Again, using numbers from last season is fools gold. Of course a good UH team will draw well in it own city. If that chart shows anything, it is that Houston is an audience of frontrunners. What happens when UH isn't having a once in a century season? How many fans will tune into UH-West Virginia at 11 am on FS1 when neither team is in the conference championship race? UH doesn't give you Houston. GOOD UH only partially does. These deals cannot be made assuming that UH will be 2015 good every single year. (And if you want to see a team carrying a market, go find some Houston TV rankings from when UT was good.)
That was the AAC championship game. So yea, I hope UH could get almost as many viewers as a regular season UT-OU game when their team advances out of the regular season into a championship game that could put them in a major bowl. Guys, the ratings numbers for UH in houston in 2015 were bad. Good for UH but not close to valuable for a team looking to get the big 12. HOWEVER, things change and maybe momentum carries over to this year. I'm not saying it will never happen. I'm saying the attendance numbers and viewership last season was mediocre but things have to start somewhere when they trend upward.
I'll say it again. The key here is a network. Network = UH out The Big 12 will likely get enough carriage in Houston to make UH irrelevant. No Network = UH in More people overall will tune in for your average UH vs Tech/BU/TCU/UT matchup than will tune in for UConn/Memphis vs Any Big 12 team (especially the Texas teams). Basketball is another story but I can't imagine it shifting the landscape that much.
It's a championship game for a non P5 group. I don't see people screaming AAC at games. Those aren't Big Bang Theory TV ratings but they definitely aren't Rush Hour ones either.
Because the local carriers will probably sign up without UH included. It's not about the ratings as much as it is new markets and territories. Even if UConn, on a week to week basis, draws fewer eyeballs than UH, the fact that there are a crapton of new homes to sell the network to makes them more valuable. Now, if UConn isn't a popular enough commodity in their markets to actually get carriage.... then the discussion changes. But they probably are, to some degree.
What else is there to talk about? Tim Irvin might transfer to Texas after de-comitting a couple years ago...that's something I guess.
You don't understand how ratings are looked at by the people making the decisions. Considering the time slots and lack of advertising, Houston's numbers were very, very good. But, either way, this is a very tiny factor in expansion discussions. There are a small handful of teams that move the tv-needle on their own. None of them are leaving their current P5 conferences to join the Big 12. The conference isn't expecting to bring in a current ratings juggernaut. They look at the size of the market and the room for growth.
Agreed. There are pros and cons for each school but the one thing a non-Texas school brings is a brand new market and recruiting landscape.
I do actually. I work in media. The people that make the decisions look at the ratings. Period. As I said, you may think their numbers are good due to circumstantial and arbitrary standards but in terms of media saturation and power, they're bad. The whole "bad time slot" issue is not a clear cut 1 way factor. Playing in odd time slots means there is less competition for viewers because you aren't competing against national games or national TV. No. It's the main factor. Adding teams to the conference will divid the pot into more pieces and there has to be a monetary justification for doing that. Another factor is stadium size for $ related to ticket sales and UH would have the smallest stadium that they can only fill %75 of. Another factor is adding another recruiting market which they don't. I agree that no teams are leaving their P5 conferences and it's because everyone is locked in due to surrendering TV dollars to the conference for the duration of their contracts and that's why the big 12 will not expand. There will not be a big 12 network even without the Longhorn network. All of the current big 12 member states are in the bottom half of population and any teams they add (outside of BYU) will not bring their statewide audience with them. It'll do well in Texas but that is not enough to sustain the league especially since you get into a realm of diminishing returns in viewers with respect to the number of teams in the state. The big 10 and SEC are spread among consistently higher populated states with teams that dominate their state markets (for the most part).
UH would be great for the conference. Anyone that says otherwise is just being silly. I would love it. My team coming here every two years is awesome in itself. There's enough food at the table for all. Texas needs to man up.
This is the most childish sentiment in the world. Looking forward to when Texas leaves all these b****ing schools who want to blame all their problems on UT. It'll make everyone happy. UT and OU go to the pac 12 with TT and Ok St. Everyone else joins the AAC making the southwest conference 2.0 vs random eastern teams. The winner out of that new super conference deserves as much consideration as the winner of any of the other conferences.
Lol. I edited from they need to stop acting so scary but that sounded more childish. You can discount the rumors as nonsense but we all know what's up by now. OU is an issue too from the comments I've read recently.
Don't worry, I'm sure you will get your wish soon enough. Once Texas and OU realize the Big 12 has nothing to offer them, Baylor and UH will see plenty of each other in some second tier conference.
Don't be so sensitive. We all want the conference to be better. "I'm gonna take my ball and go home." You all are the ones being childish.
Got damn you guys can be annoying. Who would even think that Texas went 5-7 last season with such a cocky fanbase.
Red McCombs: University of Houston 'would be the lead dog in the Big 12' Damn. Biggest UT booster on the planet is stumping hard for UH. Renu must have sent him some hella hot noodz.
