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This isn't anything new. The Power 5 wants their own league free of rules, and the NCAA is giving into their every demand too slowly for them. This is just the next step in them breaking away from the NCAA and us.

Everyone always talks about the competitive disparities between the Power 5 conferences and us and most of the time they're correct.

What doesn't get attention are the disparities within the larger conferences themselves. Ohio State will always have an enormous advantage over a place like Minnesota and these new "rules" will only serve to widen the gap between them.

The snag will occur when places like Iowa State, Washington State and Wake Forest realize they are consigning themselves to permanent doormat status. Right now they're ahead of us in the financial pecking order, but if the Sun Belt, MAC and CUSA are essentially eliminated and taken off the schedules then they become the new bottom. They'll accept it because they consider the alternative (getting left out of the party entirely) to be worse.

mscarn wrote:Everyone always talks about the competitive disparities between the Power 5 conferences and us and most of the time they're correct.

What doesn't get attention are the disparities within the larger conferences themselves. Ohio State will always have an enormous advantage over a place like Minnesota and these new "rules" will only serve to widen the gap between them.

The snag will occur when places like Iowa State, Washington State and Wake Forest realize they are consigning themselves to permanent doormat status. Right now they're ahead of us in the financial pecking order, but if the Sun Belt, MAC and CUSA are essentially eliminated and taken off the schedules then they become the new bottom. They'll accept it because they consider the alternative (getting left out of the party entirely) to be worse.

That's been my issue with the BCS of late too...and why I find it almost impossible to follow or care about college football anymore. I still love BG and want to see them do well, but on the whole scale college football is a terrible product now. The BCS has funneled dollars not just to the power conferences, but to a handful of teams within those conferences. I did some research on it last year, and don't have time to look it back up, but it was absurd how few teams have actually claimed all of those BCS bowl slots over the past decade. The Alabamas, OSUs, Oklahoma, Oregons, USCs, etc have been so completely dominant in college football that the other teams don't have a chance, and that includes many of their conference brethren.

The BCS has created a model where the best teams on the field get the most money back to keep pumping it into their programs. This allows those teams to widen the gap between them and everyone else every year. At the start this gap showed in that the BCS conferences widened the gap between them and us. Now it's gotten to the point where the gap even inside the conferences is just as huge. Heck, I'd argue the gap between OSU & Minnesota is probably further than the gap between Minnesota and BG.

This has absolutely DESTROYED college football. Not only is there no shot that MAC teams rise up and compete for a national title, there is not really even a shot that the mid tier from the BCS conferences do so. Beyond the fact that the national title race is basically limited to 15-20 teams before the first game is even played, it's made the games flat out boring on a week to week basis. As it stands you can usually only count on a handful of competitive games a week. The best teams basically play 2-3 game schedules as everybody else is a complete cupcake. It's boring. This is really manifesting itself in declining attendance all over the sport; even Alabama fans and the like are saying to themselves "Why watch my favorite team blowout a crap opponent when I can catch the 1 or 2 good games on TV instead." I'm sure TV ratings are still good, because the coverage focuses on the handful of games each week that are worth watching.

I'm not sure what the solution is. These teams are happy that they're soaking up all the revenue, but eventually that revenue is going to start declining when the games are no longer interesting. It'll be interesting to see how this continues to play out.

I know for me personally college football has gone from my favorite sport that I planned my fall Saturdays around to something that I'll do if I am bored on a fall Saturday. I'll watch a game if I'm at a bar or party, but only in the background, I"m not really paying attention. The only time I really pay attention anymore is if it's BG football (and I've even let my season tickets go the past couple years as it wasn't really worth planing my fall around anymore), or if there is an NFL prospect that I wanted to watch.

In the early to mid 70's the BIG 10 was dominated by OSU and . They called it the Big 2 and the Little 8 and there was very little interest in the conference's games outside of the occasional MSU upset of OSU and their rivalry with UM. Eventually schools like Iowa and Wisconsin and to lesser extent, MSU and Illinois got their acts together in the 80's and 90's and the overall interest in the conference grew.

The "big boys" in college football do not understand that destroying the competitive balance in the sport also destroys the level of interest even avid fans have in following the sport. Even amongst the power schools. Ala-fricking-bama had empty seat for their slate of OOC patsies last year as did number of other "power" schools. They need to focus on making the field more level than less. Chasing the money in the short term will eventually cost you down the road.

Flipper wrote:In the early to mid 70's the BIG 10 was dominated by OSU and . They called it the Big 2 and the Little 8 and there was very little interest in the conference's games outside of the occasional MSU upset of OSU and their rivalry with UM. Eventually schools like Iowa and Wisconsin and to lesser extent, MSU and Illinois got their acts together in the 80's and 90's and the overall interest in the conference grew.

The "big boys" in college football do not understand that destroying the competitive balance in the sport also destroys the level of interest even avid fans have in following the sport. Even amongst the power schools. Ala-fricking-bama had empty seat for their slate of OOC patsies last year as did number of other "power" schools. They need to focus on making the field more level than less. Chasing the money in the short term will eventually cost you down the road.

Completely agree.

If the power conferences make their own rules then shouldn't the academic conferences then be allowed to make their own rules? No real need for an NCAA office in my opinion. Just a lobby for member to vote, possibly a virtual lobby with no physical office needed.

hammb wrote:

mscarn wrote:Everyone always talks about the competitive disparities between the Power 5 conferences and us and most of the time they're correct.

