The Athletic is reporting the details of the proposed PAC12 TV deal:
According to three people with knowledge of the terms, Apple offered the members a five-year deal with an annual base rate of $23 million per school (a subsequent counteroffer lifted it to $25 million), with incentives based on projected subscribers to a Pac-12 streaming product akin to Apple's MLS League Pass.
At 1.7 million subscribers, the per-school payout would match the $31.7 million average that Big 12 schools will reportedly receive from ESPN and Fox beginning in 2025. But Kliavkoff encouraged the room to think much bigger — at 5 million subscribers, the schools would eclipse $50 million per year, closer to the deep-pocketed SEC and Big Ten than the ACC or Big 12.
For those who don't have a subscription to The Athletic, here's one of their free podcasts about it.
There's a lot to discuss here:
- Oregon and Washington could have likely gotten just as much money in the PAC as they are getting in the B10 (reportedly $35-$40m), though it would not have been a guarantee. Disappointing to see. Seems to me like they weren't that interested in trying to make the P12 work.
- However, my understanding is that Larry Scotts's PAC-12 Network required all of the schools to own their broadcasting costs (unlike every other conference, which outsources this to ESPN/Fox/Whoever) - this resulted in significantly higher operating costs for P12 Athletic Departments, which likely drove them to be a bit more risk adverse. This was discussed a bit on a recent episode of Split Zone Duo.
- Maybe I'm biased due to my position in life/interests of my social circles, but I feel like 5m subscribers for a PAC12 league pass is quite attainable. I'd consider buying it, and I have no ties to the west coast; I just think the P12 is probably the most interesting conference to watch this year. If ESPN offered to trade us (The ACC) this deal for our current deal, I would jump at it.
- Ultimately, I think this signals that college sports are opposed to streaming - presidents/ADs are risk advers and more interested in guarantees than potential upside. Coaches seem convinced that streaming will hurt recruiting. As a cord cutter, someone who works in the tech sector, and someone who is interested in business of streaming, this is kind of disappointing.
Now that I've discussed the (mostly but not completely) unbiased reality, it's time for me to step up onto my soapbox:
- Living in Atlanta, I've always encountered a lot of self described "SEC Fans" - people who aren't a fan of any single team in the conference, but just care about the conference at large (or even people who will cheer for their conference rival to win OOC games). I've always scoffed at these people (and will continue to do so), but I get it... The SEC is a group of likeminded institutions, all in the southeast, most (not all) in the rural southeast. There's a culture that everyone in this part of the country understands (whether you like or support it is a different issue, but I digress). It is literally not possible to be a fan of the 'Big 10' - Culturally, there is nothing connecting Maryland, Iowa, and Oregon. (as an aside, I think this is the biggest challenge the ACC faces - the footprint is too large and culturally diverse, but again, I digress). The B10 used to be the conference of the midwest. That identity started dying just over a decade ago, but now it is completely dead. Not only has the B10 killed their identity, but they also killed the West Coast football fan. This was a murder-suicide.
- Not only did the B10 destroy themselves and P12, but they are also hurting the 12 team playoff before it even started. The whole point of the 12 team playoff is to be inclusive of the entire country. Initially, I was very much opposed to the 12 team playoff (if you saw any of comments here when it was initially announced, you know this), but I started coming around to it after the SEC acquisition of Texas/OU. Now I'm back to hating it more than ever before - if there's no west coast football conference, there's no way to insure the west coast is included each year. It defeats the whole purpose.
- 2023 is really the end of a era... It's the last year of:
- The PAC-12
- The 4-team playoff/NY6
- The 14-team SEC
- The 14-team B12
Finally, The Hill I Will Die On:
There's a lot of complaining about NIL/transfer portal hurting the sport. Any damage resulting from these rule changes PALES in comparison to the damage that realignment has done. There's one way out out of this: College football needs to secede from the NCAA, start their own league, with centralized and empowered leadership. As long as their are a handful of conferences, each acting with their own interests (not the interests of the athlete or the fan), this will fail.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk *steps off soap box, exits stage left*
Comments
The ACC network deal required significant outlay by the schools also. Each school had to create production space and hire new people to run production. So it's fairly common. Tech Athletics had to get a loan to do it fast enough from the academic side.
