DRC: Report -- C-USA's presidents to hear realignment proposal

[El Paso Eagle]

If Memphis leaves and then perhaps SMU, Tulane, or Tulsa (sad to say) head to the MWC, what's left of the AAC is not in much of a position to dictate. They might invite UAD and a couple of the Belt schools, but Who knows how that works. The Belt has 3 programs that seem to have leverage; Louisiana, App State, and Costal.  App has shown the ability to maintain a program, but with Louisiana and Costa you run the risk of fall off when, not if, their current coaches leave. With Costal also keep in mind their all time record attendance is less than 16K

[El Paso Eagle]

1 minute ago, ColoradoEagle said:

If it were just a matter of moving from one to the other, you're most likely right. The fact that there is $15 million involved ($5m CUSA exit fee, $10m AAC entrance) is what complicates everything. Even if the AAC were to waive its $10m entrance, there's still $5m exit that I'd wager most schools don't have just laying around. Especially after 2020.

Judy feels like she has leverage, and that's why you're seeing this. Whether she actually does or not...who knows.

5 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

I guarantee the AAC could extend an invite to any C-USA school they want, and every one would jump immediately.    Why bust the whole thing up when you could just take the cream of C-USA's crop?  Or, *gasp*, SBC?

We have to stop thinking of the AAC with the leverage it has today. When the dust settles everything will be different. Yes everyone, including UNT would probably jump, but the Big 12 is not finished. Lets sat they end up taking Memphis and SMU along with Cincinnati and Houston. And if they don't take SMU but still take UCF (for example) then SMU probably heads west along with Tulsa or Tulane.

[keith]

30 minutes ago, ColoradoEagle said:

The letter...

 

WTH is this "time of great national uncertainty" everyone seems to want to use as an excuse for everything?  

[MeanGreenTexan]

2 minutes ago, El Paso Eagle said:

We have to stop thinking of the AAC with the leverage it has today. When the dust settles everything will be different. Yes everyone, including UNT would probably jump, but the Big 12 is not finished. Lets sat they end up taking Memphis and SMU along with Cincinnati and Houston. And if they don't take SMU but still take UCF (for example) then SMU probably heads west along with Tulsa or Tulane.

This is why I think NT should be more proactive in petitioning the MWC instead of trying this BS.  Need to beat SMU to the punch.  I think the MWC would rather have them than us, but as of now, I don't think SMU is ready to jump.   I mean, how awful would it be if it were SMU & UTSA that head West?

[El Paso Eagle]

8 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

This is why I think NT should be more proactive in petitioning the MWC instead of trying this BS.  Need to beat SMU to the punch.  I think the MWC would rather have them than us, but as of now, I don't think SMU is ready to jump.   I mean, how awful would it be if it were SMU & UTSA that head West?

100% Agree. With our luck we make it to the AAC just to see it go away like CUSA when we left the Belt

Edited October 12, 2021 by El Paso Eagle

[outoftown]

On 10/12/2021 at 10:40 PM, ColoradoEagle said:

If it were just a matter of moving from one to the other, you're most likely right. The fact that there is $15 million involved ($5m CUSA exit fee, $10m AAC entrance) is what complicates everything. Even if the AAC were to waive its $10m entrance, there's still $5m exit that I'd wager most schools don't have just laying around. Especially after 2020.

Judy feels like she has leverage, and that's why you're seeing this. Whether she actually does or not...who knows.

I have been wondering about the entrance fees. Something tells me that the AAC will have to lower this or wave it for most of their prospective members. NT has more money than most schools they might invite, and NT still will have to do a number of phone calls to get there.

Edited October 15, 2021 by outoftown

[El Paso Eagle]

11 minutes ago, MeanGreenTexan said:

This is why I think NT should be more proactive in petitioning the MWC instead of trying this BS.  Need to beat SMU to the punch.  I think the MWC would rather have them than us, but as of now, I don't think SMU is ready to jump.   I mean, how awful would it be if it were SMU & UTSA that head West?

The first this that comes to mind

 

[Wag Tag]

Unless you are going to a P5, why would anybody pay an exit fee and an entrance fee to a G5 conference? Consolidation probably mitigates all fees.

