And for the record, I’m still not anywhere near convinced that going primarily with Apple TV streaming is a good idea whatsoever.
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Agree and it’s something UCLA should have thought harder about. They will never win a B1G championship. They haven’t won a Pac championship in 25 years. They’re going to get buried in that conference.
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If I’m Oregon or Washington and Rutgers, Maryland and Northwestern are making $65 million a year from the B1G TV deal and I’m making $35 million. That’s an irritating thorn in my beak/paw.
Whenever the new B1G TV deal comes up for bid again, I expect that to be remedied in favor of the power schools(OSU, UM, USC) or that might usher in a new split. College athletics will forever be in a state of instability I’m afraid.
The “media deal” where many of the PAC12 contests would be on Apple TV is really not appealing to me. As a long time RSL fan, I declined to pony up the $$$$$ when the MLS went with Apple for exclusive media rights starting this season. Not only would I need to subscribe to the Apple basic package, but would need to pay extra beyond that for the MLS content. After a few decades of enjoying RSL games on local channels (with the occasional game being on a national network that I get on Dish), I had to make the decision to pass on watching them this year.
It is quite possible a PAC12 deal with Apple may very likely be similar. Sure you have a modest sized potential audience who subscribes to Apple so they can enjoy shows like Ted Lasso, but most of them won’t add on the PAC12 package. Add consider the large number of viewers out there who don’t have a smart TV and don’t know how to or do not want to ‘cast’ from another device to their TV. The number of casual sports fans who could/would watch PAC12 contests will be tiny, even if Apple is paying out money to the schools.
Of course networks like ESPN/FOX/CBS and others (who I feel are the real villains in everything that is happening) seem inclined to pay $$$$$$$$$ to a few favorite leagues with a huge number of preferred schools, and pay a pittance to other leagues and there just isn’t a big network available to most viewers that seems willing to make the PAC teams a decent offer.
Don’t get too cushy. Ok, maybe get cushy on the PAC 12 hanging around. The media side is looking like a change may be in play.
Apparently Apple is looking into the possibility to buy ESPN from Disney. Given the personnel purge, declining revenues, and huge media rights contract the network is on the hook for, is seems ESPN may be financially painted into a corner. Not a corner where they go broke, but a corner where their lower profits would drag on Disney. When Disney bought them, ESPN was the financial engine that covered the costs of other Disney operations. Now…not to the level Disney needs. Apple is flush, but hurting for consistent content. ESPN could fill that void.
This could happen.
When all the dust settles it will not surprise me if the two long term losers in all of this are CO and UCLA.
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We can only hope. Screw those guys.
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Ok, it’s almost 1130am on the East Coast. I’m very confused about the situation. Can someone ELI5 what the current situation is with the PAC in general, and Utah in particular?
I have to wonder if it was my lack of quality sleep, or what, but I’m very lost now.
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Excerpt from The Athletic. A glimpse of what might have been. Who knows if it would’ve made a difference long-term? I think it might have. I also think Larry Scott made a lot of astoundingly awful decisions.
If Jim Delany had his way 12 years ago, the Big Ten and Pac-12 would have consummated a partnership and eliminated any potential for one league to devour the other.
The former Big Ten commissioner orchestrated a strategic partnership with then-Pac-12 honcho Larry Scott that would have added an annual regular-season football game and other sporting contests between the historic allies.
“We wanted to get to the West Coast and grow our TV and work with them,” Delany told The Athletic. “We agreed. We had a release on it. We wanted to expand without expanding.
“We wanted to get to the West Coast and grow our TV and work with them,” Delany told The Athletic. “We agreed. We had a release on it. We wanted to expand without expanding.
“We were going to match Ohio State and USC and UCLA and Michigan — basketball, baseball, football, everything. But they could not do that because they were at nine (football games). We were at eight.”
The leagues’ deal was announced on Dec. 28, 2011. The Pac-12 publicly backtracked on July 13, 2012, much to Delany’s aggravation. Four months later, the Big Ten invited Rutgers and Maryland to begin play in 2014. Last year, USC and UCLA agreed to join the Big Ten in 2024. Any day, anywhere from two to four Pac-12 rivals could follow.
It’s a seismic development to watch a power conference disintegrate in real time. When retrospectives are written about the Pac-12’s demise, the series of missteps in its collapse will mirror the fall of Europe’s crowned heads. Turning down the Big Ten’s partnership was one preventable step, and the ensuing hubris ushered the Pac-12’s tumble downward. But that’s for another day. This story is about what happens next for the Big Ten in union with another set of Pac-12 newcomers. Surprisingly, it might actually work, and the current membership has a responsibility to make it work.
Unless Notre Dame is involved, Big Ten expansion is widely unpopular for all the right reasons. At first blush, an 18- or 20-school Big Ten defies logic. As Delany told The Athletic, “There’s a point at which an association of colleges is no longer a conference, and my guess is it’s at 16.”
Should Purdue play a soccer match at Washington, it removes a 90-mile bus ride to Champaign, Ill., or a three-hour trip northwest to Evanston, Ill. Perhaps the historic rivalries in football remain intact, but in men’s basketball or women’s volleyball, some evaporate. Iowa and Indiana were the Big Ten’s first expansion schools, in 1899, and they’d rather compete against each other in most sports than fly midweek to Eugene, Ore.
Let me explain.
The Big Ten has staff members working around the clock to integrate USC and UCLA into the league while implementing scheduling formats. There is genuine concern for athletes at those schools who must travel east for most of their competitions. It goes without saying campus officials at current Big Ten schools feel the same about their athletes heading west.
“Each one has its own cadence, its own pressure points, looking at a regular-season format, looking at a postseason format,” Illinois athletics director Josh Whitman said. “Each one has to be addressed on a very customized basis and at the same time trying to identify efficiencies that could exist from a scheduling perspective. How can we move student-athletes around in the most efficient way and the most cost-effective way that will minimize missed class time? All those elements are a part of the discussion, and so it’s an iterative process.”
Apparently Oregon and Washington have had a change of heart and are expected to try to talk Zona out of bailing, also their is speculation the media rights deal will be approved.
Between the lines…if you’re going to get lowballed, it’s better to get lowballed on your own terms than someone else’s terms.
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I’m starting to wonder if some Tech Billionaires got together and said “This is a travesty. Let’s fix it. I’ll throw in a couple of billion. You guys match?”
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Apple TV is $6.99. Add MLS for the season to get 100% of ALL MLS matches including playoffs and cup matches.
I’d suspect the PAC12 would be similar.
Great thing would be I could stream a game at anytime, anywhere in the world.
Welp sounds like its done, Oregon and UW off to the B1G
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Then I guess we all better hope Utah is able to do the B12 jump. Because that’s the only remaining option at this point that isn’t a death sentence.
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Y’all really think the Conference is just gonna allow the Big 1G to dominate the west?
I wouldn’t be shocked if the SEC grabs some California teams, some ACC and ND. Or some type of combo. The truth is the Big 1G’s best pickups in expansion are Oregon and Washington.
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Oregon and Washington are gone.
We’re going to be the odd school out in this game of musical chairs. We might be playing in the MWC in 2024.
No way that happens.
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