There's a huge difference between a one time cost to create facilities plus making some hires, and having to do EVERYTHING. The ACC Partnered with ESPN. The P12 was doing everything the ACC is doing AND everything ESPN was doing for us.
The conference realignment is going to pair with NIL in the future as the revenue gaps increase. There will be very minimal number of blue chip players who will be willing to play in a non P2 school due to the $$$ difference in NIL.
This just is not true. If you've been following Matt Brown's reporting on this, you understand that NIL and University athletics are two completely different fundraising arms; a lot of donors are not willing to move money to NIL. It's a big frustration for coaches/ADs.
Beyond that, NIL will be a thing of the past in the next half decade. With the Johnson case moving through the courts, the NLRB investigating college athletics, and the NCAA seeking an antitrust exemption; something will give, and athletes will likely get some form of employment status.
Here's a good twitter thread about all of this. Or you can peruse Matt Brown's newsletter, Extra Points.
Perhaps, but think about how all the money that was previously being donated to the athletic fund (large donors small donors etc) being told to donate toward NIL instead, since they'll have 40 mill more to play with from the conference that money can be directed to put in a different pot which would round about benefit the NIL funds
This is my thought as well. Although not all will be comfortable switching donations to NIL, there is a large portion of the $$ that is going to go directly to obtaining an even more elite roster than those folks already have
It's not just about being 'comfortable switching donations to NIL' (I presume you're talking about donors who thing college athletes should be amatuers)... there's a lot of aspects to it:
The assumption that every donor gives money because they want to further their team's potential for success is just not true. There are soooo many different motives for giving, and a lot of those just don't jive with the current structure of NIL.
While you are technically correct, I do think Matt Brown is missing some things here. I've spoked with some people inside a couple of Athletic departments in the ACC and they are saying that the reason the NIL deals are so big in the SEC and BIG is precisely because of the huge amount of $$ being poured into the athletic department from TV revenue. Many of the people within these athletic departments are encouraging their donors (large ones) to stop giving to the athletic department and give solely to NIL ventures.
So while those things are separate, they are intricately tied together.... I think I understand what you are saying...
He addresses that straight on in that thread I shared.
Also, I think you have the cause and effect backwards... the schools with robust NIL programs tended to have a robust bagman culture beforehand (SMU, TCU, Miami, FSU, etc). Those programs also always had plenty of traditional boosters too.
I don't disagree. I'm just putting out there what is being said inside athletic departments of the ACC.
Quite frankly, I don't blame them for not wanting to make the P12 work. That conference was always going to be dying on the vine. Better to get out of it and secure your spot at the table than to see that through. Going down with the ship might be honorable, but you're still dead.
Likewise, I really do hope VT is having as many conversations behind the scenes as we can to make sure either the Big Ten or SEC are going to bring us in when the ACC inevitably collapses. We aren't going to be the ones to break up this conference, but I sure as hell hope we have enough foresight to make sure we aren't caught with our pants down when it happens. The good news is that there appears to be plenty of smoke to suggest we have plans in place in case that does happen.
I don't 'blame them' for wanting to go to the B10. What I 'blame' OU/UW for is trying to maintain this image that they are pro-west-coast-football, and that they have no option but to go elsewhere.
I'd rather you be unapologetic (like OU/TX and the SEC) than two-faced (like OU/UW and the B10).
Well not only did they jump to the Big 10 but they'll be receiving a half share for 7 years, which very likely is only barely more than what they would have made in the PAC. With added travel and basically losing access to the playoff, the move really doesn't make much sense in the short term or medium term imo. (It seems to e a purely reactive move based on the repeated narrative that this was "inevitable".)