[wardly]

56 minutes ago, ColoradoEagle said:

It makes sense for the AAC if they're unable to get new schools to join, which seems to be where we're at. As it stands, they are no longer an FBS conference after 2022-2023. 

The AAC was unable to get MWC programs to jump. They probably have a waiting list around the block from CUSA and SBC schools seeking admission. After they poach from both of those conferences later this month CUSA and the SBC may be more amenable to working together. Assuming the CUSA and SBC are left with a total of  20 programs after being plucked it might make sense to do some horse trading. The fly in the ointment is the contempt LA. Tech. has for ULM. You could work around this issue if the Bulldogs stayed in CUSA and War Hawks in the SBC. I think 10 schools in the east would have an easier time getting together than 10 in the west, primarily because of the distance to UTEP from anywhere. However until the AAC makes its move its just guess and by golly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Arkstfan]

19 hours ago, Mike Jackson said:

This is the truth.  Now if people aren’t concerned about fans dedicated enough to get on a plane to watch an away game, I don’t know what to tell them.  Charter travel is better for the athletes but the longer travel times still matter.  Top recruits with serious aspirations to play professional it might not matter but if I am advising my son or daughter I make sure they take conference travel into consideration.  For football it’s no big deal though unless it’s a week day game.

Thing is most G5’s aren’t chartering flights for men’s and women’s hoops or volleyball etc.

[Arkstfan]

36 minutes ago, meangreenbob said:

If America continues on it’s path towards Socialism, eroding more and more of our freedoms, we won’t have to worry about conference realignment. Football will become irrelevant. 

With gas, housing and food prices soaring regional conferences are the only way to prolong the inevitable. Going West is a death sentence.  

Bite the bullet and start a new conference with regional teams then enjoy it for what it is, football.  Time is of the essence. 

I’d say in athletics, socialism has worked remarkably well for the NFL and NBA.

[Arkstfan]

19 hours ago, denton_days said:

I fly boston-austin all the time. it's like a 30/45 minute difference, based on how fast the pilot is. We have to fly west anyways if we fly out to florida for a game in C-USA. We'd go east to get to florida, and west to get back.

Cute.

There’s a difference flying from the Central time zone to the Mountain and Pacific, except for Las Vegas which is usually really reasonable except around Christmas.

[Arkstfan]

10 hours ago, keith said:

I think the presidents of C-USA hearing this "proposal" is hilarious and the click-bait DRC headline is misleading.  C-USA isn't hearing a "proposal" from anyone.  They are hearing their own realignment idea.  Something I'm sure they paid big bucks for but could have gotten for free by reading any number of college football message boards including this one.  C-USA floated this idea to the other requisite participants of this proposal and they have apparently already said no, so what's the point for the presidents of C-USA to hear their own proposal that is already dead in the water?     

There is a saying I like and try to remind myself of it at times.

”If only we could see ourselves as others see us.”

Some need that worse than others, like the folks in Ruston.

What CUSA paid for was to have one of the most successful Commissioners of the modern era look at the G5 landscape tell the presidents what they are viewed as by someone who started the realignment frenzy, the guy who started the conference network frenzy, the guy who make the B1G incredibly wealthy and forced others to keep up, something only SEC has managed to do. OU and Texas aren’t headed to SEC but for the things he set in motion.

And when you look at the G5 from the viewpoint of schools that are (mostly) receiving more applications than they could ever admit, operating on $100 million plus athletic budgets and have programs the vacuum up the greatest high school players, leaving others to seek diamonds in the rough is a different viewpoint.

The 33 or so schools in G5 that aren’t in the MAC and aren’t in MWC look pretty fungible from that angle. The media rights potential of any combination of 9-16 of those schools isn’t going to look like much.

What does look sensible when you approach it from the point of view is organizing around the most possible nearby games and putting the media rights into a 30+ team bundle where there is some leverage.

I don’t think there are many presidents willing to see themselves that way, I know few fans are. 

But it’s an idea that works in theory, makes a lot of sense in theory. Reality is the decision-makers are not going to admit that from a media rights perspective there is more out there by ignoring the human instinct to form small tribes rather than work cooperatively across a larger group.

[Cougar King]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA 

 

Thank God we got away from this shitshow. Every school involved in this might as well drop down to FCS if this proposal were to be accepted.

