[College Football] Big Ten, Texas have initial talks

1. I look at the top of the conference because that's where Texas is. And things change all the time....A&M is down right now...I dont' believe that program is out. I believe it's merely down. Way too many resources there to call it out.

2. Better in terms of football? I don't think losing Nebraska is "better." Then again, for a long time Nebraska was pretty damn irrelevant in football. Depends on how teams track going forward. But K-State and Nebraska were the best teams in this conference for a while...that seems like ages ago, but if we're talking in terms of eras, things change.

3. I don't think the Pac 10 is a better football conference than the Big 12. I also don't think the Big 12 is finished.


Colorado...as opposed to an A&M...I see as down and OUT. Not necessarily forever....but they aren't coming back anytime soon. As I said, this is a program that couldn't find $3 million to buy out Hawkins. $3 million is chump change for most athletic departments and especially UT. CU is in deep, deep trouble. And going to the Pac 10 without the hope for a Pac 16 doesn't help them. It's not an upgrade for them financially. The idea that they "bring" the Denver TV market is illusory.


Here's the bottom line...Texas likes playing for national championships. They love telling everyone, "we're #1." They love control. They have those things. In spades.

You have complete control of your out-of-conference schedule....so make use of it. Schedule all the Pac 10 teams you want. Whatever helps. Its' alllllllll in Texas' control. They can do with this whatever they like.

We're Texas, right?

 

Remember when Colt threw the ball out of bounds and we all had to go back to look on the clock to see if there was still a second left?

 

Not that this is fully representative (or all that relevant in terms of why a team should move), but here are the conference rankings by Sagarin since 2001:

Big 12: 2,1,5,4,3,6,3,2,5 (Avg: 3.44)
Pac 10: 3,2,4,2,4,3,2,4,3 (Avg: 3)

People tend to look at TX/OU when thinking of the Big 12, but if you look at the entire conference, the Pac10 has provided overall higher quality competition top to bottom than the Big 12.

 

and none of that has kept UT from playing in 2 national championship games....would have been 3 had you just tackled Crabtree.

where was all this, "we're an inferior conference" talk when UT fans were arguing why they should be in the National Championship game over and over and over again over the last few years? I AM a UT fan, and I was talking about the strength of the Big 12 over the last few years when I was arguing on their behalf.

 

I mean 4 of them probably form around the country - The Pac-XX, a the Big 10 +ND +xxx, an SEC + extras, and an ACC/Big East hybrid. Who knows, maybe they'll even leave the NCAA.

 

And would've been 1 if Bradford hadn't gotten hurt. :grin: (probably)

 

only because another big 12 school might have been there in their place. thanks for the assist

 

That's great in theory. But in reality, this decision was made by the University. The year-to-year OOC schedule is made by the athletic department. I have no faith in the idea that the athletic department is going to schedule difficult OOC games. Their job is to simply win games and titles, so their incentive is different.

But this is all getting a bit off topic anyway. This decision should be driven by what's best for the school as a whole from 2011 to 2050, not what's best for the 2011 football team.

 

Umm... who from the Big 12 would've gone ahead of Florida, TCU, Boise State, Cinci, Ohio State, Oregon, etc?

 

Which years would those be? In 2008, the B12 was the second rated conference behind the SEC, so it made sense to argue for that. What other year were people arguing for Texas to be in the national title game?

Last year, there was no controversy, but if there were, it was universally accepted that Texas would have been left out due to the ridiculously weak schedule.

 

So no more Big12 title game?

That seems like it is going to become an issue in the BCS-era if the Pac10 and Big10 now implement title games.

 

i'm assuming if Bradford didn't get hurt OU would have been a different story

 

I just mean that UT fans have argued that the conference is strong for as long as UT has been super competitive and in the national title hunt. All of a sudden they're signing a different tune.

 

I can't comment except to say the people making these decisions are pretty smart people who are privy to more information than you and I are.

 

Doubtful they'd be in the title game.

Even though I'm talking about his injury in the UT game specifically.

The next highest BCS ranked team from the Big 12 that year was Oklahoma State, at the mighty ranking of 19.

No other Big 12 team was going to sniff the title game last year, Bradford injury or not.

 

A Longhorn Network in every household in Texas. Biggest recruiting tool ever!!!

Good luck LSU, Alabama, Aggies, Sooners, etc... in snatching top recruits from Texas.

 

I think if you look at last year, people were b****ing about how terrible the conference was and how bad the OOC schedule was.

 

If UT doesn't schedule good out of conference games, they have no one to blame but themselves.

 

Why would anyone watch that network or abc/espn?

 

Sure - but so is Astros management (in theory), but that doesn't mean we don't criticize them or that they don't do dumb things.

Regardless though - you said these decisions were driven by politics. If those smart people were doing what's best for the University as a whole, why the need for politics to get involved? It seems that one of two things occurred:

1. The smart people were NOT doing what's best for the university and politics stepped in the middle to stop that (going against your initial point).

2. The smart people WERE doing what's best for the university and politics stepped in the middle to stop that (not a good thing).