7 years from now Phil Knight probably isn't around anymore, and they get a full share of the new TV deal then you benefit from it, but you throw away likely a couple playoff spots and have to compete at a heavy disadvantage in your own league for the better part of a decade
Unless I'm misunderstanding something, the PAC 12 media deal was like $21m per. They're still making way more in the B1G than PAC
$21m per was guaranteed. The total number relied a lot on subscribers.
From OP:
For context, Apple's MLS League Pass has about 1 million subscribers. That's nationwide, not just on the West Coast.
College football is obviously more popular than MLS, but is Washington State football more popular? What about Cal or Oregon State football? Are there that many Stanford alums that will buy that package, especially if it is only for football and doesn't include all of the other sports that they excel at?
How likely is it that the Pac12 (without USC and UCLA) could get almost twice as many people to sign up for an added package on a streaming service that most people don't have? The vast majority of fans still watch CFB on "cable". Casual fans aren't going to go that extra step for Cal vs WSU. It's hard to plan financially around that kind of uncertainty and to rely on pie in the sky incentives.
I 100% understand why Oregon and Washington rejected that much uncertainty and risk in favor of a more "stable" opportunity with more guaranteed money.
Source? Everything I've heard says it starts at a half share and climbs annually.
Okay as far as I see it's 50% share plus $1 mil extra per year till the end of the 7 years. So final year will be a 50% share + $6 mil, that's slightly better but still significantly less than everyone else.
https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/oregon-washington-join-b...
Also the article indicates extra travel expenses could be around $10 mil per year for all sports combined
Seems like UW and Ore just weren't that interested in staying in the Pac12 (now Pac4)
You know what's funny. Back when we lived in Washington, I'd complain and gripe about having to drive an hour to get to Seattle to watch huskies games. Now I live in Ohio, and with Uw Joining the Big10, ... I'll have to drive an hour to Columbus to watch the Huskies play when they come to town. Lol
Agree with your thoughts regarding the cultural identity of the SEC vs Big Ten, ACC. The ACC has just felt like a Frankenstein conference of sorts since the expansion with Syracuse and Pitt and addition of ND as an associate. You have the original Tobacco Road basketball schools who feel it is their league and should be basketball-centric, larger state schools more oriented toward football (Clemson, VT, FSU), small private schools in the NE like BC and Syracuse, and so on. It retrospect it's always been weird because there is no real cohesion or identity there for the most part. The SEC schools are all completely aligned culturally and all-in on football, protecting those traditions and rivalries. This is why I am hopeful that their potential future expansion will continue to be regional and based in the southern footprint - i.e. VA and NC. We obviously don't know what is going to happen moving forward, but if VT has a shot at the P2, I really hope it is in the SEC. I just don't think the sense of geographic rivalries and traditions will be the same in the Big Ten, whereas I think games like VT/Tennessee, VT/South Carolina, VT/Kentucky etc. could blossom into great matchups.
VT's fit in SEC is much better, and certainly better for me, personally. I would go to most of our away games at USC and UGA if that happened. Knoxville and both Alabama teams would also be viable away game options.
That said, I would gladly take landing in either of the P2.
Agree - I would take a seat with either, but strongly prefer SEC. I feel like we would be an afterthought in the Big Ten honestly. With the SEC, like them or not, they do a great job of hyping up all of their teams and the various rivalries and pageantry. I think they would embrace what VT brings to the table moreso than the B1G.
I also feel like the SEC shield would give us an enormous recruiting advantage in our footprint. I feel like players go to Penn State and Ohio State because of the programs, not the Big Ten. Recruits go to SEC schools because it is the best football league without question and viewed as where the best talent goes to compete.
100% - The Athletic also did a piece on this recently. Being one of the northernmost SEC teams makes us instantly attractive to anyone who wants the prestige of the SEC, but does not want to live in the deep south for 3-5 years.
This is something I've discussed plenty of times in different places. The appeal of the SEC is that even on a mid or lower-tier SEC team you are guaranteed multiple exciting games every season. You don't need to make the playoff to experience the best of college football if you're already in the SEC, but now with the 12 team playoff you're more likely to MAKE the playoff if you punch up one season.
