Hard not to mourn the state of our program. Had any one of 15 missteps not been made the pac is still alive right now, and had our programs been in an even slightly better state we’re not the ones left out of realignment.
We may not be the most rabid fanbase, but it wasn’t that long ago that Haas pavilion was regularly packed and booming with Cobbs, Tyrone Wallace then Rabb and JB. And I still remember Cal FB beating Texas at home with Davis Webb. None of those teams were necessarily top notch, but even then we showed up and I doubt we would be in the position we’re in now. How I miss those days.
Regarding the discussing litigation piece… There's a "just a guy with connections" account on Twitter that stated "There are also fears around certain studios that a lawsuit could emerge. If that happens said studios would like to quietly find a P5 home for the remaining Pac4" (https://twitter.com/MHver3/status/1688731016691687424). This entire thing has been driven by chicanery by two major media corporations that control virtually the entire college football landscape, and they used their competitive power to kneecap a potentially-competitive rival network situation (Apple streaming) while leaving 4 universities in ridiculous levels of limbo… And now don't seem very interested in finding more cash to bail us out. I'm guessing there are some lawyers at-least-looking-into this
Not a lawyer but I cannot fathom how there are not damages here. They are putting many public institutions in financial jeopardy so that they can cash in.
So you think the Regents and the tax payors of the state of CA are ok with absorbing that debt? It sure makes a lot of people who were involved with the project, look financially incompetent. I'm not a fan paying more state taxes! Simple!
The Regents became partly responsible when they let the Southern Branch bolt. And if no one thought about the worst-case scenario, that's on them. If they never discussed teh possible default on the Stadium debt then they truly are just political hacks appointed by the Gov.
The days of a slow rebuilding process and player development are gone. It's a win now or bust culture. Madsen gets it. Fox and, perhaps, Wilcox whiffed. I am cutting Wilcox some slack though because he had inertia but got knee-capped. Nevertheless, the AD can't afford to be so patient. Now we are paying the price.
Also Cal fans deserve some blame. I heard a lot of you make excuses about voting with your wallets and other BS. Colorado was winless and sold out the stadium for a white out against Cal last year. Winning is great but Cal football fandom was never entirely about just winning. Disappointed in the AD, chancellor, and all the alumni for being fairweather b*tches.
What about the big financial gorilla (stadium retrofit project) in the corner?..."The roughly $18 million interest-only annual payments on the debt consumes 20% of Cal's athletics budget and 15% of the campus structural deficit; principal repayment begins in 2032 when the annual debt payment will rise to about $26 million per year, about $28 million in 2033, about $30 million per year for 2034–2038"
Not sure of your question, Byron. But the debt is simple: if Cal does not get an invite to join a Power 4 conference, the Regents/State taxpayer are on the hook for the debt. (as well as all of the existing coaches and AD salaries)
State doesn't have a choice. The Regents authorized teh long term bonds with the expectation that the Athletic Dept woudl make the payments. But if we drop to mid-major status, the AD won't even be able to pay Wilcox' contract much less any one else's, or the stadium debt.
my guess is he is more privy to certain conversations taking place. In general, the idea of universities and media companies jumping at the sight of cash seems to be genesis of it
There's a lot of finger pointing going on in the comments. My advice: read The Athletic article on the the realignment. We never had a good deal to start with. xhttps://theathletic.com/4752583/2023/08/05/pac12-apple-tv-deal-college-football-realignment/
The problem is 60% of the USA population is east of the Mississippi and those folks are going to be watching PAC12 games at Midnight. That means less eyeballs and that’s why they can’t get a great TV deal.
Exactly, This is on the Presidents as they bought Larry's snake oil. But tbf, it was an easy sale. Just tell the President's the magic words: well show the women's sports that espn will not.
Hopefully Fredrick Wiseman is recording footage for At Cal Athletics, another 20-hr ethnography style documentary, but specifically about the university's handling of realignment.
Does anybody know if the Regents meeting tomorrow means they are discussing something Cal has been offered? Or discussing who to reach out to? What are they discussing?
One thing I think is that all this is about a relatively small amount of money. Poor athletes at West coast schools are now going to have to live on planes and play out of their time zones for a few million bucks? That's peanuts to the State of CA.
They don’t have an offer, their only hope is to pressure the California university system to step in and stop UCLA from going to the Big 10 unless Cal goes too.
Indeed, a relatively small amount of money at the Regent level, but the situation of student athletes, and especially the optics on this are probably concerning for UC.
