• The KillerFrogs

Anyone subscribe to The Athletic? (Realignment article)

I've asked around campus when I'm up there and from everything I've heard TCU is in this to win it. Per the TCU peeps I've talked to there are 5 things TCU has going for it and or need to do.

#1 Investment that's been made into our sports and campus facilities/ national brand for TV eye balls / DFW market are all appealing.

#2 Academics, the Medical School, and the TCU vibe.

#3 TCU's relationship with OU and ADJD's relationship with CDC. Supposedly, from what I was told, CDC would look out for TCU despite what others have posted here in this forum.

#4 West Coast kids that now inundate TCU.

#5 All TCU needs to do is win at football and nothing else really matters. Gary and TCU Football are a national brand, so is Schloss and TCU Baseball for that matter, and all Coach P needs to do is score more points and win. Conferences want a winner. GP can continue to provide that.
Your sentiment is great and correct on all accounts. TCU is doing everything it can to feather its nest and be attractive to suitors who come calling.

That said, the numbers are what the numbers are. There's only 1 spot available in a 4x16 Power 64 Conference Model. How does TCU get that spot over Baylor, UCF, or Houston? We need to be working the ACC every bit as much as we do the Pac-12. In fact, in my previous post, I make the case that the ACC should be our preferred destination, and we should be overtly proactive about making it happen...or else we risk being left out altogether. The only logical split between current state schools (meaning same-state P5 schools going to separate conferences) is Kansas and Kansas State. No other combo is remotely realistic. Because of this, TCU doesn't get into the Big 16 (Iowa State does) the B1G (Kansas does) or the SEC (K-State does). It's all about that one spot in the ACC. We need to grab it.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
all Coach P needs to do is score more points and win. Conferences want a winner. GP can continue to provide that.

Conferences want money. Who wins all kind of sorts itself out and ends up being a net wash. The Big 10 didn't add Rutgers and Maryland because they were looking for winners, they added them because they are large state schools that would be a net add to the money pie.
 

LeagueCityFrog

Active Member
Also, I think this poaching of Pac 12 schools by the Big 12 is great for TCU's long term stability and keeping the funds coming in.

1994 wasn't that long ago and being orphaned out into the desert was not fun and not a place we want to go back to. Politics played a big deal last time, this time it is markets and name brands. TCU has both. Make it happen ADJD. I'm sure CDC still has friends at Arizona that would be open to hearing from him. This expansion move adding USC and the Ducks would certainly help brands like OU and UT have a conference that would compete with the SEC.

I think out of the gate before any games were played the national perception of conference strength would go:

1. SEC
2. Big 16
3. Big Ten
4. ACC
5. AAC
6. Mtn West <--- this would switch to #5 when they add Oregon State, Wazzou, and Utah

We start regularly beating the SEC then the recruiting landscape would change back our way.
 
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BrewingFrog

Was I supposed to type something here?
Conferences want money. Who wins all kind of sorts itself out and ends up being a net wash. The Big 10 didn't add Rutgers and Maryland because they were looking for winners, they added them because they are large state schools that would be a net add to the money pie.
They added them because they are 1.) Big State Schools, and 2.) They are doormats and an easy win for everybody else.
 

Purp

Active Member
Couple of things,

Only reason to expand is to get the Big 12 into divisions to GET AWAY from the round robin. Every team playing every other team every year maximizes the number of losses. Make it easier so every good team doesn't have to play every other good team. More good teams at the end of the season. Take two teams to get to 12 or merge the two leagues for 22, I don't care. Colorado and Utah would be just fine.

Second, I don't see anything magical about 64 teams, or Notre Dame. Notre Dame can stay independent or join one of the existing conferences. There can be a conference with 17 teams. I don't think they're a threat to TCU. Just my opinion.
I agree that ND isn't joining the ACC for football. All the networks would basically have to conclude there was no demand for ND football on TV with their own deal to convince ND it needed a conference. I don't see it happening.

I also don't think Rutgers, Vandy, Northwestern, Indiana, Purdue, and a handful of others are quite as safe as he lets on. Truthfully, I think TCU and baylor (gag) are in much safer positions than most of those I mentioned and many that I didn't. I'd even speculate that EMAW may be the most vulnerable school in the B12 currently.

I'm also not convinced 16 is the magic number that all conferences will get to. I can easily see a 4 conference set-up with 18 teams per conference setting up to 9 team divisions. That makes for an 8 game regular season football schedule with a natural conference title game between teams who haven't seen each other during the season. If teams wanted to preserve a rivalry game with a team in the other division it could be a non-conference game every year. Such a scenario would open up space for some fringe G5 schools trying to make the push to the upper echelon of college sports.

I don't feel threatened right now by realignment as a TCU fan. I think we're in a very good spot.
 
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LeagueCityFrog

Active Member
Your sentiment is great and correct on all accounts. TCU is doing everything it can to feather its nest and be attractive to suitors who come calling.

That said, the numbers are what the numbers are. There's only 1 spot available in a 4x16 Power 64 Conference Model. How does TCU get that spot over Baylor, UCF, or Houston? We need to be working the ACC every bit as much as we do the Pac-12. In fact, in my previous post, I make the case that the ACC should be our preferred destination, and we should be overtly proactive about making it happen...or else we risk being left out altogether. The only logical split between current state schools (meaning same-state P5 schools going to separate conferences) is Kansas and Kansas State. No other combo is remotely realistic. Because of this, TCU doesn't get into the Big 16 (Iowa State does) the B1G (Kansas does) or the SEC (K-State does). It's all about that one spot in the ACC. We need to grab it.

