Here at 2:00 AM on 8/8/2023 and AllTideUp has informed me of a Board meeting for Clemson on the evening of the 9th. It could easily coincide with Florida State's impending announcement of intentions to leave the ACC by the 15th of this month.

The question would seem to be where is the destination? If it's the SEC ESPN could well work out a reasonable negotiation for their departure, if it's the Big 10 they may each need that half billion-dollar loan to buy their freedom. Some confident sources, however unconnected to Big 10 decision makers are hopeful the duo heads their way. Meanwhile quietly the SEC may ben angling for some kind of announcement in a few weeks, or so several rumors go.

No matter which direction this pair may take if FSU announces, and Clemson joins them the ACC as we've known it will be suddenly as panicked as what we've just witnessed on the West Coast. I could easily see 6 more schools taken between the SEC and Big 10, maybe more depending upon how things break and what their network backers will fork over to get.

If it transpires it will be both a relief and a shock at the same time. A relief that this endless havoc and pain for fans is about over, and a shock when surveying what was once 96 programs hoping to catch fire at the right time to win it all, has been whittled down to a Super 2 and a lesser conference or two. It will have been mathematically reduced to somewhere between 48 to 72 schools. And that number may not last. Players will be compensated whether by NIL or pay for play or both depending upon the courts. What had been 6 strong conferences 20 years ago will have been halved and expanded. A playoff will begin with at least 12 schools and a new era will come in at a time in my life when I remember what fun it once was when just winning your conference was a big deal and a bowl game was a vacation. It was messy and disorganized, but wholly delightful at the local level before piped in music and artificial crowd noises, and corporate logos everywhere instead of painted on retired jersey numbers.

Now we will have slick production with angles covered, reviews, gambling, corporate boxes for the Patricians who think like the Emperors of Rome that they need to be seen at such events so the public knows who rules them. The traditional jerseys will be redesigned 2 and 3 times a season to boost sales and your kids won't be able to afford to go. Then it will all be streamlined into an ultimate champion. Is it really progress, when our love and adoration is left in the past? Somehow, I believe it will never be cherished as it was in my youth when every one of us in my town had our transistor radio in our pockets with an ear plug in as we went to the dove shoots and still needed to hear our favorite school's radio announcers tell us how each play unfolded. And none of us missed a game ever and if ABC had it on that week it was a must-see event because that happened maybe twice a season if you were having a great year. By the time I was 12 I knew the names of the players on every SEC team and followed the race for the conference title each week, and all my friends did as well. Now only the parents know these things, and the grandparents know even more. My wife knows 10x more than my son in laws.

I fear this consolidation is the last-ditch effort to milk a beloved game for the last dime the corporations can make from them before the game also passes away.

Well may we be content with the witches' brew that these 3 will likely give us. Our condolences and sympathy to those who don't make the tier of the so-called elites.

I am reminded of James Caan's Rollerball performance. I just hope we still have a Jonathon E to cheer on! And that the corporate manipulations are few!

If Clemson and Florida State choose the SEC I will be pleased. They are the two schools out there most like the SEC schools and their fans are our neighbors. That at least would be as it should.

Peace!