Conference Realignment, Naming Rights, Financing

#127      
Population (proxy for TV markets)

South Carolina 5 M (why Clemson ACC does not move the needle for B10)
Virgina 8 M - UVA ACC
N Carolina 11 M - UNC ACC
Florida 23 M - Florida SEC FSU ACC
Texas 30 M - TAM SEC UT SEC

If there was a dominant college football program for San Francisco metro B10 would be on it but Cal Berkley and Stanford don't draw enough fans.
fyi...your overall point stands on market size for Florida & Texas...diving a bit deeper into this, Clemson to Charlotte ~ same distance as Charlotte to UNC & Clemson has a significant pull in Charlotte...so I think in Market, Clemson is much closer to UNC than these numbers show. & UNC just isn't a football school, the state is very split between State, UNC, Clemson in southwest, & VA tech, ECU, & App, Duke, Wake to a lesser degree. I also think Virginia is way overrated by state population, VA TECH pulls in more revenue than VA in charts a few pages back & DC market is pretty split. UNC & VA bring some school swag, & some basketball, but both are overrated as football adds, IMO
 
#128      
fyi...your overall point stands on market size for Florida & Texas...diving a bit deeper into this, Clemson to Charlotte ~ same distance as Charlotte to UNC & Clemson has a significant pull in Charlotte...so I think in Market, Clemson is much closer to UNC than these numbers show. & UNC just isn't a football school, the state is very split between State, UNC, Clemson in southwest, & VA tech, ECU, & App, Duke, Wake to a lesser degree. I also think Virginia is way overrated by state population, VA TECH pulls in more revenue than VA in charts a few pages back & DC market is pretty split. UNC & VA bring some school swag, & some basketball, but both are overrated as football adds, IMO
Guys, we need to quit thinking about markets when talking about realignment. This isn't the 2010s where the B1G wants to get into new markets so they can get B1G Network carriage fees from the TV providers.

The value of each program is their individual brands, and how many eyeballs they bring to nationally televised games on B1Gs current (and potential future) TV partners and their paid streaming services. It doesn't matter if UNC or Clemson have a bigger pull in Charlotte, or Virginia's state population ... what matters is which will bring more viewers across the US, so that the B1G can negotiate for a higher contract from ESPN/NBC/ABC/Hulu/Apple. The B1G is thinking about what football brands will help NBC sell more Peacock subscriptions, basically.

The conference just added two programs from the LA market instead of only adding one and bringing a San Francisco market team. The LA programs both were better brands, so we ended up with UCLA and USC instead of one of them + Stanford or Cal as an example of how markets don't matter at all in this modern realignment environment.
 
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#129      
Guys, we need to quit thinking about markets when talking about realignment. This isn't the 2010s where the B1G wants to get into new markets so they can get B1G Network carriage fees from the TV providers.

The value of each program is their individual brands, and how many eyeballs they bring to nationally televised games on B1Gs current (and potential future) TV partners and their paid streaming services. It doesn't matter if UNC or Clemson have a bigger pull in Charlotte, or Virginia's state population ... what matters is which will bring more viewers across the US, so that the B1G can negotiate for a higher contract from ESPN/NBC/ABC/Hulu/Apple. The B1G is thinking about what football brands will help NBC sell more Peacock subscriptions, basically.

The conference just added two programs from the LA market instead of only adding one and bringing a San Francisco market team. The LA programs both were better brands, so we ended up with UCLA and USC instead of one of them + Stanford or Cal as an example of how markets don't matter at all in this modern realignment environment.
Value of Markets for carrier fees are shrinking, but it isn't insignificant & personally I think it is overstated as a long term trend.

https://awfulannouncing.com/ncaa/adding-usc-and-ucla-could-be-huge-for-big-ten-network.html

Markets are also representative of upside of the brand, look at some of fighter's comments on Illinois, which i agree with...we have more market value & potential than we have football brand. It also helps build the existing brands by increasing total exposure.

I'm not sure where recruiting falls in the mix since short term it doesn't buy any extra TV money in itself, but long term adding football rich markets like Texas/Florida should appeal to the rest of the big 10 that is trying to increase the overall talent levels and will help build and maintain long term
 
#130      
Value of Markets for carrier fees are shrinking, but it isn't insignificant & personally I think it is overstated as a long term trend.

https://awfulannouncing.com/ncaa/adding-usc-and-ucla-could-be-huge-for-big-ten-network.html

Markets are also representative of upside of the brand, look at some of fighter's comments on Illinois, which i agree with...we have more market value & potential than we have football brand. It also helps build the existing brands by increasing total exposure.

I'm not sure where recruiting falls in the mix since short term it doesn't buy any extra TV money in itself, but long term adding football rich markets like Texas/Florida should appeal to the rest of the big 10 that is trying to increase the overall talent levels and will help build and maintain long term
Thanks for that, that really puts into perspective how little the carriage fees matter nowadays -- entering the 2nd largest media market is only going to net $18 million incremental dollars, while the media rights deal is bringing in $1+ billion a year to the league.

At the end of the day, to me 2020s realignment was about being able to offer a full slate of high value inventory each week in order to maximize offers from potential TV/media partners. I believe having multiple games each week with potentially ranked teams facing off (ie, Oregon vs Penn State) is more valuable than two major media markets (ie, Rutgers vs. Northwestern).

It'll be interesting what drives the next round ... will it be about out maneuvering the SEC to lock in their potential targets, even if they don't bring positive incremental value to the B1G? Take on more teams so the cumulative power of the conference is higher than other conferences, even if it lowers the per school payout? Will basketball factor in more to the perceived value equation (hello Kansas)? Or will conference try to shed dead weight to prepare for an inevitable break away from the NCAA (this probably would be the break away; the high value brands leaving the B1G/SEC to form a non-NCAA sanctioned football super conference)?
 