K-State is not getting in the SEC, more likely it would be Va Tech. Iowa is not going to shoot themselves in the foot and allow Iowa State in their yard. All previous conference "expansions" post Big XII merger have all kept the teams that were already in the conference. The schools that were vulnerable were the ones left whose conference got raided. TCU just needs to keep investing and keep winning. The TCU brand around 2014 and 2015 with football and baseball were white hot. I think that white hotness is about to return, starting with this TCU baseball season.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
They added them because they are 1.) Big State Schools, and 2.) They are doormats and an easy win for everybody else.

They didn't add them because they were doormats. Who is a doormat or not can change over time, the size and location of the school does not. Rutgers and Maryland add value whether they suck or whether they are good, that's kind of the point.
 
K-State is not getting in the SEC, more likely it would be Va Tech. Iowa is not going to shoot themselves in the foot and allow Iowa State in their yard. All previous conference "expansions" post Big XII merger have all kept the teams that were already in the conference. The schools that were vulnerable were the ones left whose conference got raided. TCU just needs to keep investing and keep winning. The TCU brand around 2014 and 2015 with football and baseball were white hot. I think that white hotness is about to return, starting with this TCU baseball season.
I never said Iowa State goes to the B1G. I said Kansas does. If Va Tech goes to the SEC (which could happen) then K-State takes their spot in the ACC.

There's only one spot available to TCU, and we are competing against Baylor for it.
 

Wexahu

Full Member
I never said Iowa State goes to the B1G. I said Kansas does. If Va Tech goes to the SEC (which could happen) then K-State takes their spot in the ACC.

There's only one spot available to TCU, and we are competing against Baylor for it.

I think what you're saying is hyperbole and an absolute worst case scenario, but there is a chance we could get left out of a future major realignment. I definitely don't think Baylor and TCU are teams 64-65 in the pecking order though.

Texas has twice as many people as North/South Carolina and one less P5 program. At some point just pure numbers come into play if generating revenue is important to conferences (which we know is about the only thing that matters). If TCU or Baylor aren't better positioned than Wake Forest someone isn't paying attention.
 

Purp

Active Member
I never said Iowa State goes to the B1G. I said Kansas does. If Va Tech goes to the SEC (which could happen) then K-State takes their spot in the ACC.

There's only one spot available to TCU, and we are competing against Baylor for it.
If conferences are competing for the left overs in the B12 I really see EMAW being the last one taken. I don't understand why you think K State is such a guarantee to land on its feet in realignment.
 

Froggish

Active Member
Money drives all this stuff..Even over hurt feelings...AM, Arky, Mizz, Neb, CO, would all still be interested if the money was right. Sure, they all hated UT but money ultimately drives these decisions. Continued expansion just delutes the cash and it doesn’t make since to that for anyone.
 

NYC Horned Frog

Full Member
#3 TCU's relationship with OU and ADJD's relationship with CDC. Supposedly, from what I was told, CDC would look out for TCU despite what others have posted here in this forum.

FWIW, CDC told me this to my face not too long ago. Not directly of ADJD and his relationship, more of he'd look out for TCU as a whole if he could. Of course, this could always change or he could have just been saying it to make me feel good.

Rightly so, he'll always do what's best for UT first and foremost. I just got the feeling his most favorable path is for Big 12 to survive.
 

westoverhillbilly

Active Member
The breakup of the SWC that was announced in 1994 (effective end of school year in 1996) largely had to do with the shedding of dead weight that was perceivably worse in the SWC than the Big 8.. TCU was no doubt the best of the leftovers, even back then- we were definitely above Rice and SMU and even UH as far as core fanbase and support, donations, attendance and infrastructure.. Gib Lewis publicly stated that had the event occurred just a couple of years earlier when he was Texas House Speaker, he would have seen to it that TCU was not excluded in a political manner that protected Baylor and Tech..

Men's basketball is nice and fun, but football carries the day..

A similar scenario as the SWC demise could happen again with any number of potential mergers, thus leaving behind some dead weight (Vandy, Wazzu, Oregon State, KU, KSU, Texas Tech, Wake, Duke, BC, Syr, Rutgers, Maryland and Baylor should they have some upcoming losing seasons) that are way less viable than TCU is now.. I'm not saying we're completely safe, but we're in a hell of a lot better shape than we were a decade ago.. Another end of year top 10 ranking or two would make us pretty invincible..
 
Wouldn't it make more sense to target some ACC schools? Due to the number they have, picking up two of those gives them a good financial setting and puts comp close to WVU. (of course, would need to get rid of the short horn channel and get a true Big 12 network. The money teams are making off the ACC and SEC and Big10 and Pac networks seems like a healthy chunk of changes)

ACC schools are locked up, they made their decision a few years ago. They are just fighting for full ND membership now.

For anybody else in this thread hoping for the Big 12 to poach some ACC schools, that ship has sailed... ESPN gave them what they wanted and schools like FSU got in line. They aren't free again until 2036.

The BIG and SEC are also close to untouchable as those conferences media rights are so valuable the Big 12 could never come close... If anything those conferences might just shed a member or two, ones we wouldn't want either.

It's all down to the PAC and Big 12 now, that's it. FOX is going to double down on the BIG, NFL, Nascar, MLB, etc... ESPN is going after everything and has the most to lose. But, all parties know they'd benefit if there was just a fourth major conference, not 5. We shall see...
 
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Froggish

Active Member
Conferences want money. Who wins all kind of sorts itself out and ends up being a net wash. The Big 10 didn't add Rutgers and Maryland because they were looking for winners, they added them because they are large state schools that would be a net add to the money pie.
Bingo...Money is the driver and state money is far more reliable than private money..

These off season merger threads are like clockwork
 
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