Realignment: The Week Ahead

Update 9/19 @ 8:16 PM:


A few nuggets:


Oklahoma Board of Regents have formally authorized president David Boren to pursue any action necessary regarding conference alignment. Nothing surprising there. 


Big East will apparently hold Pitt (and presumably Syracuse) to its contract, meaning a June 2014 exit date (earliest). No word on whether Pitt could buy its way out to an earlier date. 


Mountain West and Conference-USA are discussing a merger.


Remnants of Big East likely to merge with remnants of Big 12. Both likely can't survive.


Posturing: Info from a few sources reiterates that the Pac 12 will not budge in its insistence that all third-tier revenues from networks be shared among all teams in the conference. OU insists that equal revenue sharing is the only way it would consider staying in Big 12. Not a great deal new there, but it does make one wonder....


Musing: If Texas has presumably been checkmated into an equal revenue sharing agreement no matter where they go, why would they not consider telling OU "okay, equal sharing, we stay if you stay," making OU and UT the kingpins of a dead-on-the-vine conference - a true "AL East" as postulated by Mark Cuban. Reality suggests that members of the presumably enlarged Pac 16 stand to earn as much as $35 million (nearly double) in an expanded conference, which would seemingly make that choice a near no-brainer. 


Right now, I still think it's the Gang of Four heading west after some saber-rattling, but we'll see.


Clarification 9/19 @ 1:53PM Oklahoma's Board of Regents meeting now. Alignment (way) down the agenda.


One item I wanted to clarify in the midst of the updates is the issue of OU's "invitation" (or lack thereof) to the Pac 12. I stand behind (several) local media member reports over the last two wweeks (and tweets) that stated quite plainly that Oklahoma has a standing, informal, "unofficial" agreement with the Pac 12 to join their conference with Oklahoma State regardless of Texas' action. I have read nothing to contradict that issue, not even spin from Orangebloods.com. 


This agreement, as best I can understand it, was worked out between OU Athletics Director Joe Castiglione and Pac 12 commissioner Larry Scott close to two weeks ago. When the agreement was reached, a local reporter said that "(Castiglione) looked the most relieved he'd been in weeks." 


Right now, Texas is the team with no leverage. None. No conference wants the Longhorn Network as it sits. Public posturing indicates Texas is trying to play a measure of hardball with LHN in its Pac 12 negotiations, when in reality playing that kind of poker with a handful of blank cards and no chips gives you very little room to raise the stakes. With no alternatives, Texas either goes independent, or accedes to Pac 12 rules. There's really no middle ground. While Oklahoma is patient and wants to create at least the appearance of unity with Texas, don't think for a second David Boren won't press forward independently in a heartbeat should he decide it is in OU's best interests to do so .


This week stands to be the biggest yet in the shifting tides of conference realignment.

Texas and Oklahoma's respective Boards of Regents will be meeting to empower their presidents to make a deal with whatever conference they deem appropriate. The current speculation is that both are headed to the Pac-12, but hurdles - perhaps significant - remain, chief among them the Longhorn Network and Texas' willingness to shrink it to Pac-12 rules. Another hurdle is whether conference presidents are willing to admit schools with supposedly secondary academic status, although it would seem commissioner Larry Scott should be able to overcome them.

The Pac-12 is showing no signs of budging on its network rules, with the WilmerReport suggesting that Missouri could be on the conference's radar should Texas not come to terms. That would implicitly imperil Tech's move as well.

The SEC is reported quietly looking to jump to 16 teams, reportedly likely to accept West Virginia's upcoming application. The ACC apparently also believes that they are also about to lose Florida State to the SEC as well, meaning a currently unknown 16th team is likely brewing in the SEC's radar.

Acrimony in the Big East came to a head with the sudden departure of Syracuse and Pitt, and now suggestions are that the conference may not survive. Remants of the Big 12 and the Big East may merge to form a new regional conference.

This week should prove to be most interesting. Stay tuned.

After all this, nothing??

Update 1:23 CDT Sat: Orangebloods.com is reporting that the P12 is telling OU and OSU they have no expansion plans at this time, spinning that as an end to the presumed Sooner option of the Pac 12. I cast great doubt on that spin. Of course Pac 12 wants no part of predator perception, and of course Texas wants to make OU think it has no options. That this story comes from a Texas Rivals site makes me all the more suspicious - of course it would be a willing "mouthpiece" for such a spin. Does anyone really, really believe the Pac 12 wouldn't take an OU if they became available? 


Saturday morning brings with it the hope of *actual* football, not merely the public bickering and rumoring over whose team belongs with which conference. Yet in the shadow of the goalposts does realignment loom, and while there's not a great deal of new news on that front, we can take a moment to see where we are, and make a subject-to-change conclusion:

Right now, I have this sinking feeling we may end up right where we are now, with no big realignment after all.

