(07-06-2018 03:36 PM)AllTideUp Wrote:  

(07-06-2018 03:07 PM)JRsec Wrote:  

(07-06-2018 02:04 PM)AllTideUp Wrote:  

(07-06-2018 11:48 AM)JRsec Wrote:  

(07-06-2018 04:55 AM)AllTideUp Wrote:  The idea of Texas and Kansas as a pair to the SEC has been one of the more interesting rumors the last couple of years.

I'm not sure where it originated, but it makes me think it's not just a theory on a message board.

I don't know if I've ever talked about this, but in the early 2000s I read an article about Missouri being displeased with the Big 12. They wanted out and apparently had an eye on the SEC. I didn't think much of it at the time although I found the notion interesting. Low and behold, about 10 years later it actually happened.

When people started suggesting Mizzou as an expansion target last time around, I did think it was unusual, but I knew it wasn't the first time I had heard it. Where did I hear it before? The Tuscaloosa News and I'm pretty sure it was written by Cecil Hurt although it could have been another writer from the time.

I don't have any idea why the Tuscaloosa News would have printed an article on that subject, but I remember it like it was yesterday. I've searched desperately for that article in online archives and could not find a thing. I even emailed Cecil Hurt about it once and he didn't remember writing it. It might not have even been the subject of the article, but rather a blurb within it. I'm not sure on that part. Promise I'm not making it up though...

Anyway, it occurred to me one day that a lot of these decisions are explored and planned well in advance. The people making these decisions don't tend to make snap judgements.

So that brings me back to the idea of Texas and Kansas to the SEC circulating for a while.

1. We know Kansas has committed $300 million to improvements including some premium seating that seems quite odd with what we know about KU football. I mean, that's an awful lot of money to drop on a hail mary.

2. Jeff Long joining the team over there makes me think they have a nice long term vision. He's well respected and accomplished. I don't think he would have taken a job like that if they were bound for the American...just my take.

3. We know that the SEC is on their wish list based on the ESPN article a few years back that had a blurb quoting an unnamed KU official.

4. ESPN loves Kansas basketball so much they went to the trouble of signing a 3rd Tier deal with them. The easiest place to store that product is in the SEC and I contend that if ESPN wants that product bad enough then they'll pay for it.

5. Kansas is one of the very few schools that fits Sankey's stated vision for expansion. He said the next expansion will be very similar to the last one. He mentioned new states(border states) and AAU schools specifically.

We already know why Texas makes sense. The only question seems to be over whether or not they pull the trigger. As JR has laid out, however, there's really no good reason for them to go elsewhere.

1. If Texas really wanted to go to the PAC then they would have bolted last time. All UT had to do was drop their demand for Baylor and the deal would have happened. As it stands, the PAC probably can't ever pay enough to make it worth the while.

2. The Big Ten is not really a reasonable option either. The travel would be very tough and without any of the perks of getting exposure in growing Western markets. They'd get plenty of money out of the deal, but the B1G needs a school like Texas a lot more than Texas needs the B1G.

3. The ACC doesn't make a lot of sense in part because the money doesn't make sense. The travel would also be tough and it's not really an institutional fit. UT is a large state flagship with a football first athletic program. The ACC needs schools like that, but it wouldn't do much for Texas.

So why does the SEC make sense? Other than the obvious, there are some reasons it works best for what UT is looking for.

1. The SEC is in a lot better position than it was 20 or 30 years ago. In fact, the league is at its height of prestige and because of demographic trends, it's only going to grow.

2. It's not just that the money would be huge, the savings in travel costs alone would probably be a few million a year.

3. The LHN and the BTN are not going to mesh because ESPN and FOX are not going to mesh. At that, I think there's a lot more potential for using a property like the LHN in conjunction with the SEC than with any other league. I don't see the LHN being discontinued because ESPN has fought hard to get it carriage. The only problem with the channel is lack of content and low sub fees. Those sorts of things could be remedied with the right approach. If a 16 team SEC had access to 2 linear channels then there are ways to take advantage of that and generate additional funds.

4. The academic angle isn't overplayed, it's just silly. For one, UT has fought to keep the Big 12 together and that league has never been a paragon of academic excellence. More to the point, if the CIC or whatever they are calling it nowadays was of real material value then the Big Ten wouldn't have athletic affiliation as a prerequisite for membership. Wouldn't it be very strange of an academic first conference to want your football team in the fold before allowing you into a consortium? There's no reason for CIC membership to be linked with Big Ten membership other than that's just the way they want to do it. At that, schools like Chicago wouldn't have bailed out and schools like Johns Hopkins would have actually joined. I'm sure the CIC provides some usefulness or they wouldn't bother with it, but it's obviously not a tool one would base long term decisions on. There are far more valuable academic affiliations to be had. The AAU is one of them and Texas already has that.

I consider it a minor factor of interest, but as to your recollection of how long this may have been in the works, let's go back to the 2010-2 era. It was after the loss of A&M, Colorado, Nebraska and Missouri that the new T3 contract extensions were either made or extended (with the exception of the LHN which helped to pry A&M loose as it came before). ESPN held the T3 of just two schools (Kansas and Texas) and FOX held that of Oklahoma. Hmm? Probably a coincidence, but maybe not.

