened without it. Sure, we can tell when a top 3 team gets knocked out of the playoff by a CCG loss and the winner doesn’t get in either. But we won’t know how often 2014 would’ve been repeated (B12 champ doesn’t get in due to lack of a CCG). Or how often the upset winner and CCG loser both made NY6 games when only 1 would’ve without it, etc.
“It reminds me of the ACC’s decision to choose a very unnatural division structure, so that they could have an FSU–Miami rematch in the CCG. It has never happened. That’s what happens sometimes, when you tempt the Football Gods.”
Maybe that’s one reason the B12 avoid divisions and the obvious temptation to split UT and OU.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17910453/big-12-title-game-match-top-two-teams-conference-standings
The B12 has decided not to use divisions. The top 2 teams by record will make the CCG.
Bowlsby said the Big 12 would continue to use the same tiebreakers to determine the title game participants, with head-to-head matchups being the lone deciding factor when two teams finish with the same record. In the event three or more teams are tied, the Big 12 would compare conference records, then conference records against the next-highest-placed team(s), then scoring differential and then a draw — in that order.
I believe this will open the door for larger conferences to be able to drop divisions in the future. It will require a rule change, but once one conference is doing it it’s easier to allow it for everyone.
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Not when it hurts the Big 12 as in points 2 and 3. Not just minimal chance for a 2nd playoff team, but it hurts in getting a 2nd team in the NY6 as you guarantee another loss by one of your top 2 teams as they have to play each other twice.
Very bad for the Big 12 long term. They should have done divisions even though that has drawbacks. But what they really should have done was go to 12 and do divisions.
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bullet,
“Not when it hurts the Big 12 as in points 2 and 3.”
How will that impact whether the rule will be changed to let larger conferences do the same thing? They wouldn’t face the same downsides since rematches aren’t guaranteed.
“Not just minimal chance for a 2nd playoff team, but it hurts in getting a 2nd team in the NY6 as you guarantee another loss by one of your top 2 teams as they have to play each other twice.”
The default chance for getting 2 teams in is minimal. I’m not sure this really impacts it. Is a 12-1 CCG loser that also beat the champ really worse off than an 11-1 division runner up that lost to the champ? Yes it means an extra loss for the top 2, but it also means an extra elite win. As I showed a while ago the committee really hasn’t punished teams much for losing a CCG unless they got blown out. I think the win is more likely to help the champ than the loss is to hurt the loser.
“Very bad for the Big 12 long term.”
I think the 13th data point and ending conference play when everyone else does will keep more attention on the B12. Having an extra bye week and only 10 teams is bad for TV. It forces the networks to show some crappy games due to lack of inventory.
Besides, who says there is a long term for the B12? They might disappear in less than 10 years. They need the CCG money now.
“They should have done divisions even though that has drawbacks.”
My guess is that they couldn’t easily settle on divisions. And since they play the full round robin, divisions don’t mean much. They’d just be a way to sneak a worse team into the CCG some years. If you have to have a rematch, you’re better off having 1 versus 2 rather than risking a major upset that really hurts the conference.
“But what they really should have done was go to 12 and do divisions.”
This might have been my choice as well, but we weren’t inside the discussions. The networks might have made it clear that wasn’t a good option.
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They should have done divisions even though that has drawbacks.
I don’t see the point of divisions when everyone plays everyone. There is no upside. The downside is that you’ll have a weak CCG, in years when one division is markedly worse than the other.
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I believe this will open the door for larger conferences to be able to drop divisions in the future. It will require a rule change, but once one conference is doing it it’s easier to allow it for everyone.
Yes, I believe it will come. It’s hard to articulate a valid reason for requiring conferences with 12+ teams to split into two divisions, when you’ve already allowed those with 10 or fewer to dispense with it.
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The only dispense with it as long as they play full RR.
Bla, bla, argument for – bla, bla and against.
Fundamental disagreement about justification for a 13th game.
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ccrider55,
“The only dispense with it as long as they play full RR.”
Correct, but that’s only a concern for a conference of 10 or more. Any smaller conference plays a round robin without even thinking about it. A conference of 10 can do it as the B12 has shown. As long as the season is capped at 12 games, though, any conference with 11+ teams can’t be expected to play a round robin.
“Fundamental disagreement about justification for a 13th game.”
There was the original purpose of the rule, which was to have a better way to find a champion in a conference too large to play a full round robin. They chose to force the conference into divisions with the two division champs meeting, but I don’t believe that is actually necessary to meet the original intent. It does keep things objective, however, and maintains a round robin for each division.
But let’s be honest. The main reason for these games is money and always has been in I-A.
One question is what to do for larger and larger conferences. They can maintain divisional round robins, but it comes at the expense of rarely playing the schools in the the other division. That starts to defeat the purpose of being a conference in order to maintain the purity of the CCG concept, which seems like a backwards approach to me. The conference has to be the main concern and at some point that may force the dropping of full round robins in divisional play. That provides two options of course:
1. Keep divisions but don’t play a full round robin in the division.
2. Drop divisions entirely and just lock some games.
2a. Form pods.
2b. Lock a set number of rivals per school but they don’t have to break into distinct groups.
We’ve already seen that an inability to do this contributed to the break up of the only 16 team conference in I-A. As the P5 conferences approach 16 teams, however, there is more on the line and they have the power to change the rules.
The B12 presents the opposite issue. They don’t need a CCG since they play a full round robin but for political reasons are allowed to have one. The question of whether or not to form divisions is an interesting one due to the full round robin. Forming divisions maintains the purity of the CCG format but doesn’t optimize a game that is being held primarily for financial reasons. I think there may also have been some concern about how to split the schools into divisions anyway. Knowing that this game is almost entirely being played just for the money, I don’t really have a problem with them not using divisions.
I’m against all CCGs and this one is just more honest than most about what’s driving it. But if can lead to OSU not having to play UMD, RU, IN and MSU every single year then I’ll support it for the greater good.
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“Any smaller conference plays a round robin without even thinking about it. A conference of 10 can do it as the B12 has shown.”
Some unamed conference in the south still plays eight and has had some members advocate reducing that.
“They chose to force the conference into divisions with the two division champs meeting,”
No, they offered a way to hold a 13th game as a CCG. The choice to avail themselves of it was the conference’s.
The change can be viewed as reaffirming the RR requirement and allowing the 10 team conf the flexibility to hold the CCG (for playoff and $$ concerns) without expansion. The RR requirement is perhaps a disincentive to conferences growing beyond 14-16?
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The RR requirement is perhaps a disincentive to conferences growing beyond 14-16?
You actually think Larry Scott, Jim Delany, and Greg Sankey don’t want conferences to grow beyond 14–16?
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ccrider55,
“Some unamed conference in the south still plays eight and has had some members advocate reducing that.”
They can’t play 13, so why should it matter to us whether they play 8 or 9? They’re only hurting themselves with their chicken schedule.
“No, they offered a way to hold a 13th game as a CCG. The choice to avail themselves of it was the conference’s.”
You know exactly what I mean. The rule chose to force divisions in order to get the CCG. The rule didn’t have to be written that way, it just was.
“The change can be viewed as reaffirming the RR requirement and allowing the 10 team conf the flexibility to hold the CCG (for playoff and $$ concerns) without expansion.”
Yes, the whole point seemed to be to require the B12 to keep 9 games. The B12 wanted to keep it anyway so I’m not sure it served much purpose.
“The RR requirement is perhaps a disincentive to conferences growing beyond 14-16?”
Why would the schools restrict themselves that way unnecessarily? I think they’re just waiting for someone to get large enough that they request a rule change. If the ACC asked for the freedom to drop divisions, I think it would be granted as long as they play at least 9 games. I’m not sure they could play 8 games without divisions (since the argument for no divisions is to play each other more often).
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As late as 1987, said unnamed conference (as in Securities and Exchange Commission) played but a six-game league schedule. From 1988 to 1991, it grew to seven games, and since divisional play was instituted in 1992, it has remained at eight.
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vp19,
“As late as 1987, said unnamed conference (as in Securities and Exchange Commission) played but a six-game league schedule.”
Since the Southern Conference split up, the SEC has never felt the need to play each other a lot. The SEC didn’t standardize their scheduling until 1974 when they mandated 6 games per team. Before that, most played 5-7 games against other SEC teams although some played as few as 4 or as many as 10 in a given season.
“From 1988 to 1991, it grew to seven games, and since divisional play was instituted in 1992, it has remained at eight.”
http://www.teamspeedkills.com/2014/8/12/5996727/flashback-1987-should-the-sec-expand-to-7-conference-games
The growth to 7 was likely a response to the Supreme Court freeing up TV rights in 1984. It had the direct results of killing a lot of OOC rivalries as the SEC teams generally dropped a major OOC rival (AU/GT, UF/Miami, etc) in exchange for the 7th SEC game.
http://www.teamspeedkills.com/2014/8/14/6004569/flashback-1991-sec-to-become-first-super-conference-play-8-games
Obviously the move to 8 was due to expansion. This further hindered OOC schedules in the SEC but the move to 12 games in 2006 helped restore some quality OOC games.
http://www.rollbamaroll.com/2015/5/11/8581595/sec-football-the-historical-sec-scheduling-part-i
But the SEC started with a 5-2-1 plan, meaning 2 locked rivals per team. Thus they accepted it taking 8 years to play everyone home and home even back then. In 2003 they finally switched to a 5-1-2 plan. The point, again, is that the SEC has never felt a need to play everyone else frequently. I don’t know if that’s a function of travel issues or what, but it’s been true for a long time.
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Some unamed conference in the south still plays eight and has had some members advocate reducing that.
Is that a bug or a feature? To me, it’s the latter. Conferences decide how they want to schedule, and fans decide whether they care to watch it or not. This is how a free market should work. Starting next year, no league will have the disadvantage of playing one less game, and there’s a Committee to punish leagues that perennially schedule weaklings, a problem the SEC is not likely to have.
I would note that in the latest strength of schedule rankings, seven of the top ten hail from conferences that play 8 league games, the ACC and the SEC. Compare that to the Big 12, which has just two schools in the top 25 SOS, #15 Oklahoma and #20 Texas.
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If the ACC asked for the freedom to drop divisions, I think it would be granted as long as they play at least 9 games. I’m not sure they could play 8 games without divisions (since the argument for no divisions is to play each other more often).
Even with 8 games, a no-division structure would “smooth out” the frequency of play, which I believe is the main complaint of certain ACC schools. For instance, Boston College plays FSU annually, but Miami only once every six years. In a no-divisions structure, each team would have a smaller number of annual games, which would therefore increase the meeting frequency of those that aren’t contested every year.
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The ACC and SEC strength of schedules will drop as they play their buy a win games later in the season.
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The ACC and SEC strength of schedules will drop as they play their buy a win games later in the season.
This is true, but not to the point where you’d say they are “skating” by playing the schedules they play, relative to their peers.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Even with 8 games, a no-division structure would “smooth out” the frequency of play, which I believe is the main complaint of certain ACC schools.”
It would, but I don’t see the others changing the rules just for that. 3 of the P5 play 9 games and want the other 2 to match them so it’s a level playing field. They won’t force 9 games on anyone, but I could see them requiring 9 games to get an exception to the division setup.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I would note that in the latest strength of schedule rankings, seven of the top ten hail from conferences that play 8 league games, the ACC and the SEC. Compare that to the Big 12, which has just two schools in the top 25 SOS, #15 Oklahoma and #20 Texas.”
To which bullet said:
“The ACC and SEC strength of schedules will drop as they play their buy a win games later in the season.”
Back to Marc:
“This is true, but not to the point where you’d say they are “skating” by playing the schedules they play, relative to their peers.”
So far teams have played 8 of 12 games. Are the ACC and SEC teams “skating” by playing only 8 conference games? No, but it does have an impact, especially if they get a late cupcake (SOS is front-loaded and teams essentially get an extra bye late when players are tired and hurt). There’s also a trade-off that many 9-game teams look to have an easier OOC schedule to compensate for the 9th game, so the SOS works out about the same.
https://www.teamrankings.com/college-football/ranking/season-sos-by-other
That’s the full season SOS from the same site.
ACC – 6, 9, 15, 23, 25 (top 3 are from Atlantic)
SEC – 1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 18, 19, 21 (top 6 are from West)
B10 – 2, 4, 11 (OSU and MI plus WI who played them both)
P12 – 7, 13, 14, 16, 17, 20, 22, 24 (5 are from North)
B12 – 12 (OU with those tough OOC games)
The top teams are largely clumped by their division, especially for the 8-game conferences (fewer crossovers to balance it out).
The top teams in SOS will still shuffle some as the season progresses.
Current SOS:
11+ = 1
10-10.9 = 3
9-9.9 = 6
8-8.9 = 0
7-7.9 = 3
Top 10 are all 9+ now.
Season SOS:
11+ = 2
10-10.9 = 3
9-9.9 = 0
8-8.9 = 6
7-7.9 = 0
The top 10 cutoff drops to everyone above 8.0.
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So far teams have played 8 of 12 games. Are the ACC and SEC teams “skating” by playing only 8 conference games? No, but it does have an impact, especially if they get a late cupcake (SOS is front-loaded and teams essentially get an extra bye late when players are tired and hurt).
True, but the option to schedule cupcakes late is open to all. If that advantage is helping the SEC, the other leagues could do it too.
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Marc Shepherd,
“True, but the option to schedule cupcakes late is open to all. If that advantage is helping the SEC, the other leagues could do it too.”
True, except many conferences prevent that from happening (may be part of TV deal).
The other relevant fact is that adding a 9th conference game isn’t always a boost to SOS. A team in a strong division may well lower their SOS by playing a typical team from the other division. But conference games are harder than the team ranking would indicate in my opinion. Those teams know you better than an equivalent OOC team would so even if the SOS was identical computationally, the schedule with 9 conference games seems harder to me.
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“True, but the option to schedule cupcakes late is open to all. If that advantage is helping the SEC, the other leagues could do it too.”
True, except many conferences prevent that from happening (may be part of TV deal).
Whole conferences would need to make that decision (as the SEC clearly has done), and it would take years to implement, given how far in advance non-conference games are planned. You could be right about TV.
…the schedule with 9 conference games seems harder to me.
It could be, but I think there are more variables than legislation can iron out: 8 or 9 conference games; P5 scheduling requirement (or not), and how they define that; permission to play FCS (or not); Notre Dame deal (ACC only); number of “easy outs” on the league schedule; luck of the conference draw, for those that don’t play a RR; other types of scheduling luck (e.g., catching a usually strong opponent in one of their bad years).
And we now have the best system we’ve ever had for sorting that out, at least at the top: a committee that operates with actual rules, and has to justify its opinions, unlike traditional poll voters.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Whole conferences would need to make that decision (as the SEC clearly has done), and it would take years to implement, given how far in advance non-conference games are planned.”
And unlike the SEC, some of the other conferences have long histories of playing each other a lot and playing all the OOC games early in the season. It’d be very hard for them to change their stripes enough to drop to 8 games and start playing cupcakes in November.
“It could be, but I think there are more variables than legislation can iron out:”
Of course there are, and I’m not advocating for trying to legislate it. I was just supposing how several of the P5s might approach the ACC requesting the right to drop divisions but stay at 8 games. I dislike CCGs, but there are part of the game now. Given that, I don’t want to restrict how other conferences schedule or how they determine their champion. I do reserve the right to make fun of and/or complain about the choices they make, though, even if they aren’t objectively wrong.
“And we now have the best system we’ve ever had for sorting that out, at least at the top: a committee that operates with actual rules, and has to justify its opinions, unlike traditional poll voters.”
I wish they had to provide some transparency at the end though. Even if they don’t want to put names to votes for obvious reasons, show all the final votes so people can see what the committee was thinking (how close were various teams, etc). I’d love to see that every week, but I think it’s important after the final vote. I’d also love to hear each member explain how they personally go about ranking teams (important stats, what they look for in video, how they handle SOS, etc). They could do that in the summer when it’s all hypothetical just to give us something to talk about.
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Sagarin has a totally different SOS than your site in top 25:
Pac 12 7
SEC 6 (5 in SEC West)
Big 12 4
Big 10 4
ACC 3
Ind 1
BYU is #17
FSU-4, Clemson 18, UNC-21
WI-3, Rutgers-12, MSU-15, NW-19
Iowa St.-16, Texas-20, OU-22, KS-24
MS-1, TN-5, AR-6, AL-7, AU-9, A&M-23
Stanford-2, USC-8, OR St.-10, UCLA-11, AZ-13, OR-14, CU-25
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There isn’t for a 10 team conference.
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The only dispense with it as long as they play full RR.
Bla, bla, argument for – bla, bla and against.
Fundamental disagreement about justification for a 13th game.
Go ahead…just try to state a regulatory justification for the rule as they have now written it.
The point originally was to avoid the extra game, except where it was actually needed — for conferences too large to play a RR. Now that they allow it for any conference of any size, what is the justification?
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And now for some really ugly stuff from Baylor. Four gang rapes in the last 5 years. 19 players involved.
From this report, they did not quite throw Briles under the bus, but how is it possible that he knew almost nothing this?
http://nypost.com/2016/10/28/horrifying-details-of-baylor-sexual-assault-scandal-revealed/
“In a series of interviews with the Wall Street Journal, Baylor regents tell the paper that the scandal involved 17 women who reported sexual or domestic assaults involving 19 players, including four gang rapes, since 2011.”
“The revelations included at least one case in which Briles was aware of an alleged incident and not only didn’t tell the police but didn’t alert the school’s judicial affairs staff or the Title IX office in charge of coordinating the school’s response to sexual violence.
“There was a cultural issue there that was putting winning football games above everything else, including our values,” said J. Cary Gray, a lawyer and member of the Baylor board of regents. “We did not have a caring community when it came to these women who reported that they were assaulted. And that is not OK.”
“There was a cultural issue there that was putting winning football games above everything else, including our values,” said J. Cary Gray, a lawyer and member of the Baylor board of regents. “We did not have a caring community when it came to these women who reported that they were assaulted. And that is not OK.”
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http://www.kwtx.com/content/news/-Regent-Facts-dont-support-biting-newspaper-report-on-BU-sex-scandal-399105771.html?ref=771
This article calls into question the WSJ claim that 19 players were involved.
“Several sources say the biting article has caused a rift among the school’s regents.
The regent was present when attorneys from the Pepper Hamilton law firm briefed the board in May about the findings of its investigation of the school’s handling of sexual assault complaints.
“The vast majority of those allegations presented did not have facts to support them.””
….
“Pepper Hamilton produced a 13-page findings of fact that didn’t identify any specific cases or name Briles or any other individual.
Baylor has maintained since May that it couldn’t provide any details about the specific cases in which Pepper Hamilton found university and athletic department failures, but five months later, apparently acting on advice of the Los Angeles PR firm G.F. Bunting+Co., made selected regents available for interviews with the Journal, the New York Times, USA Today and Showtime’s “60 Minutes Sports.””
….
“The university told the paper that football players were involved in 10.4 percent of Title IX reported incidents in those four years, which suggests that members of the team were linked to only four alleged sexual offenses.
Tevin Elliot was convicted of two counts of sexual assault, for assaulting a former Baylor student in 2012. Elliot was kicked off the team shortly after the team learned about the first sexual assault allegation, in April of 2012, three days before he was arrested and charged with the crime.
Sam Ukwuachu was convicted in 2015 of assaulting a former Baylor soccer player in 2013. Ukwuachu transferred from Boise State to play football at Baylor after he was dismissed from that team in May of 2013.
Rami Hammad, offensive lineman for the Bears in 2015, was accused by a student of sexually assaulting her in his apartment early in the fall semester of that year.
Sources close to the football team said that Rami was cleared by Title IX in that case.
After the season, Hammad was charged with felony stalking in an incident involving his ex-girlfriend.
And former Baylor football standout Shawn Oakman, whose hopes of being picked up in the NFL draft were derailed by his April 13 arrest on a sexual assault charge, was indicted in July by the McLennan County Grand Jury.
No other players or former players have been charged.”
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bullet,
“This article calls into question the WSJ claim that 19 players were involved.”
It does, but in a disingenuous way.
Several sources say the biting article has caused a rift among the school’s regents.
The regent was present when attorneys from the Pepper Hamilton law firm briefed the board in May about the findings of its investigation of the school’s handling of sexual assault complaints.
“The vast majority of those allegations presented did not have facts to support them.”
As in there is no proof beyond the allegations. It’s not that they were disproven or there are alibi facts or something. The investigation just didn’t find any evidence beyond the accusations. Since most sexual assaults lack witnesses and PH looked into this well after the events happened, this shouldn’t be surprising.
“Pepper Hamilton produced a 13-page findings of fact that didn’t identify any specific cases or name Briles or any other individual.
Baylor has maintained since May that it couldn’t provide any details about the specific cases in which Pepper Hamilton found university and athletic department failures, but five months later, apparently acting on advice of the Los Angeles PR firm G.F. Bunting+Co., made selected regents available for interviews with the Journal, the New York Times, USA Today and Showtime’s “60 Minutes Sports.”
Perhaps PH was told not to identify individuals from the start?
“The university told the paper that football players were involved in 10.4 percent of Title IX reported incidents in those four years, which suggests that members of the team were linked to only four alleged sexual offenses.
Those are only the officially reported ones. Clearly more have made complaints than that. The relevance of the 10.4% is that male athletes make up less than 3% off the student body.
No other players or former players have been charged.
It’s very hard to charge someone with sexual assault without clear physical evidence. It usually devolves to he said-she said which is reasonable doubt. Not being charged with sexual assault is very different from being innocent. And that’s the unfortunate thing, because maybe there are a lot of false accusations here. But there seems to be enough evidence to indicate that the school and the athletic department screwed up.
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No other players or former players have been charged.
There seems to be some ignorance in the media, and maybe some Baylor regents too.
The rap against Baylor is that it failed to investigate every complaint thoroughly. It has the obligation to do this, even if no one is ever charged. Also, the standard of proof in a Title IX case is weaker.
The fact that no one was charged does not mean the university handled these cases correctly.
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I don’t think their keeping things so close to the vest is helping them. Sounds like the lawyers are telling them to keep things with the lawyers to reduce exposure in lawsuits, but the speculation is killing them.
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Sexual assault allegations are the hardest to defend in the court of public opinion and the hardest to prosecute in a court of law. By trying to win in court Baylor is losing in public.
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If the 10% are football players is correct, that is a lot less than FSU. The title IX coordinator at FSU gave the figure at FSU. Don’t readily have the link, but the figure was something like 40%, maybe 50%.
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http://www.outkickthecoverage.com/espn-loses-621-000-subscribers-worst-month-in-company-history-102916
ESPN has lost another 620,000 subscribers this month? Has the sports rights fees bubble finally burst?
If it has, does that stop the current consolidation?
I sure hope so.
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FLP_NDRox,
“ESPN has lost another 620,000 subscribers this month?”
Cable lost 650,000 subscribers. Some networks lost over 700,000 subscribers (NBCSN, NBA-TV). ESPN is in 89.0M homes (75% coverage) with cable in 98.4M (83%).
One hugely important note is that these subscriber numbers don’t include streaming services like Sling TV or Sony’s Vue, both of which carry ESPN.
“Has the sports rights fees bubble finally burst?”
Doubtful. Live rights gain value as subscribers become fewer.
“If it has, does that stop the current consolidation?”
What current consolidation is that? If the B12 doesn’t splinter in 2025 it’ll be at least 2035 before any realignment happens.
“I sure hope so.”
So do I.
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“Has the sports rights fees bubble finally burst?”
I doubt it. ESPN may be encroached upon – they are now the establishment being challenged by innovation and upstarts sort of like themselves 30+ years ago. How many predictions of burst bubbles have we had in the last two or more decades? How we consume it may evolve, but until the interest itself in sports declines it won’t. Live content is, and will continue to be king.
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From several years ago.
http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2013/07/22/Media/Sports-Media.aspx
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Related:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/2016/11/01/hulu-inks-deals-with-fox-and-disney-adding-channels-like-espn-abc-fox-news-and-more-to-live-service/#7e32697d4568
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According to the GfK 2016 Ownership and Trend Report, a full 25% of U.S. households have cut cords, preferring to rely on broadcast-only reception and Internet services like Hulu, Netflix and Amazon Prime. In fact, a full 6% only use these online platforms, up 4% from last year.
…
According to Nielsen, the amount of time adults spend consuming media on their smart phones increased 60% (from 64 minutes to 99 minutes) in the first quarter of 2016. For adults in the 18-34 demographic, 39% of media consumption occurs on smartphones, tablets and PCs, while only 29% occurs on TV.
…
Live TV, particularly sporting events, seems to be one of the most common reasons people stick with cable, which makes Hulu’s announcement–specifically its implications for ESPN and Fox Sports–all the more compelling to potential subscribers (and more expensive for Hulu).
“Hulu likely paid the highest carriage fees for those channels” says Neil Megly, an analyst at Moody’s. But it may just pay off. “Sports is the linchpin for a lot of folks who pay for television,” he adds.
Fox and Disney each own about 30% of Hulu, which partly explains the deal, as they are betting on the future of the platform, rather than traditional cable.
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The first CFP rankings come out Tuesday. Let’s look at the CFP contender pool. For now I’ll define it as all undefeated teams plus 1-loss P5 teams or independents. 2-loss P5 teams could come back into it later in the season.
12 current contenders (-2 from last week)
ACC (2):
0 losses – Clemson
1 loss – UL
B10 (3):
0 losses – MI
1 loss – OSU, NE
B12 (2):
0 losses – none
1 loss – Baylor, WV
P12 (1):
0 losses – UW
1 loss – none
SEC (3):
0 losses – AL
1 loss – UF, TAMU
Other (1):
0 losses – WMU
Top 2-loss options:
WI, OU
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Louisville and Texas A&M are effectively two-loss teams, because to reach their CCG, they’d need Clemson or Alabama respectively to lose twice. To reach the playoff without reaching their CCGs, they’d the gift of multiple losses by the leaders of other conferences.
Baylor and WV do not have the advantage of a CCG, and they suffer from the B12’s overall lack of schedule strength. They need to win out, and then hope at least a couple of the other conference leaders stumble.
Clemson, Michigan, Ohio State, Nebraska, Washington, Alabama, and Florida, are the teams that can reach the playoff without getting outside help.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Louisville and Texas A&M are effectively two-loss teams, because to reach their CCG, they’d need Clemson or Alabama respectively to lose twice. To reach the playoff without reaching their CCGs, they’d the gift of multiple losses by the leaders of other conferences.”
It’s too early to play that game. All 1-loss P5 teams have a shot at the playoff at this point. AL still has LSU and AU to play, for example. The CCGs could have upsets. Would you take 10-3 VT or UNC over 11-1 UL? In a few weeks I may add all other P5 division leaders with 0-2 losses because chaos in the CCGs could do weird things to the rankings.
“Baylor and WV do not have the advantage of a CCG, and they suffer from the B12’s overall lack of schedule strength. They need to win out, and then hope at least a couple of the other conference leaders stumble.”
Yes, but they’re still in the running for now. I’d rather keep teams too long then cut them and have to bring them back.
Any CFP predictions out there?
My guess:
1. AL
2. MI
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. UL
6. TAMU
7. OSU
8. WI
9. OU
10. NE
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It’s too early to play that game. All 1-loss P5 teams have a shot at the playoff at this point. AL still has LSU and AU to play, for example. The CCGs could have upsets. Would you take 10-3 VT or UNC over 11-1 UL? In a few weeks I may add all other P5 division leaders with 0-2 losses because chaos in the CCGs could do weird things to the rankings.
I don’t think it’s too early to notice facts, when those facts are simple. Louisville needs to win out, and hope Clemson loses 2 of the next 3. (Oh, and those 3 are against Syracuse, Pitt, and Wake Forest; the first two at home.) Ohio State just needs to win out. I find that a fairly meaningful difference — not that it couldn’t happen.
“Baylor and WV do not have the advantage of a CCG, and they suffer from the B12’s overall lack of schedule strength. They need to win out, and then hope at least a couple of the other conference leaders stumble.”
Yes, but they’re still in the running for now. I’d rather keep teams too long then cut them and have to bring them back.
They should be listed…without a doubt. I am just dividing your list into two subdivisions: those who can make the playoff if they keep winning, and those who need help.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I don’t think it’s too early to notice facts, when those facts are simple. Louisville needs to win out, and hope Clemson loses 2 of the next 3. (Oh, and those 3 are against Syracuse, Pitt, and Wake Forest; the first two at home.) Ohio State just needs to win out. I find that a fairly meaningful difference — not that it couldn’t happen.”
Obviously some teams have simpler paths than others. But you listed only one way UL could get in. They could also be a second ACC team in due to CCG upsets or other losses, or they could replace the ACC champ if there’s a CCG upset. As a 1-loss P5 team they still have a chance so they make the list.
The more advanced list, which you’re making, is those who control their own chance to win their conference with a second tier of those most likely to capitalize on any upsets. I just think it’s still too early to bother with that as there are too many potential upsets left.
Possible division winners:
ACC A – all but BC
ACC C – everyone
B10 E – all but MSU and RU
B10 W – everyone
B12 – everyone
P12 N – everyone
P12 S – everyone
SEC E – everyone
SEC W – all but MS
In control to be division winners:
ACC A – Clemson
ACC C – VT, UNC
B10 E – MI, OSU
B10 W – NE
B12 – OU, Baylor, OkSU, WV
P12 N – UW, WSU
P12 S – CO
SEC E – UF
SEC W – AL, AU, LSU
In control to be conference winners and 0 or 1 loss total:
ACC A – Clemson
ACC C – none
B10 E – MI, OSU
B10 W – NE
B12 – Baylor, WV
P12 N – UW
P12 S – none
SEC E – UF
SEC W – AL
It’s possible that those are the only teams that will make the CFP, but I still believe it’s too soon to eliminate a team like UL. Several of the 2-loss teams are still viable in my mind, too.
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The more advanced list, which you’re making, is those who control their own chance to win their conference with a second tier of those most likely to capitalize on any upsets.
Not exactly. I wasn’t trying to list everyone who is still mathematically alive to win their conference. I am just splitting the playoff contenders’ list you already made, into two further groups: A) Those who’d obviously make it, if they win out; B) Those who’d need additional help.
Group A is: Clemson, Michigan, Ohio State, Nebraska, Washington, Alabama, and Florida
Group B is: Louisville, Baylor, West Virginia, Texas A&M, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Western Mich.
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 63
2. MI
3. Clemson – 1
4. UW
5. UL – top 1-loss team
6. OSU
7. TAMU
8. WI – top 2-loss team
9. UF
10. NE
Others of note:
18. WMU – top G5 division leader
23. PSU
By conference:
B12 – 4 = 40%
B10 – 5 = 36%
SEC – 5 = 36%
ACC – 5 = 36%
P12 – 4 = 33%
Other – 2 (WMU, Boise)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 60
2. MI – 1
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. UL – top 1-loss team
6. OSU
7. TAMU
8. WI – top 2-loss team
9. NE
10. UF
Others of note:
17. WMU – top G5 division leader
20. PSU
By conference:
SEC – 5 = 36%
ACC – 5 = 36%
B10 – 5 = 36%
B12 – 4 = 40%
P12 – 4 = 33%
Other – 2 (WMU, Boise)
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Here’s a school trying to best support the intent of college athletics – prioritizing the athletes and coaches. Hopefully they can find funding for stable support. Would be unconscionable to lose the mighty Banana Slugs.
“The director of athletics position was eliminated to avoid being forced to cut teams and coaches this year,” Hernandez-Jason said.
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Kristi Dosh describes CFP selection committee process.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kristidosh/2016/10/31/how-the-college-football-playoff-selection-committee-works/#62a07934440a
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http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/rankings
The preseason MBB polls are out. Duke is the clear #1.
AP:
1. Duke
2. UK
3. KU
4. Villanova
5. OR
6. UNC
7. Xavier
8. UVA
9. WI
10. AZ
11. IN
12. MSU
15. PU
25. UMD
RV. OSU, MI
The Coaches poll is similar with B10 teams from #9, 11, 12, 15 and 21.
I’ll go out on a limb and guess that a team wearing blue wins the title this year.
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Yahoo’s Pat Forde has Five thoughts ahead of first College Football Playoff rankings release.
His “first thought” is that this could be the year that the committee chooses two teams from the same conference. But to get there, he relies on his “second thought,” that the committee should end its practice of favoring conference champions. Even if you agree with that idea, they’re not going to change the rules in the middle of the season.
His “third thought” is that “the Big 12 is done as a 2016 playoff contender.” I certainly agree that the Big 12 champ is highly unlikely to get the nod over any other 1-loss champ, but you can’t rule out CCG upsets.
Click through if you’re dying to know thoughts four and five.
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Pat Forde is a Mizzou grad who regularly disses the Big 12. On the other hand, he’s following herd mentality. Its the same herd that I thought was ridiculous when it wrote off the Big 10 after Ohio St. lost to Virginia Tech a couple years back early in the season.
Now I doubt anybody in the Big 12 will win out, but if WVU or Baylor do, they will be in the playoff. If OU wins out, they have a chance with upsets elsewhere. Most likely everybody has at least one more loss. Good chance neither the Big 12 or Pac 12 is in the playoff this year.
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I doubt anybody in the Big 12 will win out, but if WVU or Baylor do, they will be in the playoff.
That’s hyperbole, as much as the original statement was. WVU and Baylor do not control their own destinies. If the favorites in the other conferences keep winning, it will be a replay of 2014, and the Big 12 will be left out.
For them to have any chance at all, at least one conference must crown a 2-loss champ — and even then, the Big 12 champ won’t be a sure thing, as the other leagues’ winners will have at least one more quality win than the Mountaineers or Bears do.
Both teams are hurt by the Big 12’s overall weakness this year. Baylor played its usual joke of a non-conference schedule. WVU is marginally better: at least they tried to schedule some serious non-conference opposition. Unfortunately for them, neither Missouri nor BYU is having a very good year, so WVU’s wins over them don’t look that impressive.
If OU wins out, they have a chance with upsets elsewhere.
OU needs a ton of help. Their loss to Houston isn’t looking as respectable as it once did, and Ohio State humiliated them at home. They’d probably need one of the other conferences to crown a 3-loss champ.
Good chance neither the Big 12 or Pac 12 is in the playoff this year.
I don’t know about a “good chance,” but the Pac 12 could be in trouble if the “right” upsets happen. Despite Washington’s gaudy 8–0 record, they played a weak non-conference schedule, and they have some tough games remaining. Every other Pac 12 contender has at least two losses, and a number of them lack quality non-conference wins.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Yahoo’s Pat Forde has Five thoughts ahead of first College Football Playoff rankings release.”
Forde being wrong about something is like the sun rising in the east.
“His “first thought” is that this could be the year that the committee chooses two teams from the same conference.”
And that’ll be the first thought for all sportswriters until it happens because it’s so good for clicks.
“But to get there, he relies on his “second thought,” that the committee should end its practice of favoring conference champions.”
Which is a pointless “thought” since it’s written in black and white in the rules for the committee to follow. The committee can’t choose to ignore the mandate to value championships as a way to separate equivalent teams.
“Even if you agree with that idea, they’re not going to change the rules in the middle of the season.”
They’ll never change that rule because it was a demand from those like the B10 and P12 that wanted to make being not being a runner-up mandatory (champs and independents only).
The commissioners partitioned the nation into five major conferences to maximize TV money. That doesn’t mean all five leagues were created equally, and it doesn’t mean the champions of those five deserve some exalted status over a superior team that happened to not win its league.
1. The commissioners did no such thing. Conferences formed organically long, long ago and some of them became more significant than others based on who was in them. Over time other schools have chosen to join these power conferences when given the chance. Some conferences have merged, others have split, and all of this was determined by college presidents not conference commissioners.
2. The rules don’t say that all champions have status above a superior team and I don’t think the committee has acted that way. They say that championship status should be a tiebreaker between similar teams and it has been. Of course, one factor in the quality of a team for many people is whether or not it won its conference because winning is hard.
I would challenge him to name a clearly superior team that was left out of the playoffs so far. In 2014 OSU, Baylor and TCU were similar in quality during the season and all were technically champs (TCU would’ve lost the tiebreaker). In 2015 OSU, MSU and IA all seemed similar as well.
“His “third thought” is that “the Big 12 is done as a 2016 playoff contender.” I certainly agree that the Big 12 champ is highly unlikely to get the nod over any other 1-loss champ, but you can’t rule out CCG upsets.”
There is plenty of time for multiple conferences to end up with 2-loss or even 3-loss champions. 11-1 WV or 10-2 OU still have a shot. The ACC champ could be 11-2 VT. The B10 champ could be 11-2 WI. The P12 champ could be 11-2 or even 10-3 (WSU, CO, Utah). The SEC champ could be 11-2 or even 10-3 UF.
I think there are 3 relevant questions:
1. Does an 11-1 champ from the B12 would top an 11-2 champ from another P5 conference this year? Certainly it should top a 10-3 champ, right?
2. Does an 11-1 B12 champ top an 11-1 runner-up from another conference (UL is highly ranked, for example)?
3. Does a 10-2 B12 champ top an 11-1 runner-up from another conference?
My guesses are:
1. No, due to SOS.
2. Yes, due to champ status unless the difference on the field is very obvious.
3. Maybe for OU, but doubtful.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/is-the-college-football-playoff-process-too-taxing-and-is-the-committee-too-old/
Is the CFP committee too old and is the job too taxing?
The current committee ranges in age from 43 to 77. The average age is slightly more than 61. That’s about three years older than the also-powerful NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Committee, average age 58.5.
“Overall, no, this committee is not too old overall,” said CFP executive director Bill Hancock, “The committee has gotten it right both years and that will happen again this year. These 12 people are highly respected, and they have a great perspective on the game.”
Of course Hancock is also an older man, so his opinion may be a bit biased. I think age cuts both ways. The older folks probably are less emotional about things but are also more set in their opinions and less likely to consider new ways of evaluating teams (like advanced stats).
The big difference is the basketball selection committee meets once a year, in March, to select its bracket. That is nothing compared to the six-week slog the CFP committee endures.
The weekly travel, said one person associated with the process said, “absolutely killed me.”
That should be no surprise. Former member Mike Tranghese traveled more than 1,700 miles weekly from his home near Providence, Rhode Island, to the CFP meetings in Dallas. Haden flew 1,400 miles each week for six straight weeks from Los Angeles.
” … My doctors advised me to reduce my traveling,” Haden said upon his departure from the committee.
I’d think they could video-conference rather than meeting in person, especially for the November rankings which don’t actually matter. The technology is available and the CFP can afford it. Maybe just meet in person for the final vote.
They could also stop doing it weekly. Every other week would be fine and give more time for things to change between rankings. If it was me, I’d do them the first week of October, the first week of November, the third week of November (I could skip this one), after Thanksgiving weekend and after the CCGs at most.
“No, we do not believe [six weeks] is too much,” Hancock said. “In the planning stages three years ago, we did consider compiling rankings only one time. But we knew fans would enjoy this way much more than if we just dropped rankings on them after the conference championship games.”
There’s a reason MBB doesn’t do this, though. Why set yourself up for complaints by how teams move up and down if you don’t need to? Just meet and discuss the teams so others can give you ideas of things and teams to focus on going forward, and save the actual voting for the final time. Maybe do a post-Thanksgiving vote just to run through the process once for everyone, but not every week in November.
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“No, we do not believe [six weeks] is too much,” Hancock said. “In the planning stages three years ago, we did consider compiling rankings only one time. But we knew fans would enjoy this way much more than if we just dropped rankings on them after the conference championship games.”
For as long as he has been a public figure in college sports, I don’t remember Hancock ever saying anything except, “The status quo is exactly right,” until the moment when his bosses decided it wasn’t.
There’s a reason MBB doesn’t do this, though. Why set yourself up for complaints by how teams move up and down if you don’t need to?
Have they ever said that this was the reason why the MBB committee doesn’t release interim rankings? I am not aware that it was ever considered.
In basketball, they pick 68 teams, but the lowest seed ever to win it all was #8, and that has only happened once (Villanova, 1985). If the only point of the tournament was to identify a champion, they could stop at 32, and be practically certain of omitting no one with a serious chance.
The converse, is that if they started releasing interim rankings late in the season, almost all of the debate would be about lower-seeded teams that have no chance anyway. If Duke is in first place in the ACC, they’re not sweating it out as to whether they’re going to be a tourney team.
I don’t know how to check this, but I doubt it’s very common that a team goes from “on the bubble” to national champion contender in the last month of the season. It can’t be common enough to justify having the committee re-seed 68 teams four or five extra times, just for show.
In football, the situation is the opposite, because every team in the playoff has a very real chance of becoming the national champion, and at times the first couple of teams out would have had a significant chance too, if the field had been larger, or if the committee had weighed their resumes differently.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Have they ever said that this was the reason why the MBB committee doesn’t release interim rankings? I am not aware that it was ever considered.”
No, it’s because it’s expensive and time-consuming and unnecessary. Only the final vote matters.
“In football, the situation is the opposite, because every team in the playoff has a very real chance of becoming the national champion, and at times the first couple of teams out would have had a significant chance too, if the field had been larger, or if the committee had weighed their resumes differently.”
But there’s is still no benefit to early rankings. Only the final one counts. Is ESPN so hard up for content that they demand these rankings?
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“Have they ever said that this was the reason why the MBB committee doesn’t release interim rankings? I am not aware that it was ever considered.”
No, it’s because it’s expensive and time-consuming and unnecessary. Only the final vote matters.
But I don’t think there was ever a time when they considered it, and then demurred because it would “set [them] up for complaints by how teams move up and down.”
But there’s is still no benefit to early rankings.
By that line of reasoning, there was never a reason for the weekly AP or Coaches’ polls either, since only the final one determined who would be considered national champion (pre-BCS).
The weekly BCS rankings should have been considered equally meaningless; although, unlike the playoff committee rankings, a bunch of people didn’t have to get into a room to figure it out.
If the conferences had decided on a BCS-like system to determine the four playoff teams, rather than a committee, I’ve no doubt they would have continued to publish weekly rankings, and no one would have thought twice about it.
The decision to use a committee obviously gave them pause, because there is obviously demand on people’s time that is totally unlike traditional polls. On the other hand, I think there would’ve been considerable uneasiness, if teams went into the final month of the season completely blind as to where they stood.
That’s where the comparison to basketball comes in. In the final month of the basketball season, teams worried if they’ll make the tournament, are probably destined to be lower seeds with no serious chance of winning it. That is not the case in football.
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Marc Shepherd,
“But I don’t think there was ever a time when they considered it, and then demurred because it would “set [them] up for complaints by how teams move up and down.””
I never said that they did consider it. Only football would be dumb enough to do it. There’s also the difference that the NCAA runs the MBB tourney and they wouldn’t spend the money to vote 6 times when only the final vote matters.
“By that line of reasoning, there was never a reason for the weekly AP or Coaches’ polls either, since only the final one determined who would be considered national champion (pre-BCS).”
The AP and UPI polls were business decisions. The newspapers made more money due to having the weekly poll.
“The weekly BCS rankings should have been considered equally meaningless; although, unlike the playoff committee rankings, a bunch of people didn’t have to get into a room to figure it out.”
They were meaningless but it was the only way to find out what the computers thought. Fans like to know where they stand. But humans didn’t come under massive attack for their decisions and then having to explain why things changed later.
“If the conferences had decided on a BCS-like system to determine the four playoff teams, rather than a committee, I’ve no doubt they would have continued to publish weekly rankings, and no one would have thought twice about it.”
All the information was already public, so the BCS rankings just brought it together.
“The decision to use a committee obviously gave them pause, because there is obviously demand on people’s time that is totally unlike traditional polls. On the other hand, I think there would’ve been considerable uneasiness, if teams went into the final month of the season completely blind as to where they stood.”
They do it that way in all other college sports and it works just fine. It’s not like a team can do anything different because they know their ranking. You go out and try to win every game no matter what. You can’t change your schedule and you shouldn’t be able to try to win by more than points than you already are. Besides, there are plenty of other rankings out there to give you a decent idea of where you stand (AP, Coaches, all the old BCS computers, etc).
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They do it that way in all other college sports and it works just fine.
The difference is that, in those sports, the fields are much larger. Therefore, the teams in doubt about whether they will make the post-season, are almost surely destined to lose. Those with a serious chance aren’t sweating whether they’ll get picked.
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Marc Shepherd,
“The difference is that, in those sports, the fields are much larger. Therefore, the teams in doubt about whether they will make the post-season, are almost surely destined to lose. Those with a serious chance aren’t sweating whether they’ll get picked.”
So what? In what way is that relevant? Does anything change about the process based on the size of the field? Is there anything a team can do with the knowledge of early votes that they wouldn’t do without that knowledge? As I’ve pointed out, the polls and the computer rankings are always available to them anyway.
The only purpose the CFP rankings serve is for the fans, and so far the result has been to undermine the process (see 2014 and TCU falling from 3 to 6) rather than help matters. It probably helps ESPN recoup some money but it’s bad for the sport.
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Guys, this is the “entertainment” part of Entertainment and Sports Programing Network.
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ccrider55,
“Guys, this is the “entertainment” part of Entertainment and Sports Programing Network.”
I asked earlier if ESPN demanded these earlier rankings but nobody seems to know.
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In 2011, UConn finished the Big East 9-9 and tied for 9th place. They were very much on the bubble and likely would have been left out of the big dance with an early conference tournament exit.
Instead they won 5 games in 5 days to claim the Big East auto bid, then continued their run to the NCAA tourney title.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/baylor-public-safety-official-admits-significant-failure-over-sexual-assault-claims/
The Baylor scandal will be featured on 60 Minutes Sports on Showtime this week.
Senior vice president in charge of campus safety Reagan Ramsower spoke with Keteyian regarding the gang rape allegations against former Baylor players Tre’von Armsted and Shamychael Chatman in 2013. A Waco police report stated that Baylor was “contacted” about the incident but criminal charges were never filed against either player.
Ramsower is described as a figure that often “clashed” with the Title IX office. In the report, he said the Baylor campus police (a group he oversees) had a history of burying sexual assault complaints.
“There was a police report. I suppose it — stayed with the police department. It never came outta the police department,” Ramsower said of the allegations against Armstead and Chatman. “That was — that was a significant failure to respond by the police department. There’s no doubt about it.”
…
ESPN’s Outside the Lines revealed in April that Baylor did not investigate the rape allegations against Armstead and Chatman for two years in one of a string of revelations that led to Briles’ dismissal in May.
The 60 Minutes Sports segment includes interviews with Patty Crawford, Baylor’s first full-time Title IX coordinator who resigned claiming the school was standing in the way of her doing her job, Baylor’s interim president and four board of regents members. Additionally, a former Baylor coach tells Keteyian she is of the belief that she was forced to leave the school after reporting a number of sexual assault allegations to the athletic program.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/big12/2016/10/31/baylor-football-sexual-assault-art-briles-ken-starr-title-ix/93004402/
A little more about Baylor.
Following the release of the Pepper Hamilton report, Baylor’s faculty senate still had questions, so the university brought the firm’s attorneys back to campus in September. Asked how Baylor was doing in comparison to other schools’ handling of sexual assaults, a Pepper Hamilton attorney told the faculty that Baylor was severely behind the times, saying that while most schools were in the 1980s, Baylor was in the 1950s, according to Dwight Allman, an associate professor of political science and member of the faculty senate.
Pepper Hamilton’s “findings of fact” reported that Baylor’s efforts to comply with Title IX were “slow, ad hoc and hindered by a lack of institutional support;” that the student conduct processes were “wholly inadequate” to respond under Title IX; that the university failed to “consistently support complainants” with interim measures; that the school in some cases “failed to take action to identify and eliminate a potential hostile environment.”
In some cases, the report noted, administrators discouraged complainants from reporting.
“I think we’ve been presented with enough of the findings to have a sense of the fact that we have a problem,” Allman told USA TODAY Sports in mid-October. “At the same time, I think the institutional response has been appropriate to what has been presented to us by Pepper Hamilton.”
…
Crawford was hired as the school’s Title IX coordinator in November 2014, more than three years after the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights issued a memo in part advising schools that they should have a coordinator.
She resigned in early October, saying on CBS This Morning that Baylor officials undermined her efforts to investigate sexual assault complaints and that Baylor was more concerned with its brand than protecting students.
“I think her accusations are unfair and also untrue,” said interim president David Garland told USA TODAY Sports.
Seay, who served as a spokesperson for a petition this spring that drew attention to Baylor’s problems addressing sexual violence, is involved with a network of men and women who say they are aware of around 100 people who were allegedly assaulted at Baylor.
Several of those reported their cases after Crawford was hired, Seay said, and it’s clear to her Baylor’s response had improved. But she believes what Crawford has said.
It’s a long article with a lot more to say.
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First CFP rankings out: http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
B10 and SEC take 10 of the top 13 slots (5 each).
The Pac really needs Washington to win their conference to have a shot (I think the Huskies are definitely in if they end up undefeated).
ACC needs a 1 or 0 loss Clemson/Louisville as conference champ.
B12 needs help. Either Baylor or WVU have to win out (which I don’t see happening anyway) and they need a major upset or several in a CCG, most likely so that some conference crowns a 2-or-mre loss champ.
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Barring some pretty big upsets, the 4 teams are very likely to be Clemson, Washington, and the winners of the SEC and B10.
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No real surprises in that sense. I wonder if any chaos will happen in November to muddy the picture.
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Barring some pretty big upsets, the 4 teams are very likely to be Clemson, Washington, and the winners of the SEC and B10.
Washington ends with @Cal, USC, Arizona State, @Washington State. Football Outsiders has the Huskies’ win probabilities at 87%, 75%, 96%, and 86%. Those are highly likely wins individually, but the probability of them going 12–0 is only 54%.
Clemson’s probability of going 12–0 is at 75%, and because of their superior schedule, they can probably absorb a loss (as long as it’s not in the CCG) and still make the playoff. I am not positive that 12–1 Washington gets in.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Washington ends with @Cal, USC, Arizona State, @Washington State. Football Outsiders has the Huskies’ win probabilities at 87%, 75%, 96%, and 86%. Those are highly likely wins individually, but the probability of them going 12–0 is only 54%.
Clemson’s probability of going 12–0 is at 75%, and because of their superior schedule, they can probably absorb a loss (as long as it’s not in the CCG) and still make the playoff. I am not positive that 12–1 Washington gets in.”
Let’s consider the likely scenarios:
1. All chalk
The ACC, B10 and SEC champs are in at 13-0 or 12-1. 12-1 UW would be compared to the B12 champ (11-1 or 10-2 most likely) and any 11-1 runners-up.
Being a P5 champ would be a big advantage in that comparison. Any of the runners-up would have to be clearly superior to UW. UW’s resume would probably be better than the B12’s champ, too.
2. Some upsets happen
The bigger problem for UW might be if AL, Clemson or MI get upset and then are in that comparison as a runner up. Still, being a champ is a big edge.
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Richard,
“B10 and SEC take 10 of the top 13 slots (5 each).”
Some of those rankings seem a little sketchy to me. Who have some of those teams beaten? LSU and UF have 0 top 25 wins. AU has only beaten LSU (before Miles was fired). TAMU has only beaten AU (back when they were playing poorly). AU lost to Clemson. TAMU got whipped by AL. LSU lost to WI. Are those losses what got these teams here? But it’s still early yet and those teams might all deserve their rankings by the end of the year.
“The Pac really needs Washington to win their conference to have a shot (I think the Huskies are definitely in if they end up undefeated).”
CO finishes with 2 ranked teams (WSU and Utah). If they win out and upset UW they’ll be decently high in the rankings. They could nip the B12 champ for a spot.
I agree that 13-0 UW is in. I think any 13-0 P5 team is in.
“ACC needs a 1 or 0 loss Clemson/Louisville as conference champ.”
Clemson’s got a pretty soft finish to the schedule. The CCG is the only tough game left.
“B12 needs help. Either Baylor or WVU have to win out (which I don’t see happening anyway) and they need a major upset or several in a CCG, most likely so that some conference crowns a 2-or-mre loss champ.”
I don’t see Baylor making it with their crappy OOC schedule and the scandal hanging over them.
WV plays OU in 2.5 weeks and finishes with Baylor. OU plays Baylor in 1.5 weeks. I think any loss eliminates that team.
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https://www.landof10.com/big-ten/big-ten-makes-major-primetime-scheduling-announcement
Friday night college football no longer is taboo in Big Ten country.
Beginning with the 2017 season, the Big Ten plans to schedule six prime-time football games on Friday nights on its college campuses. That will include two games on the Friday of Labor Day weekend and four more scattered in September or October, according to Mark Rudner, the Big Ten’s senior associate commissioner for television administration.
“We saw this as an opportunity for significant exposure and more favorable use of national platforms for Big Ten football,” Rudner told Land of 10 on Wednesday morning.
The addition of Friday night football is part of the league’s new six-year media rights agreement with ESPN and Fox. Additionally, Rudner said the league will triple the total number of prime-time games airing on Fox and the ESPN family of networks from six to 18 beginning in 2017. The six Friday night games are part of the 18-game prime-time package. Prime-time games will air on either ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, Fox or FS1.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17954314/big-ten-include-friday-night-games-beginning-2017
Some more info on this terrible decision.
The Friday night games will be limited to September and October and won’t include every team. Schools with huge stadiums, such as Penn State and Ohio State, won’t be asked to host them. And Michigan has declined to participate in Friday night games at home or on the road, Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany told the Tribune.
Did every school get the chance to decline to participate? If so, shame on the others for not following MI’s lead here. These games will get terrible ratings while hurting high school attendance.
The Friday night slate will include three nonconference and three conference contests. Until now, the league has resisted playing on weeknights except for the opening week of the season. The Big Ten has no current plans to play on Thursday nights, senior associate commissioner Mark Rudner told the Big Ten Network.
I assume Thursdays are off limits due to the short week, NFL competition and having school the next day.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/ct-big-ten-friday-night-games-20161102-story.html
The Tribune had the story first, so I’ll link them as well.
The selected games will be revealed this week, as early as Wednesday afternoon.
“All things considered,” Delany said, “we thought it was worthwhile to dip our toe in the water.”
With the exception of Labor Day weekend, the league has turned down Friday night games, citing a conflict with high school football and concerns about impacting class time and campus logistics.
…
Delany said there will be three conference games and three non-league games in September and October. No team will play more than twice.
When Delany became commissioner in 1989, he said, the league had 16 televised football games. Now that number is 95, and he said the result is that the Saturday TV windows “become cannibalized.”
So the league is bucking its own tradition to create a new TV window — on a somewhat limited scale.
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The coaches don’t like it either. They can’t watch recruits play or have recruits visit for a Friday night game generally.
Tom VanHaaren, an ESPN Staff Writer, tweeted this:
The Chicago Tribune reported Wednesday that the Big Ten will play six Friday night games as part of its new TV deal. The games would include conference games as well as non-conference games in September and October, which could impact recruiting within the conference.
A few Big Ten assistants spoke out against the decision, saying it could put them behind the ball with recruiting during the season.
“Friday night games would put the Big Ten in a recruiting disadvantage,” said one Big Ten assistant coach. “No other conference has the game day atmospheres of this league. Combined with two teams, or whoever is playing, would not have the opportunity of going to recruit on Friday nights as well to watch prospects play.
“People watch the Big Ten, we don’t need it for exposure. I understand why the Pac 12 and west coast teams do it.”
Another coach echoed those feelings that Friday games wouldn’t provide anything positive for their recruiting efforts.
“There is (no advantage),” another Big Ten assistant said. “Most, if not all, high school kids play on Friday nights, which means you would lose one game for recruiting.”
One Big Ten coach said the move wouldn’t impact his team too much, because acknowledged it would make it difficult for prospects to visit.
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I haven’t seen any positive responses yet. It looks like this came out of the same idea lab as “Leaders” / “Legends”.
And you know the burden is going to fall primarily on the lousy teams. The kings and princes will usually get scheduled into more desirable windows.
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There are 2 or 3 early season Thursday/Friday games right now, so this announcement basically means an increase of 3 or 4 per season. MSU has been playing these games recently, so it won’t be all lousy programs.
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“It looks like this came out of the same idea lab as “Leaders” / “Legends”.”
Not exactly. No one was writing checks for hundreds of millions and requiring/requesting leaders and legends as a part of the deal.
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“It looks like this came out of the same idea lab as “Leaders” / “Legends”.
Not exactly. No one was writing checks for hundreds of millions and requiring/requesting leaders and legends as a part of the deal.
It was more about the almighty dollar than you may at first think. The reason for a non-geographic split, was so they could put Michigan and Ohio State in separate divisions, and “double dip” the rivalry, in years they both reached the CCG. They were even prepared to move that game earlier in the season, so that the two would never meet on consecutive weekends. (That part of the plan was squashed, when enough people complained about it.)
It may be that no TV partner expressly insisted that UM and OSU had to be in separate divisions as a condition of the deal. I wouldn’t be surprised if Fox encouraged it. And of course, the league knew that better ratings for that game would increase the value of the package, next time it went to market.
The divisions clearly couldn’t be called “East” and “West”, since they weren’t geographically aligned. “Atlantic” and “Coastal” were already taken, so they came up with “Leaders” and “Legends”. Fortunately, they got a do-over after Maryland and Rutgers joined. By then, it was clear the idea had gone over like a lead balloon.
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“The reason for a non-geographic split, was so they could put Michigan and Ohio State in separate divisions…”
The label given the divisions (leggins and lederhosen) is/was independent of its geographic split or the reasons for it.
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The label given the divisions (leggins and lederhosen) is/was independent of its geographic split or the reasons for it.
Why I referred to “the idea lab” that gave us Leaders and Legends, I was referring to the composition of them, not just the names. The composition was the real mistake, as once they decided not to align geographically, any names they came up with were going to sound hokey.
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True.
They should have gone with “Intercollegiate” and “Faculty” as the division names.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Why I referred to “the idea lab” that gave us Leaders and Legends, I was referring to the composition of them, not just the names. The composition was the real mistake, as once they decided not to align geographically, any names they came up with were going to sound hokey.”
The composition was just fine. They had reasonable balance and major rivalries were preserved.
There were plenty of non-hokey naming suggestions for the divisions. Only Delany and company would pick two things that start with the same letter, and “L” at that, and are as pretentious as Legends and Leaders.
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The composition was just fine. They had reasonable balance and major rivalries were preserved.
A lot of the fans didn’t think so. It’s fairly telling that they didn’t keep that approach, when the addition of UMD and RU gave them the gift of a do-over.
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Marc Shepherd,
“A lot of the fans didn’t think so. It’s fairly telling that they didn’t keep that approach, when the addition of UMD and RU gave them the gift of a do-over.”
There’s a big difference between unpopular and objectively bad. The names of the divisions were a much bigger problem for the fans than the actual divisions were.
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There’s a big difference between unpopular and objectively bad. The names of the divisions were a much bigger problem for the fans than the actual divisions were.
I have no idea what the average fan thought, but the league changed both the names and the underlying idea, as soon as they had a chance. That seems fairly telling.
I have a feeling that if Michigan and Ohio State had met in the CCG (clearly the hope when it was designed), an awful lot of people would’ve thought it was pretty dumb to play the same team two weeks in a row.
They themselves clearly were worried about it, because the original idea was to move the game to earlier in the season. The complaints were such that they abandoned that part of the plan, but by then the divisions were already announced, and they couldn’t walk it back, until the addition of UMD and RU gave them a mulligan.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I have no idea what the average fan thought, but the league changed both the names and the underlying idea, as soon as they had a chance.”
They could’ve changed the names or alignment at any point.
http://www.blackshoediaries.com/2010/9/2/1664422/big-ten-divisions-the-reactions
Besides, it’s easy to go back and see what the people thought. The divisions were announced in September with the provisional names X and O. People were split on them with some preferring geography and others wanting the balance. This article summarizes the reception and has links to various articles from different fan bases.
A mixed review is much better than the reception the division names got. The names were released in December. The instant the names were released the B10 got an unending string of negative feedback. Delany proclaimed the B10 would give the names some time to get accepted but they never were. He never had to defend the composition of the divisions to that extent.
“That seems fairly telling.”
Yes, the actual history does seem telling.
“I have a feeling that if Michigan and Ohio State had met in the CCG (clearly the hope when it was designed), an awful lot of people would’ve thought it was pretty dumb to play the same team two weeks in a row.”
So now you’re using a hypothetical to defend your point? It never happened and was unlikely to happen. Besides, that isn’t a divisional problem but a scheduling one. That’s a separate issue.
“They themselves clearly were worried about it, because the original idea was to move the game to earlier in the season.”
Not quite. They discussed moving it but I never saw it claimed that it was decided to do that. It was a trial balloon that was quickly shot down.
“The complaints were such that they abandoned that part of the plan, but by then the divisions were already announced, and they couldn’t walk it back,”
Of course they could have. The B10 could’ve easily said that either The Game moves or the divisions change. But many of the schools wanted OSU and MI split (guaranteed they all got to play at least 1 of them annually) and they knew OSU and MI didn’t want The Game moved, so they compromised.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I haven’t seen any positive responses yet. It looks like this came out of the same idea lab as “Leaders” / “Legends”.”
This is the price the B10 paid to get the big new TV deals. Friday night games on FS1 with literally hundreds of people watching. I suppose the bright side is fewer overlapping games on Saturdays.
Speaking of which, I’m hoping this sort of detail coming out means the TV deals will be officially announced soon so we can see the final numbers.
“And you know the burden is going to fall primarily on the lousy teams. The kings and princes will usually get scheduled into more desirable windows.”
The smaller programs are also the ones most wanting the extra exposure presumably, so they should play these games.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17954314/big-ten-include-friday-night-games-beginning-2017
More responses from the schools.
Penn State released a statement Wednesday making it clear that, if Delany changes his mind about asking the school to host a Friday night game, it would decline the request.
Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith told ESPN that the school would be able to host a Friday night game only during its autumn break, which typically occurs the second week of October.
“We don’t have classes on campus that Thursday or Friday, so operationally, it works because we’re not dealing with parking issues or classes or any of those conflicts that a game would get in the way of.”
Ohio State would be open to playing Friday night road games in September.
Michigan State said Wednesday it would agree to host a Friday night game — but only on Labor Day weekend.
Of course Smith would be a sellout. He’s never met a dollar he could refuse.
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http://buckeyextra.dispatch.com/content/stories/2016/11/02/big-ten-moving-to-a-schedule-includes-friday-night-prime-time-games.html
Smith says OSU will host once every 3 years on fall break weekend.
“We are supportive of it,” Smith said of move. “We battles for a long time to try to be respectful obviously for high school football. But the reality is what we need to do for our television partners and what we need to do for our revenue stream, we needed to consider some different options.”
…
“We will participate in hosting one (Friday night) game once every three years,” Smith said.
Ohio High School Athletic Association interim commissioner Dave Gray received a call from Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany on Wednesday morning informing him of the move, OHSAA spokesman Tim Stried said.
“We are disappointed,” Stried said of the OHSAA’s reaction. “If feedback had been asked for at some point, we would have expressed we certainly would not have been in favor of that happening.
“Every Friday night around Ohio during the regular season there are, on average, 350 high school football games. Not only are those games important for the teams and their fans, for the home teams those ticket proceeds are crucial for their athletic department. So if there are outside influences, such as a Big Ten game on television, that cause fans to stay home instead of going out to their local high school game, then our member schools are not going to be very happy about it.”
…
“We looked at that as an opportunity to create significant exposure and more favorable use of national platforms for Big Ten football,” Rudner said. “We wanted to create more prime exposure for more programs.”
To do that, the conference is expanding from the current six to 18 prime time games each year, to be televised either by the Fox family of networks or the ESPN family of networks. Rudner said six of those games will be on Friday night – three each by the two televising entities – and carving new ground for a conference that’s had only a handful of Friday night games in the past.
…
The 2017 league football schedule should be announced in the coming week, Rudner said, and “there probably will be two Labor Day (weekend) Friday games, which is where we’ve been before, and the other four (Friday) games will come in September or October. We’re not moving into November with Friday night, but some of those other 12 prime time games could be in November, early November specifically.”
There is no interest by the Big Ten in playing games on Tuesdays, Wednesdays or Thursdays, Rudner said.
1. An OSU game on Friday night is going to impact ticket sales for those 350 HS games. That’s a shame for all states.
2. Significant exposure? Has he seen the ratings for Friday night games?
2016 games in the P5 (in reverse chronological order):
OR vs Cal – 1.5M on ESPN
Duke vs UL – 1.2M on ESPN
MsSU vs BYU – 1.0 and 1.5M on ESPN
Clemson vs BC – 1.0 and 1.6M on ESPN
Stanford vs UW – 2.0 and 3.3M on ESPN
TCU vs SMU – 0.9 and 1.4M on ESPN
USC vs Utah – 0.7 and 1.0M on FS1
Baylor vs Rice – 0.9 and 1.5M on ESPN
ASU vs UTSA – 0.4 and 0.7M on ESPN2
UL vs SU – 1.7M on ESPN2
Labor Day weekend and before:
KSU vs Stanford – 0.8 and 1.4M on FS1
CU vs CSU – 0.7 and 1.1M on ESPN
Cal vs HI – 0.5 and 0.8 on ESPN
That’s 1.4M on average (that’s generally a 0.9 rating for an ESPN game). For a comparison, that’s about what UW vs Utah drew on FS1 this weekend. College GameDay from WI at 12pm before the OSU/WI night game drew 1.7M. CGD from Bristol drew 1.9M.
Games involving B10 teams below 1.4M this year:
RU vs MN – 0.3M on ESPNU
IA vs PU – 0.4 and 0.6M on ESPN2
MN vs UMD – 0.3M on ESPNU
MI vs RU – 0.75 and 1.3M on ESPN2
IA vs MN – 0.7 and 1.0M on ESPN2
IL vs NE – 0.7 and 1.1M on ESPN2
NW vs IA – 0.5M on ESPNU
IA vs RU – 0.5 and 0.8M on ESPN2
MN vs CSU – 0.3M on ESPNU
IA vs NDSU – 0.6 and 1.0M on ESPN2
NE vs WY – 0.6 and 1.1M on ESPN2
IN vs FIU – 0.2M on ESPNU
IA vs Miami (OH) – 0.4M on ESPNU
NW vs WMU – 0.2M on ESPNU
That’s 14 of 35 listed games (no BTN games are listed at http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/college-football-tv-ratings/).
I suppose if it moves a game from ESPN2 on Saturday to ESPN on Friday night it is a small increase in ratings. Notice that it will have to be 2 smaller programs (mostly in the West) to get a benefit. Any game with a major brand tends to do better than this. Even MI’s 78-0 blowout of RU almost matched the number.
3. The rough 2017 schedule has been out for years. I assume he means the complete schedule with all (or most) of the OOC games and days.
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There is no interest [for now] by the Big Ten in playing games on Tuesdays, Wednesdays or Thursdays, Rudner said.
There. Fixed it for him.
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Note that Monday was conspicuously absent from the list. I hope that’s just because of Labor Day.
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Don’t think the B10 ever will be interested in T,W,Th games (or Monday besides Labor Day). Too disruptive of school the next day.
I personally would oppose games on M-Th because they disrupt school too much and because I am not a fan of a short week.
I definitely think the B10 should try to own Sunday night of Labor Day weekend, however. That’s a great time slot for the schools on a quarter system. Right now, that’s Northwestern. Anyone else?
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I think Northwestern is it in the B10 since OSU switched over a few years ago.
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So unless games get moved around, OSU’s one Friday night game will be vs. Minny on 10/12/2018.
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In most years (pre-Rutgers, pre-Purdue) that smells like a Homecoming game.
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I see the Big 10 is planning 3 Conference and 3 Non Conference Games. It is interesting, that although Penn State said they will not play a Friday Night Home Game, The said they would play a road game, and would play a Friday after Thanksgiving home day game ( I suspect that is their goal).? I smell opening and closing with Maryland and Rutgers ( then switching). Why? Flying into and out of State College no fun on Thanksgiving weekend, but since Maryland and Rutgers are not far away, they can bus in. Is the bus trip fun? No The idea of a National TV game against Penn State either on campus or @ M&T ( Maryland) and Met Life ( Rutgers) might be worth it for Maryland and Rutgers.
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I personally like this.
Too many B10 games I want to watch at on the same time is annoying.
And I don’t watch HS football.
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Oh, and I’d like to see Northwestern play multiple Friday night games before school starts in September. OOC as well as conference games.
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They said nobody would play more than 2 in a season and they want them spread over September and October, so you might get 2 before school in some years. I’m sure nobody would complain if you wanted to play an OOC game then. I don’t know if the B10 wants to move their early week (Weeks 1-3) conference games to Friday nights, though.
Based on the previously released schedules, these are the Weeks 1-3 B10 games:
2017
9/2 – OSU @ IN
2018
9/1 – PU @ NW
9/8 – RU @ OSU
2019
9/7 – RU @ IA
9/14 – OSU @ IN
Maybe you’ll get your wish in 2018.
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I agree. I almost exclusively watch B1G games or games involving B1G schools. They could start playing B1G games on Tuesday nights (not that I’m advocating for it) and I would still watch.
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538.com predicts the CFP playoff. The top 9 schools have at least a 1% chance of winning the title. The top 7 have at least a 20% chance to make the playoff.
The fun part is you can make your own future scenario by predicting this week’s games and/or which teams win out.
Teams that have 50% or greater odds to make the playoff if they win out:
AL, Clemson, MI, UW, OSU, TAMU, AU, WI, LSU, UF, NE
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Re: Seeing lots of Buckeyes gear in Chicago but not much Indians gear:
A lot of that has to do with the respective size/depth of the fan bases.
Buckeyes draw the loyalty of almost all Ohioans. Indians only of Clevelanders. And the Buckeyes inspire more loyalty.
You see plenty of people displaying Cardinals gear in Chicago, for instance (especially when the Cards come up for a series; you should go visit Boul Mich then). And Packers (and Huskers) fans are all over the (western) Midwest.
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There’s also a large contingent of bandwagon OSU fans in Chicago. OSU has a very small alumni base in Chicago (smaller than all but NW among the non-newbies).
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That’s a relatively recent phenomenom, UM and ND were the big subway alum schools here in the 70s through mid 90s. As for actual students, Champaign was considered a safety school by North suburbanites – if you got rejected by those 2.
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Yes, those are the fans who rooted for ND or Miami in the 80s, MI/FSU/Miami in the 90s and now OSU because that’s who is winning. Chicago isn’t a bastion of true OSU support.
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BTW, I predict that those schools who have smaller stadiums (well, by B10 standards) and have the vast majority of their regular gameday fan base within an hour drive of campus (Minny, Northwestern, RU, UMD, and maybe IU and PU–Indianapolis is about an hour away from both) would be most eager to host the Friday night games. The networks would want to match up a prince/king (besides the Big Two, who are ratings gold right now so the networks wouldn’t feel a need to juice up the ratings of their games) against the former schools. So PSU, UNL, MSU, Iowa, and Wisconsin. Ideally an interdivisional matchup so that all B10 fanbases would be interested in the result.
On a Saturday, these games may be lost in the shuffle as neutral B10 fans may be watching their own team’s game, but if there is only 1 B10 game on a Friday, this may draw those fans.
Anyway, in 2017, there are 4 of these kinds of conference matchups in Sept/Oct:
10/7/17 PSU@Northwestern
10/14/17 MSU@Minny
10/28/17 UNL@PU & MSU@Northwestern
Also, MSU may be willing to host a Friday night game as they have done so regularly in the past, so add
9/30/17 Iowa@MSU
in to the mix.
We may see
9/29/17 Iowa@MSU
10/6/17 PSU@Northwestern
10/27/17 MSU@Northwestern
In 2018, there aren’t many of these types of games. Only
10/13/18 Iowa@IU
However, also possibly
10/6/18 Northwestern@MSU
and
9/22/18 PSU@UIUC
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Oh, I forgot I mentioned
10/13/2018 Minny@OSU.
And if we include OSU as being willing to travel away:
10/20/2018 OSU@PU.
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Above I listed the B10 games this year that drew worse ratings than a typical P5 game on ESPN on a Friday night. They are all ESPNU or ESPN2 games unsurprisingly. It’s also every single ESPNU or ESPN2 game a B10 team played in. So those sorts of games would get a larger audience by moving to Friday nights.
The BTN record day last year was a 2.0 rating in the 12 metered markets in the footprint. That means most any BTN game would also garner better ratings on ESPN on Friday night. But if these Friday night games get bumped to ESPN2 or FS1, or if they move better games that would’ve been on ESPN, then there’s no exposure benefit in moving them.
ESPN2/ESPNU games:
MI vs RU
NE vs IL
NE vs WY
IA vs PU
IA vs MN
IA vs NW
IA vs RU
IA vs NDSU
IA vs Miami (OH)
RU vs MN
MN vs UMD
MN vs CSU
IN vs FIU
NW vs WMU
Using the brand tiers (King = OSU, MI, PSU, NE; Prince = IA, WI, MSU):
King vs other – 2
King vs OOC cupcake – 1
Prince vs other – 4
Prince vs OOC cupcake – 2
Other vs other – 2
Other vs OOC cupcake – 3
By team:
IA – 6
MN – 4
RU – 3
NE, NW – 2
MI, IL, IN, UMD, PU – 1
OOC – 6
I’d expect a lot of West teams involved based on this.
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BTN’s article about this.
Friday nights, though, long have been considered sacrosanct, the hallowed ground of high school football. Many felt the prep tradition of “Friday Night Lights” shouldn’t be impeded upon. But the Big Ten says the high schools within its footprint are in lock-step with the league on the move to Fridays, along with administrators on Big Ten campuses.
“We have studied this and have talked with a lot of people on campuses, to presidents, chancellors and athletic directors who all have approved of this plan moving forward,” said Rudner. “We also have had conversations with the executive directors of high school athletic associations across all 11 states. Commissioner Delany has been doing that.
“We recognize that it is important to maintain good relationships with the high school executive directors. We have been in good communication with them, along with our schools. It is likely the Friday night schedule will impact no more than six schools. We don’t have the schedule confirmed yet. But for 2017, it would impact up to six.”
Either Tom Dienhart is lying or he left out a good quote. All the B10 talking head says is that the B10 has talked to HS officials, not that any of them support this. I know that the OHSAA and the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association have come out against this already. Others will likely follow. And the OHSAA said the communication consisted of Delany calling to tell him what was happening just before the announcement.
Also, note that it’s “up to six” schools in 2017. 12 is the maximum number it could impact in a given season, so it’s probably going to start with more OOC games and few B10 games.
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If it’s 3 OOC and 3 conference games, that’s a maximum of 9 per year.
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Yes, I forgot they had said that split was fixed for every year and was thinking it could average out to that instead.
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http://www.thegazette.com/subject/sports/friday-nights-are-happening-in-the-big-ten-20161102
An Iowa perspective:
Reaction from athletics directors around the league was tepid. Iowa’s Gary Barta said in a statement the UI is open to the idea, but only within certain parameters.
“We have also agreed that we would be willing to occasionally host a Friday night game surrounding Labor Day weekend,” Barta said.
…
“At Wisconsin, we are open to hosting games at Camp Randall on the Friday night prior to Labor Day weekend in selected years but have not committed to hosting Friday night games at any other time,” Alvarez said.
http://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/2016/11/02/big-ten-friday-night-football/93180318/
And from MSU:
A tweet on MSU’s official Twitter page tonight said Michigan State would host one Friday night game per year provided it was Labor Day weekend.
…
Jack Roberts, executive director of the Michigan High Schools Athletic Association, said today in a news release that he is “disappointed and disheartened” by the Big Ten’s decision to play on Friday nights.
“We are saddened by this decision. We had hoped that the Big Ten Conference would stay above this. We think this cheapens the Big Ten brand,” Roberts said. “Fans won’t like this. Recruits won’t like this. And high school football coaches won’t like this.
“We are grateful that Michigan State University and the University of Michigan are trying to minimize the effects of this decision by the Big Ten. But overall, this is just the latest step by major college athletics in the pursuit of cash that is just crushing high school sports.”
http://www.omaha.com/huskers/blogs/bigred/nebraska-open-to-hosting-big-ten-friday-night-game-no/article_3924e250-a145-11e6-8b1b-a30d8a54c89f.html
From NE:
Nebraska, according to a spokesman, will host one Friday night home game at some point over the next three seasons. NU will have no stipulations on when that home game occurs, although the Big Ten intends to schedule these games in September and October.
So all the big brands except NE are against this (maybe they are too but they’re too nice to say anything), and MI gets to exempt themselves from it entirely which seems wrong. if everyone else has to suffer through these, MI can play one on the road too.
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You forgot your own school, Brian.
UNL and OSU are the only kings/princes committing to hosting a Friday night game after Labor Day weekend (once in 3 years). Many are willing to host a Labor Day weekend game.
Looks like all kings/princes are willing to travel for a Friday night game. Besides UMich.
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I didn’t forget. I think restricting it to only 1 possible weekend per year counts as not really supporting it.
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So all the big brands except NE are against this (maybe they are too but they’re too nice to say anything),
I wouldn’t be surprised if Nebraska is just being the good the good soldier here. No reason to appear like they can’t get along.
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http://www.omaha.com/huskers/football/nsaa-nebraska-high-schools-will-need-to-adjust-to-big/article_c9aabdda-a15a-11e6-b0b3-7f18f09e8ac5.html
NE’s high schools are also against this and are considering asking the B10 for some compensation. Good luck with that.
Did Delany offer or promise any payments or grants for the Friday night move?
“He did not,’’ Tenopir said. “But certainly that’s one of the things the executive directors have talked about.
“We do have to pay for rental of facilities for (various state events), and other states have that same thing. With that lucrative TV contract, some of my executive director brethren believe perhaps the state associations and the schools should benefit in some fashion.
“Those are discussions for down the road.’’
…
Mark Rudner, the Big Ten’s senior associate commissioner for television administration, said Wednesday night the idea of any financial compensation from the league “is something we haven’t talked about, or even thought of that.’’
Also of note:
“We’ve tried to minimize (any disruption),’’ Rudner said by phone from Chicago. “We’re not going to Thursdays. We’re not going to Wednesdays. And no team is going to have more than one home game every year.’’
It looks like Richard’s hopes for seeing NW host a couple of Friday night games a year before school starts are shot. They might play in 2 though.
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http://www.indystar.com/story/sports/college/indiana/2016/11/02/iu-football-play-friday-every-3-years/93199254/
IN’s high schools are also looking to get paid. Meanwhile, IN is happy to do this once every 3 years (at least as far as B10 games).
Indiana University athletic director Fred Glass confirmed to IndyStar on Wednesday that his program has agreed to play one Friday night conference game every three years.
…
“I think this is also a great opportunity for our organizations to work together to cross-promote a sport that has been under attack,” Cox said. “Additionally, this could serve as an opening for a collegiate conference enjoying great annual revenues to assist high schools in our states to augment potential losses at the local level.”
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Given all the brouhaha over Friday night games and also because almost everyone is open to playing on a non-Saturday on Labor Day weekend, the B10 could have 2 OOC and one conference game on Friday and Sunday of Labor Day weekend. Then there would only be 3 more Friday night games the rest of the year.
I would make everybody play a non-Saturday game at least once every 3 years (UMich could be on the Sunday before Labor Day). In fact, I’d like to see the B10 own Sunday before Labor Day with 2 games then.
The conniption is silly, though; even the ESS-EEE-SEE plays a few Th/F games each year (meaning the B10 is the last P5 conference to play weeknights after opening weekend), and I’ve heard that they care a little about HS football Down South.
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Richard – the only Friday SEC games I can remember are opening weekend or the Friday after Thanksgiving. There have been a smattering of Thursday games, but they only take place in Starkville, Nashville, or Columbia, SC (which has an off-campus stadium). I haven’t research it, but that’s what I recall. I think the visiting team has to agree to such a move. The SEC doesn’t has any systematic deal like the B1G appears to have for Friday games. Short of an extreme weather event, I doubt you’d ever see a Friday game in Baton Rouge.
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Yep, the weeknight SEC games after opening weekend have been in smaller stadiums (or off-campus), but that will be true to a large degree in the B10 as well. Of the 7 B10 kings/princes comparable to LSU, only UNL (and maybe OSU) will host a Friday night game after Labor Day once every 3 years.
So the only difference between systematic and non-systematic is that the B10 will have 3-4 of those types of games after opening weekend while the SEC has 1-2 of those types of games.
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Alan from Baton Rouge,
“Richard – the only Friday SEC games I can remember are opening weekend or the Friday after Thanksgiving.”
There has been 1 over the past 3.5 seasons. That was MsSU hosting BYU this year.
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Several Thursday night games, however. Friday night games may be disruptive to HS football, but Thursday night games are disruptive to college classes.
Anyway, it looks like only Northwestern, PU, UIUC, and probably Minny and UMD will host after Labor Day.
Still believe a couple of those should be on the Sunday before Labor Day.
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Richard,
“Friday night games may be disruptive to HS football, but Thursday night games are disruptive to college classes.”
Very much so. I’m certainly not advocating for them. The short week is also a big problem for college athletes. It’s why I don’t support weeknight games except for holidays.
“Still believe a couple of those should be on the Sunday before Labor Day.”
I’m all for maximizing that Sunday, but it wouldn’t reduce the 6 Friday game requirement as far as I know.
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Richard,
“I would make everybody play a non-Saturday game at least once every 3 years (UMich could be on the Sunday before Labor Day).”
I agree that everyone should have to participate at some minimal level. There is no valid excuse on labor Day weekend.
“The conniption is silly, though;”
It’s not that people think this is majorly important, it’s that they think it’s that bad of a decision. There is so little upside and so many downsides.
“even the ESS-EEE-SEE plays a few Th/F games each year”
Outside of opening weekend (which almost nobody has complained about) and Black Friday (which many people are also okay with), the SEC does not play on Fridays. They’ve literally done it once in 3.5 seasons and that was an OOC game. As for Thursday nights, the SEC did it once in 2013, twice last year and not at all in 2014 or 2016 (so far). That’s 4 combined Thursday and Friday games in 3.5 seasons not counting Labor Day and Thanksgiving weekends.
And with the NFL playing on Thursdays, you’re going to see CFB stop playing as much on Thursdays. That probably means more competition on Friday, further reducing the marginal exposure gains of this plan.
“(meaning the B10 is the last P5 conference to play weeknights after opening weekend),”
The SEC has barely done it either. It’s mostly been the ACC, B12 and P12.
“and I’ve heard that they care a little about HS football Down South.”
Which is why they don’t play Friday night games after opening weekend.
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Upside is for those programs that usually don’t appear in primetime on a major network. Granted, being on FS1 or ESPN2 isn’t better, but being on ESPN or Fox on primetime would be.
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That’s my concern. They haven’t limited it to networks that yield decent ratings. FS1 is a graveyard for ratings and ESPN2 isn’t that much better.
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I also like the idea of PSU on Black Friday, rotating vs. UMD and RU.
So every Black Friday:
Noon: PSU vs. UMD/RU
Afternoon: UNL vs. Iowa
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If Black Friday gets oversupplied with content, we wont be far away from games that are scheduled at midnight local time (reminds me of the 1980 Texas A&M at Houston game that started at the A-dome at 11:30p due to the extra inning NLCS game earlier in the day), although many retailers are scaling back their Thanksgiving calendar date hours this year.
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http://www.pennlive.com/news/2016/11/penn_state_faces_1_million_fin.html
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Oops, US Dept of Education advises that it is planning on fining Penn State $2.4 million related to Sandusky (of course)
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17963936/penn-state-fined-record-24-million-handling-jerry-sandusky-case
The Dept. of Education is fining PSU a record $2.4M for violating the Clery Act in their handling of the Sandusky fiasco.
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http://www.cleveland.com/osu/index.ssf/2016/11/big_ten_steps_on_own_success_w.html
An imaginary conversation from the B10 office this week:
“You know, this is how I planned it.”
“Planned what?”
“World domination. Starting with the football success of a Midwest-based college athletic conference. The Big Ten. The ideal mix of tradition and progress. This is it. Right now. Maxing out. Michigan, Ohio State, Nebraska and Penn State all back in the news, in a good way. Four traditional powers on top. Big winners. Us. Right now. Big winners.”
…
“When the Big Ten added Nebraska for the 2011 season, we split up Nebraska and Michigan in one division and Ohio State and Penn State in the other. Did that for a reason, to balance the traditional powers.”
“Makes sense. What did you call the divisions?”
“Why would you ask that? Irrelevant. But in the previous 40 years, in all of major college football, from 1971 to 2010, you know which five teams had the highest winning percentages?”
“Tell me.”
“Nebraska, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Michigan, Penn State. That’s four for five. Right here. Us. Winners. Michigan State was 54.”
“Wow. So now that in the first playoff ranking Michigan is No. 3, Ohio State is No. 6, Wisconsin is No. 8, Nebraska is No. 10 and Penn State is No. 12 …”
“All is right with the world, you got it. That’s five in the top 12. Ask me how many teams the SEC has in the top 12.”
…
“Right, 14, so we need depth at the top. Traditional power, big alumni, major TV rating depth. Like this. Perfect.”
“So why’d you call me in here.”
“Drop the Friday night games thing this week.”
“What? Now? In the middle of our return to glory? By announcing we’re going to play a few conference games on Friday next year, aren’t we going to make high school associations mad and anger traditionalists and step all over what should be our greatest time ever as a football conference since we expanded?”
“Of course we are. That’s why we have to do it now. These people still think of Big Ten football as an experience, as an integral part of their lives. People view their college football team as almost part of their family, and they want to visit that family on Saturdays. But that’s not how it is. College sports aren’t an experience. They’re a product. Mostly a TV product. So TV wants Friday games and we’re giving them Friday games. It’ll be good for places like Illinois and Minnesota and Rutgers. The rest will go along. And we have to do it now. You think we’re going to announce news like this after we lose the Zaxby’s Heart of Dallas Bowl? You force change from a position of strength.”
It’s worth reading the whole thing.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/17903878/ncaa-distribute-some-revenue-academic-performance
The NCAA will start to deliver some money based on academic performance of the athletes. Schools already get money only if the teams meet academic minimums. Presumably now better performance will be rewarded.
The NCAA will begin distributing some revenue to member schools for the academic achievement of their athletes, starting in 2019-20.
The NCAA announced Thursday that the Division I board of directors and NCAA board of governors approved the change to the revenue distribution model. The money will come from the NCAA’s multimedia rights deal for the men’s basketball tournament.
The NCAA agreed to an eight-year extension of its deal with CBS and Turner earlier this year. The contract now runs through 2032 and pays the NCAA about $1.1 billion per year, an increase of about $330 million annually. The NCAA says for the first six years of the new distribution, 75 percent of the increase in rights fees will be used to pay schools based on the academic performance of their teams.
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This would benefit Northwestern,
BUT
So easy to game and such incentivization of bad behavior, however.
They want more dishonesty and UNC-type academic scandals?
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Richard,
“So easy to game and such incentivization of bad behavior, however.
They want more dishonesty and UNC-type academic scandals?”
They’re damned if they do and damned if they don’t. At least this fits with their stated mission. Besides, it’ll still be a fairly small percentage of money (at least for the big schools).
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Damned if they don’t? Why not just leave it alone?
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Because they are receiving 330M more annually, and rather than simply distribute the increase through current formula they would like to incentivize scholastic achievement with a significant portion of that increase? How is this bad?
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ccrider55:
Did you read my post above?
Because it incentivizes cheating as well.
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Richard:
Yes, corrupt folk will see any potential incentive and try to cheat in any endeavor of life. That’s why we have sanctions specifically against cheating. If the sanctions/enforcement need refinement then do that, but don’t eliminate a positive effort because of the potential for a few bad actors.
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CCrider, that all sounds nice, but what sanctions do you see being enforced?
There are a ton for inproper recruiting and eligibility, but what does the NCAA have for academics?
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CCrider, that all sounds nice, but what sanctions do you see being enforced?
There are a ton for inproper recruiting and eligibility, but what does the NCAA have for academics?
The NCAA doesn’t have a specific rule about harboring an ex-coach who turns out to be a child rapist, either. Somehow, they managed to make a case out of it.
There’s a general rule that behaving honorably that has no principled limit, which clearly could be made to apply to the UNC academic scandal, if they so choose.
I also believe there are actual rules that require student–athletes to make meaningful progress towards an actual degree. To give an extreme example, a student who took only one class a year would be ineligible, even if it was a real class. Well, if students are taking fake classes, that would violate it too.
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So easy to game and such incentivization of bad behavior, however.
They want more dishonesty and UNC-type academic scandals?
Most schools actually want to behave. After all, what we refer to as “NCAA rules” is just a shorthand for “rules the schools voted on, and passed.” Do they vote for things they don’t want?
Anyhow, I doubt that UNC believes their bad behavior was worthwhile.
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Most schools want to behave, and they’re giving those who don’t an incentive to cheat.
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So we should remove eligibility requirements? The incentive to cheat their has far higher payoff than some distribution schedule. And you’re only competing with the others interested in particular recruits, not all the member schools.
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CCrider55:
Competing schools are incentivized to make sure that their rivals don’t cheat on eligibility.
Who’s going to care enough to make sure that schools aren’t cheating on academics?
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Richard:
Academics care about the rep of their institutions, as do many alumni, donors, politicians, and even a significant number of fans. You put money into the equation (money to the schools for athlete academic achievement) and more attention WILL be paid. The more money – the greater the scrutiny.
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CCrider:
They already cared (or didn’t) about academics for intrinsic reasons.
Add money in to the equation and you just incentivize cheating
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http://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/04/disney-falls-to-session-lows-as-nielsen-reaffirms-espn-subscriber-loss-data.html
Figured this was interesting: ESPN lost 621k subs last month according to Nielsen. (But there’s a lot of variance during the year in terms of which months lose subs and which gain; net yearly averages obviously strongly negative).
Next couple of years will be extremely interesting for all the sports cable nets (ESPN, Fox Sports, NBC Sports, CBS Sports, BTN, SECN, and the coming ACCN)…; at some point though that lost revenue from lost subs has to be made up somewhere.
These streaming packages don’t seem to offer enough bang for the buck to replace the straight subs but perhaps they’ll offer enough.
It’ll be interesting to see what kind of impact all of this has on the ACCN’s launch and sub rates for Big Ten and SEC over time.
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z33k,
“Figured this was interesting: ESPN lost 621k subs last month according to Nielsen. (But there’s a lot of variance during the year in terms of which months lose subs and which gain; net yearly averages obviously strongly negative).
Next couple of years will be extremely interesting for all the sports cable nets (ESPN, Fox Sports, NBC Sports, CBS Sports, BTN, SECN, and the coming ACCN)…; at some point though that lost revenue from lost subs has to be made up somewhere.
These streaming packages don’t seem to offer enough bang for the buck to replace the straight subs but perhaps they’ll offer enough.
It’ll be interesting to see what kind of impact all of this has on the ACCN’s launch and sub rates for Big Ten and SEC over time.”
We discussed this briefly above.
Two notes:
1. Cable lost 650k and some networks lost 700k.
2. These numbers do not include streaming services like Sling or Vue which both include ESPN.
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One problem for the ESPN’s of the world (including ESPN) is that where the streaming services offer the best bang for the buck is when the subscription is not held for the whole year. So it’s likely their churn rate is higher, and “growth in sign ups” will not translate 1-to-1 into “growth in average subscriber base.”
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After yesterday’s games, the playoff favorites are unchanged. Alabama, Clemson, Michigan, and Washington, remain unbeaten and are assured of being ranked in the top four if they win out.
The committee made itself look foolish by handing Texas A&M the 4th spot in last week’s rankings, which the Aggies promptly biffed by losing to previously unranked Arkansas. This week’s parlor game is the question whether the committee will once again allot the 4th spot to a 1-loss team: Ohio State and Louisville would be reasonable candidates, after both won handily on Saturday.
Washington has the weakest resume of the undefeated P5 teams. On a neutral field, I’d favor Ohio State or Louisville to beat them handily. Nevertheless, I think that if a team would not reach it’s CCG if the regular season ended today, that team should not be in the top four, unless the argument is extremely compelling. Even with a win yesterday, A&M would have needed a lot of breaks to make the playoff. I would have waited to put them in the top four until those breaks actually happen. In my mind, the same applies to OSU and Louisville.
Among the 1-loss teams, only Ohio State definitely controls its own destiny for a playoff spot. Beat Maryland, Michigan State, Michigan, and the B1G West champ, and there is no way the Buckeyes would miss the playoff.
West Virginia also has 1 loss, but it suffers from a comparatively weak schedule and the lack of a CCG to make a statement at the end of the year. Besides winning out, the Mountaineers need one of the other conference leaders to stumble. If history is any guide, it’s probable that at least one will do so.
Louisville is the only other 1-loss P5 team, but having already lost to Clemson, the Cardinals are on the outside looking in, unless the Tigers lose their next two, or upsets occur in other conferences.
After yesterday’s games, all of the P5 conferences with CCGs are now guaranteed to feature at least one team with two losses. An upset in one of those games could pave the way for West Virginia, 1-loss Louisville, 1-loss Michigan (if that loss is to Ohio State), or a 1-loss CCG loser (could be Alabama, Clemson, or Michigan, but not likely Washington, due to their schedule).
If you rank the teams based on likelihood of reaching the playoff, it would be something like this:
1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Michigan
4. Washington
5. Ohio State
6. West Virginia
7. Louisville
This is not to say that I believe WV is the 6th-best team in the country. But given the rules that favor conference champions, they are the most probable beneficiary if there’s an upset in one of the other leagues, assuming they continue to win.
Beyond Louisville, you’d be talking about a 2-loss team, and there are too many of those to attempt to rank them. (I know the committee will do that, but I’m not spending 2 days in a conference room to figure it out.)
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Marc Shepherd,
“The committee made itself look foolish by handing Texas A&M the 4th spot in last week’s rankings, which the Aggies promptly biffed by losing to previously unranked Arkansas.”
TAMU lost to MS St. UF lost to AR.
“This week’s parlor game is the question whether the committee will once again allot the 4th spot to a 1-loss team: Ohio State and Louisville would be reasonable candidates, after both won handily on Saturday.”
OSU crushed a top 10 team. Since they were just behind UW, they might move up. This committee seems to highly value elite wins.
“Nevertheless, I think that if a team would not reach it’s CCG if the regular season ended today, that team should not be in the top four, unless the argument is extremely compelling.”
You are clearly allowed your own opinion but that goes expressly against what the committee is asked to do. They are supposed to rank the best teams in order. Conference affiliation, and thus ability to win said conference, is irrelevant to them. The committee doesn’t look at upcoming schedules or try to predict the future, they rank the teams based on what has happened so far. Conference champion status only becomes a factor once a team wins a championship.
“Even with a win yesterday, A&M would have needed a lot of breaks to make the playoff.”
Which is irrelevant to how good the committee thinks they are now.
“I would have waited to put them in the top four until those breaks actually happen. In my mind, the same applies to OSU and Louisville.”
OSU needs no “breaks.” If they win out, they’d be the 12-1 B10 champ with a slew of impressive wins (OU, WI, NE, MI, WI again) and a decent loss (PSU is #12).
“If you rank the teams based on likelihood of reaching the playoff, it would be something like this:
1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Michigan
4. Washington
5. Ohio State
6. West Virginia
7. Louisville”
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
Let’s see what the expert analysts say:
1. AL 85%
2. Clemson 79%
3. MI 55%
4. UW 51%
5. Ohio State 39%
6. UL 27%
7. WI 15%
8. Auburn 11%
9. OU 8%
10. CO 7%
11. WSU 5%
12. WV 4%
You can play with their model by picking teams to win or lose next weekend or to win out.
Some fun ones:
What if AL loses to MS St? Nothing. It just makes the other top teams more likely to make it.
What if Clemson loses to Pitt? Clemson drops to #4 and UL moves past OSU 41% to 40%.
What if MI loses to IA? OSU and MI trade places in the rankings.
What if UW loses to USC? OSU jumps to #4 with 40% odds with UL just behind at 38%.
What if you assume UL wins out? OSU still stays ahead of them 38% to 36%.
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I do think they looked ridiculous. Everyone knew A&M, Nebraska, Florida and Baylor were overrated and all but A&M got stomped Saturday, two by unranked teams. A&M also got beaten by an unranked team.
A lot of key matchups happen that first weekend in November. They really need to move the first poll back one more week if for no other reason than to avoid continuing to make themselves look ridiculous. It really exposes how flimsy their process is. The first year they kept having to give opposite explanations every week to justify their choices.
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Everyone knew A&M, Nebraska, Florida and Baylor were overrated and all but A&M got stomped Saturday, two by unranked teams. A&M also got beaten by an unranked team.
The committee rankings for Nebraska and Florida were within one position of both the AP and Coaches’ polls. The committee actually rated Baylor four positions lower than those two polls. So, you can’t really say that everyone knew they were overrated.
Ranking A&M fourth, on the other hand, looks awfully peculiar, and suggests a process that is broken.
A lot of key matchups happen that first weekend in November. They really need to move the first poll back one more week if for no other reason than to avoid continuing to make themselves look ridiculous. It really exposes how flimsy their process is. The first year they kept having to give opposite explanations every week to justify their choices.
From this point on, there are key matchups every week. If your process is broken, moving your timing to a week later won’t fix it. Brian’s idea to dump the preliminary rankings is looking better and better.
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????
They do.
The process is to evaluate and vote each week afresh.
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The polls rank to a large extent on losses. The committee is trying to look at the best wins. They put A&M up because they beat Auburn. When so little of the schedule has been played, its kind of a silly system. Both systems lead to results that everyone knows makes no sense. They are ranking teams because they “deserve” it when they haven’t really been tested.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Ranking A&M fourth, on the other hand, looks awfully peculiar, and suggests a process that is broken.”
Committees often come up with strange results. Their argument last week was SOS for TAMU over UW.
Let’s look back and see.
Top 25 (at the time) teams faced:
UW – 2 (2-0, vs #7, @ #17)
TAMU – 4 (3-1, vs #16, vs #17, vs #9, L @ #1) more wins, excusable loss
Top 25 CFP now:
UW – 1 (W @ #16 Utah)
TAMU – (W @ #9 AU, L @ #1 AL), better win, excusable loss
Wins vs teams over 0.500:
UW – Idaho, Stanford, @ #16 Utah
TAMU – @ #9 AU, AR, TN (and now SC, but they were 0.500 at the time)
SOS according to computers:
FEI: UW – #110, TAMU – #3 (last week’s numbers)
Sagarin: UW – #68, TAMU – #19 (this week’s numbers)
There really is a case to be made for TAMU playing a much harder schedule so far. If you believe that only top games really tell you how good a team is, then that could be enough evidence to put TAMU ahead at that point.
That said, the computers favored UW. UW was #5 behind OSU with TAMU #6 last week.
Mean ranking:
OSU – 4.92
UW – 4.98
TAMU – 7.28
Median:
OSU – 5.0
UW – 5.0
TAMU – 6.5
Std deviation:
OSU – 2.05
UW – 1.48
TAMU – 2.92
The computers believed UW was better, but they also believed TAMU had faced a much harder schedule. Depending on how an individual ways different factors, you could justify the committee’s result. At worst you’d drop TAMU to #6, which wouldn’t change how bad this week’s game made them look.
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bullet,
“The polls rank to a large extent on losses. The committee is trying to look at the best wins. They put A&M up because they beat Auburn. When so little of the schedule has been played, its kind of a silly system. Both systems lead to results that everyone knows makes no sense. They are ranking teams because they “deserve” it when they haven’t really been tested.”
All systems lead to faulty results because there is never enough data and the teams vary too much from week to week. It’s impossible to “correctly” rank the teams with the information available. How many systems called for MsSU to beat TAMU? How many called for AR to beat UF? Upsets happen frequently in CFB.
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The computers believed UW was better, but they also believed TAMU had faced a much harder schedule. Depending on how an individual ways different factors, you could justify the committee’s result.
To be clear…I know that a rational argument could be made for putting A&M fourth last week. The committee is composed of rational and informed people, and unlike many armchair fans, I do not believe they are corrupt. (The belief that ESPN wants two SEC teams in the playoff if at all possible, and that the committee is ESPN’s tool, is widely held on fan message boards.)
Nevertheless, the choice was a departure from both human polls and most computer rankings. When the difference between #4 and #5 is so consequential, I think it calls for clearer criteria: sunshine is the best disinfectant.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Nevertheless, the choice was a departure from both human polls and most computer rankings.”
But it wasn’t a large departure. There were several other departures that were much larger. Sometimes the committee will be right about that (and you’ll see the polls adjust quickly), sometimes they’ll be wrong. The computers certainly come up with some strange rankings sometimes.
2014:
OSU started out as #16 in the CFP and won the title. OSU was #13 in the AP and Coaches polls and #16 in the computers. Was everyone horribly wrong then, or was OSU a much better team by the end of the season? WI was favored to win the CCG but got blown out. Was WI overrated?
TCU was #3 in the CFP and computers, #4 in the Coaches and #6 in the AP before CCG weekend. Who was correct?
“When the difference between #4 and #5 is so consequential, I think it calls for clearer criteria: sunshine is the best disinfectant.”
1. It is completely inconsequential outside of the final rankings, and they’ll have more data by then which will tend to greatly reduce the gaps between the various rankings.
2. The criteria seem pretty clear to me. Maybe you want different criteria?
3. I agree more transparency would be good. I think they should release each member’s top 25 list anonymously. That would let you see the differences in opinion but not let you assign blame to a specific person for safety reasons. Even the other committee members probably wouldn’t know which list was whose.
4. I’ll always believe that part of the problem is the nature of asking a committee to reach a consensus this way. Committees come up with weird results due to compromises they make along the way. A straight vote like the polls use, followed by a prolonged discussion period as they try to persuade each other to shift various teams up and down might get a better result. Iterate until no team changes spots after the next vote and that’s your top 25.
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bullet,
“I do think they looked ridiculous.”
Some of the rankings did, yes. I was talking about process, not their final result.
“Everyone knew A&M, Nebraska, Florida and Baylor were overrated and all but A&M got stomped Saturday, two by unranked teams.”
It’s easy to say that in hindsight, but many people thought some of those teams were about right.
“A&M also got beaten by an unranked team.”
They also lost their starting QB in addition to other injury issues they have.
OSU lost to an unranked team a couple of weeks ago. Did everyone know they were way overrated too? Sometimes upsets happen.
“A lot of key matchups happen that first weekend in November. They really need to move the first poll back one more week if for no other reason than to avoid continuing to make themselves look ridiculous.”
