This is a pretty good look at what the AAC "should" do when deciding on who to target for expansion. That said, it is noted that the numbers may or may not have any bearing on who the league commissioner and university presidents choose.
Analytics of AAC expansion (link)
- Thread starter RhinoD
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Good article. If you click through it to Nate Silver’s deal, its OK, by Nate Silver standards, but it leaves a big hole. He purports to rank the TV markets by number of college football fans. Under this method a place like Birmingham comes out looking really good, because most everyone who follows sports follows college football, as contrasted to places in the northeast.
What it leaves out is that they follow Alabama and Auburn, not UAB.
Agree 100% that they will go for markets. And maybe Army or even Air Force. Which leaves us out of it.
Listening to some media podcasts, this seems to be the plan:
The answer to all of your questions is money.
Big 12 2.0 will release the Big 2 for either 23 or 24 season (significantly, 24 is when the CBS SEC contract expires and it becomes a 100% Disney property). ESPN will pay some $$.
AAC 1.0 will release its 3 for the same year. ESPN will pay $$ which will be used to pay the AAC buyouts. The 3 will get far less TV money from the B12 3.0 for 4 years. AAC 2.0 launches the same year as Big 12 3.0, 23 or 24.
AAC 2.0, in return for dropping all this conspiracy theory horses*** and for letting everything get realigned properly and quickly, will get the same $$ it would have gotten through the end of its ESPN deal (2032) regardless of the diminished TV value.
The wildcard in this is CBS. CBS has nothing of importance to show on big CBS at 3:30 starting in 24. They probably are not going to show the stuff now on CBSSN (CUSA, MWC, Army) and there is nothing out there in other sports that seems to fit, so some speculate that CBS will buy some AAC overflow an show it at either noon or 3:30, which will allow Disney to get some of its $$ back on the back side.
My guesss?
UAB
Army
Air Force or Georgia State.
What it leaves out is that they follow Alabama and Auburn, not UAB.
Agree 100% that they will go for markets. And maybe Army or even Air Force. Which leaves us out of it.
Listening to some media podcasts, this seems to be the plan:
The answer to all of your questions is money.
Big 12 2.0 will release the Big 2 for either 23 or 24 season (significantly, 24 is when the CBS SEC contract expires and it becomes a 100% Disney property). ESPN will pay some $$.
AAC 1.0 will release its 3 for the same year. ESPN will pay $$ which will be used to pay the AAC buyouts. The 3 will get far less TV money from the B12 3.0 for 4 years. AAC 2.0 launches the same year as Big 12 3.0, 23 or 24.
AAC 2.0, in return for dropping all this conspiracy theory horses*** and for letting everything get realigned properly and quickly, will get the same $$ it would have gotten through the end of its ESPN deal (2032) regardless of the diminished TV value.
The wildcard in this is CBS. CBS has nothing of importance to show on big CBS at 3:30 starting in 24. They probably are not going to show the stuff now on CBSSN (CUSA, MWC, Army) and there is nothing out there in other sports that seems to fit, so some speculate that CBS will buy some AAC overflow an show it at either noon or 3:30, which will allow Disney to get some of its $$ back on the back side.
My guesss?
UAB
Army
Air Force or Georgia State.
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One school that didn’t even have a football program only a short time ago, and another school (Georgia State) I never knew existed. Marshall is sinking lower on the pecking order.
Because none of this realignment stuff is about actual football... Never has been, probably never will be.
If it were about football, realignment would start with the SEC kicking out Vandy and adding Clemson, etc.
It's about markets and perceived media coverage. Georgia State is in Atlanta, UAB in a mid-sized city and college football hotbed in Alabama, and Army has a huge built-in following. It's the same reason Charlotte is being discussed ahead of Marshall, Louisana Tech, App State, etc... Charlotte is a large city with lots of people and media outlets, Huntington, Ruston, and Boone are not.
I understand that, but just because a school is in a large metro area doesn’t mean most people give a crap. Like I said, I had no idea Georgia State even existed. Don’tknow anything about them or their sports programs, and I would never see myself ever watching any of their games.
Of course not. But understand the Big Lie that the Big East 3.0 (Leastleftovers) AAC 1.0, and now the AAC 2.0 tell. Being IN a place = people giving a crap.
It is a fine school, in academic terms. So is Georgia Southern, so is Augusta, so are lots of other smaller schools around Georgia. And so are Georgia and Georgia Tech. And kids that care about sports self-select themselves to UGa or Tech, kids that don’t, don’t. And kids that make choices like that grow up to continue to not care about sports.
And you can say the same about both our and the AAC’s (and soon to be the “Big” 12 3.0’s ) directional Floridas, the same about Texas hyphenated, North Carolina hyphenated, Cincinnati, the MAC, and so on.
Real people understand that being in a place and people “giving a crap” are two different things. The snake oil the AAC is selling is the exact opposite.
Which is why it will look for big city based commuter colleges. Like UAB. And GSU.
Come on Geezer. You know a UAB admission in the AAC is obvious because Alabama/Auburn/SEC have a fanbase in the booming media market of Birmingham.
UAB drops their football program a few years ago and suddenly they are a darling for expansion.Come on Geezer. You know a UAB admission in the AAC is obvious because Alabama/Auburn/SEC have a fanbase in the booming media market of Birmingham.
Sure. It makes total sense....as much sense as Ga St. 😂
Not picking on Georgia State, but I've lived in Atlanta for over 20 years and No one and I mean NO ONE talks about Georgia State Football. Heck even Georgia Tech has to fight like hell to get noticed. In Atlanta the top collegiate teams and it's not even close are UGA, Alabama and Auburn. So if the AAC or any conference for that matter, thinks the they are going to get a foothold in the Atlanta market by adding a school not named UGA, Alabama, Auburn and to a lesser extent Ga Tech, they should seriously question their search criteria.
Basically same thing with U Charlotte in that city. Way down on the pecking order.
Appy St probably has a better following in Charlotte than UNC-Char has in Charlotte.
Sort of.
The TV money is what it is. ESPN or Fox or whoever just bids what it bids for a particular league’s games.
Then there are the league specific networks. The ACC Network and SEC Network (which belong to ESPN), the Big 10 Network (which belongs to Fox) and the Pac 12 Network (which refused to be in a partnership with either and thus most providers, including the largest (DirecTV) don’t carry it). The Big 12 3.0 will certainly start a network as well, as Texas will be gone, which is a story for another day.
The league specific networks have an “in state rate” and an “out of state rate”. So if you have TV (provider doesn’t matter) in Ohio, you pay more through your bill for the Big 10 Network than someone in WV does.
This really doesn’t apply to the G5, as we don’t have league specific networks.