Anyway the pushing of this thought put one of my old assumptions to rest. For a long time I thought that this particular move would require Texas refusing to move with Oklahoma and Oklahoma refusing to come to the SEC without Oklahoma. So if Texas really wanted a reunion with former rivals in the SEC that the SEC would refuse OSU and force OU to head to the Big 10 with Kansas. Then Texas and Tech would join the SEC. The reason being that Texas would want assurances that if they were to gain much of the leverage over former conference mates they would want to make sure first that OU couldn't tag along. It would make it look like OU crawled out on their own limb and it broke on them and then Tech would be the cover Texas needed to move.

Well if you replace Tech with Kansas I think the opposite strategy must be employed. I think Texas and Kansas would be announced as a pair first. This would leave the Big 10 rushing to lock up Oklahoma and leave Iowa State as the most likely pairing.

This would also in many ways be the favorable approach for the networks. Why?

If Texas moves first with Kansas it really puts the pressure on Oklahoma to accept the Big 10, it really opens the door for Iowa State to land a logical destination, and for the ACC to end their quibbling and take West Virginia. Now all 3 AAU's and the top 4 brands are off the table. So if the PAC wants help from the networks for carriage (and they do) then Kansas State, Oklahoma State (which helps OU separate), T.C.U. and Texas Tech all make sense even if they don't fit the academic plans of the PAC.

The PACN gets network support (and it doesn't really matter which network) but they also get 3 states, with penetration in the largest one, and 4 CTZ slots for marketing. KState isn't a bad academic school and Tech has made strides. T.C.U. and OSU give them deep enough penetration along with Tech in the DFW market to make it effective.

If the PAC doesn't go for it then at least OU is out.

ESPN rolls the LHN into the SEC West channel. Charlotte becomes the SEC East channel. Texas anchors the West with A&M, L.S.U, Arkansas, and hopefully a reconnected Missouri as competitors along with the Mississippi schools. Kansas becomes their Kentucky.

Alabama anchors the East with Florida, Auburn, Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina mounting the charges and in a slightly tougher division Vanderbilt helps and Kentucky plays the role of perennial basketball King.

The two divisions, and their market profiles become essentially twins of one another in a recipe designed to protect the status of Kansas and Kentucky in hoops and Texas and Alabama as national brands with both being highly competitive for football. In effect it doubles the successful recipe that ESPN and the SEC have carefully crafted and it essentially doubles the T1, T2, and T3 product.

My only disagreement would be that I don't think the LHN would become a home for SEC West content. If you regionalize individual channels then you run the risk of markets outside the region not being invested in the content and therefore not paying for it. This hasn't been ESPN's M.O. They attempt to take ever linear network to a national market even if negotiations might be a little more regional from a practical perspective. This guarantees the most bang for the buck.

I'm partial to turning the channel into a Spanish version of the SEC Network. That way it could be distributed domestically or internationally. But I have no idea if that's in their thought process.

The SECN currently owns 3 channel locations. The main SECN channel and two overflow channels the third of which I don't think has yet been used. The LHN being converted into Spanish is fine. My point was that you can really intensify your product by putting the West on one channel and the East on the other for games. They can share talk shows and news, etc. They wouldn't be available separately. They would be two halves of one whole. I would think that more people would subscribe if there was more of their school on the network. Doubling the time slots would do that.

I think inside the footprint, in most places at least, that would work. It might be a harder sell nationally though because the cable companies would fight bundling the networks together based on the limited amount of content if you divide everything by two. Could hurt the sub rates, but I don't know.

That and the football games would be the most valuable product and I don't think ESPN would dedicate any more of those to a 3rd tier network. Especially with the ACC Network coming on line, they're going to need those games for their other channels.

The main reason I like the Spanish version is because you can reach a currently untapped audience. You can also take advantage of the Austin studios whereas if you divide only the games between 2 feeds then all that could be run out of Charlotte. Of course, if the LHN is meshed with the SEC then ESPN may sell off the 2nd studio anyway so it might not matter.

I think a lot of things could get sorted out once the 1st Tier contract is done. If ESPN gains more SEC games then it could alter their broadcast schedule. It's also possible we add a 9th game if we move to 16 because it would be a very efficient form of scheduling. The additional inventory might alter some decisions as well.

Pause, take a break, and then reflect. ATU the channels are already bundled (except for the Spanish Language broadcasts). The consumer whether in footprint or outside of it aren't paying one more penny. But what ESPN gains that would make us more money is double the advertising by having original product consistently on two different channels both of which are geographically grouped. This means that not only do national advertisers pay to be on both, but that a much higher volume of local and regional advertising could buy space as well because by grouping those teams in divisions and dedicating the extra channel you target a more specific region thereby making their advertising efforts far more effective than the way we currently broadcast.

Quit thinking about the consumer here because they won't be affected. They will simply get more for their money. It's ESPN and the SEC that are able to double dip on ad revenue by making this move. The Spanish Language channel can be a stand alone utilizing the LHN studios if they need to. The SEC already has 3 channels which are bundled. But, we only really utilize one of them regularly and the 2nd when there are time conflicts. There is no added cost other than a few production people.