There is no time that will do that. Even the final rankings look silly when a few teams bonk in their bowls while lower ranked teams kick butt. That’s football.
“It really exposes how flimsy their process is.”
In the bullet rankings, how much lower would those 4 teams have really been last week?
#4 TAMU 7-1 (we all agree they were too high, but by a few places not 20 spots)
#10 NE 7-1
#11 UF 6-1
#17 Baylor 6-1
Who would you have moved up and on what basis (SOS, eye test, big wins, etc)?
“The first year they kept having to give opposite explanations every week to justify their choices.”
It’s a committee meeting. Have you ever tried to explain why a bunch of other people voted a certain way on a subjective issue? Maybe the tie-breaking measure kept changing from week to week because the previous thing stopped being as helpful.
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TAMU lost to MS St. UF lost to AR.
Yes, unfortunately hit send while still in draft, when my wife dropped a list of chores in my lap. Knew as soon as I posted it, that it was incorrect.
“Nevertheless, I think that if a team would not reach it’s CCG if the regular season ended today, that team should not be in the top four, unless the argument is extremely compelling.”
You are clearly allowed your own opinion but that goes expressly against what the committee is asked to do. They are supposed to rank the best teams in order. Conference affiliation, and thus ability to win said conference, is irrelevant to them.
I had hoped that by prefacing the statement with “I think,” it would be apparent that this is my suggestion to improve the process, not a statement of what the committee would do under its current mandate. The latter requires no opinion whatsoever, since we already know they put A&M 4th last week—a decision that was widely ridiculed, and that almost certainly was not going to stand up without losses by others whom A&M was powerless to affect. Luckily, the Aggies did the committee a favor, by losing.
OSU needs no “breaks.” If they win out, they’d be the 12-1 B10 champ with a slew of impressive wins (OU, WI, NE, MI, WI again) and a decent loss (PSU is #12).
Yes, another mistake that I realized after hitting send. That is entirely correct. Delete the words “OSU and” from my sentence.
“If you rank the teams based on likelihood of reaching the playoff, it would be something like this:…
“I would have waited to put them in the top four until those breaks actually happen. In my mind, the same applies to OSU and Louisville.”
Let’s see what the expert analysts say:..
So…complete agreement through #5, and a one-spot difference for Louisville (#6 vs. #7). The difference is likely that the 538 model is forecasting future win probabilities. There is value in that, but playoff rankings have to be based on what you’ve done, not the likelihood that you’ll keep doing it.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I had hoped that by prefacing the statement with “I think,” it would be apparent that this is my suggestion to improve the process, not a statement of what the committee would do under its current mandate.”
It made it clear it was your opinion, but it wasn’t clear to me that you were calling for a change in the system. it sounded to me like you were calling for the committee members to weigh factors differently within the current system (i.e. vote smarter, not let’s change how we tell them to vote).
“The latter requires no opinion whatsoever, since we already know they put A&M 4th last week—a decision that was widely ridiculed, and that almost certainly was not going to stand up without losses by others whom A&M was powerless to affect. Luckily, the Aggies did the committee a favor, by losing.”
It’s not a predictive ranking. It’s supposed to be descriptive of how good the team is right then. The committee doesn’t care if you’ll stay at that ranking next week nor should they.
“So…complete agreement through #5, and a one-spot difference for Louisville (#6 vs. #7).”
I think you’d agree that 1-5 were pretty obvious this week. It’s more notable that you put WV #6 versus 538 having them at #12. And I’m not saying one is right and the other wrong, but it’s a good example of how quickly opinions can deviate despite having the same data source.
“The difference is likely that the 538 model is forecasting future win probabilities. There is value in that, but playoff rankings have to be based on what you’ve done, not the likelihood that you’ll keep doing it.”
You said If you rank the teams based on likelihood of reaching the playoff, it would be something like this:. That’s exactly what I reported from 538. They simulate the games, but you’re also extrapolating to get your rankings.
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It’s supposed to be descriptive of how good the team is right then. The committee doesn’t care if you’ll stay at that ranking next week nor should they.
What I am suggesting is a modified version of the “conference champions” rule for these interim rankings. I think it would produce a more realistic view of where a team truly stands.
Currently, the committee favors conference champions in its final ranking, but ignores that factor in all of the earlier rankings — since no championships have been won yet. This can lead to some odd results, and already did so two years ago with TCU.
Suppose the committee two years ago, in its second-to-last ranking, had said: “TCU, you are not currently in a position to win a conference championship. That could change, but right now you’re not. We are therefore going to rank you below other strong 1-loss teams that still can.”
Such an approach would have avoided the strange-seeming shake-up in the final ranking. I know there is a logical explanation for it, which was entirely consistent with the committee’s rules, but most people didn’t understand that and never will. If you have to explain it every time, it’s not a great system.
The same would have applied to A&M last week: they were not (as of that date) in a position to win or even play for their conference championship, and my recommendation is that they ought to take that into consideration, much as they do at the end of the season.
Had A&M won out, the committee would once again have been placed in the hard-to-explain predicament of ripping the rug out from under them. (“Oops…we just realized you have not won a conference championship, so our earlier ranking of you is no longer valid.”)
I think you’d agree that 1-5 were pretty obvious this week. It’s more notable that you put WV #6 versus 538 having them at #12. And I’m not saying one is right and the other wrong, but it’s a good example of how quickly opinions can deviate despite having the same data source.
We didn’t consider the same data. 538 looked at WV’s remaining games, and saw a fairly high likelihood that they’d lose at least one more. (Their season is back-loaded with tough games. As of last week, Football Study Hall had WVU at just a 7% chance to go 11–1.)
I didn’t weigh the likelihood that WVU will win those games. All I am doing, is noting that they currently sit at the top of their conference, a situation that is favored in the final rankings. I am not expressing a view as to the probability that they will remain there. Had I done so, I would’ve ranked them lower, too.
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Marc Shepherd,
“What I am suggesting is a modified version of the “conference champions” rule for these interim rankings. I think it would produce a more realistic view of where a team truly stands.”
I get that, but I think you see the purpose of these early rankings differently.
1. They are a realistic view of how good the committee thinks they are right now, not how good the committee thinks their chances are at making the final 4.
2. They are for entertainment purposes, not to be predictive of the final rankings. That’s why they start with a clean slate each week.
3. They are practice rounds for the committee. They get familiar with the process, get reminded of any relevant aspects they aren’t paying enough attention to, they learn the personalities in the room and how to read what someone else is saying, etc. That way they do their best work possible in the final rankings.
4. You seem to want them to be part of a grand procedure focused on the final rankings from day one. I think that is expecting too much prediction from them. If they want to be predictive, then they have to look at future schedules for everyone and predict winners. They also have to consider conference affiliation explicitly which is something they intentionally avoid. Opening that door leads to all sorts of bias issues (real and imagined) that would undermine the process completely.
“Currently, the committee favors conference champions in its final ranking, but ignores that factor in all of the earlier rankings — since no championships have been won yet.”
More accurately, it favors champs in every ranking but nobody has clinched one until the final rankings so far. Maybe if a B12 team had clinched the title by mid-November it would’ve been reflected in the rankings earlier. But the rules explicitly say to use championship status as a tiebreaker for equivalent teams. I don’t think you really want them to start estimating the odds that Team A will win the division over Team B and then beat Team C in the CCG and do that for every conference. That’s begging for them to just always put AL #1 because they always seem to win the SEC, even if another team looks better at the time (just a hypothetical example).
“This can lead to some odd results, and already did so two years ago with TCU.”
No, the results of the final games did that as much or more than anything. Remember, the committee said for weeks that 4-6 and then 3-6 were all very close. Then came the final weekend. OSU crushed a ranked team. Baylor beat a ranked team. FSU beat a ranked team. TCU crushed a horrible team. 3 of the 4 teams bolstered their resumes/SOS and 1 didn’t. Those three moved up in order and TCU dropped behind them all. Technically all 4 were champs, though Baylor held the tiebreaker over TCU. Why assume it was all about champion status and not about who added an impressive win to their resume that weekend?
Also, why call it an odd result? Isn’t it possible for one team to look slightly better one week and then for others to look better after the next week, especially when 3 of the 4 played a ranked team?
“Suppose the committee two years ago, in its second-to-last ranking, had said: “TCU, you are not currently in a position to win a conference championship. That could change, but right now you’re not. We are therefore going to rank you below other strong 1-loss teams that still can.””
But they were in position to win a title and they did. If Baylor had lost (not unlikely since they faced a ranked foe), TCU would’ve been outright champs. Baylor had about a 70% chance of winning based on the point spread. TCU was at more like 95% odds of winning based on the spread. A TCU win guaranteed them at least a share of the title and they had almost a 30% chance of winning the title outright. Why should the committee downgrade them for that? If OSU didn’t crush WI, they don’t make the CFP. If GT beat FSU, which they almost did, FSU is out. If Baylor loses or looks bad in winning, Baylor is out.
TCU faced a perfect storm of a shellacking delivered by the most questionable team (new QB getting his first start), a perfect record for the shakiest team and a better final conference game for their B12 rival.
“The same would have applied to A&M last week: they were not (as of that date) in a position to win or even play for their conference championship, and my recommendation is that they ought to take that into consideration, much as they do at the end of the season.”
And I disagree. It’s not the job of any polling system to predict the outcomes of future games. There are too many possible paths. AL still had to face LSU and AU at that point, so envisioning 2 losses for them wasn’t crazy.
“Had A&M won out, the committee would once again have been placed in the hard-to-explain predicament of ripping the rug out from under them.”
Only if they were still #4 weeks from now. Even with a win they might not have stayed at #4.
“We didn’t consider the same data.”
You have all the same data available to you that they did. How you dealt with it differed.
“538 looked at WV’s remaining games, and saw a fairly high likelihood that they’d lose at least one more. …
I didn’t weigh the likelihood that WVU will win those games. All I am doing, is noting that they currently sit at the top of their conference, a situation that is favored in the final rankings.”
So predicting how the committee will vote is fair game but predicting game outcomes is going too far? After all, championship status is only one of several criteria listed to be used as tiebreakers. How do we know that’s the one that would be decisive this year rather than something else?
“I am not expressing a view as to the probability that they will remain there.”
Yes you are. You titled your list the likelihood of the teams making the playoff. That is nothing but a view as to the probability that they will remain there.
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“What I am suggesting is a modified version of the “conference champions” rule for these interim rankings. I think it would produce a more realistic view of where a team truly stands.”
I get that, but I think you see the purpose of these early rankings differently.
1….
2…
3…
4. You seem to want them to be part of a grand procedure focused on the final rankings from day one. I think that is expecting too much prediction from them. If they want to be predictive, then they have to look at future schedules for everyone and predict winners.
I am absolutely not suggesting that the committee should try to forecast the remaining games. I am only suggesting that they would be consider the current standings, something that requires no judgment at all.
It’s not the job of any polling system to predict the outcomes of future games.
The 538 system you cited with approval does exactly that. So do Jerry Palm’s bowl predictions. Both attempt to “game out” the remainder of the season. (538 attaches a win probability to each remaining game, and runs a computer simulation. Palm predicts them outright.)
It’s a perfectly legitimate thing to do, and perhaps quite interesting, but neither of us believe the committee ought to be in that business.
There are too many possible paths. AL still had to face LSU and AU at that point, so envisioning 2 losses for them wasn’t crazy.
The committee should not assess the likelihood that AL would lose to LSU and AU. Perhaps this analogy helps: consider the “games behind” column in baseball standings. It doesn’t rate the chances of a team coming back. It only tells you where they are.
After all, championship status is only one of several criteria listed to be used as tiebreakers. How do we know that’s the one that would be decisive this year rather than something else?
I’m taking them at their word. They’ve said that if a team didn’t win its conference, the argument to choose them above a conference winner would need to be extremely compelling. Their behavior to date — granted, with a sample size of only two years — is consistent with this. It sounds like conference championships are a kind of super-duper tie breaker. Bear in mind, this makes their rankings unlike any other poll, as no other system has this extra “thumb on the scale” for conference champs.
“I am not expressing a view as to the probability that they will remain there.”
Yes you are. You titled your list the likelihood of the teams making the playoff. That is nothing but a view as to the probability that they will remain there.
Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough about which likelihood I was forecasting. It was the likelihood that the committee would choose each team, contingent upon conference standings remaining as they are now.
I was not forecasting the probability that the standings will, in fact, remain that way. To do so would entail predicting all of the remaining games, as some people do (538, Palm), but which I don’t think we could possibly ask of the committee.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I am absolutely not suggesting that the committee should try to forecast the remaining games. I am only suggesting that they would be consider the current standings, something that requires no judgment at all.”
Unless you want them to look silly it does require judgment. After WI lost to OSU should the committee really have viewed NE as the leader in the West and given them preferential treatment over WI? UF has been leading the SEC East for awhile, but they’ve lost their QB and still have to play LSU while TN is 1 game behind with 3 bad teams to play and holds the head-to-head win. Would the committee look smarter for blindly favoring UF?
“The 538 system you cited with approval does exactly that.”
It’s not a polling or ranking system. It’s a predictor. That’s what it does. It makes no attempt to say where teams should be ranked now and actually bases everything on outside rankings (CFP – how the committee ranks, Elo – how people rank teams and FPI from ESPN – predicts winners).
“So do Jerry Palm’s bowl predictions.”
Also in no way a ranking system. He’s trying to predict what teams will do and then how humans will react to it.
“It’s a perfectly legitimate thing to do, and perhaps quite interesting, but neither of us believe the committee ought to be in that business.”
I know I don’t. You seem to be starting down that path and then stopping after 1 step.
“The committee should not assess the likelihood that AL would lose to LSU and AU. Perhaps this analogy helps: consider the “games behind” column in baseball standings. It doesn’t rate the chances of a team coming back. It only tells you where they are.”
To me that’s pointless unless you also consider the remaining schedules. Just because a team would win its division if it wins out doesn’t mean it’s more likely to win its division that the second place team at the moment. Why should the committee punish the second-place team for the order of the schedule?
After all, championship status is only one of several criteria listed to be used as tiebreakers. How do we know that’s the one that would be decisive this year rather than something else?
I’m taking them at their word. They’ve said that if a team didn’t win its conference, the argument to choose them above a conference winner would need to be extremely compelling. Their behavior to date — granted, with a sample size of only two years — is consistent with this. It sounds like conference championships are a kind of super-duper tie breaker. Bear in mind, this makes their rankings unlike any other poll, as no other system has this extra “thumb on the scale” for conference champs.
When circumstances at the margins indicate that teams are comparable, then the following criteria must be considered:
* Championships won
* Strength of schedule
* Head-to-head competition (if it occurred)
* Comparative outcomes of common opponents (without incenting margin of victory)
We believe that a committee of experts properly instructed (based on beliefs that the regular season is unique and must be preserved; and that championships won on the field and
strength of schedule are important values that must be incorporated into the selection process) has very strong support throughout the college football community.
When directly asked, it was explained that those 4 things are not listed in order of priority but can all be considered equally. Being a champion is a binary choice (as is head to head) while SOS isn’t (neither is common opponents). SOS was what doomed the B12 in 2014.
“Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough about which likelihood I was forecasting. It was the likelihood that the committee would choose each team, contingent upon conference standings remaining as they are now.”
So the CFP rankings done as if this was the final week? What’s the point of that? Is it really any more accurate that not recognizing division leaders at all? This still seems like you want their rankings to build towards the final rankings rather than just being a snapshot in time that is irrelevant to the next week’s standings.
“I was not forecasting the probability that the standings will, in fact, remain that way.”
You don’t seem to get that you are still inherently “predicting” the outcome. It’s like giving bonus points for leading at halftime.
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The first CFP rankings came out Tuesday. Let’s look at the CFP contender pool. For now I’ll define it as all undefeated teams plus 1-loss P5 teams or independents. 2-loss P5 teams could come back into it later in the season.
8 current contenders (-4 from last week)
ACC (2):
0 losses – Clemson
1 loss – UL
B10 (2):
0 losses – MI
1 loss – OSU
B12 (1):
0 losses – none
1 loss – WV
P12 (1):
0 losses – UW
1 loss – none
SEC (1):
0 losses – AL
1 loss – none
Other (1):
0 losses – WMU
2-loss division/conference leaders:
WI, OU, VT, CO, UF
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http://www.grandforksherald.com/sports/und-football/4153154-und-negotiating-missouri-valley-football-conference-summit-league
I-AA realignment rumors. UND is looking to leave the Big Sky and join the Summit League and Missouri Valley Football Conference. It makes a ton of sense for UND as it would put them in with NDSU, USD and SDSU in both conferences.
It would either be in 2017-2018 or 2018-2019.
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AFAIU, NDSU would normally oppose this, but the NDSU President may be under some political pressure in-state, and supporting admission of UND might be a token concession to relieve that pressure.
There’s a vocal UND supporter at CSNBBS that believe this is all a fake which UND knows is doomed to fail, to take that option off the table to clear the decks for the “real” plan, which is some far-fetched exploitation of the “WAC is an FBS conference” loophole to move a set of FCS schools to FBS. That is always going to be announced RSN (Real Soon Now), so the countdown to the next RSN is once again underway as soon as the Summit and/or MVFC reject UND.
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 62
2. Clemson – 2
3. MI
4. UW
5. OSU – top 1-loss team
6. UL
7. WI – top 2-loss team
8. AU
9. OU
10. WV
Clemson and MI traded places as did OSU and UL. Sort of a weird response to blowout wins by MI and Clemson.
Others of note:
14. PSU
20. NE
21. WMU – top G5 division leader
RV. MN
By conference:
B12 – 4 = 40%
B10 – 5 = 36%
SEC – 5 = 36%
ACC – 5 = 36%
P12 – 4 = 33%
Other – 2 (WMU, Boise)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 60
2. MI – 1
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. UL – top 1-loss team
6. OSU
7. WI – top 2-loss team
8. AU
9. OU
10. TAMU
Others of note:
12. PSU
14. WMU – top G5 division leader
21. NE
By conference:
SEC – 5 = 36%
ACC – 5 = 36%
B10 – 5 = 36%
B12 – 4 = 40%
P12 – 4 = 33%
Other – 2 (WMU, Boise)
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http://www.star-telegram.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/gil-lebreton/article112763173.html
Baylor’s black out yesterday is not going over well. Their fans were sell shirts supporting Briles outside the stadium. A player initially tweeted an indication that the uniforms were in support of Briles, but later said it’s because TCU is such a big rivalry for them.
They will stand united. United against, I suppose, 60 Minutes. United against Patty Crawford. United against the rogue regents who won’t toe the company line.
United against everyone who blames Art Briles.
With their black uniforms and their T-shirts with #CAB (for Briles), Baylor will be making a statement.
…
If you wear black Saturday, you back the rapists and the rape-enablers, not the victims.
That’s what the rest of the nation, watching on TV, will be thinking when it watches Saturday afternoon. Yes, it will.
https://sports.vice.com/en_us/highlight/baylor-players-say-their-blackout-jerseys-are-not-in-protest-of-art-briles-firing
Apparently the Waco police kicked out a TCU fan for taking a picture of Baylor fans selling pro-Briles shirts outside the stadium. Good to see there’s at least 1 crime related to football they care about.
http://sportsday.dallasnews.com/college-sports/collegesports/2016/11/05/national-reaction-dare-baylor-mock-victims-painwith-fans-selling-art-briles-shirts
Here’s another opinion on it.
And finally, Mark Schlabach from ESPN tweeted this:
Brenda Tracy, a rape survivor who was invited to speak to Baylor’s players and coaches about sexual assault prevention by acting head coach Jim Grobe, told ESPN that the university needs to cancel the rest of the Bears’ season following the “blackout” for Saturday’s 62-22 loss to TCU at McLane Stadium.
Some Baylor fans wore black T-shirts with the #CAB hashtag, which stands for Coach Art Briles, who was fired in late May in wake of the university’s sexual assault scandal. A #CAB banner was also hung from a luxury suite.
“What I want is for Baylor to act like they have some institutional control and stop allowing the football program to re-victimize the already traumatized survivors,” Tracy said in a statement to ESPN on Sunday. “In a show of institutional courage, Harvard just canceled the rest of the men’s soccer season over lewd ratings of female players. If Baylor wanted to do the right thing they would cancel the rest of the football season for yesterday’s display of deliberate and calculated cruelty.”
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There’s some question whether Briles was a scapegoat for a university wide problem.
There’s contradictory information about how much of the problem was football related. Those people obviously believe the “4” figure of rapes by football players not the “19.”
Its the same mentality with the football coach who asked her why she was talking to the football team. It was really bad judgement on his part, but it was the same thinking that the problem was not with the football team any more than the rest of the campus, but they were being singled out and persecuted.
There could be some benefit to Baylor of using the football team as a scapegoat. That makes the problem look a little more isolated than if it is a campus wide problem and easier to fix.
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CFP prediction:
1. AL
2. Clemson
3. MI
4. OSU
5. UW
6. UL
7. WI
8. AU
9. PSU
10. OU
* If MI wins out, they’d pass Clemson.
* If OSU wins out, they should top Clemson (not that #2 vs #3 matters).
* If WI wins out, they’d probably be #4 unless some other upsets happen.
* PSU needs chaos to have a shot at #4.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/bowl-projections-penn-state-finds-way-into-major-bowl-after-latest-impressive-win/
We’re on track for only 75 bowl eligible teams with 80 spots to fill. Jerry Palm predicts these to be the 5-7 spot-fillers: BC, NCSU, NIU, USU and UTEP.
He also has 4 B10 teams in the NY6 games right now (OSU in semis, MI in Rose, WI in Orange, PSU in Cotton).
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There are none of those “straggler” minor bowls in early January this year- I’d rather see the respective champs of FCS, D2, D3, and the 2 NAIAs.minor offered a spot in one of those than a 5-7 team, but thats thinking worse than a fan.
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http://m.newsok.com/article/5525778?utm_source=NewsOK.com&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=ShareBar-Twitter
“The defiant actions of various Baylor coaches, players and fans to continually celebrate Art Briles, and Baylor’s inability to squelch such defiance, calls into question whether this university belongs in the Big 12.”
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If the 10 of them could not put aside parochial selfishness to choose two expansion targets, they won’t be able to agree on expelling one of their own, either.
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The funny thing is Baylor got exactly what they deserved by getting spanked by TCU. As for expelling Baylor it was never going to happen. Did the Big 10 expel Penn State over Sandusky and his enablers such as University President Graham Spannier for what was the worst scandal in sports history ( Baylor, SMU, CCNY point shaving and 1919 Black Sox included (this from a Penn State fan))? What will eventually harm the program in Waco is the day that Oklahoma and Texas say goodbye ( maybe Kansas, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech as well). Schools like Baylor, Kansas State and Iowa State know that the financial gravy train is coming to an end, which is why they chose not to expand ( it’s about maximizing what they have now, instead of sharing dollars with Houston or anyone else). It is also the likely reason why the President of Kansas State went off to Washington State ( not exactly Stanford in Academics or USC in football). Once the ESPN/Fox Contract ends, Baylor will really be taking their hit. How bad? They will actually be below Iowa State because at least the Cyclones can get the Hawkeyes in Ames every other year. If the Big XII stays together ( without OU and UT), or breaks apart and Baylor ends up in the MWC or AAA, the Bears will be like Tulsa, hoping they can get a Road Game in Austin or College Station like Tulsa does in Norman.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/17997039/wisconsin-badgers-players-cite-racial-bias-demand-change
20+ athletes at WI sent out a tweet demanding change at the school.
Several University of Wisconsin athletes used their Twitter accounts Monday night to post a statement demanding change in racial inequalities on campus. The message came in the wake of an incident at an Oct. 29 home football game in which two people were involved with a Halloween costume depicting President Barack Obama in a noose.
The statement, shared by more than 20 of the football team’s black players as well as basketball star Nigel Hayes and several other student-athletes, noted that black athletes “are loved during competition but then subjected to racial discrimination in our everyday lives too.”
“It is painful that someone in our community would show up to an athletic event with a mask of our sitting president, who happens to look a lot like us, with a noose around his neck,” the statement continued. “That moment was like a punch in the face to not only student-athletes of color but also current students, faculty and alumni of color. This incident was yet another blow and reminder that there are people in this community that may not value diverse populations.”
It makes me wonder why the current athletes don’t warn recruits (and current students warn prospective students) about the environment if it’s that bad. And if they are warning the next group, why do they keep coming? Nothing will drive a school to fixing a problem like losing students (especially if it hurts their diversity stats) and losing athletes.
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Or is it a one time incident by one person that they are getting all freaked out about? And would they care if it was a Ben Carson mask with a noose around his neck?
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Seriously? You’re excusing someone being able to take something like that (no mater who the effigy is of) into a large public event, display it, and get photos? Only one kicked the step from under the victim of a lynch mob…
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I do not think that bullet was excusing it. He is asking whether this Is this a one off by a few total a-holes who should be thrown out of school (or prosecuted if possible), or is this a pervasive problem.
If this is one isolated action, that does not excuse it, but is not the same as serious ongoing campus racism.
Many recent incidents really have been one single action. Look at Missouri. There was one actual racist act (the swastika on the mirror) that led to a major explosion. Of course the black grad student on the hunger strike over medical coverage pushed the situation along, as did protesting professors. (Interesting that the cut in health coverage was mandated by the Affordable Care Act and the father of this “poor” grad student makes $20 million per year.)
Sadly, in some instances, the racist action was taken by a black student to “help the cause”. At Kean College in Union, NJ, the campus was turned upside down by a racist action. Local churches demanded action. Politicians were up in arms.
Eventually a black female graduate student was found to be the perpetrator. She has actually be convicted criminally and is going to jail for a while. She said that she did it to raise awareness of the issue. That defense did not work very well.
Does that excuse real racism? No. But sadly, it is not crazy to ask what is really happening.
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Leave it to a few disgruntled Bernie supporters to tarnish the reputation of the school. Madison is a very political activist environment. Do professors look at athletes differently? Absolutely. But to suggest there is rampant racism in Madison is ridiculous.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
CFP rankings:
1. AL
2. Clemson
3. MI
4. UW
5. OSU – top 1-loss team
6. UL
7. WI – top 2-loss team
8. TAMU
9. AU
10. PSU
11. OU
12. CO
13. OkSU
14. VT
15. Utah
16. WV
17. UNC
18. FSU
19. NE
20. USC
21. WMU – top G5
22. Boise
23. WSU
24. LSU
25. AR
Questions:
1. TAMU drops only 4 places for losing to an unranked team but LSU drops 11 spots for getting beaten by AL, NE drops 9 for getting crushed by OSU and UF dropped by 14+ spots?
2. If SOS put TAMU ahead of UW, why is OSU still behind UW? To be clear, I’m fine with UW being ahead of OSU I just don’t see how their logic holds together.
3. Did they really start from a clean sheet? There was very little shuffling of ranks except for the losers dropping.
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projections.
There’s only about a 4% chance that the top 4 all win out, so there will likely be some chaos ahead.
Teams with > 50% odds of making the playoff now:
AL, Clemson, MI, UW
Teams with > 50% odds of making the playoff if they win out:
OSU, WI, AU (CO just misses at 47% and WSU is at 44%)
Teams with > 50% odds of winning out:
AL, Clemson, UL, PSU, WMU
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http://www.bigten.org/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/110816aab.html
The 2017 B10 Friday night game schedule is out.
Fri., Sept. 1 Washington at Rutgers
Fri., Sept. 1 Utah State at Wisconsin
Fri., Sept. 8 Ohio at Purdue
Fri., Sept. 29 Nebraska at Illinois
Fri., Oct. 13 Northwestern at Maryland
Fri., Oct. 27 Michigan State at Northwestern
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Is UW Huskies (x-fingers 2016 Playoff Champions) -Rutgers at Piscataway or at MetLife?
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http://www.nj.com/rutgersfootball/index.ssf/2016/11/rutgers_to_host_washington_under_big_tens_2017_fri.html
Piscataway.
As part of the Big Ten’s new Friday night scheduling model in conjunction with a new television deal, Rutgers will host Washington in primetime on Sept. 1 at High Point Solutions Stadium.
The game, which will be aired by either ESPN or FOX, originally was scheduled for Sept. 2.
I’m not sure how they know the networks since other releases haven’t specified that. Maybe they meant the ESPN or FOX families of networks.
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This is one Friday night game that could actually help the B1G home team. High school football does not start in NJ by Sept 1st. Game may get better ratings that Fri night. Washington is certainly a good enough team to play. In addition, I really do not think that Fri night football is a big a deal in NJ as in a lot of other places, particularly that weekend. If someone tells me that I am totally wrong on that last point, OK, I am not sure. (Of course, it might not be great for RU to lose by 40 on that night, but so be it.)
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Labor Day weekend and Thanksgiving weekend are the two times nobody really has many complaints about non-Saturday games. The ratings for UW @ RU will largely depends on the network it’s on. FS1 or ESPN2 will get crap ratings and so the game would have done better on Saturday at noon. ESPN would give improved ratings over a noon game buried by competition.
One key note for RU is that by playing Friday night you are helping UW immensely. West coast teams tend to play terribly at noon ET but will be fine at night due to body clock issues. I’m not sure UW really needs any extra help in beating RU.
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Some years ago, Maryland hosted Cal, a noontime start in College Park, and buried the Bears. The rematch in Berkeley was played at night, and Cal won big.
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http://fightingillini.com/news/2016/11/8/changes-to-future-football-schedules-announced.aspx
In other B10 scheduling news, IL will no longer host NW at Soldier Field every other year. IL will continue to play OOC games at Soldier Field.
The next scheduled Soldier Field appearance for the Fighting Illini will be Sept. 15, 2018, when Illinois hosts South Florida.
“We feel strongly that we should play our traditional rivalry games in Champaign, but at the same time we are committed to a strong presence in Chicago,” Whitman said. “Our intent is to play a major non-conference opponent at Soldier Field once every four years. Our team and fans enjoyed the game against Washington in 2013. It is important to maintain exposure in Chicago, and this also allows our fans and student-athletes an opportunity to experience Soldier Field.”
“With our strong ties to Chicago, playing Illinois football in historic Soldier Field will be a highlight for our players,” Smith said. “Hosting a game in Chicago is great for recruiting while also giving the largest base of Illinois graduates access to Fighting Illini football.”
From reading Frank’s twitter, it doesn’t sound like UI alumni are thrilled by this decision.
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Welcome to bizarro America, gang.
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Empire State Building will be scarlet red to celebrate Rutgers’ 250th anniversary this week. Rutgers was founded November 10, 1766.
http://www.nj.com/education/2016/11/famous_nyc_landmark_to_glow_scarlet_red_for_rutger.html#incart_river_home
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/report-baylor-wont-receive-penn-state-like-sanctions-from-ncaa/
The NCAA will investigate Baylor, but only in the normal method and not like PSU.
The Wall Street Journal reports the NCAA “won’t exert its executive authority to impose sweeping sanctions against the school for broad institutional failings, and will instead follow its normal investigative process.”
The program is still subject to an NCAA probe, the crux of which involves answering whether Baylor athletes “received preferential treatment through the school’s disciplinary process.” That, according to the paper, could be considered an impermissible benefit under NCAA rules.
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“…and will instead follow its normal investigative process.”
Which they should have at PSU.
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“…and will instead follow its normal investigative process.”
Which they should have at PSU.
Yes indeed, one of the NCAA’s worst blunders, coming from an organization that has made plenty of them.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/playoffPicture
In case anyone cares, you can see ESPN’s stats (SOS, SOR, GC, FPI) here.
SOS: Strength of schedule played, from perspective of an average FBS team.
SOR: Strength of record – Reflects chance that an average Top 25 team would have team’s record or better, given the schedule.
GC: Game control – Reflects chance that an average Top 25 team would control games from start to end the way this team did, given the schedule.
FPI: Football Power Index that measures team’s true strength on net points scale; expected point margin vs average opponent on neutral field. *FPI is updated daily in the current week.
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http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2674528-mike-freemans-10-point-stance-raiders-reflect-transformation-of-jack-del-rio#
AN NFL writer says multiple NFL teams will make huge offers to Jim Harbaugh this offseason, but he’ll turn them all down.
I keep hearing several teams are going to make the Michigan coach mega-offers. He won’t take them. Harbaugh isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. I don’t care if he’s offered a trillion dollars, a starship and a Cuban cigar. Harbaugh. Is. Not. Leaving.
That won’t stop teams from trying.
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Not for another 2-3 years, hopefully he can cross coordinate a purchase of the Bears from the McCaskeys and be the HC/VP of the operation. You’d think hes have links to Tech money from his Stanford/49er days.
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I’m getting too old. Now I gotta go get more paraphernalia to take advantage of more stuff being sent through the inter web tubes…
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What a waste. How about they improve the regular broadcast instead of wasting money on gimmicks?
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http://www.elevenwarriors.com/skull-sessions/2016/11/76476/skull-session-ohio-state-mike-weber-ezekiel-elliott-malik-hooker-jerome-baker
Apparently NCAA rules allow former players to come back and practice on the scout team, as long as the school doesn’t advertise their presence. Doesn’t that seem odd? Shouldn’t you have to be an enrolled student with eligibility remaining?
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Earlier this year I read about a similar situation for another team, but in that case the scout participant was on staff (and replacing a redshirting QB who had just moved up due to injuries). Didn’t really like it then, but having “celebrity” participants seems really pushing it.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18029536/baylor-ex-coach-art-briles-ad-ian-mccaw-failed-report-allegations-2012-sexual-assault
Baylor has come out and refuted what the assistant coaches have been claiming about Briles failing to report a sexual assault by his players.
Former Baylor football coach Art Briles and former athletic director Ian McCaw failed to report an allegation of a 2012 sexual assault involving five football players to the university’s judicial affairs office, according to a statement released by the school on Friday night.
According to the statement:
A female student-athlete informed her coach in April 2013 that the football players had sexually assaulted her a year earlier;
She provided the players’ names to her coach;
The woman’s coach shared details of the allegation and the football players’ names to Briles, McCaw and assistant athletic director Thomas Hill;
None of them, including the woman’s coach, informed judicial affairs officials of the allegation — and that they have confirmed as much to the university over the course of the past year.
Obviously not just Briles failed in that scenario, but maybe his son and son-in-law should just shut the hell up about how great he is.
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Idaho Vandals are bowl eligible.
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Here comes the chaos. All 3 ACC division leaders lost.
#2 Clemson lost to Pitt. Clemson will still make the playoff if they win out, though. The loss will move MI up to #2. Meanwhile UL faces WF (WF leads 6-0 after 1 qtr).
#14 VT and #17 UNC (the Coastal co-leaders) lost. Both are 7-3 (5-2) now and VT holds the tiebreaker and has the easier final game (UVA vs NCSU).
#9 AU lost, clinching the West for AL. The East is UF’s to win. They just need to beat LSU or have TN lose to MO or Vandy.
Both the ACC and SEC are likely to have a 9-3 division champion.
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It increasingly appears Alabama, aka the best coaching staff (lots of) money can buy, will repeat as national champions. Outside the SEC, people are going to despise this.
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There’s at least one state in the SEC where people will despise that as well.
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I think most SEC states hate it by now. 1/3 of Alabama will hate it too.
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And more chaos out west as #4 UW loses to USC. WSU now leads the North although UW can win it by winning out. CO has a 1-loss lead in the South with their game only half over (CO 6-1, USC 6-2, Utah 5-2). Maybe a 12-1 UW can still make the playoff but nobody else from the P12 can.
Meanwhile IA is pushing MI (MI leads 13-11 in the 4th).
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And Iowa wraps up the chaos beating MI. That’s #2, 3 and 4 all losing in addition to #8 and #9. The 3 ACC division leaders coming into the week all lost as well.
It looks like the committee will finally face the question of a great 11-1 runner up versus a weaker 2-loss champ.
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They might have to confront a bigger problem. If Penn State wins out, tOSU won’t make it to the B1G championship game. Would the Committee take a team that didn’t even play in its conference championship? I raise the question because this morning Herbstreit ranked tOSU number two behind Alabama.
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Sorry, make that Penn State and tOSU both winning out. Michigan needs a loss in the division.
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If Ohio State beats Michigan, and Penn State wins out they almost have no option but to take the Buckeyes. Here is why. 1: Even in the Penn State loss, the better team was Ohio State: Every statistical category favored the Buckeyes ( this from a huge Penn State fan). 2: Look at who OSU beat and how they did it. Nebraska being an obvious example. 3: Look at the Power 5 Conference Teams with one loss ( leaving Alabama aside since they have zero losses). Louisville ( Clemson on the road. Not a bad loss). Clemson ( Pitt at home ( bad loss). Washington (USC at home. I predicted the Trojans winning, so not bad). Michigan ( At Iowa. That was a bad loss although historically have trouble in Iowa City)). The playoff teams should be: Alabama ( assuming they win the SEC Conference Game), Louisville, Clemson ( assuming they beat Virginia Tech or North Carolina in the Conference Championship), winner of Michigan or Ohio State ( unless they lose to Wisconsin in Conference Championship). Needs help: Washington. Poor Schedule. Could lose to Washington State and give the Cougars the PAC-12 Championship. Really needs to win out, and have a Michigan win ( losing the Conference Championship), or a Clemson loss. Wisconsin and Oklahoma. Badgers need a Michigan win, and then to beat them plus a Washington loss. Sooners need an Ohio State win, a Penn State win ( over Wisconsin), a Washington loss and a Clemson loss.
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If Ohio State beats Michigan, and Penn State wins out they almost have no option but to take the Buckeyes.
It depends on how big a pull the “conference champs” rule has. We have too little experience to know how they would weigh these scenarios. Practically no one thought that TCU could drop from 3rd to 6th two years ago, after winning its final game 55–3. In the traditional polls, I am pretty sure nothing like that had ever happened. The committee members do not operate like traditional poll voters.
My prediction is that with the weight of an additional quality win in the Big Ten CCG and the head-to-head over Ohio State, Penn State would be the committee’s choice in that situation. But the Buckeyes have other routes to the playoff, as both the Pac-12 and the Big 12 are well on their way to crowning weak champions, and you cannot rule out the possibility of an ACC upset.
For now, I am assume that there is almost no believable scenario where the SEC champ doesn’t get in, even if the unthinkable happens, and it’s NOT Alabama.
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ROBERT M SYKES,
“They might have to confront a bigger problem. If Penn State wins out, tOSU won’t make it to the B1G championship game. Would the Committee take a team that didn’t even play in its conference championship? I raise the question because this morning Herbstreit ranked tOSU number two behind Alabama.”
No, that’s exactly the sort of problem I’m talking about (OSU or UL vs UW, WI/PSU & OU).
If the committee won’t seriously consider it this year, then they are essentially saying that you have to be a conference champ to get in despite the mandate to pick the 4 “best” teams.
Probable champs:
13-0 AL is a given.
12-1 OSU or MI would be a given.
12-1 Clemson will make it, but even their CCG will be a fairly weak game since VT just lost again.
12-1 UW might make it.
11-2 WI or PSU might make it.
10-2 OU or 11-1 WV probably won’t make it.
The question is how they would value 11-2 MI (lost CCG) or 11-1 OSU (beats MI but PSU goes to CCG) or 11-1 UL (if more upsets occur).
11-1 OSU – road wins over OU (B12 champ) and WI (B10 champ?) and home wins over NE and MI (top 10 team) and a road loss to PSU (B10 champ?).
11-2 MI – road win over OSU, home wins over WI (B10 champ) CO and PSU, neutral loss to WI and road loss to IA
Clemson – home win over UL, road win over FSU, neutral win over VT, home loss to Pitt
UW – road wins over Utah and WSU and no ranked home wins unless CO/USC is ranked for the CCG (CO still plays WSU so one will drop out)
WI – H2H loss to OSU at home and to MI on the road but B10 title
PSU – H2H win over OSU at home and neutral win over WI and B10 title but also a loss at Pitt
OU – H2H loss to OSU at home plus a loss to UH but wins over WV and OkSU and B12 title
WV – win over OU and B12 title
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Marc Shepherd,
“For now, I am assume that there is almost no believable scenario where the SEC champ doesn’t get in, even if the unthinkable happens, and it’s NOT Alabama.”
The East champion will either be UF (has to beat LSU and then faces @FSU) or TN. Even with a win over AL I don’t think either can climb high enough to make the playoff since neither is in the top 25 right now.
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I think OSU is almost guaranteed to be in the final four without winning the B1G East or appearing in the title game. I think most people expect them to be #2 come Tuesday night. I personally believe they are the second best team and have the second best resume right now. So if they do check in at #2, they will have an opportunity to add to that resume with a win against a likely top 5 Michigan. I don’t see any way the committee moves them down 3 spots from #2 after beating a top 5 team and compiling what will easily a top 4 resume.
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Tom.
It seems that way to me as well but the committee has never had to face this question before. They could blaze their own path despite what they are “supposed” to do.
First things first, OSU needs to beat MSU and MI. Then they can worry about the post-season.
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Florida and Tennessee have no chance of making it in the playoffs. So if they upset Alabama, the SEC champ will not be in the playoffs.
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bullet,
“Florida and Tennessee have no chance of making it in the playoffs. So if they upset Alabama, the SEC champ will not be in the playoffs.”
No, but 12-1 AL would still make it.
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Meanwhile, Maryland licks its wounds after the Ohio State debacle when its women’s basketball team hosts UMass-Lowell today. The Terps bring in the nation’s top recruiting class and are coming off two blowouts (both by 100+ points) in exhibitions vs. Division II and III schools.
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Let’s look at the CFP contender pool. For now I’ll define it as all undefeated teams plus 1-loss P5 teams or independents. Select 2-loss P5 division leaders are also included as outside possibilities.
10 current contenders (+2 from last week)
ACC (2):
1 loss – Clemson, UL
B10 (4):
1 loss – OSU, MI
2 losses – WI, PSU
B12 (1):
1 loss – WV
P12 (1):
1 loss – UW
SEC (1):
0 losses – AL
Other (1):
0 losses – WMU
2-loss division/conference leaders:
OU, CO, WSU, UF
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Next week a few more will be trimmed off the bottom of the pool as OK plays WV, CO plays WSU, and FL plays LSU (even if FL beats LSU they then need to beat FSU and AL).
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Mack,
“Next week a few more will be trimmed off the bottom of the pool as OK plays WV, CO plays WSU, and FL plays LSU (even if FL beats LSU they then need to beat FSU and AL).”
Yes, the last few weeks tends to narrow the pool quickly. Or maybe we’ll see more chaos and everyone will just muddy the picture some more.
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Once you expand the pool to 2-loss teams, I’m not quite seeing the logic of which ones you included.
Louisville, in my mind, stands in a worse position than Florida. The Gators lead their division. They’ll be a heavy underdog to Alabama, but at least they’ll have a shot at winning their conference and the best quality win you could imagine. Louisville is going to be a spectator on the final Saturday, unless Wake Forest upsets Clemson this week.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Once you expand the pool to 2-loss teams, I’m not quite seeing the logic of which ones you included.”
They have to be ranked high enough and be somewhat likely to finish strong to be a viable candidate.
“Louisville, in my mind, stands in a worse position than Florida. The Gators lead their division. They’ll be a heavy underdog to Alabama, but at least they’ll have a shot at winning their conference and the best quality win you could imagine. Louisville is going to be a spectator on the final Saturday, unless Wake Forest upsets Clemson this week.”
UF is unranked and riddled with injuries including at QB. They plat @ #24 LSU (14-pt favorites over UF) @ and #18 FSU (likely a huge favorite as well) to finish the season, so a third loss is highly likely. Then they’d face AL, a near certain loss. Even if they win out, AL is much more likely to make it from the SEC than UF is. If UF beats LSU, then I’ll add them to the list (and remove them again if they lose to FSU). Right now their odds of winning out seem too remote to me to merit inclusion.
By comparison, UL is likely to win out and be 11-1. They crushed FSU and barely lost at Clemson. UL just needs one more upset to happen to get a shot at the playoff. AL, an ACC team (Clemson if they win out, UL if Clemson loses) and a B10 team (MI, OSU or maybe WI) are all highly likely to make the playoff. The 4th spot is a battle between the P12 champ, B12 champ and any 11-1 or 12-1 runners-up left. UL has decent odds of making it.
Odds of making the CFP according to 538:
UL – 48%
UF – <1%
I'm not saying they're spot on, but even if they're off by a factor of 5 for each team UL is much more likely to make the CFP than UF is.
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Odds of making the CFP according to 538:
UL – 48%
UF – <1%
I'm not saying they're spot on, but even if they're off by a factor of 5 for each team UL is much more likely to make the CFP than UF is.
538 is forecasting the results of games not played yet. Based on that, I entirely agree. UF’s remaining games are @LSU, @FSU, and if they get past that, the SEC CG against Alabama. The chances of them winning all three are very low. But at least they will get their shot.
Louisville is probably not going to get that shot. They are out of the ACC CG unless Clemson loses to Wake Forest. They also need to beat Houston and Kentucky, neither of which is a gimme. In that case, for the Cardinals to make the playoff, at least two conference champs would need to be passed over. We don’t know yet how the committee would evaluate that circumstance, but 538 may very well be over-rating it, as they did two years ago with TCU.
We are at a point in the season where the list of teams in contention to win their conference is quite small. If you simply list those teams, without trying to forecast the likelihood of them winning their games, then Florida is clearly still in the mix.
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Marc Shepherd,
“538 is forecasting the results of games not played yet. Based on that, I entirely agree. UF’s remaining games are @LSU, @FSU, and if they get past that, the SEC CG against Alabama. The chances of them winning all three are very low. But at least they will get their shot.”
You said UF was in a better position than UL. What sort of sense does that comment make if you don’t look at their remaining schedules at this point?
“Louisville is probably not going to get that shot.”
A shot to win the conference? Probably not. But my list is candidates for making the playoff, and that’s what you disagreed with. UL has a better shot to make the playoff than UF. UL doesn’t need to win the ACC to have a chance to get in. UF is highly unlikely to get in even if they do win the SEC and certainly won’t get in without winning out.
“In that case, for the Cardinals to make the playoff, at least two conference champs would need to be passed over. We don’t know yet how the committee would evaluate that circumstance, but 538 may very well be over-rating it, as they did two years ago with TCU.”
Are they likely wrong by a factor of 5 in both directions? Because even if you say UL has less than a 10% chance to make the playoff (2 champs being left out and no other runner-up in), that’s still a much better chance than UF has at winning out let alone making the playoff.
“We are at a point in the season where the list of teams in contention to win their conference is quite small. If you simply list those teams, without trying to forecast the likelihood of them winning their games, then Florida is clearly still in the mix.”
My list isn’t designed to be possible P5 champs, it’s for playoff candidates. I don’t believe UF has even a 1% chance of making the playoff this season. They’d have to beat LSU, FSU and AL and then at 10-2 be found one of the top 4 teams over another champ (12-1 Clemson? No., 12-1 MI or 11-2 WI/PSU? No., 12-1 UW? No., 10-2 OU? Maybe.) and all the 11-1 runners-up including AL, OSU and UL.
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 63
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. UL
4. MI
5. Clemson
6. WI – top 2-loss team
7. UW
8. OU
9. WV
10. PSU
Others of note:
17. NE
21. WMU – top G5 division leader
RV. IA
By conference:
P12 – 5 = 42%
B10 – 5 = 36%
SEC – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
ACC – 4 = 29%
Other – 3 (WMU, Boise, SDSU)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 61
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. UL
4. MI
5. Clemson
6. WI – top 2-loss team
7. UW
8. OU
9. PSU
10. WV
Others of note:
14. WMU – top G5 division leader
19. NE
RV. IA, MN
By conference:
P12 – 5 = 42%
B10 – 5 = 36%
SEC – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
ACC – 3 = 21%
Other – 4 (WMU, Boise, SDSU, Troy)
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/playoffPicture
ESPN’s playoff picture featuring their stats of SOR (how hard it is for a top 25 team to get their record against their schedule), GC (game control) and FPI.
AL – 1, 1, 1
OSU – 3, 2, 3
UL – 5, 10, 4
MI – 7, 4, 2
Clemson – 2, 3, 5
WI – 4, 7, 13
UW – 9, 5, 7
OU – 13, 12, 10
WV – 6, 16, 20
PSU – 11, 44, 21
http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s odds of making the playoff (everyone else is 99%
2. MI – 98%
3. OSU – 95% (obviously only OSU or MI can win out, or neither)
4. Clemson – 90%
5. WI – 84% (can’t win out if MI does)
6. UW – 83%
7. UL – 60%
8. OU – 39%
9. PSU – 18%
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http://www.espn.com/blog/ncfnation/post/_/id/133035/what-fpi-says-championship-weekend-will-look-like
ESPN projects the conference winners based on FPI.
AL – 88%
Clemson – 77%
OU – 61%
WI – 36%
UW – 39%
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Comparing ESPN to 538 (which uses FPI as part of their model) for odds of winning the conference:
School – ESPN / 538
AL – 88% / 85%
Clemson – 77% / 71%
OU – 61% / 60%
WI – 36% / 35%
UW – 39% / 34%
They aren’t identical, but if you look at one you basically know what the other one says.
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ESPN projects the conference winners based on FPI.
AL – 88%
Clemson – 77%
OU – 61%
WI – 36%
UW – 39%
AL – 88%
Clemson – 77%
OU – 61%
Not Wisconsin – 64%
Not Washington – 61%
There…fixed it for them.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Not Wisconsin – 64%
Not Washington – 61%
There…fixed it for them.”
Obviously the numbers will change, but those are the two favorites at the moment due to tough finishing schedules for the other teams in their conference (WI) or their own tough finish (UW). WI wouldn’t be the favorite except for OSU vs MI being next week. Utah, CO, WSU and UW all face one or more ranked teams in the next couple of weeks so nobody is a clear favorite.
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I assume you get the joke, i.e., that a 36% favorite is not really favored.
Obviously, we all realize that no other team has a higher probability, mainly because the Michigan/Ohio State result can’t be confidently predicted (to say nothing of other chaos outcomes).
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Yes, I knew as I was writing it that it looks silly to have plurality favorites. It’s a good reminder of how much chaos can still happen in the last few weeks, though.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18048108/ohio-state-buckeyes-root-rival-michigan-wolverines-championship-scenarios
OSU players certainly weren’t rooting for MI versus IA even if some misguided fans were.
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http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/where-last-week-ranks-among-the-wildest-in-college-football-history/
This past weekend was the 4th craziest for top 5 teams since 1950 (3rd craziest for top 10 teams).
The craziest? 11/3/1990
#16 GT 41 – #1 UVA 38
#9 CO 27 – #3 NE 12
#15 UF 48 – #4 Auburn 7
#13 IA 54 – #5 IL 28
#2 ND beat Navy
The 2nd craziest week featured 2 ranked teams and 1 unranked team upsetting top 5 teams. The 3rd best had 1 ranked team and 2 unranked teams.
I think the biggest difference is game location. For the week listed above, 3 of those were home losses (all but #4 Auburn).
This past weekend was the craziest (largest upsets) for times when all the underdog winners were unranked, though.
Also of note, of the 10 craziest weeks 7 happened this century (7 in 16 years vs 3 in 51 years). Clearly parity has increased in CFB recently (85 scholarship limit started in 1992, TV has opened the way for smaller schools to be seen as well).
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If only said parity extended to Tu$caloo$a (sigh)…
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Or to Rice…
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
CFP rankings:
1. AL
2. OSU
3. MI
4. Clemson
5. UL
6. UW
7. WI
8. PSU
9. OU
10. CO
18. NE
20. Boise*
21. WMU
* – Boise doesn’t lead their division and the highest ranked G5 champ is the one promised a NY6 slot.
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – 91%
2. Clemson – 70%
3. OSU – 55%
4. UL – 40%
5. MI – 36%
6. UW – 33%
7. WI – 24%
8. OU – 14%
9. CO – 10%
10. PSU – 9%
Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 97%
4. OSU – 97%
5. UW – 92%
6. WI – 74%
7. UL – 51%
8. CO – 51%
9. OU – 36%
10. WSU – 36%
Projection if you select for every team that can to win out in rank order (if OSU wins out obviously MI can’t, etc):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 90%
3. UW – 81%
4. OSU – 80%
5. WI – 32%
Same projection but with MI winning out instead of OSU:
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 93%
4. UW – 85%
5. OU – 5%
Same projection but with OSU & PSU winning out:
1. AL – >99%
2. UW – 92%
3. OSU – 91%
4. Clemson – 87%
5. UL – 12%
6. PSU – 11%
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Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 97%
I am struggling to come up with the 3% of scenarios where Clemson wins out, but is not a playoff team.
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I assume it would be some combination of Clemson looking so bad in the wins or being incredibly lucky in terms of bad calls, etc or suffering numerous major injuries or other teams winning so impressively that the committee felt that they had to pass on them.
Clemson has a pretty weak finishing schedule, especially if SC and the Coastal champ loses some more. If Clemson wins 14-13, 13-7 in 3OT and 6-3 while Watson and others get hurt, I could see them falling to #5. AL and UW could easily be top 4. MI and WV? OSU and WI? MI and UL? None of it’s likely, but I could see it as slightly possible.
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Credit the committee for correctly putting Clemson over Louisville.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18059207/charles-walker-leaves-oklahoma-sooners-prepare-nfl-draft
An interesting dilemma. An OU DL with an NFL future hasn’t played since 10/1 due to a concussion. This is the second time he’s missed a game or more due to a concussion. It was recently announced that he has left the team to prepare for the NFL draft despite apparently being medically cleared to play again for OU. The rumor mill says he’s concerned that a third concussion would hurt his draft standing, but not playing when you could would also hurt his stock.
The one thing I know is wrong is what his coach said:
“Quitting on your teammates is hard to take as a coach,” Oklahoma defensive coordinator Mike Stoops told reporters after Tuesday’s practice.
If he’s concerned about his brain, that’s a cheap shot. It’s certainly pointless to call someone names after they’ve already left. It seems like a coach should be supportive or at least not say anything.
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If he’s concerned about his brain, that’s a cheap shot. It’s certainly pointless to call someone names after they’ve already left. It seems like a coach should be supportive or at least not say anything.
If he were THAT concerned about his brain, he would quit the sport, and we would all respect that. To quit on your current team, so that you can get ready to play for another team next year, is a much different proposition. Does he think concussions in the NFL are less likely?
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He knows he gets paid to take the risk in the NFL but not at OU. I would understand his teammates getting upset with him and I even understand the coach being upset.
What I don’t understand is the coach saying something publicly. That risks alienating current and future players for no gain. He could’ve saved it for when NFL teams called to ask about the player.
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http://www.journalnow.com/news/wake-forest-investigating-if-louisville-knew-too-much/article_60a9c8d2-ac16-11e6-8cf3-efde99357221.html
WF is investigating whether their game plan somehow got leaked to UL.
Wake Forest officials are investigating how documents pertaining to the Deacons’ game plan might have ended up in Louisville’s hands before last Saturday’s football game at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium.
“We are concerned that there was some type of security breach,’’ coach Dave Clawson said Tuesday. “I have shared it with Ron Wellman, and we’re doing everything we can to make sure all of our information and data is more secure moving forward.’’
Wellman, Wake Forest’s director of athletics, said Clawson told him of the breach on Friday, the day before the Deacons lost to the fifth-ranked Cardinals, 44-12. Wellman said a member of Wake Forest’s traveling party found the documents at the stadium.
Wellman declined to elaborate on the nature of the documents.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/ranking-the-week-12-college-football-games-that-will-impact-the-playoff-race/
5 important games this week:
1. #9 OU @ #14 WV
2. #22 WSU @ #12 CO
3. #2 OSU @ MSU
4. IN @ #3MI
5. #5 UL @ UH
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My guess at how teams would be selected by the committee:
* indicates a P5 champ
13-0 AL*
12-1 OSU*
12-1 MI*
12-1 AL*
12-1 AL
12-1 Clemson*
11-1 OSU
12-1 UW*
12-1 UL*
11-2 WI*
11-1 UL
11-2 CO*
11-2 WSU*
11-1 WV*
11-2 PSU*
10-2 OU*
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This season could provide a good test case for how strong the “conference champions” tie-breaker really is.
I think it might be a bit stronger than you have portrayed, but we won’t know until the first non-champion gets picked in the final top four.
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I think it depends on the year. This year certain teams stand out and there is more disparity between resumes.
F/+ ratings (based on how well you play adjusted for the opponent):
1. AL 78.3%
2. OSU 66.1%
3. MI 64.9%
4. Clemson 58.5%
5. UL 52.1%
6. UW 46.5%
7. WI 45.2%
8. AU 44.5%
9. LSU 43.9%
10. PSU 38.7%
I just don’t see how being a champion makes up for that sort of difference in quality.
For comparison, here are the final numbers for 2014:
1. 69.6%*
2. 66.6%*
3. 58.9%*
4. 55.0% – UGA
5. 50.1%
6. 49.3%*
7. 49.1%
8. 48.6%
9. 44.9%
10. 42.2%*
* – P5 champ
The 4 CFP teams were #1-3 and #15 (13-0 FSU).
2015:
1. 71.3%*
2. 61.2%*
3. 54.7% – OSU
4. 49.9%*
5. 48.4%
6. 48.1%*
7. 43.3%
8. 41.6%
9. 39.1%
10. 39.1%*
The 4 CFP teams were #1, 2, 4 and 10 (MSU).
Obviously the final numbers include bowl games and the playoffs, so 2015 MSU dropped after AL killed them for example while OSU probably improved after whipping ND. In 2014 UGA crushed UL in their bowl
But the top team left out was about 55% both of those years while OSU is at 66% this year. The gap to WI, for example, is 21 percentage points or roughly +46% for OSU. Considering OSU also has a better list of wins including H2H, that’s a lot of value to put in a championship.
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As it varies from year to year, its too bad the playoff committee doesn’t first determine the number deserving teams, 2 min/6 max, and dispense with a tournament format when necessary. Devise a formula to select the top two from one round of 2, 3 or 4 bowl games; for instance, seed teams 1-8, pit 1 vs 5, 2 vs 6, 3 vs 7, 4 vs 8, with the top two surviving seeds advancing to championship game. Seeds 1 and 2 control their own destiny, 7 and 8 are potential spoilers, the rest have some chance to advance. Something similar could be done with 5 teams/3 games. If there are only two have them face off in championship game; with 3, give #1 a bye.
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It’s an interesting theory, but I can’t think of any televised sport that works this way. Both the TV networks and the schools want certainty that a given number of high-profile games will happen.
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You are right about the desire for certainty though its worth pointing out that traditionally the only high profile televised postseason tournaments with a fixed number of games have been the NFL playoffs and the NCAA basketball tournament.
The college football playoff as currently constituted has by a very long margin the most subjective and potentially controversial post-season format of all; as such a tournament isn’t necessary. Though I haven’t done the analysis, it seems to me that (in the format I proposed) 3 or 4 championship relevant bowls (5 or 6 ranked teams) is a more likely occurrence than 0 or 1; thus more participants, a higher degree of fairness, more interest and thus more money for everyone.
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The college football playoff as currently constituted has by a very long margin the most subjective and potentially controversial post-season format of all…
No, the most subjective and potentially controversial post-season format was the original one, where teams just played their seasons, and polls (sometimes conflicting with each other) decided who was #1, even if that team never played the #2, 3, or 4.
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There is no post-season, but nothing tops boxing for subjectivity and controversy.
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John,
“As it varies from year to year, its too bad the playoff committee doesn’t first determine the number deserving teams, 2 min/6 max, and dispense with a tournament format when necessary. Devise a formula to select the top two from one round of 2, 3 or 4 bowl games; for instance, seed teams 1-8, pit 1 vs 5, 2 vs 6, 3 vs 7, 4 vs 8, with the top two surviving seeds advancing to championship game. Seeds 1 and 2 control their own destiny, 7 and 8 are potential spoilers, the rest have some chance to advance. Something similar could be done with 5 teams/3 games. If there are only two have them face off in championship game; with 3, give #1 a bye.”
For practical reasons you just can’t do it. How would you bid out the TV deal if the number of important games is unknown? How would you schedule the games if you didn’t know how many you needed them?
How would you accurately determine the number of “deserving” teams? What if you think there are 6 worthy teams but #1-4 all lose their bowls? #7 and 8 just beat your top 2 but they don’t get to advance? Are you really that sure which teams are worthy?
For practical reasons, they have to pick a size and stick to it and every team involved has to have a chance to win and advance. I think 4 has been more than enough so far. Could TCU have won in 2014? Sure. Could OSU have won in 2015? Sure. But many teams can get hot/lucky enough to win 2 games in a row. That doesn’t mean everyone should get a shot. With just 4 teams you make it unusual for an at-large team to get in so the regular season doesn’t lose value.
Certainly we have discussed the related idea of holding the bowls as usual and then picking the 2 (or 4) playoff teams. That would give you one more big game for everyone to help evaluate where they should rank. But people seem to prefer the defined 4-team playoff to having the NY6 games and then picking 2 winners to play for the title. I believe it’s because some bowls can have bad match-ups that don’t tell us much while another may pit the top 2 teams. Personally I’d prefer to hold the bowls and then pick 2 teams for a title game if you have to have a playoff, but that’s basically the BCS with more information. The fans seem to want #4 to control their own destiny.
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As usual, CFB is working itself out.
UH 36 – #5 UL 10
Bye-bye Cardinals. This improves the odds of both WI and OSU getting in if they both win out. If UW or Clemson lose a game, that would probably open the door for those 2 B10 teams plus AL and the other champ.
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Lamar Jackson was 20-43 for 211 yds, 1 TD and 0 INTs. He ran 25 times for 33 yds and 1 fumble and was sacked 11 times. UH led 31-0 at the half.
Does this open up the Heisman race at all or was he so far in front that it doesn’t matter?
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Does this open up the Heisman race at all or was he so far in front that it doesn’t matter?
Maybe the door has opened slightly for another player to take it, but I think he was far enough ahead that one game won’t derail him.
I saw various mentions on my twitter feed of other Heisman winners who’ve had one bad game late, in otherwise worthy seasons, e.g., Eric Crouch (2001), Jason White (2003). I didn’t have time to look up if the circumstances were comparable.
Since Jackson most likely will not have a CCG (Clemson would have to lose to Wake Forest this weekend), it will be important that he rebounds in his final game, against a pretty good (by historical standards) Kentucky squad.
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I thought all along that the Cardinals’ playoff chances were over-stated (even if they had won out), but this settles it.
This improves the odds of both WI and OSU getting in if they both win out.
Sure does.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18080015/big-12-championship-game-held-att-stadium-arlington-texas
Jerry World will host the B12 CCG for 2017-2021.
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Surprise…🙄
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
Updating after UL’s loss.
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – 92%
2. Clemson – 71%
3. OSU – 59% (+4%)
4. MI – 39% (+3%)
5. UW – 34%
6. WI – 29% (+5%)
7. OU – 21% (+7%)
8. CO – 13%
9. PSU – 13% (+4%)
10. WV – 10%
Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 99%
4. UW – 97%
5. OSU – 96% (-1% and -1 spot)
6. WI – 86% (+12%)
7. CO – 65%
8. OU – 53%
9. WSU – 44%
10. WV – 36%
Projection if you select for every team that can to win out in rank order (if OSU wins out obviously MI can’t, etc):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 92%
3. UW – 79%
4. OSU – 79%
5. WI – 46%
Same projection but with MI winning out instead of OSU:
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 98%
4. UW – 97%
5. OU – 4%
Same projection but with OSU & PSU winning out:
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 93%
3. UW – 92%
4. OSU – 85%
5. PSU – 15%
Same projection but with WI & PSU winning out (MI beats OSU but loses CCG to WI):
1. AL – >99%
2. UW – 98%
3. Clemson – 97%
4. WI – 78%
5. MI – 13%
OSU vs MI is huge for several teams. The loser is out, obviously, and PSU needs some MI loss (OSU seems more likely than IN) plus chaos in other conferences. WI wants MI to beat OSU.
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Wisconsin may be fine even if OSU beats UMich as they would then just have to beat PSU to claim the conference title. If that happens, they have a high chance of making the playoffs; a really high chance if 1-2 of OU/UDub/Clemson loses again.
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I’ll say it right now:
2 B10 teams in the playoffs. 4 in NY6 bowls.
OSU and Wisconsin in the playoffs (OSU vs. Clemson in the Fiesta; Wisconsin vs. ‘Bama in the Peach).
UMich to the Rose.
PSU in the Orange.
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Richard,
“I’ll say it right now:
2 B10 teams in the playoffs. 4 in NY6 bowls.”
Barring major upsets (RU over PSU, IN over MI, MSU over OSU, MN over WI) I think 4 in the NY6 is looking more likely but far from assured. I’m unsure if 2 make the playoffs, though.
“OSU and Wisconsin in the playoffs (OSU vs. Clemson in the Fiesta; Wisconsin vs. ‘Bama in the Peach).
UMich to the Rose.
PSU in the Orange.”
Otherwise the B10 could fill a spot in the Cotton.
Only getting 3 is still quite possible (if PSU loses a game, for example).
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Richard,
“Wisconsin may be fine even if OSU beats UMich as they would then just have to beat PSU to claim the conference title. If that happens, they have a high chance of making the playoffs; a really high chance if 1-2 of OU/UDub/Clemson loses again.”
Agreed, they could be fine either way. But OSU losing clears the path for them much more. OSU at 11-1 is stiff competition for a spot. MI going to the CCG would get WI a better win if they can beat them.
Certainly another upset in the ACC or P12 would be a huge bonus for WI.
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There was no chaos today, but several important games helped clarify the playoff picture a little.
#12 Utah lost to OR, hurting the P12. But now we know it’ll be CO (if they beat Utah next week) or USC winning the South. UW just needs to beat WSU which looks easier now that CO has beaten them. Still plenty of room for upsets out west.
The B12 is down to OU vs OkSU on 12/3 with both teams having byes this week. OU is a big favorite after easily beating WV.
LSU only got 1 TD out of 5 goal to go situations including getting stuffed from the 1 on the final play to lose to UF. That clinches the East for UF but they play @ FSU next week before likely getting killed by AL.
VT barely beat ND but now just need to beat a bad UVA team to win the Coastal and face Clemson.
All the top B10 teams won though it was a little ugly in the East. Things largely come down to OSU and MI although MSU and MN will put up fights.
Let’s look at the CFP contender pool. For now I’ll define it as all undefeated teams plus 1-loss P5 teams or independents. Select 2-loss P5 division leaders are also included as outside possibilities.
12 current contenders (+2 from last week) – really just 7-8 unless chaos happens
ACC (1):
1 loss – Clemson
B10 (4):
1 loss – OSU, MI
2 losses – WI, PSU
B12 (2):
2 losses – OU, OkSU
P12 (2):
1 loss – UW
2 losses – CO
SEC (2):
0 losses – AL
2 losses – UF (just for Marc – they need utter chaos to make it)
Other (1):
0 losses – WMU (they have no shot but I’ll never remove an unbeaten team)
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – 89%
2. Clemson – 78%
3. OSU – 59%
4. OU – 39% (was 8th after Tuesday)
5. MI – 35%
6. UW – 34%
7. WI – 28%
8. CO – 16%
9. OkSU – 9%
10. PSU – 9%
Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 99%
4. OSU – 94%
5. UW – 93%
6. WI – 78%
7. OU – 55%
8. CO – 46%
9. OkSU – 32%
10. PSU – 16%
Projection if you select for every team that can to win out in rank order (if OSU wins out obviously MI can’t, etc):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 92%
3. UW – 83%
4. OSU – 77%
5. WI – 38%
Same projection but with MI winning out instead of OSU:
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 96%
4. UW – 90%
5. OU – 13%
Same projection but with OSU & PSU winning out:
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 98%
3. UW – 89%
4. OSU – 86%
5. PSU – 13%
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 63
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. Clemson
4. MI
5. UW
6. WI – top 2-loss team
7. OU
8. PSU
9. CO
10. OkSU
Others of note:
15. NE
18. WMU – top G5 division leader
RV. MN, IA
By conference:
P12 – 5 = 42%
B10 – 5 = 36%
SEC – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
ACC – 4 = 29%
Other – 3 (WMU, Boise, UH)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 61
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. MI
4. Clemson
5. WI – top 2-loss team
6. UW
7. OU
8. PSU
9. CO
10. OkSU
Others of note:
14. WMU – top G5 division leader
17. NE
RV. IA, MN
By conference:
SEC – 6 = 43%
P12 – 5 = 42%
B10 – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
ACC – 3 = 21%
Other – 3 (WMU, UH, Boise)
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Can anyone stop the crimson machine?
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It’s possible. LSU held them to just 10 points. If LSU had any kind of offense, they could’ve won. But LSU is #85 in ppg while AL is #2 in ppg allowed.
Top 10 scoring defenses:
MI, AL, UF, OSU, WI, LSU, AU, SDSU, WMU, UW/Clemson/App St
Top 10 scoring offenses:
UL, LT, OU, UW, WMU, OSU, USF, TT, WKU, WSU (#11 is MI)
So both OSU and MI have been strong on both sides of the ball. OSU certainly has the athletes to compete with AL (I haven’t seen enough of MI to say if they do). Clemson and UW are also good on both sides. AL has traditionally struggled to stop spread offenses more than pro-styles, so Clemson or OSU might be a tougher match-up for them.
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Sagarin has both OSU and UMich as slight underdogs to ‘Bama:
http://sagarin.com/sports/cfsend.htm
Everyone else is a big (>10 points) ‘dog to ‘Bama.
The tragedy is if neither of OSU/UMich make the playoffs or the one that does gets taken out before meeting ‘Bama.
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Two years ago, Alabama was a 9 point favorite over Ohio State, and the Buckeyes won. Anybody is beatable.
This season’s Alabama team could very well be Saban’s best, and that’s saying a lot. No opponent has made them sweat, except for Ole Miss in week 3; and LSU, which is always a tough out in Baton Rouge.
With Ohio State, the question is which team shows up. Is it the one that obliterated Oklahoma, beat Nebraska 62–3, and had four other 45+ point wins? Or, is it the one that lost to Penn State, let Indiana hang around, and only barely squeaked by Northwestern and MSU?
Michigan’s rankings don’t reflect the fact that Wilton Speight, their starting QB, was injured in the Iowa game, and did not play vs. Indiana. Without him, Michigan does not have much of an offense.
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Which opponent has each power school played the most in history?
Some highlights:
— Minnesota–Wisconsin is the most-played rivalry among the group: 125 meetings. I believe this is also the most-played rivalry in all of FBS. The most in college football is Lehigh–Lafayette, with 152 meetings.
— Two P5 schools have an FCS school as their most-played opponent: Rutgers (Lehigh) and Boston College (Holy Cross)
— Most P5 schools’ most-played rivalry is another P5 school, but there are some exceptions: Louisville (Cincinnati), Colorado (Colorado State), Utah (Utah State), Notre Dame (Navy)
— Some annual rivalries aren’t as long-standing as one would think: Auburn has played Georgia 40 more times than it has played Alabama; USC has played Cal 19 more times than it has played UCLA
— Quite a few schools’ most-played rivalries have lost their annual, or nearly-annual, status due to re-alignment. The following is a partial list: Pittsburgh (West Virginia, 104 meetings); Syracuse (Penn State, 71); Maryland (Virginia, 78); Nebraska (Kansas, 117); Penn State (Pittsburgh, 97); Iowa State (Nebraska, 105); Kansas (Missouri, 120); Texas (Texas A&M, 118); West Virginia (Pittsburgh, 104); Arkansas (Texas, 78)
Unless I missed something, it appears that Pittsburgh–West Virginia is the only one of these that is reciprocal, i.e., they are each other’s most played rivalry, and the game is no longer annual due to realignment. (The two are scheduled to play again from 2022–2025.)
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Of course, I did miss something: Texas/Texas A&M is also reciprocal.
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The Border War is also reciprocal (for now).
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The Backyard Brawl, Border War, Texas-A&M, PSU-Pitt, and UMD-UVa are true rivalries.
The others are just games that have been played a bunch of times.
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Maryland-Virginia never really was a full-fledged rivalry in any sport. UMd considered UVa stuck-up preppies, while the Cavs viewed UNC and now Virginia Tech as their real rivals.
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Maryland-Virginia never really was a full-fledged rivalry in any sport. UMd considered UVa stuck-up preppies, while the Cavs viewed UNC and now Virginia Tech as their real rivals.
That’s just the typical trash that rivals say about each other. No one says that, unless some sort of rivalry exists. The more they try to deny it, the less believable they are.
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UVa considered Maryland just another state university — it wasn’t until the past few decades that College Park became a top-tier public flagship. And by the 1980s, Maryland was so basketball-oriented that its prime rivals (UNC, NCSU, later Duke) resided in the hoops-crazy Research Triangle.
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Not even the LAX bros considered UVA a rival? I know JHU was the top rival, but it’s hard to believe there weren’t some emotions there.
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The NCAA has ordered Notre Dame to vacate its 2012 and 2013 football wins, due to academic fraud committed by a former student–trainer and eight former athletes. This would include the 2012 season, when Notre Dame went 12–1 and lost to Alabama in the BCS National Championship Game. The Irish went 9–4 in 2013.
Notre Dame says it is appealing the decision, on the grounds that: A) None of its professional staff committed any kind of fraud; B) As soon as the staff found out about it, they did everything possible to root out the problem; C) No one has suggested that the staff either encouraged this type of behavior or turned a blind eye to it; and D) The NCAA has never meted out such a severe penalty for violations of this type.
All of the above reasons are according to Notre Dame. I can’t tell, from any article I have found so far, whether anyone in the NCAA would have a different point of view on any of those points. If what they are saying is true, then I think the merits of the argument are in ND’s favor. It seems awfully Draconian to erase up to 21 wins, for comparatively minor violations by comparatively few players and one rogue student–trainer.
In the cases against USC and Ohio State that led to vacated games, it was shown (or alleged) that a member of the professional staff was aware of the violations, and did nothing about them. I am not a fan of vacating wins, but at least those violations had a distinguishing feature that, according to Notre Dame, this case does not have.
(For the record, I am not an ND fan at all.)
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This has a little tiny bit more info. http://nypost.com/2016/11/22/notre-dame-football-punished-for-cheating-scandal/
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Stanford would like a review of officiating…
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Can we expect a similar result in the UNC case?
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The NCAA makes no money from bowl games, but gets much of its $ from the men’s basketball tournament (and its broadcast rights). I’d be stunned if the NCAA dared penalize UNC hoops, a national brand and moneymaker, and doubly shocked if the NCAA forced it to vacate a national title. In a visible sport such as basketball, that simply isn’t done — runnerup maybe (e.g., Villanova 1971), but not a championship.
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I am cynical enough to think you are right. If so, why do I bother to watch NCAA sports, even my beloved Buckeyes and Boilermakers (or my wife’s beloved Golden Domers)?
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I would argue that it tilts the other way. Why would the NCAA launch an investigation of the UNC academic scandal, if it already knows that the answer will be “no violation”? If that is the outcome they want, then why investigate at all?
UNC argued that this scandal was not subject to NCAA jurisdiction — and there is a non-frivolous argument that they are right. The NCAA could very easily have drawn the same conclusion itself. It’s a lot easier to let UNC off the hook, if they never open the investigation in the first place.
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Right, they’d never punish a blueblood. Except USC football and OSU football and AL football before that.
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One key thing to remember is that the NCAA recently restructured their violations and penalty structure. It’s only just starting to be applied since cases that predate it have to use the old system. If ND is falling under the new system, there could easily be no precedent for the penalty without it being anything unusual. I don’t know if that’s the case here or not.
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In Frank the Tank’s honor, I cannot help but note the following sad statistic:
In the last eight season, all but two P5 schools have fielded either an 8-win football team or a Sweet Sixteen men’s basketball team.
Colorado was on that list, but the Buffs are 9–2 in football, and possibly en route to the Pac-12 Championship Game, if they can dispatch Utah this weekend.
Wake Forest is still on that list, but they’ve got a chance at redemption if they can beat Boston College this weekend, and then win a bowl.
That leaves poor Illinois, which is 3–8 in football, and will need its men’s basketball team to have an unlikely tournament run, or it will be on the list for at least one more year.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
CFP rankings:
1. AL
2. OSU
3. MI
4. Clemson
5. UW
6. WI
7. PSU
8. OU
9. CO
10. OkSU
16. NE
19. Boise*
21. WMU
* – Boise doesn’t lead their division
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* tOSU doesn’t lead division just like Boise
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OSU isn’t aiming for a spot that is reserved for the highest ranked G5 champion. Boise and WMU are, and Boise needs to win and Wyoming to lose to make the MWCCG.
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – 90%
2. Clemson – 78%
3. OSU – 60%
4. MI – 37%
5. UW – 36%
6. WI – 30%
7. OU – 28%
8. CO – 16%
9. PSU – 15%
10. OkSU – 7
Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 98%
4. UW – 97%
5. OSU – 95%
6. WI – 86%
7. CO – 48%
8. OU – 39%
9. PSU – 27%
10. OkSU – 23%
Projection if you select for every team that can to win out in rank order (if OSU wins out obviously MI can’t, etc):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 90%
3. UW – 89%
4. OSU – 78%
5. WI – 42%
Same projection but with MI winning out instead of OSU:
1. AL – >99%
2. MI – >99%
3. Clemson – 98%
4. UW – 98%
5. OU – 3%
Same projection but with OSU & PSU winning out:
1. AL – >99%
2. UW – 96%
3. Clemson – 95%
4. OSU – 88%
5. PSU – 16%
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If Washington loses, Wisconsin’s chances of making the playoffs if they win out goes up big time. If ‘Bama, Clemson, OSU, and Wisconsin all win out but UDub loses, Bucky has a 94% chance of making the playoffs.
PSU only has a 68% chance under that scenario and winning out according to 538 (but I’m certain the committee would put then ahead of OSU in that case).
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What if Nebraska won the B1G? Any chance they are the lone B1G rep?
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/columnist/george-schroeder/2016/11/22/college-football-playoff-rankings-questions-ohio-state-michigan-clemson-penn-state-oklahoma-state-usc/94321572/
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How would you like a Nebraska vs Penn State CCG? WWJD?
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John,
“What if Nebraska won the B1G? Any chance they are the lone B1G rep?”
I can’t see any way NE could move up that far and could be the only B10 team.
Assume AL and Clemson win out because I can’t see how NE would pass them anyway.
Assume MI beats OSU then loses to NE.
Would NE pass MI? NE would have 1 good win while MI has wins over OSU, WI, PSU and CO.
Would NE even pass OSU? That 62-3 loss plus OSU’s wins over OU and WI would make it hard.
Would NE pass the B12 champ? The 2 B12 contenders are ranked much higher right now.
If WSU wins the P12, then NE should be ahead of them at least.
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If Ohio State did not win the B1G, and they were to take Ohio State, they would also have to take whoever won the B1G, Nebraska, Penn State or Wisconsin. That would squeeze out the champion of the Pac 12 or Big 12. I think because of that Ohio State would be out.
If we are going to start dissing conference champions, then we need to shut down the playoffs and return to the bowl system.
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If Ohio State did not win the B1G, and they were to take Ohio State, they would also have to take whoever won the B1G, Nebraska, Penn State or Wisconsin.
They don’t have to do anything. The rules have an extra thumb on the scale for conference champs, but allow non-champs to get picked. There’s no rule that if a non-champ is picked, the champ of the same conference has to get in also.
If we are going to start dissing conference champions, then we need to shut down the playoffs and return to the bowl system.
I assume by “the bowl system,” you mean pre-BCS: even in the BCS era, conference champs were sometimes passed over—”dissed”, as you put it. There was always some hand-wringing when that happened, but never to the extent of a serious proposal to go back to the old system.
On multiple occasions, they responded by altering the BCS selection formula, whenever it was perceived to have produced the wrong result. By analogy, I could see them altering the selection rules, if enough people don’t like the outcome. But we are never going back to the original bowl system.
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ROBERT M SYKES,
“If Ohio State did not win the B1G, and they were to take Ohio State, they would also have to take whoever won the B1G, Nebraska, Penn State or Wisconsin.”
Not according to the rules. The committee officially pays no attention to conference affiliation. If PSU wins they’d definitely claim that they deserve to be in if OSU is with the conference title and the H2H win. WI and NE can’t make that claim. But those tiebreakers only apply if the committee thinks the teams are otherwise equivalent. Based on rankings, they most certainly don’t consider NE equivalent to OSU.
“If we are going to start dissing conference champions, then we need to shut down the playoffs and return to the bowl system.”
As Marc points out, the BCS did the same thing. I’m all for returning to the bowl system, but the schools will never give up the playoff cash.
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“I’m all for returning to the bowl system,…”
Sign me up.
“…but the schools will never give up the playoff cash.”
If a champ of the same conference is excluded while another team is invited there can be no claim to it begin anything but a four team invitational, not a playoff. But I agree. It’d be very unlikely the school would give up the money without some other financial incentive, which I don’t see.
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If a champ of the same conference is excluded while another team is invited there can be no claim to it begin anything but a four team invitational, not a playoff.
Oh, come on. An “invitational” is a tournament that selects on popularity, without regard to merit. Are you saying you are truly unable to imagine a scenario where a conference’s most meritorious team is not its champion?
Consider basketball: The tournament committee sometimes seeds non-champions over champions of the same conference. The champ still gets a bid, but that’s only because there are 68 slots. If basketball only took four teams, it would have the same problem.
Now, I get that there’s a reasonable argument that conference championships ought to count above everything. But there’s also a reasonable argument for considering the whole body of work, with league championships as an important, but not deciding, factor.
You could rationally prefer either of these, and still understand it to be a merit-based system.
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Especially when a conference champ isn’t determined by round-robin.
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I do not care what a Jesuitical reading of the rules produces. Any selection system that can ignore facts, i.e., conference championships, is open to corruption, and, in fact, is inherently corrupt. After tomorrow, there is a real chance that Ohio State will not even win its division. In that case, they do not deserve to be in the playoffs despite any popularity contest. The rule that people keep citing was inserted to allow independents, most especially Notre Dame, to be playoff eligible. It should not be extended to colleges that play in a conference.
PS. I taught as tOSU for 35 years and had season tickets from1972 (Archie’s first year) to 2010, and I am a fan.
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ccrider55,
“If a champ of the same conference is excluded while another team is invited there can be no claim to it begin anything but a four team invitational, not a playoff.”
I know this is your pet distinction, but it doesn’t make any sense. Who was it that was empowered to define exactly what a playoff was outside of it being a postseason tournament of some kind?
Every sport has a committee set criteria by which to choose and seed participants, colleges just apply the process with human judgment included. College sports are different because they don’t use the entire season to determine conference champions unlike pro sports that use overall record as the primary factor. Pro sports also don’t have extra games only certain teams can play in before determining the playoff brackets. There is also much greater diversity of quality between the top and bottom teams and conferences. Add in the much greater number of teams participating and it becomes obvious that CFB and MBB shouldn’t automatically follow the path of pro leagues like the NFL/MLB/NBA.
Also, do you honestly think people care about this distinction? The CFP was explicitly set up with the ability for non-champions to make it and was established with a human committee to rank the teams because the prior objective system wasn’t trusted. In your terms, it was created as an invitational playoff.
The goal is to pick the 4 “best” teams and not everyone believes the term “best” includes winning your conference necessarily. If it’s accepted that a non-champ can be in the 4 “best” teams, then why is it a stretch to believe that a non-champ could outrank it’s own conference champion? We’ve seen it in the AP/Coaches poll before and not freaked out about it. Your method would lead to some ugly playoffs when CCGs have upsets. Was unranked UT really better than #3 NE in 1996 just because they won an upset? Would they really have been more deserving of a playoff spot at 8-4 than 10-2 NE? Why should we ignore the rest of the season just to honor that one game so highly?
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Bob Sykes,
“Any selection system that can ignore facts, i.e., conference championships, is open to corruption, and, in fact, is inherently corrupt.”
Woah, woah, woah.
The current system doesn’t ignore facts, it considers a larger set of facts. Conference championships aren’t the only facts in CFB. That’s especially true since college conferences ignore 25-33% of the season when determining their champions while pro sports consider the entire record. And even the NFL with it’s short season has all division teams play each other twice to help reduce the importance of any single game result. The NFL also doesn’t have vastly unequal SOS problems as 14 of 16 games are against common opponents or each other unlike the crossover schedules in CFB.
“After tomorrow, there is a real chance that Ohio State will not even win its division.”
That’s been true all season. It’s true for every team that hasn’t clinched their division yet.
“In that case, they do not deserve to be in the playoffs despite any popularity contest.”
According to you. The rules for the CFP system don’t say any such thing.
“The rule that people keep citing was inserted to allow independents, most especially Notre Dame, to be playoff eligible.”
According to whom? The SEC and ACC were both insistent on that rule. Were they really that concerned about ND while others weren’t? No. They wanted the chance to get a non-champion of their own into the playoff.
http://collegefootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/03/07/only-conference-champs-not-the-way-slive-wants-playoff-to-go/comment-page-2/
Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott publicly acknowledged earlier this month that he too favors a four-team playoff, with the berths consisting of only conference champions.
It’s that latter stipulation being tossed around as a possibility that could cause consternation among some conference commissioners and school presidents as the game’s leaders attempt to reshape the postseason. Simply put, the “conference champions-only” idea is viewed as an anti-SEC tack, a knee-jerk reaction to the all-SEC Alabama-LSU title game following the 2011 season.
Suffice to say, the SEC — and possibly even a conference like the Big Ten — would not be in favor of any format that could potentially limit the number of teams the conference could put into a playoff. And, in an interview with Jon Solomon of the Birmingham News, SEC commissioner Mike Slive did not shy away from the fact that, while he’s open to talks on any concept, limiting a playoff to league title winners is not something he — and presumably the presidents he serves — is prepared to get behind.
“I’m willing to have a conversation about (only conference champions), but if you were going to ask me today, that would not be the way I want to go,” Slive told. “It really is early in the discussions, notwithstanding what some commissioners say publicly. There’s still a lot of information that needs to be generated.”
“It should not be extended to colleges that play in a conference.”
It’s not extending anything. The rule was never intended to be limited in the way you indicated nor is it limited that way as written. You are, of course, welcome to think they should change the rules to preclude such things in the future,
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Richard:
“Especially when a conference champ isn’t determined by round-robin.”
Which is why the RR in divisions (and now whole 10 team conferences) remains. The CCG is the playoff of RR champs (and now top two of 10 team conf holding a CCG). Conferences don’t get to invite a non champ (or 3rd or lower standing team in 10 team conf) to the CCG. But we do to the CFP…?
Brian:
Do the NFL teams select their own non division opponents? Some get a bunch of tomato cans while others schedule tough? Is there a parity mandate I’m unaware of in CFB? Schedules centrally arranged for result balance?
Yes selection occurs in many other D1 sports, but in none is it to the exclusion of any conf champion. Seeding is just a guessing game once the field is set. It shouldn’t be used to decide the field. Yes, I realize 5 conf, 4 spots – one gets excluded so it’s unavoidable in that sense. But you can avoid 2 champ exclusions, or even 3 if ND takes a spot in the same year too.
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Yes, I realize 5 conf, 4 spots – one gets excluded so it’s unavoidable in that sense. But you can avoid 2 champ exclusions, or even 3 if ND takes a spot in the same year too.
Yes, it could work that way, and as Brian has shown above, that option was considered. But one could also rationally prefer a system that chooses the four best teams. That entails some judgment. But as you’ve noted, judgment would be required anyway, to choose which conference champ is excluded — or which two, in the years Notre Dame makes it.
A judgment call about who are the four best teams is not an “invitational”, even though that choice is, to some extent, arguable.
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ccrider55,
“Conferences don’t get to invite a non champ (or 3rd or lower standing team in 10 team conf) to the CCG. But we do to the CFP…?”
Yes. Because the conferences ignore 25-33% of the season in determining their champions.
“Do the NFL teams select their own non division opponents?”
Is CFB the NFL?
“Some get a bunch of tomato cans while others schedule tough?”
Actually yes. 2 of the games are scheduled based on how you finished last year, so bad teams play other bad teams.
“Is there a parity mandate I’m unaware of in CFB?”
Is there a lack of human judgment mandate I’m unaware of in CFB?
“Yes selection occurs in many other D1 sports, but in none is it to the exclusion of any conf champion.”
That’s great. How many other sports have 128+ teams in 10 conferences competing for 4 spots? Why should CFB be beholden to what other sports do?
“Seeding is just a guessing game once the field is set. It shouldn’t be used to decide the field.”
But it is. That’s always how the NCAA cuts off the field. They seed the teams and draw the line at the magic number.
“Yes, I realize 5 conf, 4 spots – one gets excluded so it’s unavoidable in that sense. But you can avoid 2 champ exclusions, or even 3 if ND takes a spot in the same year too.”
You can, but they explicitly opted not to do so when establishing this system.
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“…the conferences ignore 25-33% of the season in determining their champions.”
NFL counts preseason games?
“Is CFB the NFL?”
Precisely my point.
“Is there a lack of human judgment mandate I’m unaware of in CFB?”
A “playoff”, by definition, removes human judgment. I grudgingly accept it’s necessity to limit the bracket to four teams, at least until future realignment makes it unnecessary, maybe.
“That’s great. How many other sports have 128+ teams in 10 conferences competing for 4 spots?”
Point is no non champ is included to the exclusion of a champ.
“Why should CFB be beholden to what other sports do?”
Because that’s how you fairly decide who may compete in post season for the top prize?
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ccrider55,
“NFL counts preseason games?”
Nobody counts practices.
“A “playoff”, by definition, removes human judgment.”
Where is this official definition enshrined? Who was given the power to decide that was how a playoff is defined?
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/play%E2%80%93off
Definition of play–off
1 : a final contest or series of contests to determine the winner between contestants or teams that have tied
2 : a series of contests played after the end of the regular season to determine a championship —often used in plural
“Point is no non champ is included to the exclusion of a champ.”
Point is that’s what you want, not what the system says.
“Because that’s how you fairly decide who may compete in post season for the top prize?”
Except people got together and decided that isn’t how to do it for CFB.
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“Point is that’s what you want, not what the system says.”
No, that is what every other D1 system other than FB does. You brought up the numbers involved in every other system. I note that every other system has auto qualifiers, and have (over time) added additional selected qualifiers.
“Except people got together and decided that isn’t how to do it for CFB.”
Because people got together and decided to more highlyvalue particular sectors of CFB (which is so easily influenced by financially incentivized media hype), as opposed to trusting the value of the whole of CFB, doesn’t mean I have to think it’s right.
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ccrider55,
“No, that is what every other D1 system other than FB does. You brought up the numbers involved in every other system. I note that every other system has auto qualifiers, and have (over time) added additional selected qualifiers.”
Every other system has more slots than conference champions. CFB doesn’t. That should be a hint that CFB needs a unique system.
“Because people got together and decided to more highlyvalue particular sectors of CFB (which is so easily influenced by financially incentivized media hype), as opposed to trusting the value of the whole of CFB, doesn’t mean I have to think it’s right.”
No it doesn’t, and I’m not trying to change your mind. I’m talking about application of the current system and what makes sense given how CFB is divided, how it awards conference titles and other practical issues. You are talking a dogmatic belief in titles uber alles.
If conference champs were truly better teams than non-champs, objective systems would show that. Since they don’t, it’s down to “best” versus “deserving.” As long as the CFP claims to be finding the “best” team, I don’t see how you can use “most deserving” as selection criteria.
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“Point is that’s what you want, not what the system says.”
No, that is what every other D1 system other than FB does. You brought up the numbers involved in every other system. I note that every other system has auto qualifiers, and have (over time) added additional selected qualifiers.
For decades, traditionalists loved the fact that football was like no other sport, and didn’t have a national championship decided on the field. Suddenly, the very same people want it to be the same as every other sport.
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Marc:
Only because an invitational bracket has been imposed on us. If selection was from traditional big bowl matchup winners it would be from a pool of conference champs that already had a playoff (bowl) win.
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ccrider55:
I can’t imagine that you’re unaware that even major bowls in the bowls-only era also invited non-independents who did not win their conference. So how exactly would taking only major bowl winners ensure that only conference winners make a playoff?
Bob Sykes:
So what you’re saying is that, somehow, if ND and OSU played the exact same schedule and had the exact same wins and losses by the exact same scores and both are strong enough to be top 4 but neither won their conference, ND would deserve a playoff spot but OSU would not. That sure seems to me like you;re penalizing schools that are in a conference and incenting schools to go independent.
Does that seems fair to you? Because that sure doesn’t seem fair to me.
Now, if conference champs were guaranteed a spot in the playoffs, then I can see at least how you could justify not taking conference champs, as being in a conference gives you both an advantage and a disadvantage.
But right now, you two want schools who are in a conference to be at a disadvantage vis-a-vis independents and incent power programs to leave conferences. How that does not seem wrong-headed to you, I can not fathom.
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BTW, ccrider55, if you consider OOC games to be preseason games, then does ND only play pre-season games and are USC-ND and Stanford-ND also preseason games?
Does that mean that for USC and Stanford, beating OrSt. is a bigger deal than beating ND?
Odd that USC and Stanford would do so much (and the whole Pac is willing to eff up their entire schedule) to accommodate some meaningless pre-season games. What are they thinking?!?
I can’t say I respect a conference or schools that are willing to sacrifice the sanctity of traditional conference rivalries (bitter local rivalries that, in a conference like the BigTen, would always be played as the last game of the season) just so they can play what you consider meaningless pre-season games at the end of the season. How asinine is that?
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Only because an invitational bracket has been imposed on us. If selection was from traditional big bowl matchup winners it would be from a pool of conference champs that already had a playoff (bowl) win.
Now we are descending into outright silliness. The traditional bowls were true invitationals. Some conferences had tie-ins, where a champion received an auto-bid, but not all of the major bowls operated that way.
For those bowl spots that lacked tie-ins, bowl organizers could select based on any criteria they wanted. Teams whose fans traveled well, tended to have the advantage. The playoff selection committee, at least, has rules that are supposed to select the four best teams. Bowl organizers had no such constraints.
Even where champs receive auto-bids to major bowls, you could have co-champions. At one time, the tie-breaker was, “the school who went to the Rose Bowl longest ago, receives the bid.”
The old bowl system was an invitational. The playoff is not. It’s a selection of the four best teams. The fact that this requires some judgment does not make it an invitational.
So what you’re saying is that, somehow, if ND and OSU played the exact same schedule and had the exact same wins and losses by the exact same scores and both are strong enough to be top 4 but neither won their conference, ND would deserve a playoff spot but OSU would not. That sure seems to me like you;re penalizing schools that are in a conference and incenting schools to go independent.
No school will go independent just to increase its playoff chances. However, I believe your broader point is correct. If ND can make the playoff without being in a conference at all, and therefore without winning (or even playing for) any championship at all, how can you categorically exclude other non-champions?
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“The old bowl system was an invitational.”
That included every power conf champ.
“The playoff is not.”
…?
…??
Then what exactly is the selection committee doing?
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“The old bowl system was an invitational.”
That included every power conf champ.
The current bowl system still includes every power conference champ. Remember, the playoff committee is seeding six bowls, not just two. No conference champ is staying home for the holidays.
However, in the former system, it was merely fortuitous if the bowl match-ups had any relationship to the strength of the participating teams, because no one was in charge of seeding the bowls. The bowls made separate conference affiliation deals, or chose any team they wanted, usually for selfish reasons (ticket sales, TV ratings).
In the present system, the committee is directed to seed the top two bowls with the four best teams, based on specified criteria. Unless you think the committee is totally corrupt(*), factors like “which team’s fans travel the best,” “which team has the best national brand,” or “which team has the most TV viewers,” are not among the criteria for the major bowls — as they were in the past. (The lesser bowls still do select that way.)
We might have chosen different criteria, had we been in charge of it. But it is utterly incoherent to call this system an “invitational” (implying a lack of standards), when the former system you evidently prefer was utterly standardless.
(* The perception that the committee is corrupt is prevalent among fans, and even in the media to some extent. Many people seem reluctant to believe that the committee is really doing what it says it’s doing — even though the results, at least in the first two years, have been entirely consistent with its stated aims.)
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More potential NCAA violations at Missouri
http://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/sec/university-of-missouri/article116562358.html
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Yesterday’s win vs. Arkansas was about the first maybe only time I saw the Siberian Tiger strategy (a late season cold home game) put to good use.
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LSU is expected to lift the interim tag off of Ed Orgeron at a noon presser today.
http://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/sports/lsu/article_82bf3570-b3db-11e6-b5cc-fb3c136333d0.html?sr_source=lift_amplify
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Making many people in Austin happy.
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What’s the mood of the fan base about the hire? Happy to have a Cajun or disappointed to lose out on Herman? Are people worried about the glory days of Saban slipping away?
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Brian – I’d say the reaction is mostly positive. It doesn’t appear that LSU lost out on Herman but rather LSU pulled its offer.
http://gridironnow.com/tom-herman-lsu-coaching-job-joe-alleva/
Orgeron is one of the absolute best recruiters in the country. He appears to have learned from his mistakes at Ole Miss. He appears to be much more of a CEO-type coach, relying on his assistants to do their jobs. DC Dave Aranda just re-signed and got a salary bump. LSU already had the highest paid staff in the country and I expect that number to go up with the acquisition of the top-level OC.
I would have preferred Jimbo Fisher, but am cautiously optimistic.
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tOSU and UM are OVERRATED. Yes, both have really good defenses, but their offenses are one-dimensional and neither team’s QB is really worthy of the name. Would be a travesty if the BiG gets two teams into the CFP at the expense of the Pac-12. Now if Clemson loses to S. Carolina or VTech, then it would probably be justified.
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http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/ncaa
That must be why advanced stats generally show them as 2 of the top 3 teams nationally. Both have top 25 offenses according to S&P+ and top 5 according to FEI. And the 2 QBs are both top 30 in QB rating (Deshaun Watson is between them), not to mention Barrett’s over 800 yards rushing.
I haven’t heard people calling for 2 B10 teams unless there are some upsets. I think 12-1 UW would pretty easily get in over a second B10 team. But if CO or USC wins the P12, then it could be trouble. I think CO or USC would be a toss up versus PSU for getting in while WI would beat them out.
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Um, UMich offense destroyed your conference’s southern division champ (who’s strength is suppose to be their defense), scoring more points on the Buffs than any Pac team has managed. OSU’s offense destroyed the the team mostly likely to be B12 champ.
So what were you talking about again?
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Destroyed? Hardly. CU lost their kicker and starting QB during the course of the game, gave up a TD on a blocked punt, and still led in the third quarter on the road. I am not sure who would win a rematch, but I am pretty sure that CU would give up another special teams score :-).
As for offensive stats, Michigan ran up the score and stats against very weak teams. Against real competition (i.e. – Colorado, Wisconsin, Penn State, Iowa, and tOSU) they scored 45, 14, 49, 13, and 17 (in regulation), respectively. CU and PSU’s defenses are much better now than they were when they played UM.
Speight was 11-26 + an INT for just 103 yards against Iowa. And he singlehandledly enabled tOSU to win on Saturday. Just sayin. If Iowa ends up in the Holiday Bowl against USC, WSU, or even Stanford, we will see how good their defense really is right now.
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You need to either re-watch the CU-MI game or at least look at a detailed box score. I’m not a Michigan fan – period. When I watched the game I could sense they would take control and never look back in that matchup.
It was not shocking to inevitably see Liufau get pounded on a 3 and 7, which was probably a payback play for the sack on Speight earlier in the game. A short-handed Michigan D line started taking control of the game by the second quarter – that’s just an overwhelming fact.
Colorado was down by 3 when Liufau went out.
Buffs went the entire 2nd and 4th quarters without a score.
Almost all of Colorado’s points came at the expense of a missing Jourdan Lewis, probably one of the top CBs in CF. Moreover, Taco Charlton, a beast of a defensive player, did not play either. Both these guys will be playing on Sundays.
I’ve seen plenty people on the Internet, mostly Colorado fans & Pac12 homers, and even worse, Pac12 analysts claim that CO lost this game because of Liufau’s injury & had he not been injured – Co wins. Total nonsense. Never mind the OL didn’t protect him. Never mind line play is probably the most important part of the game. Never mind injuries are a part of the game.
And again, Michigan regained the lead and never looked back all while Liufau was still playing.
But no doubt, Co is a nice team. They have a shot against Washington. As for the Huskies, I have nothing but respect for Petersen.
But USC is the best team in the Pac12 and they can’t beat OSU or Michigan, not this year. Not even sure they could beat Wisconsin.
One thing I like about the CFP, USC isn’t guaranteed the convenience of the Rose Bowl against the BIG’s best anymore. They’ll have to leave home much of the time, if they get there. I believe USC has a losing bowl record outside of California. Until now, the Rose Bowl was a huge advantage for them – total familiarity and very near home. I have never liked the BIG’s obsession with this tradition, albeit a wonderful venue – it’s essentially a Pac12 stadium, especially for the CA teams. And yes, I’ve seen two Rose Bowls in person.
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I think it’s good for CFB that the committee will be forced to deal with the issue of a highly ranked non-champion and even face the potential issue of a non-champion getting in while that conference’s champion doesn’t. It will force the committee and everyone else to examine how the system is set up and what the criteria actually are and should be going forward. The BCS made changes to the system when the end result wasn’t what people expected. The CFP could adjust the directions to the committee and/or clarify to fans how they want things to work.
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Obviously it’s been a huge weekend for CFB already with several big games left.
OSU wins but PSU clinches the East. Which B10 team(s) will make the playoffs?
NE made the BCS NCG in 2001 without winning their division after losing their final game of the season. Is that a precedent for what happens this year? Does the debate encourage the powers that be to leave things alone, or do they make changes after the season like the BCS did? Even if no changes are made, do they clarify things for everyone?
My predictions for Tuesday:
1. AL
2. OSU
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. MI
6. WI
7. PSU
The committee hasn’t punished tough losses very much so I have MI staying ahead of 2 teams they beat H2H.
My guess for the final ranking order (assuming no upsets):
1. 13-0 AL
2. 12-1 Clemson
3. 11-1 OSU
4. 12-1 UW
5. 11-2 B10 champ (WI or PSU)
6. Other P12 champ (CO or USC)
7. MI
8. B12 champ
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It’s going to be a very good test of the way the playoff rules actually work in practice.
If Penn State wins next weekend, I think it would be awfully difficult for the Committee to seed Ohio State above them, when PSU has the head-to-head, the division and conference championships, and an additional quality game in hand.
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Marc Shepherd,
“It’s going to be a very good test of the way the playoff rules actually work in practice.”
Yep.
