I hope this justifies a new thread. Politicians....guess it was bound to happen.
Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush Push for Stanford, SMU to ACC
My thoughts:
The B12 beat us to the punch on the most practical expansion candidates. Adding only 2 Western schools to the ACC is ridiculous. I see only one chance that ACC expansion could work, ASSUMING it would force a new TV contract:
Take advantage of the offers from the added schools to accept initially reduced pay outs, and go BIG: 20-24 teams in pods, rotate playing the other pods or better, pair other pod opponents matching last year's final ranking to produce more equal/interesting games. Pay an adjustment to every team based on scheduled miles traveled. Rename to the All Coastal Conference.
24 (6 pods) adds 4 states and 10 TV markets.
20 (4 pods) adds 2 states and 6 TV markets (Eliminate strike-throughs, move FSU & Miami to Central division)
Pods are geographic based: this maintains/establishes rivalries, fills stadiums, and lessens travel.
The cross-pod NC schools or other old rivalries can be maintained using OOC game slots.
West: Washington State, Oregon State, Cal, Stanford, Fresno, San Diego State
Central: SMU, UTSA, Tulane, Memphis, Louisville, GT
South: FSU, Clemson, NCSU, UNC, UVA, VT
Privates: Syracuse, BC, Pitt, Duke, WF, Miami
My color coding didn't make it thru the CSV-to-html conversion process.
My scoring is oversimplified, the average of the Aug 2023 Massey CFB Ranking and the Neilson primary TV market Ranking.
| Conf. | University | Score | CFB Rank | Private | South | Central | West | ACC | 210 TV Designated Market Areas (DMAs) | TV Rank | Private | South | Central | West |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AVERAGE | 47.0 | 51.1 | 51.6 | 47.5 | 50.7 | 54.7 | 42.8 | 34.7 | 72.7 | 32.0 | 32.0 | |||
| None | ND | 8.5 | 14 | Chicago (#3) | 3 | |||||||||
| Pac12 | Oregon St | 20.0 | 18 | 18 | Portland, OR (#22) | 22 | 22 | |||||||
| 22.5 | 8 | 8 | Clemson | Greenville-Spartanburg-Asheville-Anderson (#37) | 37 | 37 | ||||||||
| 26.5 | 27 | 27 | Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh (#26) | 26 | 26 | ||||||||
| B12 | UCF | 27.5 | 38 | Orlando-Daytona Beach-Melbourne (#17) | 17 | |||||||||
| AAC | SMU | 32.5 | 60 | 60 | Dallas-Fort Worth (#5) | 5 | 5 | |||||||
| 32.0 | 41 | 41 | NCSU | Raleigh-Durham (Fayetteville) (#23) | 23 | 23 | ||||||||
| 33.5 | 44 | 44 | UNC | Raleigh-Durham (Fayetteville) (#23) | 23 | 23 | ||||||||
| 34.0 | 45 | 45 | Duke | Raleigh-Durham (Fayetteville) (#23) | 23 | 23 | ||||||||
| AAC | Tulane | 38.0 | 26 | 26 | New Orleans (#50) | 50 | 50 | |||||||
| 38.5 | 29 | 29 | 29 | Louisville | Louisville (#48) | 48 | 48 | |||||||
| AAC | UTSA | 38.5 | 46 | 46 | San Antonio (#31) | 31 | 31 | |||||||
| Pac12 | Cal | 40.0 | 70 | 70 | San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose (#10) | 10 | 10 | |||||||
| 42.5 | 67 | 67 | Miami | Miami-Fort Lauderdale (#18) | 18 | 18 | ||||||||
| 42.5 | 38 | 38 | WF | Greensboro-High Point-Winston-Salem (#47) | 47 | 47 | ||||||||
| 44.0 | 82 | 82 | GT | Atlanta (#6) | 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| CUSA | WKU | 45.5 | 64 | Nashville (#27) | 27 | |||||||||
| AAC | Navy | 46.5 | 85 | Washington, D.C. (Hagerstown) (#8) | 8 | |||||||||
| MW | San Jose St | 50.5 | 91 | San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose (#10) | 10 | |||||||||
| MW | Fresno | 51.5 | 50 | 50 | Fresno-Visalia (#53) | 53 | 53 | |||||||
| MW | SD St | 53.0 | 76 | 76 | San Diego (#30) | 30 | 30 | |||||||
| Pac12 | Stanford | 53.0 | 96 | 96 | San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose (#10) | 10 | 10 | |||||||
