I'm not throwing bottom feeder big 5 teams with bottom feeder other teams. I'm comparing bottom feeder big 5 teams to good non-big5 teams. For example, a few years back, Baylor played a home-and-away with a ranked TCU team in non-conference. If you only have 3 non-conference games, and one has to be some major conference team, the odds of you also playing the Boise States of the world drop because you're probably going to count that as a "good" team, even though it's not. You still are going to want your two scrimmage games against the ULaLa's, so there's no room for another good opponent. "Big5" is a meaningless distinction when there are better schools out there in the other conferences. A team that wants to play a crappy schedule will still play one; a team that wants to play a good one will also do so. No one is going to think Baylor's schedule is better if they switch from playing uLaLa to playing a 1--11 Purdue team. All the requirement does is limit options and take away opportunities for the good Non-Big5 schools that are willing to play anyone, anywhere. Like I said, a clumsy solution to a real problem.
Your assumption is that you are choosing between a bottom feeder big 5 school vs a good non big 5 school and that is the fallacy here. Granted, TCU was good when they played but considering that those games are scheduled years in advance, it's possible that they were not good when the agreement was made. Also, your example is 3 years old. Furthermore, as to your example of NW State, they finished 3-4 in the Southland Conference. It's really convenient to compare them to a big 5 school that is 1-11 but it's unlikely they will be able to schedule 1-11 teams every year. On average, a big 5 team is going to be better than a non. You can cherry pick outliers but it's an extremely reasonable conclusion.
Where is my integrity? I swear (oops, no I sure don't swear) that I left it somewhere down on the coast....
TCU had been consistently good since 2000, finishing in the top-25 9 times out of 12 years. Unless Baylor is scheduling 8-10 years in advance, they knew what they were getting. Where did I mention NW State? And it's fairly easy to schedule bottom-feeder Big5 schools. Yeah, maybe you'll have some bad luck and Purdue or Kansas suddenly is good in 2017, but it's relatively unlikely. And that misses the point anyway. Schools that want to have bad schedules can still pretty easily do it. If you want to create a Big12-Pac12 challenge or something like that, that makes sense - it forces the teams to play non-conference games against teams of similar skill levels. But just requiring teams to schedule a non-conference game against a Big5 school is silly and doesn't really benefit any of the schools involved. Crappy Big5 schools are forced to lose a game to better teams when they could have used practice beating a team more at their skill level. And good Big5 schools can schedule target-practice anyway if they want.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>McLane Stadium from the Brazos River on Cary Gray's yacht! <a href="http://t.co/4ZYH7FYnEz">pic.twitter.com/4ZYH7FYnEz</a></p>— John McClain (@McClain_on_NFL) <a href="https://twitter.com/McClain_on_NFL/statuses/506099683513864192">August 31, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>McLane Stadium from Brazos River. <a href="http://t.co/QuTbwSIMkI">pic.twitter.com/QuTbwSIMkI</a></p>— John McClain (@McClain_on_NFL) <a href="https://twitter.com/McClain_on_NFL/statuses/506181060506701824">August 31, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Two Baylor giants Drayton McLane Jr. and Dave Campbell. <a href="http://t.co/eP8ZXIteIV">pic.twitter.com/eP8ZXIteIV</a></p>— John McClain (@McClain_on_NFL) <a href="https://twitter.com/McClain_on_NFL/statuses/506205487185293312">August 31, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>ICYMI, that's one awesome statue. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RG3Statue?src=hash">#RG3Statue</a> <a href="http://t.co/GF8KzwQK5C">pic.twitter.com/GF8KzwQK5C</a></p>— Baylor Football (@BUFootball) <a href="https://twitter.com/BUFootball/statuses/506202262495297537">August 31, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
keep forgetting that the big 12 has a deal with fox, and i need to check fox sports 1 that's a fine looking stadium
Stadium is absolutely amazing. Never thought I would see a giant inflatable Coors Light and Miller Lite cans on Baylors campus. Game- Our defense looked DOMINANT. Shawn Oakman is simply a freak. The offense was affected by Pettys injury and he was missing all of his deep balls because he couldn't throw correctly with his back. Thinking we are going to sit Petty this weekend. The injury can't get worse its just about his level of pain tolerance. We won't need him for NW St or Buffalo, just have to get ready to go for conference.
Plug & play. Seth Russell has a big arm. KD Cannon is the truth and Davion Hall is very good also. The future is bright.
I remember donny and other UH homers saying how Briles would just be doormats in the b12. Now they are 2 td favorites against texas. Art Briles is one hell of a coach.