Let's take a look at Ole Miss 2023 SEC schedule:
@ Alabama in front of 101k fans
LSU at home
Arkansas at home
@ Auburn in front of 87k fans
@ Vandy, which means a weekend in Nashville and will be very friendly to your team in terms of numbers
A&M at home
@ UGA in front of 93k fans
@ Miss ST. Rivalry game with unique cowbell atmosphere in front of 61k
As a player, that's a super exciting year of football, and if you go somewhere between 6-6 and 8-4, who cares? You still played in all these huge games against big teams on national television. Bright lights, lots of viewers, big game atmospheres.
Also....
If we go to the SEC, I could see a need for us to expand Lane to around 80k, if not more, for a variety of reasons. First of all, I think there would be a much higher demand for visiting tickets, and we'd be dumb to not try and capitalize on that. But mainly, our enrollment is close to doubling what it was 20 years ago, and we're going to rapidly approach the point where we have more alumni with the means to come to games will exist than seats in the stadium. As long as the team isn't dogshit levels of bad, our demand very well could surpass supply even in down years.
I think we need to sell out Lane for a couple of years reliably again before the BoV even entertains this notion. The only option left is the North student stands and then we have to relocate one of the largest billboards in the nation.
Schools are reducing capacity not increasing. Maybe adding 10,000 if we close in the entire stadium and add more luxury seating but can't see getting to 80k.
Here is the most recent data I found on SEC stadium capacity. I don't think we would need to add, but we would be on the smaller side for the conference.
LINK
Could not agree more. The national championship is truly only realistic for a handful of schools to compete for annually. VT to the SEC would cement our place in the top league of college football, and I think we could recruit well enough in our footprint to be competitive long-term. We wouldn't be a Vandy - we have a strong football culture, atmosphere, and fan base. As you mention a 6-6 to 8-4 season in the SEC with occasional chances to punch through and be in the playoff mix with a thrilling slate of games every year keeping us in the conversation would be great.
Being the most northern SEC school will do wonders for our recruiting. Us and Penn State would dominate the mid-atlantic.
So you're saying we're nearing the end of the Articles of Confederation phase and we need a collegiate football constitutional convention
Yes, and I even considered including that exact comment in my post.
But, that leadership needs to be independent of the NCAA. Football is so different from every other college sport. You could make an argument that Men's Basketball and Women's tennis have more in common that Football and Men's basketball.
At this point it is almost a requirement to keep it from being a non-stop sequence of cannibalizing events.
ACC leaders are supposedly meeting today to possibly add the final four PAC schools. My concern here is whether adding them punches a hole in the GoR that would allow FSU or any others a way to leave. Going to be interested to see what happens.
I am very much in favor of this not happening UNLESS it somehow induces Notre Dame that it's time to join the ACC football conference, and Stanford is a yearly opponent.
I was thinking ND as well and then I put myself in their AD's shoes - under no circumstance am I tossing my independence and lucrative TV contract. If anything the instability of the conferences has given ND even more reason to remain independent. I dont see how they come out in a better position by changing their conference status and football independence. Maybe swap the ACC for the Big10 (or whatever they are going to call themselves), but never lose that independent contract for football.
more concerning to me than that, is what it will do to the revenue sharing. We'll be adding 4 schools that sure as hell won't be adding enough value for our revenue splits to go up. Doing that would only do additional damage to an already damaged league - further cementing our place at the bottom of the totem pole. If the ACC picks up the 4 scraps of the PAC, teams like FSU, Clemson, VT are going to get EVEN LESS money and be even more pissed off than we are right now. It would be a bad move, IMO. The ACC just needs to sit tight and wait for the inevitable death of the league. I hope it happens sooner than later. I'm encouraged by the B1G adding two more teams to get to 18. Because I think that is a weird number and they're likely headed for 20 or 24 long term. I think the SEC is going to have to respond to that type of growth and if that means at least another 6 teams need to be taken by the P2 there may be a little bit of collusion to get at least half of the ACC teams solid landing spots so they all leave the conference at once and dissolve the GOR. In that scenario, I like VT's odds at getting into the SEC.
