[ad_1]
The Big 12 recently hosted a conference call to update stakeholders on the progress of the college football playoff expansion. In the middle of the update, someone on the call asked how this would impact another round of conference realignment.
According to a source on the call, Oklahoma President Joseph Harroz Jr. reiterated his school’s commitment to the Big 12. My how times have changed.
Texas and Oklahoma have contacted the SEC to join the league if the two great powers choose to leave their home conference, the Houston Chronicle reported Wednesday. At least Texas has contacted the SEC to seek admission to the nation’s most powerful conference, according to sources at CBS Sports.
It has not been determined if Texas is also speaking on behalf of Oklahoma.
University of Texas chairman of the regents Kevin Eltife is behind the field, according to sources at CBS Sports. Eltife is a 62-year-old commercial real estate investor in Tyler, Texas who served in the Texas Senate from 2004 to 2013. He was appointed Regent of the UT System by Texas Governor Greg Abbott in 2019.
Here we are again, 10 years after the Great Realignment of 2010, considering a new realignment for the same old reasons. Make it a reason: money.
The generator is that CFP expansion mentioned above. Conferences with the most teams win.
The SEC favors the expansion of the CFP to include the top 12 teams. If that turns out to be so, the SEC could end up with six of those 12 teams if it adds Texas and Oklahoma to the fold.
OK, maybe that is an exaggeration. Maybe not.
The SEC must seriously consider this investigation. It could eventually become the first superconference of the modern era – 16 teams from Florida to Texas. Such a realignment would essentially scuttle the Big 12 and force the ACC and Big Ten to expand just to keep pace with the SEC.
With Texas and Oklahoma, the SEC could go from an annual payout of $ 44 million per team to $ 60 million. There would not be many programs left that make a difference to admit. Notre Dame is independent. USC is in the Pac-12, which already has its own issues.
For that to happen is the next step for major varsity athletics. Adapt or die.
Who said the SEC stops at 4pm? Maybe that grows to 32, the same number of teams that populate the NFL, and just create a separate league.
The SEC would need 11 of 14 schools to vote in the affirmative to admit Texas and Oklahoma. Texas A&M would be some vote against the expansion. Missouri and Alabama could be among the dissidents for competitive reasons. As with Texas A&M, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina could have concerns about the future realignment that would loosen the SEC’s grip in their states.
The Big 12 has a rights grant agreement that would prevent this from happening immediately. This agreement states that if a team leaves the conference before the TV deal expires in 2025, the conference will own the television rights to that team.
Texas and Oklahoma could walk away, break this deal, and just say “sue us.”
There are questions about how the Longhorn network would fit together. Oklahoma also has a third level agreement with Bally Sports. But the SEC and its two potential new partners are so big and wealthy that these are just the details.
At worst, even if the SEC’s expansion is not immediate, Wednesday’s developments will linger on both conferences until the Big 12 contract expires in 2025.
“There’s way too much smoke at this point,” a Big 12 source told CBS Sports.
Texas has long considered itself too aristocratic for the pedestrian SEC. If he left the Big 12, the ACC or the Big Ten were considered more likely destinations. Oklahoma was the most likely and best suited choice for the SEC.
Either way, the school brands would be diluted. OU and UT dominate the Big 12. In the SEC, Oklahoma and Texas might be the fourth, fifth, or even sixth best programs.
Earning $ 60 million a year would appease those egos. In a way, none of this should come as a surprise. The Pac-12 arrived within 30 minutes of the Big 12 attack in 2010.
The SEC is bigger and much better than the Pac-12. This epic request is unlikely to be turned down, either in the next two weeks or two years.
[ad_2]
Source link