BLACK HEART GOLD PODCAST 23: EXPANSION BONANZA WITH T PAIN

he was clearly talking about The New School with head coach James Lipton.

Even though I’m no friend of pants, I’m certainly a Friend Of The Pants.

But I think Peter may have had a pretty solid point. Texas does hold all of the cards here and, for them, a move to the Pac-10 may simply make more sense. It may suck for fans, but traveling for the teams isn’t likely to be an issue. Hell, with the amount of pull that Texas has, the Pac-10 may just have to start showing games at dinner time on the west coast.

…but “brand” is only as big as the number of television sets it gets you. And for all the talk of Nebraska’s “value” as a “brand” (I saw the comments at Rock M, too), it’s been so valuable to the Big XII that the Huskers rarely make network television, the conference is being surrounded by cash-stuffed carpetbaggers who all make more money on broadcast rights, and Tom Osborne is openly playing footsie with the Big 10.

No matter what Steve Forbes says, Nebraska football is as culturally relevant today as Michigan basketball: The target demographics weren’t alive (or at least weren’t old enough to realize it was happening) when they were successful.

I still don’t see how that move makes enough financial sense for Texas. Obviously adding them would enable the Pac 10 to command better TV deals, but will they really be better than what they could get with the BXI or what they could get by staying in the B12? Not to mention that even when the Pac 10 and Big 12 go to renegotiate their deals, there’s a limited amount of good TV spots available after the Big Ten and SEC gobbled up so many good ones. CBS already has the SEC. NBC has Notre Dame and is cheap. FOX has baseball for most of the fall. How many more spots can ABC or ESPN offer?

And would the Pac 10 be able to get those schools approved? They apparently need approval from every school in the league; last time Stanford refused to sign off on Texas… would they really be amenable to adding Texas A&M (who is certainly not the academic equal of Texas)? (That also seems like a problem with adding Colorado and Utah, FWIW.)

I think the time difference is a bigger issue that you think. Texas and A&M are two hours ahead of most of the Pac-10 (1 hour for Arizona schools) while half of the Big Ten is already in the Central timezone and schedules accordingly.

The options for the Pac-10 are really only Colorado, Utah and BYU in the mountain time zone and Fresno in the California.

Yeah, Colorado is often mentioned for the Pac-10, but if Texas goes to Palo Alto and says “you can have us + A&M or Colorado + Utah/BYU/Boise,” does the Pac-10 even pause to consider the latter option?

As for television money, going to the Pac-10 still leaves the door open for UT to start their own network. If they did that after joining the Big 10, the conference would either nix it or demand total revenue sharing with the rest of the conference. All for one, one for all really doesn’t work for Texas, clearly.

from a non-PSU fan, is reciprocated.

And given the fact that you just used “fan’s” as a plural, the search continues.

Outside of money, this Big Ten would not be preferred by most of the fan base.

That’s almost exactly what RUTS said. But what does he know, he’s an evil PSU fan.

Pitt would sell their souls to play Penn State. They act like they don’t care about PSU, but that’s a lie.

by saying that, essentially, you don’t respect the people who you want to read it enough to use proper grammar and correct spelling, you have pretty much undermined yourself.

I’m also a Pitt Student, and I gotta say I completely disagree with Gorman. He just sweeps the issue of revenue increase under the rug and continues to think like a sports fan, not a University President. Nordy is all about increasing academic prestige; and you don’t get that with the Big East. The Big Ten has name-brand association of academic excellence as well as the research support and funding pipeline of the CIC. An extra 17 million dollars (annualy!) from the Big Ten TV deal would certainly ease the pain of leaving the Big East and I’m sure we’d find a way to keep the WvU series going. Georgia-Georgia Tech and Iowa-Iowa State rivalries thrive as out-of-conference dates; I think we could do the same.

(1) If all we’re getting is 44,000 serious faces in the stands by taking Pitt, I’m going to have to pass.

(2) This isn’t a message board.

(3) I’m not sure what argument you’re trying to make. That Pitt shouldn’t take an extra $15M per year so that they can keep playing South Florida?

While the Big Ten might not be the SEC (though it just split its two bowls with the OMG Conference), there is no doubt it is far superior, both historically and recently, when compared to the Big East. But that’s not the point.

Pitt played at home on the last week of the season against an undefeated Cincinnati for the Big East championship and a BCS berth and DIDN’T SELL OUT THE STADIUM, a stadium that would be just 7th largest in the conference. The rivalries with West Virginia might sell some seats, but I guarantee, playing in a bifurcated Big Ten where you would annually have games against 3 nearby programs that routinely sell out 100k+ seat stadiums, that those seats are full no matter what. That’s three sellouts every two years for a program that generally gives us this:

If the Big Ten calls, Pitt’s coming. There’s no doubt about that. You’d better get more fans, or more dedication from your existing fans, or that place will sound like Ryan Field.

Pitt hates Penn State in ways I can’t even describe. They may not “need” to play Penn State, but the majority of the Pitt fanbase desperately wants to play “JoePud” or whatever nickname they’ve come up with.

It may not overcome the WVU rivalry in basketball, but it sure as hell would in football. Period. End of discussion.

Gorman’s article is unbelievably fucking stupid. But I’ll give you a mini FJM treatment anyway.

First and foremost, the Panthers run the risk of ruining what has become one of the nation’s best rivalries, the Backyard Brawl. Some Pitt fans might prefer to renew the rivalry with Penn State, which would be great — just not if it comes at the expense of West Virginia.

Stupid. Pitt could still schedule WVU and even make it the last game of the year. BFD.

What’s worse, Pitt could lose its best coach by moving to the Big Ten.

Yeah, Dixon’s going to quit because the people who sign his checks decided to make a move that benefits the entire university. Excuse me while I make this wanking motion with my right hand.

While the Big Ten boasts its own television network, better bowl tie-ins and the recruiting draw of 100,000-seat stadiums, there’s no guarantee that playing in the conference would be a boost for Pitt. The competition would be better and make it harder to clinch bowl berths, especially the BCS bowls, and Pitt could go from Big East frontrunner to Big Ten also-ran.

Way to shoot for the fucking stars, Pitt! And as I explained, the B10 schools split the bowl money, so everyone’s guaranteed an even split every year, even scared, sissy-ass programs whose fans worry about being bowl eligible. Believe me, Pitt fans will love Detroit in late December.

As for the promise of more sellouts at 65,050-seat Heinz Field, consider that Pitt has played host to six Big Ten programs since 1992, and they only sold out against Ohio State in 1995 and Penn State in 2000. That’s right. Minnesota drew 31,129 in ’92, Michigan State 47,956 in ’06 and Iowa 50,321 in ’08.

Why even reference attendance numbers? Heinz Field opened in 2001. Minnesota was 2-9 in 1992, coming off a 2-9 year. Michigan State was 4-8 in ‘06, coming off a 5-6 year. Iowa was coming off a 6-6 season in 2008. These weren’t the early 2000’s Hurricanes blowing into town.

Face it, Gorman made up his mind well before he started looking at the situation. If he wrote it from the viewpoint of a fan, (1) he wrote it from the viewpoint of a terminally stupid fan and (2) he wasted his time because this decision will be made on factors that fans won’t give a crap about — academics and BTN viewership.