Why? Baylor continues to serve as the roadblock to Texas A&M's departure, refusing to waive its rights to sue both A&M and the SEC for tortious interference in its conference membership activities. Simply put, if no resolution to the Baylor Stalemate is found, there may be no other option for the Aggies but to return, hat-in-hand, to a crippled and self-mutilated Big 12. It's been said that A&M's move represents the first domino in realignment, but if it never falls...nothing else happens. Even if Oklahoma re-ups with the Big 12, allowing A&M to depart, the big four-team prize of OU, Oklahoma State, Texas, and Texas Tech to the Pac 12 would have inherently been blown apart, leaving the SEC looking for a 14th team that it might not grab until next season, willing to play an unbalanced schedule in the near-term.

The other thing pointing in the we-go-nowhere direction is T. Boone Pickens' comment on ESPN last Thursday that suggested the Pokes were interested in staying in the Big 12. That could be taken one of two ways: That some sort of agreement was nearly hammered out, or talks were in a last-gasp phase. It could be that Pickens is riding point for a behind-the-scenes negotiation between OU president David Boren and, well, the rest of college football.

To cap it off, Pac 12 commissioner Larry Scott came out last night stating he personally was against conference expansion. But you and I both know that if the SEC does, in fact, jump to a 13th, and 14th team, there's no way on earth his conference would stand pat and not respond.

There is obviously critical momentum riding decidedly against the Big 12's survival, chief among them being the question of how this fractious, embarrassed, dysfunctional conference family could ever reconstitute itself into a cohesive, respected, collegial athletic entity. Nationally, the conference is a laughingstock, a target of unrelenting media ridicule, with bridges burned between high-profile members. UT and A&M have never been so close to outright armed conflict. Oklahoma and Oklahoma State have expressed outright anger over apparent orchestrations from Baylor to put each, in their own way, in a bad light. With so much angst, how could anyone in this conference trust anyone else? And why would anyone on the outside want to join?

Regardless of the outcome, no one, repeat, no one looks worse or less competent in this fiasco than Dan Beebe who, besides carrying the title of worst sports leader this side of Bug Selig, has seemingly stood by and allowed the Big 12 to burn while he fiddles. Perhaps a "reincarnated" Big 12 could survive, but only if every vestige of Beebe's (lack of) leadership were vanquished from the books - as in new leadership, a new conference charter (with equal revenue sharing), even a new headquarters. How anyone nationally could perceive that as anything other than lipstick on a pig is beyond me.

Oklahoma still seems to hold the cards, but rest assured the Sooners won't make a move until the weekend passes, particularly considering this weekend includes services for its late, great Lee Roy Selmon. Until then, anyone - even yours truly - who says they know what happening is sniffing that smoke coming from that Big 12 fire.

And Dan Beebe is still fiddling.

Conference Shuffling 2011 - More Talk...

Update Saturday, 7:10 PM CDT: Orangebloods.com is now reporting that the remaining Big 12 AD's (minus A&M) have vowed solidarity to the conference. OU has supposedly said it is not interested in the SEC. If A&M leaves, the Big 12 would look to fill the vacancy, with a current short list of BYU, Air Force, Houston, or TCU. Now, how TCU would fit in the picture given their new alignment with the Big East is unexplained.

It looks like the crippled, castrated Big 12 is going to try and limp along as an embarrassing, 9-member remnant of college football that seems to be shifting around its members without touching them. Even if they pick-up a leftover from a middling conference as a 10th member, its a pitiful shadow of what it was just one season ago. It's amazing to me that programs the stature of Oklahoma or even Texas aren't making overtures to conferences that have something more credible than Dan Beebe as their leader.


Update Saturday, 5:03 PM CDT: CBS Sports' Gregg Doyel reports that Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, and two other "unnamed" Big 12 schools inquired of the Big 10 about joining their conference. They were declined due to their academic standing.

This continues to reflect the ongoing scramble for conference realignment with virtually all major sources concurring that A&M will leave the Big 12 for the SEC, and the SEC apparently soliciting several other schools as well.



Update Saturday, 9:30 AM CDT: BIG NEWS: ESPN's Doug Gottlieb is now reporting from his own sources that A&M will, in fact, join the SEC. That's not necessarily new news; however, the other element he is reporting IS big news: Reportedly, three NEW teams are planning the SEC jump, and they are Clemson, Florida State, and Missouri. With A&M and now Missouri departing, the Big 12 is a dead duck. The only question now, where will Oklahoma, Texas, and the rest of the Castrated 12 go? All bets look like the Pac 12 will be the winner. More as it happens!