“If Penn State wins next weekend, I think it would be awfully difficult for the Committee to seed Ohio State above them, when PSU has the head-to-head, the division and conference championships, and an additional quality game in hand.”
We’ll have to wait and see. This week they Hocutt said they didn’t see it as a small gap between #2 and #7 (OSU and PSU). The tiebreakers of H2H and championships are supposed to be used between equivalent teams. By the final rankings, OSU will have added a win over then #3 while PSU would’ve beaten #6 WI and an unranked MSU. Is that enough to close the gap?
OSU tends to outrank PSU greatly in advanced stats (better O, better D, better overall, etc) which matches the committee thinking OSU is significantly better right now. OSU has the better resume, too. Maybe PSU will beat WI 59-0 and change minds, but right now the impression I get is that OSU is staying ahead of them. I’m also completely biased.
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I don’t see UMich dropping that far.
I think ‘Bama is already in. Clemson is in with a win (and I believe they will be heavily favored).
The key game will be UWashington-CU. Huskies obviously in if they win. In that case. If they lose, final rankings will be (IMO):
1. ‘Bama
2. Clemson
3-4 are both B10 teams. Order will be OSU/Bucky if Badgers win; PSU/OSU if Lions win.
5. UMich
No way the Pac CCG loser will be ranked above UMich.
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Richard,
“I don’t see UMich dropping that far.”
You could be 100% right. I’m just guessing how much weight they might give a conference title here especially if OSU gets in. Also, MI did lose 2 games in their last 3 which is sometimes held against you unfairly. Still, MI does have wins over WI, PSU and CO to their credit after all.
“I think ‘Bama is already in.”
Agreed.
“Clemson is in with a win (and I believe they will be heavily favored).”
VT will deservedly be a major underdog.
“The key game will be UWashington-CU. Huskies obviously in if they win. In that case. If they lose, final rankings will be (IMO):
1. ‘Bama
2. Clemson
3-4 are both B10 teams. Order will be OSU/Bucky if Badgers win; PSU/OSU if Lions win.
5. UMich
No way the Pac CCG loser will be ranked above UMich.”
Agreed. I was just saying CO might be ahead of them if CO wins the P12 instead of UW (#4 wouldn’t exist so everyone moves up a spot). I can see how I wrote that might be confusing, though.
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I’m thinking if it comes down to it, the CFP committee will elect to view That School Up North as “similar to” the BigTen champion, and then fall back on the “conference championship” part of the tie breaker. Easiest on them in that regard is if Penn State wins the CCG, due to the “OSU > TSUN > PSU > OSU” triangle to help them talk themselves out of H2H as the tie-breaker.
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If Colorado beats UW, it will have a better resume than Penn State (even if it beats Wisconsin). CU will have beaten #4 UW, Utah, WSU (all in consecutive weeks and all ranked at the time), and #17 Stanford. It will have lost to #5 Michigan on the road in a game it led as late as the third quarter, and to #10 USC on the road by 4 points. By comparison, PSU will have beaten #2 tOSU (in OT), #6 Wisconsin, and a ranked Iowa team – but annihilated by Michigan and beaten by Pitt.
I do agree that if Wisconsin wins the CCG, it will clearly have the best resume of any 2-loss team (including Michigan – notwitstanding the 7-point loss at Michigan) and should get the benefit of any doubts just by virtue of having played the toughest schedule in the country.
Bottom-line: if UW or Clemson loses AND PSU wins, I can see Michigan deserving the CFP. Otherwise, no way.
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If you don’t like the playoff and want maximum chaos, this is your rooting interest next weekend:
Penn State over Wisconsin
Oklahoma State over Oklahoma
Virginia Tech over Clemson
Colorado over Washington
I have left out Florida over Alabama, because the Tide are a playoff team even with a loss. But besides that, every conference champ would have multiple, serious flaws on its resume
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Marc Shepherd,
“If you don’t like the playoff and want maximum chaos, this is your rooting interest next weekend:
Penn State over Wisconsin
Oklahoma State over Oklahoma
Virginia Tech over Clemson
Colorado over Washington
I have left out Florida over Alabama, because the Tide are a playoff team even with a loss. But besides that, every conference champ would have multiple, serious flaws on its resume”
I think the craziest mix would be UF, PSU, OU and CO winning.
Clemson and OSU would be easy choices. How do you sort OU, CO, AL and PSU for those last 2 spots? Would they let in 2 non-champs? How would the 2-loss champs sort out?
Ranked wins (using current AP poll):
AL – USC, AU, LSU
CO – Stanford, UW
OU – OkSU, WV
PSU – OSU, WI, IA
Losses:
AL – UF
CO – MI, USC
OU – OSU, unranked UH
PSU – MI, unranked Pitt
I’d think AL would still get in, but who is #4?
Clemson is in a binary state where a loss clearly eliminates them, so that game doesn’t have much chaos potential.
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I think the craziest mix would be UF, PSU, OU and CO winning. Clemson and OSU would be easy choices. How do you sort OU, CO, AL and PSU for those last 2 spots? Would they let in 2 non-champs? How would the 2-loss champs sort out?
I don’t think there is any real doubt about Alabama, in that scenario. They’d have the identical record as Clemson and a better record than OSU (by 1/2 game), with a very strong SOS despite the one loss to UF.
I think PSU > OU. PSU’s record would be 1/2 game better than OU’s record, and PSU would have two wins (OSU, Wisky) that are better than any Oklahoma win. That eliminates OU.
The choice between PSU and CO is tougher, but I think it goes to PSU. PSU’s two best wins (OSU, Wisky) would be better than CO’s two best wins (Wash, Stanford). In addition, the optics would be horrible if the committee chooses Ohio State, but passes over the team that beat Ohio State and also won the conference.
Clemson is in a binary state where a loss clearly eliminates them, so that game doesn’t have much chaos potential.
The only reason I had VT over Clemson (for maximum chaos), is because it would free up another slot for a “non-conventional” team. I agree that Clemson’s fate is binary: win and in, lose and out.
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I’m rooting for a playoff with no conference champs. That’ll really promote the value of the regular and conference season…
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That eliminates Alabama. Fine by me.
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Bob Sykes:
Massive flu bug CCG week…
Trotter recognizes the invitational nature of CFP:
Jake Trotter @Jake_Trotter
After watching Tom Herman’s press conference, the CFP selection committee has elected to award Texas 1 of next year’s 4 playoff spots…
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ccrider55, are you advocating for an 8-team playoff? Because otherwise, I don’t see how conference champs can be guaranteed a playoff spot (well, I suppose we could always stage a playoff between the BigTen, SEC, ACC, and B12 champs . . .)
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I don’t think he is advocating for an 8-team playoff. I think he believes that if you must have a playoff (and he would rather not), then only champs should be considered. Oh, and I suppose he would accept an undefeated Notre Dame.
All playoffs are bad, but the least bad playoff would consist of four conference champs, or three of them when Notre Dame gets in. There’d still be one or two excluded conference champs, but non-champs would definitely be excluded, no matter what they had done.
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Though as I have pointed out, without guaranteed spots for conference champs (as is the case in all the other college sports that ccrider55 likes to compare to), that philosophy effectively penalizes a team simply for being in a conference and unfairly (IMO) benefits independents.
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“…that philosophy effectively penalizes a team simply for being in a conference and unfairly (IMO) benefits independents.”
Idaho hits the jackpot!!!
No, I’m saying teams have an opportunity to win their conference. Non champs had their chance, and missed.
By independent you mean ND. Until the B1G, SEC and ACC are willing to risk ND joining another conf they will always make allowances.
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ccrider55: Non-champs had a chance to win a conference and didn’t. I don’t see why that should have anything to do with making a playoff when conference champs aren’t guaranteed a spot in a playoff. Otherwise, as I said, you are saying that independents should have an advantage over teams in a conference. How you can justify that or think is fair, I can not say.
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And again, by independent you mean ND. Idaho and BYU aren’t going to be joined by a bunch of others going independent. Unless, and until the Irish join a conference there will be an opportunity for them to make the big games. I never said the ND opportunity/advantage is fair, only that it seems unavoidable currently.
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Well, ND wouldn’t have an advantage if the committee didn’t say you have to win a conference to make the playoff. Which is the case now and as it should be.
You’re the one creating an unfair advantage for them.
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BTW, ccrider55, you seem to favor crowning a (mythical) national champion by polls. Yet at least one AP national champion that plays in a conference did not win its conference that year (1936 Minnesota).
So you are fine with teams that failed to win their conference being national champions, yet you are not fine with teams that failed to win their conference participating in a playoff to determine the national championship on the field.
That position seems extremely nonsensical to me.
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Richard:
I have no problem (not that I’d always agree with it) with a team being voted the best for that year, based on the whole year. I have no problem with OSU and UM being considered the best in the B1G this year (but upsets occurred on the field). Georgetown was the best BB team the year Villanova won. Dan Gable was when Larry Owings upset him. Mariner 116 win team best in a century. When you introduce the “playoff” format (win and advance) then I do have a problem with ignoring that philosophy for the first 13 weeks, have an invite, and then claim the title of NC was decided on the field.
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ccrider55,
“I have no problem (not that I’d always agree with it) with a team being voted the best for that year, based on the whole year. I have no problem with OSU and UM being considered the best in the B1G this year (but upsets occurred on the field).”
How do you reconcile those thoughts with being adamant that only champs should get into, or that the champ must also get into, a playoff? If you are fine with using the whole season to vote on a champ, why wouldn’t you want to use the whole season to vote on the top 4? It’s the same principle expanded to 4 teams.
“When you introduce the “playoff” format (win and advance) then I do have a problem with ignoring that philosophy for the first 13 weeks, have an invite, and then claim the title of NC was decided on the field.”
Who is ignoring wins and losses here, though? OSU, PSU and MI all went 1-1 in their round robin series. Does that say that 1 of them is clearly better than the other 2? How about if you look at the scoring differential (MI +36, OSU +0, PSU -36)? Sure the IA loss for MI leads to PSU winning the tiebreakers to represent the East in Indy, but aren’t the Pitt and IA losses about equal (Pitt is #25 now, IA is just outside the top 25, both are 8-4 with at least 1 great win)? One just happens to be in conference and the other out. How about the 39 point loss by PSU to MI? MI and OSU have 3 losses by a combined 7 points.
Don’t you need to look at the other 10 games for each team, where PSU lost to Pitt and didn’t beat any ranked teams, MI lost at Iowa and beat WI and CO, and OSU beat WI and OU? This is where I see the clear separation forming. Don’t the 4 top 10 wins by OSU and MI outside of the round robin (versus 0 by PSU) say something about the quality of the teams?
I think the “champs only” mentality is ignoring a lot more than the all 12 matter crowd.
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“If you are fine with using the whole season to vote on a champ, why wouldn’t you want to use the whole season to vote on the top 4?”
Then call it an invitational. You don’t get voted forward in a playoff.
“Who is ignoring wins and losses here, though?”
Unless you have identical schedules you’re just making projections and/or assumptions, probably well researched and fairly accurate. But they are comparisons of likelihood, not standings based on objective results.
“Sure the IA loss for MI leads to PSU winning the tiebreakers to represent the East in Indy…”
Get a new tie breaker enacted that reflects better who should represent, if the conference feels that way? The current one wasn’t voted in during the season.
“I think the “champs only” mentality is ignoring a lot more than the all 12 matter crowd.”
Again, schedules are too diverse for certainty, which a “playoff” asserts. The best doesn’t always advance or win. Performance and result should be the only measure in a playoff, with as even a starting point as possible. No eye tests, no this team barely beat SW tomato can state first week, while this other team trounced tissue paper tech in week nine comparisons.
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ccrider55,
“Then call it an invitational. You don’t get voted forward in a playoff.”
Again, where is this official definition of a playoff coming from? You’ve avoided that question multiple times.
And it isn’t voting them forward, all advancing is done by winning. Placement is done by vote/committee.
“Unless you have identical schedules you’re just making projections and/or assumptions, probably well researched and fairly accurate. But they are comparisons of likelihood, not standings based on objective results.”
Bull. 11-1 is an objective result just as much as 8-1 is, but with 3 more data points included. Nobody has identical schedules in a sport where you only play each team once and weather and location can be major factors in the results.
“Again, schedules are too diverse for certainty, which a “playoff” asserts.”
That’s also true if you ignore OOC games. And only you are asserting any certainty here. We all said a long time ago that it’s just a tournament that decides who won the tournament. Fans can invest any power they like in the outcome, but that’s really all it is.
“Performance and result should be the only measure in a playoff, with as even a starting point as possible.”
And you obtain that by ignoring 25% or more of the season? That sounds logical to you?
“No eye tests, no this team barely beat SW tomato can state first week, while this other team trounced tissue paper tech in week nine comparisons.”
You just said performance matters and then decry the eye test. The eye test evaluates performance including intangibles (weather, injuries, bad calls, etc).
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Then call it an invitational. You don’t get voted forward in a playoff.
By your definition, the basketball tournament is an “invitational” too…but no one says that.
Unless you have identical schedules you’re just making projections and/or assumptions…
So does the basketball committee.
Again, schedules are too diverse for certainty, which a “playoff” asserts.
No one ever asserted that the playoff identifies the four best teams “with certainty.”
No eye tests, no this team barely beat SW tomato can state first week, while this other team trounced tissue paper tech in week nine comparisons.
If you can come up with a system that avoids this, I will congratulate you.
So far, the best you have is the current system, but with certain facts selectively withdrawn from the committee’s purview — in other words, a committee still reliant on “eye tests,” but with a different rule set.
In lieu of that, you evidently prefer the old bowl system, which was even more reliant on eye tests, plus teams being chosen for totally non-competitive reasons (e.g., their fans “travel well”).
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“Then call it an invitational. You don’t get voted forward in a playoff.
By your definition, the basketball tournament is an “invitational” too…but no one says that.”
Every team has a chance to win an auto bid in basketball. Invitations to others are extended to join and expand the existing playoff.
“No one ever asserted that the playoff identifies the four best teams “with certainty.””
The use of the term”playoff” asserts the winners move on aspect, implying winning your way in (because it crowns the champ of all of D1 CFB).
“So far, the best you have is the current system, but with certain facts selectively withdrawn from the committee’s purview — in other words, a committee still reliant on “eye tests,” but with a different rule set.”
Yup, barring further conf consolidation. But no conf champ is excluded for a non conf champs inclusion.
“In lieu of that, you evidently prefer the old bowl system, which was even more reliant on eye tests,…”
But with no pretense of necessarily creating a CFB championship match.
“…plus teams being chosen for totally non-competitive reasons (e.g., their fans “travel well”).”
They are Bowl Games, not games pretending to be a playoff the season has inexorably marched toward. They’re for the history, the fans and the players involved.
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“But no conf champ is excluded for a non conf champs inclusion.”
But it’s still not possible for all teams to play their way in, so by your definition, it’s still an invitational. In that case, I’d rather have an invitational that tries to select the 4 best teams than an invitational that goes by whatever rules different conferences set up.
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“But it’s still not possible for all teams to play their way in…”
Hence the sentence beginning with “yup”.
Five into four leaves one exclusion. It’s a subjective choice, but it’s not “trying” for two, three, or four subjective choices.
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Deciding which conference champ to leave out in your setup is still a subjective choice, and that could affect any of 5 conferences. Meanwhile, better teams may be left out. So I don’t see how that is any better.
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 64
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. WI – top 2-loss team
6. MI
7. OU
8. PSU
9. CO
10. OkSU
Others of note:
14. WMU – top G5
22. NE
25. IA
By conference:
B10 – 6 = 43%
P12 – 5 = 42%
B12 – 3 = 30%
SEC – 4 = 29%
ACC – 4 = 29%
Other – 3 (WMU, Navy, USF)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 61
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. MI
6. WI – top 2-loss team
7. OU
8. PSU
9. CO
10. USC
Others of note:
13. WMU – top G5 division leader
22. IA
23. NE
By conference:
B10 – 6 = 43%
P12 – 5 = 42%
ACC – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
SEC – 4 = 29%
Other – 3 (WMU, Navy, USF)
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – 92%
2. OSU – 90%
3. Clemson – 77%
4. UW – 65%
5. WI – 30%
6. PSU – 20%
7. CO – 10%
8. OU – 10%
9. OkSU – 2%
10. MI – 2%
Projection if just that team wins out (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – 95%
3. UW – 95%
4. OSU – 90%
5. WI – 64%
6. CO – 31%
7. OU – 14%
8. PSU – 41%
9. OkSU – 6%
10. MI – 2%
Projection if you select for every team that can to win out in rank order (if WI wins out obviously PSU can’t, etc):
1. AL – >99%
2. UW – 91%
3. Clemson – 89%
4. OSU – 78%
5. WI – 39%
Same projection but with PSU beating WI:
1. AL – >99%
2. UW – 97%
3. Clemson – 95%
4. OSU – 87%
5. PSU – 16%
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/bowl-projections-ohio-state-will-make-the-playoff-if-the-committee-does-its-job/
Human prognosticators are also saying OSU is in the CFP now, so it’s not just a biased OSU fan’s opinion.
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http://www.cleveland.com/osu/index.ssf/2016/11/ohio_state_vs_michigan_had_the.html
Unsurprisingly, The Game drew great ratings. It was the most-watched game of the year so far with a 10.4 average (12.7 peak). It’s the second-highest rating for CFB on ABC ever (1.5 for the 2006 version at 3:30pm) so it set the record for a noon game.
For perspective, 10.4 is about what the Rose Bowl has been averaging since moving to ESPN.
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My thoughts and prayers are with The Ohio State family.
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2016/11/28/liberty-hires-former-baylor-athletic-director-ian-mccaw-same-position
Liberty just hired Baylor’s fired AD.
In Liberty’s announcement, President Jerry Falwell said, “Ian’s success really speaks for itself. You look at what Baylor was able to do during his tenure, it fits perfectly with where we see our sports programs going.”
Yes, let’s look at what Baylor did. Women at Liberty beware.
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Ian was a pretty good guy. I think he was just collateral damage that had no direct involvement.
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I doubt that there was ever a moment when he said, “You know, rape is fine with me, as long as we win games.” Nevertheless, the tone, attitude, inattention, and inaction of the top people created a culture where serious allegations that should have been pursued, were not.
Isn’t some of that on him?
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Baylor has kept a lot of their results secret so its hard to tell. But it seems like it was a campus wide issue, not an athletic department issue. There seemed to be a general culture of indifference. Its still not clear whether there were 4 rape allegations against Baylor football players or 18.
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There’s a general societal problem with taking rape allegations seriously. They are hard to prosecute and police departments tend to blow them off. I know a half dozen women who have been victims of or narrowly avoided being victims of rape. In only one case was the criminal ever found. And he was a serial rapist who kept doing it too long. In a couple cases they were discouraged by the police, “Its just your word against theirs.” In one case the woman and her friend were raped, shot and left for dead. Police response, “Well they’ve probably already blown town.”
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bullet,
“Baylor has kept a lot of their results secret so its hard to tell. But it seems like it was a campus wide issue, not an athletic department issue.”
I’d say it was both. There were enough players coaches and staffers aware/involved that this was clearly an AD issue. It was also a university issue based on the breadth of the problems.
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I’m not blaming him directly, but it is the ADs job to oversee all the teams and coaches. A lot of things seem to have slipped through the cracks under his regime.
My bigger concern is how the quote from Falwell sounds, as if he isn’t aware of any potential negatives people might see.
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“President Jerry Falwell”
—- Yikes
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/bigten/2016/11/28/jim-harbaugh-reprimanded-michigan-fined-10k-officiating-rant/94567070/
Harbaugh was reprimanded and MI fined $10k for his postgame tirade about the refs. Pelini was the last coach to be punished for this.
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It’s going to draw a fine in any sports league I have ever heard of, and it should.
I have my complaints with the officiating in that game, but maybe he ought to be looking at the 3 turnovers and an offense that gained just 5 yards in the whole fourth quarter.
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I think Harbaugh was just trying to deflect attention away from Speight’s mistakes. He did a great job of doing so.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/college-football-playoff-scenarios-seven-teams-alive-alabama-ohio-state-are-locks/
Jerry Palm predicts the final CFP rankings based on various outcomes. My only major disagreement is that he says AL is the #1 seed no matter what but I think they have to win the SEC to be locked at #1. They could drop to #2 or even #3 depending on how they lost (not that I think it’s likely, but locked means 100% to me).
1. AL
2a. 12-1 Clemson
2b/3a. 11-1 OSU
3b. 11-2 Clemson
4. 12-1 UW
5/6. MI and B10 champ
7. 11-2 CO as P12 champs
8. 10-2 B12 champ (OU or OkSU)
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/college-football-playoff-scenarios-alabama-ohio-state-clemson-penn-state-washington-wisconsin-oklahoma-colorado-112816
Stewart Mandel does the same sort of thing, but he breaks things down by scenario. He also assumes AL is locked at #1.
If Washington, Clemson and Wisconsin win their conference title games, we’re probably looking at:
No. 1 Alabama vs. No. 4 Washington.
No. 2 Ohio State vs. No. 3 Clemson (Their seeds could be reversed.)
…
Committee chairman Kirby Hocutt said last week that Ohio State’s and Penn State’s resumes weren’t close, even before the Buckeyes added a win over then third-ranked Michigan. Here’s what the two will look like if Penn State beats Wisconsin. (Note: I’m using Sunday’s AP rankings.)
[see the article for the resumes]
The Buckeyes could finish with three victories over 10-win teams (Oklahoma, Wisconsin and Michigan) and a close road loss to a fourth (Penn State). No playoff team to date produced anything like that even with a championship game.
Penn State, on the other hand, has one glorious win (Ohio State) but also a 39-point loss (to Michigan). And whereas the Buckeyes beat Oklahoma by three touchdowns on the road, Penn State lost to non-conference foe Pittsburgh.
Therefore, I don’t believe the purported Ohio State-Penn State argument is going to be much of an argument for the committee. Ohio State is in.
…
The more pertinent question by Saturday night might be: Can 11-2 Wisconsin or Penn State beat out 12-1 Washington?
[see article for the resumes of all 3]
Note that two teams Washington beat, Utah and Washington State, fell out of the AP poll this week, while Iowa moved into the rankings, giving both Big Ten teams an extra Top 25 win. In reality, the committee should not see much difference between beating 8-4 Iowa (ranked) and 8-4 Utah (not ranked).
Still, Washington may be more vulnerable than we thought.
…
[under the scenario of Clemson losing to VT]
The easy answer here is Alabama, Ohio State, Washington and the Wisconsin-Penn State winner. But are we certain Michigan got eliminated Saturday?
The Wolverines only dropped to No. 5 in the AP poll, and the committee may even keep Michigan at No. 4, above Washington (for now). Jim Harbaugh’s team conveniently holds head-to-head wins over fellow contenders Penn State (49-10), Wisconsin (14-7) and Colorado (45-28). But it can’t add a championship.
[snip MI’s resume]
This doesn’t look much different than the prospective Big Ten champ’s, but would the committee really select two Big Ten teams, NEITHER of which won the conference? I doubt it. On the other hand, if Penn State wins Saturday, the committee may have a hard time overlooking that 49-10 head-to-head score.
[What if CO beats UW?]
Alabama, Ohio State and Clemson would grab the first three spots, while the two-loss Buffs enter the mix for the fourth spot. You saw the three Big Ten resumes above. Here’s Colorado’s if it wins Friday night.
[snip CO’s resume]
As much as I love CU’s rags-to-riches story, it’s doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on here, especially given it likely can’t pass the Michigan team it lost to 45-28 in Ann Arbor. A second Big Ten team gets the fourth spot.
[What if VT and CO win?]
This is where three — yes, three — Big Ten playoff teams becomes a real possibility.
Once again, Michigan would likely box out Colorado. Which means the only other team that could deny the Wolverines a spot is the Big 12 champ — whoever wins Saturday’s Oklahoma State-Oklahoma showdown.
[snip their resumes]
Oklahoma State would have a better case than Oklahoma. But the Cowboys’ only argument for moving above Michigan would be its status as a conference champion. How much value does winning this year’s Big 12 really hold?
That concludes the numbers-heavy portion of this column. If you prefer a Cliff’s Notes version, perhaps just look at it this way.
— Alabama and Ohio State are in.
— Clemson will join them with a win.
— 12-1 Washington vs. an 11-2 Big Ten champ could be a real argument.
— Michigan is not out of it.
— Colorado is.
— Oklahoma and Oklahoma State need a sympathetic jury
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3 Big 10 teams in the playoff means the end of the playoff in its current form. Or at least the committee. I’m not sure the commissioners wouldn’t step in. Its not like 1971. There’s little to separate MI/WI-PSU and CU and OU.
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bullet,
“3 Big 10 teams in the playoff means the end of the playoff in its current form. Or at least the committee. I’m not sure the commissioners wouldn’t step in. Its not like 1971.”
I don’t think it’ll happen for many reasons, but the commissioners can’t step in. The committee wouldn’t stand for it and neither would anyone else. There’d be lawsuits and injunctions flying.
“There’s little to separate MI/WI-PSU and CU and OU.”
Basically, yes. Except MI beat CO head to head already and has 2 top 7 wins already. Also OU lost badly at home to OSU while MI barely lost at OSU and performance against common opponents is one of things they are supposed to consider. I think OU would still get that nod as a champion, but what if OkSU beats them? Can they come from #10 last week (only MI lost above them) to #4 by beating #8 OU (who’d drop) while MI lost at #2 OSU? I suppose it’s possible, but it’d be a strange explanation.
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Wisconsin would have played the toughest schedule.
And when comparing common opponents, Bucky barely lost to both OSU and UMich while OSU rowed OU and UMich handily beat CU.
I don’t see how you could pick OU or CU over Bucky if they beat PSU.
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If CU upsets Washington, VTech upsets Clemson, OK St. beats OU, and Wisconsin beats PSU, the only thing keeping 3 B10 teams in the playoffs is CU. CU isn’t as good as OSU and UMich beat CU, so the committee would have to pick CU over a Wisconsin team with a tougher schedule.
Granted, that is the only scenario where I can see 3 B10 teams in the playoffs.
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He repeatedly cites margin of victory — a factor the committee is explicitly precluded from considering. Maybe the conclusion is the same in any case, but it’s a serious analytical error.
Like a lot of people, I have trouble imagining a scenario where 3 Big Ten teams are picked — or 2 Big Ten teams, neither of which is the champ.
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Marc Shepherd,
“He repeatedly cites margin of victory — a factor the committee is explicitly precluded from considering.”
True, but they can consider point differential and “the eye test” which would seem to essentially bring MOV back into it (the eyes do see the score during the games, right?). Also, they can consider performance versus common opponents which is another way to backdoor MOV into things.
“Maybe the conclusion is the same in any case, but it’s a serious analytical error.”
Agreed.
“Like a lot of people, I have trouble imagining a scenario where 3 Big Ten teams are picked — or 2 Big Ten teams, neither of which is the champ.”
Oh, so do I. The committee would find a way to avoid it. But if Clemson loses badly to VT and CO tops UW, it does create a quandary. AL and OSU are easy. Then I think the B10 champ is next. Who is #4?
MI comparisons:
OU – got whipped by OSU and performance against common opponents matters, but is a champ
CO – MI beat them head to head earlier, but is a champ
OkSU – is a champ and 1 loss was fluky
Clemson – weak SOS and also not a champ
UW – weak SOS and also not a champ
MI beat both PSU and WI, better wins than any of these teams would have. Does losing to #2 in 2OT on the road drop them enough for #11 OkSU to catch them with a win over #7? Would OU pass them? They’d find a way to put MI at #5 but it could be tough “reasoning” in this scenario (not that Clemson will lose anyway).
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3 Big 10 teams or OSU/UM in while leaving out the Big 10 champ discredits the whole system as entirely arbitrary where only perception matters.
One of the reasons for going to 4 was to reduce the amount that it is a beauty contest and avoid things like 2011 where only SEC teams were allowed to play.
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bullet,
“3 Big 10 teams or OSU/UM in while leaving out the Big 10 champ discredits the whole system as entirely arbitrary where only perception matters.”
I get that argument against 3 teams, but for OSU and MI? MI beat both WI and PSU. How would that be only perception mattering?
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I am not exactly neutral, since I am a big time Badger fan, but what is the point of the league championship game if the winner is not invited to the “final four”? I realize that tOSU is going, whether I like it or not. My bigger problem would be if a second B1G team went and that team is Michigan, not the winner of the title game (the Badgers, no doubt).
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Jersey Bernie,
“I am not exactly neutral, since I am a big time Badger fan, but what is the point of the league championship game if the winner is not invited to the “final four”?”
I know this will sound snarky but I really don’t mean it that way:
The only points are to make money and determine who wins the B10 title. It’s not intended to decide which is the best team in the B10.
“I realize that tOSU is going, whether I like it or not. My bigger problem would be if a second B1G team went and that team is Michigan, not the winner of the title game (the Badgers, no doubt).”
It is unlikely that MI would go over WI, but you can make a case for it. MI beat WI. MI has the better OOC win. Both lost in OT to OSU, but WI was at home. WI’s counterpoint is that they won the B10 title, but that was helped by playing in the West. Do you doubt that MI would’ve won the West if they swapped places with WI?
Would you have the same complaint if WI was 8-4 and upset PSU in the CCG (i.e. is it the principle of the thing or just this particular MI team vs this particular WI team)?
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Brian, I sort of agree with you , but you could have stopped after saying the CCG is to make money. Ultimately, that really is the bottom line.
On an emotional level, in response to your question about an 8-4 Badger team, certainly they should move on. Being rational, no of course not. No 4 or even 3 loss team should even smell making a playoff.
tOSU has one loss. At 11-1 (and ranked number 2, they are going and deserve to go).
Here Michigan is 10-2 and either the Badgers or PSU will be 11-2. A fair argument could be made for any of the three. I just think that the winner of the B1G title has a very real claim to be that team. I do not think that 2 B1G teams are going (it is not the SEC after all), but I would expect UM to be the second, unless the B1G championship is a total blow out so some team looks really strong.
Do I think that UM would have won the B1G West? Likely, but far from certain this year. I think that OSU certainly would have won the West. Of course I also am shocked that OSU did not win the B1G East.
Isn’t the power of the B1G East now likely to be an annual event? As long as the coaches stay, I would expect OSU and UM to be top five or top ten teams every year. Now PSU has suddenly popped up this year. Will that continue with Franklin? No one knows.
Mich State had a tough year, but I think that most people expect them to be back.
And, any minute now Maryland and Rutgers will be there too. (OK, relax it is a joke)
Winning the West is certainly the easier path.
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3 Big 10 teams or OSU/UM in while leaving out the Big 10 champ discredits the whole system as entirely arbitrary where only perception matters.
I don’t see why. The Committee is already expected to whittle down at least one P5 champ, even though the excluded team might not have any games in common with the four that are selected. The Committee is also expected to consider independents, who are not required to win any conference at all.
So, such judgments are unavoidable. There are many respectable systems (like S&P) that rank college football teams on clear statistical criteria. Those merits of those systems might be arguable, but they are not arbitrary. It can be done.
I get the argument for limiting it to conference champions. But I also get the argument for considering the whole resume, with the championship as one of many factors. Penn State defeated Ohio State, but they also lost to Michigan, played a weaker non-conference schedule than Ohio State, and had weaker crossovers. Those facts aren’t just “perception”. They are real. Why should we ignore them?
One of the reasons for going to 4 was to reduce the amount that it is a beauty contest and avoid things like 2011 where only SEC teams were allowed to play.
It’s the opposite. By NOT limiting it to “conference champs only,” they are allowing a 2011 scenario to happen again.
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“Those facts aren’t just “perception”. They are real.”
That is the perception of reality. Even if many hold it, it’s still a “most likely” true/real perception.
“There are many respectable systems (like S&P) that rank college football teams on clear statistical criteria. Those merits of those systems might be arguable, but they are not arbitrary. It can be done.”
Let’s link them into the scoreboards and skip the whole point scoring system as a basis of determining winners and conference placement.
“The Committee is already expected to whittle down at least one P5 champ, even though the excluded team might not have any games in common with the four that are selected. The Committee is also expected to consider independents, who are not required to win any conference at all.”
Let’s go further – whittle it down to one…after the bowls.
I know, the past is gone. But it really seems we’ve just visited it times 4 upon the present.
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Jersey Bernie,
“On an emotional level, in response to your question about an 8-4 Badger team, certainly they should move on. Being rational, no of course not. No 4 or even 3 loss team should even smell making a playoff.”
Just checking. Some people insist that a title trumps everything else. Certainly in 2016 there’s an argument to make for any 2-loss B10 team.
“I just think that the winner of the B1G title has a very real claim to be that team.”
And I think that’s exactly what would happen. 11-1 MI (only loss to OSU) could make a strong case, but with 2 losses the conference title would be the difference.
I expect tonight we’ll see the rankings go 5. MI, 6. WI, 7. PSU. Whoever wins the CCG would then jump MI for the final rankings. The key for the B10 champ is for Clemson or UW to lose so they can be #4.
“I do not think that 2 B1G teams are going (it is not the SEC after all), but I would expect UM to be the second, unless the B1G championship is a total blow out so some team looks really strong.”
At 11-1, I’d agree with you. But at 10-2, there’s just no way the committee will do it.
“Isn’t the power of the B1G East now likely to be an annual event?”
Probably. Not always to this extent in terms of records but maybe even stronger once MSU recovers. It’s the potential pitfall of these divisions. The B10 really needs NE to recover their glory days soon.
“As long as the coaches stay, I would expect OSU and UM to be top five or top ten teams every year. Now PSU has suddenly popped up this year. Will that continue with Franklin? No one knows.”
PSU has a lot of built in advantages. With a solid coach they should be good every year. OSU, MI, PSU and MSU should combine for about 40 wins per year on average (including the postseason) for the next few years.
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Whether MSU and Dantonio with his high-risk/reward defense (which really needs 2 great man-to-man shutdown corners to work well) can keep on winning double digit games most years remains to be seen.
But I fully expect OSU, UMich, and PSU (where Franklin isn’t good at the actual coaching part but is a terrific recruiter; and if he can keep bringing in athletic freaks like Saquon Barkley, the coaching won’t matter much) to win over 30 games each year between them.
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Whether MSU and Dantonio with his high-risk/reward defense (which really needs 2 great man-to-man shutdown corners to work well) can keep on winning double digit games most years remains to be seen.
He’s done it long enough to be past the fluke stage. At this point, you’d have to bet that he can keep it up.
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Richard,
“Whether MSU and Dantonio with his high-risk/reward defense (which really needs 2 great man-to-man shutdown corners to work well) can keep on winning double digit games most years remains to be seen.”
It does, but he’s got a decent track record of doing it now. Besides, MSU just needs to stay good enough to pick off any of the other 3 who have a down year/game to keep the numbers working. Ignoring the inevitable upsets, MSU gets 3 easier games in the East to win (IN, MD, RU) plus a locked easyish crossover (IL, MN or NW) and 2 other tossup or better crossovers (NE, WI, IA, PU) based on recent success. That should add up to 4-5 wins on average plus they have 3 OOC games (2 should be easyish wins at least). Add in a bowl and they’re at 7.5-8 wins on average right there.
“But I fully expect OSU, UMich, and PSU (where Franklin isn’t good at the actual coaching part but is a terrific recruiter; and if he can keep bringing in athletic freaks like Saquon Barkley, the coaching won’t matter much) to win over 30 games each year between them.”
Yep. So if they can average 32 wins between them (includes CCGs and bowls), we’re at my 40.
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He’s essentially saying Clemson has locked up a spot but I think a 11-2 Clemson is solidly out, ahead of only the Big 12 winner.
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And by ‘he’ I’m referring to Jerry Palm.
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http://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2016/11/77386/video-ohio-stadium-registers-a-579-on-the-richter-scale-after-curtis-samuels-game-winning-touchdown-against-michigan
Fans generated similar shaking energy in Ohio Stadium as a typical 5.79 earthquake on OSU’s winning TD.
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Wonder how much energy could be recaptured?
http://inhabitat.com/award-winning-pavegen-floor-tiles-will-use-energy-from-footsteps-to-light-up-uk-shopping-center/
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At least one of ‘Bama (5 times), OSU (3 times), and USC (3 times) has played in every one of the 10 more watched non-bowl college football games over the past decade:
http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2016/11/michigan-ohio-state-ratings-highest-college-football-overnight-abc/
UMich (both against OSU), UF (both against ‘Bama), and ND (both against USC) has played in these games twice.
Saban coached 5 of these games. Meyer 3.
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OSU-UMich and ‘Bama-UF in the SEC CCG make up 4 of the top 5. ‘Bama-UF were both Saban-Meyer matchups.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
The latest CFP rankings have no real surprises.
1. AL
2. OSU
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. MI
6. WI
7. PSU
8. CO
9. OU
10. OkSU
NE dropped out of the top 25 while IA didn’t make it in. WMU is #17 and should get the G5 spot if they win the MACCG.
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I find myself in complete agreement with this list. The only mystery is how much pull the conference champion has, which is the only one of the criteria that hasn’t been applied yet.
If you take Hocutt at his word, then these predictions would seem safe:
— AL is in, no matter what
— OSU is in, no matter what
— Clemson is in if they win, out if they lose
— UW is in if they win, out if they lose
— PSU and Wisconsin need a win, plus a Clemson or Washington loss
— Michigan is out, unless there is total chaos, and maybe not even then
— No other team has a good shot
It should be noted that, two years ago, TCU dropped from 3rd to 6th in the final week, despite playing a game and doing everything they could (beating Iowa State 55–3). Ohio State is the only team in the current top four that can do no more to help itself.
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I think if Wisconsin wins, they leap over UMich in the pecking order, but if PSU wins, UMich still has an edge over the Lions.
Second B10 team in if one of Clemson/Washington gets upset.
If both get upset, 3 B10 teams could get in if Wisconsin beats PSU.
One of CU or the Bedlam winner have a shot if both Clemson & Washington get upset and PSU beats Wisconsin.
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Richard,
“I think if Wisconsin wins, they leap over UMich in the pecking order, but if PSU wins, UMich still has an edge over the Lions.”
I think the committee will move up the B10 champ no matter what. I know MI has the big head to head win, but PSU also beat both teams that MI lost to. The addition of a win over WI to their resume plus earning the B10 title will give them the edge.
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Marc Shepherd,
“If you take Hocutt at his word, then these predictions would seem safe:
— AL is in, no matter what
— OSU is in, no matter what
— Clemson is in if they win, out if they lose
— UW is in if they win, out if they lose
— PSU and Wisconsin need a win, plus a Clemson or Washington loss
— Michigan is out, unless there is total chaos, and maybe not even then
— No other team has a good shot”
Pretty much. In the total chaos scenario (Clemson and UW lose), it becomes MI, the B12 champ and CO fighting for the last spot. I don’t think MI can get it with 2 losses, though.
“It should be noted that, two years ago, TCU dropped from 3rd to 6th in the final week, despite playing a game and doing everything they could (beating Iowa State 55–3).”
They did all they could, but the other 3 all beat ranked opponents that week and OSU did so by more than TCU beat a cupcake.
“Ohio State is the only team in the current top four that can do no more to help itself.”
They’re also the only one of them that can’t lose this weekend.
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UMich has a good chance of beating out CU (whom they beat) for a spot and likely also OK St.
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Richard,
“UMich has a good chance of beating out CU (whom they beat) for a spot and likely also OK St.”
First, I wholly agree that the B12 champ is SOL but I feel like I have to mention them as an option while knowing they will be the first option rejected.
Second, I’d more likely agree with you if I truly believed the committee completely ignores conference affiliation when doing their rankings. It may be true, but I need them to prove it to me. MI also faces the problem of losing 2 of 3 while CO would be on a 7 game winning streak including beating UW, WSU and Utah in their final 3 games. People tend to be more impressed with “hot” teams.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18167752/college-football-playoff-alabama-crimson-tide-ohio-state-buckeyes-clemson-tigers-washington-huskies-top-4
Kirby Hocutt, chairman of the College Football Playoff committee said Ohio State and Penn State “are not close” to each other, though the Nittany Lions beat the Buckeyes earlier this season and are playing in Saturday’s conference championship game while Ohio State sits at home.
I don’t think beating WI will be enough to get PSU in unless there are upsets in other CCGs.
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Ohio State and Michigan each have 3 wins vs team’s in this week’s College Football Playoff Rankings, 1 more than Penn State and Wisconsin combined.
From ESPN Stats and Info on Twitter.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/gallery/5-major-takeaways-from-the-latest-college-football-playoff-rankings-112916
Stewart Mandel reads a lot into what all Hocutt said.
Selection committee chairman Kirby Hocutt seemed to have a specific message he wanted to put out there Tuesday night.
Five times over the course of his post-rankings teleconference with reporters he mentioned either the “small margin” or “small separation” between No. 4 Washington and No. 5 Michigan. At one point he estimated that over the course of two days, the committee spent nearly two hours (!) debating between the 11-1 Huskies and the 10-2 Wolverines.
…
But Hocutt does not throw this stuff out there by accident. He’s carefully coached by P.R. professionals before going on ESPN and talking with media. He has talking points prepared. Why, then, make such a big deal out of Washington vs. Michigan?
I have two theories.
One is that he’s hinting at possible disappointment ahead for fans of Washington, which has since the first rankings on Nov. 1 consistently been the lowest-rated of its peer group (first as an undefeated, then as a one-loss). The Huskies’ poor strength of schedule “continues to be a concern for the Selection Committee,” said Hocutt.
Michigan is not going to pass Washington if the Huskies beat Colorado, but perhaps whoever wins Saturday’s Big Ten championship game between No. 6 Wisconsin and No. 7 Penn State could?
Or …
Is he opening the door for the possibility that both No. 2 Ohio State and No. 5 Michigan could be playoff-bound before the Big Ten champ? Because another message Hocutt emphasized Tuesday night was to remind us of the committee’s “core purpose and mission … to identify the four very best teams in college football” – regardless of whether they won their conference.
Based on the committee’s rankings, it believes the two best teams in the Big Ten are not the ones playing in Indianapolis. And maybe that won’t change after one beats the other, as we’ve long been assuming. After all, Michigan, which he says was already thisclose to being No. 4, beat both Wisconsin and Penn State.
…
When it comes to the Ohio State-Penn State conundrum in particular, Hocutt’s message continues to be that, “Only when the Selection Committee deems those teams to be [so] comparable that the margins are razor thin, do we then go to those four measurements that we’ve talked about” as tiebreakers – those being conference championships, strength of schedule, head-to-head results and common opponents.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again – Ohio State is going to the playoff regardless of Saturday’s outcome. The Buckeyes’ resume is too strong to be left out. That doesn’t mean Penn State can’t join the field, too. But now, you have to wonder whether the Nittany Lions are in danger of also finishing behind a Michigan.
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The head of the committee over the last two years has been consistent in one thing, saying the exact opposite things to explain the rankings from one week to the next.
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It’s a new chairman this year.
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I got to thinking about this and now support an 8 team playoff but with no CCG’s allowed (13th game allowed only for those who play in Hawaii). I think the extra payoff would be enough to compensate even the confernce with the most lucrative CCG (the B10, I believe).
Permanent semifinal sites in Atlanta, Indianapolis/Detroit, Dallas, and LA/Phoenix so that every conference has at least one semifinal site (the SEC would have 2). Held the same weekend CCG’s are held now (or the weekend after, in which case the Army/Navy game would move up to the first weekend of Dec).
The playoff brackets this year would be:
1. ‘Bama vs. 8. CU/Bedlam winner in Atlanta
2. OSU vs. 7. PSU in Indianapolis
3. Clemson vs. 6. Wisconsin in Dallas
4. Washington vs. 5. Michigan in LA
How exciting would that be?
Or if you guarantee P5 conference champs a spot:
1. ‘Bama vs. Bedlam winner in Atlanta
2. OSU vs. 7. PSU in Indianapolis
3. Clemson vs. 6. Wisconsin in Dallas
4. Washington vs. 5. Michigan in LA
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Or for semifinal sites, have them be bowls:
Cotton (Dallas)
Peach (Atlanta)
Fiesta (Phoenix)
Detroit
In the second week of December.
The Rose/Citrus and Sugar/Orange would alternate hosting semifinal sites.
Rose, Sugar, and Orange would still have their conference tie-ins when not hosting semifinals.
Top G5 champ would always go to the Orange or Citrus if they don’t make the playoffs.
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The Rose/Citrus and Sugar/Orange would alternate hosting semifinal sites.
Rose, Sugar, and Orange would still have their conference tie-ins when not hosting semifinals.
This means that, in the years they don’t host semi-finals, the Rose/Sugar would be no better than the 7th most interesting bowl game of the year. I don’t think the Big Ten and Pac-12 are going to let that happen to the Rose Bowl.
The only 8-team proposal I’ve seen, that I could believe would be adopted, is where the quarter-finals are played over the New Year’s holiday, hosted by the traditional bowls.
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I got to thinking about this and now support an 8 team playoff but with no CCG’s allowed (13th game allowed only for those who play in Hawaii). I think the extra payoff would be enough to compensate even the conference with the most lucrative CCG (the B10, I believe).
All ten FBS conferences now have CCGs, or will shortly. They are not going to design a playoff that makes it impossible for the mid-majors to qualify, however unlikely it may be. So, for your proposal to work financially, the revenue for four playoff games would need to replace the lost revenue from 10 CCGs. That sounds like a stretch. I am not even sure it works if you disqualify the mid-majors, and then four playoff games only need to replace five CCGs.
Or for semifinal sites, have them be bowls…in the second week of December.
They will have trouble with attendance in the second week of December. That is not a popular date for people to travel to a football game. Also, fans of a team like Alabama or Ohio State are going to say: “Let’s add it up: if they win the quarter-final, then I have to pony up for travel to a semi-final; and if they win that, travel to a final.” After looking at their bank account, the quarter-final is liable to be the one they skip.
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Is the first weekend of December a more popular travel date than the second? Note that the quarterfinal sites will usually be no farther away than a CCG site for the top-seeded teams.
Also, the mid-major CCG’s just don’t bring in a lot of money.
However, I concede that one spot in an 8-team playoff may have to be reserved for the best G5 champ.
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Is the first weekend of December a more popular travel date than the second?
I may have misinterpreted your proposal. When you suggested the second week of December, I thought it was an alternative to allow the CCGs to continue to exist.
I do think that the second weekend of December is marginally less popular for discretionary travel than the first. The closer you get to Christmas, the more people are tied up with holiday parties, family commitments, shopping, and so forth. Depending on the school schedule, there are also final exams. No one is particularly eager to play a bowl game then.
Note that the quarterfinal sites will usually be no farther away than a CCG site for the top-seeded teams.
Clemson and Wisconsin in Dallas, Bedlam winner in Atlanta, and Michigan in LA, are all quite a bit farther than a conference championship game would be. So, that’s half of your quarterfinal participants.
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Without a conference championship game or a round robin schedule, how would a conference champion be decided? Or will large conferences like B1G, PAC 12, SEC and ACC be broken up?
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Richard,
“I got to thinking about this and now support an 8 team playoff but with no CCG’s allowed (13th game allowed only for those who play in Hawaii).”
It’s a reasonable trade-off, I suppose, but I wonder if the P5 would agree. Is 8 games among 14 teams enough to fairly decide a champion? The ACC won’t go to 9 games with the ND agreement plus the 4 locked rivalries with the SEC. The SEC is also unlikely to want to go to 9 games for the same reason the B10 might want to drop back to 8 – the imbalance of home and road games becomes important now. With divisions you can keep the race fair with all the teams getting the same number of home games.
“I think the extra payoff would be enough to compensate even the confernce with the most lucrative CCG (the B10, I believe).”
Probably, yes. You’d have to lock in that money for each P5 conference of course.
“Permanent semifinal sites in Atlanta, Indianapolis/Detroit, Dallas, and LA/Phoenix so that every conference has at least one semifinal site (the SEC would have 2).”
You mean quarterfinals, right?
“Held the same weekend CCG’s are held now (or the weekend after, in which case the Army/Navy game would move up to the first weekend of Dec).”
I’d prefer the weekend after so teams get time to heal before 3 killer games. Also Army/Navy can’t hold things up for bowl selection. I’d even consider letting the G5 keep their CCGs (played on that weekend) to give them a better shot to make the playoff (do the final rankings after the G5 CCGs and Army/Navy play that weekend).
“Or if you guarantee P5 conference champs a spot:”
I don’t think you should guarantee them an unconditional spot. Sometimes the champ won’t be very good. If they can’t make the top 8/10/15 (pick your preferred cutoff) then they don’t deserve it. This year it would work out fine but let’s look at the past 20 years and the worst P5 champ (ignoring BE):
2016 – about #8
2015 – #6
2014 – #5
2013 – #6
2012 – #12
2011 – #15
2010 – #13
2009 – #9
2008 – #19
2007 – #7
2006 – #14
2005 – #22
2004 – #13
2003 – #10
2002 – #14
2001 – #13
2000 – #17
1999 – #22
1998 – #9
1997 – #8
1996 – #20
It’s one thing to autobid NY6 games for champs, but it’s another to lock a playoff spot in my opinion. I’d say that a champ has to be in the top 10 or top 12 to make the playoff (or mandate 9 wins as a minimum to get in). If you are lower than that, then the benefit of being a champ shouldn’t be sufficient to get you in. On the bright side, there wouldn’t be all that many champs getting left out and the system would seem more legitimate to many fans. If you do keep autobids, at least there wouldn’t be a ton of weak teams getting in. I still think it’s bad policy if the stated goal is to find the best team.
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Well who determines the ranking? You need to get the beauty contest out if you go to 8. Who is to say that a 9-3 Florida SEC champ isn’t better than a 10-2 Colorado Pac 12 or 10-2 Wisconsin Big 10 champ? Everyone was convinced USC would win in 2005. Everyone was convinced Ohio St. would win in 2006. Nobody thought Ohio St. would win in 2014 or 2002.
So why should we be sure that #13 isn’t really a top 6 or 7 team? Once you get out of the top 3-8, typically there are a lot of teams who are very close to each other.
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bullet,
“Well who determines the ranking?”
That’s a longer answer that isn’t needed here. Any combo of a committee or computer models is fine for now.
“You need to get the beauty contest out if you go to 8.”
You literally can’t get rid of it if you go to 8. How else would you select 8 teams? Even with autobids you’d have multiple at-larges assigned entirely by the beauty contest, plus all the seeding would be by beauty contest. At some point any playoff system in CFB requires a beauty system so people should put more effort into developing a good one than trying to eliminate it.
“Who is to say that a 9-3 Florida SEC champ isn’t better than a 10-2 Colorado Pac 12 or 10-2 Wisconsin Big 10 champ?”
People with eyes? Computer models? Advanced stats? Former coaches and players? I don’t even think most UF fans would honestly claim UF is better than those 2 teams.
“Everyone was convinced USC would win in 2005.”
That was a debate between #1 and #2, not #1 and #22.
In the past 50 seasons (AP poll rankings):
#1 vs #2 = 21-19 (53%)
#1 vs #3-10 = 60-29-3 (67%)
#1 vs #11-25 = 81-20 (80%)
#1 vs unranked = 370-22-3 (94%)
The polls worked pretty well, and teams outside the top 10 don’t have much of a chance vs #1.
“Everyone was convinced Ohio St. would win in 2006.”
At the end of November OSU was the better team. In early January UF was. 7 weeks off and hitting the banquet series while being told how great you are changes some things. As does 5 weeks off of hearing how great the other team is and how they’ll destroy you.
“Nobody thought Ohio St. would win in 2014 or 2002.”
Miami was clearly the better team in 2002. They underestimated OSU’s defensive speed and then McGahee got hurt just as their offense was coming alive. 2014 OSU was still an unknown quantity due to the QB spot. It’s rare to have a QB starting his second game in a bowl game like that. The line would’ve been smaller without that.
“So why should we be sure that #13 isn’t really a top 6 or 7 team?”
I don’t care if they’re a top 7 team, the supposed goal is to find #1. If you aren’t in the top 10 already, you don’t deserve to be #1. Of course there is a chance that #13 could win 3 straight games. That doesn’t mean they deserved the shot over #7 who had even better odds of winning 3 games.
“Once you get out of the top 3-8, typically there are a lot of teams who are very close to each other.”
So don’t go past the top 8.
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You need to get the beauty contest out if you go to 8.
CFB is historically more of a “beauty contest” championship than any other sport. No other sport comes close. Every step they’ve taken, has been in the direction of reducing that element, but you cannot get rid of it.
The NCAA basketball tournament is *mostly* a beauty contest, and has always been. About half the field gets auto-bids, the other half is selected with the dreaded eye test. But the entire field gets seeded and assigned to regions based on the eye test. The seeding and site assignments have a not insignificant impact on a team’s win probability.
Many of the NCAA basketball auto-bids go to the winners of minor conferences that basically have close to zero chance of winning it all. Basketball has chosen to keep increasing the size of the field, so that every conference would still be guaranteed one bid, without having to reduce the number of at-large bids.
If the presidents decided to cut the basketball tournament down to 16 teams — just say — I am fairly sure they’d do exactly what they’ve done in football: select the 16 best, not limited to conference champs.
Interestingly, many of the lesser conferences have chosen to give their auto-bid to their conference tournament winner, rather than their regular-season winner. The conferences know that the tournament winner is a “more random” result, less likely to be the best team. But they figure that the regular-season champ has better chances of making it in on merit, so this strategy increases the odds that the conference will have multiple teams with bids.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Interestingly, many of the lesser conferences have chosen to give their auto-bid to their conference tournament winner, rather than their regular-season winner. The conferences know that the tournament winner is a “more random” result, less likely to be the best team. But they figure that the regular-season champ has better chances of making it in on merit, so this strategy increases the odds that the conference will have multiple teams with bids.”
I believe the NCAA requires the tournament champ to get the autobid in order to allow you to hold a tournament. If you want to reward the regular season champ then you can’t have a tournament.
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4 teams from one conference with one game a rematch? Totally uninteresting. See Bama-LSU 2011.
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bullet,
“4 teams from one conference with one game a rematch? Totally uninteresting. See Bama-LSU 2011.”
But if you’ve already given autobids to the P5 champs and the 3 highest ranking at-larges are from 1 conference, what are they supposed to do? Do you want a cap for any given conference like the BCS had? That makes sense when considering a group of bowls but a lot less sense when making a playoff field. it’s not Richard’s fault that those are the rankings this year. Playoffs often have rematches and boring match-ups in other sports. It’s the price you pay for expanding the field.
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http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2016/11/28/In-Depth/Realignment.aspx
Sports Business Daily piece proposes geographical realignment of Sun Belt and C-USA.
This is what I’ve been talking about for over a year. I’m glad a reputable publishing company’s writer is on board with the idea. It’s just too ridiculous that Appalachian State and Coastal Carolina will be in the same league with schools in Texas and Louisiana but not with Charlotte or Old Dominion, while the latter two are in a league with four other Texas schools, including one in that state’s western extreme.
“Finances are going to necessitate logical, reasonable thinking to do what’s best for the student athletes and the institutions,” said Wood Selig, athletic director at Old Dominion in CUSA. “We can’t keep trying to keep up with the SEC or ACC.”
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Michael, as someone who knows basically nothing about either of those conferences, thanks for the link. It was very informative.
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Michael,
Thanks for sharing. It’s good to read a piece that espouses some common sense and rational thinking as a way of addressing the needs of these schools’ athletic departments.
Great read…
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The problem, of course, is ego. There’s also a money issue.
In CUSA’s most recent media rights negotiations last year, the conference took a staggering 80 percent haircut, with per-school revenue slipping from $1 million a year to $200,000.
…
Sun Belt schools make slightly less from media rights — about $140,000 annually.
“It’s going to take a fiscally dramatic event to get something to happen,” Middle Tennessee State AD Chris Massaro said. “I’m not sure we’ve hit that financial crisis yet. When you hit a crisis, people will put their egos aside.”
No CUSA member will willingly give up money to be realigned into the SB. You’d have to keep all the payments the same for the next few years to get them to agree. Maybe then they can merge into 1 big entity that contains 2 separate NCAA conferences but shares money equally (to reduce arguments about who goes where). It might help their TV deal if it covered twice as many teams so the networks had more game to choose from. It would also reduce overhead to have just 1 conference office (in Atlanta, probably).
I don’t like their pods idea, though.
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Brian,
I don’t like the pods idea either.
Ego is always usually involved when good ideas don’t move forward. It’s a shame really.
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Glad to share it. Thanks for reading.
Frank’s blog is obviously geared towards those interested in conference realignment, specifically for the Power 5, and other sports business among the P5 conferences. It has a Big Ten bent, too. But it’s also one of the most civil places where humor and intelligence are valued, so I figured people would be interested even in what’s happening for G5 leagues.
If a sensible geographic realignment doesn’t happen between C-USA and the Sun Belt, I think my alma mater will be fine. I’m overwhelmed with the success App State has had so far. They’re 20-4 in three years of Sun Belt play after moving directly from the SoCon, an FCS league, and they’ve clinched at least a share of the conference title. But without the millions upon tens of millions that schools in the Big Ten, SEC, ACC, etc. receive every year, it seems silly to send these non-revenue sports to Louisiana and Texas. The world is not falling, but there just seems like there is a smarter way of conducting business.
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Michael,
Didn’t App State play a home game against Miami this year? That’s huge, I think your school is well on its way. I actually thought you guys outplayed Tenn this year too, otherwise Butch Jones would really be on the hot seat. I’m not sure what the future holds, but I think your alma mater is in a great place to go forward.
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The thought of Rice falling even further into the dregs of college football with Southwest Texas State, Louisiana-Monroe, and South Alabama just depresses me.
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Rice has been burned by conference realignment about as bad as anyone. I certainly sympathize with that.
But wouldn’t this be somewhat an even trade-off? Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette instead of WKU and Marshall? ULM and maybe South Alabama instead of the Florida schools? Obviously no one even close to compares to Rice academically in either the SBC or C-USA. No one comes close to the old SEC or even to former C-USA members like Houston, Tulane, UCF, and others. Would this really be a downgrade from what Rice has currently?
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When you look at the combined list of the two conferences the only ones who have extensive experience in the highest level of college football are UTEP, Southern Miss, and Rice. Marshall is a name people recognize and have also been around quite a while. The known basketball schools are UAB, Louisiana Tech, WKU, and Charlotte. All of those schools are in CUSA. The Sun Belt is basically a bunch of start-ups and very very low budget programs like ULM.
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I should add UTEP to the basketball list since they do have a National Championship. One of very few in the combined conferences. The others I can remember are Rice baseball, of course, and LaTech in women’s basketball.
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Coastal Carolina is the reigning baseball champion.
Ga. State and Little Rock have each won one NCAA tournament game over the past two years. Arkansas State is having a nice start this year, including a win over Georgetown. UTA beat Shaka Smart’s Texas team.
Over time, sure, I’d predict more basketball success out of Charlotte, WKU, MTSU, and UAB than anyone out of the SBC, but it’s hard to know for sure. C-USA is a far, far cry from the Cincinnati/Louisville/Memphis/Marquette/DePaul days. Even SMU, Houston, and Tulsa are finding success post-C-USA that they hardly ever found in the league.
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Between the Sun Belt and C-USA, here is how the schools rank for expenses in 2014-2015 according to http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/
1. Old Dominion: $43,994,715
2. Texas State: $34,508,786
3. Charlotte: $33,524,557*
4. UAB, $31,896,726
5. MTSU, $31,671,166
6. North Texas, $31,312,298
7. FAU, $30,919,633
8. WKU, $30,212,548
9. UTEP, $29,836,835
10. Appalachian State, $29,695,016
11. Arkansas State, $29,211,785
12. Georgia State, $28,982,441
13. FIU, $28,613,452
14. South Alabama, $28,101,936
15. Marshall, $27,069,138
16. Troy, $27,056,669
17. UTSA, $26,807,547
18. Coastal Carolina, $25,872,141*
19. Southern Mississippi, $23,972,589
20. Louisiana (Laf.), $23,460,508
21. Louisiana Tech, $22,209,912
22. Georgia Southern, $21,144,354
23. ULM, $12,953,419
24. UT-Arlington, $12,513,885**
25. Little Rock, $9,553,101**
*Coastal Carolina’s and Charlotte’s expenses will certainly rise in this list since this data was before they have moved to the Sun Belt/FBS.
**UTA and Little Rock do not sponsor football.
ULM’s budget obviously is far lower than any other football school among the two conferences. Old Dominion’s stands out well ahead of everyone else, yet their AD is one of the most open to geographical realignment. The other Sun Belt schools are well within the range of the C-USA schools. Yes, C-USA dominates the top nine, but Charlotte’s budget (#3 overall between the two leagues) is under $6M more than #14 overall South Alabama’s.
Rice’s expenses were not reported since they’re private. I did not include Idaho or New Mexico State since their last year as a football-only member is the fall of 2017.
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Last estimate I saw had Rice in the mid-30s. So probably still behind ODU.
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If we go old school, Bama-tOSU would be a lock for the Sugar Bowl. I could see Michigan-Clemson in the Fiesta, Washington – winner of PSU/Wiscy in the Rose. The Orange would be highest of Colorado/Oklahoma/OkState against loser of PSU/Wiscy. The Cotton would be dreg – Houston or TAM against LSU perhaps.
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urbanleftbehind,
“If we go old school, Bama-tOSU would be a lock for the Sugar Bowl. I could see Michigan-Clemson in the Fiesta, Washington – winner of PSU/Wiscy in the Rose. The Orange would be highest of Colorado/Oklahoma/OkState against loser of PSU/Wiscy. The Cotton would be dreg – Houston or TAM against LSU perhaps.”
Old school when, exactly?
60s or earlier? No, because the Fiesta Bowl started in 1971.
70s? No, because the Fiesta had a WAC tie-in until 1978.
80s-90s? Looks like this is when you’re thinking, because the Big 8/12 champ went there from 1976-1995. The ACC started going there in 1999 (against the BE until 2006).
Well, let’s start with the autobids (and assume all higher ranked teams win this week):
Rose = WI vs UW
Sugar = AL vs ???
Orange = OU vs ???
Fiesta = ??? vs ???
Cotton = UH vs ??? (UH is the only ranked former member of the SWC)
The ACC champ didn’t have an autobid until 1987-1991 in the Citrus and then 1999 on in the Orange.
Rose = WI vs UW
Sugar = AL vs OSU (Sugar probably pays enough to get the best available game)
Orange = OU vs Clemson (highest ranked team in the SE by a mile so Orange pays up)
Fiesta = MI vs USC (can’t be PSU or CO)
Cotton = UH vs PSU (UH is the only ranked former member of the SWC)
I would’ve put PSU in the Fiesta except they played MI already. Besides, a mini-Rose game with 2 blue bloods should go over well.
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If the BCS were still in use it would look something like…
BCSNCG (In Tampa)
#1 Alabama vs #2 Ohio State
Rose Bowl
#4 Washington vs #6 Wisconsin
Fiesta Bowl
#7 Oklahoma vs #10 USC
Sugar Bowl
#18 Auburn vs #11 FSU
Orange Bowl
#3 Clemson vs #12 Western Michigan
*Rankings are from the Colley BCS Proxy Rankings.
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The Orange Bowl might stink but the rest look pretty good.
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Scarlet_Lutefisk,
“If the BCS were still in use it would look something like…”
Or we could just drop the NCG and use the NY6 bowls instead with the current tie-ins.
It might go like this:
Rose Bowl
#4 Washington vs #6 Wisconsin (P12 vs B10)
Sugar Bowl
#1 Alabama vs #9 Oklahoma (SEC vs B12)
Orange Bowl
#3 Clemson vs #2 Ohio State (ACC vs best B10/SEC/ND)
Fiesta Bowl
#7 Penn State vs #11 USC (at-large vs at-large)
Chosen for location/travel
Cotton Bowl
#8 Colorado vs #10 Oklahoma State (at-large vs at-large)
Chosen for location/travel
Peach Bowl
#5 Michigan vs #17 Western Michigan (at-large vs at-large)
Last 2 standing plus an in-state battle to intrigue fans. MI couldn’t play PSU or CO and the in-state angle seemed the best way to sell tickets. MI and PSU could swap places but PSU vs WMU seems even worse for ticket sales.
Just like in the old days, if #1 wins their bowl they probably get the title. If they lose, then the winner of 2 vs 3 probably gets it. That seems fair enough.
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Ugh. ‘Bama would win the (mythical) national title without a challenge.
Yet some people want that.
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Richard,
“Ugh. ‘Bama would win the (mythical) national title without a challenge.”
OU might have a puncher’s chance. But if AL beat them to go 14-0 they would deserve the title. I’m not sure anyone else could give them a tough game this year.
“Yet some people want that.”
Not me, but sometimes the best team seems fairly clear.
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Brian, both OSU and UMich are certainly capable of giving ‘Bama a tough game.
Both are only slight ‘dogs to ‘Bama.
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Richard,
“Brian, both OSU and UMich are certainly capable of giving ‘Bama a tough game.
Both are only slight ‘dogs to ‘Bama.”
Not without fixing their offenses they can’t. MI would need to improve their running game and have a healthy QB. OSU would need Barrett and the WRs to improve significantly.
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Brian:
1. Speight has a lot of time to heal up before the bowl games.
2. OSU isn’t as explosive this year on offense as in 2014, and has high variability (as should be expected for such a young team), but when they are in their “good” mode, they can certainly beat ‘Bama.
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Yes, the problem is that OSU’s “good” mode has been absent for weeks. Part of that is the competition and weather, but part of it isn’t. With all the time until the bowl OSU might recover their passing game, but I don’t count on it.
That’s why I say right now AL is a clear #1 so I wouldn’t mind if the old system existed and they played OU for the title. OSU should’ve won against PSU (blocked punt and FG) and didn’t. If they had, then maybe OSU would be #1 but they would definitely have a chance to win the title versus Clemson.
It’s just my opinion. Computers and other CFB fans are free to think OSU is better than I do.
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I would probably say 1979-1986, prior to the ACC having the Citrus Bowl bid but with the flexibility to accomodate a pairing in another bowl like 1981 Clemson.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18171618/navy-midshipmen-win-aac-title-game-paralyze-bowl-system
The bowl system really hopes that Temple beats Navy in the AACCG.
That’s because if Navy wins the American and is in contention for the Group of 5 bid in a New Year’s Six bowl, the College Football Playoff selection committee could delay announcing the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion team until Dec. 10 when Navy plays Army, six days after its final rankings are revealed.
The domino effect on other bowls could “paralyze” the system, a source said.
Delaying the Group of 5’s bid to the Cotton Bowl would affect many bowl games involving Group of 5 teams. Officials would have to delay placing teams in bowls without knowing whether a conference champion could get pulled up to the Cotton Bowl. Additionally, opponents in those bowl games wouldn’t know whom they were playing in addition to the obvious logistic and financial issues involved with waiting another seven days before planning travel, buying tickets and other factors.
The bowl season begins Dec. 17 with five bowls — all involving Group of 5 teams. Teams usually arrive to those bowl sites on Wednesday, Dec. 14, so those schools would have little more than a 72-hour turnaround between learning what bowls they are in and traveling to the sites. The short time frame would also likely affect fans’ ability to travel and potentially hurt the communities hosting those games, sources said.
…
“If the committee believes the result of the Army-Navy game could affect Navy’s ranking and therefore its place in the playoff or its selection as the Group of 5 representative, only the pairings that affect Army and Navy would be delayed until after the Army-Navy game,” College Football Playoff executive director Bill Hancock said.
Hancock would not specify how close in the rankings Navy and the next closest Group of 5 champion has to be to delay the decision.
Not only would a delay affect the Group of 5 teams, but it also would prohibit teams with 5-7 records that qualified with high academic progress rates from getting placed into a bowl until Dec. 10. That’s because those teams are awarded bowl bids that couldn’t be filled by bowl-eligible teams with a 6-6 record or better. The APR teams will be the last teams placed.
…
“The bottom line is if the rankings are delayed, it would be a disaster to the bowl system,” a bowl official said.
In June 2015, the College Football Playoff changed its rules so that the final rankings would be delayed until after the Navy-Army game if it affected the playoff field or the Group of 5 bid.
The special treatment for Army/Navy needs to stop. They shouldn’t be able to hold all of CFB hostage to a fairly recent “tradition” (moved a week later in 2009). If Navy isn’t so far ahead that a loss to Army couldn’t possibly knock them out, then give the G5 spot to someone else and let Navy pay the price for playing Army after the season ends.
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The special treatment for Army/Navy needs to stop. They shouldn’t be able to hold all of CFB hostage to a fairly recent “tradition” (moved a week later in 2009). If Navy isn’t so far ahead that a loss to Army couldn’t possibly knock them out, then give the G5 spot to someone else and let Navy pay the price for playing Army after the season ends.
It’s not fair to change the rules after the games are already scheduled. Maybe they shouldn’t have agreed to this — but they did, perhaps not having thought out the implications very carefully.
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Marc Shepherd,
“It’s not fair to change the rules after the games are already scheduled. Maybe they shouldn’t have agreed to this — but they did, perhaps not having thought out the implications very carefully.”
Agreed. I’m talking about making changes for future years.
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ACC wins the ACC/Big Ten Challenge for the first time since ’08. Given that realignment shifted the relative strength of the two basketball conferences sharply towards the ACC, it could be a while before the Big Ten wins again.
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frug,
“ACC wins the ACC/Big Ten Challenge for the first time since ’08. Given that realignment shifted the relative strength of the two basketball conferences sharply towards the ACC, it could be a while before the Big Ten wins again.”
What? The B10 won in 2014 and 2015 with the same alignment. The B10 needs MSU, OSU and UMD to bounce back to their recent success levels.
There were some terrible match-ups this year for the B10 (#6 Duke vs unranked MSU, #7 UVA vs unranked OSU) and the close games went the ACC’s way this year (3-0 in 3pt games).
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This is how I would divide B1G schools into tiers based on historical basketball success:
Tier 1
Indiana
Tier 2
Ohio State
Michigan State
Michigan
Illinois
Maryland
Tier 3
Wisconsin
Purdue
Tier 4
Minnesota
Iowa
Tier 5
Northwestern
Nebraska
Penn State
Rutgers
You can argue about certain schools’ standing (perhaps Wisconsin deserves to be in Tier 2, perhaps Michigan State deserves to be in Tier 1, etc.) but overall I think this is a good look at the B1G hierarchy. It also leads to a few observations:
Most of the teams in the Tier 1/2 level aren’t performing at their peak levels. Indiana has made two final fours in 26 years and has been very inconsistent in between, although they seem to be trending up.
Michigan has made two final fours in 25 years and went through a decade without making a single tournament appearance. After playing in the title game and nearly returning to the final four in 2013, they are trending down.
Since making the final four in 2005, Illinois has been a shell of its former self and looks poised to miss the tournament for a 4th straight season.
Maryland was one of the best programs in the country in the late 90s/early 00s but after winning the NC in 2002, has largely fallen off.Thought they might break through last year but they didn’t and now look like they are trending down.
Since the Tier 1/2 programs are the ones that have had the most success historically and will recruit the best talent, they are ones that are most likely to win a national championship. Only OSU and MSU are near their peak levels, with only Indiana trending up.
Wisconsin continues to overachieve through great player development and coaching, but that can only take you so far.
Also, the B1G is dragged down by the Tier 5 schools, which are four of the worst major conference programs in the country, none of which have ever had any sustained success.
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I agree with the list except for Iowa. The Raveling and Dr. Tom years were strong enough to bump them into Tier 3, in my opinion.
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Maybe, maybe not.
The ACC is deep in terms of year-in, year-out programs, but the Big Ten is very impressive. Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Indiana, Wisconsin, Maryland, Purdue, Illinois (down lately but very good over long haul)… take those schools’ performances over any five-year stretch and it’s as good as anyone. The national championship drought is entering the level of bizarre, but this league is up with anyone.
Besides, consider how Roy Williams, Jim Boeheim, Coach K, and Rick Pitino probably have a max of six years left, and there’s going to be a massive drop in coaching power right around the corner. Even the Big Ten’s veteran coaches have a lot of years left in them.
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Maryland’s men haven’t won a Challenge game since switching conferences, losing to UVa, UNC and now Pitt. Maryland’s women were hammered by Notre Dame in 2014, beat Syracuse last year (SU later reached the NCAA finals) and play at Louisville tonight in a top-7 matchup.
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Terps won 78-72.
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http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-conference-championship-weekend-will-affect-the-college-football-playoff/
538.com on how CCG weekend will impact the playoff race. This is an article that includes data, not just the tables I link every week.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18168058/houston-board-regents-chairman-tilman-fertitta-was-critical-big-12-wake-texas-hiring-tom-herman
The chair of the UH BOR is upset and ripped the B12.
Fertitta, also one of the Cougars’ biggest boosters (he donated $20 million for the naming rights to the soon-to-be-renovated basketball arena Hofheinz Pavilion, which will become the Fertitta Center), called the Big 12’s expansion vetting process “a sham.” Houston was considered one of the top candidates to be added to the conference if the Big 12 moved forward with expansion.
“I think it was a PR play to see how the NCAA and everyone else was going to react since they don’t have a championship game,” Fertitta said. “I truly don’t know what they were thinking, other than just, maybe, poor lack of leadership.”
…
When discussing the interview process that potential expansion candidates engaged in with the Big 12, Fertitta was critical.
“You know when I knew we were in trouble?” Fertitta said. “There were three [university] presidents who were on the [Big 12 expansion] committee and when we went to the interview, they weren’t even part of the interview process. I walked out of that meeting and said ‘Wow, this is a sham. There’s no intention of doing anything.’
“It was one of the great shams in college football, and college athletics, and just college period. … It was a total sham and I sit here today and I laugh at the Big 12 and their leadership.”
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Eight years from now, when Texas, Oklahoma and accomplices flee the Big 12 for greener (as in $$$) pastures, Iowa State, K-State and whatever is left will be happy to take UH. For now, though, they’re under the thumb of the blueblood bullies.
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Earlier bullet asked me how teams should be ranked and I told him it was a long answer. Below is said long answer with context.
My Playoff System
Let me start by saying that I am against having a playoff in college football. I would always prefer to return to the old bowl system and let human and computer polls determine their own champions. That said, the cat is out of the bag and the money is too great for the sport to ever go back. Accepting that, I will endeavor to develop the best playoff system within the basic constraints of the current college football season and practical concerns.
Mission
The goal of a playoff to me is to attempt to reward the best team over the entire season. However, best is a nebulous term with different meanings to different people. I will remove the subjectivity by instead rewarding objective accomplishments. In keeping with the preferred practice of college sports, I will not consider margin of victory. MOV is an important factor in most systems for determining the best team, but we are looking for the most deserving team which isn’t the same thing (although I will refer to it as “best” from here on for brevity). The system will be fair to everyone despite the variety in quality, schedules and weather.
Size
The most important decision is how many teams should get an opportunity to play for the title. Practical considerations force it to be a single-elimination tournament (not ideal for finding the best team) and the maximum possible number is 16 teams. Lower divisions do more teams but they have 1 less regular season game and I don’t see I-A making that sacrifice.
Since the goal is to reward the best team, no team should get in that doesn’t have a reasonable claim to being #1. Likewise, no team with a solid claim should be left out. Note that being able to win the tournament and being honestly able to claim being the best team all year are not the same things. Many teams can get hot and win 2-3 games in a row over other good teams. Not all of them deserve the chance to play for #1. Based on past history, I believe 4 is the correct number of teams most years. Are there years when #5 has a decent claim? Yes, but so few that I don’t feel it justifies giving 8 teams a shot every year.
Ranking and Seeding
Having settled on 4 teams, the question becomes how to pick those 4 teams. Many people feel this is where college football often fails as subjective criteria override objective accomplishments for human voters. My system will only care about wins and losses, with adjustments for location, bye weeks, and whether it’s a conference game.
Basically, my plan gives a team points for every game played. In order to reward tough schedules, a game is worth the opponent’s unadjusted RPI^2 (that means the old formula that ignored location). The value of a game is then adjusted for result and location (win = 1, loss = 0.5, home = 0.9, road = 1.1). Neutral games are when both teams travelled more than 250 miles or neither did (WI at Lambeau is not a neutral site), or if tickets are explicitly split 50/50 (OU vs UT, UF vs UGA, etc). Each game is also adjusted for the quality of opponent (I-A = 1, I-AA = 0.5). Another adjustment is made for preparation time (coming off a bye = 0.9, opponent had a bye = 1.1). The final adjustment is for whether it is a conference game or not. The value of out of conference games depends on the number of conference games you play (9: OOC = 1.33, 8: OOC = 1.25, 0: OOC = 1.1). This bonus factor is designed to reward challenging OOC schedules. You take all these adjustments and multiply them together to find the adjustment coefficient C. Thus:
Points = C * RPI^2
RPI is squared to make tough games much more valuable than cupcakes. To give you an idea, here are some RPI’s before this past weekend (according to http://www.vaporia.com/sports/collegefootballrpi.html):
1. AL – 0.690
11. OU – 0.598
60. IN – 0.499
This sort of distribution keeps many teams with a similar value but separates the truly tough games.
RPI^2:
AL – 0.476
OU – 0.358
IN – 0.249
Playing AL is almost twice as valuable as playing IN. This means beating IN is only slightly more valuable than losing to AL. This rewards taking risks OOC and doesn’t give an elite team a ton of credit for beating mediocre teams.
You should note that this system doesn’t directly reward a conference championship. However, all the conferences now have a championship game and that is one more chance to earn points than an at-large team gets. As the CCG will almost always feature a tough opponent, this rewards both participants with valuable points. If those additional points don’t put you into the top 4 then you probably didn’t earn a spot.
Please know that I’m not married to the exact values for these adjustments, but they give a reasonable starting place.
Timing and Location
I would stick with the current system for now. I believe a northern semifinal site should to be added to the mix for fairness, but nobody wants to visit Detroit in January. I would require that northern cities host the NCG in an equal rotation with the west, south and southeast though.
Expanding to 8
The college football world could decide the 8 is the correct number instead of 4. If so, it’s simple enough to apply the same ideas to 8 teams. I still wouldn’t use autobids, but you could. Just use the points system for choosing the at-larges and for seeding. I would use 4 regional indoor sites to play the quarterfinals the week before Christmas. Use the major bowls for the semifinals on New Year’s Day.
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Something like Brian’s system is what I always thought CFB would and should do. There is a widespread perception that the committee is a sham. Even many of the media talking heads believe the committee considers factors that, supposedly, are off-limits.
A system like Brian’s would take the bureaucrats out of it; no two-day meetings every weekend in November, with hours-long debates over whether Michigan is better than Washington. This system would be in the sunshine. Anyone with the requisite mathematical ability could calculate where they stood, at any time.
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A 16 team playoff system would require that the regular season be cut back to 10 games, without a conference championship game, and that the current conferences would be cut down to 8 to 9 teams each. That moves college football back to 1950’s scheduling. Would there be enough money in a 16 team playoff to compensate all 126 or so colleges for the lost revenues?
The playoff tail is beginning to wave the CFB dog. Let’s go back to 1970 when Texas, Nebraska and Ohio State each claimed the fictitious championship. Maybe the wishbone could be resurrected, too. And the bowls.
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A 16 team playoff system would require that the regular season be cut back to 10 games, without a conference championship game, and that the current conferences would be cut down to 8 to 9 teams each.
They’ll never go to 16…but no, the consequences aren’t that bad. They would have to cut the regular season to 11 games, not 10. And conferences wouldn’t have to shrink; they’d just have co-champions, without a CCG. It used to work that way even with 8 or 9-team conferences.
They could also have both the semi-finals and finals in January, after the New Year’s Day bowls. Right now, the presidents are adamantly opposed to that. But I remember when they were adamantly opposed to any kind of playoff, so I take what they say with a grain of salt.
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The college football world could decide the 8 is the correct number instead of 4. If so, it’s simple enough to apply the same ideas to 8 teams. I still wouldn’t use autobids, but you could.
In other sports, the auto-bid philosophy strikes a balance between rewarding championships, while including every team that has a plausible case for being there. I agree with you on purely competitive grounds, but once they expand to 8, I don’t think they will be able to resist auto-bids, because every other sport has them.
The only reason we can’t do that in football, is the limitation on 4 teams. With an 8-team field, you could auto-bid the P5 champs, and still have room for three non-champs. There are never more than three such teams with a plausible argument that they’re the best, so it’s a reasonable compromise.
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I know that I’ve been in hibernation for a bit, but I’m glad the discussion is continuing. If there’s one thing other than conference realignment that gets me going on this blog, it’s advocating for an 8-team playoff with auto-bids for the P5 champs. Here is my proposal from a few years ago (using traditional bowl tie-ins):
https://frankthetank.me/2013/11/26/frank-the-tank-mini-mailbag-derrick-rose-postmortem-and-an-8-team-college-football-playoff/
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Frank,
It’s not a bad plan but I still think they don’t want to play the NCG that late. That’s why I moved the quarterfinals to the beginning of bowl season. That gives fans time to have a few days off around Christmas and then keep the current schedule (NYD semis, NCG 1+ week later).
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Marc Shepherd,
“In other sports, the auto-bid philosophy strikes a balance between rewarding championships, while including every team that has a plausible case for being there. I agree with you on purely competitive grounds, but once they expand to 8, I don’t think they will be able to resist auto-bids, because every other sport has them.”
I know. I just wish autobids came with some minimum qualification. I don’t think asking for 9-3 or better is too high a bar.
“With an 8-team field, you could auto-bid the P5 champs, and still have room for three non-champs. There are never more than three such teams with a plausible argument that they’re the best, so it’s a reasonable compromise.”
I think they’d have to autobid a G5 champ as well. Right now the G5 gets roughly the same treatment as 1 P5 conference (1 locked NY6 spot, about the same locked money total). If you expand to 8 and give the P5 locked spots, the G5 is going to want one too. Perhaps the G5 autobid comes with qualifications (must be in the top 25 or it’s just a locked NY6 bid, or something like that). I think it would be best to apply the same conditions to the P5 autobids for the appearance of fairness (if the G5 misses out on a spot while some 8-5 CCG upset winner gets in it’ll be ugly).
What I like about my system is that it rewards you for earning a CCG spot but doesn’t give you anything. You earn every point you get and it’s either enough to get in or it isn’t. I understand that it’s much easier to sell autobids to the public, though.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18181577/indiana-hoosiers-football-coach-kevin-wilson-resigns
Indiana has fired HC Kevin Wilson, apparently over allegations of player abuse. It’s a shame since IN finally got back to back bowls again. Wilson was building a pretty solid program. Hopefully the next guy can keep the momentum while doing things the right way.
Officials have yet announced a reason for Wilson’s dismissal, but a former Hoosiers player told ESPN that he and at least five current IU players were interviewed about Wilson’s treatment of players in meetings with athletic department officials and university lawyers during the past two weeks.
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https://www.seccountry.com/sec/sec-championship-tickets-cost-4-times-as-much-as-those-for-big-ten-title-game
The CFP has undermined CCG attendance. Not only is it one more expensive trip, but if the teams aren’t likely to make the playoff then the fans don’t seem to care. B10CG tickets are available for less than $20.
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It’s an awful lot to ask fans to go to three straight distant neutral site games. There used to be just bowl games.
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The B10 title game isn’t a big draw unless at least one team from an adjacent state is in it.
That may be true for the SEC CCG as well, but we don’t actually know as every single SEC CCG has featured at least one school from or adjacent to the state hosting the SEC CCG. In fact 14 of the 24 SEC CCG’s have featured both teams from adjacent/host states and of the 10 that featured only one from an adjacent/host state, 3 were in Atlanta with UGa playing in it.
Only 1 B10 CCG featured both teams from adjacent states and 3 featured 1 team from an adjacent state. The only game so far with no teams from adjacent states was UNL-Wisconsin in 2012, which drew badly, just as PSU-Wisconsin will this year.
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Distance matters for attendance to the ACC title game as well. They have had 8 ACC CCGs drawing more than 62K. All had at least one team from host/adjacent states. Of the 3 ACC CCGs drawing fewer than 54K, 2 had neither team from an adjacent state (both BC-VTech in FL) and one was Clemson-GTech in FL.
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Every single SEC CCG has featured at least one of ‘Bama/UF/UGa/Tennessee/Auburn (the majority have featured 2), and each of those would sell out a CCG (or come close to it) in Atlanta (or Birmingham) all by themselves.
If the B10 was looking solely to maximize attendance and nothing else and Cleveland had a dome, they should put the B10 CCG in Cleveland.
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Richard,
“The B10 title game isn’t a big draw unless at least one team from an adjacent state is in it.”
WI is really close despite not being adjacent. Milwaukee is closer to Indy than Cleveland is, plus a lot of WI fans and alumni live in/around Chicago.
Besides, I believe both schools sold out their 10,000 ticket allotments right away. It’s the 45,000+ other seats that have been slow to sell. I just thought PSU fans might be more eager to go after the down period they’ve been through.
“That may be true for the SEC CCG as well, but we don’t actually know as every single SEC CCG has featured at least one school from or adjacent to the state hosting the SEC CCG. In fact 14 of the 24 SEC CCG’s have featured both teams from adjacent/host states and of the 10 that featured only one from an adjacent/host state, 3 were in Atlanta with UGa playing in it.”
The SEC gets a huge advantage from playing in Atlanta since almost every school has a large fan base there. It’s why Chicago would be a better host city than Indy. The difference is that Indy has the acceptable facility while Atlanta has both the size and the facility. And let’s be fair, SEC fans are just more fervent.
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“WI is really close despite not being adjacent. Milwaukee is closer to Indy than Cleveland is, plus a lot of WI fans and alumni live in/around Chicago.”
I’d wager that most Badger fans farther away from Indy than Milwaukee while most Buckeye fans live closer to Indy than Cleveland. Distance matters. Not to mention that OSU has a bigger fanbase.
“Besides, I believe both schools sold out their 10,000 ticket allotments right away. It’s the 45,000+ other seats that have been slow to sell. I just thought PSU fans might be more eager to go after the down period they’ve been through.”
Well, yes, and for those less committed fans, distance matters. Most PSU fans live to the east of Happy Valley. The East Coast is a long way away from Indy.
“And let’s be fair, SEC fans are just more fervent.”
Disagree. They a slightly greater number of fervent fanbases, but their geography as well as having their CCG in the economic capital of their region helps them out a lot. I’m certain that all the B10 kings & princes (OSU/PSU/UMich/UNL/MSU/Wisconsin/Iowa) would fill a CCG in their state or an adjacent state, just like the SEC kings/princes (UF/UGa/’Bama/LSU/Tennessee/A&M/Auburn/SC/Arkansas do). But while there are almost the same number of kings/princes in each conference, the SEC has 6 of those schools in or adjacent to their CCG site while the B10 has only 3 of those schools adjacent.
We’ll see how well the SEC CCG does attendance-wise if it’s ever A&M/LSU/Arkansas vs. Mizzou/UK in that game.
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Richard,
“I’d wager that most Badger fans farther away from Indy than Milwaukee while most Buckeye fans live closer to Indy than Cleveland.”
My point wasn’t that WI fans live closer, just that despite not being a border state a lot of WI fans live in easy driving distance of Indy. The population in WI is densest in the SE part of the state and lots of WI fans live in the Chicago area. It’s different from Iowa which is the entire width of IL away.
And let’s be fair, SEC fans are just more fervent.
“Disagree. They a slightly greater number of fervent fanbases, but their geography as well as having their CCG in the economic capital of their region helps them out a lot.”
I agree being in Atlanta helps and I said so before. But I won’t agree that SEC fans aren’t more fervent. LSU fans would sell out Atlanta and they aren’t a short drive away. AR fans would probably sell it out, too. FL is an adjacent state but it’s a long drive to Atlanta (about 250 miles just to the border). Madison is just as close to Indy as Gainesville is to Atlanta.
“I’m certain that all the B10 kings & princes (OSU/PSU/UMich/UNL/MSU/Wisconsin/Iowa) would fill a CCG in their state or an adjacent state, just like the SEC kings/princes (UF/UGa/’Bama/LSU/Tennessee/A&M/Auburn/SC/Arkansas do).”
I disagree. 2011 didn’t sell out despite MSU being there. 2013 didn’t sell out despite OSU and MSU being there. 2014 didn’t sell out with OSU there. I don’t think B10 fans care as much about the game. That may change over time, but I think the playoff has devalued the CCG enough that it’ll never catch on as much in the B10. The SEC had decades of the CCG being vital to your team’s future to build the game up, and it correlated with their best run in CFB ever.
“But while there are almost the same number of kings/princes in each conference, the SEC has 6 of those schools in or adjacent to their CCG site while the B10 has only 3 of those schools adjacent.”
If you moved it to Chicago (less than 200 miles away) only 2 princes would be in border states but I think the game would sell out more easily. That’s just my opinion, but I think the MBB tournament attendance supports my theory.
“We’ll see how well the SEC CCG does attendance-wise if it’s ever A&M/LSU/Arkansas vs. Mizzou/UK in that game.”
Well, UF vs AR did just fine. So did TN vs MsSU and MO vs AU. UK is a long shot to ever make it based on their history. TAMU will get there sometime and they’ll probably do fine, too. But getting 1 of those 6 match-ups will be rare with all the more successful programs in each division.
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“My point wasn’t that WI fans live closer, just that despite not being a border state a lot of WI fans live in easy driving distance of Indy. ”
And my point is that Wisconsin’s fanbase is farther away, on average, from Indy than the fanbases (on average) of the kings/princes in and surrounding Atlanta besides UF (UF’s may be about as far away, but they have a bigger fanbase and likely has a considerable presence in Atlanta) so if you compare fanbase A and fanbase B (and they are the same size), but fanbase A is closer to a CCG site, then even if fanbase A fills a CCG better than fanbase B, that does not prove that fanbase A cares more about the CCG if distance is a major determinant. In other words, it’s not up to you to decide what is an “easy driving distance”.
“2011 didn’t sell out despite MSU being there. 2013 didn’t sell out despite OSU and MSU being there. 2014 didn’t sell out with OSU there.”
Huh? Lucas Oil’s stated capacity is 62,421 (expandable to 70K).
2011 had an attendance of 64,152.
2013 had an attendance of 66,002.
2014 had an attendance of 60,229.
“Well, UF vs AR did just fine. So did TN vs MsSU and MO vs AU. ”
And if you haven’t noticed, Brian, UF is a king adjacent to GA. Tennessee is a king with the bulk of it’s fanbase in Eastern TN right on Atlanta’s doorstep. Auburn’s fanbase also is right on Atlanta’s doorstep. And all 3 have a ton of their fans right in Atlanta. Tennessee and Auburn are also considerably closer to Atlanta than Wisconsin is to Indy. Did I not point all this out, Brian? So do your points not invalidate my thesis?
“TAMU will get there sometime and they’ll probably do fine, too.”
I think you’re wrong and I’m right, but A&M would have to be matched up with Mizzou/UK in order for us to find out.
“But getting 1 of those 6 match-ups will be rare with all the more successful programs in each division.”
Right, which was part of my explanation for why the SEC CCG has done better in attendance.
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“And my point is that Wisconsin’s fanbase is farther away, on average, from Indy than the fanbases (on average) of the kings/princes in and surrounding Atlanta besides UF”
You assume this to be true. You presented no evidence for it. You just said they’re in neighboring states. And you didn’t leave out UF from your list. I pointed out that being in an adjacent state didn’t make UF close to Atlanta necessarily.
“(UF’s may be about as far away, but they have a bigger fanbase and likely has a considerable presence in Atlanta)”
They may have a bigger fan base, but that’s mostly in FL. Since Gainesville is so near the GA border, most of their fan base is farther south. Southern GA is more FSU territory than UF territory as far as non-UGA fans go (AL is also big in SW GA).
WI claims slightly more living alumni than UF (435k to 415k). Nate Silver’s fan base estimates gave UF 1.81M fans to WI’s 1.44M. UF was #9 in the country and WI #12. There’s a gap but it isn’t huge.
UF claims to have over 15,000 alumni in metro Atlanta (WI has over 1500 by the way). WI has 24,620 alumni in Chicago. Milwaukee has 20,355 more. Only 37% of WI alumni stay in WI and half of those are in Madison and Milwaukee. By contrast, 58% of UF alumni stay in FL.
“so if you compare fanbase A and fanbase B (and they are the same size), but fanbase A is closer to a CCG site, then even if fanbase A fills a CCG better than fanbase B, that does not prove that fanbase A cares more about the CCG if distance is a major determinant.”
If distance is a major factor, then that exactly gets into who cares more. I believe an SEC fan base would drive farther for the SECCG than a B10 fan would on average.
Go back and look at Nate Silver’s data for the percentage of CFB fans in major cities or look at the TV ratings for CFB. SEC cities rank higher than B10 cities in general.
Atlanta – 41%
Chicago – 19%
Birmingham – 85%
When ESPN names the top CFB markets (by rating), the same set of cities tend to appear. Here’s a news release from a few years ago about it.
http://espnmediazone.com/us/press-releases/2012/08/college-footballs-top-25-highest-rated-markets-birmingham-oklahoma-city-columbus-top-three-in-2011/
Birmingham, Columbus and Jacksonville are the only markets to be among the top 10 every year since 2000. Other markets have impressive streaks as well:
Knoxville has finished in the top 10 every year since 2002 when it was first metered.
Atlanta has been a top 10 market every year except 2003.
Greenville has been in the top 10 every year since 2004.
SEC fans just care more. That’s probably a good thing since they often take it to unhealthy extremes in my opinion.
“In other words, it’s not up to you to decide what is an “easy driving distance”.”
Of course it’s up to the person doing the analysis to decide that. If 300 miles is too much for some people but not for others, that speaks exactly to the point under discussion.
But you’re also missing another point about SEC fans being more fervent. There are lots of SEC fans who will pay for the CCG no matter which teams are playing. The B10 has fewer of these and more people who cheer for their team only, but the city selection exacerbates the problem (Atlanta is much bigger than Indy).
“Huh? Lucas Oil’s stated capacity is 62,421 (expandable to 70K).”
The CCG people were hoping for their first sell out last year according to the local newspapers. I assume the people hosting the game know whether they’ve had a sellout or not.
“And if you haven’t noticed, Brian, UF is a king adjacent to GA.”
It’s over 330 miles away from Atlanta. GA is a long state. Madison is the same distance from Indy but apparently that’s too far to expect fans to travel. I guess having to cross 2 state borders instead of 1 makes the difference.
“Tennessee is a king”
It is?
“with the bulk of it’s fanbase in Eastern TN right on Atlanta’s doorstep.”
Nashville is 250 miles. Knoxville is 215 miles. Only Chattanooga is really close at 120 miles. Atlanta apparently has a very large doorstep in your mind.
“I think you’re wrong and I’m right, but A&M would have to be matched up with Mizzou/UK in order for us to find out.”
No, you’d need to provide some evidence that any 1 team sells out a game by itself rather than just claiming it to be true. If you can’t, then you are already proving my point because having just OSU in the CCG hasn’t been enough to sell out the CCG. If the B10’s largest fan base and a king in an adjacent state won’t guarantee it for the B10 but 9 of 14 SEC teams can do it, that shows I’m right. And Atlanta seats more people to boot.
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The CFP has undermined CCG attendance. Not only is it one more expensive trip, but if the teams aren’t likely to make the playoff then the fans don’t seem to care. B10CG tickets are available for less than $20.
Even the Big Ten CCGs that pre-dated the playoff were not big draws. It is just not that popular a game — at least, not with the participants they’ve had.
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Marc: As I had pointed out, the B10 CCGs that had at least one school (king/prince) from an adjacent state were sellouts or close to it. Only UNL-Wisconsin did not draw well. Agree that the playoff isn’t what affects attendance; traveling distance is.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Even the Big Ten CCGs that pre-dated the playoff were not big draws. It is just not that popular a game — at least, not with the participants they’ve had.”
I think the host city is an issue for the B10. We have to play in Indy for the facility and it’s central location, but a big city like Chicago has a lot more fans for most teams (maybe not the eastern 3). As Richard suggested, someplace like Cleveland could maximize ticket sales with the odds of OSU, MI, PSU or MSU being in the game, but nobody wants to play a night game in December in Cleveland.
If only Chicago had added a roof to Soldier Field when they updated it.
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Indianapolis being the host city is probably the biggest issue based on my experience attending the event. Indy is a great city and does an awesome job as a host for this event but it’s not a football crazy city and it’s a smaller population base. I think in a city like Chicago you would get 20-30k fans with no rooting interest that would attend. Plus you just have a lot of alums of various B1G schools that live in Chicago minus those on the east coast. I know if I was a local I would be attending the game.
I can’t imagine what attendance would look like if Minnesota was representing the West and if Maryland or Rutgers was representing the East. You would think if Indiana or Purdue was in that they would fill that place. Certainly Illinois is fairly close to Indy.
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@Kevin – The main issue with Chicago (and as a Chicagoan, I’m highly biased for anything in favor of Chicago) is that the game would need to be outside (presumably at Soldier Field) and the Big Ten and its TV partners have made it very clear that the championship game needs to be played in prime time. It actually might not be terrible outdoor weather this coming weekend here in Chicago for December (high of 39 degrees and low of 31 degrees), but there’s just a VERY high variance in temperatures from year-to-year. I remember a Bears-Packers Monday Night Football game during December a few years ago where the game time temp was 2 degrees and the windchill was at minus-13. (That was apparently one of the 10 coldest games in the entire history of the Packers whether home or away, which tells you how cold it was.) Bears-Cowboys on Monday Night Football in early December 2013 also was at 8 degrees at kickoff (getting colder throughout the night) with negative windchills that froze fans’ beer and even the Gatorade for the teams.
The point is that prime time football games in the outdoors in December in Chicago are pretty predictably terrible quite often (and I love this city). When “good weather” is considered to be above 30 degrees (which is the case this time of year), it’s not a great location for an annual game. As much as there’s romanticism for cold weather football in the Midwest, there is a standard of where it is simply TOO cold and Chicago gets there quite frequently at this time of year.
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The spaceship (instead of a dome) was just an awful awful idea.
Really, they could just play it in McCormick Place.
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@Frank – I wasn’t necessarily making the point that they play the CCG at Soldier Field outdoors. It was more of a hypothetical if they had a dome or a retractable roof. I am definitely in favor of keeping the CCG indoors for the foreseeable future.
In hindsight I think Chicago has to be kicking themselves for not building a retractable roof stadium. That city could be hosting Final Fours, Super Bowl’s and Big Ten Championships. For nearly 700 million they really messed that up.
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Agree 100%. Indianapolis is a generic city that no one wants to travel to on short notice. It may be centrally located but outside of IU and Purdue alums/fans (and those teams are almost guaranteed to never make an appearance barring complete chaos), other B1G alumni are virtually nonexistent. So if IU and Purdue are not involved, you are pretty much counting on people who live outside of Indiana to travel to the game. This probably requires at least a hotel room and possible flight depending on the teams involved.
Chicago is the obvious desired location (most B1G alumni/fans, best city, etc.) You could then count on Chicago area residents to take an Uber to the game even if their team is not involved. But I understand the concerns with weather (even though the B1G plays in the same exact weather outside the week before).
I would also throw up New York/New Jersey and DC. These are outside stadiums but weather is much milder on the East Coast. I lived in Chicago and I currently live in DC. The forecast for tomorrow calls for a high of 50. The Super Bowl a few years ago at Giants Stadium was played in 50 degree weather in February. New York and DC are also destinations that people would want to visit for a weekend. Those metro areas are also home to the 2nd and 3rd largest concentrations of B1G alumni.
Sadly, it appears that it will be held in Indianapolis through 2021.
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Agree 100%. Indianapolis is a generic city that no one wants to travel to on short notice. It may be centrally located but outside of IU and Purdue alums/fans (and those teams are almost guaranteed to never make an appearance barring complete chaos), other B1G alumni are virtually nonexistent.
Yeah, the Big Ten has managed to choose the one state in its historic footprint where the local teams are the least likely to ever play in the game.
Chicago is the obvious desired location (most B1G alumni/fans, best city, etc.)…But I understand the concerns with weather (even though the B1G plays in the same exact weather outside the week before).
Yes, but the league doesn’t play night games outdoors the week before.
I would also throw up New York/New Jersey and DC. These are outside stadiums but weather is much milder on the East Coast.
Attendance would probably be terrible. Richard’s analysis (above), and common sense, suggests that fewer people make the trip, the farther away you get from the two fan bases. Remember, it is very short notice: generally, at least one team, if not both, will not know they are in the game until Saturday evening the week before. I don’t think there would be much demand for tickets from local NY/NJ/DC fans, either.
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Tom,
The problem is that the B10 and FOX insist on it being a night game. DC expects a high of 50 today but it will be 43 by kickoff time and 40 by the end of the game. That’s not terrible, but this is a mild day. What if a front was coming through? For example, next Friday is supposed to be a high of 37 and a low of 24. Is that really the weather we want for the CCG?
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Marc Shepherd,
“Yeah, the Big Ten has managed to choose the one state in its historic footprint where the local teams are the least likely to ever play in the game.”
That’s a feature, not a bug. I’d also argue IL is close to being as unlikely which would be a great thing about Chicago. NW would theoretically have a big edge except their fan base is smaller and much more dispersed. IL would also have an edge, but they’ll rarely get there either.
UGA playing in Atlanta is a big advantage unless you allocate a ton of tickets to each school.
The B10 allocates 10,000 per school I believe with 45,000+ to be given out or sold neutrally. That’s where Indy being smaller hurts. Detroit is bigger than Indy but MI and MSU would have a huge edge there.
“Yes, but the league doesn’t play night games outdoors the week before.”
Exactly. If Fox and the B10 would play at 12pm then an outdoor facility might be an option.
“Attendance would probably be terrible.”
Exactly. Also it does get cold at night in DC and NYC even in early December. Some years would be fine but others would have a terrible front coming through.
I’d like to see Minneapolis get a shot. It’s a long trip for most fans but it’s a big city and the home team wouldn’t regularly be in it.
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The B10 allocates 10,000 per school I believe with 45,000+ to be given out or sold neutrally. That’s where Indy being smaller hurts. Detroit is bigger than Indy but MI and MSU would have a huge edge there.
Do you really think that 45k+ of the fans there are neutral? They may allocate only 10k to the schools, but I think their fans gobble up many of the other tickets on the secondary market.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Do you really think that 45k+ of the fans there are neutral?”
No, nor did I say that. I said they’re given out or sold neutrally, meaning anyone can get them. A lot go to sponsors or businesses that want tickets to give to clients. That’s why you have a quieter crowd at games like this (or the Super Bowl). And tens of thousands are sold long before the participants are known. Those tend to get on the secondary market which is how the fans get them.
