Bryan, I too am an old Ag and I can tell that you are suffering from BAS, Battered Aggie Syndrome. I have had to detox from it myself. Let's look at reality, not media hype or the way things were ten years ago. Sips do not have the legislative power they once had, nothing close. Furthermore their sway over the NCAA is nothing more then your old sips buds muttering in their beer about the way things were and working hard to stay in denial about reality. I feel sorry for sips especially guys my age. They have stuck their head in the sand and allowed a cohort of libs that they despise take over and rule. They made their bed and now they have to lie in it. I have been asking them for years about how they can support the path that tu has been going down. They really didn't see or want to see what was happening. Now they do and they are in crisis. As the Scripture says, Pride comes before the fall, and the more pride you have the greater the fall and yes the sips are falling, HARD, not just in football but in about every meaning full category. Makes since, when you go with the lib socialist agenda, you don't produce quality hard working, practical self reliant graduates that mirror your states culture.
Ag Dot Com, though you are legally correct in the 3/4s vote to be approved. It has been an unspoken agreement that a unanimous vote is expected.
The SEC has a strong collegial feel about it. The only exception is Mizzou. Mizzou is not really a fit and they are struggling. It was kind of a forced marriage of convenience, best available on the part of the SEC and the only life boat for Mizzou. They will be like KU, strong in basketball, weak in football. The deal is Mizzou brings something to the table. A fairly large TV market, a whole state, and a solid if not spectacular athletic program. THEY ALSO don't bring all the negative baggage that a tu would bring.
tu is not a fit for SEC in ANYWAY. NONE NADA ZIP.
Then one has to ask, what do they bring to the SEC? The answer, a whole lot more feces then food.
The sips have always been the master spin and power politics. Now they are just the master of spin and even that is being eroded. They have been declining in substance for a long time. The King has no clothes and now the whole nation is beginning to see it.
They are truly a liberal dominated school amongst a sea of conservative values. I just don't think other SEC ADs, and Presidents are ignorant about tu. They already got the plumb of the state in us and they have no need to take tu on and I can assure you the aspect of voting tu in would cause strong division in a conference that very much values it's unity!
Secondly the idea that ESPN can force the issue is nuts. ESPN is fighting to maintain it's market share. They do not have the power to force tu on to the SEC. ESPN is in a tough situation. They surely did not want A&M going to the SEC because it erodes the value of the Bevo conf. tu did not want us to go, Baylor, did not want us to go, Everyone pulled every stop they could to stop us, THEY FAILED.
Why? They did not have the power to stop us, not politically, not legally, not in the media either, (which is really the only real leverage they have over us left)
They used to have extreme clout in the NCAA, NOW THEY DO NOT> They made a power play with the LHN and highschool football. That was a mistake, now the whole nation and every AD and coach out there, now fully understood the reality of the sips and what we have had to deal with for a long time.
No, no. The sip power and influence has waned and it has waned across the board in every real and tangible way. We are beating them across the board, we are a much more nationally and internationally significant university in about every SUBSTANTIAL way. Our leadership is much better, across the board.
Bottomline, I think I have better chance of winning the lotto then they sips have in every being a part of the SEC in my life time.