| 53.5 | 98 | 98 | BC | Boston (Manchester) (#9) | 9 | 9 | ||||||||
| AAC | Memphis | 56.5 | 61 | 61 | Memphis (#52) | 52 | 52 | |||||||
| AAC | Temple | 58.5 | 113 | Philadelphia (#4) | 4 | |||||||||
| Pac12 | Washington St | 59.0 | 51 | Spokane (#67) | 67 | 67 | ||||||||
| 60.5 | 16 | 16 | 18 | FSU | Tallahassee-Thomasville (#105) | 105 | 105 | |||||||
| AAC | Rice | 60.5 | 114 | Houston (#7) | 7 | |||||||||
| AAC | UAB | 61.5 | 78 | Birmingham (Anniston and Tuscaloosa) (#45) | 45 | |||||||||
| SBC | S.Alabama | 62.0 | 66 | Mobile-Pensacola (Fort Walton Beach) (#58) | 58 | |||||||||
| AAC | USF | 66.5 | 120 | Tampa-St. Petersburg (Sarasota) (#13) | 13 | |||||||||
| 71.0 | 57 | 57 | Syracuse | Syracuse (#85) | 85 | 85 | ||||||||
| SBC | Marshall | 72.0 | 65 | Charleston-Huntington (#79) | 79 | |||||||||
| None | Uconn | 72.5 | 111 | Hartford & New Haven (#34) | 34 | |||||||||
| 80.0 | 89 | 89 | VT | Roanoke-Lynchburg (#71) | 71 | 71 | ||||||||
| SBC | ULL | 83.5 | 72 | Baton Rouge (#95) | 95 | |||||||||
| SBC | Troy | 85.0 | 49 | Montgomery-Selma (#121) | 121 | |||||||||
| SBC | S.Miss | 131.0 | 94 | Hattiesburg-Laurel (#168) | 168 | |||||||||
| 132.0 | 87 | 87 | UVA | Charlottesville (#177) | 177 | 177 |
Comments
They better do it fast or it will be a moot conversation with this looming...
If this happens would the PAC leadership remain intact? Doesn't seem smart to dissolve the conference that still exists.
They are keeping the PAC as that has the playoff entry and history. That said, I hope the AAC presidents move in and say all you PAC12 admin are fired for incompetence.
You could drop Rice and North Texas and have a stronger conference
but fewer coffee cup jokes
Bring it on! The people demand the Big Bad
That's an interesting Pac18...
Gonna be fun watching ECU win the PAC18 title, smh
Say what you will about the Grant of Rights, but it sure does seem like it is working as planned by keeping the ACC intact (whether we like it or not).
There's that inflection point where handcuffs go from being a good idea to being a really, really bad idea.
you speaking from experience?
This is so, so, so dumb.
I am not taking conference realignment advice from two people with a demonstrated catastrophic lack of understanding of geography.
IYKYK
Apparently Cal/Stanford/SMU -> ACC is back on the table:
It's disappointing to me that VT is a yes vote.
Timmy Sands loves him some Berkeley I guess. Hope we don't add, just makes no sense.
From what I understand that's not a sure thing. They never took a vote earlier, they know there is a small subset of schools who absolutely want them (Wake, Duke, BC, etc) and the known subset of schools who do not (FSU, Clemson, UNC, NCSU). Everyone else is an unknown as their intentions haven't really been made clear because they never needed to, however I did see a bunch of smoke around that time that VT would have voted no if it went to a main vote.
This is my understanding as well
Guess they'll rename it the CCC, Coast to Coast Conference. /s
All Coast Conference? That way you don't have to change the logos, they can save that money and use it to buy FSU some new diapers since they keep filling them. I mean, Texas is a gulf coast state.
Add a college in Alaska and we can have the Every Coast Conference
No one on the Indian Ocean. Need to outsource one school to India.
Do we need someplace in Antarctica? When I grew up, we only had 4 oceans and Pluto was still a planet.
Living in Raleigh and seeing what is happening to some of the surrounding areas, like Morrisville, I think NC State is a great candidate for a satellite campus in Bangalore/Bangaluru.
I agree. Huge Indian presence around here.
