They don't have to prove they have a right or are owed a spot. It's about what the consumers should have

This has links to 2 competing articles on this in the BCS context
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/andy_staples/04/21/bcs-antitrust-suit/index.html[/url]
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The NFL has a CBA. CFB has the NCAA.

When people have suggested that Slive/Delaney/Scott want to do away with the NCAA, I have disagreed by saying they'd much prefer a weak NCAA to grant legitimacy.

If a shift as tremendous as 4 16's happens, then a shift in classification of football subdivisions will happen. The FBS gets forked into an FBS for the non-64 and a new one. I never imagined bowls would ever go away, and the FBS gets to keep them and their AP-annointed champion or they can drop to FCS if they want to be in a playoff. Either way, they have options and have little way to say they have a right to determine a way to intrude into any relationship they want with the 64.

Too much has gone down so far for this to be Slice/Scott/Delaney floating a weather balloon, but I can't help but keep thinking about how A&M made leaving the Big12 conditional upon being accepted to another conference. The other conference made acceptance conditional upon obtaining indemnity. A&M only had verbal commitments to waiving legal action.

I still think A&M is gone in 2012. If we aren't because of this, its because the BCS played us like a fiddle to float a weather balloon as they left themselves a beautiful out.

In the end, though, money talks. Slive doesn't give one *********about Texas A&M, he wants our eyeballs. Increasing their television market almost 50% is too huge to pass up, and thats really all that matters. A&M goes to the SEC and consequently the horns get delivered to the Pac as part of the fallout. Slive and Scott both get the 25+ million households in Texas. That is a win.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/writers/andy_staples/04/21/bcs-antitrust-suit/index.html

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Baylor will say yes, because teams like them will be shut out from playing in the championship games. Yes, that's a terrible argument coming from them, but consider if "David Bois(e) State" were making it.

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Do you have a reason to believe that the Broncos won't get taken care of, or that they'd shuck the $$ to make a principled stand?

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CFB has the NCAA.

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For how long?

The BCS isn't the NCAA. That's just conferences getting together to exclude teams. And it might be the subject of a major antitrust case.

So if a 4 team deal came together, it wouldn't be the NCAA, either. And membership in the NCAA would not stop an antitrust lawsuit.

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Do you have a reason to believe that the Broncos won't get taken care of, or that they'd shuck the $$ to make a principled stand?

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Oh, someone will shuck out the cash.

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Do you have a reason to believe that the Broncos won't get taken care of, or that they'd shuck the $$ to make a principled stand?

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They would likely not make a 64 team cut, but I really used them for the play on words. I don't know any lawyer named Steve BYU

What do you mean, for how long? I don't get how people aren't seeing that the BCS is being imploded by design to make the superconferences happen. Its like everyone forgot that everyone hated the damn thing and was clamoring for a playoff and that is being delivered, in a neo-BCS manner by the same people that gave us the BCS.

The NCAA will do whatever the conferences want and stay around. I don't think Slive wants to worry about creating another puppet organization to comply with title9

I'm not sure how A&M moving is going to drastically change college football. Just one team going to another conference; we saw it all last summer. It happens. I don't think Baylor has a leg to stand on, but you never know when it comes to judges.

You've also got to understand that Baylor is trying everything they can to stop this because it is in their best interest. They know how sweet a deal they have right now. Call Starr a whiner, but he's really in a 100 year situation. He's got to try everything he can to stop it, and he knows that his chances are pretty slim. If he pisses off a few Aggies, then so be it.

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What do you mean, for how long? I don't get how people aren't seeing that the BCS is being imploded by design to make the superconferences happen.

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Okay...and so what will replace that? You think the NCAA is going to run the 4 conference playoff. Not likely. Major college football has done about as much as it can to make the NCAA irrelevant. You know why the NCAA doesn't come down hard on major programs? Because it knows if it did that would be the end of its involvement in football.

As it is now the NCAA is not necessary for college football and will be made further unnecessary by super conferences. And possibly cut out of the picture altogether.

Christ... If you figure something out by the time I wake up, I will be surprised. All I see going on here is a bunch of what if's and let's all get together and sing kumbaya. Welcome to capitalism where it is survival of the fittest.

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I'm not sure how A&M moving is going to drastically change college football. Just one team going to another conference; we saw it all last summer. It happens. I don't think Baylor has a leg to stand on, but you never know when it comes to judges.

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OU just said if you're gone, they're gone. That's why it's drastic. IF they're gone, we're gone. If we're gone the Big 12 is gone. And so on.

Once this was about more than just you guys going (which isn't drastic), then we're back where we were last year when everything came undone.

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All I see going on here is a bunch of what if's

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They pay lawyers a lot of money to make sure those what ifs don't cost money.

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OU just said if you're gone, they're gone. That's why it's drastic. IF they're gone, we're gone. If we're gone the Big 12 is gone. And so on.

Once this was about more than just you guys going (which isn't drastic), then we're back where we were last year when everything came undone.