Update 11:03 CDT....One fairly significant event to note - A&M has apparently scheduled a regents' meeting for Monday to discuss "all matters....relating to conference alignment." Florida State still officially denies they are being courted.


I still think the NCAA is going to have a finger in this, and try its darndest to stop any potential expansion. The threat superconferences pose to the NCAA is very real, but exactly how they can prevent them without some sort of leverage is hard to contemplate.


Rather than continually update yesterday's post about A&M, it seemed ripe to start fresh and evaluate where we are in the whirlwind of new conference realignment talks.

What do we know now? For concrete facts, very little. We have strong indications that Texas A&M will formally announce its intent to join the SEC on or about August 22, although there have been "non-denial denials" all over the place. I think this aspect, with details pending, is going to happen.

The next question I asked here is simple: Given that the SEC wouldn't be taking just one team, they'd take at least two, and maybe four, who was the next school on the SEC's list? Current reports and rumors strongly indicate that other school is Florida State. Supposedly, one insider at the athletic department of one current SEC school claims the conference is "confident" they will announce A&M and FSU as new members within the next two weeks.

That same source also indicates that the SEC might be emboldened to jump to superconference status by ramping up to 16 teams, possibly seeking Oklahoma and possibly Clemson.

If the SEC plans a chess move to a superconference, one has to wonder if the same anonymous "interested parties" that blocked the formation of the Pac 16 prserved what was left of the "Big" 12 would step in to prevent an "SEC 16?"

The NCAA wants no part of superconferences, for they fear the organization of an entity that jeopardizes their existence. It would not surprise me to find they were part of the "interested parties" that helped put the kibosh on the Big 12's split last year. If ESPN doesn't want to renegotiate its SEC deal and find its newly inked agreements with the BCS to be worth slightly less than the king's ransom they paid for it, it would seem logical they might use backdoor channels into the NCAA to solicit their assitance in stopping this iteration as well.

How? Stopping all the movement would presumably be simple - figure out a way to shut down the Longhorn Network, presumably the proverbial straw that broke A&M's back and led them to pursue the SEC. If the NCAA could apply pressure sufficient to force the Horns into shutting down their network before it started, A&M would have won the battle and the war. If the NCAA couldn't stop them, it would demonstrate just how serious a superconference threat would be to the NCAA's power and influence over college athletics.

How will it all shake out? At this point, who knows. COnventional wisdom holds that OU and Oklahoma State are tied at the hip, and would first want to head west to the Pac 12. OU wants no part of the SEC recruiting quagmire. Missouri has to be attractive to someone with its proximity to the St. Louis TV market, making a prospective Big 10 jump a very real possibility. Either way, it seems all-but impossible for what's left of the Big 12 to survive as a credible conference if A&M bolts.

Watch this space for updates as they come in!

Texas A&M to the SEC - Update

Update @ 9:13 PM CST: Sporting News is reporting that stories of A&M joining the SEC are "just not true." However, considering the other stories that have come out tonight, this "high ranking SEC" statement is consistent with what we've known - that there cannot be a formal announcement until August 22.

Moreover, the SN story quoted their source as saying that various other leaders within the conference must be contacted before a formal invitation could be extended, which makes perfect sense given the 11 days between now and the reported August 22 announcement date.

It's all still fluid, and could still go by the boards, but right now I still stand on the side of A&M leaving. I keep wondering if we're going to hear rumors about contingency plans for OU, Texas, and the rest of the "Not Even Close to 12" should the A&M defection happen. Stay tuned.


Update @ 8:03 PM CST: Lots of media rumors and stories, hard to separate original reporting from reports-on-other reports. Newest source of fairly reliable information is coming from Orangebloods.com, link here, which says that A&M regents will vote on an SEC membership issue on August 22, and nothing official can be discussed before then.

Now, obviously, all of this is very fluid, and tons of hype is flowing everywhere, so all of this is subject to change, but the rumbling continue to suggest that A&M really is going to the SEC.


Update @ 7:47 PM CST: According to the Texas A&M Rivals site, A&M is going to the SEC!!! I must admit that I'm stunned. Read their story here. If this proves true, it almost certainly spells the end of what's left of the Big 12, and who knows where the dominoes will fall. Only time will tell!!!

Rumors on the Internet are like flies around the tail of a Texas horse - frequent, annoying, and generally swatted away.

Yet one such rumor - that of Texas A&M moving to the SEC - was promoted to full-fledged credible gossip when A&M president R. Bowen Loftin issued a curious statement pledging that he will always "look after" the best interests of the University.

You can read the entirety of the quote here.