I would assume that it will have everything to do with Cal's present plight: current state, offers, options, etc. and hopefully some special guests that are closer to the situation (i.e. Christ and hopefully, Knowlton).
Hard to tell how much meat there is with the potential ACC invite now brewing. When the PAC had 10 teams, there was an interesting possibility of forming a bi-coastal superconference with them. Now, feels like the cons outweigh the pros (depending on if there is a Big10, Big 12, etc possibility still down the road)..
It's probably more of a CYA meeting: if Cal has to partner/join the Mountain West or go Indy, how much of a financial hit will we the Regents (aka taxpayers) take? What are the other options?
That's what I'm wondering. If this is just a "What the hell is going on?" meeting, then who cares. If they are meeting because an offer is on the table or an idea, then that is interesting.
Cal was ready to sign off on the Grant of Rights, but other conference members had different plans. The Board of Regents now has to figure out the athletic department’s next steps
I can see why Wilcox would be so upset. He gave up an opportunity to return to his alma mater so he could build something special at Cal only to be left in the lurch by less than attentive administrators at Cal and in the Pac-12. Cal MUST have some kind of media deal by the end of the week. No more delays since we know that the Kliavkoff "wait for a year and make 'em sweat" approach doesn't work at all. Big-10 or ACC, it doesn't matter. By the way, I read Wilner's article on how to rebuild the Pac in this morning's San Jose Mercury News and all this confirmed for me is that Northern California still grows the best weed in the country. The Pac is dead! As Paul Finebaum said last week; "There is nothing left to do but shovel dirt over it.". If Christ and Knowlton can't get something done, then they may as well leave California for good as they will easily be among some of the most hated people in the state. A good friend of mine is in administration at FUCLA and he has been dropping hints with me for years about how inept the Cal administration is. I used to think that it was just professional rivalry or jealousy. In retrospect, I think that he knew something all along but just couldn't say anything. Come on Christ and Knowlton! This is your moment to shine and not go down in history as two of the most inept college administrators ever to walk on a campus. Sports gods, pray for us.
He's making bank as a mediocre coach. If he did take the job at Oregon, he'd have been fired long ago, not extended. If he was a good coach, he'd already have been snapped up..
I don't think Cal Admin is "inept" per se, they are just indifferent to big time college athletics. If you have a Chancellor who doesn't believe in D1 sports, he hires an AD to just shuffle teh paper and keep kids in class. Or, in the case of Christ, she hires an AD with zero big time experience bcos D1 is just not a priority. Winning is not a priority; just participating in line with "institutional values" whatever that means.
In contract UCLA hire chancellors who embrace their student athletes. The athletes wear their team jerseys and jackets proudly around Westwood. They hire a Chip Kelly.
OC Bear: They are inept because they should have seen what was coming a long time ago! Now, at the last minute, they are racing around with their hair on fire and virtually no leverage trying to save Cal Athletics. If you want to have an athletics program with 30 plus sports, then you have to go all in and this means football and basketball need to be on some kind of national stage so they are visible and most importantly, receiving money to support the other sports. If we had deep pockets like the 'Furd or even $C, then there wouldn't be as much of an existential crisis. It really does look like Christ and Knowlton have been sleep-walking on this for a while and now, as the old expression goes, "the chickens are coming home to roost."
I don't disagree, but the operative word in your post is "want" and I'm not sure Admin and faculty want to sponsor a 30 sport varsity program. Many would rather we be more like U-Chicago, who was a founding member of the Big Ten -- and a football power back in its day -- but dropped football and went to D3.. Moreover, I don't get the sense that the Regents care much about big time athletics either. (they will start, however, once they realize how much money that they are on the hook for for the collapse of the pac)
OC Bear: You are right about the University of Chicago model that some of the faculty would love to adopt. However, as I've mentioned many times in WFC, their unofficial motto is "where fun goes to die". Granted, there is a place in higher education for a small, elite, liberal arts college that is hyper-focused on academics, especially the liberal arts. But is that really the kind of place that we want our alma mater to become? One of the reasons that I cherished my time at Cal so much was because we had outstanding academics AND an amazing college experience that included athletics. The no-sports model may have worked back in 1939, but it would be disastrous for Cal if they eliminated their two biggest revenue sports and tried to rely solely on academics and Olympic sports for national exposure. Undergraduate applications would steadily plummet and probably alumni donations as well.