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ESPN announcers twisting the knife during the Cincy – Iowa State MBB game: “this game has the feel of a mid-February conference battle”
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Jon Solomon of CBS Sports discusses an idea we’ve mentioned here, abolishing CCGs to make way for an 8-team playoff. Of those he interviewed, the Big 12’s Bob Bowlsby and Ohio State’s Gene Smith seem the most open to it.
Solomon mentions some of the absurdities of the current system, e.g.:
— Alabama is (apparently) in this year’s playoff, whether they beat Florida or not; whereas Florida is probably out, no matter what they do
— Ohio State is probably a playoff team no matter what, but Penn State and Wisconsin aren’t assured of anything
— Clemson and VT are playing an anti-climactic game; the real drama was Clemson vs. Louisville two months ago
— If the Big 12 had had a CCG this season, with the proposed rules they’re using next year, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State would meet two weeks in a row. “That’s hardly ideal and would get justifiably mocked.”
Some interesting statistics:
CCGs tend to be blow-outs, perhaps because most leagues have unbalanced divisions. There have been 86 CCGs in FBS, with an average margin of victory of 15.8 points.
The margin of victory in the P5 is even more lopsided: 17.4 points. The SEC is the only league beating that average, but it’s not by much: 16.7 points.
The SEC has the kingpin of CCGs, with better TV ratings and bigger crowds than any other. They would have to be paid a lot to give that up.
57% of CCGs have featured the teams with the two best records in a given league. However, only 33% of the original Big 12’s CCGs pitted the two best teams. This is consistent with the pretty obvious mismatch between the two divisions they had at the time, with the Oklahoma and Texas schools all together. 60% of the CCGs not involving the Big 12 have pitted the teams with the two best records.
Based on AP top 25 rankings, CCG upsets happen 27% of the time. In the original Big 12, it happened 33% of the time.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Jon Solomon of CBS Sports discusses an idea we’ve mentioned here, abolishing CCGs to make way for an 8-team playoff. Of those he interviewed, the Big 12’s Bob Bowlsby and Ohio State’s Gene Smith seem the most open to it.”
I’d be thrilled to see the CCGs go away, but disappointed that the playoff expanded to 8. No ranking system in CFB is bad enough that #8 truly deserves a shot at the title.
“Solomon mentions some of the absurdities of the current system, e.g.:
— Alabama is (apparently) in this year’s playoff, whether they beat Florida or not; whereas Florida is probably out, no matter what they do”
Why is that absurd?
AL already has 12 wins, as many as any other P5 champ could end up with. AL crushed #11 USC and @ #22 TN, won @ #21 LSU and versus #14 AU. They beat 3 other P5 teams with winning records. They have a very high SOS and all the advanced stats say they are the best team. Would a loss to UF drop that to an unworthy resume?
Meanwhile, UF is 8-3 with a win @ #21 LSU and losses @ #12 FSU and @ #22 TN. They also lost vs 7-5 AR whom AL whipped. They have 2 other wins vs P5 teams with winning records. Would a win over #1 AL turn that into a worthy resume?
“— Ohio State is probably a playoff team no matter what, but Penn State and Wisconsin aren’t assured of anything”
OSU won @WI and barely lost @PSU. OSU won big @ #9 OU, beat #5 MI and demolished 9-3 NE. 3-1 vs top 10 teams is the best resume going right now.
PSU has the win over OSU, but also losses to #25 Pitt and getting crushed @ #5 MI. They did beat 2 other P5 teams with winning records. The big drag on PSU is how they played in some of their wins. Advanced stats have them ranked significantly lower than #7.
WI lost to OSU and @ MI. They have a win over #21 LSU and 3 other winning P5 teams. PSU would be their first elite win to go with 2 elite losses. Why should they get in with those 2 losses?
F/+ rankings (combines FEI and S&P+):
1. AL
2. MI
3. OSU
7. WI
10. PSU
24 UF
“— Clemson and VT are playing an anti-climactic game; the real drama was Clemson vs. Louisville two months ago”
Yes, divisions are frequently unbalanced. When was the last time the Coastal champ was favored in the ACCCG? The SEC and B10 face similar issues in many years and the B12 used to have it.
Simple math says that #1 and #2 will be in the same division 46% of the time for a 14 team conference. The number is much higher when the divisions are unbalanced. It’s unavoidable without running into other problems.
“— If the Big 12 had had a CCG this season, with the proposed rules they’re using next year, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State would meet two weeks in a row. “That’s hardly ideal and would get justifiably mocked.””
It’s not ideal, but why mock it? The other potential 7-2 team would be WV, and OU beat them 2 weeks ago (11/20) and OkSU beat them in October.
Should the B12 stop having season-ending rivalry week just in case? No matter how they schedule the 2 teams might play in the final week (it’s the downside to not having divisions). We know they’ll get a rematch every year anyway. Should they put in a rule preventing back-to-back games (that team is skipped if they are #2 so #3 plays instead)? Is it fair to give #3 a chance instead? What if #3 played #1 just a week earlier? Is there any good answer for the B12?
My answer would be to use divisions, but we frequently talk about how nice it would be for the B10 and others to drop divisions. We know OSU vs MI would always be the last week. How would the B10 deal with a possible rematch? My answer would be to have no rematches period. (#1 plays the best team they missed during the season), but that would lead to many crappy CCGs.
“CCGs tend to be blow-outs, perhaps because most leagues have unbalanced divisions. There have been 86 CCGs in FBS, with an average margin of victory of 15.8 points.
The margin of victory in the P5 is even more lopsided: 17.4 points. The SEC is the only league beating that average, but it’s not by much: 16.7 points.”
If you think of conference championship games as a quasi-quarterfinal feeding into the playoff and bowl structures, consider that 96 NFL wild-card games (which feed into the rest of the NFL playoff) have been decided by 12.4 points since 1992. It’s not entirely apples to apples since the best NFL teams don’t play in wild-card games, unlike conference championships.
NFL games tend to be much closer than CFB games, but their first round of playoff games isn’t much better than CCGs. And remember that we’re still talking a small sample size. The average MOV drops 0.5 if you just remove the OSU blowout of WI in 2014. The B10 CCG average MOV would drop from 19.0 to 9.0 if you remove 2014.
Over the last 50 games, the average MOV in OSU vs MI is 10.3. In the history of the AP poll, the average MOV for #1 vs #2 is 12.2 in 50 games. Since the teams are usually separated by more than 1 rank, a slightly larger MOV seems reasonable.
Thirty-eight percent of conference championship games have been decided by one score or less. Again, there’s a larger gap between the bigger and smaller conferences: 32 percent of Power Five championship games are settled by one score or less compared to 54 percent for everyone else.
That seems like a high percentage of 1-score games to me.
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“Solomon mentions some of the absurdities of the current system, e.g.:
— Alabama is (apparently) in this year’s playoff, whether they beat Florida or not; whereas Florida is probably out, no matter what they do”
Why is that absurd?
…
[Very logical explanation of why it is not absurd.]
As I noted in another post, most fans (and many in the media) have an intuitive sense of “how it ought to work,” which is not supported by bothering to learn how it really operates. They don’t study and parse every rule the way we do.
To them, the idea of a meaningless championship game is absurd — that neither Alabama’s nor Florida’s playoff standing is hanging on the outcome.
I understand, of course, that the rules are what they are, and I mostly agree with those rules. But those without the patience to learn them (which is just about everyone) expect the system to work in certain intuitive ways. This flies against intuition, and therefore seems absurd to many people.
I am sure a lot of Solomon’s readers will say, “That’s right! That’s ridiculous!!” Many people who post here would say that too, and this audience is more sophisticated than the average CFB fan.
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My issue wasn’t with you but with Solomon’s whole train of thought. He said that if winning CCGs doesn’t determine the playoff teams then what is the point. The point is to determine the conference champion. That used to matter a lot to fans and still does to some of them. Whether winning the conference gets you into the playoff or not should be a secondary concern, but instead CFB is turning into MBB in the sense that all that really matters is the postseason (just in a very different way from MBB).
In this new system, OSU fans should be happy not to be in the CCG because OSU has a very high chance of making the playoff as is. Having to beat WI to make the playoff would reduce OSU’s chances. This is why I hate playoffs and CCGs. The primary goal always used to be winning the B10 to go to the Rose Bowl. Then the BCS and CCGs started to change that. It wasn’t always the Rose you went to, but you at least you almost always had to be the champion to get the best outcome. Making into the top 2 without being a champ was really hard (had to be a clear #1 then lose late) so you still wanted the CCG to boost your resume. The top 4 is more attainable without a CCG so you can face choosing the safer path or the harder one. 2016 may be an anomaly that way, but history says to expect more 2-loss champs than we’ve seen recently.
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Yep. So get rid of CCG’s and have an 8-team playoff.
At least incentives would be aligned. And you wouldn’t have as much unfairness with unbalanced divisions either.
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Richard,
Trading CCG’s for an 8-team playoff would align incentives for the playoff, but…
Regular season OOC games would be devalued. We would see fewer LSU-WI, OSU-OU, Clemson-Aub, FSU-OleMiss games meant to boost SOS.
Selection of the conference champion would be more dependent on conference scheduling practices…Alvarez’s rant about WI having a tougher road than other West contenders would become even more problematic.
The SEC has done a great job of promoting its CCG as a stand-alone achievement. Kind of like the excitement of the old ACC basketball tournament (in the 70s – 90s); or the Big East basketball tournament (on and off in the 80s – 00s).
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Trading CCG’s for an 8-team playoff would align incentives for the playoff, but…
Regular season OOC games would be devalued. We would see fewer LSU–WI, OSU–OU, Clemson–Aub, FSU–OleMiss games meant to boost SOS.
This assumes that playoff SOS is the only reason these games exist, which I believe is untrue.
But even assuming your premise, SOS is a double-edged sword. An undefeated P5 team will always be in the playoff, regardless of its opponents, but it’s a dangerous game to pin your post-season hopes on that.
Once you start losing, SOS matters. Right now, Washington is the lowest-ranked of the 1-loss teams, because Clemson and Ohio State put themselves at risk by scheduling (and beating) Auburn and Oklahoma. Washington’s premiere OOC game was Rutgers.
If the playoff field were determined today, Washington would have to face Alabama in the first round. That is the price they paid for scheduling like cowards. It doesn’t help that the Pac-12 is going through a down period right now, but they can’t control that. They could control their own non-conference schedule, and didn’t help their case.
The dynamics for an 8-team playoff would be the same, with teams who schedule like cowards either missing the cut entirely, or getting the lower seeds.
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Pablo, I agree with Mark and don’t follow your reasoning.
OSU is almost certainly guaranteed a playoff spot even though they won’t even get a chance at a conference title because of their SOS, which is due to a top OOC opponent and B10 schedule where they faced all the top B10 teams.
Alvarez bemoans his tough conference slate, but that only makes it unfair in a conference race. If Clemson loses, either Wisconsin or UMich will be the only 2-loss team to make the playoff, and that’s because they both beat a top OOC opponent (granted, UMich lucked out there when they scheduled) and faced a tough B10 schedule.
With 8 teams in a playoff, teams should want to challenge themselves more OOC as one loss (or even two) won’t kill your playoff hopes but a tough SOS gives you an edge. Even if P5 champs receive autobids, that would still be true (if to a lesser extent).
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Richard,
“With 8 teams in a playoff, teams should want to challenge themselves more OOC as one loss (or even two) won’t kill your playoff hopes but a tough SOS gives you an edge. Even if P5 champs receive autobids, that would still be true (if to a lesser extent).”
This is why I think OSU’s run this year is great for CFB. Seeing the risk of a tough OOC game make up for not winning the conference should encourage teams that expect to be good to challenge themselves. I understand the concerns about a conference champion not getting in while someone else from their conference does, but to me the rewarding of tough OOC games is more important in the big picture.
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“…but to me the rewarding of tough OOC games is more important in the big picture.”
Raises concerns about the effect of vagaries of ooc games scheduled long in advance not meeting assumptions when it actually comes around, or cancellation for weather, or dropped for another game/opportunity doesn’t it? 25-30% of a schedule out weighing in conference placement (the other 70-75%) just seems off.
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ccrider55,
“Raises concerns about the effect of vagaries of ooc games scheduled long in advance not meeting assumptions when it actually comes around, or cancellation for weather, or dropped for another game/opportunity doesn’t it?”
Yes. The committee should look at who you chose to play and how good they were both when you scheduled them and when you played them (with the emphasis on the latter).
“25-30% of a schedule out weighing in conference placement (the other 70-75%) just seems off.”
I didn’t say it outweighed conference play. I said I think the benefits of rewarding tough OOC scheduling this year (especially because it’s still early in the playoff’s existence) outweighs the benefits of emphasizing conference titles over everything.
I like conference titles being important, but I also realize that 8-1 is a very good conference record whether or not you win your conference. The B12 had their 3-way tie in 2011. Since only 1 CCG spot is available to each division you have to resort to tiebreakers to choose a representative but I don’t think the others should be punished for having the same record. I prefer to see 1 team get rewarded with the chance to win another big game and a conference title, both of which boost their overall resume. Let the committee evaluate their entire bodies of work and decide who is more deserving.
I want every game to be important and I feel that the current system already emphasizes conference play a lot (it’s most of the schedule and most of the final games plus conference titles are an explicit criterion). If tough OOC schedules aren’t rewarded, they’ll go away very quickly. The BCS demanded perfection so many teams scheduled cupcakes. I think the ideal system demands that you challenge yourself as well as rewarding accomplishments in conference play where the schedule is predetermined.
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Raises concerns about the effect of vagaries of ooc games scheduled long in advance not meeting assumptions when it actually comes around, or cancellation for weather, or dropped for another game/opportunity doesn’t it? 25-30% of a schedule out weighing in conference placement (the other 70-75%) just seems off.
The conference schedule also has the vagaries of games scheduled long in advance. Penn State’s crossovers were Iowa, Minnesota, and Purdue, which collectively went 12–15 in Big Ten play. Michigan’s crossovers were Wisconsin, Iowa, and Illinois (15–12). Ohio State’s crossovers were Wisconsin, Nebraska, and Northwestern (18–9).
Cancellation for weather is so rare as to be a non-factor. We can talk again the next time a cancelled game is a factor in a team making or missing the playoff.
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“The conference schedule also has the vagaries of games scheduled long in advance. Penn State’s crossovers were Iowa, Minnesota, and…”
Agreed. And I’ve always thought division record, with over conf record as a tie breaker, is better for deciding CCG participation. More of a playoff bracket scenario than allowing vagaries to decide participants. At least all conf games are vs P5 teams rather than usually 1/3 to 1/4 of OOC schedule.
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“Cancellation for weather is so rare as to be a non-factor.”
SEC has had multiple in the last few years. Cal in mud bowl end of season (instead of sept) cost them a better bowl in spite of winning. S Carolina LSU. Fl/LSU this year very well could have if LSU played a rent a win instead of Wisconsin. Missing/altered data is easily NOT a non factor.
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Oh, I know there are cancelled games sometimes. But I am not easily recalling any where it made a difference in whether a team played for, or contended for, a national championship.
This year’s LSU/FL game actually reinforces my point. The league made sure it got played, because they didn’t want a cancellation to determine who won a championship.
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Cancellations and weather also affect conference games, so by that logic, conference games also shouldn’t be used to determine anything.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18189507/conference-bowl-officials-considering-plans-navy-midshipmen-win-american-athletic-conference
The conferences and bowls may have a workaround in case Navy delays the bowl pairings.
Sources said conference, bowl and school officials have a potential solution even if the Cotton Bowl announcement is delayed, which would allow all but three of the 40 bowls to be announced Sunday.
The solution is based on several factors, most notably that South Alabama and Louisiana-Lafayette each win Saturday to become bowl-eligible and Clemson and Washington win the ACC and Pac-12 titles, respectively.
If all that happens, the tentative plan would be as follows:
Navy is the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion
Navy goes to the Cotton Bowl, Western Michigan plays North Texas in the Heart of Dallas Bowl, and Army plays a Big 12 team, most likely Baylor, in the Armed Forces Bowl.
Western Michigan is the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion
Western Michigan goes to the Cotton Bowl, Army plays North Texas in the Heart of Dallas Bowl, and Navy plays a Big 12 team, most likely Baylor, in the Armed Forces Bowl.
However, bowl officials stressed that those scenarios get blown up if more than three 5-7 teams are needed to fill bowls or there are major upsets in the Power 5 championship games.
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Awesome. They’ll all end up in the Metroplex anyway!
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It looks like it won’t be an issue anyway since WMU won easily and Temple is up by 21 over Navy early in the 3rd quarter.
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Well, there isn’t much suspense left except for the seeding. UW’s easy win locks them into the top 4 and both AL and Clemson are big favorites. Meanwhile WMU won big and Navy is losing so the G5 spot seems pretty clear.
NY6:
Peach – #1 AL vs #4 UW
Fiesta – #2 OSU vs #3 Clemson (they might swap seeds)
Rose – #5 WI/PSU winner vs #9 CO
Sugar – #14 AU vs #8 OU/OkSU winner
Orange – #12 FSU vs #6 MI
Cotton – #7 WI/PSU loser vs #16 WMU
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Only suspense is whether VTech can pull off the upset.
If the Hokies do it, there’s a big debate about which B10 team gets the last spot.
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Any chance USC gets Roses over Colo? I wouldn’t favor it, but…
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It’s certainly possible, especially since USC won head to head. But the committee has never punished CCG losers much and CU was 3 ranks ahead. I think OU passes CU while OkSU falls behind USC which would leave CU and USC as #9 and #10. I think CU will stay ahead, but the loss to UW was bad enough to potentially let a “hot” USC team pass them.
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USC definitely going to the Rose if UMich ends up there, IMO (which would mean Bucky in the playoffs).
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/college-football-playoff-rankings-prediction-ohio-state-in-danger-of-losing-no-2/
Jerry Palm predictions:
1. AL
2. Clemson
3. OSU
4. UW
5. PSU
6. MI
7. OU
8. WI
9. CU
10. USC
He had PSU and WI switched but WI was winning at the time.
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And he just updated it.
5. MI
6. PSU
7. OU
8. WI
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/indiana/2016/12/03/exclusive-2015-investigation-into-player-treatment-contributed-kevin-wilsons-resignation/94862298/
More details on why IN got rid of Wilson. There was an investigation into how he treated injured players in 2015.
The university, according to the documents, moved quickly after the initial complaint. Glass met with Wilson on April 13, 2015 and followed up the same day with a memorandum that included this warning: “As you know, IU will not tolerate any behavior among you and your staff that penalizes, ostracizes, or criticizes any injured football player. I trust that you and your staff are abiding by this long standing policy.”
A month later, on May 13, Glass met with Wilson again, this time to discuss conclusions from the investigation and steps to be taken. In a memorandum Glass wrote to Wilson after the meeting he noted that Wilson had admitted to him that he “made jokes to injured players about their injuries or implied that they were not useful members of the team.”
“As head football coach,” Glass wrote, “you are directly responsible for the welfare of your student-athletes. Accordingly, any comments attributed to you and your staff, whether said in jest or not, which have the effect of pressuring or demeaning injured players are completely unacceptable and will not be tolerated.” Glass warned that further such statements or actions would “subject you and your staff to disciplinary action.”
Some other incident led to a second investigation this year, and it ended with Wilson being asked to resign.
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http://www.pennlive.com/pennstatefootball/index.ssf/2016/12/penn_state-wisconsin_big_ten_t.html
A little more info on B10CG ticket sales. It has a graph of the secondary market ticket prices for the last 4 B10CGs over the last month of the season.
This year, about 3,800 tickets to the title game between Penn State and Wisconsin were selling at a record low of $102, as of Thursday.
Penn State announced Thursday that it has sold out its ticket allotment of 10,000 (plus an additional 500 tickets). A Wisconsin spokesman said the Badgers had less than 100 tickets left in their allotment as of Thursday afternoon.
The lowest face value ticket for the game available through Ticketmaster is $50. As of Friday morning, there were 477 tickets available on TickPick, while on StubHub there were more than 100 listings for tickets costing $20 or less.
The interest appears to be there for the game. So why are the ticket prices so low?
…
The 2014 Big Ten championship game between Ohio State and Wisconsin had a final average list price of $129.78. The year before, the matchup between Michigan State and Ohio State had tickets going for $265.04. Last year’s game between Iowa and Michigan State, when average list prices spiked from $267.66 to $551.97 in the 10 days before the game, appears to be an outlier.
“The conference championship games are unique in that it takes interest by both fan bases to drive up ticket prices,” Slingland wrote. “If you were to look on TickPick right now, you’ll notice that the Penn State side of the field has higher ticket prices than the Wisconsin side. Wisconsin has participated in the two cheapest Big Ten Championships in the last four years, which can’t be a coincidence.”
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This has already been a magical season for PSU,
If I was the Rose, I’d match USC up against them. King vs. King.
UMich getting that big Orange Bowl payout for the B10 for the first time (pays out more than making the playoffs). Against FSU, that would also be King vs. King.
Wisconsin gets a beatable opponent (WMU) in the Cotton.
NY6 should be happy as, if the Rose picks USC, every NY6 slot besides the mandatory G5 slot will be filled by a king or a prince.
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Richard,
“This has already been a magical season for PSU,
If I was the Rose, I’d match USC up against them. King vs. King.”
The Rose Bowl’s “rule” is to take the highest-ranking team. I don’t know if they’re actually contractually obligated to do so, but that’s their stated policy.
“UMich getting that big Orange Bowl payout for the B10 for the first time (pays out more than making the playoffs). Against FSU, that would also be King vs. King.”
It seems highly likely.
“Wisconsin gets a beatable opponent (WMU) in the Cotton.”
Unless WMU is also good at throwing 40 yard jump ball passes.
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Well, the all-king/prince(besides the G5 slot) NY6 is happening.
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http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/
Coaches Poll:
1. AL – 56
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. PSU – top 2-loss team
6. MI
7. OU
8. WI – top 2-loss team
9. USC
10. FSU
Others of note:
15. WMU – top G5 champ
21. NE
25. IA
By conference:
B10 – 6 = 43%
P12 – 5 = 42%
B12 – 3 = 30%
SEC – 4 = 29%
ACC – 4 = 29%
Other – 3 (WMU, USF, Temple)
http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll
AP Poll:
1. AL – 61
2. OSU – top 1-loss team
3. Clemson
4. UW
5. PSU – top 2-loss team
6. MI
7. OU
8. WI – top 3-loss team
9. USC
10. FSU
Others of note:
12. WMU – top G5 champ
21. IA
24. NE
By conference:
B10 – 6 = 43%
P12 – 5 = 42%
ACC – 5 = 36%
B12 – 3 = 30%
SEC – 4 = 29%
Other – 4 (WMU, USF, Temple)
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
538’s updated projection (chances of making the playoff):
1. AL – >99%
2. Clemson – >99%
3. UW – >99%
4. OSU – 87%
5. PSU – 14%
6. OU – <1%
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Since there are no remaining games to be played before the playoff field is selected, the percentages above are entirely due to the uncertainty of predicting what a bunch of bureaucrats sitting in a conference room will do.
Now, human behavior is predictable with sufficiently large sample sizes, but is there a large enough sample for this prediction to mean anything? OSU’s 87% shot is roughly the percentage that most forecasters gave Hillary Clinton of beating Donald Trump, on election morning.
Mind you, I am not saying that I disagree with these guesses — I would probably guess about the same — but we should be clear about what they actually signify.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Since there are no remaining games to be played before the playoff field is selected, the percentages above are entirely due to the uncertainty of predicting what a bunch of bureaucrats sitting in a conference room will do.”
Correct. Since I’ve been posting their projections for a while I thought it was only fair to show how much is guesswork.
“Now, human behavior is predictable with sufficiently large sample sizes, but is there a large enough sample for this prediction to mean anything?”
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/heres-how-our-college-football-playoff-predictions-work/
They do explain their methods. They use the history of the coaches poll voting and an Elo model to help them make predictions of voting. Then the experience of 2014 helped them make changes to improve things.
Instead, after a year’s worth of experience under our belts that let us see how the committee works, we’re making a couple of revisions to the model:
* First, we account for the committee’s potential to scramble the ratings slightly from week to week, even where the on-field action didn’t seem to warrant it, such as in its flip-flopping of Florida State and TCU last year. The mechanics of this are a little involved; I’ll describe them briefly down below.
* Second, we assign a small bonus to conference champions.
* Third, the model accounts for slightly more uncertainty than in last year’s version.
“OSU’s 87% shot is roughly the percentage that most forecasters gave Hillary Clinton of beating Donald Trump, on election morning.”
FWIW, 538 gave her much lower odds than that (I think it was about 67% by election day).
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“OSU’s 87% shot is roughly the percentage that most forecasters gave Hillary Clinton of beating Donald Trump, on election morning.”
FWIW, 538 gave her much lower odds than that (I think it was about 67% by election day).
I’m sort-of averaging all the forecasters together. FiveThirtyEight had Clinton at 71% on election morning, which was the lowest of anyone who expressed the outcome in terms of a percentage. On the one hand, it reinforces that 538 is still better at this than anyone else; but on the other hand, they were still wrong. We’ve been polling elections a lot longer than we’ve been seeding a college football playoff, and even so, we can still be WAY off.
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Marc Shepherd,
“On the one hand, it reinforces that 538 is still better at this than anyone else; but on the other hand, they were still wrong.”
I don’t think you can be “wrong” when you post odds for a single binary event. They favored one outcome but didn’t exclude the other.
“We’ve been polling elections a lot longer than we’ve been seeding a college football playoff, and even so, we can still be WAY off.”
We haven’t been thoroughly polling for all that many elections, actually. I think 538 says the useful data only goes back for about 12 presidential elections. Add in all the variables they have to deal with and I’d contend predicting the CFP is easier. They’ve got 7 sets of rankings from 3 seasons and they know there is voter overlap from year to year.
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“On the one hand, it reinforces that 538 is still better at this than anyone else; but on the other hand, they were still wrong.”
I don’t think you can be “wrong” when you post odds for a single binary event. They favored one outcome but didn’t exclude the other.
This raises the question of what, exactly, it means to be “right” or “wrong” about the likelihood of an event that can never be repeated. I think I can say with some certainty, that most of the political polling and forecasting industry are most definitely not saying, “Phew! We got this one exactly right!!”
I mean, if the committee had chosen Penn State over Ohio State, you’d have a tough time finding anyone who thought 538 was “right”, even though, if we are being strictly accurate, the odds they posted never ruled the Nittany Lions out.
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Marc Shepherd,
“This raises the question of what, exactly, it means to be “right” or “wrong” about the likelihood of an event that can never be repeated.”
It doesn’t mean anything if you give odds. If you make enough of those predictions we can look at your success rate, though.
“I think I can say with some certainty, that most of the political polling and forecasting industry are most definitely not saying, “Phew! We got this one exactly right!!””
No, but the goal in polling is to predict who the actual voters will be and try to adjust your poll results based on the demographics of your sample. Since it’s impossible to know who will actually vote until afterwards, it’s all a guessing game. That’s why they have sizable margins of error. The final result was well within the margin of error for the vast majority of polls.
“I mean, if the committee had chosen Penn State over Ohio State, you’d have a tough time finding anyone who thought 538 was “right”, even though, if we are being strictly accurate, the odds they posted never ruled the Nittany Lions out.”
I don’t think they worry about claiming to be right, they’re just trying to be informative.
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http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-college-football-predictions/
And now their game predictions are out.
Odds to win their semi:
AL – 64%
OSU – 55%
Clemson – 45%
UW – 36%
Odds to win the title:
AL – 39%
OSU – 25%
Clemson – 18%
UW – 17%
Odds in each possible NCG:
AL vs OSU – 59/41
AL vs Clemson – 65/35
UW vs OSU – 45/55
UW vs Clemson – 51/49
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Semifinals:
Peach – #1 AL vs #4 UW
Fiesta – #2 Clemson vs #3 OSU
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As always, the committee sends mixed messages. OOC is important enough to get OSU in, but UW gets in with a terrible OOC schedule while PSU is out in part for losing a tough OOC game.
Opening lines:
AL -11
OSU -3.5
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As always, the committee sends mixed messages. OOC is important enough to get OSU in, but UW gets in with a terrible OOC schedule while PSU is out in part for losing a tough OOC game.
I think Hocutt said that it didn’t consider Pitt that tough of an OOC opponent. But the Washington precedent has to be troubling: they played practically the weakest OOC schedule imaginable, and their conference didn’t have a great year either, and yet they got in. If Oklahoma plays Washington’s OOC schedule, the Sooners are probably a playoff team.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I think Hocutt said that it didn’t consider Pitt that tough of an OOC opponent.”
They aren’t, really. A top 5 team should beat #25 most of the time. But Pitt was a giant killer this year and much tougher than anything UW scheduled (RU was their toughest OOC game).
“But the Washington precedent has to be troubling: they played practically the weakest OOC schedule imaginable, and their conference didn’t have a great year either, and yet they got in. If Oklahoma plays Washington’s OOC schedule, the Sooners are probably a playoff team.”
OU’s defense kept them out. UW is highly ranked in all sorts of metrics (Off and Def efficiency, strength of record, etc). OU isn’t. Their D is about #60.
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Hocutt nicely said that UW blew PSU away on every metric except strength of schedule. And UW had a 4-1 record vs. Sagarin’s top 30 while PSU was 4-2.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/penn-state-college-football-playoff-why-nittany-lions-were-left-out-kirby-hocutt-120416
Why UW got in over PSU.
“We looked at a lot of things,” Hocutt told ESPN. “We looked at two conference championship teams. … We looked at one-loss Washington — that loss being against a top-10 opponent — compared to a two-loss Penn State team — one loss they were not competitive in that particular game, the other loss was to an 8-4 team. We talked about strength of schedule. Obviously, strength of schedule favored Penn State. Had Washington had a stronger strength of schedule, I don’t think the conversation and discussion would have been as difficult.
“We looked at key statistical categories, which translate to performance on the field each and every week. And the statistical categories that the Selection Committee sees value in, that we discussed in detail last night and again this morning, Washington has the advantage. We talked to our coaches about what they saw in the performance of these two teams on the field — not just in one particular game but over the course of 13 games — and Washington seemed to have the advantage there as well.
“So while it was challenging conversation, it was detailed conversation that went hours upon hours, coming out this morning, Washington deserves that No. 4 spot, and the Selection Committee believes they’re a better football team when compared with Penn State.”
So there you have it. Penn State’s blowout loss to Michigan and non-conference loss to Pitt were too much for the committee to take compared to Washington’s lone loss — at home against a USC team that shot up the rankings at the end of the season. Beyond that, the eyeball test seems to have come into play.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18201632/big-12-commissioner-bob-bowlsby-wants-clarity-non-league-champion-ohio-state-buckeyes-washington-huskies-make-playoff
Bob Bowlsby wants clarity from the committee on what he should advise B12 teams to do to make the playoff. He’s not upset about OU missing out, he just wants guidance for future seasons.
Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby would like some clarity from College Football Playoff officials on the importance of conference championship games and strength of schedule, he told ESPN on Sunday after the selection committee put 11-1 Ohio State at No. 3 in spite of the Buckeyes not winning the Big Ten East Division or their conference title.
“Obviously I acknowledge the difficulty of the task, but I’m not sure what I advise my members right now because we’ve been telling them that nonconference schedules matter and one of the four has an exceedingly weak nonconference schedule,” he said, referring to No. 4 Washington, which notched wins over Rutgers, Idaho and FCS Portland State. “And we’ve been telling them the 13th data point matters, and we added a conference championship game because of that. We’ve always heard that conference championships matter and division championships matter, and now it’s confusing.”
“I’ll have some questions to ask when the time is right,” Bowlsby added.
…
“I’m just looking for clarity,” Bowlsby said. “We didn’t have a team that was a likely participant in the playoff, and so from that standpoint it doesn’t make a lot of difference to us this year, but I’d just like to know what we’re supposed to advise our members. Does the 13th data point make a difference, or does it not? Does the conference championship game make a difference, or does it not? Are they only used as tiebreakers, or is it other metrics?
“In TCU’s case, they fell out of the playoff. They had a great year and had a Heisman Trophy candidate at quarterback and won by 50 points on the last day of the season, but we were told the reason they didn’t get in, the reason they fell, was they didn’t have a 13th data point and they didn’t have a championship. Now I think it’s reasonable to seek clarity on that, and when the time is right, I will ask those questions.”
…
“We’ve told our schools you shouldn’t be surprised if you don’t get in if you play a weak nonconference schedule, and then somebody with a weak nonconference schedule does get in,” Bowlsby said. “It’s just another case in which we need to seek clarification.”
“They have a difficult job to do,” he said of the 12 members on the selection committee. “We just need to know what the rules are.”
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I’d tell Bowlsby that you need at least one of a 13th game or a tough OOC game.
TCU in 2014 did beat Minny (a loss to a similar team like Pitt likely kept PSU out of the playoffs this year), but TCU in 2014 certainly didn’t have the SOS (or signature OOC win) of OSU in 2016.
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I’d tell him it’s all about how many top 10 and top 25 wins you have. You can get them OOC, in conference or in a CCG. The other games don’t mean much unless you play poorly.
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How many top 10 and top 25 wins did PSU and UMich have compared to UDub?
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Top 25 games:
AL – 5 W (#9, 14, 17, 20, 21), 0 L
Clemson – 4 W (#11, 13, 14, 22), 1 L (#23)
OSU – 3 W (#6, 7, 8), 1 L (#5)
UW – 3 W (#10, 18, 19), 1 L (#9)
PSU – 2 W (#3, 8), 2 L (#6, 23)
MI – W (#5, 8, 10), 1 L (#3) + 1 unranked L
OU – W (#12, 16), 1 L (#3) + 1 unranked L
5-0*
4-1*
3-1 (all 4 were top 10 teams)
3-1*
2-2*
3-1 + 1 unranked L
2-1* + 1 unranked L
* = P5 champ
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Both of PSU’s losses were to top 25 teams.
I think a fair way to do it would be to count wins and losses in the following fashion:
+1 for a win vs. Top 50.
Another +1 for a win vs. Top 25.
Another +1 for a win vs. Top 10.
-1 for a loss vs. below top 10.
Another -1 for loss vs. below top 25.
Another -1 for a loss vs. below top 50.
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Sorry, I forgot Temple moved into the top 25 and that PSU beat them. They are 3-2 vs the top 25 which doesn’t change anything.
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Heck, even Clemson.
How many top 10 and top 25 wins?
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Top 30 record per Sagarin:
Alabama 5-0
Ohio St. 3-1
Michigan 3-2
Clemson 4-1
Washington 4-1
Penn ST. 4-2
The Big 10 is pretty universally rated the #4 conference in all the computer rankings. The strength at the top is offset by the weakness at the bottom.
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Bullet:
But for playoff contenders, strength of the toughest part of the schedule should be all that should be considered.
No team that makes the playoffs should lose to a school outside the top 50 anyway (and should be heavily penalized if they do).
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Also, if you add the two B10 divisions together, Sagarin has the B10 as better than any conference besides the ACC (http://sagarin.com/sports/cfsend.htm), so what are you talking about, Bullet?
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http://www.masseyratings.com/cf/compare.htm
Massey’s composite. They have over 100 systems. Big 10 is #4 overall and is pretty generally ranked #3 or #4.
Every game should matter, not just the top games. And if you play a Rutgers, that is different than playing an Iowa. The Big 10 has at least 4 “Rutgers” this year that are guaranteed wins if they are on your schedule. No other conference has that many down at the bottom. Of course, nobody else has as many at the top. But the bowl games will tell how much Wisconsin and PSU are inflated by those games. Michigan and Ohio St. have done enough to be sure they are legit top 10 teams.
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Bullet:
I count RU, Illinois, and PU. Surely you’re not counting MSU (which, despite having a tire-fire of a season, had enough talent to put a scare in to OSU and also beat ND).
Every other B10 team made it to a bowl game.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/rankings
The final rankings and NY6 bowl pairings are out.
1. AL
2. Clemson
3. OSU
4. UW
5. PSU
6. MI
7. OU
8. WI
9. USC
10. CO
12/30 bowl:
Orange – #6 MI vs #11 FSU 8pm
12/31 bowls:
Peach – #1 AL vs #4 UW 3pm
Fiesta – #2 Clemson vs #3 OSU 7pm
1/2 bowls:
Rose – #5 PSU vs #9 USC 5pm
Sugar – #7 OU vs #14 AU 8:30pm
Cotton – #8 WI vs #15 WMU 1pm
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Some reward for WMU, playing a game that looks like typical September Big10 v. MAC in a possibly cold weather city on January 2 (at least AT & T has a rolling roof).
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What if they manage to beat Wisconsin?
I was hoping Purdue would hire PJ Fleck, alas, it was not meant to be…
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Purdue has made an offer to Jeff Brohm, the coach at Western Kentucky. I was hoping for PJ Fleck myself, although Jeff Brohm could be a great hire. It seems like a hire similar to the last two coaches and I’m wondering if our administration, both academic and athletic, can ever get out of its own way…
We should have a much better football product than we do. I’m not saying we should be at the OSU level, but have to be better than where we are. I mean when I was in school, if we won 4 games and beat IU, that was a good year. I have higher expectations now, maybe I shouldn’t though…
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Purdue has made an offer to Jeff Brohm, the coach at Western Kentucky. I was hoping for PJ Fleck myself, although Jeff Brohm could be a great hire.
They are quite similar. The season Fleck just had at WMU is better than any season Brohm had at WKU. But Brohm is 30–10, whereas Fleck is 30–21. Brohm has won two conference titles, to Fleck’s one. Brohm is 2–0 in bowls, Fleck is 1–1.
It seems like a hire similar to the last two coaches and I’m wondering if our administration, both academic and athletic, can ever get out of its own way.
Right now, Purdue is one of the worst jobs in the P5. These are the kinds of coaching resumes that the school will attract. If you’re thinking of someone markedly better than Brohm, who would it be? You might like Fleck personally, but there is nothing in his resume to suggest he is much better than Brohm.
We should have a much better football product than we do.
There isn’t any logical reason for Purdue to be as bad as it is. In Joe Tiller’s first decade, the Boilermakers averaged 4th place in an 11-team league, making them a slightly above-average program. But the wheels fell off in his final two seasons, and Purdue football has not regained its bearings.
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Michael,
I understand your reservations…. PJ Fleck seems to be more familiar with this territory, at least where he should recruit. PJ has relationships with a ton of Catholic league programs here in Chicago and the surrounding suburbs. That should help greatly. I don’t know where Jeff Brohm’s recruiting base is, it may be the in the midwest as well. I see that Jeff’s record is better, but I believe PJ is better positioned to operate under Purdue’s constraints in my opinion.
At the end of the day, I would like to see a better run and performing program, because the last five years have been dreadful….
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I was there in 1966 when Bob Griese was quarterback. Then, we were at tOSU’s level. Now we’re at RU’s level. The problem is not so much the coaches who’ve been there. It’s the attitude of the Presidents and BOT’s who have run the school. They have deliberately deemphasized sports because they think a good sports program gives a school an aura of anti-intellectualism. Ironically, Purdue is ranked academically below tOSU in most lists, as well as Michigan, Wisconsin, Stanford ad nauseam.
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If nothing else PU should be more exciting under Brohm. You’ll throw the ball 50 times a game. It won’t always work, but at least it won’t be a bunch of 1 yard runs up the middle.
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I think this is a great hire for Purdue. Per S&P+, Brohm’s offenses at WKU finished 9th (2016), 4th (2015) and 9th (2014) in the country.
I’ve long felt that unless you are OSU or Michigan, B1G schools need to run an up tempo spread offense to overcome their inherent talent disadvantages. MSU and Wisconsin have had success running pro-style attacks but there is a ceiling to that approach and both of those schools can recruit much better than Purdue.
PSU adopted this approach this year and after a rough start they have taken off. This is by far PSU’s best team in at least a decade and I expect them to be co-favorites for the B1G title next year.
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I’ve long felt that unless you are OSU or Michigan, B1G schools need to run an up tempo spread offense to overcome their inherent talent disadvantages.
Even OSU runs up-tempo, and a version of the spread that some people call a “power spread”.
But yeah, I agree. Indiana gave people fits. They were 6–6, but put quite a scare into Michigan State, Nebraska, Ohio State, and Michigan.
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Scared the Spartans so much that Team Green lost, in fact.
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It is strange to not to see a thick-necked would-be TE or LB as the Nittany Lions QB.
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“I’ve long felt that unless you are OSU or Michigan, B1G schools need to run an up tempo spread offense to overcome their inherent talent disadvantages. MSU and Wisconsin have had success running pro-style attacks but there is a ceiling to that approach and both of those schools can recruit much better than Purdue.”
—Over the past decade MSU & Wisconsin were the two most successful teams in the B1G not named Ohio State. It’s very likely that you should re-evaluate your theory rather than brushing them off.
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Probably should be modified to “unless you are a king or prince” (OSU, UMich, PSU, UNL, MSU, Wisconsin, Iowa), you should run a spread offense (even though OSU and UNL also have spread elements). Or unless you’re Minny, where your recruiting strength is linemen and non-skill positions so you should try to follow the Wisconsin/Iowa route to success.
So really only if you are Illinois/Northwestern/IU/PU/RU/UMD.
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One of my concerns with the college football playoff, is that even after three years, much of the media and most fans do not seem to understand how the committee operates.
This article is a case in point: “Should the CFB Playoff Committee revise their selection criteria?”
Despite the title, the writer’s actual complaint is not that the criteria are wrong, but that committee did not follow its own rules. Except…the writer clearly does not understand those rules. Can you spot the error?
The article at least does one thing right: it quotes the relevant criteria from the playoff website:
The article then applies these criteria, and concludes that if the committee were honest, it should have selected Penn State over Ohio State. But the writer has overlooked the first clause of the first sentence: “When circumstances at the margins indicate that teams are comparable…”
That’s the key. In the committee’s opinion, Ohio State and Penn State were not comparable at the margins; therefore, those criteria never entered into the discussion. It’s a subtle point, but one that many people miss.
Since the writer did not understand the criteria, the article assumes dishonesty:
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If they cared solely about the most favorable pairings, UMich would be in the playoffs.
UMich and OSU are the only schools that wouldn’t be heavy ‘dogs to ‘Bama according to advanced metrics. If UMich played UDub’s or Clemson’s schedule, they’d be in the playoffs now.
The big difference between UMich and UDub/Clemson is that they had to play OSU while neither UDub or Clemson had to play anyone as good.
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To be clear, this isn’t a discussion of whether Ohio State is a better football team than Penn State. It’s a conversation about whether or not the CFB Playoff Committee applied its own rules to its own decision.
Their rules are about finding the best teams.
Again, that’s not to say that the Buckeyes aren’t the better team, or aren’t the team that proved themselves as more worthy over the course of the entire season.
So other than being not better and being less worthy, PSU has all the advantages?
If the aim of the CFB Playoff is to the select the four best teams in the nation to fill its coveted bracket slots, rather than tick the boxes of its own bucket list, it needs to revise its protocol to reflect that.
Or the writer could learn to read. The last line in the first paragraph of the Selection Committee Protocol:
For purposes of any four team playoff, the process will inevitably need to select
the four best teams from among several with legitimate claims to participate.
This comes before all the criteria she focuses on.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/college-football-playoff-bracket-set-alabama-clemson-ohio-state-washington-in/
Jerry Palm with a reasoned piece explaining the CFP selections.
As we complete the third year of this system, we are still learning about what matters and what doesn’t in certain situations to the committee. This year’s lesson is one that has been true all along, but never demonstrated — this is a tournament of the four best teams, not the four best conference champions. You have to be open minded enough to accept the idea that two of the four best teams may be in the same conference and at least one of those will not be a champion. You have to be open to the idea that the best team in a conference, for one reason or another, may not win its championship.
Conference championships are decided by performance over two-thirds to three-quarters of a team’s schedule, and they’re often based on an unbalanced schedule. However, the entire season counts. Ohio State is in the playoff because of its performance over the entire season. Penn State missed out for the same reason. There is no point in playing nonconference games if they don’t mean anything.
For those of you who still feel that all that should matter is that Penn State beat Ohio State head-to-head and won Ohio State’s league, let me ask if you would feel the same way had Florida found a way to upset Alabama last night? Would you really think Florida should be ahead of Alabama because the Gators would have won head to head and won Alabama’s league? Didn’t think so.
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The Big Ten must be delighted. It got four teams into the NY6, including three out of the four kings. No other conference did that, including the vaunted SEC. A particular school might have wished the pecking order were different. But if you ask the Big Ten as a whole, I’d say they are very happy with this system.
Outside of OSU, Penn State had the Big Ten’s second-best playoff case, but they’re going to the Rose Bowl, which is one heck of a consolation prize.
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As no other conference got more than 2 in to a NY6 bowl, that makes for challenging bowl matchups down-slate, though.
The B10 could very well be 0-6 heading in to the NY6 bowls.
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For example,the B10’s 6th selection (Minny) is facing the Pac’s 4th selection (WSU) in the Holiday and the
B10’s 9th selection (IU) is facing the Pac’s 5th selection (Utah) in the Foster Farms Bowl.
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The B1G actually stacks up very favorably for the first time in a long time. It’s still a difficult slate as always, but there are only 3 games that I think the B1G will be solid underdogs. Here is how I would break down the games:
Solid Favorite:
Michigan vs. Florida State
Wisconsin vs. Western Michigan
Slight Favorite:
Ohio State vs. Clemson
Maryland vs. Boston College
Slight Underdog:
Nebraska vs. Tennessee
Iowa vs. Florida
Northwestern vs. Pittsburgh
Solid Underdog:
Indiana vs. Utah
Minnesota vs. Washington State
Penn State vs. USC
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Tom: NU vs. Pitt is a solid underdog as well. 6-6 team vs. a 8-4 team that knocked off 2 conference champs.
4 bowl games where the B10 team is essentially playing an away game at the opposing school’s home state/city.
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@Richard
I feel good about Northwestern’s chances. They took OSU to the wire in Columbus. Also, unlike alot of these bowl where the B1G is playing in virtual road games, I don’t think either team will have much of an edge in NYC.
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I feel good about Northwestern’s chances. They took OSU to the wire in Columbus.
I don’t think the NW–OSU game has any predictive value. This was a classic “hangover” game for OSU (the week after they lost to PSU). This wasn’t the same OSU that would blow out Nebraska a week later; nor, for that matter, was it the same NW that lost to Illinois State.
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@ Marc Shepherd
My point about NW taking OSU to the wire is that NW isn’t a standard 6-6 team like say Maryland, which got blown out every single time they went up in weight class. Sagarin has NW as the #43 team in the country, Pittsburgh as the #30 team in the country and Maryland as the #69 team in the country. Per Sagarin, NW is about a 3 point underdog to Pitt.
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True, the B10 could also possibly go 2/3-0 vs. the SEC and 4-0 vs. the ACC.
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Agreed. The B10 couldn’t really ask for a better season. As Richard notes the lesser bowls will be tough, but I’ll be happy as long as the top 4 do well (2-2 is okay but 3-1 or better would be nice).
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@Frank
Everybody likes to dump on Baylor, but you have to remember just how bad they were when making that 2014 schedule. And its pretty ridiculous to say they need a P5 ooc when they play 9 conference games while others were playing 8. P5 regular season games for the contenders:
Florida St. 11 (the only unbeaten and they were moved down to #3)
Oregon 10
TCU 10
Ohio St. 9
Alabama 9
Baylor 9
Now Ohio St. and Alabama did have ccgs, but their regular schedule had no more P5 games than Baylor.
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Everybody likes to dump on Baylor, but you have to remember just how bad they were when making that 2014 schedule.
We cannot rank teams based on what they were thinking when they made the schedule. We can only rank them on how the schedule actually turned out.
And its pretty ridiculous to say they need a P5 ooc when they play 9 conference games while others were playing 8. P5 regular season games for the contenders…Now Ohio St. and Alabama did have ccgs, but their regular schedule had no more P5 games than Baylor.
Earlier in the season, when Baylor and OSU had the same number of P5 games, the committee ranked Baylor ahead. The week OSU overtook them, was the week that Baylor had a bye. From then on, until the end of the season, OSU had one more P5 game on its resume than Baylor.
Now, compare the non-P5 games. Ohio State played two other opponents with a pulse, Cincinnati and Navy; they also played Kent State, which was terrible. Baylor played Buffalo (losing record), SMU (terrible), and Northwestern State (FCS).
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bullet,
“Everybody likes to dump on Baylor, but you have to remember just how bad they were when making that 2014 schedule.”
It’s entirely fair to point out that two things must be considered before mocking an OOC schedule:
1. How good/bad was this team when they scheduled those OOC games (what level of difficulty was reasonable for others to expect)?
A team that struggles just to make a bowl should schedule differently than a top power.
2. How good/bad were the OOC teams when they were scheduled (what was intent of the schedule)?
Sometimes programs have a terrible year or a scandal or coaching change destroys the program. Other times a program suddenly rises to respectability.
2014 Baylor got mocked because they scheduled 3 teams they expected to be bad and they were. Baylor had been a winning program for several years at this point.
2010 – 7-6
2011 – 10-3
2012 – 8-5
2013 – 11-2
2014 – 11-2
How far in advance did they schedule these games? I’ll excuse SMU on the basis of it being an old rivalry. But Buffalo? Buffalo won 6+ games only twice in 15 years in the MAC. A bad I-AA team? I doubt those games were scheduled before 2010.
Baylor also gets mocked because they continue to do the same thing every year. 2013 had ULM as the best game. In 2015 it was Rice (or maybe SMU). In 2016 it was SMU. In 2017-8 it’s Duke. In 2019 it’s Rice. After that the B12 rule requiring a P5 OOC game will force them play someone (they have BYU then Utah in home and homes, plus MS in 2020)
“And its pretty ridiculous to say they need a P5 ooc when they play 9 conference games while others were playing 8.”
In December 2015 the B12 decided to say exactly that, and Baylor was the primary offender (KU was the other).
“Now Ohio St. and Alabama did have ccgs, but their regular schedule had no more P5 games than Baylor.”
But they knew they had a CCG to add yet another P5 game. And almost all the other B12 schools were already playing a P5 OOC game voluntarily, so it’s clearly not too much to ask.
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“And its pretty ridiculous to say they need a P5 ooc when they play 9 conference games while others were playing 8.”
In December 2015 the B12 decided to say exactly that, and Baylor was the primary offender (KU was the other).
And Kansas at least had a decent excuse.
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Baylor should be dumped on. Pac-12 teams almost always play 9 conference games AND a tough OoC game. What UW did this year is definitely abnormal for the Pac-12. Even still, UW then played CO in the CCG to bolster its resume – which Baylor has never done.
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Concerning cord-cutting and the ESPN’s loss of customers, here’s a voice from the political right. (I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a link to breitbart dot com on this site, but here goes):
Not much substance here, but the rhetoric is fun:
“ESPN is the dilapidated foreclosure with the colony of cats living under it, and the HOA has taken notice.” LOLing.
Then here’s the political angle:
“Either way, ESPN’s decision to give voice to the full-throated fury of their radical leftist personalities turned into a decision that not only cost them a few bad Nielsen ratings books, but might also cost them their company.”
Trump famously suggested that the NFL’s ratings are down because of political protesting. Here is someone suggesting that ESPN is full of radical leftists. Whether you agree or not, this is a data point on cord-cutting and the value of live sports programming. I have never personally felt that ESpin was particularly political. But whatevs ….
http://www.breitbart.com/sports/2016/12/06/disney-may-sell-espn-due-massive-subscriber-loss/
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So, here is an article about NFL ratings from five days ago. In short, “NFL ratings have recovered only partially and that should concern NFL executives.”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/nelsongranados/2016/12/01/nfl-ratings-have-recovered-only-partially-since-election-night-so-the-drama-continues/#1a2ac0261845
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Earlier this year, it was good odds he’d be Franklin’s replacement:
http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/baylor-hires-temples-matt-rhule-as-new-coach-off-consecutive-10-win-seasons/
Maybe they got him confused with Todd Graham, who I thought would be a good candidate.
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Baylor has hired Temple’s Matt Rhule as HC. His father was a pastor so he may be a good fit for Baylor.
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Interesting that Rhule took the Baylor job. His name has been popping up (at least in the NJ/Philly press) for several P5 jobs for a couple of years. After this season, I would expect Rhule to really be a hot candidate. Brian may have picked up an important point in mentioning that Rhule’s father was a pastor. That may have been a major selling point to both Baylor and Rhule.
Certainly, it should be possible to run a clean program and get plenty or talent at Baylor, so maybe this is a very good opportunity for Rhule.
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There is a comment on the NJ.com site that may explain why Rhule has not previously accepted a P5. Last year, many speculated that Rhule was waiting for Franklin to be fired at Penn State to open up that job. Rhule felt that he might have a real shot at the PSU job. Obviously after this season, Franklin is not likely going anywhere for a while.
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I wonder if the The Rock and Franklin ever played against each other in eastern PA. They are the same age/H.S. Class.
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So I went ahead and tried a first draft of my ranking system I described a while ago.
Basically, my plan gives a team points for every game played. In order to reward tough schedules, a game is worth the opponent’s unadjusted RPI^2 (that means the old formula that ignored location). The value of a game is then adjusted for result and location (win = 1, loss = 0.5, home = 0.9, road = 1.111). Neutral games are when both teams travelled more than 250 miles or neither did (WI at Lambeau is not a neutral site), or if tickets are explicitly split 50/50 (OU vs UT, UF vs UGA, etc). Each game is also adjusted for the quality of opponent (I-A = 1, I-AA = 0.5). Another adjustment is made for preparation time (coming off a bye = 0.9, opponent had a bye = 1.111). The final adjustment is for whether it is a conference game or not. The value of out of conference games depends on the number of conference games you play (9: OOC = 1.33, 8: OOC = 1.25, 0: OOC = 1.1). This bonus factor is designed to reward challenging OOC schedules. You take all these adjustments and multiply them together to find the adjustment
I did it without the OOC bonus for now, and normalized the results so #1 is always at 100.
1. AL – 100
2. Clemson – 92.9
3. OSU – 92.3
4. PSU – 90.8
5. UW – 89.0
6. WI – 85.8
7. CO – 82.3
8. MI – 80.0
9. USC – 77.6
10. OU – 74.8
Remember, my system only considers wins and losses. Scoring differentials aren’t a factor.
With the OOC bonus, there is one change:
1. AL – 100
3. OSU – 94.6
2. Clemson – 94.0
4. PSU – 91.4
5. UW – 88.8
6. WI – 86.7
7. CO – 82.6
8. MI – 82.0
9. USC – 78.3
10. OU – 75.5
I only ranked these 10 teams, so it’s possible someone else would sneak into the top 10 but I doubt it.
My system says PSU achieved more than UW, which is probably true if you ignore the scores. UW got in for winding handily against weaker teams while PSU was hurt by a big loss to MI.
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Your results are within hailing distance of the committee results. This means most fans would consider them acceptable, with the additional benefit that there is no smoke-filled room. Anyone can calculate the standings at any time.
The one curiosity is Michigan being ranked behind PSU, UW, and CO, despite beating all three.
The value of a game is then adjusted for result and location (win = 1, loss = 0.5, home = 0.9, road = 1.111).
Are the last two numbers multipliers? So, a home loss is 0.5 × 0.9 = 0.45, while a road loss is 0.5 × 1.111 = 0.5555?
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Marc Shepherd,
“Your results are within hailing distance of the committee results. This means most fans would consider them acceptable, with the additional benefit that there is no smoke-filled room. Anyone can calculate the standings at any time.
The one curiosity is Michigan being ranked behind PSU, UW, and CO, despite beating all three.”
PSU and CO are ahead because of the CCG. PSU earned 9.6 points for beating WI while WI got 5.1 for losing. UW earned 9.7 points and CO got 5.1. That’s how my system rewards conference and division champions without making it an explicit factor. If I leave the normalization factor alone, after 12 games the points were:
1. OSU – 94.6
2. AL – 91.5
3. Clemson – 86.2
4. MI – 82.0
5. PSU – 81.8
6. WI – 81.6
7. UW – 79.1
8. USC – 78.3
9. CO – 77.5
10. OU – 75.5
This shows you why OSU so clearly deserved to make the playoff this year despite not being a champion. OSU would’ve had 100.9 points if they had beaten PSU. Then if they had beaten WI to go 13-0 they would’ve had 110.5 points on this same normalized scale. That’s how tough OSU’s schedule was compared to others.
Why is MI still so low? It’s due to MI playing most of their tough games at home (10% loss) and losing all their tough road games.
“Are the last two numbers multipliers? So, a home loss is 0.5 × 0.9 = 0.45, while a road loss is 0.5 × 1.111 = 0.5555?”
Yes, all the factors get multiplied. That means a road OOC win gets maximum points while a home conference loss hurts the most (except a I-AA loss which is another factor of 0.5). OSU’s win at OU was worth 14.2 points versus 4.3 for beating RU at home. A home win over a I-AA team was worth 1.8 points.
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Neat system.
Wonder how the top 10 for 2014 and 2015 would have looked.
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It occurred to me, though, that since the bonus is for an extra game, just getting an extra game by playing @Hawaii would also give you a bonus. Granted, maybe only a small one.
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Richard,
“It occurred to me, though, that since the bonus is for an extra game, just getting an extra game by playing @Hawaii would also give you a bonus. Granted, maybe only a small one.”
Yes, it’s a potential problem. I’d consider giving the HI game half credit. But as you note, HI usually isn’t very good so beating them isn’t worth a lot anyway.
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Also, the only adjustment I’d make is 0 for losses except OT wins and losses (maybe .7 and .3 for OT wins and losses).
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Oh, and no OOC adjustment.
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Richard,
“Also, the only adjustment I’d make is 0 for losses except OT wins and losses (maybe .7 and .3 for OT wins and losses).”
And then:
“Oh, and no OOC adjustment.”
I considered treating OT differently (W = 0.8, L= 0.7) but I didn’t. The whole point of my system is to ignore scores and thus the beauty contest and I felt that treating OT games differently would violate that principle.
Losses get half credit because I wanted to acknowledge SOS. That half credit compensates (at least a little) WI for getting OSU and MI as crossovers instead of IN and RU. Losing to OSU got them roughly the same points as beating IL at home. Losing at MI was about as valuable as winning at MSU. This is how a P5 team can get rewarded for a tougher schedule than a G5 team faces.
I’m not claiming my system is perfect, but I tried to set bonuses and penalties to reward the behavior I want to see and punish unwanted behavior (playing I-AAs, playing cupcakes OOC, etc). The goal is to reward what a team accomplished on the field without putting explicit bias in (G5 and P5 are treated the same).
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I think you can accomplish the same thing just by giving credit for only wins.
I don’t consider Rutgers impressive just because they played a tough schedule and lost to every half-decent team.
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Adjustment I’d make to your system.
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Each game is also adjusted for the quality of opponent (I-A = 1, I-AA = 0.5).
But you’re starting with RPI, which already measures quality, doesn’t it?
The value of out of conference games depends on the number of conference games you play (9: OOC = 1.33, 8: OOC = 1.25, 0: OOC = 1.1).
If I am understanding you, the third multiplier would give Notre Dame a 1.1 multiplier adjustment on every game: they aren’t in a conference, so every game for them is OOC. Is that how it works?
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Marc Shepherd,
“But you’re starting with RPI, which already measures quality, doesn’t it?”
Yes and no.
RPI is 25% your W%, 50% your opponents’ W% and 25% your opponents’ opponents’ W%. It’s supposed to measure quality but the system is easily gamed (a big problem in MBB where the committee uses RPI). When you only look at W%, WMU’s 13-0 has the same value as AL’s 13-0. Also, RPI ignores I-AA games entirely.
I wanted to punish scheduling I-AA games in my system so I did. I also had to treat all I-AA team as 1 team and gave them an RPI value just below #128 in I-A. Many I-AAs are better than that and others are far worse but I don’t have RPI values for I-AA teams so I had to do something. It’s a fairly minor penalty as it turns out. Teams would gain about 1.8 points if they got full value for a I-AA win.
“If I am understanding you, the third multiplier would give Notre Dame a 1.1 multiplier adjustment on every game: they aren’t in a conference, so every game for them is OOC. Is that how it works?”
Yes, although I would actually give an independent 13/12 as a multiplier (1.0833) to keep it fair. I just wrote 1.1 to keep it simple since I wasn’t going to do any independents. The point of the OOC bonus is to give extra emphasis to the games a school chose to play over those that were scheduled for them. Because of this, I’d need to treat the ACC/ND games as conference games. So ND would actually get 1.143 times their 7 chosen games and no bonus for the ACC games. An ACC team that played them would be treated like they had 9 conference games (1.333 times their 3 truly chosen games). It didn’t come up this time because Clemson didn’t play ND and ND wasn’t in the top 10.
It works out that every team gets 1 extra game’s worth of value spread over their OOC schedule. It’s not a huge bonus, but hopefully enough to encourage strong OOC schedules.
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USA Today article about the growth of the BTN:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/bigten/2016/12/05/appalachian-state-win-at-michigan-helped-legitimize-big-ten-network/94997288/
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To give an idea how various factors impact my system, here are some results to demonstrate that.
RPI:
Just using RPI for each opponent, no modifying factors except L = 0.5:
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 93.6
3. UW 91.6
4. PSU 91.5
5. OSU 89.0
6. WI 86.5
7. CO 85.0
8. MI 83.1
9. OU 79.0
10. USC 78.6
This would be the simplest version, but I knew it wouldn’t emphasize the hardest games enough for my liking.
Just using RPI^2 for each opponent, no modifying factors except L = 0.5:
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 91.1
3. PSU 91.0
4. OSU 89.5
5. UW 87.4
6. WI 85.1
7. MI 82.1
8. CO 82.0
9. USC 76.8
10. OU 73.8
This is the most basic version of my model, but it doesn’t reward the behaviors I want to reward.
Now adding location location and bye week factors (still no OOC weight or I-AA punishment):
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 93.0
3. OSU 90.9
4. PSU 89.5
5. UW 87.7
6. WI 84.5
7. CO 82.6
8. MI 78.8
9. USC 76.4
10. OU 73.7
Add in OOC weighting:
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 94.2
3. OSU 92.9
4. PSU 89.7
5. UW 87.3
6. WI 85.1
7. CO 83.0
8. MI 80.5
9. USC 77.0
10. OU 74.2
Now add I-AA punishment:
1. AL 100.0
2. OSU 94.6
3. Clemson 94.0
4. PSU 91.4
5. UW 86.9
6. WI 86.7
7. CO 82.6
8. MI 82.0
9. USC 78.3
10. OU 75.5
AL, Clemson, UW and CO were the only teams to play a I-AA team.
Now, if I followed Richard’s suggestion of a loss = 0:
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 90.3
3. OSU 88.3
4. UW 82.8
5. PSU 79.6
6. WI 71.3
7. MI 70.6
8. CO 65.0
9. OU 62.5
10. USC 61.5
Why would teams risk a tough OOC game this way? USC would be much higher if they beat a mediocre team rather than losing to AL, for example. This becomes just ranking by the number of losses.
Or what if I change OT values (W = 0.8, L = 0.7) with a normal loss back to 0.5:
1. AL 100.0
2. Clemson 92.8
3. PSU 91.4
4. OSU 90.4
5. WI 88.6
6. UW 85.7
7. MI 84.5
8. CO 82.6
9. USC 78.3
10. OU 75.5
As I said above, I think this factor violates the basic principle of my model. If I consider OT, then shouldn’t I consider MOV in all games? If the goal is to win, then how they do it shouldn’t matter.
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So if you take my rankings:
1. AL 100.0
2. OSU 94.6
3. Clemson 94.0
4. PSU 91.4
5. UW 86.9
6. WI 86.7
7. CO 82.6
8. MI 82.0
9. USC 78.3
10. OU 75.5
How many teams deserve a shot at the title? Does a team at 82% deserve that chance (#8)? If you give autobids, OU is in at 75.5% while the at-larges are OSU, WI and CO (or WMU if the G5 get an autobid).
Should MI really get left out for OU? Both lost to OSU, but MI was on the road. The losses to UH and IA seem comparable. OU gets in by the luck of playing in a down B12 while MI is punished for being in the B10 East. That’s not how I think the system should work.
I’d be curious to see what the final rankings look like over several years but I don’t feel like investing the time to do it. Maybe my system just happens to look good this season. But I like the principles it’s built on and I think fans could live with a similar system being used for the actual playoff because it’s open about what you need to do to get in.
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To my mind, that’s why the best system for a CFB playoff would use a series of objective systems and take the consensus (much like the old BCS computers). My model doesn’t consider scoring differentials or MOV or OT like some systems would. Likewise, my system does consider location and bye weeks and OOC status which not everyone values. Find a diverse set of open models, don’t restrict what information they can use (MOV is fair game) but do make them give all teams a normalized rating (#1 = 100) so they can all be compared. Find the average rating for each team and you have your rankings.
The value of a diverse set of models is that while everyone will have 1 system that most closely reflects their personal beliefs about how to rank teams, they can see how everyone else does it so schools know what is needed in scheduling. Something like 5-7 models should be sufficient to encapsulate the way the vast majority of people would prefer to see things done.
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To my mind, that’s why the best system for a CFB playoff would use a series of objective systems and take the consensus (much like the old BCS computers).
Something like Brian’s system is exactly what I had hoped CFB would adopt. It produces something very close to what the average observer would believe was “the right result.” But it is totally immune to corruption, or the perception of corruption. Once the formula is announced, anyone can calculate it on their desktop. There is no guessing what a committee of bureaucrats will do. It would save money, too: the committee would not need to gather in a hotel every weekend to debate the results.
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People would try to game any set system, however.
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People would try to game any set system, however.
If, by “gaming the system,” you mean “using the rules to their advantage,” then of course. This is what any sensible program should do.
But rules that anyone can calculate on the desktop are not open to corruption, guesswork, or the vagaries of opinion, as the present rules are.
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RPI^3 with zero for losses, then.
Basically, judge teams only on tough wins. That would definitely incent scheduling hard games because you’d only get credit for beating top teams, essentially (and you can’t beat them if you don’t schedule them).
Even with RPI^2, what’s the breakeven point for USC to schedule ‘Bama vs. a mediocre school? If they have 80% odds vs. an average P5 school vs. 20% vs. ‘Bama, which would be more worthwhile under your system? More realistic odds may be gotten from some power ranking systems.
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Richard,
“RPI^3 with zero for losses, then.
Basically, judge teams only on tough wins. That would definitely incent scheduling hard games because you’d only get credit for beating top teams, essentially (and you can’t beat them if you don’t schedule them).”
If I was serious about making a ranking system, then of course I would try a bunch of different exponents and weighting factors until the results over a bunch of years seemed about as good as I could get. Perhaps testing the final rankings versus bowl games where both teams had equal reason to be excited (NCG, semifinals, some of the other NY6 games, etc).
For a pure guess at what a system should be to get the results I want, this turned out pretty well in my opinion.
“Even with RPI^2, what’s the breakeven point for USC to schedule ‘Bama vs. a mediocre school? If they have 80% odds vs. an average P5 school vs. 20% vs. ‘Bama, which would be more worthwhile under your system? More realistic odds may be gotten from some power ranking systems.”
Points = C * RPI^2
C = 0.5 for a loss and 1 for a win if we assume all else to be equal
1 * x^2 = 0.5 * y^2
x = sqrt(0.5 * y^2) = sqrt (0.5) * y = 0.707 * y
The breakeven would be when the other team is 70.7% as good as AL according to RPI. This years AL was 0.695. 0.707 * 0.695 = 0.491. The closest P5 teams to that RPI were 6-6 IN, 3-8 OR, 5-6 TCU and 5-6 SC (RPI ignores I-AA games).
So if you knew you would lose, then you should schedule a mediocre P5 team you know you will beat instead.
AL was favored by 11.5 which is about an 80% chance of winning.
AL pts = 0.8 * 0.5 * AL^2 + 0.2 * 1 * AL^2 = 0.6 * AL^2
Other pts = 0.8 * 1 * Other^2 + 0.2 * 0.5 * Other^2 = 0.9 * Other^2
Other = sqrt(0.6 / 0.9 * AL^2) = sqrt(0.67 * AL^2) = 0.8165 * AL = 0.567 = between #25 and #26
The closest P5 teams to that were UF, Stanford, Pitt, OU and TAMU. But USC wouldn’t be an 80% favorite over those teams, so the correct answer would probably be a team around #40, like MN, Miami (FL) or UK.
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Brian’s system gives teams credit even if they are an FCS-level or HS-level team blown out 99-0, though, just because their opponent is tough.
I’m certain most people would think it commonsensical to rank WMU, which won all their games, over RU and would find very nonsensical a system that ranked RU over WMU.
Does Brian’s system do that?
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Brian didn’t run it for all teams. He acknowledges that if this system were seriously considered, it would need to be sensitivity-tested on a much wider range of teams/seasons. If it rated Rutgers above WMU, that would not pass the sanity test.
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Richard,
“Brian’s system gives teams credit even if they are an FCS-level or HS-level team blown out 99-0, though, just because their opponent is tough.”
Yep. But not a lot of credit.
“I’m certain most people would think it commonsensical to rank WMU, which won all their games, over RU and would find very nonsensical a system that ranked RU over WMU.
Does Brian’s system do that?”
No, it doesn’t. WMU would actually rank really high in my system despite NW being the toughest team they played (according to RPI). I think they’d squeak in just above OU (I didn’t check all their games for the bye factor) – about 75.8. RU would be much, much lower – about 52.5 out of 100. I think #10 is about the ceiling for a G5 team in my system this year unless they beat multiple elite P5 teams on their way to being undefeated. An undefeated UH would’ve been above WMU and just behind USC. If they hadn’t played a I-AA they might have been #9.
However, I should point out the my system is focused on finding the playoff teams. It probably makes less sense as you go lower in the ranks.
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Even with RPI^2, what’s the breakeven point for USC to schedule ‘Bama vs. a mediocre school?
This assumes that playoff positioning is the sole reason why these games are scheduled.
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Not really. And if playoff likelihood is less than 100% the reason why schools play these games, then giving a zero for a loss makes even more sense.
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Brian’s system is trying to reflect the commonsense idea that not all losses are the same. It would be worse (ranking-wise) for Ohio State to have lost at home to Bowling Green, than on the road to the eventual Big Ten champions. Counting all losses at zero would treat them the same, which is not how most people intuitively think about it.
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2016/12/07/big-ten-football-revival
How the B10 came back to the top in CFB.
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ESPN reports that NCAA President Mark Emmert would prefer an 8-team CFB Playoff so all Power 5 conference champions are guaranteed a bid.
As far as I know, Emmert is not capable of uttering an original thought without checking with other people, so there are probably university presidents who are putting this idea in his ear.
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If 4×16 happens the CCG’s become qtr finals, and all P conf champs get in.
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Not happening for a variety of reasons frequently discussed here.
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ccrider55,
“If 4×16 happens the CCG’s become qtr finals, and all P conf champs get in.”
I disagree.
1. We all know 4×16 is extremely unlikely. The power conferences have never all been the same size. This would require UT and company to join the P12 because there just aren’t 4 other schools the P12 would want. If UT and OU are out west, then who is left that the B10, ACC and SEC want? I just don’t see 6 more schools that those 3 would add.
2. Even if 4×16 did happen, those games can’t become quarterfinals. That would prevent any independent or G5 school from ever making it by rule. That would get them in legal trouble and/or in front of Congress very quickly.
3. I do agree that if it expands to 8 teams then the P4 champs in the 4×16 scenario would all get in.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/the-case-for-and-against-an-eight-team-playoff-in-college-football/
The cases for and against expansion.
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http://intermatwrestle.com/articles/17176
In case you didn’t already know cc, another school is adding wrestling. It’s only NAIA, but every team helps.
And #5 OSU beat #3 MO at home 30-9 tonight. MO had some injury issues but I’ll take any top 5 win we can get.
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In women’s volleyball, the BigTen has 6 of the top 16 seeds in the volleyball tourney this year. Also 6 of the the Sweet Sixteen participants. And the top 3 seeds (which are also the 3 highest ranked teams at the end of the year).
Wonder if the BTN helped any.
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http://www.offtackleempire.com/2016/12/9/13894562/net-results-ncaa-volleyball-tournament-round-2
Here’s a nice article about the B10 games. It includes a link to the live NCAA bracket.
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B10 can still land all 4 spots in the Final Four.
As the B10 didn’t have a conference volleyball tournament, the NCAA Final Four in Columbus could work out to be the de facto B10 conference tournament this year.
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So far a lot of chalk as the 1, 2, 4 and 6 seeds made the Final Four. That puts #1 NE on one side and #2 MN on the other, so the B10 could still fill the final. #3 WI was upset by #6 Stanford after being up 2 sets to 0.
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http://www.offtackleempire.com/2016/12/16/13985074/NCAA-Volleyball-Final-Four-Results-Nebraska-Texas-Minnesota-Stanford
And both B10 teams got upset in the semifinals.
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8 of the last 10 NCAA volleyball titles won by current B10 schools. Granted, PSU with 6 of them (UNL with the other 2). Looks likely to be 9 of 11.
11 of the last 12 title matches have featured at least one current B10 school. 2013 had both PSU and Wisconsin, so current B10 schools have had half of all slots in the volleyball title matches of the past dozen years.
After this year, we may have a majority over the past 13 years. 5 different B10 schools. The rest of the NCAA has featured 7 different schools over that period.
In college football, the SEC has won 8 of the past 10 title games, taking half the slots and participating in all but one of the last 10.
Any other conferences been this dominant in any other sports?
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“Any other conferences been this dominant in any other sports?”
–The B1G has won the last 10 NCAA wrestling championships. 18 of the past 22, 21 of the past 25 & 30 of the past 39.
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In women’s gymnastics the SEC has won 10* of the last 12 (10* of 11 from 2005-2015) team titles.
* 2014 was a tie between UF and OU
The SEC has 19 of the 36 titles.
…
The AAC* in WBB with 6 of the past 8 titles and 10 of the past 18.
* Just UConn.
…
The B10 in women’s lacrosse with 10 of the past 12 and 17 of 22.
…
The P12 in men’s water polo with 19 straight and 43 of 48 titles.
The P12 in women’s water polo with all 16 titles.
The P12 used to have a lot of sports cornered but lately the SEC has broken through in many of them. Tennis (M & W), baseball softball, etc.
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Split between conferences, but Texas has finished 1st or 2nd in men’s swimming 8 of the last 9 years. Cal has finished 1st or 2nd the last 7 years. Michigan won the one year Texas or Cal didn’t.
1990 (when USC finished 2nd behind Texas) was the last time somebody other than Texas, Cal, Michigan, Stanford or Auburn finished in the top 2.
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Somewhat amazingly, B10 schools have won more men’s volleyball titles over the past 9 years (3) than Pac schools have (1).
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/12/07/one-of-disneys-most-popular-brands-has-investors-really-worried/
Article about ESPN struggles with cord cutters. Most interesting part is the fact that some investors are seriously debating whether or not Disney should spin off or sell ESPN, two things that would have been unthinkable even a couple years ago.
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2016/12/09/college-football-playoff-non-conference-tournaments
Andy Staples makes the case for early season OOC tournaments in CFB.
First the basics, then the rationale. The set-up is very simple: A series of four-team tournaments all over the country. Grab teams from different conferences and put them in semifinals. Replace the tune-up games and FCS cupcake games that often ring in the season with a dud for some of college football’s top teams, and replace them with meaningful action. Guarantee each entrant two games by pitting the winners of these “semifinals” against each other in one game the following week and the two losers in another.
You could do this with 32 teams, 40, 64 or as many as are interested in participating. And if the “championship” games are played in big venues with big TV audiences and sponsorships, you can bet a lot of teams would be interested in getting a slice of that pie.
Obviously there are questions and logistics to sort out with such a radical shift in the way college football’s season starts (like, say, how to decide which teams play where and against whom), but this set-up could do a lot of good for college football.
He goes on to list 6 pros to this approach. However, I think he downplayed the logistics issues. Many schools are very concerned about playing 7 home games. It’ll be hard to convince a bunch of them to give up a home game for this.
Week 1:
A vs B and C vs D (say A and C host)
Week 2:
A vs C and B vs D (A or C host again, either B or D host once, one school never hosts)
or
A vs D and B vs C (D and B host – everyone hosted once)
Half the time everyone would host once. Or you could stop having it as a tournament and guarantee everyone can host but not always have the two winners face off. You could also try a neutral site doubleheader each week if the money works.
I think you’d have better odds doing something more like the ACC/B10 challenge but without full participation.
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The only way this can work is HaH the first round (over 2 years) and neutral site the second round that draws enough fans. That would give a school 1 home, 1 away, and 2 neutral site games over 2 years. Some schools need 7 home games to make their finances work, but others would be fine with 6-5-1 if the neutral site game gets them close to the money they’d get from a home game. Most schools who draw more than 80K at home would be excluded. The tough part is that they still would have to be good teams (and likely close by) or there is no interest and you need 4 different conferences (or independents) represented. And only one of the 4 can be G5 (2 G5 teams just won’t draw much interest).
Still, it is possible.
For instance,
WVU+Pitt/UVa+UMD+Temple/Navy with the second round at FedEx.
Northwestern+ND+Army/Navy/Temple+Pitt/Syracuse ending in NJ
Houston+BYU+B12+SEC-W ending in TX somewhere.
FSU/Miami+ND+SEC (maybe one of the MS schools)+B10 (Northwestern?) ending in FL somewhere.
I suppose you could have 2 schools from the same conference if they don’t play each other that year.
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The second round almost has to be at a big NFL stadium. So really JerryWorld, FedEx, or NJ.
And you may be able to get schools to buy 15K for a double header (so you can charge more).
Teams would have to be attractive, though.
OU/Texas+LSU+ND+BYU/Boise in JerryWorld?
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tOSU’s Logan Stieber wins world title in the weight excluded from this year’s olympics. Shame he won’t get that medal, but the olympics is wrestling’s world championship every fourth year so he is world champ.
http://www.teamusa.org/USA-Wrestling/Features/2016/December/10/Logan-Stieber-wins-World-title-with-victory-in-Budapest-Hungary
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Congratulations to Army on finally ending their losing streak against Navy.
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Loki perhaps going to think about a trip down under?
Jon Wilner
Jon Wilner – Verified account @wilnerhotline
also told that Stanford-Rice in Australia to open ’17 close to a done deal. would be Rice home game
8:18 AM – 11 Dec 2016
13 RETWEETS14 LIKES
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Jon Wilner comments on the P12’s bowl selections.
Worst wait: Us. Accustomed to a Pac-12 team (or two) playing before Christmas, we won’t see the conference in action until Washington State takes the field in the Holiday Bowl on Dec. 27.
A reminder how good the B10 has it.
Worst assumption: Pac-12. Per an ESPN report prior to the selection announcement, the conference office wasn’t considering the possibility that Washington might be squeezed out. Hmmmm.
Why should they consider it? PSU was unlikely to pass them plus they have no control over the bowls anyway.
Worst first: Colorado. The Buffaloes became the first team to lose a spot in the New Year’s Six because of a defeat in its conference title game.
Ummm …. no.
Peach = semifinal
Fiesta = semifinal
Rose = P12 vs B10
Sugar = SEC vs B12
Orange = ACC vs ?
Cotton = ? vs ?
One ? must be a G5 champ.
CO would have to make the top 4, win the P12 or be one of the 2 highest at-larges. CO wasn’t in the top 4 before the CCG, so the loss didn’t impact those 4 spots. CO wasn’t the P12 leader, so the loss didn’t change things there. And if he did count that, then several others have lost a CCG and not made the NY6. That leaves the top 2 at-larges. CO was #8 before the CCG. They trailed MI and WI, both of whom did make the NY6 as at-larges. Maybe you could argue that they would’ve moved up past WI if only WI had a CCG loss, but that’s a really weak argument.
Best measuring stick: Every game. The short bowl lineup means every Pac-12 participant will face a Power Five opponent: Three from the Big Ten and one each from the SEC, ACC and Big 12.
Again a reminder of how good the B10 has it.
Worst assigned participant: Foster Farms Bowl. First year at Levi’s Stadium: Maryland. Second year: Five-win Nebraska. Now: 6-6 Indiana. At some point, maybe the Big Ten will stop sending duds.
The bowl is in the 5/6/7 slot for the B10, assuming 1 in the Rose and 1 in the Orange or Citrus (can’t have both). The P12 sends their #4 team. Due to 4 teams in the NY6 though, they got the #9 B10 team. Would getting MN or NW (the other teams in the 5/6/7 bowls) have been a significant improvement? Or is the complaint that the P12 agree to put their #4 versus #5/6/7 (or in this case 7/8/9)? At least IN will be excited to be in that bowl. We can’t help that the P12 is sending a ranked team there.
Worst backdrop: Rose Bowl. The tradition, the pageantry, the packed stadium at sunset … and tens of thousands trying to not think about Joe Paterno and Jerry Sandusky.
I’m not sure he needed to go there.
Worst slide: Stanford. Finished on a five-game winning streak and was ranked higher than both Washington State and Utah … but got passed over by both.
A private school with a small fan base isn’t an exciting choice for a bowl, especially when the fans are used to more success (5 NY6 bowls in the previous 6 seasons). 2 bowls in CA passed on Stanford to take WSU and Utah. The FF Bowl had Stanford just 2 years ago while it’s been over 10 years for Utah. The Holiday hasn’t had WSU or Stanford recently. But Stanford’s lack of traveling fans probably was an issue in a down season for the Cardinal.
Worst reminder of the Pac-12’s bowl agreements: Minnesota. The Gophers went 5-4 in league play, have not appeared in the committee rankings and tied for fourth place in their division. Yet they’re in the Holiday against a Pac-12 team that went 7-2, played for a division title and was in the committee rankings until two weeks ago.
First it was IN, now he’s bitching about MN. The 3/4 pool should be the Holiday and Outback, but the Holiday got a worse pick (MN) than the Music City (NE) which is nominally a 5/6/7 bowl slot.
What does Wilner expect when the B10 sends 4 teams to the NY6? Both WSU and MN went 8-4. MN lost to PSU, WI, NE and IA, all very respectable losses. WSU lost to UW, CO, Boise and EWU (I-AA). Maybe WSU was ranked because their 2 toughest games (CO and UW) were the last 2 of the schedule. Both lost 2 of their last 3. I’m not seeing the big gap here. S&P+ ranks them #33 and #37.
Is he expecting the B10 to send OSU, MI and PSU to every bowl?
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Frank remarked on this before, but since the B10 has much more passionate fanbases than the Pac (and the SEC doesn’t have reason to leave its territory come bowl season and the ACC is unlikely to send teams all the way to the West Coast), the B10 almost always sends lower selections to face higher selection Pac teams in those lower bowls. Play them in Pac territory, and a whupping should almost be expected.
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Yes, and Wilner should be just as aware of that. So why does he blame the B10 rather than the P12’s bowl agreements?
Besides, those B10 “duds” are 1-1 in the FF Bowl in the 2 years of this deal. The B10 is also 1-1 in the Holiday Bowl with a combined score of 66-65 in favor of the P12 (+3 and -2 in the 2 games). Both games seem to have worked out decently so far despite the records of the B10 teams. MN and IN are underdogs and both will probably lose, but Wilner could’ve chalked that up to the 4 teams in the NY6 instead of claiming it’s been bad every year.
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Well, Wilner’s still a homer (West Coast, if not Pac) writing for a Pac audience.
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Many out there think he’s an SEC honk, frustrated that he’s in the west.
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Brian:
Regarding CO, I think they got snubbed for the Rose Bowl. They won the south 8-1 vs 7-2, and reg season 10-2 vs 9-3 over USC. This is the first time I’d believe some at CU might be grumbling about their new conference. It’s reasonable to say they were punished for losing the CCG to the benefit of a long term PAC king.
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ccrider55,
“Regarding CO, I think they got snubbed for the Rose Bowl. They won the south 8-1 vs 7-2, and reg season 10-2 vs 9-3 over USC. This is the first time I’d believe some at CU might be grumbling about their new conference. It’s reasonable to say they were punished for losing the CCG to the benefit of a long term PAC king.”
I understand that line of thought, but I disagree. There are two reasons:
1. I don’t believe 11-1 UW makes the playoff over 11-2 PSU. The committee said that was their longest discussion and that was with UW adding a big win over CO to bolster their resume. The biggest complaint about UW was SOS so if you remove that win their best win was over #18 Stanford (9-3). Would they stay ahead of another P5 champ with wins over #3 and #8?
So UW would be in the Rose, not CO.
2. I don’t think the committee ever directly compared CO and USC until the final rankings. Remember their process – they take 6 teams and pick the top 3, then the add 3 more to the pool and pick #4-6, …. The previous week CO was #8 and USC was #11, keeping them in separate groups. The final week, they were #9 and #10 so the committee had to directly compare them for ranking. When they did, USC’s tougher schedule (AL & ND OOC, beat UW) and head to head win over CO probably mattered.
And before you mention it, the 9/10 positioning happened due to other results. #9 OU beat #10 OkSU to win the B12. That was going to move OU up past CO and OkSU down behind USC. Once the two were side by side in the rankings, the committee had to directly compare them. At that point the SOS and head to head factors would favor USC. It’s just my guess, but I think USC would’ve passed CO then.
So USC would still end up ranked higher even if UW did make the playoff.
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And you know my opinion of rankings vs placement. OSU and Oregon were “obviously” third and fourth two years ago.
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And you know my opinion of rankings vs placement. OSU and Oregon were “obviously” third and fourth two years ago.
By that line of reasoning, you ought to love this system. Three years ago, OSU and Oregon would have been just-as-obviously third and fourth, but with no opportunity to prove the voters wrong.
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Marc:
Using an obviously flawed system more broadly (4 playoff teams instead of 2), AND placing teams in non playoff games like Rose (regardless of conference placement) is suppose to make me feel better?
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ccrider55,
“And you know my opinion of rankings vs placement.”
Yes, but that’s the agreement the Rose has with the B10 and P12. They take the highest ranked team to replace a champ in the playoff to avoid any appearance of favoritism on their part. Thus the Rose Bowl couldn’t have snubbed CO. That means you’re claiming that the committee snubbed them.
Let’s consider that, since you can make a case for it. That leaves me with some questions:
1. Do you agree that being #9 and 10 was the correct placement for those 2 teams (not the order, just having one at #9 and the other at #10), or do you think one or both should’ve been ahead of or behind someone else?
I think the 8 teams ahead of them all deserve to be ranked ahead of them (5 P5 champs plus OSU, MI and WI). I think they are correctly ahead of the other 3 loss teams, too (none of them had a strong resume). I’ll go forward assuming you agree for now but feel free to correct me in a response.
2. That brings it down to USC and CO in a head to head comparison. You stated your argument above: “They won the south 8-1 vs 7-2, and reg season 10-2 vs 9-3 over USC.” Both of those facts are indisputable, but I think they deserve closer examination.
As for the overall record, both got hammered OOC by an elite team. Otherwise it comes down to the P12 results again, so it’s really just 1 point you’re making.
Both went 5-1 in division play and USC won head to head. So the difference is in the crossovers. CO went 4-0, in part because they missed UW. USC beat UW but lost at Stanford when USC was still starting their other QB. After changing QBs USC went 8-1. CO won at Stanford 10-5. Is that really a reason to choose CO over USC?
The other difference against common opponents was against Utah. USC lost at Utah by 4 points while CO won by 5 when hosting Utah. That’s basically a toss up to me due to home field advantage, especially since it was USC’s second straight road game and Utah won with a TD in the final minute. If USC wins that game, both have the same record and USC wins the South by a tiebreaker. Again, I’m not seeing enough difference in their resumes to really separate the two of them. USC having the head to head win, albeit by just 4 points at home, seems like a decent way to choose one over the other in this case.
Certainly it was close enough that the Rose Bowl should try to override the decision of the committee.
“OSU and Oregon were “obviously” third and fourth two years ago.”
OR was #2 and FSU #3 in 2014. Undefeated FSU deserved the benefit of the doubt over OSU. OSU beat AL and OR but I don’t think they deserved to be ranked above them entering the playoff. The best team all season isn’t always the team that’s hot late.
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“They won the south 8-1 vs 7-2, and reg season 10-2 vs 9-3 over USC.” Both of those facts are indisputable, but I think they deserve closer examination.”
I prefer using indisputable as the discriminator.
“Do you agree that being #9 and 10 was the correct placement for those 2 teams (not the order, just having one at #9 and the other at #10),”
I see no compelling reason to worry about rankings, beyond the assumption that ranking the top four is a playoff requirement currently.
“As for the overall record, both got hammered OOC by an elite team. Otherwise it comes down to the P12 results again, so it’s really just 1 point you’re making.”
Yup, one team got jumped over by a team behind it.
“USC beat UW but lost at Stanford when USC was still starting their other QB. After changing QBs USC went 8-1.”
CO was near even at Mich. before losing QB, and got blown out by UW while playing injured QB. Can we ignore these, too?
“CO won at Stanford 10-5. Is that really a reason to choose CO over USC?”
Winning isn’t winning?
Look, I don’t have a rooting interest in either but it seems there is a breakdown in conference solidarity when you get jumped – within division.
In wrestling some/most conferences use a “true” second (or fourth, or sixth) extra match when a NC qualifying spot is at stake – but only when they haven’t already met to reach the placement matches. If one of the teams USC had not faced had won the north and had lost to CO in the CCG then (assuming a “true” second game isn’t happening) a judgment/selection might be appropriate.
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ccrider55,
“I prefer using indisputable as the discriminator.”
The facts are indisputable. Your conclusion is not.
“I see no compelling reason to worry about rankings, beyond the assumption that ranking the top four is a playoff requirement currently.”
Well you should see a reason since the Rose Bowl says they will always take the highest ranked team to replace a lost champion.
“Yup, one team got jumped over by a team behind it.”
Behind it in one sense only, and not the sense that the Rose Bowl is obligated to care about. The P12 could’ve made a different agreement with the Rose Bowl, but they didn’t.
“CO was near even at Mich. before losing QB, and got blown out by UW while playing injured QB. Can we ignore these, too?”
USC didn’t suffer an injury, they chose to switch starters. They immediately improved upon doing so. Since that is the version of USC the Rose Bowl would be getting, I’m guessing they think it’s relevant.
“Winning isn’t winning?”
Winning one ugly game isn’t everything. It’s a very weak reason to override the opinion of people whose job it is to decide which team is better.
“Look, I don’t have a rooting interest in either but it seems there is a breakdown in conference solidarity when you get jumped – within division.”
Not when that’s the deal your conference signed with the bowl. The Rose gets the highest ranked team if the champion is gone, not the highest in the P12 standings. The Rose Bowl recognizes that the whole season matters so they want the best team period.
“If one of the teams USC had not faced had won the north and had lost to CO in the CCG then (assuming a “true” second game isn’t happening) a judgment/selection might be appropriate.”
But USC beating head to head isn’t relevant because they’re in the same division?
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“But USC beating head to head isn’t relevant because they’re in the same division?”
Sure, as a tie breaker.
They weren’t tied.
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ccrider55,
“Sure, as a tie breaker.
They weren’t tied.”
They would have been if CO had to play UW during the season like USC did.
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Or SC could have beaten Utah and Stanford in actually played games like Colorado actually did. No speculation necessary.
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It’s not speculation because CO did play UW and lost handily.
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“It’s not speculation because CO did play UW and lost handily.”
It is as regards a reg season conf matchup.
And USC played and lost to Utah and Stanford.
8-1 vs 7-2. Results, not speculation. That’s how standings (should) work.
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So it’s speculation because the game was a week later? It’s no different than them playing in the final week of the regular season.
And standings do work that way, they’re just completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand. The Rose Bowl takes the highest ranked team to replace a champ lost to the playoff. That’s the deal the P12 (and the B10) has with them. You can say the P12 should change the deal, but they haven’t and I doubt the Rose wants to. The Rose needs the best possible teams to draw fan interest when the game isn’t a semifinal.
So going back to the origin of this discussion, who snubbed CO? The Rose had to pick USC. The P12 agreed to a system that rewards the highest ranked team not knowing who it would be. The committee evaluated them and felt USC had a better body of work. You don’t even seem to dispute that the committee followed their procedures correctly.
Your actual complaint seems to be that the system should favor conference standings over rankings, not that CO was snubbed. To me that’s a completely different discussion. From the conference’s point of view, I mostly agree with you in this case. Some factors to consider:
1. This could lead to taking an 8-4 (8-1) team over a 10-2 (7-2) team. That could lead to an ugly Rose Bowl.
2. What if the top options are in different divisions? Is overall conference record really the way to decide, especially if one division was much tougher than the other?
3. Does a division winner always get favored over the runner up from the other division regardless of record?
4. How would the Rose Bowl feel about getting lower ranked teams? They have to sell this product and you’re intentionally giving them lesser “ingredients” to work with. It might also mean losing more of the games which hurts the entire conference.
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“The Rose needs the best possible teams to draw fan interest when the game isn’t a semifinal.”
You don’t think CO’s first Rose Bowl would have been enthusiastically attended?
“So going back to the origin of this discussion, who snubbed CO?”
The committee punished a participant that won the right to play in ccg, favoring one who placed behind it. And ranked them next to each other. It’s not like they said they’re 9th and 15th. The only thing effected was RB participation.
1: not the case here.
2 & 3: not the case here, but that would seem a reasonable case for using tie breakers with rankings as one possibility.
4: I doubt the Rose would mind an enthused fan base of a resurgent team in it first chance for Roses, and a large number of alumni in the state.
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The committee punished a participant that won the right to play in ccg
The committee isn’t in the punishment business. Their job is to rank teams, using criteria dictated by the conferences themselves.
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ccrider55,
“You don’t think CO’s first Rose Bowl would have been enthusiastically attended?”
I’m talking policy, not one individual year. They can’t change how they pick teams from year to year or everyone would throw a fit about favoritism. And I do think USC will draw higher TV ratings.
“The committee punished a participant that won the right to play in ccg, favoring one who placed behind it.”
The committee looks at the whole season, not just conference standings. Just look at OSU in the playoff and PSU not because the whole body of work shows OSU did more. The committee didn’t punish CO for losing, the OU/OkSU removed the team from between them so the committee had to compare them directly. The guidelines for the committee include head to head (USC) and SOS (USC) as tiebreakers when comparing 2 otherwise equivalent teams. If CO had won the CCG they would’ve gotten the Rose, so in that sense you could say they were “punished” for losing the CCG. But if the P12 hadn’t had a CCG then USC still would’ve ranked higher in the final rankings, so I don’t see any punishment.
“And ranked them next to each other.”
Where else were they supposed to rank them? Make a solid case for either one of them being higher or lower than 9/10.
“The only thing effected was RB participation.”
That’s not the committee’s concern. They are supposed to rank the teams as best they can and let the chips fall where they may. They don’t consider conference affiliation when doing the rankings despite what fans want to believe.
“1: not the case here.
2 & 3: not the case here, but that would seem a reasonable case for using tie breakers with rankings as one possibility.
4: I doubt the Rose would mind an enthused fan base of a resurgent team in it first chance for Roses, and a large number of alumni in the state.”
It doesn’t matter if it factors in this year. You are asking them to change their policy. They can’t have a different policy every year, so you have to look at the potential unintended consequences of your proposal.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2016/12/11/jim-delany-college-football-playoff-expansion/95309942/
Jim Delany reiterates that the CFP isn’t expanding anytime soon.
We bring it up again to begin to answer a question that has popped up repeatedly over the last few days (to be fair, it never really goes away): Will recent events prompt a push for the playoff to expand?
Short answer: No.
It made for a nice run on Twitter, the NCAA president saying he wants the playoff to expand to eight. Except, of course, that Mark Emmert has no say in the matter. The NCAA is not involved in the FBS postseason, other than to certify the bowls.
…
“I hear it from a lot of people,” Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott said. “But we’ve spent a lot of time designing this, looking at the pros and cons of different models. There’s a lot of conviction … that four was the right number, so I do not envision any discussion about expansion anytime soon.”
Scott’s stance was echoed last week in conversations with USA TODAY Sports by Delany, Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey (ACC commissioner John Swofford has advocated an eight-team playoff, but is OK with four). That’s significant. There won’t be change until a majority of the Power Five decision-makers want it, and they don’t.
They’re splitting $500 million annually. While the sum would increase if they expanded, it’s unclear by how much (and if part of the increase might be offset, potentially, by other factors; as one example: would conference championship games continue?). There are concerns: more wear and tear on players, more missed class time, a devaluation of the regular season and so on.
Whether or not these are legitimate depends on perspective – but they’re legitimately held, anyway, by many across the college landscape. Delany likes to describe it as “too much ice cream isn’t good for anybody” – the idea being, eight might be too much of a good thing, with unintended consequences.
“I understand the entertainment value of an eight-team playoff,” Delany said. “But we’re just really three years into a 12-year arrangement. It only took about three months to start this discussion (about expanding), and I’m sure I will be viewed as too conservative on this point. But that’s how I feel. That’s how our (Big Ten) members feel. That’s how our coaches feel, that’s how our athletic directors feel and that’s how our presidents feel. So I’m going to reflect that, for sure.”
…
But in the third year of that 12-year contract, there is no impetus for change, and here’s why:
The first two editions of the playoff featured conference champions only. One conference got left out each year, but that’s simple arithmetic: four slots, five Power Five conferences.
While this season marked the first non-champion in the field, it didn’t change the math: four conferences were still represented. Other than the Big 12’s recurring angst – the condition may be chronic – the system has not yet been significantly stressed with the selections in any year, including this one.
“I’d say most people generally think we have the four best teams,” Scott said.
…
For real controversy – the kind that might eventually prompt expansion – we’d probably have had to see multiple teams from one conference in the bracket. This year, if Ohio State and Penn State had both made the field, the Pac-12 would have joined the Big 12 on the outside looking in.
If that happens more than a couple of times, the commissioners might start getting antsy. It’s one thing to know some league will be excluded each year. It’s another if two (or more) get left out, and if it begins to become a trend.
But that hasn’t happened yet, not even once. Until then, bring up expansion, and Delany will begin talking about frozen dessert again.
“I think what we have here is good,” he said. “It’s hard, because there’s not unlimited ice cream.”
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I have always believed there was near zero chance that the playoff would expand before the 12-year deal expires. There would need to be a real crisis for that to happen. CFB is a very conservative sport: people are going to want a lot more than 3 years of evidence before they consider changing it.
Between them, the BCS and its quite similar predecessors, the Bowl Alliance and the Bowl Coalition, lasted over two decades. I would bet on the 4-team playoff lasting at least that long.
We must always bear in mind that some of the very people who said there would never be a playoff, were among those who eventually supported it. That includes Delany and a number of the Big Ten presidents whom he reports to. Any claim that such-and-such will never happen must be taken with a grain of salt.
But I do believe it will happen quite slowly, if it ever does — enough so, that by the time any decision is made, it will be different people deciding. Delany himself is probably going to retire before the current 12-year deal is up.
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Real crisis. SEC or Big 10 get left out.
We’ll get to 8 real quick in that case. ESPN will push it.
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bullet,
“Real crisis. SEC or Big 10 get left out.
We’ll get to 8 real quick in that case. ESPN will push it.”
I think it’s only the SEC being left out that would do it (or 2 SEC teams getting in). B10 fans weren’t ready to revolt in 2014 if OSU didn’t make it. But let the SEC champ get left out and you’ll see riots in the streets.
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https://theringer.com/college-football-playoff-alabama-sec-schedule-impact-76f40d4d16b2
Bama ain’t played nobody. Or so says the article.
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https://theringer.com/whats-the-ideal-size-for-the-college-football-playoff-434ff209aa2f
What is the right size for the CFP?
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http://247sports.com/Season/2017-Football/CompositeTeamRankings?Conference=Big-Ten
It’s less than 2 months until Signing Day, so here’s a look at where the B10 schools stand now.
B10 only (Rank. School – # of commits, average rating out of 100):
1. OSU – 17, 95.72
2. MI – 21, 89.45
3. UMD – 25, 85.96
4. PSU – 16, 88.32
5. MSU – 17, 85.97
6. NE – 14, 87.19
7. RU – 19, 84.55
8. NW – 18, 85.07
9. WI – 15, 85.54
10. IA – 13, 85.92
11. MN – 16, 83.23
12. IN – 16, 82.66
13. IL – 12, 84.69
14. PU – 14, 82.06
The schools are ranked in order of total points for the class.
National ranks:
2. OSU
9. MI
15. UMD
17. PSU
26. MSU
29. NE
30. RU
33. NW
35. WI
43. IA
54. MN
57. IN
62. IL
69. PU
By average recruit rating (and split into tiers):
1. OSU – 17, 95.72
2. MI – 21, 89.45
3. PSU – 16, 88.32
4. NE – 14, 87.19
5. MSU – 17, 85.97
6. UMD – 25, 85.96
7. IA – 13, 85.92
8. WI – 15, 85.54
9. NW – 18, 85.07
10. IL – 12, 84.69
11. RU – 19, 84.55
12. MN – 16, 83.23
13. IN – 16, 82.66
14. PU – 14, 82.06
There’s a lot of time to go, but I thought IL might be doing a little better with Smith there. The average ratings is decent for them, but I thought they might have more commits. I’m positively surprised that PU held together even a class of that level with the coaching change and yet another terrible season.
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Well, close to an 80 average is almost MAC-level. Even with their troubles, I’d expect PU to outrecruit MAC schools.
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PU is recruiting like an upper-tier AAC school (like Cincy) or bottom-tier P5 school.
Upper-tier MAC schools are around 80.
I personally think that the average points give you a better sense of the talent differential than absolute rankings.
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Richard,
“I personally think that the average points give you a better sense of the talent differential than absolute rankings.”
They tell you different things. The mean gives you a decent sense of quality, but team scores usually aren’t linear (higher-rated players carry more weight in the team score). Having 20 4* players is different from having 10 5* and 10 3* players. Also, there is some value in quantity. 20 4* and 15 4* are not the same class either. Obviously every school approaches things differently (NW redshirts lots of people and has very little roster management, other schools churn through more players), but having more bodies coming in can help fill holes more easily.
I think the mean is a useful way for NW fans to evaluate their classes since they’ll always tend to have smaller classes. I think total scores are useful for similar schools to compare to each other (say for all the kings, or all the princes, etc).
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No, having 10 5* and 10 3* isn’t the same as having 20 4* but is one definitively or empirically better than the other?