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Then correct me if I'm wrong, but does that mean OU will be lumped into the lawsuit as well? You can't hold A&M responsible for them leaving as well, not even in a court of law.

I don't think individual schools are quite as worried about it as conferences may be.

Go back and read what BMX and I posted from CNNSI. It really explains it well.

The BCS is enough trouble. A 4 conference deal would be a major headeach and possibly impossible to defend against an antitrust claim--one that almost certainly would be coming.

So if you're at 16 teams in your conference and can't get a +1 to decide your champion, then you just ****ed every school in your conference. Especially if you're the SEC. They're better off now with the BCS.

I admit a lot of this is speculative.

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Major college football has done about as much as it can to make the NCAA irrelevant.

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Agree, they've effectively been made irrelevant.

And that's why propping up a weak NCAA is good (in an extremely cynical, cold sort of way if you're Slive/Scott/Delaney...they need some sort of nickname).

Kill the NCAA, and you've got a hot political mess on your hands. I can't imagine that this is what they want. They are going to want to keep them as the noble image to show the world that the virtue of amateur athletics is thriving.

Commercials to the country saying almost all NCAA athletes go pro in something other than sports keep happening. It provides the cover to head off any major argument.

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I admit a lot of this is speculative.

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That's why I don't think Baylor has a leg to stand on. It's a pretty tall order to claim that A&M going to the SEC would cause such a collapse of college football as we know it. I think it's just a bluff and last resort from a desperate university. Wasn't there something like this regarding V-Tech and the Big East?

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That's why I don't think Baylor has a leg to stand on. It's a pretty tall order to claim that A&M going to the SEC would cause such a collapse of college football as we know it. I think it's just a bluff and last resort from a desperate university. Wasn't there something like this regarding V-Tech and the Big East?

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Yeah. But go back and read the thread--I'm not sure that's all Slive is worried about. It may not be a suit about breaking up the Big 12 per se...but a consequence of it: An antitrust claim later down the road against Baylor among other teams left in the cold.

From 20,000 feet . . . This whole "Will Baylor Sue" deal sounds eerily like Obama's famous statement "you know, just spread the wealth around" to Joe the Plumber. Illustration: so here I am in Kiev, Ukraine driving on city streets with and ENDLESS sameness to everything. The same 10-15 story apartment buildings lined up in every direction. Despite 20 years of independence, the legacy of communism is everywhere; ie a suppression of the competitive spirit that brings virtually everyone down to a common level. So it bothers me when the very spirit of creativity and competition that made our nation great is morphing into a whiny attitude that resents the creativity and aggressive spirit of TAMU . Seeking the least common denominator ? How'd that work out for you, Ukraine?

In that case either they have decided to go for 4 16's, or it'll never happen because fear of antitrust lawsuits, or they haven't made up their mind

Positing a theory theres anxiety about antitrust may be something that deserves attention. But theres been a year for them since things imploded last year for them to figure out how they were going to go.

So, I'll say that they did already give it attention and are going ahead with it. As huge a drama the Aggies have been for the country up to this point, this is only the tip of the iceberg, and my money is that 4 16's or 20's are going ahead with the battle plans having been drawn.

I have a feeling you'll agree the odds of that are most likely?

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In that case either they have decided to go for 4 16's, or it'll never happen because fear of antitrust lawsuits, or they haven't made up their mind

Positing a theory theres anxiety about antitrust may be something that deserves attention. But theres been a year for them since things imploded last year for them to figure out how they were going to go.

So, I'll say that they did already give it attention and are going ahead with it. As huge a drama the Aggies have been for the country up to this point, this is only the tip of the iceberg, and my money is that 4 16's or 20's are going ahead with the battle plans having been drawn.

I have a feeling you'll agree the odds of that are most likely?

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I don't know how much has been drawn up. I think there is a lot of momentum in favor of keeping the BCS, despite it's problems. It appears to work particularly well for the SEC, as it is currently constituted.

I think that just about any conference would love to add a Texas or OU or A&M to their ranks. As long as it stopped with that.

But I'm not sure much thought has gone into what you really do if you end up with 4 big conferences.

First, it's not clear what the advantages of that are monetarily to the teams in each conference

Second, it's not clear what happens competitively to the teams in your conference in their quest to win national titles. You might be doing nothing but disadvantaging them.

Look I get as excited about the possibility of playing tOSU or Michigan or Penn State or USC or Oregon in conference games as you do Alabama and LSU. There's something appealing about that. But there's a downside, too.

Again, I'm speculating about Slive's concerns but I can say that in the lead up to all this it has only been recently clear that OU is going to use your leaving as an excuse to kill the conference. Slive could elect to stand pat at 13 or 14 teams while the Pac 12 and possibly Big 1G and ACC consolidate. But I doubt it. And even if he doesn't expand if you end up with one or two less conferences that changes the BCS and maybe in ways he won't like.

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First, it's not clear what the advantages of that are monetarily to the teams in each conference

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Isn't this tantamount to saying its possible they can't renegotiate their TV contracts? Because thats what its about. National titles don't matter, per your second point. Its TV markets.