[Wag Tag]

26 minutes ago, Cougar King said:

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA 

 

Thank God we got away from this shitshow. Every school involved in this might as well drop down to FCS if this proposal were to be accepted.

At least we still have your interest. Must be others!

[Arkstfan]

45 minutes ago, Cougar King said:

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA 

 

Thank God we got away from this shitshow. Every school involved in this might as well drop down to FCS if this proposal were to be accepted.

That last sentence is just silly and smells vaguely of being pulled from a colon.

[denton_days]

58 minutes ago, Arkstfan said:

Cute.

There’s a difference flying from the Central time zone to the Mountain and Pacific, except for Las Vegas which is usually really reasonable except around Christmas.

what difference? Are you talking plane tickets? It's so cheap to fly out of DFW towards Denver (CSU & AF), Salt Lake City (Utah), and Las Vegas (UNLV) - like 70 dollars a ticket. I was responding to how long it takes to fly. Looking it up, Dallas to San Francisco is 4 hours, and it's 3:30 to get back. Think that could be our farthest possible game (outside Hawaii, obviously). It's a 30 minute difference. I was being generous with my 45 minute estimation. Maybe you're aware of something else that makes it difficult, but there's plenty of flights that go where we need to go, and are not significantly longer to take heading west. 

[UNTLifer]

18 hours ago, Arkstfan said:

I’d say in athletics, socialism has worked remarkably well for the NFL and NBA.

Too bad we can't say the same regarding running countries, but that is another subject.

[Mike Jackson]

On 10/11/2021 at 10:56 PM, El Paso Eagle said:

Hawaii has 15 players from Texas. Guess they didn't worry about the traveling 😈😇 

I am assuming you are talking about Football.  The travel is way more taxing on the students for other sports.  Also who passes up a full ride to Hawaii is more attractive than any G5 school in the state except maybe Rice and that is strictly for the academics.

[Tom McKrackin]

32 minutes ago, Mike Jackson said:

I am assuming you are talking about Football.

Mike I respect you as a board member here but dammit, of course he was talking about football as it is the most important endeavor of any program at UNT right now.  We have to be careful about these decision or we will be another University of (who gives a shit) Texas at Dallas or UTA.

[Mike Jackson]

7 hours ago, Tom McKrackin said:

Mike I respect you as a board member here but dammit, of course he was talking about football as it is the most important endeavor of any program at UNT right now.  We have to be careful about these decision or we will be another University of (who gives a shit) Texas at Dallas or UTA.

Making a conference move strictly for football has a potential to be disastrous for the athletic department as a whole.  And moving to the MWC without travel partners would be that kind of move. 

[Arkstfan]

9 hours ago, Tom McKrackin said:

Mike I respect you as a board member here but dammit, of course he was talking about football as it is the most important endeavor of any program at UNT right now.  We have to be careful about these decision or we will be another University of (who gives a shit) Texas at Dallas or UTA.

You can’t have FBS football without sponsorship of another 15 sports. They are part of football existing and their costs matter. 

[keith]

So it's been a few days since "the letter."  Has there been any...any...response from the AAC either formally or informally?  Have they replied with something like, "thank you for your interest in the AAC and potential reorganization opportunities.  We'd be happy to engage in discussions with you along these lines, blah, blah, blah."  Or have they just ignored it completely?  

[MeanGreenTexan]

12 minutes ago, keith said:

So it's been a few days since "the letter."  Has there been any...any...response from the AAC either formally or informally?  Have they replied with something like, "thank you for your interest in the AAC and potential reorganization opportunities.  We'd be happy to engage in discussions with you along these lines, blah, blah, blah."  Or have they just ignored it completely?  

https://www.smudailycampus.com/sports/aac-commissioner-mike-aresco-responds-to-c-usa-letter-realignment-and-murky-future-for-conference

[DeepGreen]

20 minutes ago, keith said:

So it's been a few days since "the letter."  Has there been any...any...response from the AAC either formally or informally?  Have they replied with something like, "thank you for your interest in the AAC and potential reorganization opportunities.  We'd be happy to engage in discussions with you along these lines, blah, blah, blah."  Or have they just ignored it completely?  

Yes they have.