The Pac-12's problems

I respond to Wilner’s article today where it discusses the Pac-12’s problems. I think he’s being silly, like sports writers usually are when they try to talk about off-field stuff.

Going 0-5 in the COVID Bowl Season 2.0??? Not good, but understandable. Four of those 5 teams simply checked out. UCLA simply got too sick with COVID to field a team.

Not “investing in football”…Utah has invested more and better than any period of my fandom - including the 2002 Games expansion of RES. The other schools have been investing too; but at least 2 of the schools (Stanford and Berkeley) has enrollment rules that limit who they can recruit. If I recall, U$C has some restrictions too. Utah’s basic enrollment rules have limiting effects, as well. It’s what happens when you are in the world of being real higher education institutions. I do not see any PAC 12 school lowering their enrollment rules anytime soon. It is something Wilner ought to consider the next time he starts writing a piece like this one.

Almost all the $EC and a good number of the B1G and Big 12 all have a “fog a mirror and you’re in” enrollment policy. As long as the recruit fulfills the NCAA minimum enrollment policies, they’re in. With rules like that, is there any reason 5 star players who are academic underachievers would bypass the PAC 12?

A better TV contract is important, but it’s more than just the money. We need our teams playing games in National Prime Time on any number of transmission/streaming platforms. As much as some around here scoff at the idea of playing early games, and prefer the “PAC 12 Way the ■■■■ After Dark” offering, the reality is the early games have better national exposure windows. Yes, it means If we suck, we will be sucking on prime time TV with millions of people watching the carnage, but there are a ■■■■ ton of ACC, $EC, B1G, and Big 12 teams who suck like a Dyson Vacuum getting aired in those slots now. Not playing Prime Time to the bulk of the population hurts recruiting more than any other thing. We can’t have a G5 on the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday” Ocho contract, in short, if it’s money or more prime time TV slots, take the prime time TV slots for now. There are other way to make the money. OK, the PAC 12 could save a ■■■■ ton of money being spent on “fru-fru overhead” if they really wanted to.

Where I will agree with Wilner is it is going to take some organization shifts in focus and priorities to make it happen, which may require changes in the overall culture, as culture is generally a a written/unwritten construct of beliefs, and beliefs are almost impossible to change, some of the needed changes may never happen. That said, the PAC-12 has been more than just football for a very long time.

There are any number of sports we basically own at the national level. In the overall picture, the Conference is always in the Top 3. Where we hit it out of the park is graduations and transitioning to the next chapter (which is what it’s all about anyway).

Ok, nuff said.

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The academic standards are stupid. Should we pull a physicists scholarship because he can’t catch a football? One doesn’t have to do with the other. What’s so wrong about celebrating talent regardless of scholastic achievement? If the goal is education, why exclude those who are academically less talented?

I get it, schools don’t want to use education resources on the less scholastically gifted, they can’t dumb down their classes to accommodate the less qualified students, but if football players generate the revenue to fund their own classes why not provide a path for them to grow? If football revenue funds it, the school is not hurt by affording a lessor student the opportunity to improve. The PAC12 is very snobbish and it’s gross.

Until the PAC12 starts valuing sports as a sperate department of their University system, it will continue to win Nobel prizes but no football prizes. I know many people see that as a good thing but it’s not an either/or, they could have both if they weren’t too smart for their own good.

edit: I’m going to do my best not to make this political or social justicy.

Every time I watch a PAC12 game, the commercial breaks are loaded with social justice virtual signaling. They talk about BLM and marginalized people, institutional racism and how it effects public education. Yet many of the students they reject are products of this poor education system. So it all amounts to bull ■■■■ posturing on the PAC 12’s part, when they reject these same students on academic standards such a system can’t prepare them for.

Then they wash their hands of the real problem while they shoot another commercial about how we all need to do better. Conference of hypocrites.