I also wonder if some behind-the-scenes conversations have been happening between ESPN and the SEC/ACC. ESPN has the media rights to both leagues - why not work out some sort of deal to get the top brands over to the SEC and totally lock the Big Ten (and maybe more importantly from ESPN's perspective - Fox) out of the southern footprint to combat future expansion that way? The remaining ACC schools could be moved over to the Big 12 (thinking Pitt/Louisville in particular). Adding the Pac 4 who are obviously the lowest tier in a failed media deal would just be an absolute disaster.
My biggest concern is that it ups the number of dissenters needed to dissolve the conference from 8 schools to 10. If we add these 4, it'll do next to nothing to increase annual tv revenues, it'll significantly increase travel costs (you damn well know the ACC will fuck us over in this regard) and it'll make it damn near impossible for any of us to get out of this before 2036.
Fuck this shit.
I can think of a pile of schools who see increasing the number of votes for dissolution as a feature not a bug. If your ship is going down and you don't have a life vest or access to a life boat, you're going to spend all your energy plugging holes and pumping water and you're going to make as many hands stay on the ship and help even if it's a losing battle.
If you believe the reports that there are currently upwards of 7 schools who are looking to get out, there are more schools who don't want to increase the number of votes to dissolution than who would be in favor of it.
Would make any attempt to expand the conference.... difficult
"Looking to get out" does not mean having a surefire landing place. The school presidents/ADs have to weigh if it's better to lock everyone in rather than risk being one of the schools who thought they had an invite to the P2, but was sorely mistaken. Last time they were in this position, what they came up with was the GoR, which was the "safe" plan. It's not insane to think that a majority would opt for the "safe" route again when staring down being dumped into CUSA, Sunbelt, or whatever other G5 league will take them.
don't look now, but the CUSA and Sunbelt might actually be better conferences than the ACC...
I can't imagine they do this. I just don't understand how this does anything other than marginally increase revenue.
the revenue increase would have to be more than "marginal" for it to make any sense. It's just going to make each slice that every team in the league gets a little bit smaller.
That's what I'm saying - let's say ACC schools make about $35m each, and these school bring $40mil of additional value each. That's an extra $1.1m per current ACC School... that does nothing to get us closer to the SEC/B10.
That's a big "if".
They definitely don't but you don't have to give them $40 million either. They get peanuts in the Mountain West or current PAC setup. They would probably come to the ACC for $10-12 million. (Personally I believe that's what we should be paying Boston College and Wake etc while investing in our top 8 programs that are actually trying to win at football.)
I am definitely not saying we should do it but I can see where the math might make sense if (and only if) you bid them down and squeeze every bit of value out of them to add to our current pool (also still a better situation for them than the current one).
I might offer both Stanford and Cal; and maybe SMU. Would depend on how much additional revenue it would generate for ACCN (TX and CA become footprint $). Those markets could make the 2026 look-in a lot more interesting.
Roger Goodell on line #1
I'm not so sure about this. Right now, the NFL very much benefits from the current system by basically having a free minor league for their teams in the form of NCAA football. Does the NFL want to create a true minor league system? Basically I guess that is what the XFL and USFL has been trying to do on their own but the profits have not really been there. I think the NFL more than anything wants NCAA football to stay the way it is now, and keep providing them with developed players and weeding out the guys who are not going to make it.
Absolutely. Reap all of the benefits of having college football with zero competition or cost.
NFL has tried multiple affiliations but absolutely does not want a minor league that they are beholden to. It works in other sports because the facilities and the number of people required is significantly less than football. The other aspect NFL doesn't want to be on the hook for is medical, as significant injuries are much more common and with longer term impacts as other sports.