One thing I’d like to point out is getting into either the Big 10 , SEC or Big 12 won’t be a utopia. Rutgers has been in the Big 10 for a decade and they still haven’t turned a profit let alone broke even.
Their Admin sounds about as incompetent at Cal's. (but note, Rutgers still does not receive a full share which only reinforces your point; if Cal gets in, they get a small share)
They could rebuild the Pac 12 conference but it really wouldn’t be ideal but it is doable. It would require them to immediately take Rice , SMU then get Idaho and Idaho State along with Montana ,Montana State and Wyoming and South Dakota state to move up to FBS.
It would require some of those institutions to invest in their infrastructure, Idaho and Idaho state would have to build new stadiums as their current facilities only seat about 12 to 15,000. But if those schools felt that they could get into a power five conference they might be willing to do it.
The biggest obstacle would be CAL’s administrators who might have a case of Judge Smails in that they would turn their nose up at the prospect of having schools located in Rapid City, South Dakota & Moscow, Idaho joining their conference but if they want to survive as a conference that’s really the best option because those schools would not have big buyout fees unlike the mountain west where each of those schools would have to come up with 34 million to exit the league. It would create a really good rivalry between Idaho and Washington state as those schools are only separated by 9 miles. The PAC 12 predicament brings to mind the scene in Argo where Affleck’s character tells the Secretary of State that there are no good options is just choosing the best bad option.
Ted: Cal playing schools like Rice, Idaho and Idaho State would be an absolute disaster. I can't think of one television network that would pay to broadcast that. Cal to the ACC actually seems like a much better fit based on academic excellence and it consists of teams that Cal could actually compete with on the football field. Becoming Big-10 cannon-fodder only makes sense if we are getting a full share (or even UW or OU shares) to join.
Cal’s travel cost would be enormous in the ACC and their students athletes would be affected. They would have to do 2 huge road trips to mitigate the costs being gone 2 weeks at a time. The closest ACC school is Tallahassee, Florida the only school in the Central time zone. Every Cal & Stanford game would be at 10 AM or 4 pm. It really isn’t a sustainable business model.
Ted: As much as I hate to say this, extensive travel is going to be the rule for all major conferences moving forward, especially schools located on the west coast. There is no way to get around it, which is why Cal needs to make sure that their student-athletes are justly compensated with NIL opportunities. It's too bad that the idiots in charge of the Pac-12 didn't think about this until it was too late.
Why does everybody leave out UNR? I know the media market is small (if you think the only market for UNR is Reno) but they seem to have better basketball and football programs than UNLV.
It's hard to envision a scenario in which it wouldn't. But I expect that will also be the case for the NW and LA schools as well. There is all of a sudden less incentive for west coast athletes to stay coastal.
Not just that if Cal can’t get into a different conference how are they going to schedule games? When the Big Ten and SEC and big 12 eventually move to 20 teams and yes eventually they will move to 20 teams they will no longer play nonconference games. There’s no reason for them to play nonconference games because they will have enough opponents in their league. So who is Cal going to schedule outside of Stanford,Notre Dame, Oregon State and Washington state that leaves them with seven more games they need to complete their schedule.
Hard not to mourn the state of our program. Had any one of 15 missteps not been made the pac is still alive right now, and had our programs been in an even slightly better state we’re not the ones left out of realignment.
We may not be the most rabid fanbase, but it wasn’t that long ago that Haas pavilion was regularly packed and booming with Cobbs, Tyrone Wallace then Rabb and JB. And I still remember Cal FB beating Texas at home with Davis Webb. None of those teams were necessarily top notch, but even then we showed up and I doubt we would be in the position we’re in now. How I miss those days.
And don't forget Tennessee visiting for a night game in Memorial. Even the tree sitters couldn't ruin teh night.
And guys like Aaron Rodgers and Marshawn Lynch doing amazing things on the field.
Regarding the discussing litigation piece… There's a "just a guy with connections" account on Twitter that stated "There are also fears around certain studios that a lawsuit could emerge. If that happens said studios would like to quietly find a P5 home for the remaining Pac4" (https://twitter.com/MHver3/status/1688731016691687424). This entire thing has been driven by chicanery by two major media corporations that control virtually the entire college football landscape, and they used their competitive power to kneecap a potentially-competitive rival network situation (Apple streaming) while leaving 4 universities in ridiculous levels of limbo… And now don't seem very interested in finding more cash to bail us out. I'm guessing there are some lawyers at-least-looking-into this
Not a lawyer but I cannot fathom how there are not damages here. They are putting many public institutions in financial jeopardy so that they can cash in.