Not strictly related to this round of expansion, but it just dawned on me that we're not playing Miami this year for the first time in 31 years. The most consistently exciting game on our schedule over that time period, but thank god we're able to keep that BC game, and now potentially trips to Dallas and SF. Also goes to show how much football has fallen off the radar, or at least my radar, that it took this long for me to realize that.
We got absolutely hosed when the pods were setup. Louisville got our pod...
oh come on. Name a more iconic football pairing than Louisville and Georgia Tech. After all, the schools have similar focuses, have played each other yearly for decades, and even have similar names. And Virginia? Come on. Cardinal fans have that one circled on their calendar every year. Lastly, Miami. For the first decade after ACC expansion, the game between Louisville and Miami basically determined the Coastal Champion, even the ACC Champion that first year.
Yeah, someone totally swapped their talking points with ours.
of course we did. Because VT has been the ACC's red-headed step child since 2004. The league shits on VT at every opportunity and we should be the first ones scratching at the door to get out. I guarantee you if Cal and Stanford are added to the league they'll find a way to pair VT up with one or both of them just to fuck us.
Meh, Louisville and VT got swapped. Its pretty clear when looking at the rivals that what we have was made for them and what they have was made for us. And it was swapped. Given the ESPN piece last week, I almost guarantee that we asked for it thinking it would help on the short term having absolutely zero clue that it would erode and destroy the main rivalries we have built up over the past 18 years in this conference.
I just don't see it. How are Pitt and Wake Forest rivals to Louisville? Or, UVA even?
Also, why on earth would anyone in our AD think that Pitt and Wake would be better for us to play against than GT and Miami, for any amount of time?
Travel distance. Again, penny wise and pound foolish.
In that case you'd think Duke or UNC would make more sense than Pittsburgh
Their dance cards were already full by the time they got to VTs matchups.
Meh, at this point in the ACC clown show, I'd be more likely to accept that it was a clerical error and by the time they figured it out, they'd already published too much marketing material commissioned from someone's cousin in Chapel Hill to walk it back. #goACC
probably NOT Napoleon
I hate to say it, but this is a fair point. It does feel kind of like the ACC is run by a bunch of brainless dweebs with fake degrees
i thought our group was pitt, wake, and loluva?
i hate this new format, trying to be too cute. go back to divisions
It is- and I am super sure that the ACC braintrust didn't get us and louisville (UVA, Miami, FSU) mixed up and just said screw it... nahhhh.
It is, just a theory out there that Louisville and VT's pods got swapped (UL has GT, Miami, and UVA which are the three rivals we should have had) because Miami didn't want to play us regularly anymore and it was too much work to retool the whole schedule so they just swapped UL and VT.
Or Whit punted that call to Ballein and he likes Wake or something. The damn VT pod makes zero sense other wise.
I've heard the same, but that it was because VT wanted the easiest path to the ACCCG.
Either way, it sucks.
LOL- so they asked to be in a pod with a program they can never beat. Brilliant. Pitt dominates VT more than anyone else in the league. lmao.
Yeah supposedly they're in. Sounds like either NC State or Carolina flipped to yes.
I really, really, hope not. Just one entry changes the majority needed to dissolve the ACC from 8 to 9. All three, now we need 10 teams. I don't want the ACC to fail, but I want the option available before 2036.
These new teams don't bring enough to the table to offset them coming in. Yeah, big money initially on savings, but an additional 4 million (2 assigned for travel) isn't a lot in big picture. Not to mention that 4 million is going to go down every year when Stanford, Cal, and SMU start getting bigger shares. Unless they never get full shares, eventually we are looking at losing money with the increased travel costs.
I sincerely hope you are wrong. Not because of you. Because of what it will mean for the ACC and for VT. It's not going to be good.
It's already not good. This is the ACC schools doing the best they can with the cards they've been dealt.
I totally agree that it's already not good. But doing something like this is absolutely not better. Especially for VT. Chances are HIGH that VT will be paired with one or both of the California schools so any potential financial benefit that VT MIGHT get from the deal is going to be completely negated by travel costs for all the sports teams that have to travel out to California each (or every other) year. It will be a net loss for VT and does very little to move the needle in terms of the ACC's standing as a conference. The "financial models" that these presidents are looking at are probably showing that there is a net benefit to the league as a whole, at least in the short term, but I imagine that it's relative peanuts in the grand scheme of things and someone (historically, likely VT) is going to get screwed.
