Big Ten makes initial offer to Big 12 pair
The Big Ten Conference has extended initial offers to join the league to four universities including Missouri and Nebraska from the Big 12, according to multiple sources close to the negotiations.
While nothing can be approved until the Big Ten presidents and chancellors meet the first week of June in Chicago, the league has informed the two Big 12 schools, Notre Dame and Rutgers that it would like to have them join. It is not yet clear whether the Big Ten will expand to 14 or 16 teams but sources indicated Missouri and Nebraska are invited in either scenario. Notre Dame has repeatedly declined the opportunity to join the Big Ten. If Notre Dame remains independent, Rutgers would be the 14th team. The Big Ten would then decide whether to stop at 14 or extend offers to two other schools. If Notre Dame joins, sources say an offer will be extended to one other school* making it a 16-team league.
In order for the University of Missouri to join the Big Ten, the Missouri Board of Regents will still have to approve the move. Sources close to the governing body say the Big Ten has told officials that Mizzou could add $1.3 million per month in revenue to the lucrative Big Ten Television Network. The Big Ten Network is currently offered on basic cable to very few of over 7 million residents living in Missouri television markets and adding it throughout the state will be a windfall for the conference.
Big Ten representatives have also told Missouri officials they would like to have the entire expansion process wrapped up this summer with a formal announcement coming no later than July.
The University of Missouri is currently under contract with the Big 12 conference and will have to pay a stiff penalty to leave the Big 12. The Big 12 charter states any member will lose between 50 and 100 percent of its shared annual revenue depending on the length of notice any school gives. According to published reports, Missouri receives around $9 million annually in shared football revenue from the Big 12. According to sources, it seems likely Missouri would give one- year notice. It is projected that Missouri's football revenues would increase by $10 million or more per year when it joins the Big Ten versus what it currently receives in the Big 12.
*My guess is that the other school is
Pittsburgh.
This is the first real nudge; the first push toward tectonic conference realignment. So how will the dominoes fall...? And how will the shifting plates ultimately affect the college football landscape?
My [
extremely educated and well-read] guesses as of now:
1) Mizzou and Rutgers want to join the Big Ten. Openly. They'll both eagerly, greedily, and immediately accept their invitations, and the Big Ten Network (henceforth known as the "BTN") will grow into the rich Missouri and New York media markets.
2) Nebraska doesn't want to leave Texas behind. But the grass is much greener in the Big Ten. They'll drag their feet a bit, but the Huskers will join Mizzou and Rutgers.
3) Notre Dame is the key. They make $15mil/year from their ongoing NBC deal. The Big Ten can offer at least $22mil, and probably much more, via the BTN. The Irish will join the Big Ten, finally, after many, many, many long decades of holding out. And the BTN will be on basic cable in almost every home in the US. $$$ $$$ $$$ $$$ $$$ Dollar, dollar bills yo.
4) Poised at 15 teams, the Big Ten will add one more school -- Pitt -- to round out their conference at 16. The first SUPERCONFERENCE is born. (Sorry WAC, but your 16-team conference doesn't count. And Big East, nice try, but we're talking about football here.)
5) Not to be outdone by Jim Delaney and the Big Ten/Sixteen, Mike Slive will quickly move to expand his SEC to 16 teams. Invitations will be sent to Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State, as a four-school package deal built around the Texas superpower.
6) Texas is the biggest crown jewel in all of this assorted conference expansion and realignment business, probably even bigger than Notre Dame. But if the Longhorns are stubborn and decide to try to hold the Big 12 together, it would really surprise me. I think they will lead their quartet into the SEC to form SUPERCONFERENCE #2, leaving behind the poor crippled remains of the Big 12 -- K-State, Iowa State, Colorado, Kansas, Texas Tech, and Baylor.
7) Larry Scott, the commissioner of the Pac-10, has been eyeballing expansion just as Delaney has. The major difference is that the Pac-10 doesn't have the BTN or the SEC's cache, and thus, doesn't have the big money to throw around in its expansion bid. Wanting to expand gently and gracefully, the Pac-10 decides to add two schools to get to 12, the NCAA's minimum for a lucrative championship game in football. The Big 12's demise is the Pac-10's gain, as the conference cherry picks Colorado. To land #12, they raid the Mountain West and invite Utah to the fold. Both schools accept the Pac-10/12's advances happily, eyelids batting.
8) The Big East is damaged by the defections of Rutgers and Pitt, but the conference is not dead. In fact, the Big East has weathered worse storms than this. They just need two football-playing schools to replace the two they lost to the Big Ten/Sixteen, to have a chance to defend their conference BCS auto-bid. Keeping in mind that basketball runs the conference now, the Big East identifies Memphis as its primary target. Needing an 8th team for football, the Big East carefully weighs the pros and cons of Temple (for the basketball tradition), ECU (for relatively strong football), and UCF (for an increased toehold in the Florida media market)... and eventually opts to invite Temple back into the conference. Memphis and Temple join the Big East, mitigating the football loss and completely overcoming the basketball loss. Say what you will, but the Big East are a bunch of
survivors.
9) The ACC stands strong, unscathed by all of the commotion in the conferences around them. (However, if Texas spurns the SEC's overtures, Miami, Florida State, Georgia Tech, and Clemson could end up receiving invitations... which I think could be cataclysmic for the ACC. I'm not too worried about that right now, because I think Texas will go to the SEC. It makes too much sense for the Longhorns.)
10) The five remnants of the picked-clean Big 12 will pull together and issue strong invitations to the best the Mountain West, WAC, and C-USA have to offer, in an effort to outclass the new-look Big East and save their BCS auto-bid. How about TCU, BYU, Boise State, Fresno State, Houston, UNLV, and Nevada joining with Kansas State, Iowa State, Kansas, Texas Tech, and Baylor in the NEW Big 12? Not too shabby, and not bad at basketball, either.
11) What's left of the Mountain West joins back together with what's left of the WAC to form the West Coast Unwanted Conference -- WCUC.
(I don't actually think it will be named that.)11) As the dust settles, we're left with two SUPERCONFERENCES: The Big Sixteen and the SEC, two strong 12-team conferences next in the pecking order: the ACC and the Pac-12, two decent third-tier conferences: the Big East and the NEW Big 12, and a handful of lesser conferences: C-USA, the MAC, the Sun Belt, and WCUC.
That's what, if I had to wager, I think will happen. It's a little bit out on a limb, but I can really see the dominoes fall in that way.
But what if one of two things happen:
A) Texas rejects the SEC, and Slive then comes after Miami, Florida State, Georgia Tech, and Clemson? Would the ACC be content to go back to eight teams, lose its championship game, and potentially lose its BCS auto-bid? Not likely.
B) Texas goes to the SEC, but John Swofford and the ACC decide they too want to expand to 16 teams and forge the third SUPERCONFERENCE?
Either way, the ACC would need to add four new schools to the fold. My guesses for those schools are ECU, UConn, Syracuse... and West Virginia. Maybe Louisville. Maybe UCF.
Hang on for dear life, college football fans. It's going to be a wild ride.
