I absolutely understand what you are saying, but I don’t think the way forward is to pull schools up. The Big10 makes a strong move for USC, UCLA, and the SEC makes the move for Texas and Oklahoma, all as a way to weaken their competition and expand their markets.
SDSU does only one of those things. It is my opinion that to hurt a rival and to gain market share, the PAC needs to raid the Big12
I think this is the only option.
Let’s say that is the direction that the PAC goes. Who would jump to the PAC, and what is the Grant of Rights cost? I’m not averse to the idea, as long as the addition is not UCF, or WVU. Mostly because they’re on the wrong side of the country. I don’t want BYU either, but that’s been hashed over by all of us so many times that we don’t need to go there again.
edit to fix some grammar.
Geography matters to me as well. Travel partners matter as well. The PAC could still stick to some of those sorts of traditional arrangements.
Kansas is an AAU school. Kansas State is good at football (sometimes). Kansas City media market.
I despise everything about Texas, but a foothold there would be good. I joke somewhat about shiny rocks, but ABQ is a media market and home to a flagship state university. Travel partners of UNM and Texas Tech, or other TX school.
SDSU and UNLV simply for their media markets.
Part raiding, part media share grabbing, with a tiny bit of academic justification. It’s probably the best case scenario and I hate everything about it. ■■■■ USC and UCLA.
SDSU was the 1st school to come to mind for me.
UNLV has everything you want…outside of competitive football and basketball programs. Lol.
Well someone has to be the bottom feeder. But a serious question. Do they have enough viewers to move the needle, or more exactly do they add value to the PAC?
That’s the question. For ESPN/P12, it’s more clear. Do they have enough population who buy cable packages that would have ESPN News and P12 on the basic lineup?
Probably.
Amazon? Who knows what they are looking for.
Fair enough. As we’ve all noticed this is all speculation until it’s not. It does make for some great banter amongst the various fanbases I suppose.
So true. I get to sit here on a cold morning drinking a cider, dreaming of football. I love it.
And as far as UNLV sucking…I think that’s a good thing. You want teams with 0 and 1 losses at the end of the year. A scheduled win every year? Let’s do it.
Filler content to get more active streaming on their platform. So far, Thursday Night Football has moved the needle for them quite nicely. Unfortunately is has been so good some of the ISP’s have seen some of their local service lock up on them.
We’ll let you make the call to UNLV to invite them as the conference’s designated “slump buster”.
Mark Grace will give them the invite
Excellent!
Trick is you don’t want a bottom feeder so bad they often go 0-3 outside the conference which drags down the whole league. I remember a few years ago when Southern Utah blew UNLV out. Pathetic.
I’d rather not add to the number of P5 schools.
Snobbish, I realize, but increasing the number of P5 schools just makes the overall problem worse. It would be better to attract schools from another P5 conference. Big 12.
There’s another aspect with UNLV that might be worth a thought.
How many of the LV Raiders fans are actually from Vegas? It wouldn’t surprise me if most of their fans on any given home game come from elsewhere. The entire city is composed of people from out of town.
Of course, the Raiders have a history and have an actual fanbase.
I don’t know if Vegas is a town that can generate a lot of sports fans into a cohesive group supporting the home team, at least not what you’d expect from a city of 1 million people. (They do have an NHL team, though, so maybe I’m being too harsh.)
The one thing missing from the conference is a perennial doormat team. UNLV would definitely fit the bill. Of course playing their games in Rice-Eccles WAY SOUTH doesn’t suck, either. With UCLA leaving, have another venue where we represent better than the home team would be hilarious.
More than a few of the Raiders fans travel in for the games. I know of several dozen here on the Wasatch Front who bought season tix to see them.
@Ma-ake, I heard Spence Checketts interview Chris Hill about an hour ago, and Chris said that without the U’s medical school and health sciences, we never would have been invited to join the PAC-12. FWIW.