IRVING, Texas — The Big 12 is expanding — to a 13th data point, that is.
Beginning in 2017, the league will add a conference championship game, boosting its bank account and hoping to boost its chances of reaching the College Football Playoff. And although that’s debatable, this much appears clear at the end of the league’s annual meetings:
There’s growing skepticism within the Big 12 that a bigger conference is a better conference.
The Big 12 also announced Friday a 20% increase in its revenue distribution to $30.4 million per school, and that it has no plans to pursue a conference network. Given all of that, here’s the takeaway as the league’s presidents headed home after three days of discussions:
Expansion is highly unlikely.
That’s not official, of course. As expected, they punted any final decision about adding teams until later. They’ll have an answer probably this summer, or almost certainly this year — but hey, who really knows, because it’s the never-ending story.
And Oklahoma president David Boren, the current chairman of the league’s board of directors, dropped just enough vague phrases for fans of schools to parse and remain hopeful about the possibilities. Boren said the league’s presidents asked consulting firms Navigate Research and Bevilacqua Helfant Ventures (BHV) to do more research.
“We are certainly continuing to consider possible expansion and what that might do,” he said, “in terms of how it might impact the conference, both positively and negatively. We’re looking at the whole picture.”
But Boren also said this:
“The data for the championship game was absolutely compelling. The data for expansion is going to require some further thought. There’s no doubt that expansion gives some marginal (financial) gain, but how much marginal gain? We have to refine that a little further financially.”
If you’re parsing, pay very close attention to this next part:
“It does give some marginal gain,” Boren continued, “but you have to weight that against reputational impacts. In other words, our fans want to see our teams play against great teams. They don’t want to see them play mediocre teams. We have to determine what that’s going to do to the longtime reputation of the brands at each of the schools and what quality of opponents we’re having.”
Keep in mind, this came from the guy who jumpstarted this entire process in June 2015, when he said at 10 members, the Big 12 was “psychologically disadvantaged” as compared to the other Power Five conferences. Last January, Boren insisted it was imperative to add two teams, a conference network and a conference championship game.
Apparently, one out of three ain’t bad.
The current TV climate isn’t favorable for a conference network.
“The marketplace, in some ways, has decided that issue for us,” Boren said.
He’s correct, although Texas also decided that issue for them. It’s not willing to give up the Longhorn Network, which was a prerequisite for a conference media network.
Similarly, others may have decided the issue of expansion for Boren. He first publicly retreated on the idea last month, after the chairman of Oklahoma’s board of regents — who are at least nominally Boren’s bosses — indicated he did not want Big 12 expansion. This week, Texas — always and forever the league’s biggest power player — staked out its position against expansion. And around the Big 12, the topic has always generated mixed sentiments. As Boren suggested, some might favor expansion “in the abstract,” but the problem is in the details: Which schools?
“There were still some questions raised,” Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said, “about whether adding members was going to be the right thing or whether in the end, it was dilutive.”
A day earlier, “dilutive” had been Boren’s buzzword, too. As in: “We want to make sure (expansion candidates) are not dilutive,” he said, referring to athletics, academics, fan bases, media markets, etc.
Friday’s announcement of revenue distribution of $304 million for 2015-16 was also significant. Although adding schools would provide “marginal” gain, there’s no pressing financial reason to expand because the Big 12 has not yet fallen significantly behind its Power Five peers. Its per-team payout ranks third, behind the SEC and Big Ten but ahead of the ACC and Pac-12.
“We don’t have to be dollar for dollar or penny for penny what somebody else is making,” Boren said earlier in the week, “but we have to be in the neighborhood.”
And when talking money, this is an important point: Unlike several other leagues, the Big 12 schools retain their third-tier media rights; that’s not accounted for in the $30.4 million per school (Texas, for example, gets an additional $15 million from the Longhorn Network; Oklahoma makes $5 million annually from a side deal with Fox). In other words, the comparisons aren’t always apples to apples.
And that’s before they restart the conference championship game, which the consultants estimated would produce $27 or $28 million in additional revenue (or more than $2 million more per school).
The Big 12’s long-term prospects remain cloudy. If there’s one big realignment left in college sports, when all of the current TV deals expire, the Big 12 is easily the most vulnerable Power Five conference. But none of Boren’s proposed solutions would necessarily have prevented the league from being plucked apart. Maybe nothing will.
But at least for now, they’re in the right neighborhood. Which is why there’s a growing sense that the only Big 12 expansion we’ll see involves that 13th data point.
SPRING FOOTBALL HIGHLIGHTS