So you think the Regents and the tax payors of the state of CA are ok with absorbing that debt? It sure makes a lot of people who were involved with the project, look financially incompetent. I'm not a fan paying more state taxes! Simple!
The Regents became partly responsible when they let the Southern Branch bolt. And if no one thought about the worst-case scenario, that's on them. If they never discussed teh possible default on the Stadium debt then they truly are just political hacks appointed by the Gov.
maybe they need financial literacy courses before we do
''This is the chart that explains projected TV rights distributions by league''
https://twitter.com/UofLSheriff50/status/1686926301993529344
Article from SwimSwam
Why Conference Realignment Might Be a Blessing in Disguise (Except for Cal and Stanford)
https://swimswam.com/why-conference-realignment-might-be-a-blessing-in-disguise-except-for-cal-and-stanford/
From that chart, we should join SEC
Anything but the MWC
The days of a slow rebuilding process and player development are gone. It's a win now or bust culture. Madsen gets it. Fox and, perhaps, Wilcox whiffed. I am cutting Wilcox some slack though because he had inertia but got knee-capped. Nevertheless, the AD can't afford to be so patient. Now we are paying the price.
Also Cal fans deserve some blame. I heard a lot of you make excuses about voting with your wallets and other BS. Colorado was winless and sold out the stadium for a white out against Cal last year. Winning is great but Cal football fandom was never entirely about just winning. Disappointed in the AD, chancellor, and all the alumni for being fairweather b*tches.
What about the big financial gorilla (stadium retrofit project) in the corner?..."The roughly $18 million interest-only annual payments on the debt consumes 20% of Cal's athletics budget and 15% of the campus structural deficit; principal repayment begins in 2032 when the annual debt payment will rise to about $26 million per year, about $28 million in 2033, about $30 million per year for 2034–2038"
Not sure of your question, Byron. But the debt is simple: if Cal does not get an invite to join a Power 4 conference, the Regents/State taxpayer are on the hook for the debt. (as well as all of the existing coaches and AD salaries)
If state tax can cover the debt, that will be amazing.
State doesn't have a choice. The Regents authorized teh long term bonds with the expectation that the Athletic Dept woudl make the payments. But if we drop to mid-major status, the AD won't even be able to pay Wilcox' contract much less any one else's, or the stadium debt.
Wilcox said, "From what I know, it didn’t really need to come to this"
Does anyone know specifically what he's talking about here?
my guess is he is more privy to certain conversations taking place. In general, the idea of universities and media companies jumping at the sight of cash seems to be genesis of it
There's a lot of finger pointing going on in the comments. My advice: read The Athletic article on the the realignment. We never had a good deal to start with. xhttps://theathletic.com/4752583/2023/08/05/pac12-apple-tv-deal-college-football-realignment/
The problem is 60% of the USA population is east of the Mississippi and those folks are going to be watching PAC12 games at Midnight. That means less eyeballs and that’s why they can’t get a great TV deal.
That was because of Larry Scott.
He sure deserves blame but there’s a collective blame to go around with arrogance of university Presidents who thought the PAC 12 was invincible.
Exactly, This is on the Presidents as they bought Larry's snake oil. But tbf, it was an easy sale. Just tell the President's the magic words: well show the women's sports that espn will not.
Larry Scott not getting DirecTV to sign on was a crime
Hopefully Fredrick Wiseman is recording footage for At Cal Athletics, another 20-hr ethnography style documentary, but specifically about the university's handling of realignment.
Turns out we weren't thinking outside the box. The commissioners' plan was hiding in plain sight right beneath our very noses...
https://imgflip.com/i/7v1xfg
file:///var/mobile/Library/SMS/Attachments/85/05/68608A0E-66DA-4B6F-9F78-3D84FBDC8268/IMG_0753.jpeg
Sorry to repost something but thought it would be if interest - ACC in discussions to add Cal and Stanfurd
Does anybody know if the Regents meeting tomorrow means they are discussing something Cal has been offered? Or discussing who to reach out to? What are they discussing?
One thing I think is that all this is about a relatively small amount of money. Poor athletes at West coast schools are now going to have to live on planes and play out of their time zones for a few million bucks? That's peanuts to the State of CA.
With an emergency meeting with the regents...my guess/hope is that they have at least 1 offer on the table.