What doesn't get attention are the disparities within the larger conferences themselves. Ohio State will always have an enormous advantage over a place like Minnesota and these new "rules" will only serve to widen the gap between them.

The snag will occur when places like Iowa State, Washington State and Wake Forest realize they are consigning themselves to permanent doormat status. Right now they're ahead of us in the financial pecking order, but if the Sun Belt, MAC and CUSA are essentially eliminated and taken off the schedules then they become the new bottom. They'll accept it because they consider the alternative (getting left out of the party entirely) to be worse.

That's been my issue with the BCS of late too...and why I find it almost impossible to follow or care about college football anymore. I still love BG and want to see them do well, but on the whole scale college football is a terrible product now. The BCS has funneled dollars not just to the power conferences, but to a handful of teams within those conferences. I did some research on it last year, and don't have time to look it back up, but it was absurd how few teams have actually claimed all of those BCS bowl slots over the past decade. The Alabamas, OSUs, Oklahoma, Oregons, USCs, etc have been so completely dominant in college football that the other teams don't have a chance, and that includes many of their conference brethren.

The BCS has created a model where the best teams on the field get the most money back to keep pumping it into their programs. This allows those teams to widen the gap between them and everyone else every year. At the start this gap showed in that the BCS conferences widened the gap between them and us. Now it's gotten to the point where the gap even inside the conferences is just as huge. Heck, I'd argue the gap between OSU & Minnesota is probably further than the gap between Minnesota and BG.

This has absolutely DESTROYED college football. Not only is there no shot that MAC teams rise up and compete for a national title, there is not really even a shot that the mid tier from the BCS conferences do so. Beyond the fact that the national title race is basically limited to 15-20 teams before the first game is even played, it's made the games flat out boring on a week to week basis. As it stands you can usually only count on a handful of competitive games a week. The best teams basically play 2-3 game schedules as everybody else is a complete cupcake. It's boring. This is really manifesting itself in declining attendance all over the sport; even Alabama fans and the like are saying to themselves "Why watch my favorite team blowout a crap opponent when I can catch the 1 or 2 good games on TV instead." I'm sure TV ratings are still good, because the coverage focuses on the handful of games each week that are worth watching.

I'm not sure what the solution is. These teams are happy that they're soaking up all the revenue, but eventually that revenue is going to start declining when the games are no longer interesting. It'll be interesting to see how this continues to play out.

I know for me personally college football has gone from my favorite sport that I planned my fall Saturdays around to something that I'll do if I am bored on a fall Saturday. I'll watch a game if I'm at a bar or party, but only in the background, I"m not really paying attention. The only time I really pay attention anymore is if it's BG football (and I've even let my season tickets go the past couple years as it wasn't really worth planing my fall around anymore), or if there is an NFL prospect that I wanted to watch.

Well said bro...I just got done reading "Death to the BCS" and "It's Possible! A 16 team playoff in the BCS era". Right now I am reading "Bowls, Polls and Tattered Souls: Making Sense of the Chaos in College Football" by Stewart Mandel. Hell I knew the differences between the haves and have nots was big but after reading these books, I'm afraid nothing will ever change. I hate the fact that college football is being destroyed to benefit the few at the top. I know my dad has been clamoring for years to see the MAC, MWC, COnf USA, Sun Belt form their own division and play for a National Title. I HATE the fact of seeing BG drop from the FCS division but dammit, we don't have a shot in hell of ever even getting to the title game before the season even starts.

When it comes to bowls, the bcs conf are taking home over 90% of the dollars. How the hell do you compete with that? I pisses me off so badly when I hear o$u fans talk down to the MAC and how we cannot compete with them. First off, we can and do. Second, how about leveling the playing field a bit? Teams like the buck$ have every advantage in the books and still want more. Effin greedy bastards.

FalconTurf wrote:If the power conferences make their own rules then shouldn't the academic conferences then be allowed to make their own rules? No real need for an NCAA office in my opinion. Just a lobby for member to vote, possibly a virtual lobby with no physical office needed.

No one wants to split and lose the NCAA tournament money.

Split the power conferences from the NCAA tournament and there won't be any tournament money. Nobody will pay for a tournament without the Big 10, the ACC and the SEC

Flipper wrote:Split the power conferences from the NCAA tournament and there won't be any tournament money. Nobody will pay for a tournament without the Big 10, the ACC and the SEC

This is true. Which is why in 2024 when the current NCAA deal runs out, I'm guessing the 5 power conferences, the Big East and a few others bolt to form their own tournament. They may get impatient and leave before then. But, the conferences are already banking millions off the current deal, each year. I figure they will sit back and take their time while cashing the NCAA's checks and as the NCAA gives them more and more leeway on things. Then, once they get their TV partners lined up and form their own governing structure they will bolt.

Yet another great thing ruined by greed.

Falcon137 wrote:

FalconTurf wrote:If the power conferences make their own rules then shouldn't the academic conferences then be allowed to make their own rules? No real need for an NCAA office in my opinion. Just a lobby for member to vote, possibly a virtual lobby with no physical office needed.

No one wants to split and lose the NCAA tournament money.

I would not assume that the NCAA money will last for long either. This could very well be the break point.