I absolutely understand that perspective. But the NFL loves money above all else. I dont know that they'll do this or what the cost/benefit analysis is - i just know that college football is already their minor league farm system, there's relatively little they would need to do other than create a shell corporation to replace the NCAA with limited (if any) liability directly associated with the NFL.
I just hope VT isn't left like Steven Glansberg wondering WTF happened.
I for one can't wait until the 24 team SEC and the 24 team B1G merge and the Big Eleventy becomes reality.
I said it earlier....
I imagine the SEC and Big Ten will split away from everything else and rebrand themselves to be something like the "Collegiate National League" and the "Collegiate American League" or something like that, with each dividing itself into 2 12 team conferences, each comprised of two 6 team divisions. From there, you get a very logical playoff that would closely resemble what you have with the NFL and bam. The money making potential of collegiate sports is fully realized while at the same time reaching its natural end state of completely neutering everything that was once good about it in order to satisfy that corporate greed.
See I totally disagree with this. A superleague of the top 60+ you could convince me, but when you start getting in the 30-40 team range you're alienating too much of the national audience. If VT is left out in the cold would you still watch SEC and Big 10 games? I sure as hell wouldn't. This consolidation will only hurt "helmet game" ratings and the profitability of the sport in the long run imo. Where as adding more seats at the table and growing mid sized programs while also growing the sport promises more long term gains for all involved. My two cents
YES! I came here to post the same thought haha 🤣
That would be so shit
Amazing thread from a UM board member:
Is there anyway to read this without a twitter account or have Joe and Elon Musk attended the same seminar?
https://threadreaderapp.com/
But you have to sign up, and I can't do that from work. (Not signing up with my work email.)
It's not twitter anymore. It's "X." As in, Ex-, like, former. The social media network you used to use but got all crazy on you so you don't even answer her texts anymore.
Another tremendous piece by Matt Brown explains how the P12 crumbled
SBJ reporting P12 leadership turned down a 'significant' package the prior year.
So much blame to go around here
hubris is a helluva drug
AOL says "hi".
I think everyone is missing the most important issue with all this conference realignment...IS THIS GOING TO DELAY THE RELEASE OF NCAA 24?! Those poor coders...
Do I have some good news for you!
Haha, what if it's only SEC and B10? You know the premier conferences.
Pisses me off so much. They were not even that much better than us before the most recent round of expansion
Exactly, ACC simply has been out maneuvered. GOR is keeping us from evolving.
Na, the ACC and SEC are the top two conferences just ask ESPN
so, blame Fox?
It's always the networks to blame for conference realignment. They want more ad revenue so they're pushing conferences to poach big programs for more helmet games.
There's so much blame to go around:
Honestly, Larry Scott is probably most to blame here (for the P12 falling off), but there is more than enough blame to go around. Yes, blame the networks, but also blame the school presidents who knowingly and willingly collaborated with networks time and time and time again.
My understanding is that ESPN gave the PAC12 a fair offer last year at this time and the Presidents turned it down to chase big money. At which point, FOX and ESPN walked away and left Apple to make a lowball as the only game in town.
Correct
Kind of old news at this point, but big oooof
LOL, They wanted to be #3 in payment with number 6 performance. Pretty sure the PAC12 has underperformed the ACC by far for the last decade. They should have taken the 30, Apple's offer was lower partially because they were the only game in town this year.
Related:
So the academics killed sports in the PAC 12
Weird that a single professor would wield so much influence on a conference negotiation. I guess it was what Kliavkoff wanted to hear.
Let's be honest, it could have been an USC or Oregon professor and he figured their value was 50 million. He neglected to say the rest of the schools weren't worth jack.
Confirmation Bias'll really get after ya.
Smart money would have been to seek out an outside evaluation. But, the PAC showed they were not smart about money.
Seattle Times did a public records request, and got their hands on text messages between university presidents, B10 presidents, and Kliakov during the final 24 hours before the PAC12 died. It's a pretty interesting read.
Link Here
Which is pretty much how most things fall apart.
Phillips, you watching?