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Richard,
“No, having 10 5* and 10 3* isn’t the same as having 20 4* but is one definitively or empirically better than the other?”
Yes. And that’s why you use more than 1 measure to evaluate a class.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/eye-on-college-football/21641769
The team should expect about 2.67 All-Americans from the split class versus 1.25 from the 4* class. That’s a significant difference, because it also impacts the number of starters and other things. It has a major impact on the NFL draft, too.
http://www.footballstudyhall.com/2014/2/5/5382140/recruiting-matters-why-the-sites-get-the-rankings-right
Game results show that teams with higher ranked classes defeat teams with lower ranked recruiting classes at a high rate.
And realize, there are generally about 30 5* recruits each year. For 1 school to land 10 of them would be unprecedented. That class would be ranked very, very highly.
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There is at least a good argument that the number of 5 star and 4 recruits is more important than the average score. At this time, Ohio State has 6 five stars. Iowas has one five star. The B1G does not have any other 5 Stars. Here are the numbers of 5 and 4 star recruits as of now (based on 247)
Total 5 star 4 star 3 star
Recruits
Ohio State 17 6 10 1
Michigan 21 0 13 8
Maryland 26 0 4 18
Penn State 16 0 8 8
Michigan State 17 0 3 14
Nebraska 14 0 3 11
Rutgers 19 0 3 16
Northwestern 18 0 0 18
Wisconsin 15 0 1 10
Iowa 13 1 0 12
Minnesota 19 0 0 16
Indiana 16 0 0 14
Illinois 12 0 0 12
Purdue 15 0 0 14
The other five B1G schools do not have any 4 or 5 stars at this point.
With regard to Rutgers, while 3 kids ranked as four stars is hardly a coup (if they stay), I believe that they have recruited exactly one four star in the last three or four years and he was a reject who had his scholarship pulled by Tennessee, spent one year at Rutgers and did not play at all. He then transferred.
Further on RU agony, in the past 4 years (prior to this year), they have recruited exactly one player from the NJ top ten in one year and zero the other three years. So over 4 years, they have one NJ top ten player out of 40. (As of this time, RU has two of the top 5 NJ players and are favored for a couple more top 10 recruits in NJ. Let’s see who signs)
Michigan has recruited the top player in NJ at least two of the last three years. Michigan is favored to also get the kid who might be number 1 this year. I say might be, since this kid tore his ACL. He is still ranked 1st by some services (including 247) and lower by others.
The kid who other services rank as number 1 in NJ is committed to RU and claims that he is a hard commit. It does not hurt that his brother is a lower level 3 star and he is committed to RU. Something of a package deal it appears. Personally, I would gladly take an 82.8 in other to get his brother who is a 93.9.
Michigan Heisman nominee Jabrill Peppers was never going to RU. Projected PSU Heisman nominee for next year, Saquon Barkley was an RU commit, who decommitted and went to Penn State. The top running back in NJ this year was a high 3 star RU commit, but has flipped to Wisconsin.
One reason that UMd is doing so well is that this is a very strong year for Maryland high school football (at least based on 247 composite rankings)
Which of the lower level B1G schools are likely to finish strong? Certainly, I would expect Penn State, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Iowa to pick up some more good kids. Ohio State and Michigan will probably add to their top level classes. Maryland, with 26 recruits, could pick up one two more (and they are favored for at least one more top level Maryland kid).
I would guess that Minnesota , Indiana and Purdue will not climb very much.
What about Illinois? Only 12 kids? Can they fill in with some good kids or is this recruiting class in trouble? The Illini average rating is not super terrible, but they will probably need to be adding several more kids.
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I have no idea what happened to the pagination. The first number after each school is total recruits, then 5 stars, 4 stars and 3 stars.
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Wisconsin, Iowa, and Northwestern pull in only a handful of 4/5-stars each class yet they do alright.
Certainly, the more of those, the better, but I don’t think (outside of all-world athletes like Peppers or a stud QB) that they are several times more important.
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It’s remarkable that Lane Kiffin has accepted the head coaching job at Florida Atlantic, which this writer describes as “desperation”.
There are obviously downsides to Kiffin: he was one-and-done at Tennessee, and got booted out unceremoniously at USC. Still, despite a checkered history, you figure that the guy “fresh off three SEC titles,” who “tutored four Heisman Trophy winners and has three national championship rings,” wouldn’t be taking a pay cut to coach at FAU, which didn’t even play football until 2001.
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The way he left Tennessee is haunting him.
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Right, because Tennessee is normally considered a destination job — not a place you leave because a better offer comes along. But in this case there is no doubt whatsoever that Kiffin will be on the first plane out of Boca Raton that he can get. Tennessee fans had good reasons to think that Kiffin was there to stay, assuming he succeeded. No one at FAU believes that.
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It’s not so much that he left Tennessee. According to USA Today, after talking to people who were at Tennessee and USC when Kiffin coached there, Lane was considered radioactive by major college programs.
Houston was the only other program that had serious in Lane as a HC.
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http://www.big12sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=10410&ATCLID=211354689
The B12 released their 2017 schedule. They had to move some major rivalries to protect the CCG. For example, Bedlam is now 11/4 instead of 11/25.
Here are the last 2 weeks:
November 18
Iowa State at Baylor
Kansas State at Oklahoma State
Oklahoma at Kansas
Texas at West Virginia
TCU at Texas Tech
November 25
Baylor at TCU
Texas Tech at Texas
Iowa State at Kansas State
Kansas at Oklahoma State
West Virginia at Oklahoma
Bedlam has decided the B12 winner in 4 of the last 6 years, so it had to move. Still, I’m not sure a rematch 4 weeks later is all that much better. And some of these games could become rematches.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18272514/wake-finds-radio-announcer-alum-leaked-game-plans-opponents
Talk about having no class. A former WF player and assistant coach turned team radio announcer has been determined to be the one who leaked plays to UL and several other teams.
Elrod played for Wake Forest from 1993-1997 and was later hired as a graduate assistant under Jim Grobe for 11 seasons. He was not retained by current head coach Dave Clawson.
He joined the Wake Forest IMG Radio Network in 2014 as a football analyst after Clawson took over.
…
In announcing the results of the investigation Tuesday, the school cited emails, text messages and phone records in concluding that Elrod had tried to give out the confidential information.
I wonder if many teams will further restrict media access due to this.
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I wonder if many teams will further restrict media access due to this.
In the long run, I suspect not: this is such a bizarre case, not likely to be repeated.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18279216/louisville-cardinals-admit-receiving-leaked-plays-prior-game-vs-wake-forest-demon-deacons
UL admits that one of their coaches received the info from the WF guy. They try to downplay it, but I think a coach would be expected to refuse the information and report to someone that this had happened. Is this really much different from point-shaving? Was the WF guy just mad or was he paid? This would be an easy way for bad people to impact sports gambling.
Louisville athletic director Tom Jurich said in a statement Wednesday that offensive coordinator Lonnie Galloway received “a few plays” from former Wake Forest radio announcer Tommy Elrod, who has since been fired for leaking confidential information to the Demon Deacons’ opponents.
Galloway and Elrod have known each other since 2007 and worked together on the Wake Forest football staff from 2011 to 2012.
“Lonnie received a call from Elrod during the week of the Wake Forest game, and some information was shared with him that week,” Jurich said in a statement. “Among the communication were a few plays that were sent and then shared with our defensive staff. None of the special plays were run during the course of the game. Our defense regularly prepares for similar formations every week in their normal game plan.
“Any other information that may have been discussed was nothing that our staff had not already seen while studying Wake Forest in their preparations for the game and the material was not given any further attention. I’m disappointed that this issue has brought undue attention to our football staff as we prepare for our upcoming bowl game.”
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Did GOP operatives turn down Dem strategy data and analysis that was hacked/stolen by Russians and leaked to Wikileaks (then leaked to GOP operatives)?
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Feel free to punish them, too.
This was essentially insider trading and sports have explicit rules about the integrity of the game and sportsmanship.
Army has now admitted receiving information too as they have a former WF coach on staff. IN also has a former WF coach on staff but they haven’t said anything yet.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/wakeyleaks-case-closed-wake-forest-radio-analyst-gave-game-plans-to-opponents/
Now the ACC is getting involved, as they should.
“Protecting competitive integrity is fundamental to the Atlantic Coast Conference. The conference office is in the process of obtaining the internal findings from Wake Forest University. Based on the information provided, and any other information obtained, the league office will perform its due diligence, and as necessary, additional discussions and actions will occur.”
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Correction:
Army has been contacted by WF about this but hasn’t admitted any wrongdoing. IN has not acknowledged being contacted by WF.
The radio guy I heard either misstated the facts or has info nobody else does.
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The rules in politics are a lot looser. And some (I won’t give any examples) think the rules don’t apply to them and that its ok for them to tilt the playing field by getting information before the start of a contest.
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The rules in politics are a lot looser.
Not only that, there are no vacated wins, even if it turns out later that the rules were actually violated.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18286777/virginia-tech-hokies-received-wake-forest-demon-decons-insider-intel
Add VT to the list of schools that got info from the WF radio guy.
Virginia Tech athletic director Whit Babcock said Thursday that a former assistant coach at the school received “game plan information” from Wake Forest radio broadcaster Tommy Elrod before the schools played in 2014.
…
It is unclear which Virginia Tech assistant received information from Elrod, who has since been fired by IMG Radio Network and banned from Wake Forest athletics and facilities.
“We have recently been made aware that a former Wake Forest staff member provided one of our former assistant coaches some game-plan information prior to our game in 2014,” Babcock said in a statement. “We have no indication at this time that any of this information was shared with any other staff members, nor utilized during the game itself. However, should new information become available, we will be forthcoming and transparent.
“We hold ourselves to a higher standard at Virginia Tech. We are disappointed and embarrassed that this type of information was distributed to, and apparently received by, one of our former assistant coaches. The distribution of this type of information among peers or rivals is wrong and not in the vein of sportsmanship and integrity that we demand and expect for this. I personally apologize to the coaches, student-athletes, administration, alumni, students and fans of Wake Forest University.”
Babcock continued, “I am also aware of former head coach Frank Beamer’s and current defensive coordinator Bud Foster’s public remarks yesterday as to having no knowledge of the situation, and I believe both of them wholeheartedly. It should also be noted that there is no known connection of any kind to our current coaching staff, who were hired in 2015. We will, of course, comply fully with the ACC and all relevant parties as this unfortunate situation unfolds.”
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http://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2016/12/78027/ohio-states-path-to-big-ten-championship-and-playoff-should-be-much-easier-in-2017
A quick look ahead to 2017. This has a chart comparing the schedules for OSU, MI and PSU as they seem likely to battle for the East, perhaps with MSU in the mix. It looks better on the website, obviously.
Date – Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State:
Sept. 2 – at Indiana*, Florida [Arlington, TX], Akron
Sept. 9 – Oklahoma, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh
Sept. 16 – Army, Air Force, Georgia State
Sept. 23 – UNLV, at Purdue, at Iowa
Sept. 30 – at Rutgers, BYE, Indiana
Oct. 7- Maryland, Michigan State, at Northwestern
Oct. 14 – at Nebraska, at Indiana, BYE
Oct. 21 – BYE, at Penn State, Michigan
Oct. 28 – Penn State, Rutgers, at Ohio State
Nov. 4 – at Iowa, Minnesota, at Michigan State
Nov. 11 – Michigan State, at Maryland, Rutgers
Nov. 18 – Illinois, at Wisconsin, Nebraska
Nov. 25 – at Michigan, Ohio State, at Maryland
* – The OSU @ IN game has been moved to Thursday, August 31 from Saturday September 2. That means OSU will have some extra time to prepare for OU in week 2.
PSU has a soft OOC schedule again with Pitt as the toughest game. OSU and MI each have 1 tough game (OU, UF). The rest of OSU’s OOC schedule is weak while MI’s is a little tougher.
All 3 get their bye at a good time.
Toughest stretches:
OSU – PSU, @IA, MSU
MI – @WI, OSU or MSU, @IN, @PSU
PSU – MI, @OSU, @MSU
All the East teams get 5 B10 road games.
OSU, PSU and WI were all very young this year, so they should be very good next year too. MI will lose a ton on defense and some on offense, so they may take a step back (not a big one, though).
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Northwestern, like Bucky, will lose very few (but key) seniors.
Possibly the winner of NU-Wisconsin vs. the winner of OSU-PSU for the B10 title.
However:
Didn’t Iowa return almost all skill players from 2015?
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Huskers lose 28 seniors.
Some are key ones.
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Also, is UF a tougher opponent than Pitt? The Gators certainly have a bigger name, but this year, F/+ has
Pitt as a better team than UF.
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UF has a great defense but suffered from QB injuries. You have to assume the injuries were a fluke, so the offense should improve next year. Pitt was good on offense but terrible on D, and they just lost their OC.
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2016/12/14/minnesota-football-players-suspended
MN has suspended 10 players indefinitely but won’t say why. It is apparently related to their ongoing Title IX investigation of an incident that happened earlier in the year. 4 of the players were suspended for 3 games earlier due to an incident but were reinstated when no charges were pressed.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18288753/minnesota-golden-gophers-players-boycotting-football-activities-suspensions-10-teammates
Now the other MN players are boycotting all football activities.
Minnesota football players announced Thursday night that they were boycotting all football activities in the wake of the suspensions this week of 10 teammates.
…
In a statement read by senior wide receiver Drew Wolitarsky, the players said: “The boycott will remain effective until due process is followed and suspensions for all 10 players involved are lifted.”
The statement said the players were forced to take action after an unsatisfactory meeting with athletic director Mark Coyle in which they “wanted answers but received misleading statements.”
Coyle and university president Eric W. Kaler released a joint statement after the players’ announcement that read: “We understand that a lot of confusion and frustration exists as a result of this week’s suspension of 10 Gopher Football players from all team activities. The reality is that not everyone can have all of the facts, and unfortunately the University cannot share more information due to federal laws regarding student privacy.
“We fully support our Gopher football players and all of our student-athletes. Situations like this are always difficult and the decision was made in consultation with and has the full support of President Eric Kaler. The decision was based on facts and is reflective of the University’s values. We want to continue an open dialogue with our players and will work to do that over the coming days. It’s important that we continue to work together as we move through this difficult time.”
The players are demanding a closed-door meeting with members of the board of regents without the presence of Coyle or Kaler.
“We got no answers to our questions about why these kids are suspended, when they were just found not guilty by the law,” Wolitarsky told reporters following the players’ statement. “He [Coyle] basically told us that he didn’t have answers, and that led us to believe that this is kind of unjust.”
…
Wolitarsky also asked that the Holiday Bowl committee “be patient” while the team waited for a resolution to the suspensions. The coaching staff is planning to come in tomorrow, a source tells Adam Rittenberg, but there isn’t expected to be another team practice until players get their meeting.
…
“We are concerned that our brothers have been named publicly with reckless disregard in violation of their constitutional rights,” Wolitarsky said. “We are now compelled to speak for our team and take back our program.”
1. Maybe they need to teach their players what the Constitution actually says. You don’t have a right not to be named as an alleged violator of rules/laws.
2. The Holiday Bowl should go to the NCAA and ask about a replacement team. Maybe all the lower B10 teams bump up a spot, maybe some 5-7 team gets a great bowl spot.
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That was a good response by the president. Very difficult situation for them. I knew Missouri’s boycott was the opening of Pandora’s box. Maybe Grambling was the start, but they weren’t as high profile and their’s didn’t have the same amount of controversy (unsafe conditions in their facilities).
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This could be the beginning of the end of college football. 30 years from now, this moment may be remembered. I know the strike that cancelled the World Series broke my bond with baseball which used to be my favorite professional sport.
And with FSU, Notre Dame, Missouri, Montana, Baylor and others, boycotting in favor of people who have been ordered to keep their distance from a woman they were alleged to have gang raped is not a good look.
Whether they raped the woman or not, they clearly exhibited bad judgement that makes the University of Minnesota look bad and Minnesota has a duty, not just a right, to make sure their university is represented well.
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This could be the beginning of the end of college football. 30 years from now, this moment may be remembered.
If the players carry out their threat to boycott the game, it could be a transformative moment. Suppose the next step is a major bowl, or perhaps a playoff game? What about the Final Four? The implications are not fun to think about.
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The President says one thing and the coach says another. Also not a good look. They need to fire the coach. Its one thing to be respectful. Its another to be as supportive as he was.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18289509/northern-illinois-huskies-replace-minnesota-golden-gophers-holiday-bowl
NIU would be the replacement team based on APR.
NIU had the next highest APR of the 5-7 teams, but the NCAA’s Football Oversight Committee would have to officially approve the Huskies replacing Minnesota, if the Gophers decided not to play, sources said.
The Gophers are slated to play Washington State on Dec. 27 in San Diego.
The Huskies would “likely play” in the game if a decision could be reached in the next 48 hours, a source told ESPN. Among the challenges for NIU, a source said, would be getting its student-athletes to the San Diego bowl since NIU’s commencement was last weekend and some student-athletes have already left campus. Other challenges would be having enough practices and preparation time to prepare for Washington State.
Sources said moving the Holiday Bowl back a few days to allow NIU more preparation time is not an option for several reasons, including existing travel plans by Washington State, local accommodation and television commitments, and other factors.
The bowl should ask for permission today and should put MN on a 48 hour clock. If the team doesn’t commit to play by Sunday at noon, tell NIU to get ready.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18289509/northern-illinois-huskies-replace-minnesota-golden-gophers-holiday-bowl
NIU would be the replacement team based on APR.
NIU had the next highest APR of the 5-7 teams, but the NCAA’s Football Oversight Committee would have to officially approve the Huskies replacing Minnesota, if the Gophers decided not to play, sources said.
The Gophers are slated to play Washington State on Dec. 27 in San Diego.
The Huskies would “likely play” in the game if a decision could be reached in the next 48 hours, a source told ESPN. Among the challenges for NIU, a source said, would be getting its student-athletes to the San Diego bowl since NIU’s commencement was last weekend and some student-athletes have already left campus. Other challenges would be having enough practices and preparation time to prepare for Washington State.
Sources said moving the Holiday Bowl back a few days to allow NIU more preparation time is not an option for several reasons, including existing travel plans by Washington State, local accommodation and television commitments, and other factors.
The bowl should put MN on a 48 hour clock. Either the team 100% commits to play by noon on Sunday or NIU gets the call to get ready.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/ex-florida-state-qb-who-punched-a-woman-is-first-to-join-lane-kiffin-at-fau/
Lane Kiffin is off to a great start. His first “recruit” is a QB FSU kicked out because video surfaced of him punching a woman in the face. To be fair to Kiffin, the player visited FAU before he was hired and Kiffin’s superiors were OK with it.
Though Johnson is the first player to sign with FAU under Kiffin, he visited the program last weekend before Kiffin was hired. According to Bruce Feldman of Fox Sports, Johnson met with FAU’s president and athletic director during his visit.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/gallery/2016-bowl-schedule-matchups-game-times-start-tv-best-worst-games-121516
We have officially reached the point of too many bowl games.
How bad is this game? It isn’t actually being broadcast on TV and instead will only be streamed online.
The article is a list of the 7 most unwatchable bowl game, and that game only ranked #4. The B10 is playing in 2 of the 7 (UMD vs BC, IA vs UF).
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http://mgoblog.com/diaries/fixing-way-b1g-chooses-champion
Here’s a solution worse than the problem – a fan’s plan to change how the B10 champ is determined so the best team is “always” the B10 champ.
The Big Ten has a problem this season. Nobody thinks that the winner of the B1G championship game is the best team in the league. Part of this is because the divisions are unbalanced (which will happen because things change). Another part of this is because there are only 9 games for each team in a 14-team conference. Lastly, non-conference games don’t matter. I know College football is not the NFL, but the NFL uses overall record to determine division champs, and division record as a tie-breaker. Penn State lost to Pitt. 8-4 Pitt. That should matter. Instead, the B1G is all, “Why does it even matter that Penn State is lost in a hole?”
The task of determining the “conference champion” must align with determining the “best team in the conference”. This is especially important in a limited-access playoff. The only reason that people are even giving a second B1G team to get in is because none of the other leagues have two clear top tier teams. The goal of every conference should be to have their conference championship game be a de-facto play-in game for the conference championship. The eye test here says that OSU and Michigan are the best teams in the league. Can we construct a system that generates that result?
Why do these things need to be aligned? The CCG winner is always the champion whether they were the better team all year or not (see 2011 WI).
A possible solution:
Many of these things can be solved by changing how we determine the conference champion, and re-structuring some things a bit.
1. Play 10 conference games. Five at home, five on the road. No more uneven home/road splits.
2. Structure non-conference play. You must play one team from a P5 conference, and one team from a G5 conference. Practically speaking, this means that each team will have 6 or 7 home games in a season (because P5 teams will want a home-and-home). Notre Dame should be considered as a P5 team since they are ACC adjacent. And it isn’t like you can tell me that they are worse than the dregs of the P5, even when they go through down stretches. Still, to hell with Notre Dame .
3. Use overall record as baseline comparison. All 2-way ties are broken with the head to head result. Three (or more) way ties are broken according to the typical B1G tiebreaking procedure. (1. Record against each other. 2. Record within the Conference. 3. Record within the division. 4. Higher CFP ranking.)
4. Play division games first, then re-align divisions into a top division (Top 4 teams from East and West) and a bottom division (Bottom 3 teams from East and West). Have teams in the Top Division play all of the other teams in the Top Division that they haven’t played yet.
5. Conference championship games is a rematch between the #1 and #2 teams in the top division (at a neutral site).
So a season would look like this:
Week 1: P5/G5 opponent
Week 2: G5/P5 opponent
Week 3: East/West division game 1
Week 4: East/West division game 2
Week 5: East/West division game 3
Week 6: East/West division game 4
Week 7: East/West division game 5
Week 8: East/West division game 6
Week 9: Bye week. Realign divisions
Week 10: Top/Bottom division game 1 – Played at West Home field
Week 11: Top/Bottom division game 2 – Played at East Home field
Week 12: Top/Bottom division game 3 – Played at West Home field
Week 13: Top/Bottom division game 4 – Played at East Home field (Bottom division repeats week 10 opponent at other team’s field)
Week 14: Conference Championship (Rematch of #1 vs. #2 in top division at neutral site)
Responses:
1. Schools won’t approve 10 B10 games in a 12-game schedule. Too many schools need 7 home games to allow that.
2. The B10 already does this. They require 1 P5 game and have said no more I-AAs, meaning G5s instead.
3. Why should OOC games factor into the conference race? It works in the pros because all teams are on par more or less. You won’t get teams to schedule tough OOC games this way.
4. That may be great for TV but you’ll make it tough to get into the playoff that way. Asking your top 8 to play a full round robin is asking for lots of losses. The top 4 on each side only lost to each other this year except for NW beating IA. 2-loss teams rarely make the CFP, even as champions.
5. No more season-ending rivalries? The whole conference takes a week off? What does BTN show that week? How would you fulfill your deals with ESPN and Fox that way? Why are bottom teams playing twice? Nobody wants to see that. This system would cost the B10 a ton of money.
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It reads like a solution in search of a problem.
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I’m guessing this fan saw MI not making the CCG as a problem since he feels MI is one of the top 2 B10 teams this year. Having #1 and #2 (or #3, depends on your opinion) miss the CCG bothers some people because they want conference recognition and national recognition to align. It would also solve problems for people like ccrider55.
Now this solution is worse than the problem, but I would promote the conference considering the whole season if (and only if) the CFP were to require the playoff to take champs before at-larges. It would change the conference races from what they should be, but that seems like a lesser problem to me than leaving elite teams out of the playoff.
As for how to do it, you have to be a little flexible. His plan fails because it is so rigid that it destroys the season. Parity-based scheduling favors 8 of the teams a little, especially MSU which has played like a top team over the past few years but gets a lower team’s schedule, but it isn’t changing. At least MSU has to face the 3 eastern kings to help provide some balance. 9 games isn’t changing either, and I don’t think it needs to. The only change I would make from current policy is to eliminate most of the exceptions to which teams count as P5. It should be the true P5 plus a limited number of worthy teams. My list is ND, Boise and BYU. Below is an explanation of how I got that list if anyone cares.
So require a team to play at least 1 P5 opponent OOC to be eligible for the B10 CCG, and use the overall record to pick the two best teams. This would work better in a conference without divisions, but if that rule is still around then pick the best team from each division. This year it would’ve been OSU versus WI. Without divisions it would’ve been OSU versus one of MI, PSU or WI. If the tiebreakers stayed about the same, that would make it OSU versus MI (2-0 vs PSU and WI). If the top tiebreaker was CFP ranking, it still would’ve been OSU versus MI.
I get the same result as him with a much simpler system.
Personally, I wouldn’t want that. I’d like common sense to not let MI get back-to-back chances to beat OSU. I’d make the tiebreaker be OSU’s record against the other 3 and have OSU and PSU play again. If PSU goes 2-0, they deserve the title. If OSU ends up 12-1, they deserve it.
But really, I’d rather keep the current system where the B10 champ is based on B10 games but the national race considers the whole season.
How I got my list:
To be objective, I started by listing all 128 I-A teams by SRS over their entire history. SRS is the Simple Rating System from http://www.sports-reference.com/; a rating that takes into account average point differential and strength of schedule. The rating is denominated in points above/below average, where zero is average. 59 of the top 66 teams are in the P5. The others are #2 ND, #29 Boise, #39 Navy, #45 Army, #46 UH, #56 SMU and #65 AF. The only P5s below that are #73 ISU, #74 KSU, #76 UL, #82 WF and #84 RU. So I’ll consider those 7 schools as options for an exemption.
ND and Boise are easy to accept. Army and Navy are artificially high due to their success in the 40s and before so they need more investigation. UH and SMU are here because of their time in the SWC, so they also need a closer look. I consider the academies a group decision and focused on their more recent history (about the last 40 years). Army has been terrible, AF slightly above average and Navy slightly below average. IN’s all-time SRS is higher than any of them over the past 40 years. UH has been below average as well with SMU almost as bad as Army. None of these 5 deserve to be treated as a P5 team.
All-time SRS isn’t everything. Maybe schools stunk a long time ago (BYU is #75), so I’ll also look at W% over the past 40 years for some more candidates. The top ones are #2 Boise, #11 BYU, #17 ND, #27 Fresno, #28 Toledo, #34 USM, #35 Marshall, #36 AF, #38 NV and #42 CMU. That’s it for schools at 0.550 and better. Boise and ND are already in while AF is out. The only ones worth investigating are BYU and Fresno since I know the MAC schools don’t belong.
Over the past 45 seasons, BYU is a top 25 team by SRS, top 35 over the past 20 seasons. That’s worthy of inclusion. Fresno is another team right around average, so not worth including. A third check using total AP poll points over the past 40 and 20 seasons found no other candidates, so that’s it. That gives me 3 exemptions – ND, BYU and Boise.
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http://www.fanragsports.com/cbb/sources-wichita-state-emerges-potential-basketball-addition-aac/
Wichita St to the AAC for hoops only?
I didn’t think you could join a conference just for MBB. Is that a recent rule change?
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Perhaps it was just careless writing. Wichita State doesn’t play football, and the article makes no mention of what would happen to their other sports.
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Perhaps with a VCU or other comparable public U with no football out east, but otherwise very disruptive to both the BE and also the non-MBB sports. Is DePaul the only B.E. without baseball, a traditional WSU strength.
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It’s the AAC (UConn, Cincy, Houston, Memphis) we’re talking about, not the Big East (Villanova, Providence, DePaul, Butler).
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18293818/louisville-cardinals-suspend-offensive-coordinator-lonnie-galloway-amid-wake-forest-game-information-scandal
Well, Tom Jurich sure flip-flopped quickly. The OC who accepted game plan info on WF is now suspended for the bowl game.
The Louisville Cardinals have suspended offensive coordinator Lonnie Galloway for their New Year’s Eve bowl game because of his involvement in the events that led to the Wake Forest play-sharing scandal, Cardinals athletic director Tom Jurich said Friday.
Jurich said in a statement that when Galloway was contacted with information from radio commentator Tommy Elrod regarding Wake Forest’s game plan, he should not have accepted the information and Wake Forest officials should have been alerted. Jurich said that Louisville will accept any disciplinary actions that the Atlantic Coast Conference wishes to take.
Two days ago, in a statement about Louisville’s involvement in the case, Jurich acknowledged that Galloway had received “a few plays” that he shared with the defensive staff but noted that none of the plays was run in the Nov. 12 game between Louisville and Wake Forest.
“It is clear to me,” Jurich’s Friday statement said “that the information should not have been shared by anyone at Wake Forest and it should not have been received by anyone at the University of Louisville. Although no one from Louisville sought the information, once it was provided, we did not do what should have been done. The information should not have been accepted. It should have been rejected, and officials at Wake Forest should have been alerted to the inappropriate action taken by Mr. Elrod.
“This is an unusual situation. When someone receives information they should not be given, it is important that they do the right thing. Even in a competitive atmosphere, the right and ethical thing would have been for us to not accept the information. I regret very much that this took place.”
I’m guessing someone got a talking to from the president and/or BOR.
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The ACC made their bed with a messy Louisville program. Now they have to sleep in it.
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I seriously doubt that the ACC now wishes it had chosen UConn (the apparent runner-up), which has had plenty of problems of its own.
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http://kstp.com/sports/university-of-minnesota-eoaa-investigative-report-gophers-football-players/4347059/?cat=1
This MN thing is getting really ugly. Both the police report and EOAA’s 80 page report have been leaked and are linked in this article. The EOAA report gets ugly fast.
5 EYEWITNESS News dug into the many questions swirling around the Gopher football player investigation and the differences between the two reports.
The evidence reviewed by University investigators and police appears to be different, including cellphone video of the alleged sexual incident.
Cellphone Video
Minneapolis police had three video clips from a player’s phone, including one that was 8 seconds; the other two totaled 92 seconds, according to the police report.
The University’s Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action report revived by 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS mentions two videos reviewed totaling 12 seconds.
Instead, records show the EOAA obtained a redacted version of MPD’s description of the 90-second video.
People Questioned
In its more than 80-page investigation, it appears EOAA investigators questioned at least 12 players and 16 other students, while the 23-page Minneapolis police report mentions at least five athletes interviewed along with the woman.
Prosecutor’s Statement
Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman’s office provided 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS a statement earlier this fall about their review of the case.
“The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office reviewed a case investigated and submitted by Minneapolis Police against several Minnesota Gopher Football players. Based on the evidence available, the county attorney’s office is declining to file any charges. There is insufficient, admissible evidence for prosecutors to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that either force was used or that the victim was physically helpless as defined by law in the sexual encounter. This office will have no further comment on the case.”
University Standard of Evidence
According to the University’s investigative report reviewed by 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS, their investigators wrote about looking at a variety of evidence, including redacted police reports, but they did not get evidence from the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office.
“EOAA determines whether sexual assault or harassment occurred using a preponderance of the evidence standard. In other words, EOAA determines whether it is more likely than not that the alleged sexual assault or harassment occurred.”
MN is looking at a future NCAA investigation, too, since a recruit was involved in this.
http://fansided.com/2016/12/15/minnesota-coach-tracy-claeys-supports-players-boycott/
Meanwhile, HC Claeys is fully supporting his players in their boycott on twitter.
Have never been more proud of our kids. I respect their rights & support their effort to make a better world!
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From here, we have no idea what happened in Minnesota. Is this is a football team ready and willing to severely damage their own program to defend a number of their friends who committed vile acts?
Or is it a football team that collectively feels (for whatever reason) that their teammates are being rail-roaded? Is this Duke lacrosse? Is this a Rolling Stone case? Are these players making a principled stand?
Is this Baylor part 2, only with the rest of the team defending the miscreants?
Why is the head coach proud of his kids? Is he really supporting kids who committed sexual assault? Is he defending his kids with good reason? What is the better world? More freedom to commit sexual assault? More due process for the players?
It is a mess, but there may be a lot more info coming out.
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Duke was a total fiction by a drug using hooker.
Here its a student who works for the athletic department and we know the sexual acts with several players took place. How consensual it was is the only question.
Its really not comparable.
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Jersey Bernie,
“From here, we have no idea what happened in Minnesota.”
We know quite a bit. There’s an 82 page report plus video. The legal question was whether she revoked consent at some point or was unable to give consent.
“Is this is a football team ready and willing to severely damage their own program to defend a number of their friends who committed vile acts?”
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18297065/minnesota-golden-gophers-football-team-ends-boycott-prepare-holiday-bowl
Apparently not as the players have ended their boycott.
The team released a statement, which was read Saturday morning by wide receiver Drew Wolitarsky.
“As a team, we understand that what has occurred these past few days, and playing football for the University of Minnesota, is larger than just us,” the team said in its statement. “So many before us have given so much to this University and this football team … we will not … and we recognize that we must not, let these people down.
“We now ask that you, the members of the media, our fans, and the general public hold all of us accountable for ensuring that our teammates are treated fairly, along with any and all victims of sexual assault. We also ask that the public dialogue related to the apparent lack of due process in a university system is openly discussed and evaluated.”
The announcement came after a late-night meeting Friday between Gophers players and university president Eric Kaler and other campus leaders. The statement revealed that the 10 players remain suspended, but also said that the players will have a “fair hearing” in front of a “diverse review panel.”
“After many hours of discussion within our team, and after speaking with President Kaler, it became clear that our original request of having the 10 suspensions overturned was not going to happen,” the statement said. “Our senior group had a meeting with President Kaler and AD Mark Coyle last night, Friday the 16th, where they agreed to the following requests: That all ten of these players have a fair hearing — which includes a diverse review panel. Number two, a showing of support for our team and the character shown by the great majority of our players. Finally, that we as a team will use our status as public figures to bring more exposure to the issue of sexual harassment and violence against women.”
Or is it a football team that collectively feels (for whatever reason) that their teammates are being rail-roaded? Is this Duke lacrosse? Is this a Rolling Stone case? Are these players making a principled stand?
They don’t seem to understand how due process actually works. Nobody disputes that they had gang sex with the woman and the report shows multiple ways they violated university policy if not the law. The only legal dispute was whether she revoked consent and the cops felt they couldn’t prove anything there. Duke and UVA involved allegations of events that didn’t happen at all.
Is this Baylor part 2, only with the rest of the team defending the miscreants?
Kind of, yes. Which is why so many people probably told them to stand down.
Why is the head coach proud of his kids? Is he really supporting kids who committed sexual assault? Is he defending his kids with good reason? What is the better world? More freedom to commit sexual assault? More due process for the players?
I’d guess he was proud they were supporting their teammates and fighting for legal rights, but maybe he’s just a people-pleaser that supported them because he felt he had to in order to get them to play for him.
It is a mess, but there may be a lot more info coming out.
That leaked report is all the info we’re likely to get until their appeal hearings. Privacy rules prevent much from becoming public.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18294274/joe-mixon-lawyers-release-video-oklahoma-sooners-rb-punching-female-2014
The Joe Mixon assault video from 2014 has been released. It is ugly. The woman pushed and slapped him first, and he says racial insults were being used towards him, but he knocked her down with a single hook to the head and broke 4 bones in her face.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/james-madison-ends-five-time-defending-champ-north-dakota-states-fcs-reign-in-semis/
The king is dead. 5-time reigning I-AA champ NDSU lost in the semifinals to JMU.
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JMU will face Bo Pelini and Youngstown State in the finals. YSU scored a TD on the last play to win the game over EWU.
I wonder how NE fans feel about Pelini being on the verge of a national title so soon? Will this rehabilitate Pelini’s image enough to get him back in I-A?
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Mike Riley heading to a small school in OH for his next stop?
Ex-UNL coaches seem to do well in that state.
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Both Solich and Pelini grep up in Ohio, which helps. Riley is a westerner. On the other hand, Solich will have to retire soon (he’s 72) so there may be a spot for Riley.
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Riley is a westerner whose family has deep roots in Alabama. Dad was an assistant for the Idaho Vandals, with other relatives in non-football posts at Tuscaloosa. So a return to ID or a gig like Troy State or USA-Mobile would be the equivalent to Solich/Pelini. Pelini might pick up Pitt if Narduzzi goes elsewhere after next season.
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http://thecomeback.com/thestudentsection/uncategorized/cfb-playoffs-this-year-show-why-we-should-never-go-to-8-teams-ever.html
This year’s playoff shows why we should never expand to 8 teams.
Alan Jackson wasn’t so prescient when he said, “too much of a good thing … is a good thing.”
If we had an 8-team playoff this year, we’d have been rendered victims of rematch games almost assuredly. You’d be looking at three Big Ten teams from the same division. Why should Michigan have to re-validate it’s thrashing of Penn State?
Why should Ohio State have to re-validate it’s tooth and nail rivalry win over Michigan? Or their blowout over Oklahoma?
Or how about Penn State … who … if it gets them in, fine I’m sure they’d say, but why should they need to defeat Ohio State again?
What if Southern Cal got in? Why should Alabama have to revisit their bludgeoning of them to start off the season?
All of those above games become meaningless unless you explain-flog yourself into thinking that venue location or potential home games (no way that logistics works, by the way) is your “reward” for clawing out a win against a rival, who now gets a second chance they don’t deserve.
At the point of 8 teams, especially in a season like this, says to players, fans, and yes, even you media who just want more fish in the kettle, “the regular season simply doesn’t matter as much as it used to.”
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By this logic, CCGs should not exist either. Why should Stanford have to play USC or UCLA twice in a season? Why should the Big 12 play a CCG since it necessarily results in a rematch?? And on and on. Moreover, employing this logic would discourage any team from ever scheduling an OoC game with Alabama or tOSU. Automatic disqualification from the CFP is too high a price to pay.
But it actually would be fine with me. I think the whole CFP process should be a funnel, in which you have to win your division to advance and you have to win your CCG to advance.The only problem is that the funnel approach is only really fair if all of the contenders are in one of 4 conferences and every conference champ advances to the CFP.
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Actually, even with 4 power conferences (each with 2 divisions), the funnel system is unfair as the different divisions/conferences could vary a lot in strength.
Note that no major sport now uses a funnel system for their playoffs.
That’s why I’d prefer an 8 team playoff with no CCGs.
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Redwood86,
“By this logic, CCGs should not exist either.”
By most logic they shouldn’t exist. They exist almost entirely for financial reasons. I’d love for them to go away.
“Why should Stanford have to play USC or UCLA twice in a season? Why should the Big 12 play a CCG since it necessarily results in a rematch?? And on and on.”
That’s bad planning on their part. Playing 9 games in a 12 team conference and then a CCG leads to lots of rematches. The B12 doesn’t need a CCG at all, they just want the money. If they were playing the game for the right reason, they wouldn’t have this problem.
“Moreover, employing this logic would discourage any team from ever scheduling an OoC game with Alabama or tOSU. Automatic disqualification from the CFP is too high a price to pay.”
I doubt that since most teams don’t plan on making the playoff in any given year. Besides, you need wins like that to make the playoff. Especially if your conference is down or you lose a game along the way. Besides, schools also do it for the ticket sales.
“I think the whole CFP process should be a funnel, in which you have to win your division to advance and you have to win your CCG to advance.The only problem is that the funnel approach is only really fair if all of the contenders are in one of 4 conferences and every conference champ advances to the CFP.”
One problem is that a pure funnel ignores the high likelihood that 2 of the best teams are in the same conference or even division. Does a lesser team deserve a shot because the better team lost on the road, on a bad call , by a fluke play, …?
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One problem with eliminating the conference championship game is that conferences would have to be small enough to run a round robin, about 10 teams tops. So which four teams are expelled from the B1G? Purdue and Illinois are charter members. Who leaves the Pac 12 or ACC or SEC?
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Why do conferences need a round robin with no CCG?
Aren’t you a B10 guy, Bob? I presume your memory extends back to before UNL joined. The B10 almost never played a round robin back in the pre-CCG days yet somehow the conference managed to survive for over a century.
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bob sykes,
“One problem with eliminating the conference championship game is that conferences would have to be small enough to run a round robin, about 10 teams tops.”
Why? As Richard notes, the B10 hasn’t played a full RR outside of 1983-4. I don’t think the SEC ever has. The P10 didn’t for almost 30 years. You can declare a champion without playing a full RR. Other sports like wrestling do it.
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As a follow-up, I’ll point out that many/most other sports don’t use a pure funnel. Wildcard teams can advance past their division and conference champs. Multiple Americans can make the Olympic finals in individual events like track or swimming or even gymnastics. Multiple B10 teams can make the finals in most NCAA sports. What is the justification in CFB for using a pure funnel?
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The B12 doesn’t need a CCG at all, they just want the money. If they were playing the game for the right reason, they wouldn’t have this problem.
Also, a consulting firm advised them that their chances of making the playoff would increase if their two best teams played a 13th game.
Anyhow, no league truly needs a CCG…nor did they “need” the 12th regular-season game (used to be 11), nor did they “need” the 11th (used to be 10).
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The only problem is that the funnel approach is only really fair if all of the contenders are in one of 4 conferences and every conference champ advances to the CFP.
Even if the power conferences consolidated to four — which is exceedingly unlikely — they would never design a playoff that independents and mid-majors can’t qualify for.
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http://www.gobearcats.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/121416aab.html
An interesting little note from UC’s hiring of Luke Fickell.
But long before Bohn interviewed Fickell, he and his staff had done extensive research on Fickell, including the use of data analytics to vet all 12 of the candidates on Bohn’s original list. Bohn said he had never used such research before during a coaching search, but he decided to tap into the expertise of a UC graduate who had a past relationship with the athletic department and expressed a desire to help in the search.
“Having a University of Cincinnati graduate expressing a desire to help us was intriguing,” Bohn said.
According to Brandon Sosna, Bohn’s chief of staff, a simulation on each candidate starting with the personnel on the current UC roster was run 100,000 times to produce a four-year projection of how the team would perform.
“There are a few characteristics of coaches that are consistent no matter where they go or what they do,” Sosna said. “Things like turnover margin tend to follow coaches. Penalties per game tends to follow coaches, and tempo. You’re either an up-tempo coach or you slow down but you don’t tend to change over time.”
Naturally, since Fickell is a defensive coach, “We were able to assess the defense a lot better than we would his offense,” Sosna said. “But there were some core assumptions based on what we knew we could assess, that we would be running a version of an up-tempo spread offense.”
The computer analysis projected UC’s win-loss record, points for and against, and where the Bearcats would finish in conference play based on what is currently known about UC’s schedules during the next four years. Sosna said Fickell gave the Bearcats their best chance over a four-year period to win a conference championship at about an 80 percent probability.
Bohn’s early conversations with Fickell included assurance from him that he would run an up-tempo, spread offense.
I’ve never heard of schools doing that sort of analysis, but it’s good to see. I wonder how the analytics would evaluate some of the other recent coaching hires.
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Brian, that is a great find. Would love to get my hands on the dataset.
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http://www.theacc.com/news/acc-issues-institutional-fines-to-louisville-and-virginia-tech-12-17-2016
The ACC has fined UL and VT $25,000 each for taking the leaked game plan info about WF.
“I am deeply disturbed something like this would occur, and regardless of the degree of involvement, the protection of the competitive integrity of our games is fundamental to any athletic contest,” said ACC Commissioner John Swofford. “Sportsmanship and ethical values are at the core of competitive integrity and in these instances, those were missing. The expectation, regardless of the sport, is that any athletics department staff members would immediately communicate with their supervisor if they are approached by someone from another institution with proprietary information.”
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/donnel-pumphrey-rushing-record-ron-dayne-tweet-all-time-leaders-career-yards-ncaa-controversy-121716
Officially Donnel Pumphrey from SDSU is the new rushing king in the NCAA, but he’s really #3. Bowl games before 2002 don’t count in official NCAA stats for some reason. If they did, Ron Dayne would still be #1 and Tony Dorsett would be #2.
The real FBS career rushing leaders (bowl game stats included):
Rank Player School Yards
1 Ron Dayne Wisconsin 7125
2 Tony Dorsett Pittsburgh 6526
3 Donnel Pumphrey San Diego St. 6402
4 Ricky Williams Texas 6279
5 Charles White USC 6245
6 DeAngelo Williams Memphis 6026
7 Travis Prentice Miami-Ohio 5596
8 Archie Griffin Ohio State 5589
9 Cedric Benson Texas 5540
10 LaDainian Tomlinson TCU 5387
11 Damion Fletcher Southern Miss 5302
12 Anthony Thompson Indiana 5299
13 Herschel Walker Georgia 5259
14 Garrett Wolfe Northern Illinois 5164
15 Montee Ball Wisconsin 5140
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18303978/minnesota-gophers-football-coach-tracy-claeys-says-knew-was-risking-job
Coach Claeys spoke to a radio station.
Minnesota football coach Tracy Claeys said Sunday that he knew he was risking his job last week when he expressed support for players who boycotted practices and threatened to skip a bowl game if 10 teammates who were suspended after a sexual assault investigation weren’t reinstated.
Claeys also said in an interview on WCCO Radio that he plans to donate $50,000 to support victims of sexual assault.
The standoff with university administrators ended Saturday, when the players backed down and said they would play in the Dec. 27 Holiday Bowl against Washington State in San Diego, even though officials declined to reinstate their suspended teammates. The players agreed after getting assurances that those accused will get a fair hearing next month.
After the entire team announced the boycott on Thursday, Claeys publicly backed his players.
…
On Sunday, Claeys told WCCO Radio that he and his team met before the players decided on the boycott. He said he told them “about all the different fallouts. One was that we might not be able to play in the bowl game. Two is that we knew that there was going to be a group who took the stance that we were being pro-sexual assault, which we’re not. And then I told them there’s a great chance I could lose my job over this.”
Claeys said his players weren’t condoning sexual assault or harassment in any way. But they believed their suspended teammates were denied due process, he said, and that it was “pretty easy” to support them on that issue.
Officials announced the suspensions Tuesday after an internal investigation determined the 10 players violated school conduct codes in an encounter involving a woman and several players at an off-campus apartment Sept. 2. Many of the players who initially backed the boycott Thursday had not read the university’s 82-page report detailing the woman’s specific allegations. The school had kept those details private under federal law, but players saw the report after KSTP-TV published it Friday.
According to the police report, the woman told police she had consensual sex with two men that night but that she did not consent to sexual contact with other men who were present, including players. According to the university’s more detailed internal report, she told university investigators that she believed 10 to 20 men had sex with her that night, though she wasn’t sure because she had memory gaps from drinking. Prosecutors declined to press charges, saying there was insufficient evidence to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, but the university uses a lower standard of proof in student discipline cases.
Linebacker Nick Rallis told the station the players believe the boycott succeeded, even though nobody was reinstated, because they believe it will ensure that athletes at Minnesota and other colleges who are accused of misconduct in the future get fair hearings.
Claeys should still get fired for this.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18303978/minnesota-gophers-football-coach-tracy-claeys-speaks-first-players-boycott
Claeys spoke again.
Speaking publicly for the first time since a standoff between 110 Golden Gophers football players and the administration, Claeys said he understands the players’ frustration with a Title IX investigation that they felt was inherently unfair to teammates who were accused of assaulting a woman at an off-campus dorm in September.
“As kids, they have no problems being held to a higher standard than the university requires and should require,” Claeys said after Minnesota’s practice. “This is all about the due process.”
…
“I was a sounding board for them, and it was their decision,” Claeys said. “I made sure to make sure that they knew what the possible fallouts could be, and we went through all those things. … I was there to make sure that they were doing it for the right reasons and they knew what the consequences could be.”
…
Claeys said Sunday he wished he would have chosen his words more carefully in the tweet, but said he did not regret sending it.
“If you just show support for the players behind closed doors, you’re going to have a group of them that don’t believe you,” he said. “I needed to do that in a public way, and I tried to do it as short as possible. … It was all about me supporting their actions to try to improve the due process. Not just on this campus but other campuses.”
…
Minnesota President Eric Kaler said Saturday that he understood Claeys’ position.
“Coaches are in a challenging position,” Kaler said. “They need to support their players. They need to motivate their players. At the same time, they need to be responsible for their actions, and there are times in which those two demands put coaches in very difficult positions.
“And I think some of our coaches around this issue were in that very difficult position, and we’ll talk about that with them and try to improve both their understanding and our understanding.”
Claeys said he has spoken with athletic director Mark Coyle several times since Thursday and is not concerned about his job at the moment.
“I understand why [the suspensions] were made,” Claeys said. “But as for the players, the due process part was the part I did agree with on the players.”
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Although it’s a difficult needle to thread, there really is an issue with due process in Title IX investigations. Meaning there basically is no due process. Although the level of nuance required surpasses the capability of most media, it is reasonable to be upset that accused teammates (or anyone else accused at an institution of higher learning) are being dealt with unfairly by what amounts to a kangaroo court, even if one doesn’t know enough to opine about the facts or merits of the case.
There are two legitimate crises in our society that this situation at Minnesota could have ideally shone a light on without necessitating a rush to judgment in either direction:
1. Sexual Assault
2. The erosion of due process for people accused of sexual assault.
Both of the above are serious problems.
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Except the process isn’t done at MN and the players know that. That’s why I have an issue with their response. Wait until after their January hearing before claiming there is no due process or fair treatment. But since the players aren’t being punished for breaking the law but rather for breaking university rules, they shouldn’t expect this to play out like a criminal complaint. The process is different just as the possible punishments are.
The school investigation found that the preponderance of evidence said the 10 broke rules. That’s cause for instant punishment to protect the victim from them. Their upcoming hearing is their chance to clear their names, but why should the victim be put in harm’s way while they await the appeal? The players weren’t suspended the moment she complained, just after the investigation concluded they probably did it.
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I agree. You can’t undermine your university’s procedures in public.
Can you imagine a manager at a company doing something similar, undermining the CEO and COO, and keeping his job?
And with Baylor, FSU, Montana and others with the coaches backing accused criminals, it makes the university look really bad. He is saying he could lose his job over this, but he is really trying to protect his job by keeping the players.
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Reports are that Rutgers will be hiring former Minnesota head coach Jerry Kill as offensive coordinator. http://www.nj.com/rutgersfootball/index.ssf/2016/12/sources_rutgers_expected_to_hire_jerry_kill_ex-min.html#incart_2box_nj-homepage-featured
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I dont know that he could survive the Jersey livestyle.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18290379/alabama-clemson-ohio-state-feature-inexperienced-rosters
3 of the 4 playoff teams returned very little experience. They made up for it by returning some key players and having great recruits in the pipeline.
Alabama entered the season with the SEC’s least experienced roster. Ohio State did the same in the Big Ten. Ditto for Clemson: bottom of the ACC. But it was actually much starker than that. Phil Steele, the king of preseason mags, uses a five-part formula to determine experience, and he ranked the Tide roster 116th out of 128 FBS teams. Clemson was ranked 101st. Ohio State was dead last at 128th.
So if you’re scoring at home — and recruits are — then three of this year’s best four teams were also among its youngest, somehow surviving one of the most unpredictable regular seasons in recent memory. The holdout is Washington. The Pac-12 champ ranked fourth in its conference and 43rd overall in experience, with only four returning senior starters but a whopping 80 percent of the roster having already played enough to earn a varsity letter.
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Some may find this development troubling: Christian McCaffrey has decided to skip Stanford’s bowl game, so that he can begin preparing for the NFL draft.
This isn’t a first. LSU’s Leonard Fournette made a similar announcement, but he is nursing an ankle injury and has a history of such injuries. Charles Walker, a defensive lineman for Oklahoma, left his team with two regular-season games remaining, but he has a concussion history.
McCaffrey, as far as I can recall, is the first to quit before his season was over, without any such extenuating circumstances: he simply wants to get paid, and doesn’t want to risk an injury that would hurt his draft stock. As the announcement only came today, one would assume that he attended at least some of his team’s bowl practices, before bowing out, quitting on teammates and the coaching staff, to say nothing of Bowl organizers and fans who bought tickets, and who expected Stanford’s best known and most explosive player to be on the field.
One might infer that if Stanford had qualified for a more important game than the Sun Bowl, McCaffrey would have made a different decision — but who knows? Last season, Notre Dame linebacker Jaylon Smith tore his ACL in the Fiesta Bowl. He had been expected to be a first-round pick. Instead, he slipped to the second round, and signed for about $14 million less. He has still not played a down in the NFL.
Now that the dam has burst, can we expect future high-round draft picks to start bailing on their teams earlier and greater numbers, once they are out of playoff contention? I would have to think so. From a strictly financial standpoint, the incentive to do so is pretty compelling. Notre Dame had nothing but pride to play for in last season’s Fiesta Bowl, but the consequences to Jaylon Smith will last a lifetime.
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Yes, if the NFL doesn’t penalize players for doing so.
This is really a consequence of certain college football players not being paid their fair value in college sports.
Now, I know that many folks here really value amateurism, but if you truly believe in amateurism, then you should be fine with players quitting at any time.
By definition, an extracurricular activity isn’t a job, and nobody would bat an eye if a theatre major quit a school play to join a TV show or show on Broadway.
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…nobody would bat an eye if a theatre major quit a school play to join a TV show or show on Broadway.
No field except athletics forces the participant to choose between staying in school and making money in their chosen profession.
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“No field except athletics forces the participant to choose between staying in school and making money in their chosen profession.”
—How many doctors have you visited that left school early?
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“No field except athletics forces the participant to choose between staying in school and making money in their chosen profession.”
—How many doctors have you visited that left school early?
Obviously, they cannot practice medicine but they can take summer jobs in the health field, much as law students take summer jobs with law firms, and so forth.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Obviously, they cannot practice medicine but they can take summer jobs in the health field, much as law students take summer jobs with law firms, and so forth.”
What summer jobs are there in the football field? Many players do work at summer camps. They can also get summer jobs as long as they get paid appropriately. Many sports have low level seasonal jobs (workers at the stadiums, etc) and full-time workers. A college athlete doesn’t have the depth of knowledge in the field yet to get an analyst/coach type of job. Besides, the other players are the ones keeping a 3-year rule in the CBA so players must stay in college.
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What summer jobs are there in the football field?
Since any such job would result in immediate loss of eligibility, it is understandable that no such jobs exist.
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“Obviously, they cannot practice medicine but they can take summer jobs in the health field, much as law students take summer jobs with law firms, and so forth.”
—But that isn’t what you said. Summer jobs have nothing to do with leaving school early, and many college athletes do have jobs during their off season.
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Scarlet, but the point is that NCAA players can not make money in summer jobs in their field of talent (like, say, a basketball player playing basketball) , even though no other type of student (even if they are on an academic/music/theatre/writing/whatever scholarship) is restricted in that fashion.
How is that fair?
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…the point is that NCAA players can not make money in summer jobs in their field of talent (like, say, a basketball player playing basketball) , even though no other type of student (even if they are on an academic/music/theatre/writing/whatever scholarship) is restricted in that fashion.
Yes, that is indeed the point. A gifted chemistry student is allowed to take a summer job with a chemical company. Not so the basketball player, because we maintain the fiction that athletics are extra-curricular activities, and the athlete is not in school to prepare for a career in sports.
Of course, for about 99% of NCAA athletes, that is absolutely true: they will never make money playing their sport. If that were true of the chemistry department, no one would major in chemistry any more.
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IMO, extracurricular has nothing to do with it. Sketch comedy is extracurricular, but students majoring in something else can still make money as comedians or writers.
Also, some people major in something because of love of that subject, so you would still have chemistry majors even if that didn’t pay.
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IMO, extracurricular has nothing to do with it. Sketch comedy is extracurricular, but students majoring in something else can still make money as comedians or writers.
It has everything to do with it. Basketball players can take side jobs as comedians or writers, just like everyone else. The one thing they can’t do is take a side job at the thing most of them are best at, which is basketball.
Why is that? Because the players are supposed to be amateurs. We can all understand that a game between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Cleveland Cavaliers wouldn’t be a fair fight. Well, if you allow college players to get paid for basketball, at what point do you say they are no longer amateurs, and a game against those who still ARE amateurs is simply not fair.
Many other NCAA rules are designed with this same objective in mind. For instance, all of the rules around academic progress rate (APR) are meant to ensure that student–athletes are making real progress towards a degree. All of the limits on practice time are similar: there are no comparable limits on how much time a student can spend on chemistry.
If the NCAA were ever to admit that, for some students, basketball really IS the degree, a lot of rules would go out the window.
Also, some people major in something because of love of that subject, so you would still have chemistry majors even if that didn’t pay.
Hardly anyone goes to college now to study something they love, with no economic aspirations whatsoever. That is certainly not the service that universities claim to offer, even if some students wind up not using their degree they way they planned.
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Has nothing to do with what Chem or drama or med students are allowed to do. Anyone CAN do what the others do, but they won’t be able to participate in the additional intercollegiate athletic opportunities offered by the schools that have joined together in an athletic association to set rules and govern the competition between member schools if they don’t follow those rules.
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Sure, but why should NCAA athletic competitions have those restrictions when collegiate sketch comedy troupes and collegiate a capella groups (or pretty much any other collegiate extracurricular group) do not?
This answers Marc as well: a capella singing and comedy are also extracurricular, yet they do not restrict students when they are not in school.
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Richard:
If schools chose to they could form an intercollegiate symphony association, with regular competitions and championships crowned. As soon as schools started recruiting from (and boosters paying for) major metro symphonies some form of regulation would be enacted to try to balance the playing field for the majority who didn’t have access to (or resources to recruit/pay for) major symphonies.
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Or they could decide that 1: they didn’t care about the potential competitive advantage or 2: didn’t see a competitive advantage worthy of barring or 3: didn’t think the entire enterprise was worth the time, effort, and cost to regulate. They obviously do in the athletic competition arena.
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Richard,
“Scarlet, but the point is that NCAA players can not make money in summer jobs in their field of talent (like, say, a basketball player playing basketball) , even though no other type of student (even if they are on an academic/music/theatre/writing/whatever scholarship) is restricted in that fashion.”
But they can. It is perfectly legal to get paid to coach at summer camps as long as the pay rate is commensurate with other guest coaches. They can’t get paid to play football because there are no professional leagues playing over the summer that a college player can join.
What they can’t do is become a professional player and still be a college player in the same sport, nor can they take endorsement deals. You can go pro in one sport and be eligible for another one in college. But pro sports require a full-time commitment that make it nearly impossible to be a full-time student and play at the same time, so a player would be choosing one or the other.
“How is that fair?”
Because it’s the only possible way to prevent blatant breaking of the NCAA rules to the point that it becomes a fully professional sport and without a salary cap. If they don’t like it, they don’t have to play NCAA football. There are other paths to the NFL.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Yes, that is indeed the point. A gifted chemistry student is allowed to take a summer job with a chemical company. Not so the basketball player, because we maintain the fiction that athletics are extra-curricular activities, and the athlete is not in school to prepare for a career in sports.”
1. It’s not fiction. Varsity sports are extra-curricular activities. The amount of time you spend on them doesn’t change that.
2. You can work a summer job in your sport, like coaching at a camp. What you can’t do is play professionally but that isn’t an available job option anyway. Pro leagues don’t really hire players for a few months during the season.
3. You can even play professionally, you just can’t return to playing as an amateur. That’s different from all your academic examples because this is an extracurricular activity. They are welcome to remain college students.
4. Some other extracurriculars do have limiting rules, too. You can’t be really good and play on the lowest level sports teams which are designed for beginners (like a pro trying to also play in college). They will force you or your team to move up to a higher level.
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Richard,
“IMO, extracurricular has nothing to do with it. Sketch comedy is extracurricular, but students majoring in something else can still make money as comedians or writers.”
But they couldn’t compete in the NCAA sketch comedy Olympics. Nobody stops a pro athlete from being a college student.
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Richard,
“and nobody would bat an eye if a theatre major quit a school play to join a TV show or show on Broadway.”
I’d be upset that they missed the final performance when they didn’t have a scheduling conflict. It’s one thing to quit because you have to do the other thing in that same time period. It’s another to desert people right before the finale.
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Maybe. But many people would understand skipping on a school play to do a Broadway audition. Especially if the school play carried a not insignificant amount of physical risk.
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Sure, but not if the audition was 2 months away.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Some may find this development troubling: Christian McCaffrey has decided to skip Stanford’s bowl game, so that he can begin preparing for the NFL draft.”
I understand the decision but I don’t agree with it. He is quitting on his teammates. But he might have gone pro last year if the NFL CBA didn’t prevent it, so I’m not all that upset at him. The others also have reasonable injury situations to deal with.
“McCaffrey, as far as I can recall, is the first to quit before his season was over, without any such extenuating circumstances: he simply wants to get paid, and doesn’t want to risk an injury that would hurt his draft stock.
…
One might infer that if Stanford had qualified for a more important game than the Sun Bowl, McCaffrey would have made a different decision — but who knows?”
He’d be playing if it was a NY6 game.
“Last season, Notre Dame linebacker Jaylon Smith tore his ACL in the Fiesta Bowl. He had been expected to be a first-round pick. Instead, he slipped to the second round, and signed for about $14 million less. He has still not played a down in the NFL.”
http://www.espn.com/nfl/draft2017/story/_/id/18310396/christian-mccaffrey-stanford-cardinal-skip-hyundai-sun-bowl
McCaffrey has a $5 million disability policy if an injury caused him to be permanently disabled, which means he would collect a tax-free $5 million, a source told ESPN’s Darren Rovell. He also has a $3 loss of value policy and could start collecting if an injury caused him to slip past the 40th overall pick, according to the source.
It’s not like his financial future is completely at risk. He’s also from a wealthy family so he can’t claim that he needs to support them.
Smith still lost a lot of money, but his rookie deal pays $6.5M plus his insurance pays another $900k so he’s set for life. He went #34 in the draft, not a terrible fall.
“Now that the dam has burst, can we expect future high-round draft picks to start bailing on their teams earlier and greater numbers, once they are out of playoff contention? I would have to think so.”
I think the NY6 games will be safe from this for a while because those games matter to the teams. Maybe the other NYD-level bowls (Citrus, maybe Outback) are safe too.
“From a strictly financial standpoint, the incentive to do so is pretty compelling.”
I’m not sure about that. How will NFL teams react to this? Could it hurt his draft stock with certain teams? Will he quit late in the season if his NFL team is out of it, too?
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One might infer that if Stanford had qualified for a more important game than the Sun Bowl, McCaffrey would have made a different decision — but who knows?
He’d be playing if it was a NY6 game.
An Oklahoma player quit with two games left in the regular season. Oklahoma is in a NY6 bowl. Maybe not McCaffrey, but before long, someone will likely do it.
McCaffrey has a $5 million disability policy if an injury caused him to be permanently disabled, which means he would collect a tax-free $5 million, a source told ESPN’s Darren Rovell. He also has a $3 loss of value policy and could start collecting if an injury caused him to slip past the 40th overall pick, according to the source.
The article cited above, stated that Jaylon Smith, the Notre Dame linebacker, lost $16 in first-year salary alone. These policies (which are hard to collect on) provide some cushion, but don’t protect against anywhere near everything the player has to lose.
I agree with you that McCaffrey, coming from an affluent family, and having a Stanford education, is not going to be in the poor house, no matter what. Imagine the dilemma for kids who don’t have those advantages.
,em>“From a strictly financial standpoint, the incentive to do so is pretty compelling.”
I’m not sure about that. How will NFL teams react to this? Could it hurt his draft stock with certain teams?
McCaffrey, whose family has multiple NFL connections, was probably in the ideal position to get a ton of free advice from people in a position to know.
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The only mitigating thing, for me, would be if he’s nursing an injury. He was hurt during season, missed a game and was less effective than expected in several more. Perhaps it’s still bothering him. What more meaningless game did Stanford play in than the non conference Rice game? He played in it.
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Marc Shepherd,
“An Oklahoma player quit with two games left in the regular season. Oklahoma is in a NY6 bowl.”
Didn’t he have concussion issues? We’ve already said injuries are a reasonable excuse to miss a game, and head injuries most of all.
“The article cited above, stated that Jaylon Smith, the Notre Dame linebacker, lost $16 in first-year salary alone.”
Not true, since they could only guess where he might have been drafted. That was the most he could have lost because 2 QBs went #1 and 2 and that wouldn’t have changed.
“These policies (which are hard to collect on) provide some cushion, but don’t protect against anywhere near everything the player has to lose.”
They aren’t hard to collect on. Smith already has, for example. The amount of coverage is based on what you’re willing to pay for insurance.
“McCaffrey, whose family has multiple NFL connections, was probably in the ideal position to get a ton of free advice from people in a position to know.”
Maybe, but different teams view things differently. Certainly his future teammates may have opinions about it.
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“An Oklahoma player quit with two games left in the regular season. Oklahoma is in a NY6 bowl.”
Didn’t he have concussion issues? We’ve already said injuries are a reasonable excuse to miss a game, and head injuries most of all.
He did not have an injury that would keep him out of the game, or that would prevent him from contributing at his usual level. He’d had at least one concussion in the past, and didn’t want to risk having another one.
You can distinguish his decision and McCaffrey’s — but not by much. There is no doubt in my mind that we will see more of this — unless the NFL itself starts looking down on it, and so far I am seeing no indication of that.
“These policies (which are hard to collect on) provide some cushion, but don’t protect against anywhere near everything the player has to lose.”
They aren’t hard to collect on. Smith already has, for example. The amount of coverage is based on what you’re willing to pay for insurance.
Here is a fairly recent NY Times article on the difficulty of collecting. I did not say no one collects, only that it is difficult, and that it does not come anywhere near to compensating the actual risk the player is taking. (I have seen other such articles, over the years. I can’t include a second link in this post, but you can Google it and find them.)
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Marc Shepherd,
“He did not have an injury that would keep him out of the game, or that would prevent him from contributing at his usual level. He’d had at least one concussion in the past, and didn’t want to risk having another one.
You can distinguish his decision and McCaffrey’s — but not by much.”
It is known that the longer time between blows to the head, the better. Having one concussion makes you more susceptible to future ones. If it was a different body part, he would be expected to play. But you only have one brain and you can’t get it fixed after the season like you can a shoulder or knee. That’s a huge distinction. If McCaffrey said he was quitting football due to brain injury issues, I wouldn’t say a word.
“There is no doubt in my mind that we will see more of this — unless the NFL itself starts looking down on it, and so far I am seeing no indication of that.”
You can’t see anything until the draft. Even then, the NFL only cares if it’s behavior they think will impact performance in the NFL or draw such negative attention that they have to pretend to care (drugs, violence to women, other crimes). The NFL doesn’t care what happens to CFB. The NCAA needs coaches and other players to stand up and fight this.
“Here is a fairly recent NY Times article on the difficulty of collecting.”
All insurance companies resist paying out. It’s how they make money. In that sense, sure it’s hard to collect. You’re also insuring something very nebulous (who knows where you would’ve been drafted without the injury, or how your career might have gone). It’s hard to prove your original value.
“and that it does not come anywhere near to compensating the actual risk the player is taking.”
I disagree in 2 ways with that:
1. You can get more coverage if you’ll pay more in premiums. People underinsuring themselves doesn’t mean insurance won’t cover it.
2. You aren’t accounting for the risk correctly. Take Smith as a worst case scenario, and for ease of math say he lost $20M in his rookie deal due to his injury.
a. There are 40 bowl games with 22 starters on each side (880 players). How many suffer such a significant injury in any given postseason, on average? 1, maybe fewer? Let’s call it a 1:1000 chance for easy math.
b. How many players have significant NFL value? Only 256 get drafted in a year and not all of them are in bowls. Of those 250, only 32 are 1st rounders. Smith only dropped to #34 (top of the 2nd round), so really it’s only the top 10-20 players with much to lose (dropping 20 spots from 200 to 240 doesn’t lose you much).
c. So I’ve got 20 players with 1:1000 odds of getting significantly hurt and losing a lot of money. That means 1:50 odds of any 1 of them suffering said injury. $20M/50 = $400,000 expected loss for those players. Smith got paid about $1M and others didn’t lose value. That seems to have worked out fine.
d. It’s unknown how skipping the game might have impacted his draft status. One little negative thing can get the ball rolling towards negative evaluations and then suddenly he’s dropping 5, 10 or even more spots anyway.
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1 such injury per 40 college football games seems like an extremely low estimate. Seems like every team every year has several players come down with season-ending injuries over 12/14 games.
For example, in 2015, ND had already lost 9 starters to season-ending injury before they had even played Stanford (http://www.si.com/college-football/2015/11/24/notre-dame-fighting-irish-college-football-playoff).
Even if that is high, 5 per 14 games for one team or 30 for the 40 bowl games (80 teams) seems like a more realistic estimate.
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Richard,
“1 such injury per 40 college football games seems like an extremely low estimate. Seems like every team every year has several players come down with season-ending injuries over 12/14 games.”
Season-ending injuries aren’t always serious in terms of draft status though. Lots of bone and joint injuries that end seasons are easily fixable and not a major concern to the NFL. Smith destroyed his knee which is the sort of injury that can really hurt your draft status.
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A decently high percentage of season-ending injuries are knee injuries, though,so that estimate of 1 such injury per bowl season still seems too low.
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Richard,
“A decently high percentage of season-ending injuries are knee injuries, though,so that estimate of 1 such injury per bowl season still seems too low.”
The point is that many knee injuries aren’t considered a big deal any more. Todd Gurley tore his ACL in November and was the #10 pick the following April (2014). Willis McGahee tore all 3 knee ligaments in the NCG and was the #23 pick the following spring (2003).
Smith’s injury was more severe. He tore his ACL and MCL and it caused nerve damage in his knee and ankle. Other than a spinal injury or other career-ending injury, that’s about as bad as it gets because nerve damage is hard to fix.
It takes a really, really bad injury to drop much in the NFL draft for a top player, and that level of injury is pretty rare.
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“Here is a fairly recent NY Times article on the difficulty of collecting.”
All insurance companies resist paying out. It’s how they make money. In that sense, sure it’s hard to collect.
Not really in that sense. I mean, my dental insurance is pretty straightforward. If my dentist says I have a cavity, and he charges a customary amount to fill it, I am covered. You might say cavities are trivial, but if you total your car, it’s a similar story. Either your teeth or your car could be under-insured, but to the extent of the insurance, you are going to collect. This is not really in serious doubt.
You’re also insuring something very nebulous (who knows where you would’ve been drafted without the injury, or how your career might have gone). It’s hard to prove your original value.
Yes, that is the harder problem, because draft placement and contract value depend on so many variables besides just the health of the athlete.
I am not advocating for players to skip out on the last game of their college careers, but I do understand that the insurance available cannot really cover their risk: if it really could, then you wouldn’t see athletes making this decision. McCaffrey, it should be noted, had loss of value insurance, and skipped out anyway.
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Insurance companies do try to defer paying. Its kind of understood in the fidelity field that you have to threaten a lawsuit to get them to pay even obvious claims. UnitedHealthcare has been sued by providers for a systematic effort to fail to pay claims I have lots of personal experience with them that makes you doubt that they could possibly be THAT incompetent and that part had to be deliberate. They also got sued and lost for using a “customary and reasonable” software to avoid paying overpriced providers when their software was using neither customary or reasonable limits
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This article provides a good overview of the legal issues that animated the Minnesota football players’ protest.
Briefly: in 2011, the Department of Education issued a clarifying letter, which set forth a number of new compliance requirements for Title IX. In a sexual harassment case, schools are now obligated to use a “preponderance of the evidence” standard, which basically means that if the adjudicator believes there is slightly more than a 50% probability that an assault occurred, it must find in the accuser’s favor.
This contrasts with the standards in a criminal case, where guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Now, a Title IX accusation is not criminal, but it can carry severe consequences, including expulsion from school and the public perception that the accused is a sex offender. This, as the article notes, “can create a rather lopsided system, particularly since both parties typically consumed alcohol before the encounter at issue.”
Also, a Title IX case adjudicated by the school, unlike a civil case in court, does not guarantee the accused “the right to counsel, the right to present exculpatory evidence, or the right to confront and cross-examine their accusers and witnesses.”
The question of the right standard of proof in sexual assault cases is fraught with problems. Such cases often come down to one person’s word against another’s, making them very difficult to prove. Historically, many victims were reluctant to file a report, as there was a perception that nothing was going to be done. The DOE’s 2011 letter attempted to redress the balance.
The Minnesota case is not a great example, as the players very likely would have been found liable, even under a stronger evidence standard that many schools used before the 2011 letter, such as “clear and convincing evidence.”
But in closer cases, many commentators have had concerns that the DOE’s “preponderance of the evidence” standard, coupled with the lack of procedural protections (such as the right to counsel), could work unfairly against those who are accused in cases that aren’t as clear-cut.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Briefly: in 2011, the Department of Education issued a clarifying letter, which set forth a number of new compliance requirements for Title IX. In a sexual harassment case, schools are now obligated to use a “preponderance of the evidence” standard, which basically means that if the adjudicator believes there is slightly more than a 50% probability that an assault occurred, it must find in the accuser’s favor.
This contrasts with the standards in a criminal case, where guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Now, a Title IX accusation is not criminal, but it can carry severe consequences, including expulsion from school and the public perception that the accused is a sex offender. This, as the article notes, “can create a rather lopsided system, particularly since both parties typically consumed alcohol before the encounter at issue.””
Let’s note that a civil trial has the same standard, so these hearings are not unique.
The Department of Education then clarified that schools must use a preponderance of the evidence standard to evaluate complaints. The Department based this standard off of the burden of proof used in civil litigation involving discrimination claims brought under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which also prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex.
“Also, a Title IX case adjudicated by the school, unlike a civil case in court, does not guarantee the accused “the right to counsel, the right to present exculpatory evidence, or the right to confront and cross-examine their accusers and witnesses.””
Let’s be clear that they are talking about the rights in the hearing process. The players are more than able to get counsel, they just might not have the right to have counsel represent them in the hearing. It doesn’t mean a lawyer can’t coach them up and point out what to say and not say.
As for exculpatory evidence, I’ve never heard of anyone being denied the right to show they weren’t there (an alibi) or they didn’t do it (video of someone else doing it or eyewitness testimony from a truly neutral source). These hearings are held after an investigation is conducted so most evidence should already be known. If someone had that sort of evidence, they’d win a lawsuit to overturn the punishment.
While they may not get to confront their accuser (a way to protect the accuser), they can generally confront the claims of the accuser if the accusation are flat out wrong. The problem is that many of these cases (as you note) are he-said/she-said issues and so not much evidence or argument is helpful.
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Let’s note that a civil trial has the same standard, so these hearings are not unique.
That was the DOE’s rationale, but a Title IX lawsuit against an institution with unlimited resources to defend itself is hardly the same as a sexual assault hearing against a college student.
The players are more than able to get counsel, they just might not have the right to have counsel represent them in the hearing. It doesn’t mean a lawyer can’t coach them up and point out what to say and not say.
That is not the standard of a civil trial.
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Marc Shepherd,
“That was the DOE’s rationale, but a Title IX lawsuit against an institution with unlimited resources to defend itself is hardly the same as a sexual assault hearing against a college student.”
My point was that all civil lawsuits have the same standard of the preponderance of the evidence. It doesn’t matter who is the accuser and who is the defendant.
“That is not the standard of a civil trial.”
I didn’t say that it was. But not being allowed to have an attorney present is also the rule for small claims court in several states, so again it’s not unprecedented in the US legal system. My point, however, was that not being able to have a lawyer at the hearing is very different from not having access to counsel outside of the hearing which is what some people make it sound like.
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My point was that all civil lawsuits have the same standard of the preponderance of the evidence. It doesn’t matter who is the accuser and who is the defendant.
Actually, many civil cases require a higher standard of proof: “clear and convincing evidence,” which is more than “a preponderance of the evidence,” but less than “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Critics of the DOE’s Title IX interpretation, think that “clear and convincing evidence” would be the more appropriate standard for sexual assault hearings, because, although they are non-criminal, they carry far more serious consequences than merely money damages.
…not being allowed to have an attorney present is also the rule for small claims court in several states, so again it’s not unprecedented in the US legal system.
It is limited to cases where the amount at issue is exceedingly small. The Seventh Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, in fact, guarantees the right to trial by jury for any controversy in excess of twenty dollars. State laws vary, but in most cases, there is an option to file in a higher court, with the attendant benefits of counsel, if the amount is anything more than trivial.
My point, however, was that not being able to have a lawyer at the hearing is very different from not having access to counsel outside of the hearing which is what some people make it sound like.
I don’t think any critic of Title IX has suggested that the student cannot have counsel outside the hearing, which would be absurd: no one can control whom the student seeks advice from, outside the hearing room. But, in a civil suit with comparable stakes, no one would consider that an acceptable solution.
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Marc Shepherd,
“It is limited to cases where the amount at issue is exceedingly small.”
In GA the upper limit is $15,000. I don’t consider that exceedingly small.
“I don’t think any critic of Title IX has suggested that the student cannot have counsel outside the hearing, which would be absurd: no one can control whom the student seeks advice from, outside the hearing room.”
I have seen people imply exactly that when discussing this case in other places on the internet, which is why I mentioned it.
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“It is limited to cases where the amount at issue is exceedingly small.”
In GA the upper limit is $15,000. I don’t consider that exceedingly small.
“You are allowed to have an attorney represent you in small claims court in Georgia.”
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Marc Shepherd,
““You are allowed to have an attorney represent you in small claims court in Georgia.””
I didn’t say you weren’t, I just quoted the number for the one state I happen to know about. But not all states allow a lawyer and the amount can still be sizable. For example, the limit is $10,000 in CA and no lawyers are allowed.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/miami-beach-bowl-attendance-marlins-park-photo-central-michigan-tulsa-121916
More proof we have too many bowls. Look at the crowd shot from the Miami Bowl, owned by the AAC. It kicked off at 2:30 yesterday to literally tens of fans.
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And probably not many more than that watching on TV.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/video-joe-mixon-says-he-punched-woman-as-reaction-after-it-felt-like-a-dude-hit-me/
Joe Mixon tried to explain his hitting a woman in the face to the police at the time.
In short, the video doesn’t help his case as it differs in some areas from previous assertions made by those who represented him. It also paints a picture in which he had multiple opportunities to walk away.
Specifically, Mixon shines light on a previous statement by his attorney, Kevin Finlay, who said Mixon was”racially slurred” by Molitor. (Molitor’s representation has disputed this narrative.) Per Mixon’s interrogation video, which came three days after the incident, it was only Molitor’s friend who used racial slur “about” him, to which Mixon replied with a homophobic remark.
Via The Oklahoman:
“The gay dude … he called me something,” Mixon said in the video. “He was like (slur). So then I was like, you got me messed up. And then I called him a (slur). And after that, the girl, she dropped her purse, that’s when she came in my face, pushed me, and then my glasses came off, and then, like, I had, like, jumped at her, like, to watch out. And then she came in my face. I put my head down. And she swung on me.
Mixon also claims Molitor’s slap “felt like a dude hit me.”
“I was so shocked, because she hit me so hard,” Mixon said. “It felt like a dude hit me. And after that, like, my face went boom, my reaction was just right there.”
Getting slapped in the face by a woman felt like getting hit in the head by a man? He must never have been hit hard by someone.
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He dropped her like a ragdoll.
But honestly, what was she thinking? He already restrained himself after she shoved him. Do you honestly expect any 18 year-old guy to not lash out after being slapped by anyone?
Are girls going to be allowed to go around slapping anyone they want just because they are girls?
Mixon probably didn’t control his strength (but how many 18 year-old guys would after being slapped/hit? Also, that girl slapped with her full force of her body as well), but you initiate violence, you should suffer the consequences.
I also challenge this statement:
“It also paints a picture in which he had multiple opportunities to walk away.”
The verbal stuff took place over a few seconds. The whole physical altercation was over in a blink of an eye.
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Richard,
“He dropped her like a ragdoll.”
Yep.
“But honestly, what was she thinking? He already restrained himself after she shoved him. Do you honestly expect any 18 year-old guy to not lash out after being slapped by anyone?”
Yes, I do. So does the law. She committed a crime first and could/would have been charged if he had filed a complaint. There was no way the DA was going to charge her after his retaliation, though.
“Are girls going to be allowed to go around slapping anyone they want just because they are girls?”
They do get away with more, but in this case there would be video evidence and she should be convicted. But no jury would convict her after seeing the whole video.
“Mixon probably didn’t control his strength (but how many 18 year-old guys would after being slapped/hit? Also, that girl slapped with her full force of her body as well), but you initiate violence, you should suffer the consequences.”
That’s not how the law works. Vigilante justice is illegal. And escalating from a slap which has no ability to cause serious injury to a full power punch from a trained athlete that is much larger than the victim is uncalled for. He wouldn’t be in much, if any, trouble if he just slapped her back.
“I also challenge this statement:
“It also paints a picture in which he had multiple opportunities to walk away.”
The verbal stuff took place over a few seconds. The whole physical altercation was over in a blink of an eye.”
I believe the writer is referring to the altercation starting outside the restaurant. The woman and her friends came inside and Mixon followed her. That was opportunity one to walk away instead. Then he could have left after the racial slur was used rather than respond in kind. Finally he could’ve walked away after getting hit. All 3 would’ve been the mature thing to do, but I realize that’s asking a lot of an 18 year-old boy..
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The cowardice of the gay dude is also in plain view.
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Not sure what you want him to do considering
1. if you (like me), think initiating violence is wrong.
2. the whole physical altercation was over in about one second.
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He should have stood and tried to resolve the conflict before the girl stood up and initiated the violence. Maybe he should have apologized or showed deference to superior force–kowtow. He might have been hit anyway, but the dispute was between him and Mixon. It was up to them to settle the dispute.
But we have here the convergence of incompatible, entitled, privileged cultures.
Mixon is an alpha male from the ghetto. He cannot permit a dis to go unanswered.
The girl is most likely a middle class feminist who grew up in a culture where women are not hit. She wrongly believes that she can hit a man without consequence. Her initiation of the violence shows how delusional she is.
The gay guy thinks his gay privilege allows him to mouth off. It doesn’t.
You can argue that Mixon is in the wrong, and by White middle class standards he is, but those are not the governing standards in this ugly incident. The three people involved simply operated on radically different, unconscious assumptions, and the inevitable happened.
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Bob Sykes,
“He should have stood and tried to resolve the conflict before the girl stood up and initiated the violence.”
No, standing up would be a bad move in that scenario.
“Maybe he should have apologized or showed deference to superior force–kowtow.”
That or just stay silent. There was certainly no reason to use the n-word. That was pure escalation.
“He might have been hit anyway, but the dispute was between him and Mixon. It was up to them to settle the dispute.”
It sounds like it was a group dispute to me.
“Mixon is an alpha male from the ghetto. He cannot permit a dis to go unanswered.”
Which is a crap excuse for being a thug.
“The girl is most likely a middle class feminist who grew up in a culture where women are not hit.”
Based on what? We all theoretically grow up in a culture where women aren’t hit since it’s illegal.
“She wrongly believes that she can hit a man without consequence. Her initiation of the violence shows how delusional she is.”
No, it shows she wasn’t thinking. Sometimes women will throw the first blow in a domestic situation, even if they know what the result will be. Humans do dumb things sometimes.
“The gay guy thinks his gay privilege allows him to mouth off. It doesn’t.”
You need to move past the homophobia. I’ve seen plenty of straight guys run their mouths until it got them in trouble too.
“You can argue that Mixon is in the wrong,”
It’s not an argument, it’s a pure statement of the law in the US.
“and by White middle class standards he is, but those are not the governing standards in this ugly incident.”
I’m pretty sure the law of the land is the only relevant standard here or anywhere.
“The three people involved simply operated on radically different, unconscious assumptions, and the inevitable happened.”
That punch was from from inevitable. Many men who grew up in the same environment as Mixon wouldn’t have thrown that punch. It’s way too easy to stereotype people. Most people would have let it go when the others walked away.
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Brian:
If you’re going to go by the law, both Mixon and the girl were in the wrong, and I don’t consider Mixon more wrong than the girl.
“Many men who grew up in the same environment as Mixon wouldn’t have thrown that punch. It’s way too easy to stereotype people. Most people would have let it go when the others walked away.”
You accuse others of stereotyping but here you go stereotyping yourself by speaking about “most people”. Maybe you hang out with a bunch of stoner dudes, but I know plenty of guys at 18 who would not have walked away from a personal slur.
BTW, Bob, in the video, gay guy was chatting with Mixon (possibly with slurs thrown in). Neither guy was threatening physical violence. Not sure how you’re expecting him to prevent the girl from charging at Mixon. Pretty certain that he wasn’t expecting that to happen and most people don’t have Superman reflexes, so, considering that a second (at most) elapsed in the time where the girl shoved Mixon, Mixon cocked his fist, the girl slapped Mixon, and Mixon dropped her, I don’t see how you could expect him to do anything.
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Richard,
“If you’re going to go by the law, both Mixon and the girl were in the wrong, and I don’t consider Mixon more wrong than the girl.”
Well, the law does consider him more wrong. He committed a more serious crime. As the bigger, stronger person he’s expected to show more restraint.
“You accuse others of stereotyping but here you go stereotyping yourself by speaking about “most people”. Maybe you hang out with a bunch of stoner dudes, but I know plenty of guys at 18 who would not have walked away from a personal slur.”
You’re blurring 2 different statements. I said many men with his background would let it go. I also said that most people would let it go. Most people aren’t 18yo males and thus are less inclined to violent reactions to things.
You also are confusing the timeline. The slur happened after they were inside. I said most people would’ve walked away after the victim’s group went inside. Thus the slur would never have been said.
Still, it’s easy math. How many people hear a slur? How many of them end of hitting someone hard enough to break 4 facial bones and getting arrested? Clearly most people don’t react the way Mixon did.
Remember, the slur was used about Mixon but not directed at him and the guy said it, not the woman he hit. Mixon responded in kind to the slur which is typical behavior for 18yo males. The woman responded to his slur by pushing him. He then feinted towards her, and she replied with her slap. If he hadn’t been aggressive towards her after the push, she wouldn’t have slapped him. At every turn, Mixon kept ratcheting things up when he could’ve been diffusing things.
From his own mouth:
“The gay dude … he called me something,” Mixon said in the video. “He was like (slur). So then I was like, you got me messed up. And then I called him a (slur). And after that, the girl, she dropped her purse, that’s when she came in my face, pushed me, and then my glasses came off, and then, like, I had, like, jumped at her, like, to watch out. And then she came in my face. I put my head down. And she swung on me.
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“How many people hear a slur? How many of them end of hitting someone hard enough to break 4 facial bones and getting arrested? Clearly most people don’t react the way Mixon did.”
How many people can hit hard enough to break 4 facial bones?
Basically, you’re faulting Mixon for being strong. Remember that the girl also put the full force of her body behind her slap. She did not hold back. By your logic, people who are physically weaker should be protected if they assault people.
“Remember, the slur was used about Mixon but not directed at him and the guy said it, not the woman he hit. ”
Yes, and he didn’t hit the guy. He was conversing with the guy.
It was the girl who initiated the violence.
” At every turn, Mixon kept ratcheting things up when he could’ve been diffusing things.”
And at every turn, the girl ratcheting things up when she could have diffused things. So why does Mixon have a responsibility to diffuse things but the girl doesn’t? I don’t understand why you hold the girl and Mixon to different standards. I believe in gender equality and gender fairness. That means equal opportunity in the workplace and yes, equal treatment towards those who initiate violence regardless of gender.
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Richard,
“How many people can hit hard enough to break 4 facial bones?”
Actually, a lot more than you probably think. Many facial bones break fairly easily, and adrenaline gives people a lot of strength they don’t normally demonstrate.
“Basically, you’re faulting Mixon for being strong.”
No, I’m faulting him for being strong and hitting someone.
“Remember that the girl also put the full force of her body behind her slap.”
No she didn’t. She tried to swing as hard as she could but she did not successfully put the full power of her body behind that slap. It’s very difficult to put your full body power behind a slap based on how the human body works.
“She did not hold back.”
Agreed.
“By your logic, people who are physically weaker should be protected if they assault people.”
No, I said nothing like that. But the law does relate the charge to the damage you actually do as well as your intentions, so smaller people do get a benefit from the law in that sense. They also suffer greatly in an actual physical confrontation due to their lack of size. Bigger people get the much better end of that tradeoff.
“Yes, and he didn’t hit the guy. He was conversing with the guy.”
Which was fine. But he initially tried to use that slur as justification for hitting the woman.
“It was the girl who initiated the violence.”
Yep. And the law allows Mixon to defend himself. What he can’t do is significantly increase the force level and still be covered by self-defense.
“And at every turn, the girl ratcheting things up when she could have diffused things.”
Yep. And she paid for it in the end. Dumb decisions are dumb.
“So why does Mixon have a responsibility to diffuse things but the girl doesn’t?”
They both are supposed to diffuse things, but Mixon is held to a higher standard because of his relative size and strength. It’s why a child can hit you but you can’t hit them back. The woman didn’t present an actual physical threat to Mixon’s safety so the law requires him not to intentionally injure her.
“I don’t understand why you hold the girl and Mixon to different standards.”
The law does, not just me.
“I believe in gender equality and gender fairness. That means equal opportunity in the workplace and yes, equal treatment towards those who initiate violence regardless of gender.”
That’s great, but that isn’t the law. If it was Ronda Rousey that hit him first, then maybe he wouldn’t be in trouble. If it was another 200lb+ guy, then Mixon wouldn’t be in much trouble. But an unarmed Mixon represents a lethal threat to that woman and the law recognizes that.
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You didn’t have sound, but it looked like Mixon initiated the verbal confrontation. Its hardly a crime to shove somebody. It wasn’t much of a shove.
Hard to tell what he was doing with the feint. The slap hardly looked like anything at all. But, of course, you can’t really tell.
She shoved and slapped. He hit somebody much smaller and weaker with a hard right and broke several bones in her face. He could have knocked her down with a mere slap.
Mixon will end up in jail, sooner or later. He violates anybody’s standards, except those of privileged football players who think they can get away with anything and expect to be kowtowed to.
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bob sykes,
“The cowardice of the gay dude is also in plain view.”
WTF? He’s supposed to physically confront a football player and his friends? And what does his orientation have to do with it?
1. Fighting is stupid and dangerous. They tried to walk away (right idea) but Mixon followed them.
2. Mixon had multiple friends (fellow athletes) with him when this all started. Fighting 1 on many is really dumb if it’s avoidable.
3. Mixon walked away after throwing his 1 punch (thankfully), so there was no defending of the woman or himself for the victim’s friend to do.
4. Even if he’s trained in self-defense, they did all the right things until Mixon followed them into the restaurant. There they made 2 mistakes – running their mouths and getting physical first. After the punch, they did the right thing (call the cops).
Cowardice has nothing to do with it.
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BTW, the Big Ten CCG turned out to be a near-sellout/sellout once again (Lucas Oil’s stated capacity ranges from 62K+ to 70K), drawing 65K. This despite neither school being from an adjacent state, though both were top 10.
So the only B10 CCG that hasn’t been at least a near sellout is 2012 which featured a Wisconsin team that was barely over .500 overall (.500 in conference play) and had finished 3rd in its division against a UNL team that is 3 states away.
The ACC CCG, which featured a team that was a lock to be a playoff participant with a win, was far from a sellout (in fact, was the 2nd-worst attended ACC title game of all time).
The Pac CCG, which also featured a team that was a lock to be a playoff participant with a win, was also far from a sellout (drawing less than 50K).
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Richard,
“BTW, the Big Ten CCG turned out to be a near-sellout/sellout once again (Lucas Oil’s stated capacity ranges from 62K+ to 70K), drawing 65K. This despite neither school being from an adjacent state, though both were top 10.
So the only B10 CCG that hasn’t been at least a near sellout is 2012 which featured a Wisconsin team that was barely over .500 overall (.500 in conference play) and had finished 3rd in its division against a UNL team that is 3 states away.”
The people that run it say it wasn’t a sellout before 2015. Apparently they list 67k as the capacity for the B10CG. Being a “near-sellout” is in the eye of the beholder. I wouldn’t count 2014, and maybe not 2011 and 2016. Thousands of tickets is not a negligible amount to me.
2011 – 64k
2012 – 41k
2013 – 66k
2014 – 60k
2015 – 67k
2016 – 65k
I understand the distinction you’re making between the 2012 game and the rest, I just don’t think you should understate the gap between a capacity crowd and what the CCG has drawn most years.
http://www.secsports.com/article/11037746/championship-football
The SECCG has had capacity crowds in 22 of 23 years (1995 – UF vs AR) in Atlanta. It was 1 of 2 at Legion Field, but that bad year AL played instead of AU because AU was under sanctions. AU went 8-0 to AL’s 5-2-1 in SEC play, so AL fans weren’t too excited. It was also a very rainy day that led to a muddy field and moving the game indoors going forward.
“The ACC CCG, which featured a team that was a lock to be a playoff participant with a win, was far from a sellout (in fact, was the 2nd-worst attended ACC title game of all time).”
It should be noted that the ACC moved the CCG to Orlando from Charlotte due to the SB2 issue. A lot more fans from both sides would have attended in Charlotte.
“The Pac CCG, which also featured a team that was a lock to be a playoff participant with a win, was also far from a sellout (drawing less than 50K).”
The game is now in Santa Clara. That’s a long trip for both teams and their fans. I don’t think the P12 fans are fervent enough to fill that place without a CA school in the game.
2014: #2 OR vs #7 AZ – 45,618
2015: #7 Stanford vs #20 USC – 58,476
2016: #4 UW vs #9 CO – 47,118
The games on campus did better.
2011: UCLA @ #9 OR – 59,376
2012: #16 UCLA @ #8 Stanford – 31,622 (rematch from previous week, started during Friday rush hour in the rain)
2013: #7 Stanford @ #11 ASU – 69,535
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Been to 2 B1G CCG’s and they felt full inside and look full on TV and that’s mostly what matters.
If you study the distances that most of the SEC teams must travel to Atlanta you may or may not be surprised at how close some of the travel is for that league. Birmingham is 2 hours from Atlanta. Auburn is less than 2 hours. Georgia is an hour. Knoxville is 3 hours. Florida (4.5 hours). LSU about 7 hours. Of the likely participants LSU is furthest drive. Not including aTm until they make a game. Not too mention that Atlanta is large metro city with a lot of college football fans.
The SEC has the perfect storm where a lot of fans can travel to and from Atlanta all on game day. If Purdue or Indiana, both highly unlikely, ever make the CCG then I would expect a full sellout. Ohio State fans have the shortest drive for the school likely to make the game most often.
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Kevin,
“Been to 2 B1G CCG’s and they felt full inside and look full on TV and that’s mostly what matters.”
Agreed, but which years were you there? The empty seats are very noticeable in crowd shots from several years (I found 2011 and 2014 in a quick search).
“If you study the distances that most of the SEC teams must travel to Atlanta you may or may not be surprised at how close some of the travel is for that league.”
I’m not, especially since I live in Atlanta, and we had that discussion weeks ago. I think the sheer size of the city makes a big difference. If Chicago had a suitable facility, I think attendance would be better.
“If Purdue or Indiana, both highly unlikely, ever make the CCG then I would expect a full sellout.”
You’d hope. I’d also expect IL to sell out. I’d hope that NW, RU, MN and UMD would fill the seats because they get relatively few chances at the B10 title, but it’s a long haul for most of their alumni and NW starts with a smaller fan base.
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No way RU, UMD, and Minny would fill even half the seats. It’s not only about chances but the fervor of the fanbase as well as distance on short notice.
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@Brian – I was at the the first game in 2011 (UW vs. MSU). I was on the 35 yard line in the first level maybe row 15. To be honest you couldn’t really see the top level very clearly from that level so it felt full. I was also at this years PSU game.
The only disappointing year attendance wise was the UW vs. Nebraska game. Nebraska fans fully expected to beat the Badgers and were saving their travel dollars for the Rose Bowl. UW fans had no desire to travel given that we weren’t very good and didn’t win our division. That may have been the point when the conference hit rock bottom. Terrible coaches at the major programs all at one time save Urban being hired at OSU that year.
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@Richard. Difficult seeing RU or UMD making that game but Minny has gotten close. You’d hope that if Minny ever did make it that they would play OSU or some other fan base that is close by. Would be interesting to see Illinois in that game. They’ve been down for a while but have show fan and school passion at times in the past. Champaign is less than 2 hours to Indy.
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Richard,
“No way RU, UMD, and Minny would fill even half the seats. It’s not only about chances but the fervor of the fanbase as well as distance on short notice.”
I was thinking that a once in a lifetime sort of event may draw a lot of fans that wouldn’t travel for a normal road game or bowl. They’re unlikely to be in the playoff, so it’d be the CCG and the Rose Bowl. I think some of the smaller and less fervent fan bases would be very excited for a rare shot at the B10 title and the Rose Bowl so they might come out in droves. I could very well be wrong, but I do remember how NW fans acted in 1995.
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Brian: NU fans were excited about going to the Rose Bowl. There were people who had waited generations to go (back) there.
Minny fans may be too. RU and UMD fans? Er, no. If they pined for any bowl, it would be one in FL.
And the B10 CCG isn’t the Rose Bowl.
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Richard,
“Brian: NU fans were excited about going to the Rose Bowl. There were people who had waited generations to go (back) there.
Minny fans may be too. RU and UMD fans? Er, no. If they pined for any bowl, it would be one in FL.
And the B10 CCG isn’t the Rose Bowl.”
I get that, but the CCG is the gateway to the Rose Bowl. IA fans seemed very excited last year to go to the CCG and then the Rose Bowl and they have more success than MN or RU or UMD. RU and UMD fans don’t have the emotional ties to the Rose, but getting to any NY6 bowl means a lot to them. RU has never been to a NYD-level bowl. UMD went to the Orange after 2001 (their last ACC title) and the Peach in 2002, and before that it was the Citrus in 1983. I think they’d have a lot of pent up excitement for success.
But again, I could be completely wrong. It’s just a guess on my part. There isn’t enough of a track record of success for any of them to base a stance on facts.
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The 2002 Orange Bowl that UMD was in had home-state school UF yet drew less than the 2003 Orange Bowl that featured 2 schools from nowhere near Miami (Iowa and USC) or the 2004 Orange Bowl (granted, that one was Miami vs. FSU) or the 2006 Orange Bowl (granted, that one had FSU vs. PSU) or the 2007 Orange Bowl that featured 2 teams with smallish fanbases (WFU & Louisville) or the 2008 Orange Bowl also featuring 2 teams far from FL (KU and VTech).
Also, we know that Iowa has a large die-hard fanbase that travels well to bowl games. We also both know that neither UMD’s or RU’s fanbases are nearly as passionate and as big as Iowa’s (Minny’s may be closer but still definitely is not at the Iowa level). Northwestern has a small fanbase, but a national alumni base, so we typically travel better to bowl games than any of UMD/RU/Minny/IU/PU/UIUC, so neither Northwestern or Iowa are good examples to use to try to project that UMD/RU/Minny would fill up the B10 CCG.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/18325400/north-carolina-tar-heels-receive-third-notice-allegations-academic-fraud-scandal
UNC has received their third notice of allegations from the NCAA for the academic scandal.
North Carolina has received a third notice of allegations from the NCAA outlining violations connected to its multi-year academic fraud scandal.
UNC spokesman Rick White said in statement Wednesday that the university will publicly release the document but didn’t specify when. The statement didn’t comment on any changes compared to two earlier versions, both of which included five serious charges centered on a department offering irregular courses featuring significant athlete enrollments.
The NCAA first filed charges in May 2015, then sent a revised notice in April. Both versions charged UNC with lack of institutional control.
UNC appeared before an infractions committee panel in October to argue the NCAA lacked jurisdiction to handle academic matters among several procedural responses to the charges.
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http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18334913/nfl-launching-small-development-league-april
The NFL is launching a developmental league. This one is small (4 teams) with a very short season (3 weeks) and only open to veteran free agents. But could it develop into the beginning of something bigger that would take college-age players?
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/18333496/north-carolina-tar-heels-again-face-ncaa-extra-benefits-charge-academic-case
UNC’s amended NOA includes extra charges.
The NCAA’s new allegations include an extra-benefit charge involving men’s basketball and cover a period from the 2002-03 season through the 2010-11 season. The Tar Heels won national championships in 2005 and 2009. If the NCAA, through its committee on infractions, concludes that some of the players on that team received extra benefits, they could be deemed ineligible, which could lead to serious charges, including potentially vacating those titles.
The NCAA argues that the sham courses constitute extra benefits because the university used its relationship with two African-American studies professors to “obtain and/or provide special arrangements to student-athletes in violation of extra-benefit legislation.” The new notice additionally claims that “many at-risk student athletes, particularly in the sports of football and men’s basketball, used these courses for ensuring their continuing NCAA eligibility.”
…
Cunningham is charging that when the university met with the NCAA in October for a jurisdictional meeting, committee on infractions chair and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey refused to admit two documents into the record that explained why the second notice of allegations — which removed the impermissible benefits allegations, including men’s basketball — was fair and aligned properly with NCAA bylaws.
Then, according to Cunningham, Sankey argued that the absence of those documents gave the enforcement staff reason to revisit and amend the notice of allegations once more.
“That means the university was deprived an opportunity to submit evidence, and then they used that very lack of evidence against us,” Cunningham said.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18335367/ken-starr-lifted-suspension-baylor-bears-tevin-elliot
Ken Starr lifted the academic misconduct suspension of a Baylor who went on to commit multiple sexual assaults, according to a court transcript.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Starr granted a reprieve for Tevin Elliot in 2011 when the athlete was accused of academic misconduct.
The newspaper says the information is “deep” in the transcript of Elliott’s 2014 trial at which the former defensive end was convicted of sexually assaulting multiple Baylor students.
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https://www.seccountry.com/alabama/2016-peach-bowl-ticket-prices
Could Ohio St. fans be getting playoff fatigue? The bowl prices provide some interesting thought on the possibility of expanding the playoffs to 8 games.
Median prices of selected games:
National Championship game $1,300
Rose Bowl $484 (higher than the semi-finals) USC-PSU
Peach Bowl $289 AL-UW
Orange Bowl $210 FSU-UM
Fiesta Bowl $195 tOSU-Clemson
Sugar Bowl $172 Auburn-OU
Music City Bowl $143 NU-TN
Pinstripes Bow $117 NW-Pitt
Outback Bowl $115 FL-IA
Cotton Bowl $35 WI-WMU
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Well, note that every bowl game above the Fiesta features at least one team that is in the state of the bowl or an adjacent state while AZ is very far away from both OH and SC. The Rose is in USC’s hometown, in fact.
I’d wager that the Fiesta would have those prices if it featured ‘Bama vs. Clemson as well.
So my key takeaway is that if you expand to an 8 team playoff, the sites would have to be close to at least one of the teams.
Indy, Atlanta, Dallas, LA?