#132      
Last fall Peacock was a pixilated mess, bad enough I wouldn’t watch it for free.

I've had no issues with Peacock and I've been a subscriber since NBC started moving EPL matches to Peacock (2020). I have an excellent broadband connection (AT&T fiber), so perhaps that's a factor.
 
#134      
I was watching The Illini Guys on youtube . He was interviewing Loren Tate

Tate said unequivocally he knows for a fact that Texas A&M has been in discussions with the B1G about potentially joining for over 6 months . tifwiw . He said A&M does not want to be in UT’s shadow in the SEC.

Tate also said he heard B1G presidents , right now , are against FSU joining due to academics . This explains FSU starting the process of AAU affiliation .
 
#135      
Tate also said he heard B1G presidents , right now , are against FSU joining due to academics . This explains FSU starting the process of AAU affiliation .
I don't doubt this but it's easy to be against it when you don't have an actual decision to make. When the time comes to pull the trigger, there will hand wringing and maybe even a little wailing, but FSU will be coming to the B1G, IMO.
 
#136      
Last fall Peacock was a pixilated mess, bad enough I wouldn’t watch it for free.
No problems with PeaCock here - in fact it is also my main streaming source for movies and so forth. Sorry you had issues.
 
#137      
I was watching The Illini Guys on youtube . He was interviewing Loren Tate

Tate said unequivocally he knows for a fact that Texas A&M has been in discussions with the B1G about potentially joining for over 6 months . tifwiw . He said A&M does not want to be in UT’s shadow in the SEC.

Tate also said he heard B1G presidents , right now , are against FSU joining due to academics . This explains FSU starting the process of AAU affiliation .

I've no doubt the Presidents have reservations. But at the end of the day, Fox and the BIG are running this show. As long as FSU has a legit plan to attain AAU status, the Presidents will acquiesce.

19/20: FSU and A&M
 
#139      
I've no doubt the Presidents have reservations. But at the end of the day, Fox and the BIG are running this show. As long as FSU has a legit plan to attain AAU status, the Presidents will acquiesce.

19/20: FSU and A&M
I agree . FSU is already doing what is necessary - applying for AAU membership .
 
#143      
#145      
the day is coming fairly soon when we will play 12 games with all of them being in conference.
it would be wise if the people in charge have the schedule be like the NFL's where its somewhat dependent on the W-L record the previous year. Teams that do well in year 1 play a harder schedule than teams that don't.

Getting viewers to the TV sets on prime time national slots is radically increased when those teams are both ranked in the top 20
 
#147      
Farewell Big 10 or Big 14 or whatever forever. Not at all interested in USC, UCLA, Washington or Oregon. Go away. They're already taking up too much space on BTN. ILLINI football highlights soon to be extinct. I still miss the University of Chicago Maroons and Alonzo Stagg. (Got neat info about Red Grange versus Maroons; may provide. But I kinda think there isn't much demand.)
 
#149      
Thanks for that, that really puts into perspective how little the carriage fees matter nowadays -- entering the 2nd largest media market is only going to net $18 million incremental dollars, while the media rights deal is bringing in $1+ billion a year to the league.
just for clarity...the 18 million is just carrier fees for BTN...doesn't include any of the fox sports carrier fees that are usually packaged with BTN. If you use the ratio estimate from the article of fox's bundled total of $1.86 with BTN accounting for $0.49 >Fox would be making $68 million more in carrier fees.. no idea if that is a valid comparison, my guess is FOX doesn't get as much % bang as BTN. However, there are also some conservative numbers in the 18 million estimate for BTN money. But BTN money is basically mostly the leftover games that the networks didn't want & has never been the big money in the media deal.
At the end of the day, to me 2020s realignment was about being able to offer a full slate of high value inventory each week in order to maximize offers from potential TV/media partners. I believe having multiple games each week with potentially ranked teams facing off (ie, Oregon vs Penn State) is more valuable than two major media markets (ie, Rutgers vs. Northwestern).
Don't disagree at all that inventory is the most important. Just think that B1G has done a great job at maximizing revenue in all aspects & being able to get TV sets in California watching more games has a value to the networks as well.

It'll be interesting what drives the next round ... will it be about out maneuvering the SEC to lock in their potential targets, even if they don't bring positive incremental value to the B1G? Take on more teams so the cumulative power of the conference is higher than other conferences, even if it lowers the per school payout? Will basketball factor in more to the perceived value equation (hello Kansas)? Or will conference try to shed dead weight to prepare for an inevitable break away from the NCAA (this probably would be the break away; the high value brands leaving the B1G/SEC to form a non-NCAA sanctioned football super conference)?
personally, I think we get very picky at this point, we have maximized prime time TV spots by dividing packages between FOX, NBC, ABC, more teams mean you push current games down tiers where there is less money to be made when divided on a per school basis. The only school out there that brings a TV slot with it is ND. I think FSU & Texas A&M bring brands & market size, at this point I think it will take both to move the needle
 
#150      
the schools that eventually might get left out without a home in this next round are UNC & UVa
I could see that as well, especially VA when they don't even outdraw VA Tech in their home state & MD already giving the B1G a presence in DC area. UNC football ~= NC State Football; but the dollars behind UNC is definitely greater & UNC certainly brings some basketball value. But with Media rights deals going up not sure the academic value of UNC doesn't get undermined by the lack of football revenue/clout.
 
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