Maybe they wouldn't be able to. I suppose its true everyone assumes it is because its a standard practice. The ability to renegotiate for a fatter payout is the genesis of all of this and is the assumption we the country has been operating on to make sense of this. I just don't buy that its not in their contract.

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Isn't this tantamount to saying its possible they can't renegotiate their TV contracts? Because thats what its about. National titles don't matter, per your second point. Its TV markets.

Maybe they wouldn't be able to. I suppose its true everyone assumes it is because its a standard practice. The ability to renegotiate for a fatter payout is the genesis of all of this and is the assumption we the country has been operating on to make sense of this. I just don't buy that its not in their contract.

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It's not so much that. It's that you're just taking the teams already playing and re-packaging them. It's not clear why the money will increase so much.

Now granted, I get the appeal of the "big games" we're supposed to be talking about having. But it's been posted here--some folks that know a lot about TV are saying they're not sure those additional games are worth that much more money.

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I don't know that I am.

Last year everyone was CERTAIN that the Big 12 was about to bust up. But it got stopped very suddenly. And everyone said they were happy with where things were.

You guys changed your minds. The SEC apparently said let's talk. That was okay because Texas and OU said go on, we're fine here. But then OU said no, we're not really fine.

And we're back to where everyone got chicken**** the last time--where it appears that superconferences are about to start.

As much as fans seem to want it, it's not at all clear that the commissioners do. They want their conferences to have advantages, and so they're okay picking off teams here and there as long as leagues aren't completely de-stabilized. But once a league like the Big 12 goes and you get 4 super conferences, college football is a HELL of a lot different. And I think the conference commissioners chicken out thinking about that.

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I don't think that's a correct description of the sequence of events. We have been talking w/ the SEC for a considerable time before OU said "they were fine" (if they ever did). OU apparently didn't really think we were even serious about leaving until they visited w/ Mizzou.

You seem to have shifted your argument somewhat. You no longer seem to be suggesting that Slive is worried about suits by Baylor per se, but that he's using the threat of one as cover to bail out of expansion. Essentially, that he lost his nerve.

That's possible, but he's playing an extremely dangerous game if that's true. If he deserts A&M now, he may be forfeiting his one shot of making a major play in the Texas market. I don't think the horns are ever going to go to the SEC, so the Ags are the only option.

But if he closes off the SEC escape valve, there's no guarantee that A&M goes meekly back to the Big12-whatever, to wait for Slive's next round of courting. We may go B1G. If that happens, he will have screwed his conference out of the biggest opportunity for growth it will ever see.

two of the largest television markets to sell, then throw in austin and san antonio on top of it. Its going to increase the number of households, compared to current SEC ones, by almost 50%. That is a coup.

Who is saying the games aren't worth that much more money? I only saw one guy on twitter say that (forget his name).

I don't see how the economic reality of adding A&M with its massive presence throughout Texas television markets is not going to factor into an option to renegotiate. And even if somehow this is a non-issue, is the addition of the DC/Virginia markets not going to matter for the same reason? (if VT gets added too and I think they will)

Not buying it. There is simply a lot of FUD that is getting created around this. Ineffable lawsuits years down the line, strange assertions theres not money to be made.

[This message has been edited by rebelionel (edited 9/7/2011 4:32a).]

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From 20,000 feet . . . This whole "Will Baylor Sue" deal sounds eerily like Obama's famous statement "you know, just spread the wealth around" to Joe the Plumber. Illustration: so here I am in Kiev, Ukraine driving on city streets with and ENDLESS sameness to everything. The same 10-15 story apartment buildings lined up in every direction. Despite 20 years of independence, the legacy of communism is everywhere; ie a suppression of the competitive spirit that brings virtually everyone down to a common level. So it bothers me when the very spirit of creativity and competition that made our nation great is morphing into a whiny attitude that resents the creativity and aggressive spirit of TAMU . Seeking the least common denominator ? How'd that work out for you, Ukraine?

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All of this arguing is based purely on speculation. If the hurdle is being scared of Baylor sueing the SEC, I just don't get it.

Can someone answer this question? If A&M has followed all bylaws and withdrawal procedures, how does Baylor sueing the SEC prevent us from leaving the Big 12? After we leave the Big 12, what right does Baylor have to sue the conference we choose to join?

if the info is right, they dont have to sue

they simply dont have to say they wont sue

Which makes absolutely no sense. Slive is a smart guy. No way he puts the SEC and us in a position where we can basically be extorted. There is more to this story than we've heard.

[This message has been edited by Philip j fry (edited 9/7/2011 4:43a).]

Or it's all bs from our buddy chip

Baylor's powerplay opens the door to the Big Ten to offer A&M an invite to apply for membership. As much as A&M may hate going north, this may be the only option without litigation.

Again this doesn't make sense unless I'm missing something. How does Baylor waiving their right to sue the SEC remain a hurdle? As far as I can tell, Baylor has no grounds to sue the SEC. This is just some Chip Brown bs. Doesn't make sense. All procedures were followed.