Then two of the Sugar, Orange, Fiesta, Cotton for semifinals.
Rose would always feature B10-Pac.
Semifinals would be Sugar+Fiesta and Orange+Cotton so SEC-ACC would rotate between Sugar and Orange. B12-G5 would rotate between Fiesta and Cotton.
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Revision:
Indy, Atlanta, Houston, & LA for quarterfinals the weekend that Army-Navy now plays (North, East, South, and West Bowls). Army-Navy on current CCG weekend. Playoffs set right after Thanksgiving weekend. No CCG’s.
Two of the Sugar, Orange, Fiesta, Cotton for semifinals.
Rose would always feature B10-Pac. Peach would always feature SEC-ACC.
Semifinals pairings would be Sugar+Fiesta and Orange+Cotton. B12 would get a spot in either the Cotton or Sugar.
Each P5 conference guaranteed 2 slots (5 playoff slots for champs + 5 in NY6 bowls). G5 also guaranteed a slot in NY6 bowls.
Semifinal bowls on NYD at 1PM and 9PM with the Rose and Peach at 5PM.
This year, the playoff would be
1. ‘Bama vs. PSU/OU in Atlanta
2. OSU vs. OU/PSU in Indy
3. Clemson vs. Wisconsin in Houston
4. Washington vs. Michigan in LA (note: a traditional Pac/B0 matchup in LA)
Let’s say winners go in to Sugar and Fiesta.
Likely ‘Bama vs. Washington/Michigan in Sugar and OSU vs. Clemson in Fiesta.
Other bowls:
Rose: Colorado vs. (UNL?)
Peach: FSU vs. Auburn
Orange: Louisville vs. WMU
Cotton: OK St. vs. USC
Top 14 schools in playoffs/NY6.
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Fun little factoid:
If we had had an 8-team playoff each of the last 3 years, the B10 would have had the most participants in the playoffs (9 total over 3 years). The SEC would have had one each year (‘Bama each time).
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If you are using the final CFP rankings, Mississippi State was #7 in the final 2014 standings.
2014
1. Alabama
2. Oregon
3. Florida State
4. Ohio State
5. Baylor
6. TCU
7. Mississippi State
8. Michigan State
2015
1. Clemson
2. Alabama
3. Michigan St.
4. Oklahoma
5. Iowa
6. Stanford
7. Ohio State
8. Notre Dame
2016
1. Alabama
2. Clemson
3. Ohio State
4. Washington
5. Penn State
6. Michigan
7. Oklahoma
8. Wisconsin
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Scarlet, I used the CFP ranking before the CCG’s (and placed where the B12 teams that played regular games on CCG weekend would end up), as there are no CCG’s in my setup.
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The post-season structure has to satisfy politics, fairness, and the need to make money. There are aspects of Richard’s proposal that would run into serious problems with all three.
1) Richard wants to ensure that every quarter-final game will feature at least one team from the host state or an adjoining state, if at all possible. That may be best for ticket sales, but it means ignoring the committee seeding. Alabama would argue that part of their reward for earning the 1 seed, is to play the 8 seed, rather than a higher seed. This system doesn’t do that.
2) Even with that goal in mind, Richard had to put Clemson vs. Washington in Houston, not an great location for the fans of either school. That game, played on Dec. 10, would be very poorly attended. Fans would quickly figure out that the winner is going to play another bowl game in a distant city just 3 weeks later; and if they win that, yet another 2 weeks after that.
3) Washington vs. Michigan in LA would be similarly problematic. LA is not particularly close for Husky fans. Many Michigan fans would feel that a game in LA on Dec. 10 that is not the Rose Bowl is not very attractive, and would hold out for New Orleans on New Year’s Day.
4) Would the organizers of the Rose and Peach accept permanent “loser bowl” status? The Rose is traditionally a reward for a great season. Richard has seeded it with the Pac-12 #3 and Big Ten #4.
5) Would the Big Ten and SEC give up their lucrative CCGs in exchange for this structure? I don’t think so.
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Marc:
I’m going by seeding.
To try to have sites close to teams, I’m spreading out the quarterfinal sites (so same philosophy as MBB tourney).
2. Pretty much all the Pac schools have a decent alumni presence in LA.
3. If money is the concern, it comes down to how lucrative the CCGs are compared to quarterfinals and also who has more votes. The SEC and B10 do not form a majority and as we have seen, other conferences struggle to fill their CCG.
4. For the Peach, it wouldn’t be much different from before they were a NY6 bowl (when their matchup was ACC #3 vs. SEC #5?) This would still be better.
Rose could choose between hosting more semifinals or more B10-Pac matchups, but it’s an either-or proposition under any setup.
Also note that both get permanent quarterfinals.
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The lack of a CCG puts a severe limit on the size of a conference. Without the CCG, you have to play a round robin to determine the champion. That’s 10 teams maximum in a 12 game regular season, or perhaps 11 if you only play 2 OOC games.
So who gets kicked out of the B1G? Charter members like Purdue and Illinois? Newbies like Michigan State, Nebraska and Penn State. Fat chance.
If you decide not to determine the conference champion on the field and rely on opinion polls like the current playoff committee, then what’s the point of a conference?
Well conferences have history and are made up of like-minded schools that share that history. The playoff system itself will disappear long before conferences and their CCGs do.
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Bob, you seem to have copied and pasted your post so I’ll (mostly) copy and paste my response:
Why do conferences need a round robin with no CCG?
Aren’t you a B10 guy, Bob? I presume your memory extends back to before UNL joined. The B10 almost never played a round robin back in the pre-CCG days yet somehow the conference managed to survive for over a century.
Maybe you think the B10 didn’t determine it’s champion on the field (for all but a couple of years) for over a century before they had a CCG? But even so, the B10 survived (and thrived) for over a hundred seasons without playing a round-robin in football.
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The SEC and B10 do not form a majority and as we have seen, other conferences struggle to fill their CCG.
This is true, but dramatic changes, such as those you are suggesting, are always made by consensus. There is no way such a system would be imposed over unified Big Ten and SEC opposition. No. Way.
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…the B10 survived (and thrived) for over a hundred seasons without playing a round-robin in football.
Richard is, of course, correct that there is no need to play a round-robin, and many conferences went decades without doing so. But if two or more teams finished the regular season with identical conference records, the league crowned co-champions — and this happened with some frequency. In 1990, four Big Ten teams could claim to have won the “championship” with identical 6–2 records.
In those days, the only prize claimed by the conference champion (other than bragging rights) was a trip to the Rose Bowl. Various systems were employed to break ties. I think the final system used (before the league split into divisions) was that the program that had gone to the Rose Bowl longest ago would get the bid. I trust it is obvious that the Big Ten would never go back to that method, if the prize at stake were a playoff berth.
Attitudes change over time. There are plenty of things that college football used to do, but that you will never see again. In a 14-team league with no CCG, a team could “win” the Big Ten with (say) a 9–0 record while missing all of the best teams in the league that year, while Ohio State comes in “second” with an 8–1 record, while playing a much tougher schedule.
I don’t think that would be considered acceptable today, even though it was in the past.
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Marc:
With an 8-team playoff (and 3 at-large spots for non-conference-title winners to claim), I doubt you’d hear more whining about conference title tie-breakers than we do now from UMich fans about the current system.
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And to address your example, an OSU team that finishes 8-1 in conference (and 11-1 overall) vs. the toughest possible conference slate is extremely unlikely to miss out on one of the 3 at-large playoff spots even if they don’t win the B10.
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With an 8-team playoff (and 3 at-large spots for non-conference-title winners to claim), I doubt you’d hear more whining about conference title tie-breakers than we do now from UMich fans about the current system…
And to address your example, an OSU team that finishes 8-1 in conference (and 11-1 overall) vs. the toughest possible conference slate is extremely unlikely to miss out on one of the 3 at-large playoff spots even if they don’t win the B10.
In my example, I did not stipulate that OSU finishes 11–1 overall. The solution would need to work for all leagues, and cover cases such as multiple teams with 7–2 conference records and at least one OOC loss as well.
Yeah, it’s safe to say that any 11–1 Big Ten team would make the playoff, whether as the champ or an at-large, but that is not the only kind of tie that is possible.
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Yeah, but I (and many people) would say that any school that goes 10-2 doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on when it comes to whining about not being included in a playoff. If you want to be included, win your games.
Plus, even at 10-2, any team that plays the toughest opponents in the B10 would have a good shot at being included in an 8 team playoff.
Over the past 3 years, of B10 teams that were 10-2, UMich, Wisconsin, and PSU this year would have made an 8-team playoff, Northwestern in 2015 (which tied for the 4th best B10 record that year) would have missed out, while in 2014, 10-2 (7-1) MSU would have been in while Wisconsin with the same record would have been out (but both tied for 2nd in the B10).
In 2015, Iowa would have been B10 champ (undefeated against a weak schedule) but both OSU and MSU would have been in as well.
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bullet,
“Could Ohio St. fans be getting playoff fatigue? The bowl prices provide some interesting thought on the possibility of expanding the playoffs to 8 games.”
I’d say it’s more Fiesta Bowl fatigue. OSU played there on 1/1/16 plus in 2003, 2004, 2006 and 2009. OSU has a lot of alumni out there, but others don’t want to travel to the same place all the time. Besides, the NCG is a cheaper flight but more expensive ticket so fans might be saving up.
http://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2016-fiesta-bowl/2016/12/77751/fiesta-bowl-ticket-sales-going-extremely-well-for-ohio-state-despite-second
But analysis from ticket vendors says that the problem is Clemson fans.
“I think the difference in demand has a lot to do with location,” Cameron Papp said in an email. “The Peach Bowl is almost down the street for Alabama fans and we’re seeing it in our sales.”
Papp said the state of Alabama is responsible for 29 percent of sales for the Peach Bowl on StubHub, while Georgia is second at 22 percent. Facing a cross country flight as well as lodging and tickets for the game, patrons from the state of Washington are only responsible for 6 percent of sales on StubHub.
By comparison, Ohio State fans from the home state have bought 27 percent of tickets for the Fiesta Bowl on StubHub. California is responsible for 15 percent, while South Carolina—the home state of Clemson—has scooped up just 3 percent of them.
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Congratulations to MN and NW on upset bowl wins. Perhaps the middle of the B10 was better than people gave it credit for, they just kept having to play top teams.
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Thanks. I’m kicking myself for not wagering on NU after seeing a depleted Minny defense throttle a high-flying WSU offense.
What that game (should have) told me is that the defenses of many B10 teams (even the middling ones) are good. So a Pac/ACC/B12 team may score a ton of points in part because they play defenses in the Pac/ACC/B12 that mostly aren’t B10 standard, but they’ll be kept in check by a B10 bowl team.
That’s good news for the B10 in the Fiesta, Rose, Cotton, and Orange.
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Hmm. IU’s defense is also pretty good (#30 according to S/P, which has IU’s D as better than Utah’s D). Bodes well for the Hoosiers in the Foster Farms Bowl vs. a Pac opponent.
S/P has 9 B10 defenses in the top 30.
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Jinx
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Well, IU did beat the point spread. Vegas had them as significant underdogs yet they were close.
I also had less confidence in this prediction (which is why I originally left it out).
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Richard,
“Well, IU did beat the point spread. Vegas had them as significant underdogs yet they were close.”
Underdogs are 19-6 (76%) against the spread so far this bowl season and 15-2 over the last 17.
I give UMD and IN credit for playing closer games than they should’ve been on paper. I was worried that with teams having to play up a couple of slots that things could go very poorly in the early bowls for the B10. Now I just need to hope for the top end to live up to their billing.
I don’t understand why IN stayed with Lagow when he was 14 of 39 and getting sacked and hurried instead of putting Diamont back in at QB, though. IN could never get their offense flowing with Lagow playing that poorly.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18369921/growing-number-group-5-officials-considering-playoff-non-power-5-teams
Several G5 officials are talking about starting a G5 playoff.
“It’s time to have a realistic conversation about creating a playoff for the Group of 5,” Frazier told ESPN. “Why not?”
…
“There is absolutely no ability for us (teams in the Group of 5) to be in that national title conversation,” Frazier said. “That’s just reality. Anyone that says we can: That’s a flat-out lie.”
Is there a reason they should be in that conversation most years? Even at 13-0, how many G5 teams are as good as the top P5 teams? Let’s see how a 13-0 Boise or Houston with wins over multiple ranked teams is treated before saying the G5 can never be in the conversation.
Frazier said he believes a Group of 5 playoff could be financially rewarding to those schools. NBC, CBS and ESPN have interest in televising a Group of 5 playoff, an industry source said.
“As long as the financial agreement that currently exists with the CFB Playoff remains and we had the opportunity to package a Group of 5 championship, why wouldn’t we want to do it?” a Group of 5 official said. “It would spread the exposure to all five conferences, rather than just the one conference champion that plays in a New Year’s 6 bowl.”
Why should the G5 continue getting the same cut from the CFP if they are starting their own playoff in addition? Is their playoff going to determine the 1 G5 team that makes the NY6 bowl, or are they going to pull their best teams out of the NY6 bowl mix? How many games do they want their champion to play in 1 season?
Currently, the highest-ranked Group of 5 champ is under contract to play in a New Year’s 6 bowl — the Cotton, Fiesta or Peach — for the next nine years, through the 2025 regular season. Frazier envisions an eight-team playoff made up of the five Group of 5 conference champions and three at-large teams or independents.
“Every division of college football has a national championship — Power 5, FCS, Division II, Division III and NAIA — every division, that is, except the Group of 5,” Frazier said.
So they would drop their NY6 slot in exchange for their playoff. So why should the CFP pay them the same amount? They aren’t playing in any of the major bowls.
Also, they’d be dropping multiple bowl slots to play home games for the quarterfinals and semifinals most likely. Will they keep the 12 game schedule and CCGs? I assume they’d go neutral site for their NCG, but when would they play it? NYD weekend is pretty full already. Would they try to play their semifinals in mid-December and then the NCG on NYD in the early slot (not against the Rose or Sugar)?
While Frazier and several other Group of 5 officials, who wished not be identified, support adding a Group of 5 playoff, plenty of Group of 5 officials oppose a separate playoff.
“Absolutely would not want a separate playoff,” said a Group of 5 AD, “and I can’t put enough exclamation points behind that.”
American Conference commissioner Mike Aresco has no interest in it either.
“The answer is an emphatic no,” Aresco said. “We compete for national championships like anyone else in FBS, including the Power 5, and have no interest in any kind of separate championship.”
The Group of 5 officials that favor a Group of 5 championship acknowledge several factors would have to be resolved: how much the playoff would be worth, how would it impact the Group of 5’s automatic bid to a New Year’s 6 bowl, what bowls and how many teams would be involved.
Why would a bowl want the quarterfinals or even semifinals? Unless 1 or both teams are local, they aren’t going to sell tickets and fill hotels.
Some officials are concerned a separate national title would perpetuate the perception of the haves and have-nots between the Power 5 and Group of 5.
“You mean compete for a junior varsity championship?” one Group of 5 AD said. “No thanks.”
Of course that perception would exist. They’d be admitting that it’s true.
“The College Football Playoff is great and I love the committee, but their focus is on the national championship for the Power 5 teams and not focused on getting Group of 5 (teams) in the national conversation,” Frazier said.
It’s the job of teams to put themselves into the conversation. It’s the committee’s job to pick the best 4.
This season, Western Michigan was only one of two undefeated teams along with No. 1 Alabama. The Broncos had non-league wins at Power 5 opponents Northwestern and Illinois, yet 13-0 WMU was ranked No. 15 — behind six Power 5 teams with three losses and one Power 5 team with four losses.
Massey composite has WMU #12, with 9 of 124 systems having them in the top 4.
RPI has WMU #12.
F/+ has WMU #22.
It’s not just the committee that thinks they don’t belong in the conversation. It’s not like they had any big wins OOC (NW and IL are P5, but went 7-6 and 3-9) to bolster their case, unlike UH would have with OU and UL (but they lost multiple AAC games). The playoff teams all faced multiple ranked teams. The G5 shouldn’t be rewarded for playing much easier games.
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Is there a reason they should be in that conversation most years?
It sounds like the proponents of this G5 playoff are acknowledging the answer is: no.
A G5 team needs to go undefeated, and have a couple of highly-ranked scalps on its non-conference slate, to even have a chance at making the top four — and even then, it is not assured.
So, there is a logic to putting the best of the G5 into a playoff they’ll always be in, rather than holding out for the once-per-decade miracle team that crashes the P5 playoff party. (My estimate of once per decade may very well be optimistic.)
But the article isn’t clear about when they would propose to play the games, or if they’d be giving up their guaranteed NY6 slot.
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If that G5 proposal comes with 3 lesser bowls being euthanized into rotating permanent Semifinal and Final sites (Albuquerque, Shreveport, and Boca Raton), I could live with that.
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I don’t think the semifinals would be at neutral sites. I think they’d have to play on campus until the finals. At least, that’s what I-AA does and I don’t think the G5 would draw significantly more traveling fans necessarily.
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Of course, it doesn’t need to be said that an 8-school playoff makes it far more possible for a G5 team to make the playoffs.
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What are the chances that if the playoff is expanded to 8 that the G5 get an autobid?
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What are the chances that if the playoff is expanded to 8 that the G5 get an autobid?
I think there’s a fair chance they will. The trend, over the years, has been increasing access for the G5. This assumes they don’t short-circuit that process by forming their own playoff, which for now is just a pipe dream.
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Marc Shepherd,
“A G5 team needs to go undefeated, and have a couple of highly-ranked scalps on its non-conference slate, to even have a chance at making the top four — and even then, it is not assured.
So, there is a logic to putting the best of the G5 into a playoff they’ll always be in, rather than holding out for the once-per-decade miracle team that crashes the P5 playoff party. (My estimate of once per decade may very well be optimistic.)”
I get that logic, but what do they call their title? The G5 National Championship? The Best of the Rest? And exactly which independents would qualify for their playoff and which would accept invitations? Would they offer ND a spot every year? I assume ND would turn down any such invitation. What about BYU? Would they be willing to play in it?
“But the article isn’t clear about when they would propose to play the games, or if they’d be giving up their guaranteed NY6 slot.”
Let’s use this year as an example.
Assume they keep the 12 game schedule and CCGs.
12/3 – CCGs done
12/4 – Selection Sunday for CFP and for G5P
How do they pick the 8 teams? Assume they give autobids to the 5 champions. How do they pick the 3 at-larges? Computer rankings? A G5 committee? For this I’ll use the Massey composite.
#1 WMU (MAC champ) vs #8 AR St (SB champ) @ Kalamazoo
#2 Boise (at-large) vs #7 SDSU (MWC champ) @ Boise
#3 USF (at-large) vs #6 WKU (CUSA champ) @ Tampa
#4 Temple (AAC champ) vs #5 UH (at-large) @ Philadelphia
Note 1: AR St and App St tied at 7-1 in the SB and didn’t play, so the tiebreaker is that Troy beat App St and lost to AR St. The downside of this is that App St is much higher ranked (#42 in Massey vs #78). The SB might want to re-examine those tiebreakers.
Note 2: BYU would be the first team out (UH was #31, BYU #40).
I wonder if they’ll follow the pro model of giving the top seeds to the champs and the at-larges get #6-8 to reduce the beauty contest aspects? I think they might.
#1 WMU (MAC champ) vs #8 UH (at-large) @ Kalamazoo
#2 Temple (AAC champ) vs #7 USF (at-large) @ Philadelphia
#3 WKU (CUSA champ) vs #6 Boise (at-large) @ Bowling Green, KY
#4 SDSU (MWC champ) vs #5 AR St (SB champ) @ San Diego
So when do they play round 1? On 12/10 like Army/Navy? That’s a short turnaround for the coaches, but that’s how I-AA does it so I’ll go with that.
12/10 – quarterfinals
12/17 – semifinals
This is the same schedule as I-AA, so I’ll stick with it.
#1 WMU (MAC champ) vs #4 Temple (AAC champ) @ Kalamazoo
#2 Boise (at-large) vs #3 USF (at-large) @ Boise
or
#1 WMU (MAC champ) vs #4 SDSU (MWC champ) @ Kalamazoo
#6 Boise (at-large) vs #7 USF (at-large) @ Boise
They could try to use bowls for the semifinals, but I just don’t think the games will be attractive enough. Would the schools commit to buying lots of tickets for travel on short notice?
Note: The different seeding methods result in 3 of the same game winners in this case.
12/24 – off
12/31 – off
1/7/2017 – finals
Again, this is the exact same schedule as I-AA.
#1 WMU (MAC champ) vs #2/6 Boise (at-large) @ some neutral location
There’s no way to keep the G5 champ in the NY6, and I doubt the NY6 want a G5 team that just lost a playoff game. The NY6 certainly doesn’t want G5 #9 (or at-large #4).
As is, they champ could play 16 games (17 with a game at HI).
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I get that logic, but what do they call their title? The G5 National Championship? The Best of the Rest?
That strike me as a second-order problem. FCS didn’t have a separate playoff until after I–A and I–AA were split. Naming it wasn’t the hardest part. One thing FCS has shown, is that the “championship” of a lower division can still be worth fighting for, even if the “price” is that they can no longer compete for the higher championship, which they weren’t very likely to win anyway.
And exactly which independents would qualify for their playoff and which would accept invitations? Would they offer ND a spot every year? I assume ND would turn down any such invitation. What about BYU? Would they be willing to play in it?
ND has always been treated like a P5 school. I doubt anyone would bother insulting the Irish with an invitation everyone knows they won’t accept. At the opposite pole, no one would dispute that Army and UMass are effectively G5 schools. I have no idea how BYU would react, but in some ways it is the same logic for them as for the others: their path to a NY6 bowl or a playoff berth is a very narrow one. The Cougars have not played in a major bowl since a Cotton Bowl appearance in 1996.
They could try to use bowls for the semifinals, but I just don’t think the games will be attractive enough. Would the schools commit to buying lots of tickets for travel on short notice?
I agree that campus sites are the only way to go. The biggest question is what the proponents want to do about the G5’s NY6 auto-bid. Do they think they can somehow still preserve that? I don’t see how, but maybe I don’t have a good enough imagination.
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How Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Washington make and spend their money.
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Jabrill Peppers showing how important he is to Michigan.
The difference in the Orange Bowl has been FSU’s explosion plays, which have come directly and indirectly because of Pepper’s absence.
Without Peppers, nobody in the Michigan D can keep up with Cook and they switch from their usual man coverage which led to big miscommunication breakdowns.
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Michigan had three losses this season, and in each of them, it had a late lead that it failed to protect. Peppers played in the other two.
The other common thread in the losses was the lack of a sustained running game: in all three, Michigan had less than 100 team rushing yards. Against Iowa, Peppers had 4 rushes for 11 yards. Against Ohio State, he had 4 rushes for 4 yards.
Michigan had first downs at the FSU 1, 6, and 12, and came away with FGs each time, in each case moving backwards for 3 plays before having to send out the kicker. I’m sure they’d have preferred to have Peppers available, but he isn’t the panacea.
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This is another data point in the discussion about players sitting out their bowl games. Michigan senior tight end Jake Butt (Mackey Award, All-American) tore his ACL in the Orange Bowl, and will require surgery. He walked off under his own power, so it is probably the type of injury that can he could recover from. Nevertheless, he will miss draft preparation, and likely the combine. Several NFL mock draft sites projected him as a likely second-rounder. He reportedly has a $2 million loss of value insurance policy that begins to pay out if he slips past the second round.
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Standard ACL tears don’t hurt a player’s value all that much anymore. See Todd Gurley going #10 in the 2015 draft as still the top RB taken.
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Nick Saban is not wasting any time getting rid of Lane Kiffen.
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18394667/lane-kiffin-not-coach-offense-alabama-crimson-tide-title-game
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18399936/texas-longhorns-hire-ohio-state-buckeyes-tim-beck-offensive-coordinator
And Meyer quickly dropped Tim Beck (he left to “pursue other opportunities” and was replaced within a day).
New Texas Longhorns coach Tom Herman is hiring Ohio State’s Tim Beck to serve as his offensive coordinator, sources confirmed to ESPN on Tuesday.
…
Ohio State announced Tuesday that former San Francisco 49ers assistant Ryan Day will replace Beck as Ohio State’s quarterbacks coach. Day spent the past two seasons coaching quarterbacks under Chip Kelly with the 49ers and the Philadelphia Eagles.
Prior to making the jump to the NFL, Day was the offensive coordinator at Boston College from 2013-14 and at Temple in 2012 under coach Steve Addazio, a former Urban Meyer assistant.
Many OSU and NE fans questioned Beck’s hiring 2 years ago and the offense since then did nothing to quell those concerns. The bowl was the last straw for many fans, and perhaps for Meyer as well.
Day is 37 and will be just the QB coach, not the co-OC as well like Beck was. Presumably Warriner will be the sole OC.
—
It’s too easy to put all the blame on Beck, though. Meyer has never had a great passing offense at OSU.
2016: 82nd (213.9 ypg)
2015: 100th (188.8)
2014: 52nd (247.1)
2013: 90th (203.3)
2012: 105th (181.5)
Meyer says his goal is 250 yds passing and 200 yds rushing in every game. Clearly the passing game just hasn’t gotten there. The running game has been great, though.
2016: 12th (245.2 ypg)
2015: 11th (245.2)
2014: 9th (264.5)
2013: 5th (308.6)
2012: 10th (242.3)
He almost has the balance switched. It’s one thing to have to do that with Tressel’s players but everyone at OSU is now a Meyer recruit. When will the highly ranked WR prospects lead to a strong passing game? Is it the QB holding them back? Barrett was a lot better in 2014 than now. Maybe it’s mental or maybe his ankle just isn’t the same. More likely the OL isn’t the same, which again should be full of highly-ranked prospects. Maybe the WR coach needs replacing. I don’t know. Hopefully Meyer finds thew answer soon.
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And after Barrett, is a McSorley clone Martell. The WR talent at tOSU might be better served with a traditional drop back passer.
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Go to Elevenwarriors, and they fault the coaching of the WR, QB, O-Line, as well as playcalling.
Can’t say I disagree.
Right now, the OSU offense is built to run the single-wing.
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It is rather remarkable that OSU did as well as it did, with such a mediocre passing game. If I showed you those numbers, without telling you who it was, you wouldn’t expect the kind of record that OSU has had.
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Wow is the big ten bad. Michigan’s ranking was a huge joke, PSU choked under pressure, Iowa was killed by a bad Florida team and Ohio State forgot to show up. I guess Wisconsin has a big win vs a MAC school
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OSU and Iowa were destroyed, but Michigan almost pulled out a win despite losing their best player before the game and PSU nearly pulled off the upset despite coming in as a decided underdog.
As I stated before, one drawback with getting so many teams in to NY6 bowls is that most of the B10 slate ends up being underdogs in bowls.
Here were the B10 bowl matchups where one team was a favorite (more than a FG) or heavy favorite (TD or more) according to Vegas/advanced stats:
B10 favored:
Wisconsin over WMU (won; beat some spreads)
Michigan over FSU (lost)
Opponent favored:
WSU over Minny (won)
Pitt over Northwestern (won)
Utah over IU (lost but beat spread)
USC over PSU (lost but beat spread)
Of course, the problem was that the OSU, Iowa, and UNL (and UMD) games were suppose to be close, and OSU, Iowa, and UNL were blown out (though I was kinda expecting that to happen to UNL).
Depending on when you bet on Wisconsin-WMU, the B10 went 5-5 (or 4-6) vs. the spread.
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To take just one example, how does barely losing to an FSU team that was among the top 5 teams in the second half of the season even without their best player make Michigan’s ranking a joke?
‘Bama, USC, Clemson, and FSU were among the top 5 teams by S&P in the second half of the season: http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2016/12/26/14080738/college-football-teams-2016-rankings-alabama-clemson-fsu-usc
PSU was #6. Michigan was #11. OSU was #17.
If anyone was overranked, it was OSU.
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The top BiG teams were bad compared to their CFP/poll rankings – that is what matters, not the spread.
tOSU was ranked #3 and humiliated by #2.
PSU was #5 and lost a heartbreaker to #9.
UM was #6 and lost a squeaker to #11, albeit w/o its best player.
Wisconsin was ranked #8 and beat, but did not dominate, #15.
Iowa was ranked #21 and was humiliated by #20.
Nebraska was ranked #24 and lost to #33.
The outperformance came from the lunranked ower echelon:
Minny beat #27 WSU
NW beat #23 Pitt
Indiana almost beat #25 Utah
Maryland lost to a very mediocre BC.
The bottom-line is that, for all the arguments about multiple BiG teams deserving multiple CFP invitations, the results indicate that the BiG did not deserve to have a single representative in the CFP.
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The top BiG teams were bad compared to their CFP/poll rankings – that is what matters, not the spread.
I am not sure how ANY of this matters, other than bragging rights among players and fans. The Big Ten has underperformed its rankings for years. It still gets the invitations and rakes in the dollars.
The bottom-line is that, for all the arguments about multiple BiG teams deserving multiple CFP invitations, the results indicate that the BiG did not deserve to have a single representative in the CFP.
The B1G deserved every bid it got, given the data available at the time. No other data counts. The seeds aren’t, and can’t be, THAT precise. Remember, two years ago, Ohio State got a #4 seed that many believed it didn’t deserve. It went on to beat both #1 and then #2 handily.
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Yeah, you have to look at more than bowl games, though results do matter.
Really, after ‘Bama, it’s a jumble. Plus, teams may improve or become worse. PSU, FSU, OU, and USC all were considerably better by the end of the season than when the season began. OSU was worse by the end of the season than they were at the beginning of the season.
Clemson was a fluke missed FG (from reasonable range) away from losing to NCSU and being out of the playoffs.
UDub didn’t beat a single elite team (and struggled mightily against good defenses).
PSU is very volatile because their offense can hit home runs (McSorley with the deep-ball and video game character Barkley) and they love to blitz, but that could mean big swings against them with their high-risk style of play.
In UMich’s losses (all close), they were missing their QB or best player or their QB was hampered.
OSU’s offense was uniquely unsuited to beat Clemson’s D (ferocious d-line but secondary that can be beat with deep ball).
So if we are talking about the best teams at the end of the season, after ‘Bama, they would be some combination of Clemson, FSU, UMich, USC, PSU.
It’s funny how perceptions can change based on a few plays. If a couple of plays in the Rose and Orange bowls has turned out differently, we’d be talking about how the B10 won 3 of 4 NY6 bowls; more than any other conference.
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Right – a team that went 1-3 in its last 4 games is one of the best teams at the end of the season.
And FSU is one of the best teams season-end, why? Because they played their conference rival close at home, beat a bunch of patsies, beat their in-state rival at home, and then barely beat a team that went 1-3 in its last 4 games?? By that kind of logic, you could say that Stanford was one of the best teams at season-end – and believe me the Cardinal were not.
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@Redwood86: As I gather, Richard is going off the advanced stats, which have the virtue of not being driven by emotion, as it appears you might be.
There’s a lot of randomness in sports. Michigan lost to FSU by 1 point, without their best player, who pulled his hamstring the day before. It was the worst possible case, not only because he was absent, but also because they had prepared for a month on the assumption of him being available.
Up to that point, I am not aware of any impartial observer (or even most partial ones) who thought that Michigan did not belong in the Orange Bowl, based on their resume up to that point. They lost on the road in double OT to the playoff #3 seed, and they lost to Iowa in a game where their QB broke his collar bone. If someone had a better resume, who would it be?
Obviously, Ohio State did not play like a playoff #3 seed, but if you saw that coming, you are a better fortune-teller than anyone else I’ve heard of. All the teams below Alabama and Clemson had flaws. That is why they weren’t the #1 or #2 seeds.
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Yep, what Marc said about UMich. Even counting the bowl games, who else besides the teams I named (‘Bama, Clemson, FSU, USC, PSU; maybe OU) has a better resume? Not all wins are the same and not all losses are the same.
Close games that are decided by a FG or less (or in OT) are almost coin flips. Teams win roughly half of those.
As for FSU, they absolutely destroyed UF, which is a pretty good team (inconsistent offense, but the kind of defense that would shut down any Pac team besides USC).
They also played Clemson close.
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Furthermore on FSU:
No shame in barely beating a rival on the road who finished with 9 wins and dominated a 10 win team (WVU) in its bowl game.
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Redwood86,
“The bottom-line is that, for all the arguments about multiple BiG teams deserving multiple CFP invitations, the results indicate that the BiG did not deserve to have a single representative in the CFP.”
Who was making those arguments? I didn’t hear any informed person say the B10 deserved 2 spots by the end of the season. There was discussion about it being possible if CCG weekend had certain upsets, but nobody really suggested it after Clemson and UW both won their CCGs. There was debate over which B10 team should get in, but only a few fans thought UW should be left out in favor of PSU.
And how do we know the B10 didn’t deserve a team in the CFP? #1 and #2 won the semifinals. #3, 5, 6 and 8 were all B10 teams. So who is it that deserved the CFP spot if not a B10 team?
#7 OU? Whipped at home by OSU during the regular season. No elite wins.
#9 USC? Humiliated by AL en route to opening the season 1-3 and didn’t win their division.
#10 CO? Crushed by UW and MI, lost to USC.
Yes, USC won a bowl game in their home city (USC is 25-9 in the Rose Bowl). Big deal. It doesn’t change what happened during the season. It just reinforces what everyone already knew, which is that USC was really hot at the end of the season.
OU beat 8-5 AU in their bowl, so I’m not impressed. CO got blown out yet again.
MI did well considering their injuries. WI won which is the whole point of the game. WMU was very excited for that game while WI was disappointed after losing yet another close B10. A win is a win. Clemson exposed flaws that we all knew existed in the OSU offense at the end of the year. The only question was whether OSU could fix them in time and the answer turned out to be no. Clemson was a terrible match-up for OSU and it showed. That doesn’t change what happened during the season, though.
The point is, the B10 clearly earned a CFP spot this year. I think AL and Clemson would’ve beaten any 2 teams in the semis based on how they played, and OSU earned that spot more than USC (the only possible non-B10 suggestion). 11-1 trumps 9-3, especially when going 3-1 versus the top 10.
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Brian: based on records up to that point, OSU deserved the playoff spot, but based on matchups and play at the end of the season, I think PSU and USC (and Michigan if they had everyone healthy) would have had a better shot at beating Clemson.
In fact, I would say both PSU and USC would have been 50/50 to win against Clemson.
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Richard: Even accepting the points you made, I don’t think there’d be much support for changing the playoff committee rules, to allow (or require) them to take those factors into account.
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Marc:
I didn’t argue for changing committee rules anywhere in my post.
What I was doing was rebutting Brian’s assertion: “I think AL and Clemson would’ve beaten any 2 teams in the semis based on how they played”
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Richard,
“Brian: based on records up to that point, OSU deserved the playoff spot,”
Correct.
“but based on matchups and play at the end of the season, I think PSU and USC (and Michigan if they had everyone healthy) would have had a better shot at beating Clemson.”
PSU and USC gave up 52 and 49 points. They would’ve scored on Clemson that night, but Clemson would’ve scored more.
“In fact, I would say both PSU and USC would have been 50/50 to win against Clemson.”
UW would’ve been a 4.5 pt favorite over PSU according to Vegas and Clemson was a favorite over UW. USC would similarly be an underdog.
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Brian:
When you have both sides able to score, there’s more volatility so the outcome is more uncertain. As we have seen this bowl season, the oddsmakers have been shite when it comes to prognosticating bowl results (not a huge surprise as, with such a long layoff, bowl games are so different from regular season games), so I would not count their judgement at all.
There is no way you can say for certain that a team that was outscored by Pitt and was a blown FG from being outscored by NCSU was certain to score more than either PSU or USC.
PSU and USC would have been 50/50 vs. Clemson because they both would have been able to exploit Clemson’s biggest weakness (it’s secondary), which OSU was unable to so.
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Mark is wrong, as Richard has explained, but the headline stats aren’t pretty. The league went 3–7. The East, which at one point looked like the strongest division in CFB, went 0–5.
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Correct, it was an untidy ending to what had arguably been the finest combined showing of the B1G’s “heavies” in the last 20 years. There is no denying, having PSU, OSU and Michigan to go 0-3 in bowl season undercuts much of the conference’s momentum. Why is this relevant? Because there won’t be another game played for eight months.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18402000/minnesota-golden-gophers-announce-firing-coach-tracy-claeys
MN has fired Tracy Claeys. I think this was inevitable.
Coyle said in a statement that he made the decision to “address challenges in recruiting, ticket sales and the culture of the program. We need strong leadership to take Gopher football to the next level and address these challenges.”
Minnesota’s initial preference to be Claeys’ successor is Western Michigan coach P.J. Fleck, although a source close to Fleck told ESPN there has not been any contact between the school and the coach. Other candidates immediately expected to be considered for the opening include former LSU and Oklahoma State coach Les Miles and Boise State’s Bryan Harsin, who was hired by Coyle when he worked there. Minnesota is also expected to target Penn State offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead and North Dakota State coach Chris Klieman, a source told ESPN’s Brett McMurphy.
…
Claeys publicly supported his players in lobbying for fairness in the sexual assault investigation. A tweet in which he voiced support for the players during their two-day boycott last month drew wide criticism from victims’ rights groups and faculty on campus.
Claeys later said he should have used different wording in his tweet but reiterated his support for the players’ push for due process in the school’s Title IX investigation. He also said he planned to donate $50,000 to raise awareness for sexual assault victims.
Claeys’ stance seemed to clash with the administration, particularly Coyle and Kaler, who were determined to respond quickly and decisively to allegations that had upset the community. The AD had given Claeys a vote of confidence at the end of the regular season before the issue resurfaced in December.
Coyle said Tuesday the tweet “was not helpful. I accept that coach Claeys intended it to support the boycotting players. Understandably others did not see it that way.”
…
“Moving forward, we need a leader who sets high expectations athletically, academically, and socially,” Coyle said.
…
Minnesota senior quarterback Mitch Leidner told McMurphy he was “extremely surprised,” calling it a “terrible decision by the administration” to fire Claeys and saying he would be “shocked if any coach wants to come and work for an administration that doesn’t support their coach.”
“This is a pretty sad day for Gopher football,” said Leidner, a four-year starter who holds at least seven school records.
Leidner said the team also learned of the news on social media. Shortly after, Claeys sent a text to the team: “The school decided to fire me. I wouldn’t change anything in the world. I love and support all of you. Best of luck.”
Leidner said he wonders how many players with eligibility will come back.
“No one is happy with the administration right now. I don’t know who would want to be a part of this program at this time,” he said.
An underclassman starter is also skeptical many players will stick around.
“I honestly don’t think it matters who the coach is,” he told ESPN. “People don’t want to play for the administration. So I think countless people will transfer if possible.”
The players continue to sound as clueless as ever. That is exactly why they need a new coach.
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I wouldn’t say that about the players.
I wasn’t there, so I can’t say whether the orgy was consensual or nonconsensual or was consensual and turned nonconsensual. Maybe you were there, Brian, but if you weren’t, I don’t see how you can say either.
I would also expect the players to believe their fellow players.
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Richard,
“I wouldn’t say that about the players.”
Clearly I would.
“I wasn’t there, so I can’t say whether the orgy was consensual or nonconsensual or was consensual and turned nonconsensual. Maybe you were there, Brian, but if you weren’t, I don’t see how you can say either.”
I said nothing about that event in my above comment. I called them clueless, not rapists.
I base my statement on a few things I quoted above:
1. Leidner was “extremely surprised,” calling it a “terrible decision by the administration” to fire Claeys.
The players threatened to boycott the bowl game and made ultimatums to the administration. The coach supported them. Why is any player shocked the coach got fired, especially when he told them in a team meeting that he might lose his job over their boycott before they did it? You don’t get to threaten your boss’s boss and not have any consequences.
2. Also Leidner said he would be “shocked if any coach wants to come and work for an administration that doesn’t support their coach.”
Coaches are only supported up to the point that the team stops winning or scandals occur. That’s true everywhere and coaches know that.
3. “This is a pretty sad day for Gopher football,” said Leidner, a four-year starter who holds at least seven school records.
It’s not like they fired Nick Saban. How sad can it be to lose a mediocre coach whose team brought a giant scandal to the university and also wouldn’t stop getting targeting calls on the field?
4. “Leidner said he wonders how many players with eligibility will come back.”
Since most MN players are there for a free education and not the NFL, I’m guessing a lot of them stick around (depending on the coaching hire). Nobody has left yet and before the spring semester would be an easy time to change. It’s harder for lots of players to transfer over summer because rosters are full by then.
5. “No one is happy with the administration right now. I don’t know who would want to be a part of this program at this time,” he said.
At least 15 recruits want to join at the moment. And most of the roster probably doesn’t have many better options.
I’m sure they’ll lose some players over this, and I’m sure the administration is fine with that.
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How sad can it be to lose a mediocre coach…
I agree with all of your other points, but I am not so sure about the “mediocre” part.
Claeys went 9–4 in his first full season. That’s better than “mediocre” almost everywhere, except at king programs where a 9-win season is an off year. For Minnesota, it’s superb. The Gophers have exactly two 9-win seasons in the last hundred years, and Claeys owns one of them. He ends his short tenure at Minnesota with a .579 winning percentage, the best of any Gophers head coach since Clarence Spears, who won .757 from 1925–29.
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Marc Shepherd,
“Claeys went 9–4 in his first full season. That’s better than “mediocre” almost everywhere, except at king programs where a 9-win season is an off year.”
MN was #37 in the last Massey composite. They lost to PSU, WI, IA and NE who all outranked them. Their best win was over #47 NW at home. Beyond that they beat #53 (at home), 66 (top road win), 72, 98, 103, 112 and a I-AA. That’s a pretty favorable schedule to get 8 wins (3 home OOC games and a bunch of crappy B10 teams). In the bowl they beat #18 WSU, but both teams looked bad. Claeys also was gifted with a 4th year starting QB.
2016 was one of their best teams lately, but not by that much. 2014 under Kill went 8-5 with a Citrus Bowl loss and a tougher schedule. Glen Mason had 3 better teams according to SRS but the schedule wasn’t always as soft.
I also didn’t say that the season was mediocre, I said he was mediocre as a coach. He’s a poor recruiter, his team had a scandal, the team won’t stop targeting, MN fans complain incessantly about his clock management. Those are all aspects of coaching.
http://athlonsports.com/college-football/ranking-all-128-college-football-head-coaches-2016
Claeys ranked as the #101 HC.
https://campusinsiders.com/news/ranking-college-football-coaches-06-27-2016/
Claeys ranked as #55.
http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/2016-power-five-college-football-coach-rankings-nos-65-26/
Claeys ranked #61 among P5 coaches (plus ND).
It’s not just me calling him mediocre.
“The Gophers have exactly two 9-win seasons in the last hundred years, and Claeys owns one of them.”
Part of that is because the season is longer now. They’ve had 42 better seasons by W%. Glen Mason went 10-3 in 2003. Does that make him a great coach?
“He ends his short tenure at Minnesota with a .579 winning percentage, the best of any Gophers head coach since Clarence Spears, who won .757 from 1925–29.”
Bierman didn’t retire until 1950 and he went 0.727. 4 other MN coaches have gone at least 0.500 since then besides Claeys. And unlike Claeys, most other coaches were handed a tire fire of a MN program and had to fix it. Kill built the program and then his health let him down. So Claeys had a solid program to work with.
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Agree with Marc.
I think you’re letting your emotions rule you again, Brian.
Under the Kill/Claeys regime, Minny football had been at a level a clear cut above where they had been in the several decades prior. They had 3 seasons with 8 or more wins in 6 years. They matched the number of times the Gophers had 8 or more wins in a season in the previous 43 years.
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“Under the Kill/Claeys regime, Minny football had been at a level a clear cut above where they had been in the several decades prior. They had 3 seasons with 8 or more wins in 6 years. They matched the number of times the Gophers had 8 or more wins in a season in the previous 43 years.”
I didn’t say anything about Kill being a mediocre coach. He built the program that Claeys just rode to a 9-4 season. Having 1 good season with someone else’s players doesn’t impress me when the prior coach also had success with them. He didn’t hire a staff, build the program, implement a system or anything. He was handed a turnkey system and didn’t ruin it on the field.
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Having 1 good season with someone else’s players doesn’t impress me when the prior coach also had success with them. He didn’t hire a staff, build the program, implement a system or anything. He was handed a turnkey system and didn’t ruin it on the field.
None of that means “mediocre.” If you said that there was too little data to assess how good a coach he really is, I would agree.
On the other hand, football teams don’t coach themselves. Luke Fickell is living proof that you can be handed a turnkey system, and produce worse results with the same assets. It is not a guarantee.
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Marc Shepherd,
“None of that means “mediocre.””
I didn’t say that it did. I gave my multiple reasons for calling him mediocre elsewhere.
“If you said that there was too little data to assess how good a coach he really is, I would agree.”
I would say there is too little W/L data to determine how good of a head coach he is solely on that, but there is other data.
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Anyway, considering the kind of guys that Fleck recruits, and especially given what just happened at Minny, I can’t see how Minny could justify hiring Fleck: http://woodtv.com/2016/09/01/former-wmu-football-player-had-4-prior-sex-assault-cases/
I personally think either Bohls or Harsin would be a better choice.
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Done Deal for Fleck
http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/minnesota-to-hire-western-michigans-p-j-fleck-to-replace-fired-tracy-claeys/
It will be a tough one to outdo Strippergate and the Orgy, but Fleck just might.
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This tells me that all this wasn’t about sexual assault but Coyle’s feelings about Claeys as a coach.
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This tells me that all this wasn’t about sexual assault but Coyle’s feelings about Claeys as a coach.
I am having trouble comprehending that. If you leave out the sexual assault charge and Claeys’ response to it, nobody is firing a coach who goes 9–4 (including a bowl win) at Minnesota in his first full year.
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Marc:
As I posted above, Fleck recruited and brought on to the team a guy who had 4 different sexual assault allegations against him:
http://woodtv.com/2016/09/01/former-wmu-football-player-had-4-prior-sex-assault-cases/
He and another player then committed armed robbery while at WMU: http://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/2016/08/27/western-michigan-university-football/89489270/
That tells me that Coyle was simply looking to get rid of Claeys. Maybe he didn’t like Claeys not showing him the proper respect. Obviously Coyle could never get rid of Claeys given his winning without an excuse.
But no one is going to convince me that Minny really cares about preventing sexual assault when they then go out and hire a coach who recruited and brought on to his team a guy who 4 different people called a rapist.
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Marc Shepherd,
“I am having trouble comprehending that. If you leave out the sexual assault charge and Claeys’ response to it, nobody is firing a coach who goes 9–4 (including a bowl win) at Minnesota in his first full year.”
It’s a new AD (the prior one had sexual assault issues) looking for a clean slate. The team had a scandal under Claeys watch which was bad enough, but his tweet and support for his players boycotting was probably the final nail in the coffin. Season ticket sales are down, recruiting is poor, the coach doesn’t appear to have the team under control and the administration is upset with the coach’s behavior. My guess is that the president wanted this done and the AD is happy enough to hire his own coach.
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I think Coyle thought Tracy Claeys did not fit the mold of the face of the program. Let’s face it he is significantly overweight and has a personality of tree stump. That likely doesn’t do well with boosters. Minnesota needs a coach that is going to help out in fundraising and Claeys in not that guy.
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Yep, being a college football HC is so much about being a politician, salesman, and PR guy now.
In that sense, it is more like a CEO role.
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Yep, being a college football HC is so much about being a politician, salesman, and PR guy now.
But there’s no way he gets fired with a 9–4 record after one year, if the sexual assault scandal (and his handling of it) don’t happen.
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Really. What a bunch of clueless kids. The coach publically contradicted his bosses. And did it on an issue where the university had an image question. That will usually get you fired outside the privileged world of college football.
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Doesn’t mean they have to like it. If your boss got fired for standing up to his superiors for you/your peers, how would you feel?
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No, but it does mean they shouldn’t be “extremely surprised” especially since he told them he might lose his job if they boycotted.
That’s the clueless part.
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Harsin or Klieman (current NDSU) would be good; Bohl might be in the Danny Glover(now Damon Wayans)/Lethal Weapon stage of his coaching career.
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IMO, if you want a good coach, you hire a good coach. Bohl (like Jerry Kill), makes every program he goes to better than it was when he joined and wins divisions/conferences.
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/ct-wrigley-field-bowl-game-cubs-spt-0106-20170105-story.html
The Cubs want to host a bowl game at Wrigley Field starting in 2020.
The Pinstripe Bowl has become a commercial and cultural success, with players visiting Times Square, Wall Street and the 9/11 Memorial and Museum in the buildup to the game.
“When we first announced the bowl game, there was a lot of criticism,” Yankees President Randy Levine recalled. “Mayor (Michael) Bloomberg, who was sitting next to me, said: ‘Wasn’t football supposed to be played in cold weather?’
“I have nothing against warm-weather cities, but there are certain things that New York, Chicago and Boston can offer that some cities cannot.”
…
Football will return to Wrigley Field in November of 2020, Cubs President Crane Kenney told the Tribune, with Northwestern’s hosting multiple Big Ten games the team’s “first priority.”
More intriguing, Kenney said the Cubs “absolutely” intend to begin hosting an annual bowl game.
The bowl would be the first of its kind in the Chicago area, and the timing should be ideal.
By 2020 (actually 2018), fans will be able to eat in new Wrigleyville restaurants such as Big Star and Smoke Daddy, sleep at the boutique Hotel Zachary and revel in a tented plaza that can accommodate crowds of nearly 6,000.
And needless to say, the field area will be expanded to allow for two full end zones.
…
Why Wrigley?
College football has been a dud at Soldier Field, and the NIU-Toledo game at the White Sox’s home park drew little attention and a modest crowd of 10,180.
When Northwestern took on Illinois at Wrigley in 2010, a full 41,058 attended and ESPN’s “College GameDay” set up shop.
“Concerts that may not sell out elsewhere sell out at Wrigley,” Kenney said. “It’s because of the ballpark, Wrigleyville, Chicago, the history. It gives us confidence that a bowl game will succeed here.”
…
The Cubs also will need up to two years to align with conferences, find a title sponsor and secure a broadcast partner. Big Ten Network President Mark Silverman told the Tribune that the network “would be open to exploring televising a bowl game in Chicago. Our ability to reach over 60 million homes would be a great asset to promote the bowl game.”
Another B10 bowl up north? I guess we’d drop the Heart of Dallas/Armed Forces Bowl in TX (alternates every year) versus CUSA which is on the same tier as the Detroit game. Perhaps Foster Farms would go away due to the travel distance, though.
New lineup:
1. Rose
2*. Orange
2/3/4. Citrus, Outback and Holiday
5/6/7. Music City/Gator, Foster Farms, Pinstripe
8/9. Detroit, Chicago (MI, IL)
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The 2020 date isn’t a coincidence. There is currently a freeze on the creation of new bowls, which lasts through 2019.
According to this article, the NCAA’s football oversight committee is looking at whether there are too many bowls:
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I think we drop Foster Farms or commit one spot to a rotation that includes Foster Farms/Cactus/Dallas/Armed Forces (along with the Pac, B12, BYU, MWC, AAC, CUSA)
So:
1. Rose
2. Orange/Citrus
3/4 Outback and Holiday
5/6 Music City/Gator and Pinstripe (which already picks before Foster Farms, BTW)
7/8/9 Detroit, Chicago, Bay Area/AZ/DFW
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I listed the bowl tiers as Wikipedia has them listed. It’s not a simple selection order anymore.
Click to access Bowl_Determination_Procedures.pdf
The official word from the B10.
http://www.thegazette.com/2013/05/15/big-ten-breathes-life-into-next-round-of-bowls
The Big Ten is acutely aware that if it’s going to run the race with the SEC for national championships, it’s going to have to broaden recruiting scope. That also was part of the B1G’s bowl plan, which will be announced in the next week or two.
The new model also will move away from a pure selection process by the bowls to pools of teams divided among multiple bowls with the decision made by the conferences, Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany said Wednesday at the Big Ten spring meetings.
“We’ll probably be somewhere between a selection and a conference placement,” he said. “We’ll give a lot of conditions to each bowl and they’ll have to get conference approval for the selection that they choose.”
http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/sec-big-ten-acc-college-football-playoff-bowls-selection-sunday-primer-120214
Another primer on how the pool system works.
The ACC, Big Ten and SEC have all instituted new “pool” systems in which they will essentially dictate which teams go where — with varying degrees of input from the schools and the bowls themselves. The goal is keep bowl matchups fresh both for cities and schools by avoiding undue repeat appearances or rigid adherence to teams’ records.
“We came to this decision with our bowl partners based in part on the view that the postseason had really become stale,” said Big Ten Senior Associate Commissioner Mark Rudner, whose conference winced seeing Wisconsin or Michigan play in the same one or two Florida bowls year after year. “We think this is a much better process than the bowls having the exclusive right to keep picking the same teams year in and year out.”
Beyond the Rose and Orange bowls and the committee-controlled Peach, Cotton and Fiesta, the 14-team Big Ten now has partnerships with nine lower-profile bowls — Citrus, Outback, Holiday, TaxSlayer, Music City, Foster Farms (San Francisco), Pinstripe, Quick Lane (Detroit) and Heart of Dallas. While loosely pooled into tiers based on prestige and payout, theoretically the conference can place any of its bowl-eligible teams into any of those bowls. And there’s stipulations in place that guarantee, for example, that the two California bowls will each get five different teams over the course of their six-year contracts.
Come Sunday, the bowls will each rank in order their top three preferred teams, and the schools will indicate where they’d most like to go, at which point Rudner and commissioner Jim Delany will go into matchmaker mode. All of which makes it much harder than years past to predict ahead of time who’s going where. However, 8-4 Minnesota, which hasn’t played in a New Year’s bowl since 1962, appears a lock for one of the Florida bowls. Conversely, having made three straight Sunshine State trips, 9-3 Nebraska will likely head west.
“We’re all really not sure how it’s going to work out,” said Gary Cavalli, president of the Foster Farms (formerly Fight Hunger) Bowl in San Francisco. “It used to be the bowls made a pick and that was it. While the bowls and schools can state their preferences, it’s clear that the conference is the primary matchmaker.”
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Brian, yes, that is what the B10 said, but in reality, it’s a simple selection order with the caveat that the B10 has veto power (so each half-decent-or-better bowl has to take at least 5 different teams in 6 years or 6 different teams in 8 years and the B10 doesn’t like schools to go back to the same bowl–ideally, the same state–2 times in 3 years).
Here is the actual bowl selection procedure:
Click to access Bowl_Determination_Procedures.pdf
Link is on the B10 site: http://www.bigten.org/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/073114aaa.html
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Richard,
“Brian, yes, that is what the B10 said, but in reality, it’s a simple selection order with the caveat that the B10 has veto power (so each half-decent-or-better bowl has to take at least 5 different teams in 6 years or 6 different teams in 8 years and the B10 doesn’t like schools to go back to the same bowl–ideally, the same state–2 times in 3 years).”
So you know the system better than the B10 office. Got it.
How do you reconcile your description of the caveat above with the phrase “simple selection order”? The bowls request teams, the teams request bowls and the B10 makes all the actual decisions. As we get deeper into the 6-year bowl contracts, the required rotation of teams will make things far from simple. Sure the bowls know the rules and will largely make requests that follow them but that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t really prefer a different team, they just know the rules prevent it. There will be years when the middle and lower bowls are scrambled in terms of where the better teams go.
“Here is the actual bowl selection procedure:”
I put that same link in my comment.
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It’s a simple selection order with caveats.
You can pretend that the B10 makes the final decision if you like, but so long as the bowls follow the rules, I don’t see the B10 turning down their requests.
They even let UNL go bowling in CA two years in a row. That tells me that “restrictions are in place on multiple and/or consecutive appearances
within states or regions” just aren’t very strong.
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“They even let UNL go bowling in CA two years in a row. That tells me that “restrictions are in place on multiple and/or consecutive appearances within states or regions” just aren’t very strong.”
Or at the very least, that the restriction is applied with a bit of common sense. The country has some real big states, and saying you can’t go to a bowl in Northern California after bowling in Southern California, while you are allowed to go bowling in Alabama after going bowling in Georgia, would be absurd adherence to a rigid interpretation of the rule.
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http://collegefootball.ap.org/article/fewer-games-games-campus-bowls-could-get-makeover
Speaking of bowls, there may be some changes in the near future.
There is currently an NCAA-imposed freeze on the creation of new bowls that caps the field at 40 through 2019. Over the next few years the people invested in the bowls — commissioners, athletic directors and bowl executives — will consider ways to improve the bowl system and answer the question: What should bowls be?
Chances are there will be fewer bowls, data-driven limitations on how many bowls a conference can lock in and maybe even postseason games played on campus.
…
Everyone seems to agree that while the bowl system is not perfect, it does not need to be razed.
…
“The question for people in college football is: What’s the utility of the bowl?” Bagnato said. “Is it a great trip for your alumni? For your student-athletes? Is it television exposure for four hours for your program? Is it a branding exercise for the school and for a conference? For the communities I think the questions become: Are they tourism magnets? Is the utility of a bowl game the fact that it attracts tourists? All those are factors.
“I don’t know there is one reason to have a bowl game.”
The main reason is the same as it ever was. “The first thing we want them to be is a reward for the players,” said Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby, who also leads the NCAA’s football oversight committee.
The problem is that bowls also reward competence, not excellence.
Once the minimum for postseason eligibility was drawn at 6-6 when the regular season expanded to 12 games, pressure built on conference officials to place each eligible team in a bowl.
Coaches want the extra bowl practices to develop players and the ability to sell a bowl game to recruits.
…
“Beginning in 2020 I seriously doubt there will be 40 bowl games,” Sun Belt Commissioner Karl Benson, who has previously been the commissioner of the Western Athletic Conference and the Mid-American Conference.
But no conference is about voluntarily shut down one of its bowls.
That’s where the oversight committee will come in. Bowlsby said the group has been analyzing data to determine how many bowl slots each conference can typically fill. When bowl lineups are reset for 2020 and beyond, conferences will likely be limited to a number that matches a five-year average of the eligible teams they have produced.
…
Derzis called the TV ratings for this season’s bowls respectable. Waters said those final numbers were still being compiled. But ratings for one particular game provide part of the explanation why ESPN is so heavily invested in bowls.
The Las Vegas Bowl on Dec. 17, in which San Diego State beat Houston 34-10, drew 3.7 million TV viewers on ABC, ESPN’s parent network. At the same time, Kentucky and North Carolina, two of college basketball’s traditional powers, played a thrilling game won by the Wildcats 103-100. The game drew 3.6 million viewers on CBS.
The ratings for the Rose Bowl, a down-to-the-wire 52-49 victory by Southern California over Penn State, jumped 20 percent from last year, but at 9.4 they are still way behind the days when that game would consistently draw double-digit ratings.
Now the playoff draws the most attention and everything else feels more like an exhibition.
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Heck, at least Houston was ranked at one point this year.
Ohio and Troy in the Mobile Bowl drew 2.5M viewers.
Hallmark spends several million dollars each to get those type of ratings with their Christmas movies.
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To add on, UNL (tied for 5th best record in the B10 and the 6th B10 bowl selection) and Tennessee (.500 in SEC play) garnered over 5M viewers in the Music City Bowl.
That’s almost as much as the ACC title game (featuring a playoff contender) and more than the Bedlam game that determined the B12 title. Also almost as much as the ND-USC rivalry game that features 2 king programs, more than the UNL-OSU with 2 king programs, UMich-MSU rivalry game, UF-UGa rivalry game and almost double the Texas-OU rivalry game.
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/special-reports/college-football
Interesting Bloomberg series of articles at the link.
1. The Unravelling of College Football Starts With All These Empty Stadiums.
Low attendance threatens today’s ticket revenue and tomorrow’s alumni donations.
2. College Football’s Top Teams Are Built on Crippling Debt.
Football’s critics often point to multimillion-dollar coaching salaries. They should be more worried about debt, which costs more and lasts longer.
3. Why TV Riches Aren’t Enough to Keep College Football Alive Anymore.
Programs and conferences have sacrificed ticket sales for media money. What happens when that dries up?
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Nate Silver (fivethirtyeight) with a modest proposal to upgrade conference scheduling.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/make-college-football-great-again/
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He would pre-lock five weeks of the conference schedule. The other four would be “flex games,” determined by performance within the season. This ensures that the best teams all play each other, and the CCG is no longer needed — freeing up that weekend for an extra round of playoffs. It also cures other the well-known flaws of the CCG: rematches, imbalanced divisions, and teams that win a division on the strength of easier crossover games.
I think he minimizes the drawbacks: “Coordinating travel logistics would become mildly more annoying.” It’s a lot more than mildly: four times during the season, teams would finish their Saturday game, not knowing who or where they’d be playing the following week — or even whether they’d be playing: the proposed system doesn’t account for byes.
It would be complex for the TV partners, too, who would have four weekends they can’t plan in advance. Would the home fans buy tickets for “TBD”? And what about the traveling fans (there are a lot of these in the Big Ten), who don’t know where their team is playing next?
There are ways the proposal could be improved. Of the five non-flex games, two are played in weeks 1 and 3, based on last year’s record. Three are rivalry games, played in weeks 2, 4, and 7. But there’s no reason why each team’s main rivalry can’t be played in week 9. That’s one tradition I see no reason to abandon. And I don’t think the league needs three locked rivalries per team; two is enough.
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It would be easier to get rid of the playoffs, and go back to 1970, when we had the gift of three national champions. Think of how much more fun the blogs would be if we could argue over that mess.
If we don’t need a conference champion, we surely on’t need a national champion.
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Marc Shepherd,
“He would pre-lock five weeks of the conference schedule. The other four would be “flex games,” determined by performance within the season. This ensures that the best teams all play each other, and the CCG is no longer needed — freeing up that weekend for an extra round of playoffs. It also cures other the well-known flaws of the CCG: rematches, imbalanced divisions, and teams that win a division on the strength of easier crossover games.
I think he minimizes the drawbacks: “Coordinating travel logistics would become mildly more annoying.” It’s a lot more than mildly: four times during the season, teams would finish their Saturday game, not knowing who or where they’d be playing the following week — or even whether they’d be playing: the proposed system doesn’t account for byes.”
I don’t think he made a convincing case that his system would be better than the current system. It’s trading one set of issues for another. A lot of people like the idea of flex scheduling on the surface, but it gets ugly pretty quickly when you get to the details. All fans want more than 5 days notice of who the team will play so they know whether they want to attend and to make travel plans if so. The schools want more time to sell tickets. The teams want more time to make travel arrangements for 100 people and a lot of equipment.
He also made no real case for 8 being better than 4 anyway. Many of his conference championship complaints could be fixed by just dropping divisions and having the top 2 teams play in the CCG. That’s a much simpler fix.
Look at the issues he mentions:
1. Unbalanced divisions prevent the top 2 teams from playing.
2. Rematches.
3. The best teams don’t always play during the season.
4. A weekend is “wasted” on a CCG when it could be used for another playoff round.
Just dropping divisions, a plan we have discussed here quite often, would fix #1 and partially address #3. The B10’s parity-based scheduling already addresses #3 as does having 9 B10 games. #2 is almost unavoidable unless you’re willing to give #1 the top team they haven’t played yet as a CCG foe, but that would often give an unworthy team a shot at the title. #4 is an opinion and ignores issues like most of CFB losing a game from their season (plus losing the CCGs) and thus a large drop in money that an extra playoff round would have to pay for before adding any money to the coffers.
“There are ways the proposal could be improved. Of the five non-flex games, two are played in weeks 1 and 3, based on last year’s record. Three are rivalry games, played in weeks 2, 4, and 7. But there’s no reason why each team’s main rivalry can’t be played in week 9. That’s one tradition I see no reason to abandon.”
I assume his reasoning was to essentially force a week 9 game to be the new CCG.
“And I don’t think the league needs three locked rivalries per team; two is enough.”
One could use the third game to make sure all 14 teams play each other more frequently if it isn’t needed to lock a rivalry. Otherwise some of the top and bottom teams might not play each other much.
For me at least, that feels a lot cleaner than having a conference championship game. Thanks to power-pairing, the top four finishers — Penn State, Iowa, Ohio State and Michigan in our simulation — all played one another, so a championship game wouldn’t have left a lot more to prove or disprove.
The top 4 teams (OSU, PSU, MI, WI) all played each other this year, too. And what if you end up with a tie? The whole playoff system is designed around having to win on the field to advance, but we’re reverting to shared titles in conferences?
He also ignores the impact on the players of his system. If all the top teams play each other a lot, you’ll see more injuries. And lawsuits over professionalism will only increase as you chase more playoff rounds and change the nature of conference play.
And does anyone really believe his simulated season? It has IA ahead of WI. WI beat IA by a game and won @IA. WI was ranked #8 and IA was unranked by the committee. It has RU beating NW.
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A bit of trivia…
Between them, the states of Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, sent 11 teams to bowls.
They went 0–11.
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The curse of he who shall not be named?
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Post #1313
Drove to Mockingbird Lane to do it.
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Penn State has paid out nearly $240,000,000 related to Sandusky matter – so far.
http://nypost.com/2017/01/09/penn-state-pays-out-nearly-250m-for-role-in-child-sex-abuse-scandal/
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Several senior PSU administrators deserve jail time. Lots of it.
Still waiting on the UNC penalty, if any. In the narrow terms of academic integrity, UNC’s crimes are more important, and cut closer to the quick of what a university is, although no one there suffered the psychological trauma the kids at PSU did. No one at UNC deserves jail time, although a big bunch of people should be fired.
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I will be surprised if “several” PSU administrators receive “lots” of jail time (or any).
I don’t think anyone has suggested that UNC committed an actual crime. Not every bad thing in the world is a crime. Those events are far enough in the rear-view mirror that I doubt “a big bunch of people” are going to be fired. They would’ve done it already, if they were going to.
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Fraud? I think there is a good case for that. Lots of people knew about the fake classes.
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You are almost certainly talking civil fraud, not criminal. We are now more than six years after the fraud was made public, and no crime has been charged.
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Actually the professor involved has been charged with criminal fraud. He was getting paid for classes he didn’t teach. Not sure who got the money for the classes other professors didn’t teach.
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Regarding the PSU case, two out of the three administrators are charged with the failure to report and a related charge of child endangerment, which are misdemeanors. This practically guarantees those defendants will not receive substantial prison sentences, even if convicted.
One administrator has those same charges plus a perjury charge, so he is in a bit more peril.
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> One administrator has those same charges plus
> a perjury charge, so he is in a bit more peril.
Just for the record, Curley’s perjury charge has been dropped now, too. I believe (but haven’t gone back to double-check) that it wasn’t dropped when Schultz’s and Spanier’s charges were dropped because of an oversight or technical error by his attorney.
It hasn’t been widely reported, but during the Sandusky trial the state prosecutor told the judge at sidebar that they were not going to take the Curley and Schultz case to trial. (Spanier hadn’t been charged yet.) “But we’re not going to try that case.”
It has now been over five years since Curley and Schultz were charged, and there is still no trial scheduled. One might be tempted to wonder whether the state ever believed it had a case against Curley and Schultz or whether there was some other reason for the charges …
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Bob Sykes,
“Still waiting on the UNC penalty, if any.”
UNC just received the most recent version of their NOA from the NCAA. They still have about 2.5 months to respond and then the hearing will be held this spring/summer.
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http://www.espnfc.com/fifa-world-cup/story/3035778/fifa-council-unanimously-approves-world-cup-expansion-to-48-teams
FIFA has decided to expand the World Cup from 32 to 48 teams starting in 2026. There will 16 groups of 3 playing a round robin with the top 2 in each group advancing. It will be knockout play from then on. That ups the number of games to 80 from 64 and they expect to make an extra $1B, but the WC will still fit in 32 days.
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Greedy corrupt jokesters running a corrupt joke organization making a joke of the most prestigious tournament of the more popular game in the world because of greed.
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http://www.espn.com/chalk/story/_/id/18439150/college-football-full-list-odds-win-2017-18-college-football-national-championship-game
Early odds for the 2017-18 national title.
AL 3-1
FSU 7-1
OSU, OU and USC 8-1
MI, UL and LSU 12-1
PSU 30-1
WI 60-1
MSU 100-1
NE 200-1
NW, MN and IA 300-1
IN and UMD 500-1
IL, PU and RU 1000-1
Full list is in the article.
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Doing predictions for 2017 isn’t nearly as ridiculous as the polls they put out for 2016! USC #3 in one? OU #3 in the other? OU ahead of Ohio St. in both? Wisconsin ahead of Michigan in both?
And the double standard. Auburn still ranked with 5 losses despite looking like a 3-9 team at the end of the season while Ohio St. drops like a rock with a loss.
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Doing predictions for 2017 isn’t nearly as ridiculous as the polls they put out for 2016! USC #3 in one? OU #3 in the other? OU ahead of Ohio St. in both? Wisconsin ahead of Michigan in both?
And the double standard. Auburn still ranked with 5 losses despite looking like a 3-9 team at the end of the season while Ohio St. drops like a rock with a loss.
Ohio State dropped four places after losing 31–0 (they were the only bowl loser to get shut out). That’s a pretty fair outcome. OU lost to Ohio State in September, but won their next 10 in a row, including 3 straight against ranked teams to close out the season. Both teams ended with 11–2 records. Based on how they were playing at the end of the year, I don’t have an argument with OU being ranked higher.
Michigan lost 3 of their last 4, so I don’t think they can rely too much on a 7-point win at home over Wisconsin on October 1.
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Big 10 “round robin”
Ohio St. 2-1
Penn St. 2-1
Michigan 2-1
Wisconsin 0-3
Only if you ignore what actually happens on the field can you rank Wisconsin above any of those 3. Wisconsin didn’t play Ohio St. or FSU in their last 4 games as Michigan did. Wisconsin beat 4 loss LSU by 2 and MAC champ Western Michigan by 8. That was it for their marquee wins. And if you want to talk about timing, that LSU game was the first game of the season. They went all the way to bowl season without a win over a team in the final rankings.
Ohio St. lost to the national champ and beat 3 top 10 teams. They were 3-2 vs. the top 10. OU was 0-1 vs. the top 10, including a decisive loss to Ohio St. at home. Absurd to rank them above Ohio St.
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The polls have always been heavily biased by the recency effect. Luckily they no longer matter. Let the journalists navel gaze all they want.
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American Football Coaches Assn supports December early signing date for recruit. They did not agree to a summer signing period. The actual vote will come in April.
http://247sports.com/Bolt/Coaches-association-endorses-early-signing-period-for-football-50470394
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A related issue is whether they’ll allow official visits in spring and summer, not just once their senior year starts. Northern schools want the chance to get recruits on campus in warm weather and when travel is easier.
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Actual Realignment news.
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Holland was asked if the WAC is considering expanding, and he responded that not only is it being discussed, but it is a “high priority.” Holland went on to say that it’s something that might happen sooner rather than later.
…
He then added that an announcement could be made before the end of the season, though he did not name specific schools.
As an eight-team, geographically disjointed league, the WAC is not a conference that can easily poach from other, more stable, leagues. This is especially true given Chicago State’s uncertain future as a university and New Mexico State’s tough luck with its football program. The conference dates back to 1962, but no current basketball member has been part of the WAC for more than 12 years. Arizona, BYU, New Mexico, San Diego State, UNLV, Boise State, Nevada, and SMU are among the dozens of schools to cycle through the conference over its history.
The most likely candidate for potential WAC expansion would then seem to be a school new to Division I. There are not any currently unaffiliated members transitioning to D-I, but UC San Diego is openly eyeing a move in the near future. The Tritons seem more likely to join the Big West, but they could nevertheless be a strong fit for the WAC if that does not work out.
Southern Illinois-Edwardsville and Nebraska-Omaha have both been linked to the WAC in the past as well, but with conference stability at an all-time low, getting those schools to jump on board would be a tough sell.
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Source: Cal Baptist to join Western Athletic Conference
http://www.midmajormadness.com/2017/1/13/14268062/sources-cal-baptist-to-join-western-athletic-conference
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California Baptist University is a joint member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level, and a member of the National Christian College Athletic Association (NCCAA)[9] CBU competes in the Pacific West Conference in most sports and in 2012–13 the university joined the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) for men’s volleyball.[10] CBU offers 19 sports for men and women:[11] For men, California Baptist sponsors baseball, basketball, golf, soccer, swimming and diving, volleyball, water polo, and wrestling. For women, California Baptist sponsors basketball, cheerleading, golf, soccer, softball, swimming and diving, volleyball, and water polo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Baptist_University
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Riverside now will have two Div I programs (the other being UC Riverside).
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Awful Announcing has a new story about the B1G media contract…
http://awfulannouncing.com/2017/the-big-tens-new-tv-deal-puts-it-into-the-lead-may-provide-a-competitive-edge.html
“College football conference strength has a lot to do with television money, especially money that comes in from the conference’s own TV deals. By that metric, the Big Ten may be set up for success, as their new television deals with both ESPN and Fox kick in this year and should vault them into the lead in terms of TV revenue per school.”
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How far will the Big Ten be pulling away from the SEC in terms of TV money? Well, Bennett’s piece doesn’t say, but we know the Big Ten’s new deal averages $440 million per season ($220 million from Fox, $190 million from ESPN, $10 million from CBS for basketball). Of course, that’s annual value, and as this July piece from Forbes’ Chris Smith notes, these deals usually start at the bottom and grow over time.
The conference networks also need to be factored in. According to Smith, the SEC made $375 million from its own TV deals (including the SEC Network) for the 2015-16 season, while the Big Ten made $291 million (counting its network) there. He writes that it looks like that will change significantly under the new deal, even at the start:
[snip quote]
By that analysis, the SEC would be making about $380 million ($255 ESPN/CBS plus $125 SEC Network) to the Big Ten’s $390 million from regular TV revenue before factoring in postseason play. That’s not a huge gap, especially when you consider that each league has 14 schools, but the new Big Ten deal at the very least puts the conference on pretty equal financial footing with the SEC, and perhaps slightly better footing.
Factoring in other conference-distributed revenue streams such as postseason play is how you get to those estimates of $43 million per school in 2017-18 (which would be $602 million total) and $54 million per school at the end of the contract in 2022-23 ($756 million total). The SEC could still come out ahead if it makes more from postseason play, and that’s certainly a possibility. Still, the Big Ten seems to be in pole position here.
…
That analysis had the SEC with $515 million total ($36.8 million per school) and the Big Ten with $431 million total ($30.8 per school) for 2015-16. Now that the Big Ten’s closer to the SEC, the gap to everyone else looks larger. The Big 12 made the next largest per school over that timeframe($302 million, $30.2 per school), while the Pac-12 had $351 million (29.8 per school) and the ACC had $328 million ($21.9 per school). ACC revenues are going to rise a bit with this new digital network, but not to the scale of the SEC or Big Ten networks, and while it’s possible the Pac-12’s network income could rise, it seems hard to imagine it closing the gap.
The article also references and quotes this piece from Forbes several times:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/chrissmith/2016/07/18/the-most-valuable-conferences-in-college-sports-can-the-sec-be-caught/#664bb86ff4df
The quote I removed above was this bit from the Forbes article:
So how about the Big Ten’s odds of pulling even? The new TV deals will reportedly pay an average $440 million per year, but annual rights fees typically escalate over the life of a TV rights contract. The Pac-12, for instance, has 12-year deals with ESPN and Fox that pay an average $250 million per year. But those annual payouts escalate at roughly 5% per year. So even though the conference just wrapped up its fourth year of the deal, it still only made some $215 million from ESPN and Fox this year. It won’t actually receive a $250 million payout until three years from now.
Assuming that the Big Ten’s new deals have a similar 5% annual escalator in place, that means the conference will earn somewhere in the neighborhood of $390 million next year. That same year the SEC will generate around $255 million in rights fees from its ESPN and CBS deals. The conference-specific networks are major factors here, but they’re mostly equivalent at this point – we figure each conference made around $125 million from its respective network. In other words, even at its least valuable the Big Ten’s new TV income will give it a major head start, and that should easily put the conference back in the hunt for the title of college sports’ most valuable conference.
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/ct-college-football-national-championship-tv-ratings-spt-20170110-story.html
TV ratings for the NCG were down again, but the combined viewership for the semis and NCG were up 9% over last year due to the semifinals being on a Saturday.
http://thebiglead.com/2017/01/10/alabama-clemson-ratings-national-championship-overnight/
2014 – 18.5
2015 – 15.8 (16.0 combined)
2016 – 14.7 (15.3 combined)
Here are some reasons why:
College Football Is a Regional Sport: … Clemson vs. Alabama is an inter-conference matchup. But, it’s a team from Alabama playing a team from South Carolina. That’s not going to engage the casual audience outside the former Confederacy. We saw it when LSU played Alabama in a rematch. We saw it when Florida State played Auburn.
SEC Viewership Is Constant: The SEC has the most rabid college football fans. Birmingham always has the highest TV market share. People actually go to the conference title games. SEC fans watch the title game come what may. Adding Alabama into the playoff or the final, for all the brand power, doesn’t affect ratings. Those fans watch regardless.
Traditional Brands Matter, But Only a Few Of Them: We have a small sample size with the playoff. But, we can look at the BCS title games to get a broader sample. When there is a bump in the rating, it is because Texas, Ohio State, or Notre Dame were playing. That mattered more than the quality of the game. We could add Michigan in there if the Wolverines ever reach a title game. That’s about it. Even famous football schools such as Florida State, Oklahoma, and USC had little impact.
Clemson Is Not a Traditional Football Brand: …It does not have the accrued pull of schools that have been on television playing big games for 40-50 years. One-half or one-third the size of some of the bigger football powers, Clemson does not have the huge national alumni base of an Ohio State.
So basically, having AL in the CFP is bad for business.
http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/college-football-tv-ratings/
NY6 ratings (all from one source, but their numbers are about 1.0 lower than other sources for these games):
Rose – 8.6
Sugar – 5.6
Orange – 6.2
Cotton – 3.1
Fiesta – 10.7
Peach – 9.8
NCG – 14.2
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Top-rated BCS title game: Texas-USC (21.7)
OSU-Oregon in 2014 would be second at 18.5
Then 8 games between 17 and 18:
Tenn-FSU
FSU-VTech
OU-FSU
OSU-Miami
UF-OSU
LSU-OSU
‘Bama-Texas
‘Bama-ND
Worst-rated BCS title games (14.5 or below):
Miami-Nebraska
LSU-OU
USC-OU
‘Bama-LSU
Then this year (Clemson-‘Bama)
15-16:
UF-OU
FSU-Auburn
Clemson-‘Bama
It seems that programs from smaller states/regions (I consider Miami to only deliver S. FL) deliver poor ratings.
So he was right to mention OU not delivering, but he should have mentioned LSU instead of FSU.
In fact, FSU delivered a bunch of times (the one time it didn’t, it was playing a non-king in a small state from the same region).
So does OSU. So does Texas (and ND).
And yes, having 2 teams that are separated by only 1 state or are adjacent is bad for ratings.
Of the 10 best rated, only 1 game (the first BCS game: FSU-Tenn) featured 2 teams that had only 0/1 state between them.
Of the 8 worst rated, only 3 games featured 2 teams that had more than 1 state between them:
Miami-Nebraska
USC-OU
UF-OU
Looks like OU really sinks ratings. Most of those teams are from small states or privates (with a smaller alumni base) as well.
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UConn has all of 10 recruits and their recruiting class is ranked last in the AAC and 118 in the country. With that, new coach Randy Edsall has managed to anger football coaches all over New Jersey by pulling a scholarship from a kid. This kid has just about an average 247 rating (.7782) for UConn recruits, is a good student, with an offer from Cornell, and apparently is an all around good kid. It is hard to believe that UConn with replace him with a better choice. http://usatodayhss.com/2017/uconn-football-coach-randy-edsall-pulls-scholarship-offer-from-n-j-star-less-than-3-weeks-before-signing-day
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I saw that, but it’s a little unfair to Edsall to discuss it now since he can’t give his side (a coach can’t talk about any unsigned recruit). A lot of headlines are very misleading claiming UConn pulled a scholarship from the kid. They are choosing not to send him a LOI to sign. That’s slightly different.
Did Edsall have a valid reason to want someone else? I don’t know. I’ll note that no other I-A school offered him, so the offer may have been a reach by the prior staff. The timing stinks for the kid, but Edsall just took the job. Diaco made the offer and Edsall’s DC or LB coach may not like this kid nearly as much as Diaco’s did.
And let’s remember, commitments are a two way street. The kid may have chosen someone else on signing day and UConn would’ve had no recourse. He has other offers and has 2 weeks until signing day. He doesn’t have to sign then, either. He could wait for weeks or even months.
http://highschoolsports.nj.com/news/article/-5482660132244712626/uconn-reneges-on-scholarship-offer-ditches-jersey-football-recruit-in-eleventh-hour/
This story makes it sound much worse, though.
UConn fired Diaco in late December and hired Edsall — who had previously served as head coach of the Huskies from 1999 to 2010 — on Dec. 28. Dickens worried about his scholarship offer, but Edsall called on New Year’s Day to assure Dickens the school still wanted him and his scholarship was safe, his parents said.
UConn linebackers coach Jon Wholley even met with Dickens at Raritan Thursday to talk about signing day and his upcoming visit to UConn on Jan. 20, Dickens’ 18th birthday.
Three days later, the scholarship was gone.
Once you affirm that you’ll honor the offer, you need to follow through. Especially when you just had his position coach down talking to him. Presumably UConn heard from a better recruit that he was interested so they made some space, but with only 10 recruits that doesn’t seem like a real issue. Sign him and at least he can play special teams or something. Maybe he’ll never play but the negative PR and pissing off HS coaches isn’t worth it at this point.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/nflnation/post/_/id/229070/how-the-nfl-advises-college-underclassmen-on-entering-the-draft
Information on how the NFL advises underclassmen on whether to go pro or return to school. They tell you round 1, round 2 or return to school. Since 2010 they are about 84% accurate in having players go in the top 2 rounds. It’s important to note that this is solely an evaluation of their skills and does not include the impact of any injuries or off the field issues, which may explain some of the players they get wrong.
Their accuracy is about the same for players they tell not to go pro.
From 2015-16, 322 players were evaluated.
Of that total, 73 declared after being advised to stay in school.
The average draft position of that subgroup was the fifth round. Twenty went undrafted.
…
Of the 73 who declared after being advised to stay in school, 11 were drafted in the first or second rounds (15 percent).
I wonder if some of these are workout warriors who jump up based on a great combine performance.
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Physical measurables are easiest to evaluate.
Likely those who jump are those that show something usually not picked up (on film).
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/01/18/summer-signing-period-college-football-abandoned/96725542/
The NCAA D-I Council approved recruiting reform. The only early signing period will be in December as coaches wanted (another one in June had been proposed but coaches hated it). However, official visits can start April 1 of your junior year. This is big for northern schools looking to get recruits on campus in nice weather.
“You can’t ignore the statistics and that is, we’re tracking over 70% of high school seniors are verbally committed by Oct. 1,” said Northwestern athletics director Jim Phillips, who chairs the council. “They want to get this thing over with. So you have that group, then you have another group that may want to wait. You’ve seen it in men’s basketball and it’s worked out well where you’ve had an early signing period. What the December date does is allows you that seventh semester of high school transcript, which is important.”
Phillips said the group could still push for a third signing date before the high school season begins, perhaps at the end of August, but conceded that June was too early.
Among the other items tackled by the council Wednesday:
* The council adopted a recommendation by the Football Oversight Committee to allow for rising high school seniors to take official visits starting April 1 and extending until nearly the end of June. Currently, prospects can’t take official visits until Sept. 1 of their senior year.
* No adjustment was made to the summer camp proposal, which limits them to 10 days and only on college campuses, eliminating the satellite camp circus that ensued last summer.
* The council discussed the issue of taking a team away from campus for spring break – as Jim Harbaugh did last year with Michigan at IMG Academy in Florida – but is forwarding it to the Student-Athlete Advisory Council to make a recommendation.
* The council is recommending adding a 10th full-time assistant coach for football, something widely supported by coaches.
* The council discussed a mandatory 14-week playing season starting in 2020, which would move the start of the season into August. The idea would be to give every team two bye weeks during the course of the year.
The NCAA BoD is expected to approve all the changes the the council approved.
It’s interesting to see them discussing a mandatory 14-week schedule. They already have 2 byes in certain years, this would just add it to all years. While I think that’s good for the players, this is also how the move to 12 games started. How long until that second bye becomes a 13th game?
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Texas broke Georgia’s 22 year (not a typo) long home win steak in swimming this weekend.
https://swimswam.com/georgias-22-year-home-dual-meet-win-streak-snapped-hands-texas-women/
The victory was enough to vault the Texas women to #1 in the coaches’ poll ahead of even superpower Stanford.
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http://247sports.com/Season/2017-Football/CompositeTeamRankings
With less than 2 weeks left before signing day, here’s how the B10 stands:
(Rank. School – Ave rating per player)
1. AL – 93.24
2. OSU – 95.12
3. UGA – 93.34
4. MI – 91.09
5. OU – 90.84
11. PSU – 88.86
18. UMD – 86.16
24. NE – 87.18
31. MSU – 86.22
39. RU – 84.55
40. NW – 85.21
41. WI – 85.54
45. IL – 84.39
49. MN – 83.53
50. IA – 84.56
56. IN – 82.29
64. PU – 82.07
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It looks like Maryland and Rutgers will actually improve the overall quality of B1G football.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18518579/power-5-conferences-vote-stop-campus-practices-vacation-periods
Spring break practice trips won’t be allowed as of 8/1/2017.
Proposal No. 2016-139 received majority support from all five leagues, including an 11-3 vote from Big Ten institutions. Student-athletes on the 80-member autonomy panel voted 11-4 against the proposal.
The legislation is effective Aug. 1 and passed as part of a comprehensive package designed to provide better time balance for student-athletes.
…
Also on Friday at the autonomy session, the Power 5 schools approved Proposal No. 2016-135 with an 80-0 vote, prohibiting athletically related activities, not including competition, between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m.
Other passed proposals added mandatory off days during the academic year, during preseason and vacation periods, and created a student-athlete time-management plan.
Add in the reduction in summer camp days (a council recommendation that has to be voted on in April by the NCAA) and Harbaugh’s recruiting tactics suffered a lot this legislative session.
I think they should’ve just made spring break a no-practice period so players could take a break, but maybe they’d rather practice on days without classes than have a week off.
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Interesting note on the 2017 P12 schedule.
Last season, there were three Thursday night conference games.
Next season: Only one (Stanford-Oregon State).
What, or who, gave? The conference is obligated via its contract with ESPN and Fox to play eight ‘special date’ games (i.e., not Saturday).
My understanding is that Pac-12 schools favored Friday over Thursday, relayed that sentiment to the conference, and the conference then went to ESPN and FOX with that preference.
It so happened that the networks themselves wanted a certain number of Friday games and gave the conference the option on a few others. The Pac-12 picked Friday at every opportunity, and here we are:
One conference game on Thursday, seven on Friday.
I realize HS football isn’t as big out west and that it makes for less of a short week, but I’d think Friday nights might be tough for ticket sales. I guess they’ll find out.
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http://thecomeback.com/thestudentsection/football/three-years-in-the-cfb-playoffs-have-underwhelmed.html
This article makes the argument that the results of the semifinal game sin the CFP so far indicate there’s no need to expand the playoff. Granted it’s only 3 years, so the data is limited.
Semifinal records:
#1 and #2: 5-1
MOV:
>16 – 5
>30 – 3
<17 – 1 (the only upset in the 6 games)
If #1 and #2 are that superior to #3 and #4, what is the case for #5+? Instead, the results suggest that semifinals aren't really needed. The BCS was a better fit, they just had a worse process for picking the teams (human polls).
Advocates for an expanded playoff need some upsets to start happening in the semifinals.
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Not advocating for expansion, but income rather than results will be the deciding factor. Continuing lower ratings for games featuring single regions may indicate geographically reorganized bracket might result in higher interest (income) in the final. We crown the champ. Whether they beat #2 in semi or final is trivia in short order.
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ccrider55,
“Not advocating for expansion, but income rather than results will be the deciding factor.”
What?!? Money will drive a decision in CFB? That’s blasphemy and I won’t stand for it.
“Continuing lower ratings for games featuring single regions may indicate geographically reorganized bracket might result in higher interest (income) in the final.”
You propose to ditch seeding in favor of geographical placement? That’s the solution for a system designed to prove things on the field? How do you assure a diverse bracket? There are 5 major conferences, 2 of which overlap significantly. Likewise there are 5 minor conference with some overlap. Do you shuffle the teams in every round for geographical diversity, or just in the initial bracket?
Also, I think you should ignore the 2014 ratings as an anomaly. It was the first ever playoff and benefited from years of hype. It also had the bonus of geographical diversity and two big names that aren’t southern powers playing for the title (I think there is some AL/SEC fatigue nationally).
Total viewership numbers for semis:
2014 – 28.3M
2015 – 18.6M
2016 – 19.7M
I think around 22M is about the most we should expect in a normal season for now (the product could grow to become more important over time). 2015 had bad scheduling and this year had blowouts, but there’s been diversity and big brands. I think 2014 was based on the hype from ESPN/ABC and the rest of the media and will never be repeated.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/140962/a-look-at-the-toughest-big-ten-nonconference-schedules-in-2017
and
http://www.espn.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/140969/a-look-at-the-easiest-big-ten-nonconference-schedules-in-2017
ESPN looks at the toughest 7 and easiest 7 OOC schedules for 2017 in the B10.
These rankings are based, in part, on how teams performed last season, as well as their expected talent in 2017, though opponents could always perform better or worse than anticipated.
From hardest to easiest, with toughest game (as determined by me) noted:
1. PU – vs UL
2. MI – UF (in Dallas)
3. IL – @USF
4. OSU – vs OU
5. NE – @OR
6. MSU – vs ND or vs WMU
7. RU – vs UW
8. IA – @ISU or vs WY
9. WI – @BYU
10. PSU – vs Pitt
11. UMD – @UT
12. MN – @OrSU
13. NW – @Duke
14. IN – @UVA
Way to challenge yourselves PSU (Akron, Pitt, GA State) and WI (USU, FAU, @BYU). Those schedules won’t help you in the race for a CFP spot.
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Well, Pitt and BYU were actually pretty good last year. Better than all B10 teams outside the Big 4 in the B10 according to F/+.
Plus, Pitt is a rivalry game while BYU is away.
And Wisconsin had just come off a string of seasons where they played an SEC king in OOC.
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rtung,
“Well, Pitt and BYU were actually pretty good last year. Better than all B10 teams outside the Big 4 in the B10 according to F/+.”
Pitt was 8-5 and tied for 2nd-4th in the weaker ACC division at 5-3. They had no defense (over 35 ppg allowed).
BYU went 9-4 with no wins against ranked teams.
Those are the sort of games that should be your second-toughest OOC game if you want to be in the playoff race.
“Plus, Pitt is a rivalry game while BYU is away.”
I’m not saying they’re bad games, they just shouldn’t be the toughest game on the OOC schedule for teams with CFP aspirations. That’s even more true when you look at the other OOC games they have (Akron, GA St; USU, FIU).
“And Wisconsin had just come off a string of seasons where they played an SEC king in OOC.”
So? That’s what the top teams are supposed to do. And it was only 3 years in a row. Before that was ASU and OrSU.
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“Before that was ASU and OrSU.”
You mean games they lost weren’t tough enough?
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For a CFP contender, yes. They lost the last two in years when WI wasn’t a contender anyway. They won the first two when WI might have been a contender. But those are traditionally mediocre at best programs and wouldn’t have been much help in committee discussions.
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Clemson’s best OOC opponent in 2016 was 8-5 Auburn.
I guess Clemson shouldn’t have had playoff aspirations or been in the playoff race, according to you.
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Too bad that’s not remotely what I said.
“Those schedules won’t help you in the race for a CFP spot.”
“Those are the sort of games that should be your second-toughest OOC game if you want to be in the playoff race.”
“I’m not saying they’re bad games, they just shouldn’t be the toughest game on the OOC schedule for teams with CFP aspirations. That’s even more true when you look at the other OOC games they have (Akron, GA St; USU, FIU).”
I said that if you have CFP aspirations, then you should schedule harder (to help your seeding as a champ or give you a chance as an at-large), not that you shouldn’t/can’t have CFP aspirations without scheduling harder.
There was a lot of talk in the last few weeks of the season about the weakness of Clemson’s OOC schedule, it just didn’t matter compared to the embarrassingly weak OOC schedule of UW. All Clemson’s schedule could do was flip them between #2 and #3 based on their final record and being a champ. At the same time, we saw that the reason OSU got in was due to beating OU OOC.
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So if Clemson got in with what you deem a weak OOC schedule and UDub got in with an even weaker OOC schedule, does it then not stand to reason that PSU and Wisconsin’s OOC schedules are plenty strong enough to get them in to the playoffs?
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/01/23/analytical-approach-inexact-science-recruiting/96963326/
Analytics comes to recruiting. Companies like this are likely to grow quickly in the near future.
Boiled down, Zcruit’s goal is to assist a program’s efforts by streamlining the process — by taking all the streams of data at their disposal and creating a formula for recruiting success, in the same way a university’s admissions office attempts to pinpoint the best and most likely fits for the student body at large.
Three baseline factors are taken into account. The first is demographic information: background information, such as where a recruit is from. The second is a prospect’s interactions with the school, such as how many visits he has made on campus, whether he attended any camps or when the scholarship offer was tendered.
The third is the prospect’s interactions with other schools. Is he showing any interest? When was he offered by another school, when did he visit, how many times did he visit? In the end, the data compiled by Zcruit creates a threshold, for lack of a better word, between whether a program should recruit a player — if the data suggests he’s gettable — or whether it should move on to another prospect.
…
More than anything, the model created by Zcruit may see its greatest impact in how a program allocates time — a precious resource throughout the year, but during the recruiting process in particular.
…
By and large, FBS programs land roughly 10% of the student-athletes they recruit. “Most of that time is wasted chasing the wrong guys,” Weiss said. It can be a cruel cycle: A program misses on one group of players before chasing its second tier of prospects, many of whom have already been offered by a number of recruiting rivals.
…
The proof of effectiveness is seen in Northwestern’s own recruiting efforts. (Zcruit also worked with two other FBS programs, one in a Power Five conference and the other on the Group of Five ranks.)
Zcruit worked alongside Bowers and the coaching staff during this current recruiting cycle, helping the Wildcats identify and evaluate a number of recruits at positions of need. With one week until national signing day, the algorithms created by Zcruit have predicated which recruits would not sign with Northwestern with 94% accuracy; the same algorithms predicted which recruits would sign with the Wildcats with 80% accuracy.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/141019/looking-at-the-most-and-least-favorable-big-ten-conference-schedules-in-2017
The most and least favorable B10 schedules for 2017.
So today we’re taking a look at which teams have the most and least favorable Big Ten schedules in 2017. We’re not using “tough” and “easy” because it’s never easy to get through a conference slate. And things are all kind of relative here. Playing in the East Division is going to present a major challenge with all the heavyweights located on that side. But we’re more looking toward who has the more advantageous crossover games and how the home/road splits sort out. (As a reminder, West Division clubs gets five conference home games each this year, while East teams have only four apiece.)
After going through all these, I have to say I’m pretty impressed with how the league has managed to balance things out in Year 2 of the nine-game schedule. There are few glaringly obvious discrepancies in who plays whom.
Most favorable (with reasons):
1. WI – UMD and IN as crossovers
2. IL – IN and RU as crossovers, plus NE, NW and WI at home
3. RU – PU and IL as crossovers
4. MN – NE and WI at home
Least:
1. IA – PSU, OSU and MSU as crossovers, plus @WI and @NE
2. NE – OSU and PSU as crossovers
3. PSU – @IA, @NW and vs NE as crossovers, plus @OSU
4. OSU – @IA and @NE as crossovers, plus @MI to end the season
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Based on the 2017 schedules, recruiting and returning starters, here’s my early guess at the final standings:
East:
1. OSU – gets PSU at home after a bye while PSU plays MI
2. PSU – returns 16 starters (OSU has 17) so should stay elite
3. MI – only 5 starters return so I expect a small step back
4. MSU – have to improve from last year but probably won’t crack the top 3
5. UMD – strong class coming in
6. IN – coaching change puts them 6th
7. RU – they have to prove they aren’t a train wreck
West:
1. WI – 16 returning starters and an easy schedule
2. NE – new DC may make the difference, but the new QB has to be solid
3. IA – tough schedule
4. NW – could be anywhere from 2nd to 6th but they improved after a rough start last year
5. MN – scandal hurts them
6. IL – Lovie can’t work miracles
7. PU – need at least 1 more year to improve for Brohm
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I have NU above both Iowa and UNL.
NU was only 1 game worse than those 2 in the B10 in 2016 (and beat Iowa @Iowa) and bring back almost everyone and has an easier conference schedule than those 2 while those 2 have a harder conference schedule and both lost their multi-year starting QB’s.
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Richard,
“I have NU above both Iowa and UNL.”
You certainly are more in touch with where they stand, so you could well be correct. I think 2-4 could be a tight race in the West this year as every team has some questions. I’m sure I’m influenced by the hype NE’s new DC hire is getting (multiple outlets calling it a top 10 off-season hire).
http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2017/1/18/14300370/college-football-rankings-2017-early-top-25-polls
The consensus preseason top 25 has NW as the #2 team in the West. I just never feel like I have a good idea of how good NW will be in any given year. They seem to have 1 or 2 very surprising (good or bad) results every year.
1. AL
2. OSU
3. USC
4. FSU
5. PSU
6. OU
7. Clemson
8. UW
9. MI
10. OkSU
12. WI
RV. NW
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http://www.wdaz.com/sports/4204986-sources-und-set-leave-big-sky-and-join-summit-missouri-valley-conferences
Actual realignment news. UND will join the Summit for all sports except football (MVFC) and hockey (stays in NCHC). This will reunite UND with NDSU, USD and SDSU.
UND has verbally agreed to join the Summit League in the fall of 2018 for all of its athletic programs outside of football and hockey.
Summit League commissioner Tom Douple is expected at a press conference Thursday in Grand Forks.
UND also is finalizing a move to the Missouri Valley Football Conference. MVFC presidents will vote on the potential move Wednesday. It is expected to pass.
Once the MVFC move is finalized, UND will sign the contract to join the Summit League and officially be set to leave the Big Sky.
…
Barring a last-minute turn of events, UND will play its final season as a full member of the Big Sky Conference in 2017-18. Every sport outside of hockey and football will join the Summit League as full members the following year.
The Summit doesn’t sponsor football. All four football-playing members of the Summit compete in the MVFC.
UND won’t join the MVFC until 2020 because of scheduling issues. The current plan calls for UND to play as a full member of the Big Sky Conference in 2017 and as an affiliate member in 2018 and 2019.
As an affiliate member, UND would not be eligible to get the league’s automatic qualifier to the FCS playoffs or to win the league’s regular-season championship. But if UND does win the league, it will almost surely get an at-large bid to the FCS playoffs, anyway.
…
UND officials have acknowledged a move to the Summit and MVFC will help the travel budget a little bit. But the biggest impact financially may be through a rise in attendance — both from local fans coming out to see familiar teams and from fans of opposing teams making the trip to Grand Forks.
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It’s almost like the halcyon days of the North Central Conference. (Do Augustana and Morningside still play football?)
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Before there was Mount Union, there was Augustana.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18552895/poinsettia-bowl-dropped-holiday-bowl-move-petco-park
Fallout from the Chargers moving to LA is hitting CFB. The Poinsettia Bowl is going away and the Holiday Bowl may move to the Padres’ stadium as the city considers closing Qualcomm rather than pay for upkeep.
San Diego State’s football program could be in peril if Qualcomm closes after 2018. However, a private group on Monday announced plans for a smaller stadium that could host an MLS team and the Aztecs. If necessary, SDSU might be able to play a few seasons at Petco Park.
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http://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-men/article/2017-01-23/march-madness-extends-february-first-ever-season-look-ncaa
The CFP has tainted MBB now. The NCAA will have a mid-February bracket preview show revealing the current topic 16 much like the CFP weekly shows. Later in the show bracketology guys will fill in the rest of the field. How long until this becomes a weekly thing?
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Yesterday I heard Jay Bilas say that MBB should more or less cede the 1st half of their calendar to CF and do a switch of scheduling – put low interest conference games in December/November and move the more compelling Non-Conf games to the Jan – March.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/statsinfo/post/_/id/129052/in-big-ten-theres-ohio-state-and-michigan-and-then-theres-everybody-else
ESPN claims that when it comes to recruiting, the B10 is the Big 2 and Little 12. Whether you consider that important, or even think they’re correct or not, I leave to the reader.
National signing day approaches with Ohio State and Michigan leading the Big Ten charge. The two rivals are both on track to finish in the top five of ESPN’s recruiting rankings, something no Big Ten tandem has done in the same year since the rankings began in 2006.
In fact, entering the 2016 season, the Buckeyes were the only Big Ten program to ever finish with a top-five class, and both instances came under Urban Meyer (2013 and 2016).
…
Meyer signed top 10 classes in each of his first five recruiting cycles in Columbus (2012 through 2016) and, including his time at Florida, his 10 total top-10 classes are the most signed by a head coach in the ESPN 300 era.
Jim Harbaugh, Meyer’s counterpart at rival Michigan, is on track to sign his second straight top-10 class after he finished with the nation’s 40th-ranked class in 2015. That first class was signed during an abbreviated recruiting period after Harbaugh was hired by the Wolverines in December 2014.
In Harbaugh’s first two full cycles (2016 and 2017), Michigan has received commitments from 31 players in the ESPN 300, the most in the Big Ten and tied for the second-most in the FBS over that span (as of Thursday). The success has come at a perfect time for the Wolverines, who need to replace an FBS-high 17 primary starters from last season.
Together, Michigan and Ohio State have received more ESPN 300 commitments (76) than all other Big Ten schools combined (63) since Harbaugh arrived in Ann Arbor. Those two are the only schools from the conference to sign a top-10 class during that span.
The last Big Ten program other than the Wolverines or Buckeyes to sign a top-10 class in ESPN’s rankings was Penn State in 2006. The reigning Big Ten champions finished with the nation’s No. 9 class that season and are on track to finish 2017 with their third consecutive top-20 class under James Franklin.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/ncfnation/post/_/id/136220/tex-odus-why-more-recruits-are-fleeing-the-lone-star-state
Why are so many top prospects from TX going out of state this year? ESPN provides some analysis.