Rumors of A&M to the SEC started last year as talks of a mass migration of teams from the Big 12 to the Pac 10 gained steam. Just as the move seemed an inevitability, an eleventh-hour deal among "interested parties" funneled more revenue to the conference and putting the kibosh on the move. Now the talks are, supposedly, starting up again.

There's only one problem. The SEC isn't going to accept just one team. If the SEC is serious about inviting A&M, it makes sense they're just as serious about inviting another, as yet unnamed school to compliment the Aggies.

The question is simple: What other school is in the SEC's gunsites? The only two high-profile programs that would seem likely candidates from the remnants of the erstwhile Big 12 would be Texas and Oklahoma; yet Texas with its new Longhorn Network hardly seems a fit for the SEC and its new ESPN contract. Oklahoma could be a legitimate second candidate, but chances are the Sooners would not move without a package deal including Oklahoma State.

The bigger fish is out there. Common sense says it has to be, with A&M serving only as the lure. That means that, as the Aggies deal with the SEC, they would do well to tread very, very cautiously. Why? If the second team on the SEC's agenda falls through, prospective talks with the Aggies could end abruptly, leaving A&M nowhere to go but back to league it, apparently, desperately wants to leave.

Let the rumors fly.

Update: Some media outlets have pointed out that the ONLY place from which the A&M-to-the-SEC rumors seem to be originating is College Station. There's been no vibe or rumor from any SEC outlets or sources, which means this may all be nothing more than disgruntled saber rattling by the Aggies....and, as of 5:30pm CST Thursday, College Station continues to be the only place other than the media talking this issue...

Auburn: The Ecstasy and the Agony

Not quite seven months ago, Gene Chizik and the Auburn Tigers rode the Cam Newton Wave of Negative Publicity right into the BCS throneroom. Denying (or merely in denial) the rampant allegations that Newton's quarterback services were, essentially, auctioned off to the highest bidder, Auburn's powers-that-be made a decision that the opportunity for glory dwarfed the risk for scandal, and somehow (we leave the reader to fill in the details) persuaded Newton to head for the Tigers.

That was the Ecstasy.

Now, what stands to come is a long road of agony.

With the requisite caveats that nothing "official" has been proven, there's every reason to believe that an NCAA noose is heading Auburn's way. When the rumors of Newtongate first surfaced, some reports indicated that the mechanism Newton's inner circle allegedly used to solicit and receive payment also involved shady financial institutions and even casinos, all under scrutiny by federal officials. So abject was the scrutiny that the products of that federal probe supposedly even include recorded conversations that describe a vast array of corruption schemes. If those recordings truly exist, and if any of those schemes trace back to Auburn in general or Cam Newton in particular, prepare for the NCAA to send a punitive shock wave through the Tigers and college football.

Critics slammed the NCAA for its lack of aggressively pursuing and punishing Southern Cal for its involvement in a scheme to deliver improper benefits to Reggie Bush and his family. And the primary reason for that seeming distance was simple - the NCAA has no subpoena power to extract information from relevant players to prove their allegations. Investigators had to rely substantially on voluntary statements to reconstruct the web of deceit that led to one of the harshest penalties assessed on a football program since SMU received the death penalty some three decades ago.

But this Auburn case may prove to be drastically different, and that difference doesn't bode well for UA. The NCAA has been, in a word, petrified of the potential influence of organized crime and gambling into its sanctioned collegiate sports. The rumors of the mechanism that allegedly routed funds to Auburn football players include the alleged distribution of blank electronic funds cards from a casino, which the players could then take to the casino and cash in while leaving no trail. If that card scheme has drawn the attention of the federal government as a possible source of money laundering, and thus have conversations about its existence on wiretaps, the NCAA would, theoretically, have in its hand the smoking gun necessary to link casino gambling to a major college football team.

That's a recipe for a NCAA punishment hammer to come down on Auburn unlike any school before it. Under pressure to punish improper benefits, yet having scant evidence to punish some suspected offenders, the NCAA would be crazy not to make an example of Auburn if, in fact, the trail of hard evidence really leads to the Tigers' front door. And, of course, until the NCAA's knowledge is made public, everything remains "alleged."

Combine that with the fact that college oddsmaker Danny Sheridan came out this week with his own allegations that the Newton family employed a "bag man" to deliver the "winning" school's cash payment to Newton while giving the family plausible deniability, and further allege the system was apparently well established among recruiting circles, and it all starts to spell the beginning of what may be a very long, dark path for Auburn football.

Tis truly the Agony. And one will wonder if the Ecstasy will truly have been worth it - especially if the BCS title and Heisman trophy won as a result disappear from the record books.

And the rest of college football would do well to take notice.