Recent Comments
I always love these... Thanks and keep up the good work.
Also, let's make the Pittsburgh Panther like the Florida Panther... Endangered.
GO HOKIES.
If you think about it, weak teams = more win's for your top teams and more recruiting territories for your top teams.
Since it is apparent that your conference is only as good as your top couple teams...
Not saying this is the best approach...just how CFB is right now.
Does anyone know if ND would be subject to the full $50M exit fee if they were to do this again in a couple years? I would be interested to see if ND pulled some contract tenant that only subjects them to a partial amount because they didn't lock into football.
I ask because, despite this recent development, I still believe ND and the Big10 are destined to be together.
One more team to beat... that is all.
Well I highly doubt that will be the outcome as explained in my post at the top, but in that situation I think Rutgers would make the most financial sense. They are struggling in football right now but they have the resources to be a solid program if they get into a stable conference and they are the most popular CFB team in the largest TV market in the country.
I think like the economy there are cycles and then there are long term trends. The SEC is on top of the current cycle but they are using their position to drive the long term trend in their favor too. They are consolidating money and power and competition in their league to ensure that they will always be at the top of the heap. With VT and one more good western school we could have been the dominant force in football for 100 years. I am actually getting physiologically upset at the missed opportunity there. And now this deal is the payoff for our misplaced loyalty. I am not a fan of Jim Weaver right now, to put it lightly.
I love how SportsCenter keeps reiterating that they're joining "in ALL sports, except football" but yet every time they go to commercial or talk about it in depth, they show clips of the football team.
It would be confusing to a viewer who isn't fully paying attention.
I believe the ND CBS Contract expires in 2015. IF Notre Dame joins for football in 2016 it gives us time to find a 16th member. It would probably be a Big East team to be #16 once ND joins fully.
I actually believe this is the first time in six years that the SEC does not, repeat does NOT, win the National Championship... Bold statement, I know. But I have a gut feeling about this one.
Also, I was going to post about this as soon as I saw it around 11 but you guys are already on top of it like clockwork! Nice work!
The thought has to be once the playoff system gets going (and possibly expanded), that automatic tie in's from the major conferences would force ND to join one. It feels like more of a transition than anything. The 5 ACC games feels like the end goal is to be full in with football. Until that happen's a new member isn't needed for balance.
Still though, I'm ready to start going down the list of possible applicants for the ACC!
We don't actually have a 15th member for football. UConn would be a good non-football member but I don't see how that benefits them.
I think that was part of it, and it's a benefit, but I still think the end goal was to get ND into the ACC as full fledged members at some point in the future.
I was a strong supporter of #VT4SEC, and I'd still jump at the chance to go. However, if you choose believe the rumors, Tech had an opportunity to join before Mizzou did. Our brass never wanted to be the ones who killed the conference. If FSU and Clemson had left, it might have happened, but now that the $50M has solidified the league, it won't.
One thing to remember, college football is cyclical. Yes, the SEC is running the show now, but it always won't be that way.
Let the scramble begin to be the 16th member of the ACC. Who would you guys like to see as the 16th member?
How much do you want to bet that many of these games are held at neutral sites. VT-ND at FedEx was a rumored matchup a few years ago.
Swofford's motivation here was clearly mainly to get the exit fee increased to reduce the probability of the conference falling apart. This was not done to benefit the stronger schools in the conference- VT, FSU and Clemson. The monetary gains will be marginal and our flexibility to improve our situation has decreased. As a benefit we get to see ND in lane maybe once a decade. Is that really better than having some combo of Tennessee, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Auburn, TAMU, etc every year? I really don't get why VT fans would support this.
Yeah this is a step in the right direction, but the whole exceptions thing is one of the main reasons I think that the Big East went bad. Hockey I understand fully, but we shoulda got ND in for football. Now the 1% chance we had of maybe snagging PSU has just been reduced to about 0.00000000001% if ND won't be in for football.
Would absolutely love to see VT-ND in Lane...
...but, it would be sweet if some of these games were done primetime in a major media market (Charlotte, DC, NYC, etc.)
My reaction upon seeing the news this morning on Twitter:
And if we do go to war, having ND gives us a little more leverage than we might have otherwise had to do some cherry picking.
The question is how are the rights to the 5 games divided between the ACC or ND, ESPN or NBC, and how will the revenue be split? It's not going to be a proportional split, or else ND may as well have joined as a full member. It's also questionable how much value there is to ND-Duke, Wake Forest, Maryland, UVA, etc. I see a very marginal gain for the conferece. Something like 2.5 million per year split betwen 14 schools after Notre Dame takes their slice.
To me it's just sad to think about how much better off we could have been financially and competitively in the SEC. Why wasn't VT more aggressive? TAMU, Mizzou and even WVU are better off than we are right now and we started in a more powerful position.
Conspicuously absent from the announcement is what the process is for determining the venue for ND vs ACC football games. Having to cycle through 14 teams every 3 years means we aren't getting the home and home series we get with our cross-divisional games, and you can bet ND will try to get as many of those five ACC games in South Bend as it possibly can.
Joe, you pretty much nailed my exact thoughts. I think it's a very pragmatic and forward-looking move. The fact that this was kept so quiet tells me there's a whole lot more to this story than meets the eye, and I think it will ultimately lead to ND ending up as a football member, too.
Solidifies that FSU or Clemson won't jump ship and sets up the ACC to have 16 teams at some point in the future.
Source: Bringing in Notre Dame will allow ACC to ask for additional compensation in ESPN deal— Dan Wetzel (@DanWetzel) September 12, 2012
Bling, bling. (Hopefully.)
ND doesnt want to come to Lane...ever