VT's new pod in a few years after expansion: Cal, Stanford, BC lol
would not shock me
I think doing the best with the cards is folding on Cal, and Stanford at a minimum and making SMU agree to never more than a 40% payout.
This is the ACC feeling like it has to do something, because doing nothing looks weak, but the only thing they could think to do is stupid.
So we're not weak, we're stupid. Go ACC!
Sounds like every move the ACC has made since adding BC.
Well if those schools are in, then the ACC takes the lead in the Electoral College race with 255.
It does mean that there will be an ACC school in the five most populated, and 7 of the 10 most populated states in the Union.
Source?
Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick Big on Adding Stanford/Cal to ACC
"Swarbrick went on the Dan Patrick Show on Wednesday, speaking about conference realignment as a, "complete disaster." He said that Notre Dame is putting a lot of work into getting both Stanford and Cal into the ACC."
ND's AD is campaigning for this, but still obtuse over ND joining as a full member says a lot about his tone deafness
The only thing that makes sense about this is it makes ND more money if it happens and whether ND gets into ACC or not. He wants the win, win.
I think the only motivations behind ND pushing for this expansion are 1) it gives them one of their traditional rivals in Stanford as a part of the ACC scheduling rotation, so more flexibility for them and 2) secures a continuing place to park their other sports which helps them maintain independence. They will never join in football. It's obnoxious how they seem so opinionated over this move but are defiant against ever giving up their independence and joining the ACC in football. If the conference folded, it would seriously jeopardize their independent status because nowhere else worth going is going to give them the same sweetheart deal.
I think the league presidents should take up a vote to kick ND out of the conference. That might be really interesting.
It ends up being a money loss for the ACC schools as the percentage payouts for Cal, Stan, and SMU would go from 0/30% to full. Just vote NO.
Fine on either of two conditions, ND joins as a full member or ND agrees to take a lesser payout in line with Cal and Stanford.
Edit: I thought a bit more about this and the third condition on which I would be willing to allow ACc expansion would be if ESPN agreed to renegotiation of the current TV package and for no longer than 6 years.
They already don't get a share of the football money, now they would need to give up their BB money.
Not true at all. Here's how it works:
In this case, ND would get 3% of the ACC's football revenue (3 games out of 100 total, those 100 generate $200m, thus ND's cut would be $6m).
Suppose VT played in the chick-fil-a kickoff, had 2 OOC home games, 1 OOC road game, and 4 conference home games. In this situation VT would get some pre-agreed upon number from Chick-fil-a + 6% of Total ACC regular season football earnings (6 home games out of 100 that generated $200m total = $12m).
There's a lot of odds and ends in the contracts, this doesn't get into post-season revenue sharing, but as I understand it, this is the 'happy path' scenario so to speak.
ND is not joining a football conference until the day football splits off from the NCAA and whomever controls that- the SEC/B1G/ESPN tells them they need to be in a conference to have a seat at the table. Until that day, they are not joining a football conference.
I guess this is actually happening.
https://sports.yahoo.com/sources-acc-presidents-to-meet-on-conference-ex...
Interesting point by McMurphy, especially given the timing of the hit piece that ESPN ran on Whit last week. We already know from reports earlier in the year he's been one of the main characters working behind the scenes on getting the GoR broken, so.... very interesting.
Seems like ESPN really pressuring this to happen, along with ND for their own self-preserving reasons. Now really does make me wonder if the ESPN article was a hit piece on VT/Whit for being vocal about realignment. Honestly starting to hope ESPN goes bankrupt soon. Terrible organization.
truly the dumbest timeline
Its like the conference has given up all hopes of being competitive athletically, so now they're just trying to partner with as many academic schools as possible. Watch us go after the likes of Georgetown and the military academies next.
The ACC is being killed by ESPN. Fact. Really that simple. When you are the only option and you pay South Carolina 50 million more per year than you pay Clemson and there is not a fucking thing Clemson can do about that, your conference dies. If ESPN would pay market/fair rates for ACC sports rights, we aren't having this conversation.
100% correct and I'm glad someone is saying it. ESPN is the only buyer in town, what they say is law when it comes to valuation. And the only way to increase a brand's value nationally (promotion) is owned by them as well.