But of the 46 ESPN 300 prospects in the Lone Star State, only 17 are currently committed to in-state schools (36.9 percent). That is by far the lowest percentage of ESPN 300 recruits to stay in-state in the last five recruiting cycles. More than half of the state’s ESPN 300 recruits have stayed home in the previous four classes; the last two cycles saw at least 62 percent of the state’s top prospects stay in-state each year. Even if a few of the six uncommitted ESPN 300 prospects in the state stay home, more than half of them will go out-of-state in the 2017 cycle.
…
There are some theories. One is the lack of on-field success for the state’s FBS programs in 2016: No Texas team finished the season in the top 25.
…
Wilson — whose top five are Florida State, LSU, Ohio State, Oklahoma and South Florida — agrees that the wins and losses matter in recruits’ decisions.
“Right now, Texas schools aren’t like the old Texas schools back in the day,” he said. “A lot of out-of-state schools are rolling.”
Coaching turnover has a role in this, too. It matters because players begin getting recruited as early as their freshman or sophomore seasons, and those relationships are built over time.
…
In addition to on-field performance and coaching changes, out-of-state schools are more familiar to prospects now than 10 or 20 years ago for many reasons. West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen, who has long recruited the state, said the availability of games on television might be a reason recruits are willing to leave.
…
Social media also closes the distance. The constant communication it allows between prospects and coaches — not to mention the photos and videos a prospect can see to give him a peek at what’s going on — makes a faraway school seem less foreign.
…
Finally, the sheer number of schools recruiting Texas is also a factor. Texas A&M’s move to the SEC continues to reverberate in recruiting, opening the door for other schools. Perennial power programs like Alabama have long recruited the state, but now SEC teams like Ole Miss and Mississippi State are seen more frequently, coaches say.
“There used to be schools that where they were located and financially they just weren’t going to recruit Texas, like Georgia, South Carolina, even Ole Miss and Mississippi State. They used to never come to Texas,” Fleener said. “So many of those guys now are putting in the effort in coming to Texas now.”
Said Kay: “We definitely see a lot more of that SEC East than we did before. Without question the SEC West is a mainstay here now.”
They do have some quotes talking about it being cyclical and this is just sort of a perfect storm year of all these factors coming together.
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At the same time, these numbers are meaningless until signing day. Even more so because Charlie Strong preferred silent commits. 2 weeks before signing day last year, Texas wasn’t even in the top 50. They ended up top 10. That seemed to have a cascading effect. TCU and Texas Tech also had a lot of very late commits. When Strong was fired he only had 10 commits.
There really hasn’t been any significant activity from the SEC East or even Auburn in Texas among the top 100. Arkansas and LSU have always recruited Texas. LSU does seem to have an exceptional year this year so far.
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bullet,
“At the same time, these numbers are meaningless until signing day.”
They may be meaningless long after that, too.
“Even more so because Charlie Strong preferred silent commits.”
Except only 6 of the 46 are uncommitted right now with 17 staying in state. Ignoring NSD flips (which can cut both ways), the best TX schools can do is 50% of those ESPN 300 players. That’s still well below previous years. Please note that 1 year isn’t a trend and nobody is claiming it is.
“2 weeks before signing day last year, Texas wasn’t even in the top 50. They ended up top 10. That seemed to have a cascading effect. TCU and Texas Tech also had a lot of very late commits. When Strong was fired he only had 10 commits.”
UT is at #26 now with 15 commits. They could move up, and nobody is saying it’s a bad class. Just that all the state schools combined don’t have as many elite TX players as usual.
“There really hasn’t been any significant activity from the SEC East or even Auburn in Texas among the top 100.”
Looking at 247’s top 50 from TX, I agree. But they are probably still forcing everyone to recruit harder to keep them from getting players.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/ncaa-recommends-ending-two-a-day-football-practices-and-reducing-tackling/
Big changes could be coming for CFB practice methods.
College football two-a-day practices appear to be ending. For safety reasons, the NCAA Sport Science Institute has recommended eliminating the popular two-a-day preseason practices and reducing contact at all practices, including limiting full contact to once a week during the season.
The recommendations, which are endorsed by 16 medical organizations and five football organizations, would put college football more in line with NFL rules adopted several years ago. NCAA members received the 17-page document last week at the NCAA Convention and now must decide whether to create legislation to fit the recommendations. If two-a-day practices end, the preseason could be extended by one week to accommodate the lost practice.
…
But the NCAA Sport Science Institute says preseason practices have the highest injury rate, whether through concussions, heat illness or overuse injuries. According to a Big 12 analysis of players from 2013-15, 58 percent of practice concussions during the entire season occur in the preseason.
“The consensus at our Safety in College Football Summit committee meeting was the preseason was a high-risk time and two-a-days doesn’t really make sense anymore,” NCAA chief medical officer Brian Hainline said.
Other new NCAA recommendations include:
In-season practices: Allow three days per week of non-contact/minimal contact, one day of live contact/tackling, and one day of live contact/thud. Currently, the recommendation is no more than two live contact/tackling days. Live contact means tackling to the ground and/or full-speed blocking. Non-contact/minimal contact practices don’t involve tackling, thud (in which players hit but don’t take each other to the ground), or full-speed blocking.
“Full pad practice, shell practice and helmet only practice all carry a risk of concussion,” the NCAA report says. “No helmet and no shoulder pad practice is the only evidence-based non-contact practice with negligible concussion risk.”
…
Of course, these changes are just recommendations. Even if the NCAA writes these guidelines into legislation, “you can choose to do what you want,” Hainline acknowledged. “But culturally, to ignore this public document that has such widespread endorsement, I don’t think it makes any sense from any point of view that you can point to.”
That raises a larger question often asked: Is the NCAA — which was founded in the name of player safety — ever going to turn medical guidelines into medical rules that are enforced by penalties? For instance, the NFL now can investigate and penalize teams for not following proper concussion protocol with players.
“I believe the NCAA is closer (to enforceable safety rules) because it is a very active discussion within the membership,” Hainline said. “But it’s tricky because traditionally the enforcement (staffers), who are trained in a certain way, they have not dealt with health and safety issues. This is all happening at a good pace, and I think that’s probably going to be the next stage of what you’re going to be seeing. I can’t predict when. I can just say that compared to a year ago, the discussions are very palpable and on the table.”
…
The study also found 3.5 percent of concussed NCAA athletes sustain a repeat concussion in the same year. No repeat concussion happened in the first 10 days and the average time until the next concussion is 74 days. The last major concussion study of college athletes, in 2001, showed 6.5 percent of concussed athletes had a repeat concussion in the same year and 92 percent of those reoccurrence happened within 10 days, Hainline said.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18569197/latest-lawsuit-filed-baylor-university-alleges-culture-which-drugs-alcohol-sex-were-encouraged
Ugh.
A lawsuit filed against Baylor University by a former female student on Friday alleges that the program fostered a culture in which alcohol and illegal drugs were provided to recruits and coaches encouraged female students in the Baylor Bruins hostess program to have sex with recruits and players.
The Title IX lawsuit, filed by a former member of the Bruins, is the second such lawsuit filed against Baylor this week and the sixth federal lawsuit the school faces in the wake of an investigation that revealed the school failed to properly respond to and address sexual assaults by students, including football players. The scandal led to the firing of former football coach Art Briles, the sanctioning and later resignation of athletic director Ian McCaw and the demotion and later departure of president and chancellor Ken Starr.
The woman’s attorney, John Clune of Boulder, Colorado, said his firm’s investigation uncovered at least 52 acts of rape, including five gang rapes, by not less than 31 Baylor football players from 2011-14. That is a significantly larger number of alleged rapes than what was revealed in Philadelphia law firm Pepper Hamilton’s investigation into how Baylor responded to allegations of sexual assault, the findings of which were released in May.
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oh my…
FB back in news, but not for signings/commitments.
Don’t know what to say that hasn’t been said.
Rinse and repeat?
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So its worse than you might have believed from their silence.
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These are allegations in a complaint, so they must be taken with a huge grain of salt. With that caveat, if this is even close to true, how does Baylor avoid the “death penalty” or something close to it?
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Briles, Starr and the AD are gone.
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bullet, so? Schools are often punished after the guilty parties move on (one way or another).
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The point is that Baylor has taken action on their own. It isn’t the NCAA or government forcing them to act. That is always a mitigating factor in punishment.
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bullet,
“The point is that Baylor has taken action on their own. It isn’t the NCAA or government forcing them to act. That is always a mitigating factor in punishment.”
Yes, but don’t go too far. Baylor was out of compliance with the federal government in terms of not even having a Title IX coordinator during the period when many of the alleged assaults occurred. Since then multiple people from that department at Baylor have complained about the school preventing them from doing their job properly. Basically, Baylor was forced by the government to act and did the bare minimum at most.
Their self-imposed “penalties” also were very self-serving in terms of legal issues. And they came in baby steps. And they actually needed the people involved to self-punish even more (Starr quit a while after being demoted, Baylor didn’t fire him). The NCAA has been known to blow over the top of minimal self-inflicted punishment as if nothing was done.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18570191/suspended-minnesota-golden-gophers-players-present-case-university-panel
Due process continued this week.
The 10 Minnesota football players suspended after an alleged sexual assault last fall presented their case Friday in the final day of hearings in front of a panel of university members.
The university presented its side of the case Thursday during a session that lasted more than nine hours. Many of the players were expected to testify Friday as they try to avoid the expulsions and other punishments recommended by the school’s Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action office.
The proceedings are closed to the public.
The players have denied any wrongdoing and remain enrolled at Minnesota. The hearing stems from an incident in September, when a woman alleged that she was pressured into having sex with multiple players at an apartment after the team’s season-opening win.
Minneapolis authorities twice declined to charge any of the players, citing a lack of evidence. But the school conducted a Title IX investigation that concluded that the players violated the student conduct code and recommended expulsion for Ray Buford Jr., Carlton Djam, KiAnte Hardin, Dior Johnson and Tamarion Johnson; one-year suspensions for Seth Green, Kobe McCrary, Mark Williams and Antoine Winfield Jr.; and probation for Antonio Shenault.
The three-person panel will have one week to come to a decision, which can be appealed to the university provost and then, if need be, in federal court. The guidelines require that a majority of the panel decide it was “more than likely” that the accused violated the conduct code. That is far different from a court of law requiring a unanimous ruling from a jury that a crime was committed beyond a reasonable doubt.
1. The players are still enrolled, so no expulsions or suspensions have happened yet.
2. The players got to present their case.
3. The results of this hearing can be appealed to a higher level twice (provost, then federal court).
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Seems like they need more due process. Someone can be kicked out by a 1 vote margin because 2 people think it is 51% likely that it is true. A
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bullet,
“Seems like they need more due process.”
They get 2 more levels of appeal if they aren’t satisfied here. That is “more due process.” If they can’t convince this panel, the provost or a federal court, then they should lose the case. The school has to win at all levels, the players only need to win once.
“Someone can be kicked out by a 1 vote margin because 2 people think it is 51% likely that it is true.”
The Supreme Court regularly decides issues 5-4, federal appellate court usually uses 3 judge panels (many decisions are 2-1), every judicial decision is 1-0, 1/3 of states allow for majority jury decisions in civil cases, etc. In other words, a 1 vote margin is completely normal is American courts so I see on reason to decry it here. Likewise, as discussed previously, 51% is a common standard in American courts. It’s not like they can go to jail based on these hearings. At worst they are expelled or suspended from 1 university.
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Expelled is a pretty severe penalty. In a civil case it is a 51% standard, but (at least in Texas) you need 10 our of 12 to agree. Those appeals are apparently just whether there were process errors or that they were very unreasonable.
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bullet,
“Expelled is a pretty severe penalty.”
Rape/sexual assault/sexual harassment/etc are pretty serious violations of the student conduct code.
The student conduct code is readily available and all students are obliged to live up to it.
Click to access Student_Conduct_Code.pdf
It lists 21 disciplinary offenses, several of which various players were accused of (harm to person, bullying and sexual misconduct are #6-8).
There are 13 possible sanctions, not all of which apply to these specific violations (academic sanction, for example, since this wasn’t cheating).
Factors to consider in determining appropriate sanctions include: the
nature of the offense, the severity of the offense, the culpability of the student or student group, the impact on other students or members of the University community, and the opportunity for student development. Separation from the University through suspension or expulsion is a serious sanction that may be appropriate for: repeated violations of the Student Conduct Code, for serious scholastic dishonesty, and for misconduct that constitutes a threat to community safety or well-‐being (including,
but not limited to harm to person and sexual assault), or significantly disrupts the rights of others or the operations of the University.
…
The following sanctions, which are listed in order of least severe to most severe, may be imposed upon students or student groups found to have violated the Student Conduct Code:
1. Academic Sanction – not applicable
2. Warning.
3. Probation.
4. Required Compliance. (community service, etc)
5. Confiscation. – not applicable
6. Restitution. – not applicable
7. Restriction of Privileges.
8. University Housing Suspension – not applicable to everyone
9. University Housing Expulsion. – not applicable to everyone
10. Suspension.
11. Expulsion.
12. Withholding of Diploma or Degree. – not applicable
13. Revocation of Admission or Degree. – not applicable
Would you agree that a warning or probation is clearly too little if the person did the things they were accused of in this case? If so, then the choices are:
a. Community service
If you feel they did this, then community service seems too light a punishment unless you’re really unsure they did it (say 55% sure) and it was only the lesser offenses (saying something harassing once maybe). But I don’t believe there is much doubt about who did the lesser offenses (players admit to being there and saying stuff, it’s a question of exact words and intent).
b. Loss of privileges (kicking them of the team and/or pulling their scholarship I guess)
This feels too light for the worse offenses (again, if they did it). It could suffice if someone only committed a lesser offense.
That leaves us with the choices the school has sought:
c. Suspension
d. Expulsion
“In a civil case it is a 51% standard, but (at least in Texas) you need 10 our of 12 to agree.”
It varies from state to state, but about 1/3 use simple majority as I noted. My point being that it is a commonly used standard in US courts even if not in one’s particular state.
MN is one of a few states where the requirement actually changes based on the length of deliberations (it starts at unanimous, but drops to at least 5/6 – they can seat anywhere from 6-12 jurors – after 6 hours of deliberations). The parties can also agree beforehand to a lesser standard if they wish (it seems unlikely, but maybe both sides have strong claims).
“Those appeals are apparently just whether there were process errors or that they were very unreasonable.”
That’s what appeals are generally.
Let’s look at criminal cases:
http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-procedure/the-basis-for-a-criminal-appeal.html
There is an institutional preference to uphold a trial court’s rulings and findings in the U. S. judicial system. Thus, for an appellate court to hear an appeal from a lower court the aggrieved party must demonstrate to the appellate court that an error was made at the trial level. The error must have been substantial, or material.
“Harmless errors,” or those unlikely to make a substantial impact on the result at trial, are not grounds for reversing the judgment of a lower court. Any error, defect, irregularity, or variance, which does not affect a defendant, or a litigant’s substantial rights, shall be disregarded as a harmless error.
Assuming that there was more than merely harmless error, there are four basic grounds for appeal:
1. The lower court made a serious error of law (plain error);
2. The weight of the evidence does not support the verdict;
3. The lower court abused its discretion in making an errant ruling;
4. The claim of Ineffective Assistance of Counsel under the Sixth Amendment
I highly doubt that #1 applies as the student conduct code is pretty clear and so are the procedures they’ve followed. I haven’t heard the players complaining about rights violations or anything. I doubt #4 applies here as players generally have access to good lawyers that could tell them how to defend themselves. #3 also seems inapplicable here. #2 is the whole point of the case and it’s hard to say whether the evidence is 40% or 60% against someone. Beyond that range, most neutral parties would likely agree which side “won.”
Their best hope might be a claim against the whole Title IX hearing system and that’s not something anyone but federal judges should be deciding. As federal appeals court is an option for them to air that grievance, I don’t have much issue with the process so far.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/signing-day-recruits-quarterback-transfer-clemson-hunter-johnson-alabama-tua-tagovailoa-michigan-dylan-mccaffrey-013017
A look at the high percentage of CFB QBs who transfer.
Data from 2011-2014 classes, top 50 QBs:
4*/5* (96) – 47% transferred, 33% started early on, 28% stayed anyway (may have started later)
3* (104) – 53% transferred, 13% started early on, 34% stayed anyway
Overall – 50% transferred, 23% started early on, 31% stayed anyway
The number don’t add to 100% because some players started early and transferred.
It didn’t used to be this way.
Go back 15 years to 2002, when future Texas star Vince Young sat atop the recruiting rankings. Of the 24 quarterbacks to earn composite four- or five-star ratings, all but five finished their careers at the school they signed with out of high school. Only a few (Young, Ohio State’s Troy Smith, Michigan State’s Drew Stanton) emerged as stars. Far more waited their turn and started eventually, or, in a few cases, changed positions or joined the baseball team.
…
Unfortunately, just 22.5 percent of the Top 50 QBs start by their first or second seasons. Of the rest, only 40 percent stay for the remainder of their careers.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/01/29/new-twist-old-recruiting-trend-numbers-early-enrollees-rise/97212534/
An early signing period only makes sense as early enrollees are a growing trend.
Broiles is one of 11 newly minted Sooners football players — including nine high school graduates. It’s the largest class of early enrollees, as they’re known in recruiting parlance, in the school’s history. Their goal is not complicated:
…
In leaving high school early for college, Broiles and his new classmates are joining what appears to be a growing trend. The early enrollee is not a new phenomenon, but the sheer volume in some school’s recruiting classes is unusual. A few examples: Alabama has 12 players already on campus. Ohio State has nine. Michigan has 11. Texas A&M and Virginia Tech have nine.
Like Oklahoma, Alabama has the most midyear football enrollees in school history. In 2010, when the Crimson Tide had 11 early enrollees (the previous largest number), coach Nick Saban called it “a unique circumstance,” and noted that early enrollees “used to be sort of the exception.”
If it’s not now the rule, it might be a trend — at least for some schools and some players. Alabama sits atop 247Sports’ current team rankings. Ohio State is No. 2, Michigan No. 4, Oklahoma No. 7 (Texas A&M and Virginia Tech rank ninth and 18th, respectively). Individual player rankings show similar movement, with 12 of 247Sports’ top 18 recruits already on campus. Three of the six still in high school are headed to Stanford, which doesn’t accept early enrollees.
If 1/3-1/2 of the top classes are enrolling in January anyway, letting players sign in December doesn’t seem like a big deal to me. That gives coaches time to focus on finishing a class and pick the last few players to fit around the core he knows he has in hand. I think that’s good for the lower-ranked players, too.
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http://ohiostate.247sports.com/Article/Marvin-Wilson-has-hats-out-and-Jeffrey-Okudah-doesnt-like-where–51026699
Ignore the article, but the embedded video has Urban Meyer talking about recruiting the state of Ohio. One of the key things he mentions is that players from the south and west are about 1 year ahead of players from Ohio in terms of development due to spring football and similar things (7 on 7s, etc). He says it’s a tough balance to anticipate the development of an Ohio player versus the demonstrated prowess of those from elsewhere. Midwestern states may need to jump on spring football wholeheartedly to help the local kids.
This ties into why many B10 schools seem to develop their players better than schools in other conferences. Schools like WI, IA and MSU are known for taking 3* players and developing them into NFL-caliber players. If northern players got the same amount of FB time as others while in HS, maybe they’d be rated higher and you wouldn’t hear as much talk about B10 schools developing players because they’d have higher-ranked recruits in the first place.
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http://247sports.com/Season/2017-Football/CompositeTeamRankings
Well, NSD is mostly over with all the major decisions made.
Rank by total points [Rank. School (recruits) – total points, average recruit ranking]:
1. AL (29) – 322.53 (just missed the record of 323.66 by 2010 UF), 93.61
2. OSU (21) – 310.97, 94.47 (crushed old record of 93.64 by 2015 AL)
3. UGA (26) – 300.98, 92.71
4. USC (25) – 296.12, 91.63
5. MI (30) – 293.77, 90.93
6. FSU (23) – 292, 90.98
7. LSU (24) – 288, 91.44
8. OU (27) – 268, 89.88
9. AU (23) – 256, 89.23
10. UF (24) – 250, 88.82
15. PSU (21) – 238. 88.80
18. UMD (29) – 234, 87.00
22. NE (20) – 222, 87.58
34. MSU (22) – 201, 85.37
40. WI (18) – 191, 85.17
41. IA (19) – 188, 84.98
42. RU (26) – 188, 83.65
44. IL (25) – 185, 84.10
48. NW (19) – 182, 85.12
57. MN (26) – 172, 83.26
61. IN (23) – 166, 83.02
68. PU (20) – 154, 82.23
The gap from #1 in the B10E (OSU) to #1 in the B10W (NE) is about the same as the gap from NE to Ball St (#83 nationally).
B10 tiers by average ranking per recruit:
1. OSU – 94
2. MI – 91
3. PSU, MD, NE – 87-89
4. MSU, WI, NW – 85
5. IL, IA, RU, MN, IN – 83-84
6. PU – 82
The gap from #1 to #2 is larger than the gap from #6 (MSU) to #14. The gap from #1 in the B10E (OSU) to #1 in the B10W (NE) is about the same as the gap from NE to UTSA (or from PSU to PU).
I understand that the West relies more on developing players than bringing in elite recruits compared to the East, but at some point this talent gap is problematic.
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I note that Maryland is in the top half of the B1G, and even Rutgers is running with most B1G teams. Oh, my pathetic alma mater! At least they play decent men’s basketball. Were great once upon a time.
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Brohm slightly outperformed the classes Hazell was bringing in and he did it with a very small window to recruit. I think you’ll see improvement in Pu’s classes going forward.
As for UMD and RU, they are aided by having a lot more local talent. What talent is in IN has better programs very close by.
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A small but significant issue though is that Ohio State/Michigan are firing on all cylinders (top coaches, top 5 recruiting classes, NY-6/playoff bowls etc.) and Penn State looks like it’s starting to generate near that level of excitement (another 10+ win season and a NY-6 bowl for Franklin would really cement that now that the sanctions cloud is off).
Maryland’s position in the East as the only Big Ten Mid-Atlantic school as well as their attempt to make it sort of the UnderArmour version of Oregon will likely give them a strong edge in recruiting over most of the Western schools in most years as long as they have quality recruiters. They’re like North Carolina in that sense; North Carolina’s never been known as a historically great football school, but their situation/location practically gifts them top 20-30 classes. If they can turn that into 8-9 wins a year that would start to be interesting.
The West really needs Nebraska to get to top 10-15 classes since they’re the only Western school that can.
Wisconsin though proves somewhat that it’s not necessarily the be-all-end-all given they’ve built a pretty unique program that has gotten to NY bowls with regularity with somewhat less heralded local kids and historically stout DL/OL, but that’s an anomaly.
Northwestern is recruiting at the highest level it ever has the past 5-6 years under Fitz except for some blips in the past, so it’s hard to be tough on them. For Northwestern, a top 50 class with a few gems in Texas/Penn/Ohio is going to be a great class, especially compared with the past when a lot our recruits were typically MAC level players.
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The Maryland men’s 77-71 victory at Ohio State last night gave them 20 wins before January ended, while the Terrapin women have 21 wins entering tonight’s game at Purdue. The teams are a combined 41-3, with only Baylor having a better joint record. And compared to the mess in Waco…
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Oops — the women’s game is Thursday.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18602544/art-briles-withdraws-libel-lawsuit-baylor-bears-officials
Art Briles has dropped his libel suit without a settlement.
Former Baylor football coach Art Briles has withdrawn a libel lawsuit he filed in December that claimed three school regents and a vice president falsely stated he knew of reported assaults and alleged gang rapes by players and didn’t report them.
…
Briles’ lawyer, Ernest Cannon, told KWTX-TV in Waco, Texas, that no settlement was made between Briles and school officials before the decision to withdraw the lawsuit was made.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/recruiting/2013/09/16/college-football-recruiting-new-coach-first-year-bump/2794545/
This is an old article, but it talks about the first year bump in recruiting new coaches generally get so it seemed relevant.
Here is a related infogram (not from the article):
Infogram
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/sec/2017/02/02/sec-tax-return-639-million-in-revenues-2016-fiscal-year/97400990/
SEC distributes between $39 million and $41 million to member schools.
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I think that is more than the legacy B1G schools for FY 2015-2016 which I thought was around $35 Million. Next year it will be closer to $45 million or so.
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The SEC is the first conference to release their info for 2015-2016, so we don’t know where anyone else stands. I’d guess the SEC will be #1, though, as they’re on a new TV deal and the B10 is ending their old one.
The article provides the previous year’s numbers for everyone as a reference. As always, add in the caveat that the B12 doesn’t have a network so the schools earn tier 3 money individually rather than getting it distributed by the conference. The B12 schools probably average around $8M in tier 3 rights as a guess.
The Southeastern Conference continued flexing — and growing — its financial muscle, showing revenue of $639 million during its 2016 fiscal year, according to its new federal tax return.
The return, provided to USA TODAY Sports by the conference on Thursday, showed that the distributions to its 14 members schools ranged from $41.9 million for the University of Georgia to $39.1 million for Alabama and Mississippi.
…
The SEC is the first conference to release its tax records for the 2016 fiscal year, but its revenue distributions —– helped by the burgeoning SEC Network — may swamp those of even other Power Five conferences. In fiscal 2015:
►Among the ACC’s 14 schools other than Notre Dame, which remains an independent in football, the conference distributions ranged from $27.6 million for Florida State to just under $24 million for Syracuse. Notre Dame received $6.2 million.
►The Big Ten distributed about $32.4 million to each of its 11 longest-standing members.
►The Pac-12’s per-school shares were about $25.1 million.
►The Big 12’s were around $23.4 million, except for West Virginia and TCU, which each got a little more than $20 million.
For a fiscal year that ended Aug. 31, 2015, the SEC reported $527.4 million in total revenue — so the new figure represents a one-year increase of more than 21%.
Most of that increase came in the amount conference reported as coming from TV and radio rights fees. On the new return, the SEC listed $420 million in such revenue. In fiscal 2015 — the first year in which amounts from the SEC Network were included — the figure was $311.8 million. That’s a one-year increase of nearly 35%.
The figure is double the $210.4 million the TV and radio revenue conference reported for its 2014 fiscal year.
The SEC’s revenue in 2016 from what its return describes as postseason events — which includes its share of money from the College Football Playoff — grew to $180.6 million, up from $162.8 million in 2015 and $98.6 million in 2014.
http://www.jconline.com/story/sports/college/purdue/football/2014/04/25/big-ten-schools-expecting-big-payouts-continue/8187133/
The old B10 projections were for $30.9M in 2014-5 ($32.4M actual), $34.1M in 2015-6 and $35.5M in 2016-7 with a jump to $44.5M in 2017-8. If we assume the same margin of error for 2016 as in 2015, that would be $35.8M (about $5M less than the SEC).
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18586725/alabama-crimson-tide-florida-state-seminoles-remain-top-2017-way-too-early-top-25-national-signing-day
ESPN has a post-NSD top 25 for 2017.
1. AL
2. FSU
3. USC
4. OSU +2
5. PSU -1
6. Clemson -1
7. UW +1
8. OU +2
9. LSU +6
10. OkSU -3
12. WI -3
14. MI -2 (they dropped after a top 5 class?)
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/national-signing-day-one-true-raid-of-big-12-talent-continues-in-state-of-texas/
The raid of talent from TX by the non-B12 P5 conferences continued this year.
Let’s see how it changes going forward with Herman now at UT.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18609288/art-briles-baylor-bears-assistants-buried-player-misbehavior-documents-say
Be careful who you sue.
It’s a long article, so read the whole thing. Some highlights:
Former Baylor coach Art Briles and his assistant coaches actively intervened in the discipline of football players, worked to keep their cases under wraps and tried to arrange legal representation for their players, according to a series of emails and text messages released by three university regents in a legal filing Thursday.
The document filed in a Dallas County court was in response to a libel lawsuit that former football director of operations Colin Shillinglaw had filed Tuesday against the school and several members of its senior leadership.
The regents’ response alleges Briles and his coaching staff created a disciplinary “black hole” into “which reports of misconduct such as drug use, physical assault, domestic violence, brandishing of guns, indecent exposure and academic fraud disappeared.”
…
Among the information released in Thursday’s legal filing is a description of what happened when the former girlfriend of Baylor defensive end Shawn Oakman reported that Oakman physically abused her. She made a report to Waco police, and brought a copy of it to Shillinglaw and “two other people she believed to be assistant football coaches.” The response to the lawsuit states, “There was no evidence that Shillinglaw or anyone in the football program shared the report with Baylor officials outside of the athletics department. Worse, when Pepper Hamilton questioned Shillinglaw about the incident and showed him evidence of his involvement, Shillinglaw insisted he did not recall anything about it.”
…
In one of the messages, dated April 8, 2011, the response notes that Briles sent a text message to an assistant coach, referencing a freshman defensive tackle who was cited for illegal alcohol consumption, “Hopefully he’s under radar enough they won’t recognize name — did he get ticket from Baylor police or Waco? … Just trying to keep him away from our judicial affairs folks. … ”
In reference to a player who was arrested for assault and threatening to kill a non-athlete, a football operations staff member “tried to talk the victim out of pressing criminal charges,” the document states. The correspondence from Sept. 20, 2013, quotes Briles in a text to McCaw, “Just talked to [the player] — he said Waco PD was there — said they were going to keep it quiet — Wasn’t a set up deal … I’ll get shill [Shillinglaw] to ck on Sibley.” (Sibley was in reference to Waco attorney Jonathan Sibley.) It states McCaw responded, “That would be great if they kept it quiet.”
…
The regents’ response also claims Briles personally appealed to Starr on behalf of former Bears defensive lineman Tevin Elliott when he was charged with a second count of plagiarism, which made him ineligible for the 2011 season. After Elliott missed an April 2011 appeal deadline, according to the response, Briles “personally took up Elliott’s cause more than two months later” in June.
“The coach notified President Starr in an email that Elliott wanted to appeal the suspension,” the response says. “The unusual request by Coach Briles triggered concern among top Baylor administrators, who complained to President Starr and among themselves that overturning Elliott’s suspension after the appeal deadline would send a message that athletes were above the rules.”
The response says Elliott’s appeal letter was suspect and “appeared to have been authored by an academic adviser in the Athletics Department. Nevertheless, President Starr ignored the decision of his Provost and overturned the suspension.”
…
Thursday’s legal filing notes that the messages were collected by the Pepper Hamilton law firm that was investigating Baylor’s response to sexual violence. “There could be dozens more, but Pepper Hamilton believed it had compiled enough to support a conclusion that those in charge of the football program, including Shillinglaw, improperly covered up disciplinary problems other than sexual assault,” it states.
…
Thursday’s legal filing recounts a meeting that Baylor alumni and donors had with regents, who were unwilling to share more details of the investigation, citing privacy concerns. It states that the regents tried to explain why they couldn’t keep people whom they found responsible for Title IX failure because that would not uphold the “mission of the university.” It quotes a donor as responding, “If you mention Baylor’s mission one more time, I’m going to throw up. … I was promised a national championship.”
…
With social media reaction already calling for the NCAA to take action against Baylor in light of the new information, Hardin said Baylor should be commended for hiring Pepper Hamilton, releasing the highly critical results of the investigation and firing its head coach at a time when most other colleges confronted with such allegations would just quietly pay off the victims and not investigate further.
“At the end of the day, I’m hoping that the NCAA and others will recognize that instead of punishing Baylor, they ought to be saluted,” he said. “I think they ought to be held up as a model for how to respond.”
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Baylor has to be punished. The football program was totally out of control in the most terrible way (right up there with Sandusky). So, after years of that garbage, they hired Pepper Hamilton. Yes, that was only after they lost control and information was starting to go to the public.
By the way, how can Briles ever coach again?
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18615626/ncaa-continues-investigate-potential-rules-violations-baylor-bears
NCAA enforcement staff has interviewed former Baylor administrators, Title IX investigators and some of the women who alleged football players sexually assaulted them, as it continues to investigate whether its rules were violated during the school’s sexual assault scandal, sources familiar with the investigation told Outside the Lines on Friday.
Sources said NCAA investigators haven’t yet focused on specific allegations of wrongdoing, instead casting a wide net to determine if any NCAA rules might have been violated. The NCAA is also asking whether Baylor players might have been provided improper recruiting inducements and other illegal benefits while playing for the Bears.
…
On Thursday, in a court filing in response to former football director of operations Colin Shillinglaw’s libel lawsuit against the school and several members of its senior leadership, the university released text messages and emails that indicated former Baylor coach Art Briles and his assistants actively intervened in the discipline of football players, worked to keep their cases under wraps and tried to arrange legal representation for their players.
Bowlsby told ESPN on Friday that the NCAA could be looking into some of the issues raised in the text messages as they pertain to extra benefits.
“I doubt very much that most students have anybody available to steer them to legal counsel,” he said.
Bowlsby noted that he would need to know the specific circumstances; referring a student-athlete to a lawyer might not qualify as an extra benefit, but transporting him to an attorney’s office and negotiating a payment might.
“It’s the kind of thing that will raise the antenna of NCAA investigators, that those are exactly the kind of things that are athletic-related that the NCAA’s investigation will certainly look into.”
Asked whether helping a student circumvent the school’s student conduct code also could be considered, Bowlsby added: “Yeah, I think that would likely constitute an extra benefit, as well. … Anything that a student-athlete received that other students wouldn’t be privy to, there could certainly be a case made to consider it an extra benefit.”
…
Bowlsby said the Big 12 is not poised to take any action against Baylor, noting that the conference itself doesn’t have an investigative arm. Bowlsby said the Big 12 is planning to wait and see what happens with the NCAA’s investigation.
“We have some tools at our disposal, but I think there’s a right time to use those and a right situation to use them, and it’s an ongoing process,” he said.
Bowlsby noted there was a desire and a “shared frustration” among the members to get to the bottom of what happened and figure out all the parties involved.
…
Stuart Brown, an Atlanta-based attorney who works in NCAA-related matters, said he didn’t think the NCAA would investigate how the school responded to allegations of sexual assault, and it might not seek to impose penalties for moral issues, like it did in the Jerry Sandusky scandal at Penn State. He said he believes the NCAA would focus more on recruiting violations, coaches’ actions and whether the school altered its conduct code or academic standards for players.
If Baylor was found to be in violation of NCAA rules in those areas, it could face failure to monitor or lack of institutional control. Briles could also face a show-cause penalty, which would require a school that hires him to appear before the NCAA infractions committee. If his assistant coaches broke rules, he could be charged with failing to monitor a staff member, which is what the NCAA charged Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino with after its investigation into allegations made by an escort.
“All of those would still be on the table, depending on what in fact the NCAA gets, and they could pursue all of those without getting into the societal judgment part of it,” Brown said. “There are a couple of things the NCAA can look into and address without looking at the underlying social issues that are beyond its jurisdiction. There are other forums — mainly the court system — where those issues are better resolved.”
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So attorney Stuart Brown says; “All of those would still be on the table, depending on what in fact the NCAA gets, and they could pursue all of those without getting into the societal judgment part of it,” Brown said. “There are a couple of things the NCAA can look into and address without looking at the underlying social issues that are beyond its jurisdiction. There are other forums — mainly the court system — where those issues are better resolved.”
Is this really a social issue? Football players were assaulting and perhaps raping women and the football coaches tried to cover up. (I say perhaps because two players were criminally convicted, so I refer to other cases, not those two).
That is not a special benefit for the players? Please let us be serious. Players committed serious criminal acts and the coaches saved them from punishment – of any type.
As far as a violation of NCAA rules, I believe that this is far worse than Sandusky in terms of the NCAA. While Penn State did not save those poor young kids from abuse, there was no benefit to PSU football players. I do not believe that any Penn State player was ever implicated, it was coaches only.
What is more of a benefit to the player?
1. To allow football players to assault women and avoid any punishment. No criminal charges – not even losing a scholarship and being thrown out of school.
or
2. Giving the kid (who might really need the money) a few hundred dollars “under the table”.
If a school gave four or five kids extra money, all hell would break loose. Allowing a few fine young men at Baylor to run wild is supposedly not a problem.
I guess that I do not understand NCAA rules very well, but I feel that number 1 is much more of an illegal/inappropriate benefit. I apologize to Stuart Brown, Esq., who is an NCAA rules professional, but I respectfully hope that you are full of sh*t.
Again, please don’t respond that Briles, et.al. are gone. That is pretty much how it always happens.
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> … Penn State did not save those poor young kids from abuse, …
Jersey Bernie, which poor young kids did Penn State not save from abuse? (Have you followed the actual trials? I’m telling you, there’s a lot of misinformation out there …)
> … it was coaches only [who were implicated].
Besides Sandusky, which coaches have been implicated in what?
(It’s funny, two former PSU coaches are now at Ohio State, one is at UCLA, and one just became head coach of Baylor. One at each school has been accused in the press, but neither Ohio State, UCLA, nor Baylor seems to believe any of the claims. Neither did the PA AG nor Louis Freeh. Urban Meyer has a picture of Joe Paterno prominently displayed in his office. I wonder what he thinks.)
There is a reason for due process, and there was a reason for the Freeh report, and those reasons aren’t the same.
Keep watching, Jersey Bernie! 😉
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Carl, I am really confused. So no young children were harmed or abused by a Penn State football coach in the Penn State facility. And Sandusky was not convicted of criminal acts involving children And no Penn State coaches had any contemporaneous information about what Sandusky was doing. Good to know.
I gladly admit that I did not follow this closely, but I foolishly thought that Sandusky abused kids – at Penn State. I guess that I was wrong.
I also assume that you have access to the files and information regarding the cases that Penn State settled and that no kids were abused.
Carl, really. If you want to defend the coaching staff, go for it. I really have not followed the matter closely enough to argue. If you say “which poor young kids did Penn State not save from abuse?” are you sure that you are not in danger of losing all credibility on this issue? Just asking.
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“If you say “which poor young kids did Penn State not save from abuse?” are you sure that you are not in danger of losing all credibility on this issue? Just asking.”
That ship sailed long ago.
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> Carl, I am really confused. So no
> young children were harmed or
> abused by a Penn State football
> coach in the Penn State facility.
Jersey Bernie, the issue was not whether Sandusky abused children. (He did.)
The issue was your claims.
First:
> … Penn State did not save those poor young kids from abuse, …
Again, Jersey Bernie, which poor young kids did Penn State not save from abuse?
(There are multiple reasons why your words are very difficult to justify, and I’ll be happy to explain the known facts to you if you will answer my question first. I have no doubt you’d be surprised.)
Second:
> … it was coaches only [who were implicated].
As I have mentioned several times before, both the PA AG *and* Louis Freeh have said that the claims that assistant coaches knew or saw Sandusky abuse children are not credible. Even Mike McQueary says he didn’t actually witness child sexual abuse, which is also what Mike’s father and Dr. Dranov (a medical doctor) testified that they were told at McQueary’s recent trial.
It’s also what Wendell Courtney, Penn State’s lawyer, testified that he was told at Mike’s recent trial. Coincidentally, it’s also what Curley, Schultz, and Spanier have testified to.
That leaves Paterno. McQueary says he didn’t tell Paterno details (in other words, he told Paterno less than he told Dranov and his father). And the PA AG said that Paterno did what he was supposed to do and that Paterno was not part of a coverup. (Only Freeh claims that he was.)
So I ask again:
Besides Sandusky, which coaches have been implicated in what?
> [A]re you sure that you are not
> in danger of losing all credibility
> on this issue? Just asking.
If I lose credibility with you or anyone else here because I actually know and am willing to repeat the known facts, then so be it. I understand that many people here are willing to substitute ignorance, innuendo, and ridicule for facts, and that’s their (and your) prerogative. Good luck with that.
Keep watching, Jersey Bernie! 😉
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Jersey Bernie,
“Is this really a social issue?”
In part, yes. He’s putting the potential criminal acts under that label to separate them from NCAA issues like impermissible benefits.
“Football players were assaulting and perhaps raping women”
That’s the social issue part.
“and the football coaches tried to cover up.”
And that’s the NCAA-actionable part.
“That is not a special benefit for the players?”
If they can prove it, then yes. But it’s not really a major violation of NCAA rules, unfortunately.
“Players committed serious criminal acts and the coaches saved them from punishment – of any type.”
And civil suits should punish many of the people involved, especially the LEOs that let things slide.
“What is more of a benefit to the player?
1. To allow football players to assault women and avoid any punishment. No criminal charges – not even losing a scholarship and being thrown out of school.
or
2. Giving the kid (who might really need the money) a few hundred dollars “under the table”.”
According to NCAA rules, #2 is worse. I think the NCAA may look to add explicit rules about criminal behavior and covering things up in the future, but those rules aren’t in place now.
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According to the NCAA, #3 would be the worst of all-contact with an agent.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/02/03/conference-breakdown-college-football-recruiting-classes/97422242/
5-year recruiting ranking averages for all the P5 schools. They have a decent correlation to results, but it’s far from perfect (WI, GT, Stanford, etc greatly outperform while others underperform). Still, the data is good to have if you’re curious how your school does overall and not just in any one year.
Overall:
1. AL – 1.0 (SECW #1)
2. OSU – 3.6 (B10E #1)
3. LSU – 4.8
4. FSU – 5.2 (ACCA #1)
5. UGA – 7.2 (SECE #1)
6. AU – 8.4
7. UF – 11.0
7. TAMU – 11.0
9. TN – 13.2
10. UCLA – 14.0 (P12S #1)
Others under 20 or division leaders:
OU – 14.2 (B12 #1)
Clemson – 14.3
MI – 14.4
MS – 15.0
UT – 15.2
Miami – 17.2 (ACCC #1)
OR – 20.4 (P12N #1)
NE – 27.0 (B10W #1)
Worst:
KSU – 60.0
SU – 60.0
KU – 62.0 (B12 #10)
WF – 62.0
UC – 63.0 (P12S #6)
BC – 69.4 (ACCA #7)
PU – 69.4 (B10W #7)
Other division worsts:
GT – 56.2 (ACCC #7)
OrSU – 54.4 (P12N #6)
RU – 52.4 (B10E #7)
VU – 47.0 (SECE #7)
MsSU – 26.0 (SECW #7)*
* One of these schools isn’t like the others.
B10E:
1. OSU – 3.6
2. MI – 14.4
3. PSU – 21.4
4. MSU – 26.6
5. UMD – 38.0
6. IN – 52.2
7. RU – 52.4
B10W:
1. NE – 27.0
2. WI – 36.6
3. NW – 50.6
4. IA – 53.0
5. IL – 56.8
6. MN – 58.0
7. PU – 69.4
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18615694/minnesota-panel-upholds-punishment-five-10-football-players-alleged-involvement-sexual-assault
And this is why we call it due process. Half of the MN players got their punishments overturned or reduced by the appeals panel, the other 5 didn’t. Both sides can appeal the results to the provost.
The University of Minnesota panel that heard the case of alleged involvement by 10 football players in a sexual assault on campus has upheld recommended punishment for five of them and overturned or reduced discipline for the other half.
Attorney Lee Hutton III, a former Gophers wide receiver representing nine of the players, confirmed Friday that quarterback Seth Green (one-year suspension), running back Kobe McCrary (one-year suspension), cornerback Antonio Shenault (probation) and safety Antoine Winfield Jr. (one-year suspension) had recommended punishments dismissed.
…
Twin Cities television station KSTP reported cornerbacks Ray Buford Jr. and KiAnte Hardin, safety Dior Johnson and defensive end Tamarion Johnson had recommended expulsions upheld, quarterback Mark Williams had a one-year suspension upheld and running back Carlton Djam had a recommended expulsion reduced to a one-year suspension.
…
The 10 accused players went through more than 18 hours of hearings over two days last week in front of the three-person panel. The woman and other university-summoned witnesses testified on Jan. 26, and the players gave their response the following day. The panel was required to produce a decision within a week, but unlike a criminal trial that requires a unanimous verdict by a jury, the university proceeding required a simple two-person majority.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/18616780/ncaa-agrees-historic-209m-settlement-scholarship-shortages
Thee NCAA reached a $209M settlement with former CFB, MBB and WBB players over not getting FCOA scholarships.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/lsu-tigers-leonard-fournette-citrus-bowl-nfl-draft-ankle-skip-ed-orgeron-020417
Leonard Fournette now says his coach told him not to play in the bowl game.
“To be honest, it really wasn’t my decision,” Fournette told NFL Now Live. “My coach brought me into the office. He told me ‘You have a lot on the line.’ He didn’t want me to play. I cried like a baby. It was hard for me. That was my first time not really traveling with the team and I couldn’t play in a game with my brothers. I’m going to miss them.”
1. Assuming that’s true, shouldn’t Orgeron have come out and said so once Fournette started to catch flak?
2. Should a coach put 1 player ahead of the team? Isn’t it the coach’s job to help the team win the best he can? Or does that not apply to a meaningless bowl game?
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/why-super-bowl-li-would-have-benefited-from-college-football-overtime-rules/
The Super Bowl would’ve been even better if the NFL had a CFB-style overtime.
But what if the Falcons had one more opportunity? They were, after all, the league’s best offense in 2016 with an MVP at quarterback. The outcome might have been the same — there’s no woulda, coulda, shoulda here — but at least there would have been an equal number of chances to win. That’s true no matter which team went first and it’s the thing that harms NFL’s overtime the most.
It doesn’t need to be an exact replica. NFL overtimes don’t have to put offenses on the opponent’s 25-yard line. Move the starting position back to the 35- or 40-yard line. Kickers are obviously far better in the NFL, too. For the sake of argument, though, let’s say Super Bowl LI had a college football style overtime as it is. That’s giving Tom Brady, an already four-time Super Bowl champ having the game of his life, and Matt Ryan, the league MVP, incredible field position to make the last play.
…
In the NFL, college football-style overtime would get its extra value from seeing both sets of star players take the field at least one more time. Sunday’s battle wouldn’t have been just Brady in overtime, it would have been Brady and Ryan. Maybe twice. Maybe three times. The important thing is they each would have been given the same number of tries.
Therein lies the two primary benefits of college football overtime: It’s exciting and it’s fair. A game many will consider one of the great Super Bowls of all time deserved to have that type of ending.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/baylor-university-coach-arrested-prostitution-assistant-strength-coach-brandon-washington-fired-020617
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At least he is the John. From reading the URL, I wondered if he was the pimp.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/alabama-drama-reported-disagreements-between-saban-sarkisian-led-to-split/
AL is looking for a new OC yet again as Saban and Sarkisian apparently clashed over system philosophy. Both sides knew Sarkisian would move on after signing day, and the Falcons hired Sarkisian.
Will Saban’s iron rule of the program prevent him from hiring an elite OC? People have mentioned Chip Kelly or Mark Helfrich, but I don’t see how they could be on the same page as Saban. Mike Locksley is already at AL as an analyst and his ego is probably small enough to do what he’s told.
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The Big 12 Conference Board of Directors voted unanimously to withhold one-quarter (25 percent) of future revenue distribution payments to Baylor University, pending the outcome of third-party verification review of required changes to Baylor’s athletics procedures and to institutional governance of its intercollegiate athletics programs, among other matters.
http://www.big12sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=10410&ATCLID=211461596
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Baylor’s resposne:
http://www.baylor.edu/mediacommunications/news.php?action=story&story=177217
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I agree with Kirk.
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It may be lip service, but that’s still progress compared to anything the B12 has done previously.
What I’d like to see is a conference require a 3rd-party review of all it’s members on these issues before a school has a major scandal.
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http://www.nj.com/rutgersfootball/index.ssf/2017/02/what_is_rutgers_paying_to_stage_maryland_twinbill.html
RU is paying the Yankees $750k to stage a doubleheader of the RU vs UMD football game plus a wrestling meet between the two this November. RU gets to keep all ticket proceeds, so they need to sell at least 35,000 full price tickets to make money.
General terms of the agreement — including its inclusion in Rutgers season ticket package — were negotiated by former athletics director Julie Hermann with former football coach Kyle Flood’s support.
Though successors Pat Hobbs and Chris Ash long ago agreed to uphold a verbal commitment, the financials were signed in November and recently became publicly available for the first time.
Hobbs — who has faced backlash because of the game’s unpopularity within a vocal portion of the fan base — says the primary benefits are brand association between Rutgers and the Yankees and building the Big Ten’s budding presence in New York City market.
Rutgers could make money on the game, depending on attendance.
Rutgers earned an average of $1.495 million for its seven football home games in 2015, according to the athletics department’s annual NCAA fiscal report.
Rutgers-Maryland — played as the season finale each of the last three seasons — has not been a hot ticket and results in less-than-average revenue.
…
For the Yankee Stadium game to be as profitable as a regular home game, Rutgers must sell at least 35,000 tickets, according to sources. That number does not include free tickets distributed to students in exchange for student fees.
Rutgers football had 28,478 season tickets from 6,511 accounts in 2016.
The average attendance for Rutgers’ last three appearances in Yankee Stadium — 2013 Pinstripe Bowl against Notre Dame, 2011 Pinstripe Bowl against Iowa State and a 2011 regular-season game against Army — is 38,492.
For an outdoor wrestling match at High Point Solutions Stadium in November, Rutgers had a school-record crowd of 16,178 fans.
There are 83,000 Rutgers alumni living in the New York City metropolitan area, according to school officials.
Hobbs added the wrestling component in an effort to build a more unique event and respond to the complaints of Rutgers fans, especially because of limited tailgate options.
…
“Jim Delany, the commissioner of the Big Ten, thinks it’s tremendous for Rutgers University,” Hobbs said earlier this month. “I believe in the end everybody will see it that way.
“I understand the frustration on some folks’ part, but my hope is we pack that stadium, we have an amazing day there, and then we say, ‘You know what? This was pretty good. Maybe we should think about doing this.’ But I do understand the hesitation on some folks’ part.”
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The Rutgers ticket holders are not happy, but too bad. This predates AG Hobbs. I believe that this was a deal required by the B1G. It is more B1G exposure in NYC. A few weeks ago, RU played Wisconsin in bball at Madison Square Garden. None of these things are for RU, they are for the “greater good”.
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In the long run, this is good for Rutgers. How long a road trip is it? I’ve to both Rutgers and the Meadowlands (yes, it isn’t Yankee Stadium), it isn’t very far, and a lot closer if you live in NYC.
Rutgers is already recruiting competitively in the bottom half of the B1G, and will do better in the future.
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Yankee Stadium is in the Bronx, pretty much right across the river from Manhattan. Most people who go to Yankee Stadium from inside New York City do so by subway. There is parking at the Stadium, but the train is easier.
Rutgers to Yankee Stadium is about a 45 mile drive. The problem is that with NYC traffic, it can be a fairly quick ride or can be a real pain.
One can also get from Rutgers to Yankee Stadium by taking a train into the City and then a subway to the Stadium.
The Meadowlands in NJ, where the Giants and the Jets play, is less than 10 miles from midtown Manhattan. RU is about 35 miles from the Meadowlands.
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Jon Wilner looks at the revenue gap between the B10/SEC and the P12.
Fiscal year 2015 school distributions (all figures confirmed):
SEC: $32.7 million
Big Ten: $32.4 million
Pac-12: $25.1 million
Fiscal year 2016 school distributions
SEC: $40 million (confirmed)
Big Ten: $35 million (approximate)
Pac-12: $27 million (approximate)
That looks bad … that is bad … but it’s about to get much worse for the Pac-12.
Remember: The Big Ten’s new Tier 1 deal begins in 2017-18, and it’s also a whopper, averaging $440 million per year.
Which brings us to …
Fiscal year 2017-18 school distributions …
Big Ten: $45 million (estimate)
SEC: $43 million (estimate)
Pac-12: $31 million (estimate)
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http://awfulannouncing.com/league-networks/athletic-directors-worried-pac-12-networks-payments-distribution-compared-sec-big-ten-nets.html
This article says multiple P12 ADs are disappointed in the P12N’s payouts and want to make changes. Others are happy as is.
Utah athletic director Chris Hill is on record as one AD who is disappointed with the Pac-12 Networks. He told the San Francisco Chronicle, “we expected more.”
Washington State AD Bill Moos said the payouts have increased each year and he was expecting them to be in the range of “$5 million to $6 million when we were launching,” but that has yet to happen.
…
Media analysts estimate that Pac-12 Networks are in just 15 million homes while Big Ten and SEC Networks are available in many more households. Due to the distribution, Pac-12 member schools receive $1.5 million per year while the SEC Network pays $7.5 million. The Big Ten Network shells out even more.
And Hill from the University of Utah says the lack of DirecTV is “making the gap bigger and bigger” as compared to the Big Ten and SEC.
Another issue is the league’s deal with ESPN and Fox that allows the two networks to schedule games at 10 or 10:30 p.m. ET with only one to two week’s notice which have hindered ticket sales locally and hurt TV audiences in the East.
The deal with ESPN and Fox has been well-liked by the schools as it has given the schools more money, but athletic directors wonder about the longevity of the Pac-12 Networks without a network partner. Colorado AD Rick George is one who also would like to see more money from the league-owned network, but AD’s from Cal and Stanford like the exposure they receive the channels.
So as the Pac-12 looks to the future, there’s a double-edged sword. The AD’s like the increased exposure and that has helped recruiting, but at the same time, the lack of distribution and payments as compared to the Big Ten and SEC Networks has some league athletic directors worried.
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Usually the P12 has strong OOC schedules, but not so much this year.
* Number of games against teams ranked in the final AP poll of the 2016 season: Three.
* Number of games against teams ranked in the final AP poll of the 2016 season not named San Diego State: One
* Number of games against teams ranked in the final AP poll of the 2016 season not named San Diego State or Western Michigan: Zero.
* Number of games against teams ranked in the Hotline’s early 2017 rankings: Two.
Put another way: Oregon State’s forgettable schedule, which features Minnesota, Colorado State and Portland State, nonetheless ranks sixth on the difficulty scale. Sixth!
…
3. UCLA
Lineup: vs. Texas A&M, vs. Hawaii, at Memphis
…
2. Cal
Lineup: at North Carolina, Weber State, Mississippi
…
1. USC
Lineup: vs. Western Michigan, vs. Texas, at Notre Dame
Comment: All credit to the Trojans for the all-comers approach. The difficulty level hinges on WMU remaining relevant and whether Texas and Notre Dame have top-25 caliber seasons. (The guess here is that UT makes a major jump under Tom Herman while the Irish are respectable but not elite.) The Trojans’ schedule could be only the third- or fourth-toughest in the Pac-12 … or it could be the most arduous in the country. The guess here is that it’s somewhere in the middle.
That’s a pretty weak lineup by P12 standards. It’s still better than the B10, though.
http://www.espn.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/140962/a-look-at-the-toughest-big-ten-nonconference-schedules-in-2017
ESPN ranked the hardest B10 OOC schedules adjusted for how good the team is. If we ignore #1 PU and #3 IL, the top OOC schedules for good teams are:
2. Michigan
Sept. 2: vs. Florida (9-4), AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas
Sept. 9: vs. Cincinnati (4-8)
Sept. 16: vs. Air Force (10-3)
…
4. Ohio State
Sept. 9: vs. Oklahoma (11-2)
Sept. 16: vs. Army (8-5)
Sept. 23: vs. UNLV (4-8)
…
5. Nebraska
Sept. 2: vs. Arkansas State (8-5)
Sept. 9: at Oregon (4-8)
Sept. 16: vs. Northern Illinois (5-7)
Clearly USC and Cal have tougher schedules with 2 P5 teams. These 3 should be on par or harder than UCLA’s, though.
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ESPN tweeted out that IL just added another Friday night game:
Brian Bennett ESPN Staff Writer
Friday Night Lovie: Illinois and USF have moved up their game one day to Friday, Sept. 15, on ESPN. The Illini now have two Friday night games, as they’ll also host Nebraska on Sept. 29 as part of the new Big Ten Friday night package.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18654953/michigan-state-spartans-suspend-3-players-staffer-amid-sexual-assault-investigation
MSU’s turn under the gun as 3 players and a football staff member have been suspended pending investigation of a sexual assault complaint from late January.
The school released a statement on Thursday afternoon saying that the three players have been barred from team activities and removed from on-campus housing pending the outcome of an investigation by campus police, in conjunction with the Ingham County prosecutor’s office.
Charges have not yet been filed, but police are expected to forward reports in the case to the prosecutor’s office for possible criminal charges. The sexual assault complaint was made in late January.
The school did not release names of the players or the staff member.
The university has hired an outside legal firm to conduct a Title IX inquiry “into football program staff members’ compliance with university policy in connection with the allegations,” the statement read. Members of the Spartans’ coaching staff and “other relevant individuals” are being interviewed as part of that investigation.
Let’s hope MSU has learned lessons from Baylor and MN and handles this more smoothly.
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Wisconsin is Budgeting over $51 Million in conference distributions in 2017-2018. More than I expected so maybe BTN profits are now being generated.
Click to access 589e3555d72f1.pdf.pdf
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They probably have been for a while. I’d guess some set asides/reserves, BTN projects, contingency planning, loans (Maryland) and whatever else the conference wanted before distributing a larger amount.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2016/05/18/big-ten-revenue-jim-delany-pay-salary-compensation-television/84553752/
From last May.
As a result, the conference distributed roughly $32.4 million to each of its longest-standing 11 members, amounts that put those schools on par with amounts the Southeastern Conference distributed to each of its 14 member schools from conference revenue that totaled $527.4 million.
Nebraska, Maryland and Rutgers are each on separately negotiated paths to full shares of Big Ten revenue. In fiscal 2015, Nebraska received $19.8 million, Maryland $24.1 million and Rutgers nearly $10.5 million, according to the new return, which the conference provided Wednesday in response to a request from USA TODAY Sports.
The return also showed that the Big Ten loaned Maryland an additional $11.6 million. That money was an advance against future conference distributions, deputy commissioner Brad Traviolia said in an interview. Traviolia declined to discuss the reasons for the loan, but as part of a settlement to a legal dispute with the Atlantic Coast Conference over its exit fee, Maryland agreed in August 2014 to let the ACC keep more than $31 million in revenue share money the conference had been withholding from the school.
The additions of Maryland and Rutgers resulted in increased TV revenue for the Big Ten from deals that were renegotiated with the conference’s TV partners, Traviolia said. Like other Power Five conferences, the Big Ten also got a revenue boost from the inaugural College Football Playoff.
…
Traviolia declined to detail the impact that adding Maryland and Rutgers had on the Big Ten’s TV deals, but the conference’s tax returns give some indication of the impact of adding the Washington and New York markets. The Big Ten annually provides a figure for what it terms “Sports Revenue.” Based on the way the conference categorizes other revenue streams, “Sports Revenue” includes — but is not exclusively comprised of — TV revenue and revenue from football bowl games.
The conference reported about $317 million in “Sports Revenue” in fiscal 2014 and almost $397 million in 2015 — an $80 million difference. Based on reports from other conferences that approximate their bowl revenue increases from the CFP, it is likely that $50 million to $60 million of the Big Ten’s “Sports Revenue” increase is attributable to the TV rights fee increases that resulted from adding Maryland and Rutgers.
The Big Ten’s television strength was demonstrated on the new tax return in another way — the reporting of a $22.6 million dividend from Big Ten Network Holdings LLC, an amount that Traviolia said is connected to the conference’s after-tax portions of Big Ten Network profits that it shares with network co-owner Fox. (The Big Ten Conference’s share of those profits are in addition to a television rights fee payment it gets from the Big Ten Network, Traviolia said,)
Traviolia said that the $22.6 million in dividend money was used to provide the loan to Maryland, as well as $1 million of the amounts distributed to each of the conference’s 11 longest-standing member schools.
http://www.indystar.com/story/sports/college/purdue/2015/07/16/big-ten-network-big-ten-revenue-money/30229169/
And from 2015:
As part of the more than $32 million Purdue received from the Big Ten during the 2014-15 fiscal year, $1 million was generated from BTN profit shares, according to a document obtained by the Journal and Courier through a records request.
The Big Ten Network, which the league owns along with Fox, began showing a profit in 2011-12. However, those shares were initially held back by the conference to help with the transition of Maryland and Rutgers.
Big Ten deputy commissioner and treasurer Brad Traviolia said this is the first year the conference distributed BTN profit shares to schools. Traviolia, though, declined to say which schools received them and how much was distributed.
The conference’s five-year budget plan, obtained in 2014, showed the league projected to distribute $11 million – $1 million each to 11 schools – in BTN profit shares beginning in 2014-15. The profit shares are subject to approval by the Big Ten’s Chancellors and Presidents.
Sizable profits have been rolling in for a while and they just recently started getting distributed. As much of the transition expenses for RU and UMD should be covered by now, it wouldn’t be surprising to see that profit share increase. I think we often forget to include all the money RU and UMD added to our old TV deals (BTN especially) so that should be a sizable bump.
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Kevin,
I’m glad to see those sorts of projections. That’s well ahead of what the B10 estimated before the new TV deals were struck (have they officially been signed/finalized yet?).
http://www.jconline.com/story/sports/college/purdue/football/2014/04/25/big-ten-schools-expecting-big-payouts-continue/8187133/
In a document obtained by the Journal & Courier through an open records request from Purdue University, 12 of the 14 schools are projected to receive $44.5 million each through the league’s distribution plan. That’s the first year Nebraska becomes fully financially integrated into the conference, according to Big Ten deputy commissioner and treasurer Brad Traviolia.
…
Eleven conference schools are expected to receive around $4.7 million from bowl distributions in 2014-15, more than double the projections this year. By 2016-17, the league is projecting schools will receive $7.1 million from the league’s bowl agreements.
The Big Ten is anticipating 12 schools will receive roughly $33 million in 2017-18 from television revenue alone — about a $10 million per school increase from 2016-17 projection, the final year of a 10-year, $1 billion deal which started in 2007-08.
So the original guesstimate was $44.5M for the 12 full-share members (NE gets 100% starting in 2017-18), with $33M coming just from TV (about $10M more than the year before). WI is predicting a $20M jump in the B10 distribution to $51.2M. That’s $6.7M more than projected a few years ago, most likely due to the new TV deals and BTN success. Some of that will be from bowl games and other sources, but I’d guess the B10 media deals are most of it.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/recruiting/story/_/id/18654463/if-recruiting-reforms-happen-benefits
ESPN looks at who benefits from the various recruiting reforms that the NCAA is expected to sign off on this summer. They explain the proposed rule change and give their reasoning for each one, but I’ll just give the lists.
Early visits
Winners: Big Ten and other Northern schools
Losers: Southern schools
…
Summer camp limitations
Winners: Schools near major metro areas and in talent deep states
Losers: Rural programs
…
Early signing period
Winners: Blueblood programs, schools that recruit early
Losers: Schools that don’t adjust
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A little B10 hockey update.
http://www.uscho.com/rankings/
USCHO Poll (2/6) / USA Today Poll:
MN – 5/4
PSU – 10/9
OSU – 12t/13
WI – 17/17
http://www.uscho.com/rankings/pairwise-rankings/d-i-men/
More importantly, the Pairwise Rankings:
The PairWise Ranking is a system which attempts to mimic the method used by the NCAA Selection Committee to determine participants for the NCAA Division I men’s hockey tournament. The PWR compares all teams by these criteria: record against common opponents, head-to-head competition, and the RPI.
6. MN
7. PSU
15. OSU
17. WI
FYI, 16 is the cutoff to make it.
http://www.uscho.com/rankings/krach/d-i-men/
And the KRACH ratings, which is an advanced model of good teams are.
KRACH — or “Ken’s Ratings for American College Hockey” — is the implementation for college hockey of a sophisticated mathematical model known as the Bradley-Terry rating system, first applied to college hockey by a statistician named Ken Butler.
This method is based on a statistical technique called logistic regression, in essence meaning that teams’ ratings are determined directly from their won-loss records against one another. A key feature of KRACH is that strength of schedule is calculated directly from the ratings themselves, meaning that KRACH, unlike many ratings (including RPI) cannot easily be distorted by teams with strong records against weak opposition.
7. MN
8. PSU
16. OU
17. WI
http://www.uscho.com/2017/02/09/a-chat-with-big-ten-deputy-commissioner-brad-traviolia/
An interview with Brad Traviola, B10 deputy commissioner.
Topics of discussion:
* The big improvement over last year
* PSU reaching #1 after only 5 years of hockey
* WI’s return to prominence (they were horrible last year)
* The B10 playing in NYC
“It’s really a long-term commitment from the conference, that we want to be relevant in the New York City area,” Traviolia. “We’re bringing the Big Ten, which traditionally is a Midwest conference, to a new region of the country. If you’re going to go out east, you want to be relevant in the New York City area.”
Michigan and Penn State played in the inaugural event last season and drew more than 13,000 fans, which may have been aided by the fact that both basketball teams played beforehand. This year’s game drew a little more than 5,000. Though the attendance was more than cut in half, Traviolia said that the conference doesn’t expect to make any drastic changes.
“Attendance was down from year one [and] you can draw a lot of inferences from that,” he said. “We’re looking at the long-term success of making the Big Ten relevant in New York City as the overarching goal.
“A single year’s attendance at one game doesn’t make or break or have you significantly adjust that long-term goal. It may tweak how we do matchups in the future, it may tweak how we change a few small things here and there, but the overarching goal of bringing the best of what the Big Ten is to a new region of the country still remains the same.”
Minnesota and Michigan State are scheduled to play at MSG next season. The Gophers men’s basketball team will also play against Ohio State. The hockey matchup for 2019 hasn’t been announced.
“With the first three years, we obviously are going to have all six of the current Big Ten hockey members in the building participating in the Super Saturday,” Traviolia said. “The future matchups may be dependent on what we learn in years one, two and three, or it probably will be dependent on them.”
* ND joining next season
Having seven teams puts the conference at an odd number, a position that most conferences don’t strive to be at, but that doesn’t mean that an eighth team is on the horizon.
“We were comfortable, as an all-sport conference, with 11 institutions for 20 years,” Traviolia said. “So the fact that it’s maybe a little funky on the scheduling side really doesn’t influence tremendously how we operate.
“Going from seven to eight, from our mindset, just increasing to get to an even number, that’s not the reason you expand. The reason you expand is can you as a conference get better.”
Adding Notre Dame means that the conference is open to affiliate members, but aside from the Irish there aren’t a lot of potential suitors. Arizona State, which is currently a Division I Independent, fits from a school-size perspective, but not on the travel side of things. There is always the possibility that a current Big Ten institution decides to field a team, but there has been nothing concrete on that front.
“We have to be able to check those boxes and really do the due diligence and feel that Big Ten hockey overall would be improved, the Big Ten conference would be improved, the affiliate institutions with hockey coming in it would benefit them so there’s a long term relationship,” Traviolia said. “Those are the kinds of things that we would want to consider and do due diligence on before going to eight from seven.”
* Moving the B10 tournament back to campuses
The Big Ten was made up of schools from the WCHA and CCHA, so naturally, the first four years of the new conference’s tournament were scheduled to rotate between the two former homes of the previous conferences’ tournaments: Xcel Energy Center and Joe Louis Arena.
“It was what I’d call a pretty straightforward and simple approach to, ‘let’s get our feet wet and play where you played before,’” Traviolia said. “We’ll alternate, not favor one side over the other, and see how it responds.”
It responded poorly. Simply put, not many fans showed up.
“What the WCHA and the CCHA built up over the years was special, they did a great job and they were respectively very successful events,” Traviolia said. “But given the location of our schools and where the fan bases are going back to campuses and taking the tournament back to the home sites, we’re going to have a better chance of filling up those venues than we are to get the fans to travel to a single neutral site.”
Traviolia said that after the second year, the conference started strongly looking into moving the tournament to campus sites. It was announced before this season that the change would be made for next year. The tournament will be played over three weekends with three three-game series being played between everyone but the regular-season champion the first weekend, two single-game quarterfinals hosted by higher seeds the second weekend and a one-game championship game hosted by the highest remaining seed.
“We feel long term, one of the best things that there is about college hockey and what we feel about Big Ten hockey is the campus environment,” Traviolia said. “A regular-season series between our schools bring out tremendous crowds, they’re great environments and we think that we have a very good chance of replicating that in a tournament setting on campus.”
…
WCHA commissioner Bill Robertson said last March that there was a possibility of the WCHA, Big Ten and NCHC combining to create a college hockey festival of sorts with their respective postseason tournaments being at the same time and in the same area, more than likely the Twin Cities. Traviolia said that he would call the discussion that took place “very early conversations” and that campus sites ended up being the preferred option.
“On one hand, that could have worked as a festival atmosphere, but I also think that the conferences liked having their respective identities and liked building towards those,” he said. “The campus sites for us, that was priority one and we’re going to run with it.”
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http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/18666334/villanova-wildcats-kansas-jayhawks-baylor-bears-gonzaga-bulldogs-get-no-1s-early-ncaa-bracket-reveal
The first MBB top 16 preview came out.
1 seeds – Villanova, Kansas, Baylor, Gonzaga
2 seeds – North Carolina, Florida State, Louisville, Oregon
3 seeds – Kentucky, Arizona, Virginia, Florida
4 seeds – UCLA, Duke, West Virginia, Butler
That’s 0 B10 teams in the top 16.
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https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5bojD7KfX0VOVU2X3Jmd0EwMHM/view
A proof that the head-to-head tiebreaker makes no sense in actually determining which team is better in a full round robin.
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It seems like a lot of work just to show what we all already know – the best team doesn’t always win the game.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18640822/washington-huskies-baylor-bears-10-easiest-nonconference-schedules-2017
The 10 easiest OOC schedules for 2017:
1. UW
2. CO
3. KU
4. Baylor
5. MO
6. KSU
7. IN
8. NW
9. PSU
10. AR
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http://collegefootballnews.com/
CFN is doing their pre-spring team ranking countdown. What we know so far for the B10:
73. RU
76. IL
Also, we know PU isn’t ranked lower than that since they started with the bottom 50 (81-130) and are counting up.
Lowest P5 team – #80 KU
No other P5 teams have been ranked yet.
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More B10 teams have been revealed:
54. IN
55. UMD
58. PU
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35. NW
39. MN
So far they seem to see some well-defined tiers in the B10:
Bad – RU, IL
Mediocre – IN, UMD, PU
Decent – NW, MN, maybe more
That leaves 7 teams in the top 34. OSU and PSU will be in the top 10 with MI and WI top 20 at least. That leaves MSU, IA and NE probably in the 20-25 range.
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31. MSU
33. IA
The rest are in the top 25. It looks like they expect parity in the middle of the West with IA, NW and MN so closely bunched.
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18. MI
24. NE
Just OSU, PSU and WI left.
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8. WI
10. PSU
That only leaves OSU and #3 and below are out. I’ll go all out and guess that OSU is #2 with AL #1.
As a reminder, here’s the B10 list:
2. OSU
8. WI
10. PSU
18. MI
24. NE
31. MSU
33. IA
35. NW
39. MN
54. IN
55. UMD
58. PU
73. RU
76. IL
Thoughts?
* I’m surprised to see WI ahead of PSU since schedule isn’t supposed to be a factor. Both have a bunch of starters back (as does OSU). I guess they’re favoring D over O.
* I think MSU could be a top 25 type of team, but they could also be mediocre so #31 seems like a decent compromise.
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Brett Favre is promoting a concussion treatment drug. It’s still very early and I’m not claiming this is or isn’t a viable treatment, but I do think it’s important for us to remember that the medical industry could come up with ways to greatly reduce the threat of longterm brain injury from playing football.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/02/13/jerry-sandusky-son-jeffrey-sandusky-charged-child-sexual-abuse/97859942/
Maybe it’s genetic? One of Jerry Sandusky’s adult children has been charged with multiple counts of sexual offenses involving minors.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/statsinfo/post/_/id/129505/ohio-state-is-no-1-in-preseason-fpi-1-0
ESPN’s FPI (football power index) is one of their made up stats that’s largely BS, but they have a preseason ranking for all 130 teams and I thought the relative ranking of teams might be of interest to some people.
About preseason FPI:
Preseason FPI is designed to take the guesswork out of preseason ratings. It is an automated ranking intended to measure team strength going forward. It is not a ranking of who will have the highest win total (which is dependent on schedule) or who is most likely to make the College Football Playoff.
The model comprises four major components: the last four seasons of performance on offense, defense and special teams, with the most recent season counting most; information on offensive and defensive returning starters, with special consideration given to a team returning its starting quarterback or gaining a transfer quarterback with experience; a four-year average recruiting ranking of four systems (ESPN, Scouts, Rivals and Phil Steele); and head coaching tenure. These four components interact and are assigned different weights depending on the team to produce preseason FPI.
Combining all of the factors above produces a predicted value on offense, defense and special teams, which represents the number of points that each unit would be expected to contribute to the team’s scoring margin if it were to face an average FBS team on a neutral field.
1 Ohio State
2 Alabama
3 Oklahoma
4 Florida State
5 Auburn
6 LSU
7 Clemson
8 Penn State
9 Washington
10 Wisconsin
Rest of the B10:
18 Michigan
29 Northwestern
39 Iowa
57 Nebraska
58 Michigan State
60 Indiana
61 Minnesota
69 Maryland
83 Illinois
88 Rutgers
98 Purdue
Other P5 schools below #60:
68 Iowa State
72 Boston College
73 Virginia
102 Kansas
This mostly make sense. The bottom 3 are expected to be terrible again with a cluster of mediocre teams, 3 good teams and 3 elite teams. The good new for the B10 is that we know it’s recruiting tends to be undervalued, especially for certain teams (WI, MSU, IA, …), so hopefully several teams can outperform these rankings. I think MSU and NE will be much better than their ranks here.
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A couple more recruiting years like this last, and Maryland will be up there with Nebraska and Michigan State. Even Rutgers is out-recruiting the B1G bottoms, and they might move up, too. But, being in the East, neither will go to the Rose Bowl for a very long time, if ever.
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The closest Maryland came to the ACC title game in the divisional era was in 2006, when it lost…to Wake Forest. And the B1G East is a tougher version of the ACC Atlantic, with Michigan/Ohio State/Penn State in the roles of Clemson/Florida State.
No one in College Park is complaining, though, as they’re glad to see the Terrapins out from under the yoke of the Research Triangle.
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I think they will get better recruits simply by being in the B1G. They won’t win any titles, but they’ll be competitive and go to good bowls.
Rutgers will torment PU and IL and some OOC powder puffs, but that’s it. No Stanford in the East.
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http://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2017/02/79938/run-up-the-score-beat-michigan
An interesting result. How OSU does against MI predicts how they’ll do in the postseason. That’s not totally surprising, except that even a close win over MI predicts a poor postseason.
Over the last 30 years:
9 losses -> 2-7 postseason
1 tie -> 0-1 postseason
7 close wins -> 2-5 postseason
16 close wins & losses -> 4-13 postseason record
9 big wins (10+ pts) -> 8-3 postseason record (and the 3 losses were all close losses)
Is this true for other kings or your school?
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😦
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https://twitter.com/flugempire/status/831897611443568640
Greg Flugaur talking UConn and realignment.
FOX wants UCONN.
FOX has always wanted UCONN.
The ? is…
IF UCONN goes INDY for FB (BE for BB) what can FOX promise UCONN on that front?
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Meanwhile, the Dude is predicting the B12 will expand in the next 5 years by taking P12 schools.
I’m almost certain the Big 12 will expand within the next 5 years…by adding Pac 12 schools. Why?
…
I’ve said many times there has to be great need (or great discontent) to make switching conferences worthwhile.
…
Several Pac 12 schools have the great need and the discontent necessary to explore a move.
…
I’m not saying the Big 12 will raid the Pac 12. I’m saying the conditions exist to make it possible.
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http://www.newsobserver.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/luke-decock/article131008644.html
NC shows no signs of repealing HB2 any time soon, and that decision will come with a heavy price tag.
If House Bill 2 isn’t repealed in the next 12 days, while the North Carolina General Assembly is in session, the NCAA is going to extend its ban on events in North Carolina for another five years. The ACC will follow. And so will countless amateur and youth sporting organizations.
The letter the N.C. Sports Association sent legislators on Monday spells it out in brutal detail. The NCAA’s individual sports committees will, over the next 7-10 days, convene to begin their final deliberations about event sites for the 2018-19 through 2021-22 academic years. Those decisions will come at the end of the month. They have been instructed to exclude all 133 of North Carolina’s bids from consideration if HB2 is still on the books.
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The ACC already pulled its neutral-site championships from North Carolina for this year. By the time the conference has its spring meetings in May, there will be plans in place to move the 2019 and 2020 ACC basketball tournaments from Charlotte and Greensboro, respectively. If nothing happens now, those decisions will be a foregone conclusion by then.
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In December, MLS commissioner Don Garber said that HB2 “will be a factor with other factors we have to consider.” That was before two of the 12 expansion bids turned out to be from North Carolina, and now that the process is under way, it remains unclear what impact HB2 could have. An MLS spokesman did not immediately return a request for clarification.
And there’s a long list of organizations that already simply won’t come here any more, from US Lacrosse to US Figure Skating (which brought its championships, a massive event, to Greensboro in 2011 and 2015) to USA Rugby to USA Ultimate to the group that oversees college club sports. The Big East wouldn’t even give North Carolina sites the information to submit bids for its baseball tournament. That list is only going to get longer.
…
There are countless reasons, better reasons, to repeal HB2, even for those who support the law in principle. But nothing has broken the political deadlock, not a change of parties in the governor’s office, not even a repeal deal that failed in a special session in December – a special session called specifically to repeal HB2.
Sports is a useful lever here, a political neutral zone that offers the potential to meet on common ground, potential cover for legislators afraid of provoking their base by voting to repeal HB2.
Perhaps the threat of six years without college championships in North Carolina – and the potential loss of hundreds of millions of dollars – is enough to make a deal worth doing.
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And this ACC blogger suggests another consequence could be the ACC moving their headquarters out of NC. He suggests the DC area as a likely location.
So, let’s prepare for the future here. If the ACC major neutral-site championships out of North Carolina, it’s likely also going to move the conference headquarters (and several jobs associated with the conference). This is a big endeavor – it is not a small effort. And you’ve got to thing that long-standing commissioner, John Swofford (who is almost 70 years old), would retire (he has the longest tenure of any ACC Commissioner) when the conference offices move (because they won’t stay in North Carolina as long as HB2 is in effect there).
The ACC would then likely put out a request for proposal for a conference headquarters located in one of the states represented by the conference (or a neighboring city – yes, I’m dropping a massive hint) and take an offer that best fits the financial interests of the member schools.
The Washington, DC metro area has to be one of the top locations for the ACC to move it’s headquarters. It is in a central location to most ACC schools, the ACC could likely get a competitive deal on its facilities lease(given that the ACC could choose from Northern Virginia, Washington, DC, or Montgomery County, MD), and it is close enough for ACC employees located in North Carolina to make the move up north (and heck, in this business, you can easily telework).
That would be a huge change for the ACC.
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I would guess the ACC would find a place in Arlington or Fairfax. Its new offices almost certainly wouldn’t be on the Maryland side of the Potomac.
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Yes, I assumed he meant either NoVA or DC itself.
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Where is the espn studio that is being used for the SECN?
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Charlotte
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http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/18691591/texas-gov-greg-abbott-rips-nfl-bathroom-bill-warning
Meanwhile the NFL has warned TX that if they pass a similar bill that is under consideration, TX would not be allowed to host the Super Bowl as long as such a law exists.
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http://www.tvovermind.com/sports-news/actual-odds-making-nfl
The NFL does try to warn players about valuing their education. The picture in the article shows a giant sign giving the odds of making it in the NFL.
A few of them:
6.5% of HS football players play in the NCAA
1.6% of NCAA players make the NFL
300 rookies make a team each year
150 players make it to their 4th year each year (so half the number of rookies making a team)
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https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-ncaa-is-modernizing-the-way-it-picks-march-madness-teams/
A look at the NCAA’s move to replace over-reliance on the RPI with a broader set of metrics. The whole discussion is applicable to the CFP as well.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/141516/combine-invites-are-another-sign-of-progress-at-michigan
This article points out that the time to judge Jim Harbaugh really starts now. MI is sending 14 players to the combine this year, matching OSU’s number from last year, but all of those players were recruited by Brady Hoke. Hoke’s first 2 recruiting classes were ranked much like Harbaugh’s and Hoke went 19-7 in his first 2 years versus 20-6 for Harbaugh.
So now Harbaugh will largely be reliant on his own recruits as he’s had 3 recruiting classes. The 2014 class that was Hoke’s last was smaller (17 players) and lower-rated and Harbaugh’s first class in 2015 was very small (14 players) due to his late hiring, so the past 2 classes will provide a bunch of starters and most of the depth. A decent number of starters will still be Hoke’s recruits, but they’ve been coached mostly or solely by Harbaugh and company.
I think it’s clear that Harbaugh is a better coach and has done more player development than Hoke, but the final proof will come when he does it with his own guys.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/college-football-targeting-penalties-ejections-may-see-sizable-reductions/
There may be an adjustment made to the targeting rule in CFB.
If the proposal with the most support passes at the rules committee meeting on March 2-3, replay officials would have three options when reviewing targeting:
* If replay confirms targeting, the player is still ejected and the 15-yard penalty stands.
* If replay overturns targeting, the player stays in the game and the 15-yard penalty goes away.
* If replay doesn’t have enough evidence to confirm targeting or overturn the penalty — i.e., the call on the field stands — the player stays in the game and the 15-yard penalty remains.
The article also has stats on targeting penalties by year and by conference (as always, the tables in the article are formatted better).
Year – Upheld, Overturned, Ejections Per Game
2013 – 31, 24, 0.04
2014 – 72, 26, 0.09
2015 – 115, 43, 0.14
2016 – 144, 51, 0.17
The experts interviewed said the increased number of calls is due to refs being more comfortable with the call and the rule being less narrowly defined than it was at first. The overturn rate is very high, though, showing how tough the call is to make. I wonder how many other types of penalties replay would overturn (or call) a lot.
2016 by conference:
Conference – Upheld, Overturned, Ejections Per Game
SEC – 26, 3, 0.27
ACC – 18, 4, 0.18
Big Ten – 16, 6, 0.16
Pac-12 – 16, 6, 0.2
C-USA – 14, 2, 0.17
MAC – 14, 7, 0.19
Sun Belt – 13, 0, 0.19
Big 12 – 8, 6, 0.12
Mountain West – 8, 7, 0.11
AAC – 8, 9, 0.1
Independent – 3, 1, 0.27
Total – 144, 51, 0.17
The SEC and independents were much worse than everyone else. Is it a function of speed and/or style of play or is it mostly random from year to year? Note that the overturn rates very tremendously from conference to conference. The ACC and SEC rarely overturn calls while the AAC overturned more than they kept.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/liberty-university-gets-approval-to-move-football-program-up-to-fbs/
Some potential realignment news. Liberty is transitioning up to I-A.
The Flames are expected to begin the two-year transition this fall and be classified as an FBS Independent in 2018 with the hopes of joining a conference the following year. A perfect fit for the program would seem to be the Sun Belt, who will lose Idaho University after the 2017 season with the program choosing to go back to the FCS level.
Liberty will also not be bowl eligible until 2019. The athletic department is under new management after they decided to hire former Baylor AD Ian McCaw to the same position.
http://www.underdogdynasty.com/sun-belt-conference/2014/8/22/6046907/liberty-Flames-FBS-Sun-Belt-Karl-Benson-money-to-the-fbs-level
The SB may be an ideal fit in many ways, but in the past current SB presidents expressed doubts about whether Liberty brought enough to the table to be worth adding.
“They have a lot of resources, but does anybody even know they’re Division I?” the person said. “If we’re going to add a 12th, we want someone people are going to recognize and raise the profile of the conference. I just don’t think Liberty adds anything to our profile.”
http://www.newsadvance.com/sports/liberty_university/chris_lang_blog/falwell-addresses-coastal-s-sun-belt-invite/article_fd258508-50ef-11e5-a07a-a7d1710e067d.html
On the other hand, Liberty claimed to have no interest in being a I-A independent just a few years ago which would imply they have a landing spot in the works. We know that LU expressed interest in the SB before and the SB said they were on their radar.
Liberty has openly courted the Sun Belt for several years now, seeking to land a spot in the Football Bowl Subdivision. LU’s problem continues to be getting the votes necessary from the current membership to gain entrance into the league. A majority vote of nine of the 11 full-time conference members was needed for another school to gain admittance.
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Falwell said he texts regularly with Sun Belt commissioner Karl Benson. He also noted that Liberty has “more than one option” in terms of a path to FBS, though he wouldn’t elaborate. LU has not been in contact with any other conferences recently, and when asked if suing to become an FBS independent has been discussed among the administration, he said, “no, it hasn’t.”
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Liberty’s athletic dream is to one day be to evangelical Baptists what Brigham Young is to Mormons or Notre Dame is to Catholics. With Baptist institutions such as Wake Forest and Baylor secularizing in recent decades, Falwell Jr. believes he may have an opening.
I used to live in Lynchburg, and while I’m no fan of the Falwells, the university itself has many things going for it, including a considerable online studies program that floats under the radar.
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. . . or what Sewanee is to Episcopalians . . .
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…or USC for the Methodists.
https://www.quora.com/How-did-the-USC-Trojans-get-their-name
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/its-time-for-refs-to-start-ejecting-college-football-coaches-for-wild-behavior/
Look for more unsportsmanlike conduct calls on coaches this year. Officiating coordinators at the national and conference level are reminding refs to make the calls when coaches cross the line. 2 of those penalties and a coach is ejected, just like in hoops.
National officiating coordinator Rogers Redding sent a memo this month to conferences reminding them of sideline rules because “a small minority of coaches continue to come on to the field of play regularly during the course of a game, in clear violation of the rules.” The memo advised “there will be an emphasis nationally to apply these rules fairly and consistently.”
The NCAA didn’t provide data on the number of unsportsmanlike conduct penalties on coaches. Anecdotally, several officiating coordinators said they think more got called in 2016.
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“There are some high-profile situations where the coach behavior is not what we’d like, and I think the officials are calling [unsportsmanlike conduct] when they feel like it’s really out of line,” Redding said. “It doesn’t happen a lot. When it does, it gets a lot of notice. That’s part of the challenge for the officials: When are we going to call this, when are we not?”
American Football Coaches Association executive director Todd Berry said he’s “very proud” of the way coaches act, adding that it’s “a very, very small minority” who behave poorly.
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“You don’t want to let something happen in the SEC that then happens in another league and it’s penalized,” SEC officiating coordinator Steve Shaw said. “I think two unsportsmanlikes are a very solid way to do it. But I think there are times we need to be more consistent administering when it is an unsportsmanlike foul. It’s not a rulebook problem. The rulebook is very clear.”
Yes, it is. Redding’s latest memo clearly states: “Coaches who enter the field of play to question, protest or otherwise demonstrate disagreement with an officiating decision are subject to an immediate 15-yard penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct.” So just enforce it.
Anderson, the Big 12 officiating coordinator, said the behavior of some coaches has deteriorated to the point that ejections could probably be a useful deterrent. He remembers how player celebrations changed after the NCAA rule change in 2011 wiping out touchdowns for excessive celebration.
Now, it’s fair to argue the NCAA went too far by taking some joy out of touchdowns. But once some scores got wiped out, coaches conveyed the message to players to cut out the celebrations. Coaches can adapt, too. Maybe a year of some ejections will send the message.
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https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nfl-coaches-yell-at-refs-because-it-freakin-works/
One reason coaches act this way is because it works.
But as it turns out, a sideline bias in the NFL is real, and it’s spectacular. To prove it, we looked at the rates at which refs call the NFL’s most severe penalties, including defensive pass interference, aggressive infractions like personal fouls and unnecessary roughness, and offensive holding calls, based on where the offensive team ran its play.1
For three common penalties, the direction of the play — that is, whether it’s run toward the offensive or defensive team’s sideline — makes a significant difference. In other words, refs make more defensive pass interference calls on the offensive team’s sideline but more offensive holding calls on the defensive team’s sideline. What’s more, these differences aren’t uniform across the field — the effect only shows up on plays run, roughly, between the 32-yard lines, the same space where coaches and players are allowed to stand during play.
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Refs throw flags for defensive infractions at significantly higher rates when plays are run in the direction of the offensive team’s sideline; near midfield, defensive penalties are called about 50 percent more often on the offensive team’s sideline than the defensive team’s. Close to the end zone, where the sidelines are supposed to be free of coaches and players, these differences are negligible.
For offensive flags, that association is reversed, at least on holding penalties.3 Here’s the rate of holding calls made on outside run plays, which shows how the defensive team’s sideline can help draw flags on the offense. Around midfield, offensive holding gets called about 35 percent more often on plays run at the defensive team’s sideline.
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The most common cue in sports is crowd noise, and because crowd noise almost always supports the home team, the way the fans sway the referees is the No. 1 driver of home-field advantage in sports. And one notable experiment suggests that how loud a crowd is helps refs decide whether an interaction should be penalized. A pair of German researchers showed actual referees old video clips of possible soccer infractions, with crowd noise played at high or low volume. Refs looking at the exact same interactions were more likely to hand out a yellow card when they heard a lot of crowd noise than when the volume was low.
It follows, then, that screaming and hat-throwing football personnel may also have an effect on referee choices. In football, this sideline bias even seems to supersede refs’ tendency to support the home team: The differences in the penalty rates from sideline to sideline are several times larger than the differences in penalty rates between the home and away teams.
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We often think about the B10’s long MBB title drought (about to reach 17 years), but we forget that the P12 has it worse in many ways. The B10 is 0-6 in the title game since 2000 (6 different schools) and has had 12 Final Four teams. Meanwhile, the P12 hasn’t seen the Final Four since 2008 and a non-UCLA team hasn’t gone since 2001 AZ.
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The results would suggest there is a lot of really good basketball in the B1G but no real elite teams. Michigan and Wisconsin were close to winning titles recently. MSU hasn’t been real competitive when they made it to the championship game since the early years of Izzo. OSU was close with Oden. Indiana has the best blue blood history in the league but they have not been consistently good the last 20 years. I think Indiana has the best chance with the right coach.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/sec-sees-significant-improvement-in-replay-accuracy-with-new-command-center/
Using a centralized review center helped the SEC be more accurate with replay reviews.
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Oddly, OSU continues to be UMD’s kryptonite in WBB. OSU is 3-0 over the past 2 seasons against UMD in regular season games and those are the only 3 B10 losses UMD has since joining the B10. I say it’s odd because while OSU is very good this year, they weren’t that good last year. It must be a match-up issue.
I mention this mostly to compliment UMD’s WBB team on being very impressive ever since joining the B10 (91-9 overall, 48-3 B10, 2 outright B10 regular season titles, 2 B10 tourney titles, 1 Final Four). I know WBB doesn’t get a ton of attention and UMD has several other top sports among the non-revenue sports, but WBB is the most prominent of the women’s sports. If only RU had a sport that had done half as well.
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It used to. In 2007, the year after the Terps won the NCAA title, Rutgers placed second to Tennessee (although it’s better remembered now as leading to the downfall of radio’s Don Imus). I suppose Rutgers thought that after leaving the Big East/AAC and the Connecticut Evil Empire, it would reassert itself in the Big Ten. Hasn’t happened, and perhaps C. Vivian Stringer is having the same problems fellow veteran coach Chris Weller did when Maryland’s women declined in the late 1990s. Maryland AD Debbie Yow struck gold by hiring Brenda Frese in 2002; we’ll see in a few years whether the Knights can follow suit in the post-Stringer era.
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“I say it’s odd because while OSU is very good this year, they weren’t that good last year. ”
— Going 26-8, finishing 2nd in the B1G & ranked in the top 10 isn’t ‘that good’?
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Scarlet_Lutefisk,
“Going 26-8, finishing 2nd in the B1G & ranked in the top 10 isn’t ‘that good’?”
No, it really isn’t. There is very little elite depth in WBB (the gap between #1 and #2 is often huge, let alone down to #10) and the B10 was the worst of the P5 conferences in WBB last year. OSU finished #9 but were a 3 seed out West. They also lost 4 of their last 7 games including blowout losses to #19 MSU in the BTT and to unranked TN in the Sweet 16.
OSU was strong in the middle of the season but started 0-2 with a tough schedule and ended 3-4 with a not that bad schedule (1-2 vs teams ranked #19-23, 2-2 vs unranked teams).
OSU vs teams in the final AP poll:
#1-5: 0-3 vs others, 2-0 vs #5 UMD
#6-15: 0-0
#16-25: 2-0 OOC (1 early, 1 in NCAAs), 1-2 vs MSU
That isn’t “that good” compared to a UMD team that was ranked #5 to end the season and went 10-1 to finish the season after losing to OSU in my opinion.
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I actually DO think that it’s partly a match up issue, but it would be substantially more odd if it was some team OTHER than OSU. Even when there is a gap between #1 and #2 in a sport, the #2 team getting up for the game with the #1 and upsetting them for three successive regular season games is not short odds, but neither are they terribly long.
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“That isn’t “that good” compared to a UMD team that was ranked #5 to end the season and went 10-1 to finish the season after losing to OSU in my opinion.”
— No ranked just inside the top ten isn’t as good being ranked in the top 5. That being said downplaying the accomplishment is a bit absurd.
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YMMV. UConn is so far ahead of everyone else that being top 10 in the polls is not an impressive accomplishment to me. I have zero respect for the depth of WBB plus I know the postseason always shows OSU to be overrated.
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WBB is where MBB was 45-50 years ago at the height of the Wooden era — and that sport didn’t really take off until the late 1970s, following his retirement. (The growth of the NCAA tourney and adding at-large bids played a major role, too.) The problem is that comparatively fewer women play hoops, and until more do (thus deepening the talent pool), a handful of schools will dominate and upsets will be the rare exception, not the rule.
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vp19:
By take off you must mean became more tv coverage, yes. But there was plenty of great MBB in the ’60s. Houston/UCLA (Hays/Alcindor) in sold out Astrodome. Agree that WBB could gain more depth of player pool, but the change since the sixties is a factor greater than in the men’s game. I think as soon as Gene retires we’ll see a far more balanced competitive field. He’s the Wooden of WBB and overshadows the advances at other schools because of our singular focus on the winner. Easier story to repeat, with little need for nuance or deep knowledge of the overall game.
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For the second consecutive year, Ohio State stumbled en route to a rematch with Maryland in the B1G women’s tourney. This time, Purdue was the culprit, beating the Buckeyes 71-60 in the semifinals. Maryland followed with a 100-89 conquest of Michigan State, which KOed OSU in the semis a year ago.)
The Terps could have used a win over OSU to bolster their NCAA tourney seeding. Barring upsets in a few other conference tourneys, Maryland appears to be locked into 8-9 nationally, meaning a possible meeting with the Evil Empire in Bridgeport in the regional final. (The B1G is lowest-ranked among the P5 conferences, meaning Maryland’s domination hasn’t had much national impact. Get serious about women’s hoops, folks!)
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OSU’s WBB never met a postseason tournament they couldn’t choke in.
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http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/18737245/mlb-union-agree-get-rid-traditional-intentional-walkwill-use-signal-dugout
MLB may finally end the stupid practice of having to throw 4 balls to intentionally walk someone.
As part of its initiative to improve pace-of-game play, Major League Baseball has approved a change to the intentional walk rule, going from the traditional four-pitch walk to a dugout signal, team and union sources told ESPN’s Howard Bryant.
ESPN’s Jayson Stark reported earlier this month that MLB had made formal proposals to the players’ union to usher in both raising the strike zone and scrapping the practice of lobbing four balls toward home plate to issue an intentional walk.
Getting rid of the old-fashioned intentional walk would eliminate about a minute of dead time per walk. In an age in which intentional walks actually have been declining — there were just 932 all last season (or one every 2.6 games) — that time savings would be minimal. But MLB saw the practice of lobbing four meaningless pitches as antiquated.
http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/18736441/mlb-commissioner-rob-manfred-says-no-rule-changes-2017-due-lack-cooperation-union
The union is refusing other rule changes, so the owners are giving them the 1 year of notice which allows them to unilaterally make the changes.
Major League Baseball intends to give the players’ association the required one-year advance notice that could allow management to unilaterally change the strike zone, install pitch clocks and limit trips to the pitcher’s mound starting in 2018.
Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred made the announcement Tuesday after union head Tony Clark said last weekend he did not foresee players agreeing to proposed changes for 2017. Under baseball’s labor contract, management can alter playing rules only with agreement from the union — unless it gives one year notice. With the one year of notice, management can make changes on its own.
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MLB has studied whether to restore the lower edge of the strike zone from just beneath the kneecap to its pre-1996 level — at the top of the kneecap. Management would like to install 20-second pitch clocks in an attempt to speed the pace of play — they have been used at Triple-A and Double-A for the past two seasons.
Players also have been against limiting mound meetings.
The least controversial change appears to be allowing a team to call for an intentional walk without the pitcher having to throw pitches. MLB approved that change to the intentional walk rule, from the traditional four-pitch walk to a dugout signal, team and union sources told ESPN’s Howard Bryant on Tuesday night.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/hit-with-lack-of-institutional-control-ole-miss-imposes-postseason-ban-for-2017/
The NCAA finally sent Ole Miss their notice of allegations. MS is self-imposing a 1 year postseason ban.
The NCAA accuses MS of LOIC but MS is contesting that as well as several other allegations.
Ole Miss on Wednesday announced that it will self-impose a one-year postseason ban for the 2017 campaign after receiving an official notice of allegations from the NCAA, which concluded its investigation into violations made by the football program.
According to Ole Miss, the NCAA has come to the conclusion that the “scope and nature of the violations demonstrate that the university lacked institutional control and failed to monitor the conduct and administration of its athletics program.” Ole Miss has decided to contest this serious Level I violation, among others.
Ole Miss received a notice of allegations from the NCAA that included eight new charges against the football program, as well as the expansion of a ninth initially made against the program earlier as part of 13 violations announced in a notice of allegations last May . That bring the total number of football-related charges against Ole Miss to 21.
The self-imposed bowl ban comes on top of Ole Miss previously self-imposing an 11-scholarship reduction in football (one from 2015, two from 2016 and four from 2017 and 2018 incoming classes), suspending two assistants from recruiting, accepting a $159,352 fine and putting its staff through additional NCAA rules training.
MS admits to 3 allegations, says a 4th is partially proven and denies the rest. Details are in the article.
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It appears that the Trump administration is about to issue an executive order eliminating the Obama administration order regarding the use of bathrooms, etc., based on the gender self-identification of the person. I presume that the Trump people will conclude that it is a states’ rights issue.
Then we shall see how many states enact legislation. North Carolina and Texas may suddenly become the norm, not the exception.
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They recend guidance. They do not change the law (T9 in this case). The states are not relieved of equal protection obligation by a lack of guidance unless a high court announces a reinterpretation.
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The Obama guidance also carried a threat of potential loss of federal funding. If the equal protection argument has been decided, I am not aware of that court ruling.
It might be tough for a man to argue that if he is gender fluid, so he can use a womens’ locker room at any time.
The Obama guidance was not restricted to men who had medical documentation that to support their identities as females. If it were so restricted, it would be far of an issue, since there are so few people like that.
Most analysis that I have read do not agree this is a Title IX issue, but with the right judge who knows.
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Or title seven.
Humor…
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Is it your position that a biological man can say that on a particular day he can feel like a woman and refusing to accept that fluidity is discrimination against that man for his sex? The Obama guidance was not in any way limited to those who have a documented medical condition.
Personally, I do not want an adult male, or a 15 year old boy, sharing a locker room (or bathroom) with my 10 year old granddaughter. If the person is a true transgender then I could live with that since there is a medical basis and it would be very rare.
There have been any number of reports of this policy going wrong. Not due to transgenders, but due to male perverts. Here is just one of many examples http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/10/06/u-of-t-bathrooms-voyeurism_n_8253970.html
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Jersey Bernie,
“Personally, I do not want an adult male, or a 15 year old boy, sharing a locker room (or bathroom) with my 10 year old granddaughter.”
Child molesters share the rooms with little boys and girls no matter what the rules are. Besides, how often are 10 year-olds and 15 year-olds sharing a locker room or bathroom at school? The only adults that would be there are school employees who already spend time alone with these children on a regular basis.
“There have been any number of reports of this policy going wrong. Not due to transgenders, but due to male perverts.”
These same problems happened before the policy, too. Bad people will find ways to do bad things no matter what the law.
The real answer is to stop building so many group bathrooms or at least use full dividers between stalls and showers rather than partial walls or no divider at all. No child should ever be asked to use a group shower with an adult but it happens all over the place. Nor should kids have to use a toilet while others can watch them.
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Brian, the problem that I have with your response is that the rule from DC invited the child molesters. Yes, Mr. Wolf, you can come into the hen house. Why not?
Now if a perverted 19 year old boy wanders into a ladies dressing room, under the Obama rule, he could not be asked to leave. People have been fired for telling men to leave ladies dressing rooms.
The problems are not the same as before. The biggest issue to me is not rest rooms, it is locker rooms and theoretically showers. You are inviting bad things to happen.
Why should school employees of a different gender doing in a locker room when kids are there?
What do you say to a wise ass 16 year old boy who wants to watch the 16 year old girls change in the locker room? You can not bar the boy once he declares that he feels like a woman that day.
I guarantee you that some wise ass high school boys will play this for all that it worth.
What happens when the 17 year old quarterback and three other HS football players want to walk in on the cheerleaders when they are half naked? It will happen. A thousand years ago when I played HS football, I know guys that would have done that in a second if they could not get in trouble.
According to Chris Cuomo on CNN,
CNN’s Christopher Cuomo asked, “so what if your kid were xgender? tell them to suck it up? tell them to accept they are an ‘other’. good luck with that.”
In response to this, @PurportedPundit asked a very good question. “What do you tell a 12 year old girl who doesn’t want to see a penis in the locker room?”
Cuomo’s response was: “i wonder if she is the problem or her overprotective and intolerant dad? teach tolerance.”
So a 12 year old girl does not want to see a man’s private parts and that is intolerant.
Well I want my granddaughter to be intolerant. I want to be overprotective.
We tell our little kids to not talk to strangers, but sharing a locker room with a strange man has to be accepted.
Do you have a young daughter or granddaughter? Is she intolerant if she does not want to see and be seen by naked men?
Sure it is easy to say don’t build group showers. What about the ones that exist now? Are schools with limited funds to rebuild their facilities?
You say that children often are in showers with adults. Do you know of situations where young girls or young women are forced to shower with men? I guess that I am old fashioned, but I have a real problem with that.
If that works for you, enjoy. If the State of New York insists on keeping this rule in their schools, which they do, let NY politicians make that position. Why does this need to come from DC?
I also repeat my statement that if a guy has an established medical issue so that he is really a transgender, then figure out a way to deal with it. Perhaps private facilities.
It is this sweeping rule that any guy can simply identify as a woman for a day and go into a locker room.
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Jersey Bernie,
“Brian, the problem that I have with your response is that the rule from DC invited the child molesters.”
Adults have been molesting children for millennia – same gender and opposite gender. They’ve been doing it in bathrooms for a long time too. No guidance from DC started that.
“Now if a perverted 19 year old boy wanders into a ladies dressing room, under the Obama rule, he could not be asked to leave.”
But he can be arrested for breaking the law if he does things other than using the room as intended.
“People have been fired for telling men to leave ladies dressing rooms.”
People get fired for dumb reasons all the time. People have also chased off women who looked too butch from using a ladies room.
“The problems are not the same as before.”
Yes they are, we just didn’t hear about it before. Transgender people didn’t just magically appear 5 years ago. They have been getting harassed, assaulted and even raped in bathrooms for decades. That’s what led to laws allowing them to go elsewhere.
“The biggest issue to me is not rest rooms, it is locker rooms and theoretically showers. You are inviting bad things to happen.”
Any room that invites multiple people, especially adults and children, to be naked at the same time invites trouble. They are a bad idea, period. That’s the actual solution to the problem.
“Why should school employees of a different gender doing in a locker room when kids are there?”
Not all coaches and gym teachers are the same gender as the students. Janitors clean everywhere. And you ignore the number of homosexuals who are using these rooms already and present similar issues (if the adult is interested in kids). Why is having a homosexual male gym teacher in the locker room with young boys not a problem but a few transgender people will ruin everything?
“What do you say to a wise ass 16 year old boy who wants to watch the 16 year old girls change in the locker room?”
First, you make his parents sign a form with the school district claiming transgender status with the school and then that status applies until the parents revoke it. I’m not aware of any schools letting people change their mind on a day to day basis (I’m not saying it doesn’t happen, but I don’t know about it). Second, you welcome him to the girls’ sports teams and gym classes and monitor his extracurricular actions to make sure they’re compliant (no summer baseball leagues, etc). You can always cordon off a small area with opaque shower curtains for him to change behind.
“You can not bar the boy once he declares that he feels like a woman that day.”
Sure I can. No significant number of experts agrees that gender is day-to-day fluid like that. You can force the family to make a choice that lasts for the school year. You just also have to make everyone else declare their gender too so it isn’t discriminatory.
“What happens when the 17 year old quarterback and three other HS football players want to walk in on the cheerleaders when they are half naked? It will happen.”
They already do that. Or more likely, they get them drunk at parties and rape them. Welcome to modern America.
“A thousand years ago when I played HS football, I know guys that would have done that in a second if they could not get in trouble.”
And you don’t think their dads would’ve found out and gotten them in trouble back then?
In response to this, @PurportedPundit asked a very good question. “What do you tell a 12 year old girl who doesn’t want to see a penis in the locker room?”
Cuomo’s response was: “i wonder if she is the problem or her overprotective and intolerant dad? teach tolerance.”
So a 12 year old girl does not want to see a man’s private parts and that is intolerant.
1. Tell her not to look. It’s rude. She shouldn’t be looking at naked women either. Locker room etiquette needs to be taught.
2. Again, why the hell are we having adults and children naked in the same room? That’s the issue, not the genders involved. Bad things happen sooner or later when you mix nude children with nude adults. Adults should use separate rooms (coach’s office, adult-only bathroom, etc) or use them at separate times.
“Sure it is easy to say don’t build group showers. What about the ones that exist now?”
1. Stop using them.
2. At least put in floor to ceiling barriers to separate the showers.
3. Schools spent a lot to make handicap-accessible facilities. This is of a similar nature but safer for everyone (and limits liability).
“Are schools with limited funds to rebuild their facilities?”
If they consider voyeurism and potential child molestation a problem, yes. We spend money to prevent crimes all the time. If they aren’t willing to spend a little to redo the rooms, they must not consider it a big deal.
“You say that children often are in showers with adults.”
No, I didn’t say it’s often. But it is the norm in gyms and other facilities open to people of all ages.
“Do you know of situations where young girls or young women are forced to shower with men? I guess that I am old fashioned, but I have a real problem with that.”
No, but I do know that pedophiles are in those showers as are homosexuals. And I’m not aware of girls ever being forced to shower period.
And why isn’t it equally problematic for women with little boys? Have you noticed that all your concerns have been for little girls? There are female predators and boy victims too. Moms seem to feel it’s their right to accompany their boys into a boys dressing room. Why should the other boys have to let that mom see them naked? Moms also frequently bring a boy with them into the women’s dressing room or bathroom. Why is that okay?
“If that works for you, enjoy.”
I don’t like sharing a shower with other men let alone any child. Some things are best done in private.
“If the State of New York insists on keeping this rule in their schools, which they do, let NY politicians make that position. Why does this need to come from DC?”
Because when someone crosses a state line and needs to use the bathroom, it shouldn’t be hard for them to know which one to use. And people shouldn’t be arrested for being who they are.
“It is this sweeping rule that any guy can simply identify as a woman for a day and go into a locker room.”
I’ve heard or seen no legal basis for allowing someone to make day-to-day changes in gender identity at school.
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/23/politics/transgender-teen-supreme-court/index.html
There is a case heading for the Supreme Court about this issue.
Lawyers for Gavin Grimm, a transgender teen who is barred from using the boys’ bathroom at his Virginia high school, told the Supreme Court Thursday that his challenge to the school board policy should go forward, arguing that the restrooms “must be equally available to all boys and all girls, including boys and girls who are transgender.”
…
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in Grimm’s case on March 28 and legal experts question whether the justices could decide to use the Trump administration’s move to dodge a ruling on the merits. A lower court had deferred to the Obama administration’s when it ruled in favor of Grimm.
“The withdrawal of the guidance only impacts one of the questions in the case — whether the Obama administration’s guidance was valid. Even without it, the larger question, whether transgender discrimination should be treated as sex discrimination under federal statutes, remains,” said Steve Vladeck, a CNN contributor and professor at the University of Texas School of Law.
Joshua Block, an ACLU lawyer representing Grimm, argued in court papers that the justices should still hear and decide the remaining question in the case.
“Under the plain text of Title IX, Gavin has stated a claim on which relief can be granted,” Block argued.
“Under the Board’s policy, Gavin is subjected to discrimination at, excluded from participation in, and denied the benefits of Gloucester High School on the basis of sex,” Block wrote.
“Gavin simply asks the court to apply the statute as written,” he said.
“If the Supreme Court holds that Title IX protects against sex discrimination by guaranteeing bathroom access based on a person’s gender identity, that would strike down the school’s policy that did not permit Gavin to use the boys’ facilities,” said Kari E. Hong, a professor at Boston College Law School.
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I knew about that case. I have not read the circuit court opinion, but they upheld the validity of the guidance. I do not know if they reached constitutional questions.
Now that the guidance is gone, it will be interesting to see what the court rules, or whether they decide that it is moot and punt.
To be clear, I do not have a personal problem making reasonable accommodations for people with actual medical issues.
My issue under the Obama guidance is that a guy could self declare identify as a female and then use female locker rooms, go out for girls sports teams, etc.
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Nebraska WR coach was sentenced to 30 days in jail today for his most recent DUI.
http://www.wowt.com/content/news/Husker-WR-Coach-Keith-Williams-sentenced-for-third-DUI-414528123.html
“On Tuesday, Nebraska football Wide Receiver Coach Keith Williams was sentenced for a DUI he received in Aug. 2016.
Williams was given a 30 day jail sentence.
However, County Attorney Joe Kelly said that in situations where the defendant has a permanent residence, the sentence is routinely served as house arrest.
He will also serve 36 months of probation, beginning on Feb. 22.
The DUI occurred on Aug. 14, and it was his third offense
….”
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I heard some lawyers on the radio today arguing that this could open NE up to liability if he injures someone in a future DUI while out recruiting or doing some other job function.
More importantly, I wish the US would take DUI much more seriously like the rest of the first world. Every DUI means many peoples’ lives were put in danger and only a very small percentage of all drunk drivers get busted for DUI on any given day. The US has the highest rate of traffic fatalities per capita and 31% of those are due to drunk driving. That’s over 10,000 people per year killed by drunk driving in the US.
Is this coach really that important to the Huskers?
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No just no, but maybe recent executive orders with regard to withdrawing federal guidance on transgender rights may have put BYU back in play:
http://www.yardbarker.com/college_football/articles/big_12_expansion_rumors_are_back_as_texas_ad_wouldnt_be_surprised_to_see_something_happen/s1_13156_23295895
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Doubtful. As I said above, they recend guidance. They do not change the law (T9 in this case). The states are not relieved of equal protection obligation by a lack of guidance unless a high court announces a reinterpretation. Unless the B12 school administrators have suddenly adopted a Jeff Sessions mind set I don’t see this admin action altering BYU’s standing.
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What I think will happen is that only some states will continue to enforce the prior Obama order. The majority will not. As I said before, I await seeing a “gender fluid” man filing suit saying that on a particular day when he feels like a woman he can not be denied entrance into a woman’s locker room.
People who have diagnosed medical conditions can be given protection, but that is a tiny number. Probably less than one-tenth of one percent of the population.
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http://gridironnow.com/?p=1075496
Here’s another piece on it.
The writer doesn’t consider it likely but presents 2 possible scenarios anyway:
1. Waiting for the P12 to fall behind in money enough that someone wants out.
The first is a waiting game for the Big 12.
Earlier this month, the SEC announced it would be distributing a whopping $40 million per member. Exact comparisons get a bit sticky, but the Pac-12’s members can expect to receive somewhere around $27 million in conference revenue for the 2015-16 school year.
…
Last June, the Big 12 announced it had distributed $30.4 million to its 10 members.
It’s hard to categorize the Pac-12 Network, which is still struggling for widespread distribution, as anything other than disappointing. It hasn’t been the cash cow or the symbol of prestige that the Big Ten Network and SEC Network have become.
If the Big 12 continues to prove it will be closer to the Big Ten and SEC in revenue, it gains a foothold in convincing Pac-12 members to make a cash grab. That’s what realignment decisions are. Arizona and Arizona State have only been Pac-12 members since 1978.
2. Some G5 programs rise up to become viable candidates.
This summer, the Big 12 figured out what most of its members already knew: None of the Group of Five candidates made sense as members. In two-to-three years, maybe that changes. TCU quite literally won its way into the Big 12, and though Houston’s candidacy met resistance from league members outside Texas, the Cougars’ run under Tom Herman in just over a season fashioned them into a more attractive candidate than ever.
Is it that unrealistic to wonder if another school with a new-ish face on the sidelines– hey there, Cincinnati, Memphis, UCF or USF– got on a run, it could be viewed very differently if the league revisited the expansion conversation?
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Although there are clear exceptions like TCU and Baylor, academic quality is a big part of being a P5 member. Schools like Cincinnati, Memphis, UCF and USF don’t qualify. Schools like Maryland, Rutgers and Kansas do. UConn and BYU are borderline.
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bob sykes,
“Although there are clear exceptions like TCU and Baylor, academic quality is a big part of being a P5 member. Schools like Cincinnati, Memphis, UCF and USF don’t qualify. Schools like Maryland, Rutgers and Kansas do. UConn and BYU are borderline.”
Agreed in general, but I think it varies from conference to conference.
The B10 has been the pickiest about it’s members. The ACC also was fairly picky. The B12, P12 and SEC are/were mixed bags.
Expansion in the past 30 years:
B10: PSU; NE; RU & UMD – very picky
P12: CO & Utah – picky
ACC: FSU; Miami, VT & BC; Pitt, SU, UL & ND – mostly picky (UL is an outlier)
SEC: AR & SC; TAMU & MO – picky in the second round, not in the first
B12: TCU & WV
Weaker academic members (non-AAU outside of THE’s top 250 & ARWU’s top 300 in the world):
B10 – none
ACC – SU, VT, Clemson
B12 – KSU, OkSU, TT, TCU, WV, OU, Baylor
P12 – OR, WSU
SEC – TN, SC, LSU, AR, AU
Many of those are still solid schools of course, but UConn is on par or better than many of them. BYU is also considered on par with many of them but does face religious hurdles. Still, they’d fit in the B12 easily.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/18743132/acc-commissioner-john-swofford-says-future-championship-sites-north-carolina-depend-hb2-status
The ACC will decide in April or May about the future of ACC championships in the state of NC based on the status of HB2.
Also, the ACC wants to pull the addition of a 10th assistant coach out of the football recruiting reform package and vote on it separately. The ACC supports it, though they want it to start in 2018-9, but they think it deserves separate discussion from the rest of the package. They also want to discuss the unlimited staff spots with a goal of reigning those in.
“On the 10th coach issue, our preference would be to separate it out from the whole package and talk about that, and also talk about the noncoaching positions that continue to grow surrounding college football,” Swofford said.
“That’s a concern of our schools going forward and the discrepancies that are there, where there are no limitations as to those positions and what that means going forward, and a desire to have some controls on that from a competitive balance standpoint.”
Not surprisingly, the ACC is generally against adding spring official visits (it would help northern schools like the B10) but supports the rest of the package so Swofford is unsure how the schools will vote.
“It’s challenging, because you’re going to end up with situations where people are supportive of part of the package but not every point of it, and then you have to make a decision about whether you are supportive of enough of the big picture that you could live with some aspects of it that you’re not comfortable with,” Swofford said.
“That varies from program to program. I’m not sure where that will all ultimately end up.”
Also of note is that the SEC commissioner has come out against the reform package. That should be no shock since the current system favors them so widely.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2017/02/27/lgbt-groups-urge-acc-reject-compromise-north-carolina-bathroom-bill/98474140/
The state of NC is considering a compromise bill and :GBT groups are pressuring the ACC not to accept it as good enough to bring championships back to the state.
But some LGBT organizations believe House Bill 186, proposed Wednesday, doesn’t fully repeal HB2 and is still discriminatory. The bill would allow North Carolina cities to pass their own nondiscrimination ordinances, with the limitation that they would not be allowed to regulate bathroom access in private facilities.
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https://sports.bovada.lv/football
It looks like the 2017 OOC games won’t be quite as great as 2016 overall, but there are a few really crucial ones. The link goes to the Bovada odds for winning the national title next season and those are the rankings I’m using below. Yes, I realize that inflates popular teams like ND and UT.
Major OOC games:
#1 AL vs #2 FSU
#5t OU @ #3 OSU
#13 UT @ #4 USC
#2 FSU @ #16t UF
#4 USC @ #16t ND
#5t MI vs #16t UF
#11t AU @ #9t Clemson
#9t UGA @ #16t ND
Add in the usual tough conference games and it should be a pretty solid year.
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http://www.foxsports.com/womens-college-basketball/story/baylor-coach-kim-mulkey-defends-school-amid-sexual-assault-scandal-football-022517
It’s not just the men at Baylor that don’t get it. Here’s their WBB coach while celebrating her 500th career win:
“If someone’s around you and they ever say, `I will never send my daughter to Baylor.’ You knock them right in the face,” Mulkey said. “Because these kids are on this campus. I work here. My daughter went to school here and it’s the damn best school in America.”
…
“I’m just tired of hearing it. I’m tired of people talking on it on a national scale that don’t know what they’re talking about,” she said. “If they didn’t sit in those meetings and they weren’t a part of the investigation, you’re repeating things that you heard. It’s over. It’s done. This is a great institution, and I would send my daughter here, and I would pay for anyone else’s daughter to come here. I work here every day. I’m in the know. And I’m tired of hearing it. This is a great institution. The problems that we have at Baylor are no different than the problems at any other school in America. Period. Move on. Find another story to write.”
…
A new lawsuit alleges that at least 31 Baylor football players committed at least 52 acts of rape over a four year period starting in 2011.
No coach, not every school has 31 FB players accused of 52 acts of rape and the FB staff, administration and police accused of covering it up.
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http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/sec-football-decline-four-reasons-alabama-lsu-nick-saban-022717
4 reasons why the SEC is no longer dominating CFB.
“I don’t claim to be the best historian of the SEC,” said Kiffin. “But I have a hard time imagining there was ever a stronger roster of players and coaches on all the teams then when we got to the SEC (in ’09).”
Five years later, in 2014, the former USC head coach returned to the conference to be Saban’s offensive coordinator. Soon he began noticing the conference had changed.
“(At Tennessee), every week when you went to game plan, there was a dominant, dynamic player in the front seven you had to game plan around. That’s very rare,” said FAU’s head coach. “When I came back the second time, the first year, there were still good coaches and similar kind of players, though not quite as strong.” By 2016, he said, “it was clear that what Nick Saban was doing the previous three to four years, just dominating recruiting, had changed the conference.”
…
“When you don’t really have anyone to speak of in the SEC East, and now the SEC West suddenly slips, you’ve got a conference that people are saying may only be the third-best conference,” said Rivals.com national recruiting director Mike Farrell. “It’s 1a and 1b to me with the ACC and the Big Ten.”
The SEC’s regression to the pack did not happen overnight. And it’s hardly the result of any one factor. In speaking with various experts connected to the conference, four key themes emerged.
1. Decreased quality of head coaches
2. Poor player development* (perhaps due to the constant coaching churn in the SEC)
3. Bad QB play (unclear why – perhaps a result of #1 and #2)
4. AL’s dominance (AL gets all the top players now, other teams try to copy AL rather than be themselves
* – I’d say the other side of this issue is their recruiting classes being overrated. Southern players are more developed than northern players (Urban Meyer estimates they’re a full year ahead) due to spring football, 7 on 7s, etc. That means they’re closer to their ceilings when they go to college while northern players develop more. Perhaps the recruiting services forget to allow for the difference in developmental stage so SEC classes get ranked higher than they truly deserve.
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https://www.philsteele.com/Blogs/2017/FEB17/DBFeb25.html
Phil Steele’s list of returning starters is out. As expected, it shows that the B10 East should be a tough battle between OSU and PSU while WI should control the West.
16 – NW, PSU – #9t
15 – IN, IA, OSU, WI – #25t
14 – UMD, MN – #48t
13 – PU, RU – #71t
11 – IL – #103t
10 – NE – #114t
9 – MSU – #124T
5 – MI – #129 (dead last)
It’ll be interesting to see how well MI reloads. OSU, PSU and WI were all really young last year. Maybe they do better on the big stage with more experience.
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http://registerguard.com/rg/news/local/35310847-75/story.csp
The University of Oregon is re-writing it’s rules so that coaches are included in the group of personnel they don’t have to disclose disciplinary information about under a FOI request.
The UO is in the midst of writing a new policy that explicitly says the personnel records of about 1,400 staff members, called “officers of administration,” a classification that includes coaches, are to be treated like faculty personnel records and kept secret.
…
Oregon public records law already allows government to withhold disciplinary records, but it’s a conditional secrecy. If the public interest in a public employee’s performance is compelling enough, the disciplinary records must be made public. In a dispute over public disclosure, a judge decides.
In the past, for example, that has allowed the public to learn of school districts’ actions when a teacher was charged with theft or of a coach who was charged with child abuse.
But the law the UO is invoking provides total secrecy with no appeal to a judge who would weigh the interests.
The Legislature put public university faculty records completely off limits to public inspection by law 46 years ago.
…
Considering the OAs as faculty is a long-standing UO practice, said UO spokesman Tobin Klinger.
The UO bases its definition on a now-defunct state administrative rule that said a public university can assign academic title to staff members in “unclassified academic service.” Unclassified service includes many OA-type positions, including coaches, under that rule.
In 2014, for example, the Lane County District Attorney’s Office ruled that a lawyer who works in the UO General Counsel’s Office was faculty in the eyes of state law, so the UO could keep the lawyer’s résumé and job application letter secret. UO economics professor Bill Harbaugh had appealed to the district attorney the UO’s denial of that record.
But the original 1971 law that made faculty personnel records secret said only that “personal information” held by a university about faculty and students would not be subject to disclosure under public records law.
In subsequent iterations, lawmakers took students out of the law and dealt with their privacy elsewhere.
At no time in the law’s evolution to its current version as ORS 352.226 did lawmakers mention any category besides faculty and students. None of the hearing minutes or legislative records that survive mentions “administrators” or “coaches,” for example, as being covered by the law.
When the University of Oregon won independence from the state on July 1, 2014, the UO adopted a former Oregon University System policy that was based on and consistent with that faculty records law.
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Fine.
As long as the coach is a fully tenured faculty member. Something that use to happen…a long time ago.
Dr. Dale Thomas (wrestling coach at OrST) may have been the last in D1.
Dr. Harold Nichols (ISU wrestling) I believe was, too.
How about UO just deal with, avoid, and/or prevent problems rather than hide them?
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/is-offense-dominating-too-much-in-college-football-tough-call-as-games-get-longer/
A nice long article looking at whether offense is dominating CFB too much and about whether games should be shortened and how to do it. He looks at 3 main reasons the NCAA might look to shorten games – competitive balance, player safety and fan enjoyment.
Some highlights before they get into the details of each reason:
No major actions on game lengths are expected in 2017 since this is an off year for rules changes unrelated to player safety. But there’s a multi-faceted, big-picture conversation starting to occur again related to game lengths that involve fan enjoyment, player safety and competitive balance. They’re all intertwined to these central questions: Has college football shifted too much to offense, and if so, is there a desire to swing the pendulum back?
…
“There’s a growing sense on the administrator side we need to make sure we’re keeping an eye on length of game,” said NCAA associate director Ty Halpin, the liaison for the football rules committee. “Certainly, the television partners are part of that. But there’s also a factor of how attractive it is to spend your entire Saturday at a game. Plenty of people want to continue to do that, but we have to make sure the next generation of fans also want to be a part of that.”
American Football Coaches Association executive director Todd Berry said style of play can’t largely explain why games are longer since teams in lower divisions run similar offenses in shorter games. FCS game lengths averaged 3:05 in 2016 — up 10 minutes over two years – while Division II averaged 2:48 and Division III was 2:40.
Berry believes any dramatic rules changes, such as a running clock after first downs, would need to apply for every NCAA division. Otherwise, he said lower divisions would be averaging two-and-a-half hour games. Still, Berry notices the games are too long.
“I went to eight or nine games this year, and by midway through the third quarter, I was getting tired,” Berry said. “I never recognized it as a coach because you have so many things you’re thinking about. But for the spectator, you can only watch the entertainment on the field during breaks so many times before it gets really old.”
…
Deciding what’s best for the game must start by agreeing on targets. What’s the right length of time for fans to watch a game? What’s the right number of plays for the safety of players? What’s the right competitive balance between offenses and defenses?
Since the answers reside in the eye of the beholder and are based on self-interest, we turned for some help in framing the dialogue to the officiating community — the only real neutral observers in college football.
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The biggest threat to game enjoyment is TV commercials. SEC CBS games are terrible.
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Amen!
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/02/28/top-10-games-college-football-opening-weekend/98523350/
10 best games of the opening weekend:
1. AL vs FSU
2. UF vs MI
3. VT vs WV
4. BYU vs LSU
5. TAMU @ UCLA
6. OSU @ IN
7. Troy @ Boise
8. App St @ UGA
9. Tulsa @ OkSU
10. Temple @ ND
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2017/02/20/kansas-jayhawks-recruiting-tony-hull
Last week Andy Staples wrote a piece that looked at the NFL combine invitees stats by conference.
2017:
SEC 66
ACC 60
Big Ten 51
Pac-12 46
Big 12 19
American 18
Conference USA 11
MAC 11
Mountain West 11
Sun Belt 5
That looks really bad for the B12, but they do have fewer members.
2017 average invitees per school by conference:
SEC 4.7
ACC 4.3
Pac-12 3.8
Big Ten 3.6
Big 12 1.9
American 1.5
MAC 0.9
Mountain West 0.9
Conference USA 0.8
Sun Belt 0.5
Clearly the B12 is still an outlier among the P5s. But is it a 1 year anomaly or part of a trend?
He gives the totals per conference from the previous 3 years. Here I’ll give you the 3 year average per school (2014-2016) for each conference.
SEC 5.07
Pac-12 3.83
ACC 3.52
Big Ten 3.17
Big 12 3.00
Mountain West 1.42
American 1.14
MAC 0.67
Conference USA 0.48
Sun Belt 0.37
That looks a lot better for the B12 although they are still the lowest of the P5.
Why might this be a trend?
Every team except Kansas State runs an up-tempo spread offense, and league members recruit accordingly. That results in a surplus of skill sets and body types recruited to run or defend schemes that don’t really exist in the NFL because of clock rules and hash mark width.
The question now is will this scare away potential NFL players who would have considered a Big 12 school but might look elsewhere because schools in other leagues had more success grooming players for the NFL?
I’d add some other reasons for what has happened:
1. UT has been down and they’re one of the 2 NFL factories in the B12. If they start winning again, the B12 numbers will perk up.
2. Since adding TAMU, the SEC is more of a factor in TX. That impacts recruiting as well as the number of fans of the B12.
3. The B12 has the fewest people in it’s footprint. That means less media coverage which filters down into less success.
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2017/03/01/big-12-nfl-combine-invites
Now SI follows up with a roundtable discussion about whether the B12 should be worried about this.
The basic opinions:
Colin Becht: The Big 12 should be concerned (but not panicked)
Gabriel Baumgaertner: The Big 12’s problems will fix themselves
Chris Johnson: The Big 12 isn’t producing enough talent
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/report-alabama-adds-ex-heisman-trophy-winner-to-staff-as-offensive-analyst/
Nick Saban has hired Chris Weinke as an offensive analyst at AL. Most stories point out that he won the Heisman at FSU and was the QB coach for the Rams last year. What they don’t mention is that he was the head coach at IMG Academy (major football factory) in FL the year before that. One of his former players is a RB at AL and he still knows some of the players at IMG. I wonder if Paul Finebaum will call Saban out like he did Harbaugh for trying to make a similar hire.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/mac/2017/03/01/mac-releases-schedule-zero-saturday-games-november/98596842/
This is sad. The MAC released their 2017 schedule and there are zero Saturday games in November. Zero. There is only 1 game on Saturday 10/28. After that, they shift to T, W and Th night games (and Black Friday instead of W or TH that week).
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Longer term mistake for short term exposure.
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Bullet:
Any back story you’d like to share?
http://abc13.com/education/ut-system-ends-plan-for-campus-in-houston/1779781/
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Haven’t heard anything. Probably political pressure. Didn’t want to make enemies. UH, like many Texas institutions in the dysfunctional Texas higher ed system, is more focused on their own institution and not on their community. Texas has 6 “systems” and a half dozen independent schools.
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Well, NW all but locked a spot in the NCAA tournament with that win over MI. It’s great for the school and the conference, but unfortunately B10 hoops has other problems.
Only P5 team not to make the NCAAs – NW (only for a couple more weeks)
Only P5 teams with 0 NCAA wins – NE and NW
Longest current P5 NCAA tournament drought – RU (1991), NW (never)
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18808087/art-briles-says-cover-sexual-assaults-baylor
Art Briles doubles down and says he didn’t cover up anything or obstruct any investigations.
“I did not cover-up any sexual violence. I had no contact with anyone that claimed to be a victim of sexual or domestic assault. Anyone well-versed in my work as a coach knows that I strove to promote excellence, but never at the sacrifice of safety for anyone,” Briles wrote. “I did not obstruct justice on campus or off.”
Briles insisted that when alerted to an assault incident, his response was that victims should go to the police so it could be prosecuted.
Briles’ remarks Thursday struck a very different tone from apologetic comments he made in an on-camera interview with ESPN’s Tom Rinaldi last fall, in which Briles said, among other things, “There were some bad things that happened under my watch,” Briles said. “And for that, I’m sorry. … I was wrong. I’m sorry. I’m going to learn. I’m going to get better.”
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/college-football-rule-proposals-focus-on-player-safety-but-targeting-still-an-issue/
A few rules tweaks are proposed for this season.
Specifically, three changes are being proposed.
1. Players will be penalized for running towards the line of scrimmage and leaping/hurdling offensive linemen on field goal attempts and PATs. While this is essentially already a no-no, the clarification is that the hurdling player doesn’t have to land on an opposing player to be penalized.
2. Knee pads and pants must cover the knees (this is currently only a “strong recommendation”).
3. Horse collar tackles now include the nameplate area of a jersey.
However, there will be no change to the targeting rule.
…
Additionally, there are two “Points of emphasis” from the committee that focus on game length. However, these are directed towards “sideline management” rather than playing rules adjustments. They are…
1. Coaches taking to the field to protest a call will be penalized.
2. The second half will start immediately after the halftime clock hits zero. Additionally, the game clock will wind consistently after the ball has been spotted when a player runs out of bounds.
…
These proposals remains subject to approval by the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel.
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2017 CFP schedule:
Cotton – Dec 29
Fiesta & Orange – Dec 30
Peach, Rose (semi) & Sugar (semi) – Jan 1
http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18815608/cotton-bowl-moves-kickoff-one-day-get-prime-slot-dec-29
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/03/03/cotton-bowl-moves-up-to-friday-dec-29-in-primetime/98706278/
The Cotton Bowl is moving from Saturday 12/20 to Friday night 12/29.
The move will take advantage of a prime-time television audience that proved beneficial last season: The Orange Bowl was moved from an early afternoon kickoff on Dec. 31 to a prime-time start on Friday, Dec. 30 and ended up drawing big ratings.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/news/wichita-state-getting-serious-evaluation-to-join-american-athletic-conference/
Wichita State getting a serious look from the AAC.
The American Athletic Conference is at a “serious evaluation point” in considering Wichita State for full membership, a source told CBS Sports on Friday.
Conference officials immediately downplayed that assertion. However, TMG College Sports first reported on Thursday the league was looking to “upgrade” its basketball, focusing on Wichita State. VCU and Dayton were also mentioned.
CBS Sports has since learned that while the issue hasn’t reached the presidential level in the American, there are discussions at least at the AD level.
Wichita State is being evaluated as an upgrade for the 11-team basketball league. There is no decision among concerned parties as yet. There is no timeline on the next move, never mind a date of the school’s entry.
That same source said VCU and Dayton were not in the mix.
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Is this contingent upon Wichita State reviving its football program, as has recently been rumored?
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More likely contingent on it NOT reviving its football program, as the AAC is unlikely to want to invite any direct FCS call-up at all, never mind a recently revived FCS program. As it’s reportedly AD level discussion, could be testing the waters for a “balanced” 12/12 alignment, given what seems likely to be antipathy to anything at all resembling the old Big East unbalanced alignment.
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Here is a December article with some UConn thoughts on AAC expansion. http://www.theuconnblog.com/2016/12/16/13326828/the-american-athletic-conference-needs-to-expand
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tOSU has a great performance and wins the B1G wrestling tournament!
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http://www.bigten.org/sports/m-wrestl/spec-rel/030517aaa.html
1. OSU 139.5
2. PSU 130
3. IA 112.5
OSU finished with 4 champions and 2 runners-up. PSU and IA each had 2 champs while IL and RU had 1 each.
On paper it was a major upset since PSU is rated much higher in the tournament format (#1 PSU – 137.5, #3 OSU – 102). But their #2 ranked wrestler at 125lbs was injured and had to forfeit. That probably cost PSU the win.
Add in a few upsets of PSU guys (#2 seed at 141 lbs J. Gulibon got pinned 3 times, #1 seed at 184 B. Nickal lost to #4 M. Martin from OSU) and OSU getting some upsets (Martin over Nickal, Moore over Pfarr, etc) and things swung in OSU’s favor. The OSU guys also just performed well, winning some very close finals (Tomasello scored with 1 second left to win, B. Jordan won in OT).
PSU is still the prohibitive favorite to win the NCAA title again if Suriano gets healthy. If not, OkSU may push them for the title. The B10 champion has won the national title 10 straight years, but OSU seems unlikely to continue that streak. They just don’t have enough elite guys and bonus point machines unless something weird happens to PSU and OkSU.
The B10 features 6 of the 10 #1 ranked wrestlers (OSU, PSU – 2, IL, IA – 1) and 40% of all the top 10 ranked wrestlers. It also has 4 of the top 6 teams in tournament ratings (1. PSU, 3 OSU, 4. IA, 6. NE) as well as 8 of the top 15 (10. IL, 11. MN, 13. WI, 14. MI) and #20 RU.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/colleges/big-ten-doesnt-expect-sellouts-for-tournament-in-dc-its-sending-a-bigger-message/2017/03/07/be29f3e2-033c-11e7-b1e9-a05d3c21f7cf_story.html
As we all should know, the B10 tournament is starting today in DC. Jim Delany doesn’t expect sellouts but wants to keep sending the bigger message that the B10 lives in DC (and NYC) too.
Jim Delany does not expect standing-room-only crowds this week at Verizon Center. What the Big Ten commissioner does expect is to underline a message sent three years ago, when he spearheaded the conference’s additions of Maryland, Rutgers and the major Mid-Atlantic television markets that came with them.
The Big Ten is “not just visiting,” Delany said in an interview last week, returning to a phrase he has repeated at times since expansion. “We’re going to be living here.”
Approximately 250,000 Big Ten alumni live in the Washington area and nearly another 100,000 live in Baltimore, according to Delany — but it remains to be seen how well the conference will tap into those swaths once the tournament starts Wednesday. The Big Ten has not released ticket sale numbers for the tournament.
“I really don’t expect us to have the same experience in D.C.” as in the Big Ten’s traditional tournament venues, Delany said. “I think we’ll have a good experience, but I think it’s a build. I would love to sell it out. But we’re not at a sellout. There are public tickets available.
“I think we’ll have very good crowds. A little bit depends upon who wins and moves on. It’s been a very unique year. I think many, many teams feel like they could win it.”
That so many teams are viable options to win the tournament could make it a difficult product to sell this week. Purdue, behind sophomore center Caleb Swanigan, the Big Ten Player of the Year, is the No. 1 seed and clear-cut favorite. But after that, it’s a mixed bag. The rest of the top four seeds — Wisconsin, Maryland and Minnesota — all have at least six conference losses and slumped for parts of January and February.
…
Ohio State, whose largest alumni base outside of Cleveland is in the Washington area, according to Delany, is the No. 11 seed and isn’t favored to get to the quarterfinal round on Friday, either. Should the Buckeyes make it that far, they would face Maryland, which would have to travel just 15 minutes to play on a floor that it already won on against Georgetown earlier this season.
…
Maryland has already sold out its allotment of 750 tickets and requested more last week, according to athletic department spokesman Zack Bolno. While Terrapins Coach Mark Turgeon was firm in calling his team’s tournament opener — a quarterfinal on Friday night — a neutral-site game, he admitted that it stands to benefit Terrapins fans, who won’t have to take plane rides or book hotel rooms.
“When we joined the league, Delany talked about it, so he came through. I don’t know how often it’s going to happen, so we got to enjoy it,” Turgeon said.
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Sports news with a focus on D.C. area teams.
Next year, the tournament will to Manhattan at Madison Square Garden, closer to the fan base at Rutgers, the other league newcomer. That, too, is a bold move: The Garden’s commitment to the Big East tournament will force the Big Ten to play its tournament a week earlier than other power conferences, compressing the 2017-18 conference schedule.
While Delany has not publicly announced a firm return date for the tournament to the District — after visiting New York, the tournament will rotate between Chicago and Indianapolis from 2019 to 2022 — he expects it to be back.
A combined 1.85 million fans have attended the tournament over its previous 19 years, Delany said, with some tournaments proving more lucrative than others. According to Destination D.C., which serves as the city’s convention, tourism and special events bureau, this week’s tournament is projected to generate more than $33.3 million in direct spending in the District, with taxes back to the city expected to hit $5.8 million. By comparison, the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament brought in a little more than $24.2 million in direct spending when it was held at Verizon Center last year, according Kate Gibbs, Destination D.C.’s domestic media relations manager.
The Big Ten is still relatively young in the conference tournament business compared to several major conference counterparts — the Southeastern Conference held its first tournament in 1933, the ACC in 1954 and the Big East in 1980. That fact hasn’t been lost on Delany as he pushes for the Big Ten tournament’s future on the East Coast. If the tournament at Verizon Center was a “one-off,” he said, it would have been more difficult to put together over the past three years. And even as he wonders what the crowds might look like, the potential is certainly in place.
“We have slightly less than a million alums living in that corridor. We’ve got a quarter-million in D.C. Almost a 100,000 in Baltimore,” Delany said. “So if you’re going to be there, you got to be there.”
An important point is the bit about next year’s tournament at MSG. It will be a week earlier than normal, forcing a more compressed B10 schedule and then almost 2 weeks off before the NCAA tournament.
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http://www.bigten.org/genrel/030817aab.html
On a related note, the B10 is partnered with the CFP to help fun education in DC. They already worked together in IN.
The Big Ten Conference and the College Football Playoff (CFP) Foundation have jointly announced a partnership with District of Columbia Public Schools to fund an educational initiative in Washington, D.C. The partnership will result in a $10,000 donation to the Jessie LaSalle-Backus Education Campus for the 2016-17 school year that will be used to emphasize the importance of improving early childhood literacy for students.
“The College Football Playoff Foundation is thrilled to continue its partnership with the Big Ten Conference into the Spring for this initiative in Washington D.C.,” said CFP Foundation Executive Director Britton Banowsky. “Our organization is highly attuned to the importance of early childhood literacy, and we are excited to see the positive influence these funds will have on the students and teachers this program engages.”
The Big Ten will welcome students and teachers from kindergarten through eighth grade classes to attend Game 1 of the Big Ten Men’s Basketball Tournament, which tips at 4:30 p.m., on Wednesday.
“We are pleased to partner with the College Football Playoff Foundation to provide this donation to the District of Columbia Public Schools and the LaSalle-Backus Education Campus,” Big Ten Commissioner James E. Delany said. “The Big Ten has seen first-hand the positive impact that results from emphasizing the importance of early childhood literacy for more than 25 years through its Success Comes Out of Reading Everyday (SCORE) program in Chicago, and is grateful for the opportunity to support the students and staff at LaSalle-Backus Education Campus, while continuing to raise awareness of this issue in Washington, D.C.”
“At DC Public Schools, our goal is to prepare every student for success in college, career, and beyond by providing them with a world-class education,” said Shanita Burney, Chief of Family and Public Engagement. “Our partners play an important role in this success. We’re excited about Big Ten’s donation and know it will have a lasting impact on the students and staff at LaSalle-Backus Education Campus.”
In November 2016, the Big Ten and CFP Foundation teamed up to introduce the funding of educational initiatives in the state of Indiana. Through that activation, the CFP Foundation and Big Ten, in conjunction with Extra Yard for Teachers, recognized 10 teachers at the 2016 Big Ten Football Championship Game in Indianapolis, while providing funds to enhance educational efforts in those teachers’ respective classrooms and schools.
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https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/unc-duke-really-is-college-basketballs-best-rivalry/
538.com says the numbers verify that Duke/UNC is the best hoops rivalry over the past 50 years. Both teams tend to be elite, they play a lot, the series is fairly even and the schools are close together. They admit there are plenty of intangibles to a rivalry, but these were the factors they felt they could quantify.
Another rivalry high on their list based on quality teams is UK/UL, but the series is lopsided and the schools are farther apart. In addition, the series is marked down for playing less often (it’s a once per season game barring NCAA meetings).
But is that really true? Is a rivalry lessened by playing once per year instead of twice (or maybe 3 time with a conference tourney)? I’m not convinced. It makes that one game more important and there’s no chance of split bragging rights.
Another interesting factor to me is being in conference versus OOC. Is a rivalry automatically improved by being able to fight for conference titles or can the rivalry be just as strong with that? 538 didn’t factor that in explicitly (it shows in the frequency of play of course), but I wonder if it should be a factor.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2017/03/07/ncaa-incurred-14-billion-in-expenses-in-2016/98856520/
A look at the NCAA’s finances. For those who say the NCAA makes hundreds of millions every year, they reported $996M in revenue last year (a record). But they distributed $769M back to schools as part of $1.4B in total expenses (some were artifacts of accounting rules since the actual expense didn’t occur last year).
They spend over $130M running championships according to other sources. They also have around 500 employees ($25M if they average just $50,000 each) plus the national office to maintain. They have some reserves, but spent 60% of them last year.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2017/03/07/judge-sides-with-ncaa-lawsuit-challenging-transfer-rules-division-i-schools/98877526/
You don’t hear this often but the NCAA won in court again.
A federal judge in Indiana on Tuesday dealt a significant blow to a lawsuit that has been seeking to challenge the NCAA’s rules that prevent some Division I football players from transferring to other schools without losing a season of athletics eligibility.
The case is being pursued primarily by Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP on behalf of Peter Deppe, a punter who had planned to transfer from Northern Illinois to Iowa in 2015. The suit alleges that Iowa accepted Deppe academically but that Iowa’s athletics department declined to pursue a waiver that would have allowed Deppe to become eligible immediately and the NCAA would not consider a waiver request from Deppe. The suit alleges that Iowa then turned its attention toward another punter who would be eligible immediately without a waiver.
…
As with yet another suit the Hagens Berman firm is pursuing against the NCAA, the Deppe case also seeks to overturn the association’s rules capping the number of football scholarships a Division I football team may award.
However, at issue in Tuesday’s ruling was the NCAA’s bid for dismissal of the part of Deppe’s case pertaining to the so-called “year-in-residence” rule, which generally requires football players who transfer to sit out a year and their new school.
The lawyers for Deppe argued that this constitutes “an unreasonable restraint on trade,” and this violates antitrust laws.
As she did in Pugh’s case, U.S. District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt sided with the NCAA. Citing a prior ruling by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and other precedents, Pratt ruled that since the NCAA transfer rule is an eligibility rule connected to education — as opposed to a restraint on trade — it does not violate antitrust law.
Pratt also ruled that Deppe did not have the legal standing to sue the NCAA because at the time the suit was filed, Deppe was not “enrolled at Division I school or playing or attempting to play football.” However, she noted that Deppe may be able to establish standing “by adequately pleading a sufficiently concrete and particularized injury,” and that during oral argument on the matter last week, his lawyers requested that ability to do. So her dismissal in that aspect of the case was made without prejudice.
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http://www.ncaa.com/news/wrestling/article/2017-03-07/college-wrestling-ncaa-announces-large-selections-division-i
The NCAA has announced the 330 wrestlers for the tournament (3/16-3/18). The B10 has 90 guys going including 77 automatic qualifiers and 13 at-large bids. The 330 are made up of 277 automatic qualifiers and 53 at-larges.
9 – MN, OSU, PSU, WI
8 – IA
7 – IL, MI, NE, RU
4 – IN, UMD, NW
3 – MSU, PU
OkSU and NCSU were the only schools to get all 10 wrestlers invited. Others with 9 are CMU and Stanford. At 8 you add OU and MO. Those with 7 are Princeton, Lehigh, Edinboro, UNI and VT. Cornell is the other school with 6.
The brackets for each weight class were just released at 6pm.
Click to access brackets.pdf
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http://www.si.com/college-football/2017/03/08/pac-12-larry-scott-commissioner-extension
The P12 has extended Larry Scott’s contract through 2022.
According to some figures compiled by Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News, the Pac-12’s 2016 annual per school distribution of an estimated $27 million projects to be $13 million behind the SEC and $8 million behind the Big Ten. The gap only projects to get bigger.
While those numbers have caused some grousing within some Pac-12 athletic departments, it clearly hasn’t been enough of an impediment to prevent the decision makers on campuses throughout the league to give Scott a five-year deal.
The Pac-12’s current television deals, both tier one with ESPN and FOX and distribution deals with the Pac-12 Network, expire in 2023-24. That means the league will decide in the next few years if it wants Scott to negotiate that next contract or bring in someone else, as his deal expires in 2022.
Clearly that people that matter aren’t that concerned about the financial gap, or at least realize it isn’t Scott’s fault. I’m guessing they’ll extend his deal again so he can negotiate the next TV deal for them unless he wants to leave before that. By 2025 I could see him wanting to move on. He doesn’t strike me as a lifer necessarily.
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http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/top-25-college-football-conference-games-early-predictions
Top 25 conference games for next season.
2. OSU @ MI – 11/25
4. PSU @ OSU – 10/28
8. MI @ PSU – 10/21
14. MSU @ OSU – 11/11
18. WI @ NE – 10/7
20. MSU @ MI – 10/7
22. IA @ WI – 11/11
24. MI @ WI – 11/18
8 of 25 are B10 games. That’s pretty strong.
Top 10 by conference:
ACC – 3
B10 – 3
SEC – 2
B12 – 1
P12 – 1
Top 25 by conference:
B10 – 8
SEC – 6
ACC – 5
P12 – 4
B12 – 2
http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/top-college-football-conference-games-early-predictions-no-26-to-50
Top 50 by conference:
B10 – 14 (1.00 per team)
ACC – 9 (0.64 per team)
SEC – 9 (0.64 per team)
P12 – 6 (0.50 per team)
B12 – 4 (0.30 per team)
Other – 8
http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/top-college-football-non-conference-games-early-predictions
Top 40 OOC games for 2017.
2. OU @ OSU
3. MI vs UF
8. NE @ OR
11. ND @ MSU
12. Pitt @ PSU
14. WI @ BYU
32, WMU @ MSU
35. WY @ IA
40. AF @ MI
Top 40 by conference:
ACC – 14 (1.00 per team)
B10 – 9 (0.64 per team)
B12 – 7 (0.70 per team)
P12 – 14 (1.17 per team)
SEC – 12 (0.86 per team)
Other – 24
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18898597/former-penn-state-nittany-lions-athletic-director-pleads-guilty-abuse-case
Tim Curley (AD) and Gary Schultz pleaded guilty to misdemeanor child endangerment charges today from their time at PSU. The max sentence is 5 years in jail. Graham Spanier continues to fight the charge.
Two former Penn State University administrators pleaded guilty Monday to misdemeanor child endangerment for their roles in the Jerry Sandusky child molestation case, more than five years after the scandal engulfed the school and led to coach Joe Paterno’s downfall.
Ex-Athletic Director Tim Curley and former university Vice President Gary Schultz originally were charged with felonies. The reduced charge is punishable by up to five years in prison.
Penn State ex-President Graham Spanier was also charged in the case. He was not in the Harrisburg courtroom Monday morning, though his attorneys were. His prosecution appears to be moving forward, with jury selection scheduled for next week.
The three handled a 2001 complaint by a graduate assistant who said he saw Sandusky, a retired defensive football coach, sexually abusing a boy in a team shower. They did not report the matter to police or child welfare authorities but told Sandusky he was not allowed to bring children to the campus.
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An interesting article.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/03/universities-overtake-harvard-cambridge-oxford?utm_content=buffer536f9&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
Lists those chasing the “elite”, but doesn’t list those being chased.
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Nine in the B1G, including tOSU and MSU.
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Actually, 10 (Northwestern, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Maryland, Penn State, Purdue, Ohio State and Michigan State). Chicago and Johns Hopkins, with quasi-Big Ten ties, made the list as well.
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Thanks. I missed Minni, and chose not to count Chicago or JHU.
The Pac12 did very well, too.
New York and New England are full of excellent private schools, and people there tend to disparage public schools. One Mass. governor famously said that UMass was for kids who couldn’t get into Harvard–largely true. They have no concept of the very high quality of the Midwestern and West Coast schools.
When I took a job at tOSU, my mother thought I had thrown away any chance at a good academic career, and sent me job ads for years for any and all private colleges
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B1G:
Northwestern
Michigan
Illinois
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Maryland
PSU
Purdue
Ohio State
Michigan State
ACC:
Duke
Georgia Tech
UNC
PAC:
Washington
USC
B12:
Texas
SEC:
lol
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Think they forget Cal and UCLA.
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Unless Cal and UCLA are already considered in the elite these are chasing?
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UC Davis, Santa Barbara and San Diego as well as Oregon should be on the list, and Arizona and Arizona State deserve consideration.
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UCSD, UCSB & UCD are on the list.
Oregon & the two Arizona schools aren’t really close in the relevant metrics.
“Unless Cal and UCLA are already considered in the elite these are chasing?”
—Which doesn’t really fit as they fit the ‘young turks’ grouping being discussed far better than the ‘old guard’ Oxford/Cambridge/Ivies. Stanford isn’t there either. The three are certainly an odd omission.
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Baylor scandal blast from the past. Dave Bliss still thinks he’s the victim.
http://www.star-telegram.com/sports/college/big-12/baylor-bears/article138292563.html
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18904309/baylor-bears-fire-associate-director-football-operations-demarkco-butler
And Baylor just keeps giving. They just fired their associate director for football operations for sending inappropriate texts to a teenager. How do they keep hiring such fine individuals at a Baptist school?
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http://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2017/mar/ranking-athletic-conferences-by-cfo-201716174.html
Big 10 #1—-in CFOs.
Overall, the Big Ten trained 75 of the 648 CFOs with known educational backgrounds, according to the report. Foreign schools produced 48 current CFOs, while the Atlantic Coast Conference produced 47 and the Ivy League produced 42. The sports powerhouse Pac-12 educated 38, finishing ahead of the Big East (32), Southeastern Conference (30), Big 12 (30), Mid-American Conference (23), and Patriot League (23).
Companies with overseas operations help account for the large number of CFOs educated abroad, Crist said. Universities in Canada produced the most foreign-educated CFOs with 15, followed by schools in the U.K. (11) and India (7). “Oftentimes these companies are bringing people from their international operations over to be the CFO of the American parent, and it’s rounding those folks out and giving them exposure to the United States,” he said.
Leading individual colleges in the report were the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League school, with 14, and the University of Notre Dame, an ACC school, with 13, just ahead of Midwest neighbors Illinois and Indiana. Notre Dame’s conference change in 2013 boosted the ACC’s CFO ranking while diminishing the Big East’s. Stanford University, a member of the Pac-12, rounded out the Top 5 schools with 11.
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http://www.pennstatewrestlingclub.org/content/tournament_team_score.php?id=18&type=team
PSU is going to win another wrestling national title tonight. The race for second is close between OSU and OkSU. PSU has 5 finalists (tonight at 8pm) versus2 for OSU and 1 for OkSU. OkSU has a higher possible score than OSU, so we’ll see what happens tonight.
Current scores:
1. PSI – 121
2. OSU – 93
3. OkSU – 91.5
4. MO – 81.5
5. IA – 77.5
6. MN
9. NE
10. IL
11. MI
13. WI
18. RU
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Well there won’t be any drama tonight except for who wins the individual titles, as PSU has the title locked and OSU has second place locked up. Still should be some great matches on ESPN, though.
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http://intermatwrestle.com/articles/17998
PSU was dominant in the finals to close it out, going 5 for 5 to win their 6th title in 7 years.
1. PSU
2. OSU
3. OkSU
4. IA
5. MO
6. VT
7. MN
8. Cornell
9. NE
10.MI
11. IL
13. WI
19. RU
On an OSU note, Olympic gold medalist and world champ Kyle Snyder won another national title at heavyweight despite injuring his ribs in the quarterfinals and beating a guy 38 pounds heavier than him in the finals.
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As an Illini alum whose parents are both Cowboys I did not see this coming.
http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/18944037/illinois-fighting-illini-hire-brad-underwood-oklahoma-state-cowboys-next-coach
Illinois has found its next coach, hiring Oklahoma State’s Brad Underwood after just one year with the Cowboys.
A source told ESPN that Underwood agreed to a six-year deal worth more than $3 million per season. He earned a little more than $1 million per season at Oklahoma State and had four years remaining on his contract.
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Congrats to NW on finally getting into the NCAA tournament and then even getting a win before a tough loss. Here’s hoping it isn’t another 80 years before you’re back. Now NE is the only B10 (and P5) team to never win an NCAA game.
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http://www.bigten.org/sports/m-hockey/spec-rel/031917aaf.html
After years of complaining from fans, B10 hockey got 3 teams into the NCAA field of 16 this year (MN, PSU and OSU).
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ND joins B10 hockey next season and they also made the tournament. In fact, they just made the Frozen Four. PSU is currently playing for another Frozen Four spot but trailing 3-2 in the 2nd period. If PSU won, they’d face ND to make the finals.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18963861/3-minnesota-golden-gophers-cleared-school-sexual-assault-case
Due process continued in MN.
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http://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/what-theyre-drinking-at-ohio-state-beer-sales-breakdown-after-2016-debut/
OSU’s beer sales number for 2016 are in. About $1.1M in sales and fewer alcohol-related problems than before. Of course, the OU was on the road last year and not at home.
I have yet to see any analysis about whether postgame DUIs are up or not. Perhaps MADD shuold run that analysis since they are strongly against these beer sales.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/2017/03/24/ncaa-200-million-payout-bonus/99582450/
As I mentioned before, the NCAA is doing a one time $200M distribution. The amount per school is based on how many total scholarships they give.
Ohio State will receive the most, just more than $1.3 million because it awarded the equivalent of nearly 404 scholarships.
Five of the other 11 schools that were in the Big Ten Conference in 2013-14 also will be receiving more than $1 million — Michigan, Penn State, Michigan State, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
The only other schools getting more than $1 million are Stanford, Virginia and North Carolina.
At the other end of the spectrum, Davidson will be getting the smallest amount: slightly more than $165,000 from having awarded the equivalent of just more than 50 scholarships.
…
The new distribution report shows how strategic some private schools are being with their athletic scholarships as they remain competitive nationally in men’s and/or women’s basketball with schools from power conferences that are pulling away from the rest of Division I financially because of skyrocketing football-related revenue.
Of the nearly 350 schools getting money from the $200 million distribution, fewer than 50 awarded less than the equivalent of 100 scholarships in 2013-14. About three-quarters of those schools are private, including Gonzaga (87.25), Xavier (97.08), Butler (99.23), Creighton (89.3) and Dayton (86.86). The Division I scholarship limit in men’s basketball is 13; in women’s basketball, it’s 15. These schools likely have been at — or near — the limits in those two sports.
…
Though these schools’ shares from the $200 million distribution are being driven by their athletic scholarship numbers, schools that don’t award athletic scholarships — those in the Ivy League and the service academies — are getting money based on the average amounts being distributed to Football Championship Subdivision schools: $520,337, which would be from having awarded the equivalent of about 158 scholarships.
…
“Our issue,” Ensor said, “is why is football getting such weight in the formula” for the $200 million distribution. Ensor pointed out that football results in the awarding of many scholarships, and is driving schools’ shares of the distribution, but “no funding goes to the NCAA from football operations” because conferences control TV contracts for football and the bowl system. Nearly all of the NCAA’s revenue comes from its media and marketing rights contract with CBS and Turner for the men’s basketball tournament.
Meanwhile, Ensor said, many of the NCAA’s recent legal problems and settlements are “being driven by football.”
Schools will face restrictions on how they can use the money, which is coming from the liquidation of a type of endowment that had grown to more $360 million. The money is to be put toward “the direct benefit of the student-athlete and their academic success, life skills, career success, health and safety and student-athlete focused diversity and inclusion initiatives,” according the Q&A document. The money cannot be used for items such as coaches’ salaries, strength equipment, and stadium or arena improvements aimed at fans.
Each school will have to provide the NCAA office with answers to a 48-item spending plan questionnaire within three months of receiving the money, and the plan will have to be approved by NCAA staff before any of the money can be spent. Schools will be subject to random audits of their use of the money, and the spending plan questionnaire advises schools that supporting “documents should be retained for a 10 year period … which may exceed your institution’s current document retention policy.”
The article includes a list of all the payouts by school.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18994840/graham-spanier-former-penn-state-president-found-guilty-child-endangerment
PSU ex-president Graham Spanier was convicted of one count of child endangerment by a jury.
Jurors found Spanier guilty of one count of child endangerment over his handling of a complaint against Sandusky, a retired assistant football coach, but found Spanier not guilty of conspiracy and a second count of child endangerment.
According to multiple reports, first-time offenders such as Spanier face anywhere from probation to a maximum sentence of five years.
He is free on bail until sentencing later this spring. Prosecutors declined to say whether they would seek jail time, and Spanier’s lawyer said he would appeal.
That’s 3 PSU administrators that either pleaded guilty or were found guilty as part of the scandal.
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Go Badgers. Argument that Badgers might be the best football/basketball combo school in the country. http://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/news/ncaa-tournament-2017-wisconsins-case-as-best-basketball-football-power/
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Apropos the NCAA playoffs, only 19% of Division I basketball players come from families in which neither parent went to college.
https://theundefeated.com/features/gentrification-of-ncaa-division-1-college-basketball/
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Michigan Wolverine basketball might be the best illustration of this trend – the program likely has become gun-shy about having to persuade multiple 5-star player recruiting classes (with all the controversy that may entail) and instead relying on “,Jrs” and “bougie” players. Also, like any other trade, those that are successful in it are going to ensure that their progeny at least have the opportuity to participate at entry level (that’s part of my questioning of the Mike Rowe approach to labor fulfillment, in Chicago it is not exactly easy to get an in to Locals 150 (IUOE) and 134 (Electricians).
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http://www.espn.com/blog/oakland-raiders/post/_/id/18079/raiders-move-to-vegas-approved-now-what
I think we all know this by now, but the Raiders got approved to move to Las Vegas. Their new stadium isn’t supposed to be ready until 2020, though. They have 2 1-year options to play in Oakland that will cover 2017 and 2018. They are hoping to sign another 1-year deal to cover 2019. Playing 3 lame duck seasons in Oakland could get really ugly.
I think the team will do fine in LV. The casinos will buy large numbers of tickets and plenty of locals will too. Add in tourists looking for single games and it should be fine. I doubt gambling will be any more of an issue than it is already as long as no casino owners own the team.
I applaud Oakland for standing up to the team and refusing to pump hundreds of millions into a stadium for them. All the studies show that these deals never work out well for the city except for the brief window of constructions jobs.
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I believe the Oakland/Alameda tax payers are still obligated to pay 80-90M in bonds for past improvements.
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ccrider55,
“I believe the Oakland/Alameda tax payers are still obligated to pay 80-90M in bonds for past improvements.”
You’re correct. USA Today just wrote an article about Oakland, St, Louis and San Diego all still owing money for stadiums.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/2017/03/31/relocation-oakland-raiders-san-diego-chargers-st-louis-rams/99848210/
As taxpayers, many of those fans are helping pay about $90 million in debt left on the Coliseum stemming from a $200 million renovation that helped lure the Raiders to move back to Oakland from Los Angeles in 1995.
So yes they still owe money, but they did get a team for 25 seasons. $8M per season might be a fair price to pay for an NFL team.
But taxpayers also still have the former home of the Rams: the old Edward Jones Dome, which has about $85 million left in debt for the city, county and state, according to St. Louis officials.
The dome opened in 1995 at a cost of about $300 million. Twenty-one years later, the Rams left last year for Los Angeles,
…
In the NFL’s absence, the dome has done better financially, said Kitty Ratcliffe, the president of the St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission, which operates the dome. She said the dome lost around $400,000 in a year of Rams games but generally can gain about that much with a single big concert.
So they paid about $10M per season of having the Rams and now the dome is doing better financially while they continue to pay it off. Again, that doesn’t sound too bad.
In fact, St, Louis is considering paying $60M to build a soccer stadium in hopes of adding an MLS team.
After the Chargers then decided to leave for Los Angeles, the city of San Diego has been considering the fate of the Chargers’ old home: 50-year-old Qualcomm Stadium, which is owned by the city and has cost around $12 million per year for the city to maintain. San Diego State’s football team and the college football Holiday Bowl have leases to use the stadium through 2018.
“Given the high cost to the city’s operating budget, the city is undergoing review of the financial feasibility of continuing stadium operations beyond that point,” said Craig Gustafson, spokesman for San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer.
Those costs are in addition to about $47 million owed on Chargers-related debt that the city is scheduled to pay through 2027, including about $10 million in interest, Gustafson said. In the 1990s, the city had borrowed around $68 million for stadium renovations and Chargers practice facility construction to help keep the team from leaving.
The good news for taxpayers is that the Chargers had to pay the city $12.6 million to break their lease this year in San Diego – money that can be put toward the city’s $4.7 million annual payments on that Chargers-related debt. “That will free up $4.7 million in the budget for other purposes,” Gustafson said.
San Diego got a pretty solid deal, too. It stinks to keep paying after a team leaves, but you have to factor in how much value you got over time.
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I prefer the Green Bay model.
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Well, the citizens of San Diego and other cities are welcome to pool their money and buy an NFL team as well as build a new stadium which they then own. I think most major cities have way too many people with zero interest in having the NFL there to do it, though. I don’t believe the NFL is a good investment for a major city anymore, especially if the owner won’t pay for his own stadium.
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While I realistically agree, I’d counter with these considerations.
“Well, the citizens of San Diego and other cities are welcome to pool their money and buy an NFL team as well as build a new stadium which they then own.”
Yes, getting the support would be tough, but the Louisiana and Alaska purchases happened with great opposition. On a smaller level the decision to build the Big House, far from being a huge waste turned into a tremendous asset.
” I think most major cities have way too many people with zero interest in having the NFL there to do it, though.”
Not everything in a city needs to directly benefit each individual for it to benefit the whole.
” I don’t believe the NFL is a good investment for a major city anymore, especially if the owner won’t pay for his own stadium.”
Cities are already performing what many feel is ownership function through building/owning stadiums. Owning the team would remove the “blackmail” threat and lend more permanence to the team-city identity.
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ccrider55,
“Yes, getting the support would be tough, but the Louisiana and Alaska purchases happened with great opposition. On a smaller level the decision to build the Big House, far from being a huge waste turned into a tremendous asset.”
All valid points. But there is a track record of NFL stadiums and teams to look at unlike in those cases. In a world where so many people want less government and believe the government incompetent to do anything that can be done privately, I just don’t see how they could raise the billions needed to buy a team and build a stadium that the city would run.
“Not everything in a city needs to directly benefit each individual for it to benefit the whole.”
Very true, but I’m not sure a majority would see it as benefiting them. Higher taxes, travel headaches, TV blackouts, etc.
“Cities are already performing what many feel is ownership function through building/owning stadiums.”
They are, but it’s also very unpopular in many cities. Especially when people see 20 year old stadiums being abandoned because they are too out of date for teams.
“Owning the team would remove the “blackmail” threat and lend more permanence to the team-city identity.”
Agreed. But would the NFL owners even accept a bid from a city to own a team or would they rather have another billionaire join their club? The other owners all profit as these teams hop from city to city extorting hundreds of millions of dollars from the peasants. They know a city-owned team would never move and would have limited leverage to blackmail the locals into paying for renovations and such.
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Jerry Jones’ role in franchise relocation: http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/heres-how-jerry-jones-will-reportedly-make-hundreds-of-millions-on-nfl-relocation/
He’s a very shrewd businessman.
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http://collegebasketball.ap.org/top-100
The AP just released their all-time top 100 list for MBB. Their hoops poll started in 1949.
To determine the all-time Top 100, the AP formula counted poll appearances (one point each) to mark consistency and No. 1 rankings (two points each) to acknowledge elite programs. Keep in mind that AP doesn’t release a poll after the NCAA Tournament, so eventual national champions are not factored into these rankings. Instead, this list focuses more on those programs that consistently appear in the poll and/or at the top during the regular seasons.
I understand why the AP can’t factor in national titles, but many will see that as a significant flaw in the rankings. On the other hand, it may make for a more accurate ranking since single-elimination tournaments often have skewed results.
All-time list:
1. UK – 1111
2. UNC – 1098
3. Duke – 1032
4. UCLA – 957
5. KU – 857
6. IN – 662
7. UL – 627
8. AZ – 594
9. SU – 581
10. Cincinnati – 500
11. IL – top team to never win a title
12. OSU
13. MSU
14. MI
17. UMD – top team that has never been ranked #1
23. IA – was #1 once
24. PU – only other top 25 team never to be #1
37. WI
43. MN
Unranked – NE, NW, PSU, RU
The list looks about right. It looks like there are 5 true blue bloods that have separated from the rest. IN’s 5 titles would help them if they were factored in. I’d also like to see point penalties for teams that got busted for cheating.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/19032291/michigan-state-staffer-curtis-blackwell-gets-1-month-contract-extension-investigation
The MSU football staffer under investigation as part of the sexual assault issue at MSU just got a 1-month contract extension as he continues to be on indefinite paid suspension during the investigation.
Blackwell’s contract was scheduled to expire at the end of this week, according to a copy obtained through a Freedom of Information request earlier this month. When a university employee’s contract expires in the middle of a suspension, the spokesman said the school determines whether to extend the deal or let it expire on a case-by-case basis.
I’m guessing they’re waiting to see whether he’s found guilty or not before deciding what to do with him. It doesn’t look good, though, when you could just let his contract expire and move on.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/19033720/wayne-duke-was-big-ten-commissioner-18-years-dies-88
Former B10 commissioner Wayne Duke died. He was the commissioner from 1971-1989, so he started the process of making the B10 rich from TV revenue.
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http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article141656549.html
The NC legislature has passed a compromise bill that partially overturns the controversial HB2 that cost the state so many jobs and sporting events. Assuming the governor sign it into law, it remains to be seen how sports leagues will react to it.
There are three provisions in the new bill: Repeal of HB2, leaving regulation of multiple occupancy restrooms, showers or changing facilities to the state, and a moratorium on local ordinances regulating public accommodations or private employment practices until Dec. 1, 2020.
…
The N.C. Values Coalition was also dissatisfied with the outcome.
“These chambers were filled today with men and women who have been under a full-court press by the NCAA and th” business community for months, and today, the leaders of our state have let the people of North Carolina down,” Tami Fitzgerald, the executive director, said in a statement. “The truth remains, no basketball game, corporation, or entertainment event is worth even one little girl losing her privacy and dignity to a boy in the locker room, or being harmed or frightened in a bathroom. Today each member cast a vote based on what they believed was in the best interest of their constituents and North Carolina.”
The Human Rights Campaign released this statement by president Chad Griffin:
“After more than a year of inaction, today North Carolina lawmakers doubled-down on discrimination and cemented North Carolina’s reputation as the worst state in the nation for LGBTQ people. This bill does nothing to repeal HB2. Instead, it institutes a statewide prohibition on equality by banning non-discrimination protections across North Carolina and fuels the flames of anti-transgender hate. Each and every lawmaker who supported this bill has betrayed the LGBTQ community.”
The NCAA is about to decide where championships will be held for 2018-2022, so NC had to rush to beat that deadline. Now we’ll wait to see if the NCAA considers this good enough or not.
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http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/17-for-17-key-big-ten-questions
The key B10 off-season questions. There’s one question for each B10 team. Follow the link to read the answers.
Illinois Fighting Illini
Uhhhh, the offense?
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Indiana Hoosiers
Will the intensity still be there under Tom Allen?
…
Iowa Hawkeyes
How much will all the new coaching changes matter?
…
Maryland Terrapins
Just how fast can the awesome recruiting class help the defense?
…
Michigan Wolverines
So, what does Michigan have left that’s any good?
…
Michigan State Spartans
Can Michigan State get past all the problems and be good again?
…
Minnesota Golden Gophers
Beyond the coaching changes, what’s Minnesota’s biggest storyline?
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Nebraska Cornhuskers
Is Bob Diaco the key to the Big Ten West?
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Northwestern Wildcats
Can the O line let the stars work?
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Ohio State Buckeyes
Controversy, schmontrovery – how will Kevin Wilson do as the new offensive coordinator?
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Penn State Nittany Lions
The one thing missing in Penn State’s repeat attempt is … ?
…
Purdue Boilermakers
So how long will it take before the Jeff Brohm offense starts to rock?
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Rutgers Scarlet Knights
When will all the offensive changes turn into production?
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Wisconsin Badgers
Do the Badgers have a real, live wide receiver?
In previous days, they’ve also listed the sleeper title contenders and predicted disappointment team.
http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/sleeper-college-football-conference-championship-contenders
B10 darkhorse – MN
The Gophers were in the Big Ten title chase right up until the end of the regular season, and now they should be even better – especially with a coaching upgrade.
P.J. Fleck was the hot guy at the right time, and even though it took an ugly scandal to eventually make it happen, that hot guy’s in Minneapolis now.
With a potentially devastating running game behind a great-looking line, while the defense gets half the season to get it right.
They have to go to Iowa, and they have to face Michigan and Michigan State from the East, but they get Nebraska and Wisconsin at home.
http://collegefootballnews.com/2017/college-football-top-disappointments
B10 disappointment – MI
You can’t just lose that much talent and be better.
The Wolverines have a ton of young talent, they have a NFL-potential quarterback in Wilton Speight, and they have the coaching staff to make sure that things don’t fall totally off the map. But when the goal now is to win something big – like a College Football Playoff national title – going 10-3 again would be a total disaster.
Can you be better after losing all 11 defensive starters and seven on offense? Probably not.
Florida, Air Force, Michigan State, at Indiana, at Penn State, Minnesota, at Wisconsin, Ohio State. It’s not a brutal schedule with most of the big games are at home, but this is Year Three under Jim Harbaugh. This is when the machine is supposed to be humming.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/03/30/penn-state-trustee-running-out-sympathy/99826214/
More proof that some/many PSU people still don’t get it.
Penn State trustee Albert L. Lord said he is “running out of sympathy” for the “so-called” victims of former Nittany Lions assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, according to an email sent to The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Lord, a former CEO of student loan company Sallie Mae, also defended Graham Spanier, the dismissed Penn State president who was convicted of one count of child endangerment last week for his handling of complaints about Sandusky.
…
Lord is an alumni-elected trustee, and he’s currently seeking re-election. He’s one of five candidates running for three spots in an election that will conclude on May 4.
A very interesting comment to make just before an election. Does he expect that stance to help him in the election? What does it say about PSU alumni if it does help?
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Another glimpse into what a swell guy Lord is…
https://www.revealnews.org/article/who-got-rich-off-the-student-debt-crisis/
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http://thecomeback.com/ncaa/worst-college-realignment-decisions.html
Bob Ryan tweeted the other day that SC leaving the ACC in 1971 was the worst realignment decision ever.
Lots of dumb moves, but So Car exiting ACC #1 dumbest. Simple geography, let alone common sports culture, tells you where they belong.
He followed up with:
You guys are talking money. I understand the business. I’m talking common sense. And why So Car left. It wasn’t about the $$$ then.
Since Ryan is a basketball writer primarily, I think his point was based on SC having a decent MBB program back in the day and being in the perfect league to maintain that. We all think of SC as a football school now, but under Frank McGuire they made the Sweet 16 3 times and made 4 straight NCAA appearances. They won the ACC regular season once and the ACC tournament once. He went 283-142 over 16 years at SC. After that stretch of 4 straight appearances, it took SC 30 years to get 4 more appearances. It also would’ve kept them with Clemson which might have been good for them in football. On the other hand, SC really is more of a football state and things have worked out well since SC joined the SEC 20 years later. But at the time, and especially from a MBB perspective, Ryan might have a point.
That said, I don’t see how it could be #1 on the list. Tulane leaving the SEC? The Big East turning down PSU? The B10 turning down ND and NE back in the day? The B10 turning down UT in the early 90s?
Anyway, this article has their own list of the worst moves:
1. B10 adding RU (and UMD)
When the Big Ten announced it was inviting Rutgers and Maryland to the conference, there were mixed opinions. There was a clear push to expand the conference in an eastward direction, but options like Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, and Pittsburgh were either non-existent or too far-fetched or too late to discuss. Instead, the Big Ten offered an escape from a financial burden to Maryland and added on Rutgers to come up with a 14-team conference that would allow for a reworking of the division lineup. In the case of Rutgers, the push to get the Big Ten brand as close to the New York market was complete, regardless of how valuable that NYC market really is.
But could the Big Ten have managed to cut a slice of the Big Apple without Rutgers? Does Rutgers really bring that much value to the conference? Was Rutgers really the key to working out a deal with the New York Yankees and the Pinstripe Bowl? That is doubtful at best, because the Big Ten and Yankees could have just as easily worked out a way to make a deal for more money with or without Rutgers, and odds are they would have. Rutgers has pretty much been a hot mess and a laughing stock since joining the Big Ten. But that Big Ten Network money sure is worth it!
2. Tulane leaves SEC
3. UMass joins the MAC for football
4. SC leaving the ACC
5. The B12 dragging its feet and leading on multiple schools
I think you need to lump in the B12 passing on UL when they added WV to #5. As I said above, I’d have multiple moves that failed to happen on my list.
As for their opinion of the RU/UMD addition, I think it’s way too early to judge. Yes RU became an almost immediate embarrassment in seemingly every way possible, but they may be turning things around. RU certainly has brought money to the B10 (one major goal of expansion). I also think all that NYC access really was dependent on having a local team in the B10. Maybe other schools (SU, UConn) could have also provided it, though likely to a lesser extent in my opinion. But the article ignores two other major reasons for the B10 doing that expansion. The east coast has tons of B10 alumni that the B10 wanted to reach out to while adding fertile recruiting grounds for future students to balance the demographics in the midwest. I think RU has been everything the B10 wanted in all regards except athletically and that will likely change once RU starts to receive a full B10 financial share. They’re already good in a couple of sports (wrestling, MLAX) and used to be good at WBB. They’re in a great spot to recruit for CFB and MBB. Give them time and they’ll become decent. It’s not like PU and IL are much better at CFB.
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As I’ve often stated here, Maryland essentially was B1G-ready when 2014 arrived, thanks to its 61 years of big-time competition in the ACC. Rutgers never really had that sort of culture, and has had far more catching up to do. Syracuse might have made an easier transition athletically, but it wasn’t quite the academic fit, particularly in graduate-level research (one reason it exited the AAU)…and its location upstate, far from metro NYC, worked against it too.
Had South Carolina jumped immediately from the ACC to the SEC, the move would’ve made sense — but instead, the Gamecocks spent two decades in the athletic wilderness after Paul Dietzel won an internal power structure from Frank McGuire.
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https://news.osu.edu/news/2017/03/30/energy-partnership-to-support-ohio-states-sustainability-and-academic-mission/
OSU is about to approve a $1.165B energy deal with a French consortium to exclusively provide HVAC and electricity to OSU’s main campus. OSU will get over $1B as an upfront payment that will go straight into the endowment. I know schools are looking to privatize many things to save money, but this seems like a huge deal. OSU gets educational opportunities, facility improvements and energy conservation while also getting a huge check up front.
The Comprehensive Energy Management Project promises to modernize the university’s 485-building Columbus campus, create substantial academic benefits and establish a major center for energy research and technology commercialization.
The total value of $1.165 billion includes a $1.015 billion upfront payment to the university and a $150 million commitment to support academics in specific areas requested by students, faculty and staff during the bidding process. This would be the largest single investment in Ohio State’s academic mission.
More details, in case anyone is curious:
https://www.osu.edu/energymanagement/index.php?id=55
Under the proposed contract, ENGIE-Axium would have three primary responsibilities to related to the university’s energy system:
Operations: ENGIE-Axium must efficiently and effectively operate the systems that power, heat and cool Ohio State’s Columbus campus under a 50-year lease of the university’s energy assets. The consortium must meet or exceed the university’s already high performance standards under the terms of the contract.
Sustainability: Propose, provide the capital funding for and implement energy conservation measures to improve Ohio State’s sustainability. The university will review each capital project and would approve only those that will provide appropriate environmental and financial benefits.
Supply: The university will continue to buy electricity, natural gas and other energy sources directly from providers, and Ohio State will continue to determine its priorities in terms of renewables vs. traditional sources. ENGIE-AXIUM will work to enhance Ohio State’s effectiveness in the procurement process.
…
Ohio State will pay ENGIE-Axium a fee each year that is made up of three components:
A fixed fee that will start at $45 million a year and escalate by 1.5 percent per year to cover inflation
An operating fee that will start at about $9.2 million, reflecting the university’s average operating and maintenance costs for the past three years. This will be adjusted throughout the concession based on actual costs of the operation, as approved through an annual budget process with the university.
And a variable fee that will be directly tied to approved capital investments that ENGIE-Axium makes on the Ohio State campus. ENGIE-Axium will fund those projects with a 50/50 split of debt and equity.
The initial return on equity would be 9.35 percent. After five years, it will be set to a 10-year average for a five-state region that includes Ohio.
The initial cost of debt would be 3.691%. After five years, it will be set to a corporate investment grade index.
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http://www.cfbfilmroom.com/
If you like detailed stats, you might like this site. They don’t have every P5 team unfortunately, but they have detailed breakdowns of stats per game and for the season. They only have OSU and MI from the B10 right now, and the stats only go back to 2015, but it can be interesting.
Other schools: Clemson, FSU, OU, OR, USC, AL, UF, LSU, MS, TN, ND
Some of their stats that you don’t usually get:
QB:
Dropbacks
Times pressured
Passes dropped
Throw aways
Times hit
Hurries
RB:
Yards after contact
1st downs
Missed tackles forced
Times stuffed
Total fumbles (includes ones your own team recovers)
WR:
Times targeted
Contested targets
Contested receptions
Yards after catch
Missed tackles forced
Drops
1st downs
OL:
Hurries allowed
QB hits allowed
Sacks allowed
Pass blocking snaps
Pass blocking %
Penalties
Penalty yards
Def:
Missed tackles
Stuffs (tackles for loss or 0 yards)
QB hits
Hurries
Passes batted down (not in direct coverage)
Coverage stats:
Times targeted
Completions allowed
Contested targets
Contested completions allowed
Passes defended
Yards allowed
1st downs allowed
PI calls
Yes, we know our stats don’t match up with the numbers you’re seeing elsewhere. There are a number of reasons for this.
Most frequently, especially with common statistics such as rushing and passing yards, it’s because we believe the NCAA’s policy for recording official statistics is archaic, at best, and often just flat out illogical.
The most common question we get is in regards to rushing and passing yards. When our stats differ in these categories it is almost always due to our policies on tap passes and sacks.
Unlike the NCAA, we do not treat sacks as negative rushing yards. Because they’re, well, not running plays.
We also choose to treat tap passes and other short pitches or shovel passes as handoffs rather than passes. The NCAA treats anything that leaves the quarterback’s hand and travels forward as a pass. This is a little more simplistic and easier for them to differentiate, but we feel it doesn’t paint an accurate picture of what happened.
As for “official” defensive stats. Well, those are just plain fiction. Defensive statistics at the college level (and even in the NFL) are dramatically overinflated. Our analysts go over every play to identify the player actually responsible for the tackle, sack, etc. rather that just create a fictitious list everyone who piled on or was in the vicinity of the tackle.
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New thread topic?
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That could tie into a lot of issues with regard to sub-P5 athletic program viability (e.g. various financial footing of public Illinois universities) in general as well as “next man up” moves from the AAC down to the Summit/WAC.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/19042825/wichita-state-shockers-eyes-2017-move-american-athletic-conference
Wichita State has indicated the school would be willing to leave the Missouri Valley Conference and become a member of the American Athletic Conference as soon as next season, a source with direct knowledge said.
The Missouri Valley Conference has been told of the Shockers’ interest to leave as early as this fall, the source said.
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Also:
The AAC currently has 11 basketball-playing members and 12 for football, with Navy as football-only participant.
The Shockers would make the move only if their 15 sports were added to the AAC. Under NCAA rules, a non-football playing member has to add all of its sports to the league.
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The incentive would likely be for the American to move quickly.
Wichita State returns virtually its entire team from last season, which finished 31-5 and took No. 2 Kentucky to the final seconds in the Round of 32. (Former walk-on John Robert Simon is the team’s lone scholarship senior).
The incentive for the AAC to act now comes down to NCAA units, which are worth nearly $1.6 million for every NCAA game that a team plays in. If Wichita State’s stout team makes a deep run next season, the potential haul of units—which are shared by the conference—would make an expedited timeline look wise. Regular season college basketball moves the needle so little for television that Wichita State’s ultimate value for the AAC would likely resonate more in earning NCAA units than in potential television dollars. (The AAC’s television deal expires in 2020).
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On that note, when the SEC and B1G were 12 team leagues, how were the conference teams that they went 2 games (home and home) decided on – pods, football divisions, or every other team had to endure a period of having only 1 conference game – even close rivals like OleMiss-MSU and UTK-VANDY? Wichita would ostensibly play Memphis, Tulane, Tulsa, Houston, and SMU twice in conference play if they just plugged into Navy’s “empty” slot.
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The SEC implemented divisions when they expanded to 12 until 2010-2011. They only played 16 games then, HaH in division and single crossovers. They went back to an equal rotation once they dropped divisions.
Now the SEC has 3 locked rivals that get HaHs, plus 2 more games that rotate equally. The B10 rotates all 5 second games equally. The B10 has always done an equal rotation (no locked rivals) for as long as I can recall.
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The Golden Nugget has put out odds for teams to win their P5 conference except for the B12.
B10:
OSU – 8/5
MI – 2/1
PSU – 5/1
WI – 6/1
MSU, NW – 20/1
NE, IA, MN – 25/1
IN – 50/1
IL, PU, UMD – 150/1
RU – 200/1
Other favorites:
FSU – 6/5
USC – 1/1
AL – 2/3
Clearly they’re playing to the fan bases because there’s no reason to give MI better odds than PSU. On the other hand, there are some good value bets in the West.
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http://sportsradiopd.com/2017/03/how-sports-fans-view-the-current-state-of-espn/
Many sports fans are down on ESPN. This may explain their loss of subscribers better than cord cutting.
A media blogger ran an unscientific poll of sports fans and asked 10 questions.
A combined 91% of participants say they consume ESPN’s content less or no longer enjoy it.
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60% of survey members felt that the company has a left-leaning agenda.
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The survey showed that 97.2% of sports fans feel less enthusiastic about ESPN’s programming. A total of 69.9% say they either no longer watch or only tune in occasionally.
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The remaining 59.7% feel the network’s talent level is either underwhelming or not close to where it once was.
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The change in presentation for SportsCenter (adding more “personality”) appears to be too early to draw any concrete conclusions. 49.3% say it’s either not their style or they don’t like it, but most people initially reject change so this isn’t uncommon.
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The three programs that received the most positive feedback were Pardon The Interruption, Baseball Tonight, and College GameDay.
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The two shows which earned the least favorable feedback were First Take (#1 by a wide margin) and SportsCenter (many felt the show has become background noise and lacks great content worth tuning in for).
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In measuring the categories which offered the least amount of value to sports fans, the members of this survey concluded that the number one area of disdain for them were Debate Shows. The only other category to receive double digit negative feedback was SportsCenter.
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The final question was created to find out why sports fans were spending more or less time with the network. Those who enjoy ESPN’s programming more said it was because they Still Love Watching Games, 30 For 30 Is Exceptional Programming, and the channel is Easy To Find on Their Television.
Survey members who say they’re investing less time in the network’s programming attribute it to a Decrease In Content Quality and Talent, Better Choices Available via TV-Digital-Social, and Too Much Focus on Hot Take Shows with a Left Leaning Agenda and Less on Making Sports Fun and Neutral. Deflategate was another specific subject which turned off many fans.
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I think that the political commentary and leanings of ESPN are a huge issue. Most people do not want to watch sports to hear about politics, or social justice, or anything of the sort. Sports should be a “safe space’, except maybe with beer instead of cookies, to avoid politics.
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I agree.
But I also think the unspoken underbelly of this issue is the increase in women and non-whites in prominent positions at ESPN. Many view that as political, but it’s also subconscious racism and sexism.
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BS
It’s simple. People love sports coverage as in covering competitions, and to a lesser extent pre and post comp shows/evaluations. Those rise or fall with the interest in the event. Manufacturing interest is becoming less effective, and talking head time filler/game shows succeed as often as new sit coms (occasional hit surrounded by duds).
Other networks have encroached on territory espn yes to monopolize. And new modes of consumption haven’t (yet) been dominated in the same manner espn managed during cable expansion.
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ccrider55,
“BS”
It may be, but I was only talking about when people complain about politics on ESPN. Sure actual politics comes up occasionally (and it shouldn’t), but I think many of the political complaints can also be tied to who is speaking and the political positions viewers assume they hold. It also happens because women and minorities bring up issues that others would prefer to ignore. Again, one could claim that ESPN isn’t the place for spouting those opinions but they aren’t just a news channel and racism and sexism do exist in sports.
“It’s simple. People love sports coverage as in covering competitions, and to a lesser extent pre and post comp shows/evaluations. Those rise or fall with the interest in the event.”
Sure. It’s a given that events are their most popular shows. They also cost a lot. ESPN can’t just show the NFL 24/7. But the pure neutral coverage of ESPNNews hasn’t been a huge success, either. People want opinions, they just want everyone to agree with them.
“Manufacturing interest is becoming less effective, and talking head time filler/game shows succeed as often as new sit coms (occasional hit surrounded by duds).”
I think their argument shows are basically anchovies. You either love them or hate them. Those shows get solid ratings while being hated by everyone else. Like everything else in entertainment, the diversity of choices has fragmented the audience and there’s no way to keep everyone happy.
And remember, all this comes from someone who doesn’t watch ESPN. I read the complaints online and see an occasional clip in a story, but I gave up watching ESPN long ago.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/19047482/acc-consider-north-carolina-championship-host-again-lgbtq-law-change
The ACC presidents decided that the HB2 repeal compromise was good enough to allow championships back in NC.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2017/04/01/column-why-is-michigan-st-going-ahead-with-a-spring-game/99902508/
An AP columnist thinks MSU is making a huge mistake holding a spring game.
In the latest example of an athletic program botching the way it handles some very serious allegations, the Spartans set up a guessing game to go along with their meaningless football game by basically casting a cloud of suspicion over anyone who doesn’t play.
That includes three players, not yet identified, who are being investigated for sexual assault. That also includes an undisclosed number who won’t be allowed to play for violating some sort of team rules, presumably of a much-less serious variety.
When queried on the fairness of that stance, coach Mark Dantonio pulled out a card that has already been overly played in the political arena.
Blame it on the media.
“You’ll be the person lumping them in,” Dantonio told a reporter at a news conference this week. “So if you write about it, no, I don’t think it’s fair.”
Never mind that it’s the media’s job to report who’s playing and who isn’t.
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http://www.espn.com/blog/pac12/post/_/id/109061/las-vegas-new-football-stadium-could-have-a-large-impact-on-college-football
Potential impact on CFB of the new stadium in LV, summarized:
1. UNLV gets a much better home
2. Las Vegas Bowl could move up the bowl pecking order (#6 for P12 now). In part that would mean adding a P5 foe. Would the B10 consider playing in LV rather than SF? Would the B12 be interested?
3. Would the P12 CCG move to LV? The hoops tourney is already there and the CCGs have had mediocre attendance elsewhere (Levi’s, home sites).
4. New CFP title game spot. They aren’t eligible yet but the NCAA will likely change their rules to allow championship game in NV now that the NFL is moving there.
Down the road even further is the possibility of hosting a College Football Playoff championship game, however NCAA president Mark Emmert said Thursday that Las Vegas will not be eligible to host a playoff game when the next round of bidding for the 2019-22 games takes place. The NCAA sports wagering policy prohibits a state that allows single-game sports betting from hosting NCAA championship events, however, it should be noted that the playoff operates separately from the NCAA and could allow an event in Las Vegas before other sports are allowed.
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“It seems a bit hypocritical when we have an NCAA institution here in Las Vegas who plays every one of their sports here, but we can’t host a college baseball regional or an NCAA tournament regional game, as well,” Saccenti said. “I think they’re going to take a long hard look at it. I think everybody’s eyes have been opened to the gambling factor with the NHL coming and the NFL coming.”
5. Early season neutral site OOC games. I could see a P12/B12 matchup just like Dallas and Atlanta host big games.
One thing they don’t mention is if this could be the start of UNLV elevating their status among the G5s. Could this be the impetus that makes UNLV and BYU a reasonable pair for the B12?
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“Could this be the impetus that makes UNLV and BYU a reasonable pair for the B12?”
While it might seem like it I don’t think so. If OU and UT want to play in the west is Nevada and Utah the population base they seek? Wouldn’t a move to the PAC be the likely alternative?
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ccrider55,
“While it might seem like it I don’t think so.”
Certainly not in the short term. I’m wondering if the stadium and their new coach can combine to build UNLV’s program over the next couple of decades into something desirable. If they had Boise’s level of success, I’m guessing they’d be wanted.
“If OU and UT want to play in the west is Nevada and Utah the population base they seek?”
Western TV markets the B12 probably can’t touch:
2. LA – P12
6. SF – P12
12. Phoenix – P12
14. Seattle – P12
17. Denver – P12
20. Sacramento – P12
21. STL – SEC
25. Portland – P12
28. San Diego – P12
50. New Orleans – SEC
Western TV markets the B12 already has:
5. Dallas – B12/SEC
8. Houston – B12/SEC
31. San Antonio – B12
33. KC – B12
39. Austin – B12
41. OKC – B12
Potentially available western TV markets:
34. SLC – P12
40. LV – P12
48. Albuquerque – P12
51. Memphis – SEC
Unless there’s a P12 meltdown, which I don’t believe is likely, SLC and LV seem like the best markets available to the B12 in the west. Denver makers sense geographically but UC just rejected them and nobody else would really bring the Denver market. BYU has religious and logistical issues, but I’m guessing those could be dealt with if there was a solid #12 option. I also expect BYU will eventually tweak their honor code to take away the largest political objection.
“Wouldn’t a move to the PAC be the likely alternative?”
The P12 is too snobbish about academics to accept UNLV any time soon and we know they’ll never take BYU for religious reasons. I agree they’d make better geographic sense out there but it seems logistically impossible.
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“The P12 is too snobbish about academics to accept UNLV any time soon and we know they’ll never take BYU…”
I was thinking from OU/UT perspective. If UNLV and BYU are the western B12 option, I’d guess that joining the PAC would look considerably better.
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ccrider55,
“I was thinking from OU/UT perspective. If UNLV and BYU are the western B12 option, I’d guess that joining the PAC would look considerably better.”
I just don’t see UT ever accepting a move elsewhere as long as they can be in the B12. They wouldn’t be the alpha dog in the P12 and TX wouldn’t be the center of the conference universe. Besides, the B12 pays better than the P12 already. I realize the P12 would get a big bump for adding UT, but UT already is as rich as they need to be thanks to the LHN. Maybe when that deal ends UT would look elsewhere, but I think they’d still prefer a TX-centric conference with some western additions to a western conference with only a couple of TX/plains teams.
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/ct-northwestern-no-friday-night-games-spt-0402-20170401-story.html
NW’s 2 Friday night games for this season have been shifted back to Saturday. There are still 6 Friday games on the schedule, but 1 is a road game and another is a Black Friday game which was covered under the old TV deal. No word on whether the B10 is giving up on the Friday games or just letting NW out of them.
Teddy Greenstein says NW complained and the B10 listened:
Fitzgerald has been strongly opposed to Friday games because they can detract from high school football and disrupt his players’ class and practice schedules. Many NU fans also were outspoken in their opposition, citing Friday work schedules, traffic and the inability to have enough time to tailgate.
The league listened, with a Big Ten source saying it heard from university leadership at Northwestern regarding all the “unintended consequences” that accompany Friday night games.
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http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/19067246/northwestern-friday-games-switched-saturdays
Here’s a little more info from ESPN.
The Big Ten plans to scale back its plans for Friday night football games moving forward after hearing from a long list of parties affected by the change.
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A conference official told ESPN on Monday that moving forward, the league is likely to scale back even further to two or three Friday night games after the opening week per year.
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The Big Ten official said that Fitzgerald was far from the only person who made an impact on their decision to move two of the Wildcats’ games from Friday to Saturday.
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The Big Ten has plans to bring its television partners together with many of its members and the high school athletic association directors from the 11 states within its footprint in the near future to discuss ways to mitigate the negative effects that playing on Fridays might have.
Outside of Labor Day weekend and Black Friday, the fewer the better.
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I could see it being managed to perhaps 2 Fridays in November, when there is less HS football inventory due to eliminations from state playoffs. But where (what state) in the B1G footprint would it hurt the least – which state(s) have the least interest in HS football (or competing interest from prep winter sports)?
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Presumably the hoops states (IN, IL, MD) would be the best candidates.
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-03-30/espn-has-seen-the-future-of-tv-and-they-re-not-really-into-it
ESPN has a different vision of the future of sports media than others. It’s a long piece and worth reading.
The executive consensus in Bristol is that the threat from cord cutting is greatly exaggerated. Although the audience for traditional satellite and cable is declining, there’s a raft of new services—including Google’s YouTube TV, Dish Network’s Sling TV, Sony’s PlayStation Vue, and a soon-to-be-launched one from Hulu—that are offering channel packages that look suspiciously like cable bundles, and that uniformly include ESPN. Aimed at millennials, these online services are designed for smartphones and devices such as Roku and AppleTV and cost from $20 to $50 a month. Even though these plans are cheaper than a traditional cable subscription, ESPN gets paid its usual $7 per subscriber by Google and the other newcomers, according to people with knowledge of the agreements. So far, more than a million subscribers have signed up, a figure not yet reflected in Nielsen data. “We think that this wave that we are seeing is really a signal of what is to come, and what the future will be,” Iger said on a February earnings call.
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Last August, Disney made a more dramatic move, paying $1 billion for a one-third stake in BAMTech, a streaming business spun off by Major League Baseball that specializes in distributing live events for sports leagues and other media companies. The same day, Disney said BAMTech would launch ESPN’s first standalone subscription service. The announcement, followed by MLB and Disney’s decision to hire Michael Paull, the former head of Amazon.com Inc.’s digital video unit, to oversee BAMTech, raised the prospect that ESPN would finally offer its flagship channel to customers outside a traditional cable bundle.
Although ESPN executives acknowledge that this could happen years from now if cable continues to decline, the plan for now is more modest. In February, Iger characterized the new service, which doesn’t yet have a name, as “an add-on or adjunct product that consumers can buy on top of what is their normal multichannel package.” Executives at both ESPN and MLB say the offering will likely include a mix of baseball and hockey games—though not the marquee matchups that appear on national telecasts today—as well as competitive video gaming, international sports such as cricket and rugby, and college football and basketball games from outside the major conferences. “I think it’s a learning exercise more than anything,” says BTIG’s Greenfield. “This is really them starting to learn the direct-to-consumer business and dealing with customer service, churn, retention, and marketing.”
If a combination of hockey, low-wattage college sports, and cricket doesn’t quite seem worthy of the Worldwide Leader in Sports, that’s by design: ESPN doesn’t want its new product to draw viewers away from its very profitable cable channel.
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http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/19074512/ncaa-announces-north-carolina-consideration-host-title-games-repeal-hb2
The NCAA has also caved and will allow NC to host championships again.
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Perhaps the NCAA did not cave. Perhaps the NCAA was waiting for anything that allowed it to reverse its position and this was enough.
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Jersey Bernie,
“Perhaps the NCAA did not cave. Perhaps the NCAA was waiting for anything that allowed it to reverse its position and this was enough.”
If you read the article, I summarized it accurately.
In its statement, the NCAA called the new law “far from perfect.” The NCAA didn’t lobby for a specific change in the law, but was hoping for a full repeal.
In the statement, the NCAA said: “In the end, a majority on the NCAA Board of Governors reluctantly voted to allow consideration of championship bids in North Carolina by our committees that are presently meeting. The NCAA championships previously awarded to North Carolina for 2017-18 will remain in the state.”
1. They were hoping for a full repeal and didn’t get it.
2. The NCAA says their members voted reluctantly in favor of allowing them.
The NCAA’s position on this may have been wrong (that’s a matter of opinion), but it hasn’t changed. They caved. Articles from last week said the NCAA had at least 4 problems with HB2 and the compromise fixed 2 or 3 of them.
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http://www.omaha.com/sports/shatel-if-when-wichita-state-kicks-off-mid-major-realignment/article_5759bc6e-fdd1-5542-a1b6-b3fbd08ac62b.html
Tom Shatel drops a Chip Brown style “stay tuned.” He’s still the worst.
The college sports world is preparing for another seismic shift. This one is titled “The Mid-Major Edition.”
Wichita State is expected to leave the Missouri Valley for the American Athletic Conference, possibly as soon as this spring.
That will send the dominoes flying, and one of the dominoes most mentioned is UNO.
Several sources in college sports say the Horizon League and Missouri Valley Conference could have interest in UNO.
If Wichita bolts, the Valley will be left scrambling. Valparaiso, a Horizon school, might be high on the Valley’s list of replacements. The Valley could also look at UNO, bringing the city of Omaha back into the league to fill the void left by Creighton.
Several sources say the Horizon League is looking to expand by two schools, and perhaps four. The reason: improving the league’s basketball profile but also providing more conference games and, thus, more home game revenue for members.
[snip]
Sources at UNO say the school is happy with the Summit. Another Summit member, Denver, is said to be coveted by the Horizon.
Stay tuned. Now that the Final Four is over, the action might just be starting.
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He could be right that a mid-major round of realignment is coming. The money differences between their leagues are smaller but more important.
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http://thecomeback.com/ncaa/wichita-state-american-aac-2017-2018-addition.html
More reports of Wichita State joining the AAC this fall.
This move makes all kinds of sense for Wichita State as it attempts to gain more respect nationwide. Despite having been a top program for years, the Shockers are overlooked by the rest of college basketball, and their soft conference schedule has led to them being criminally under-seeded—they were at top 10 team in KenPom this year but got a 10-seed in the NCAA Tournament.
Moreover, Wichita State spends like an AAC team, or even a power conference team. Backed by the billionaire Koch brothers, the team spends $6.9 million per year on basketball, according to data reported to the Department of Education. Top MVC rival Northern Iowa spends just $2.9 million per year.
The question is whether this will be worth it for the AAC. Wichita State is a good brand to have for basketball, but football and TV networks drive revenue, as the Big Ten and SEC have shown, and the Shockers don’t even have a football team. They’re also in the not-so-great TV market of Wichita, Kansas.
That has some fans of AAC schools puzzled.
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How has there baseball (Joe Carter among others – http://www.baseball-almanac.com/college/wichita_state_university_baseball_players.shtml), been lately? It doesnt hurt that they will now have recruiting touch in Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, Memphis, the I-4 corridor and SW Ohio.
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urbanleftbehind,
“How has there baseball (Joe Carter among others – http://www.baseball-almanac.com/college/wichita_state_university_baseball_players.shtml), been lately?”
Mediocre. From 1980-2009, WSU missed the NCAAs only 3 times. They’ve only gone once in 2010-2016. Their old coach retired in 2013 with a 0.735 W%. Their current guy is at 0.443.
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“The question is whether this will be worth it for the AAC. Wichita State is a good brand to have for basketball, but football and TV networks drive revenue, as the Big Ten and SEC have shown, and the Shockers don’t even have a football team. They’re also in the not-so-great TV market of Wichita, Kansas.”
But this is the AAC, not the Big Ten or the SEC … being a multi-bid Basketball conference is part of what sets them apart from the run-of-the-mill Go5 conferences. At the level of the AAC, a University is primarily funding sports as a part of their marketing budget, so the visibility of the American Conference name during the NCAA Tourney could well be something that matters to an AAC President, while it is something that would be taken for granted by one of the six Majors … and while last year they got 4 bids, this year they only got 2. With Wichita, they not only get an additional prospective at-large candidate, but the impact of a good Shockers team on their conference RPI might pull an AAC school from the wrong side of the bubble to the right side.
And the AAC is “in” a number of respectable sized markets already … what they may come up short is the marquee contests to drive interest IN those markets. Back before they dropped out of the ranks of the Majors, when they were chasing Boise States, it was not for the Boise market, if was for that kind “watchability”. This is a similar play, but in basketball.
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BruceMcF,
“But this is the AAC, not the Big Ten or the SEC … being a multi-bid Basketball conference is part of what sets them apart from the run-of-the-mill Go5 conferences. At the level of the AAC, a University is primarily funding sports as a part of their marketing budget, so the visibility of the American Conference name during the NCAA Tourney could well be something that matters to an AAC President, while it is something that would be taken for granted by one of the six Majors … and while last year they got 4 bids, this year they only got 2. With Wichita, they not only get an additional prospective at-large candidate, but the impact of a good Shockers team on their conference RPI might pull an AAC school from the wrong side of the bubble to the right side.”
We also shouldn’t neglect the value of an NCAA tournament share. Each share earned this year will pay out about $1.76M over the next 6 years. That’s about $150k per school in a 12-team league. The AAC only earned 3 this year, so adding WSU could make a significant financial difference for them.
“And the AAC is “in” a number of respectable sized markets already … what they may come up short is the marquee contests to drive interest IN those markets. Back before they dropped out of the ranks of the Majors, when they were chasing Boise States, it was not for the Boise market, if was for that kind “watchability”. This is a similar play, but in basketball.”
Good point.
There’s also some value in having 12 teams instead of 11 since the AAC didn’t play a full round robin anyway. An even number lets them have 6 conference games going instead of having to schedule byes or short turnarounds. If they are looking for a 12th member, who better than WSU?
The P5 and Ivy League are untouchable. The AAC is too far above many of the minor conferences to find anyone. Some just don’t make any geographic sense (MWC, WCC, etc). Others bring football problems (MAC, CUSA). That leaves the A10, Horizon and MVC as the most likely sources for #12. Out of those teams, which make the most sense for the AAC? WSU is pretty high on that list.
It could make geographic sense if they want to schedule with divisions or just travel partners (2 road games with limited travel between).
West – WSU/Tulsa, Tulane/Memphis, SMU/UH
East – UConn/Temple, ECU/UC, UCF/USF
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http://thecomeback.com/ncaa/showtime-baylor-scandal-dave-bliss-resigns.html
Dave Bliss resigned from his NAIA coaching job just days after a Showtime documentary about him and his scandal at Baylor aired.
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After a NCAA women’s final where we wee assured a first-time champion, we now have gone 12 straight NCAA men’s tourneys without a first-time winner (Florida in 2006). Sure would be nice to have a champ who isn’t one of the usual suspects, though I expect defenders of kings will gripe.
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I think many people were rooting for Gonzaga, but their center couldn’t buy a bucket. There just aren’t that many new winners available with a realistic chance.
P5 schools without one (44):
ACC – BC, Pitt, UVA, VT, WF, Clemson, GT, FSU, Miami, ND
B10 – IL, IA, MN, NE, NW, PSU, PU, RU
B12 – Baylor, UT, TT, TCU, OU, KSU, ISU, WV
P12 – UW, WSU, OrSU, Cal, USC, ASU, CO
SEC – UGA, TN, Vandy, SC, MO, AL, AU, LSU, MS, MsSU, TAMU
The only teams in the AP’s all-time top 25 without one: IL, ND, OU, IA, PU
You’d think IL, ND and PU would all win one eventually. Many of those P5 schools have been close a time or two. But the nature of MBB recruiting is that the few blue bloods dominate the blue chip players to such an extent that it’s rare for anyone to beat them.
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