But have to point out that they're only paying SC $10-15 M more than Clemson. (Obviously Clemson should be the one getting more. But the disparity is not close to $50 M per school *yet*.)
I think the argument would be that ESPN is paying fair market rate for the ACC. And Clemson's add on point, made with your point in mind, is that they should be getting more of that lower payment to reflect, for instance, the SC/Clemson relative value props.
Meh, I think ESPN is paying around/above the 'market value' for ACC rights. I don't think ACC football is a great TV property.
That is a BS reason. The GoR is preventing anybody from leaving. You don't have to worry about the revenue lowering. Heck if it forces renegotiation, that means revenue could go up based on market changes.
That's why ESPN wants the ACC to expand, so they don't have to worry about paying us more money anytime soon.
It's actually the opposite. Stewart Mandel detailed this in an article for The Athletic last week. The ESPN contract requires that they pay the ACC on a per member basis.
So if the ESPN contract pays every ACC school $30 mil, then by adding the three new schools, ESPN would need to pay an additional $90 mil to the ACC. Since the 2 Cali schools are willing to take a much smaller share and SMU would just be happy to be there, that would add upwards of $70 mil for ACC to distribute to the other schools (supposedly on a performance basis).
I still think adding them sucks and is the equivalent of the Big East adding SDSU. Just thought that was interesting that it would cost ESPN if the schools joined
And to add to that, if Clemson and FSU and UNC were to leave and the ACC falls below a certain amount of members, ESPN can renegotiate the contract: ie also insurance for the acc to not lose money by having their most valuable teams leave and have to renegotiate a deal for the less valuable remainders
can't wait for our pod to become Stanford, Cal, and LOLUVA. At least we'll be able to avenge the 2003 Insight Bowl and the 2010 Orange?
F Aaron Rodgers?!?
Also as a Bears fan , I can't upvote this enough. I honestly thought that bowl game would be the last time I'd have to see him play one of my teams more than once in a while.
I can see that. He owned the Bears...
As a Hokie yes.
I cheered for him as a Packer fan.
so...is the fact we haven't heard anything yet a good thing? Like, maybe this actually isn't happening?
Heard or read somewhere that a potential vote set for last night was pushed back due to the shooting at UNC.
ah, well, that would make sense
Confirmed by CBS
Sheesh, I thought our fans were upset at this vote...
Ouch, hadn't heard about the shooting. Hope everybody is okay.
If we are going to add schools from the west, why not Alaska and Hawaii.
Our fanbase wants to go hunting and fishing in Alaska, and fish in Hawaii.
My point is if we are adding schools that don't fit our geography, I might as well get some King Salmon out of it.
free reign salmon drift net fishing in alaska this time of year, gotta love it
The business of football is a real detriment to the enjoyment of football.
Politicians and businessmen really do know how to turn everything to crap, including college football.
It's a damn shame
I absolutely do not want the ACC to expand because it really does feel like that would be the final nail in the coffin that will kill the conference and drag the schools down with it. With all of that said, if we had to pick amongst the final 4 in the PAC 12, I couldn't care less about academic prestige with Stanford and Cal. We should have gotten Oregon State and Wazzu, at least they'd be fun to tailgate with.
Sadly, university presidents make these athletics conference decisions based on academic factors which makes absolutely zero damn sense. But it is what it is. Stanford and Cal might be great to apply for some research grants with, but not going make a compelling football product in any universe.
The flipside is being the ACC has helped Virginia Tech's academic profile. The most notable example is VT's BME program and Wake Forest's medical school.
If this leads to VT STEM students getting a direct pipeline to Silicon Valley, research collaborations, getting more research money, and poaching young professors to come teach/do research in SWVA, I'll take that over tailgating with Oregon State and Wazzu fans. But only if that stuff happens, otherwise I agree with you.
This feels like deciding to have a baby to save the marriage. Not going to work, and going to put the kids in a rough spot.
Of all the things that make me feel like a middle aged man, CFB re-alignment makes me the feel oldest.
How about that Tech is recruiting DeAngelo Hall's son as a TE for the 2025 class
I remember when Chung the second signed with VT. My thought was they signed Eugene Chung's younger brother. When I realized it was his son ... man was I feeling old.
go All Coasts Conference. Couldn't they have waited a few more days for this vote? Now this is all we will hear about all weekend.