They don’t have an offer, their only hope is to pressure the California university system to step in and stop UCLA from going to the Big 10 unless Cal goes too.
lol what
that ship has sailed!
Indeed, a relatively small amount of money at the Regent level, but the situation of student athletes, and especially the optics on this are probably concerning for UC.
There is but one agenda item:
B1(X) Discussion UC Berkeley Pac-12 Conference Membership
I would assume that it will have everything to do with Cal's present plight: current state, offers, options, etc. and hopefully some special guests that are closer to the situation (i.e. Christ and hopefully, Knowlton).
Hard to tell how much meat there is with the potential ACC invite now brewing. When the PAC had 10 teams, there was an interesting possibility of forming a bi-coastal superconference with them. Now, feels like the cons outweigh the pros (depending on if there is a Big10, Big 12, etc possibility still down the road)..
It's probably more of a CYA meeting: if Cal has to partner/join the Mountain West or go Indy, how much of a financial hit will we the Regents (aka taxpayers) take? What are the other options?
A huge one! MW schools only get $4 million a year.
which won't even cover Wilcox' contract
That's what I'm wondering. If this is just a "What the hell is going on?" meeting, then who cares. If they are meeting because an offer is on the table or an idea, then that is interesting.
probably a mix of both if i had to guess. Skepticism that it got this far but hearing offers
Based on the last Regents meeting, they probably don't even realize most of the PAC12 schools are out and we aren't in the B1G
I don't, but I hope the discussion is about whether to take the ACC invite, BIG10 invite, or the MWC invite.
Cal was ready to sign off on the Grant of Rights, but other conference members had different plans. The Board of Regents now has to figure out the athletic department’s next steps
https://www.on3.com/os/news/cal-california-berkeley-board-of-regents-meeting-pac-12-membership-big-12-apple/
I can see why Wilcox would be so upset. He gave up an opportunity to return to his alma mater so he could build something special at Cal only to be left in the lurch by less than attentive administrators at Cal and in the Pac-12. Cal MUST have some kind of media deal by the end of the week. No more delays since we know that the Kliavkoff "wait for a year and make 'em sweat" approach doesn't work at all. Big-10 or ACC, it doesn't matter. By the way, I read Wilner's article on how to rebuild the Pac in this morning's San Jose Mercury News and all this confirmed for me is that Northern California still grows the best weed in the country. The Pac is dead! As Paul Finebaum said last week; "There is nothing left to do but shovel dirt over it.". If Christ and Knowlton can't get something done, then they may as well leave California for good as they will easily be among some of the most hated people in the state. A good friend of mine is in administration at FUCLA and he has been dropping hints with me for years about how inept the Cal administration is. I used to think that it was just professional rivalry or jealousy. In retrospect, I think that he knew something all along but just couldn't say anything. Come on Christ and Knowlton! This is your moment to shine and not go down in history as two of the most inept college administrators ever to walk on a campus. Sports gods, pray for us.
He's making bank as a mediocre coach. If he did take the job at Oregon, he'd have been fired long ago, not extended. If he was a good coach, he'd already have been snapped up..
I don't think Cal Admin is "inept" per se, they are just indifferent to big time college athletics. If you have a Chancellor who doesn't believe in D1 sports, he hires an AD to just shuffle teh paper and keep kids in class. Or, in the case of Christ, she hires an AD with zero big time experience bcos D1 is just not a priority. Winning is not a priority; just participating in line with "institutional values" whatever that means.
In contract UCLA hire chancellors who embrace their student athletes. The athletes wear their team jerseys and jackets proudly around Westwood. They hire a Chip Kelly.
OC Bear: They are inept because they should have seen what was coming a long time ago! Now, at the last minute, they are racing around with their hair on fire and virtually no leverage trying to save Cal Athletics. If you want to have an athletics program with 30 plus sports, then you have to go all in and this means football and basketball need to be on some kind of national stage so they are visible and most importantly, receiving money to support the other sports. If we had deep pockets like the 'Furd or even $C, then there wouldn't be as much of an existential crisis. It really does look like Christ and Knowlton have been sleep-walking on this for a while and now, as the old expression goes, "the chickens are coming home to roost."
I don't disagree, but the operative word in your post is "want" and I'm not sure Admin and faculty want to sponsor a 30 sport varsity program. Many would rather we be more like U-Chicago, who was a founding member of the Big Ten -- and a football power back in its day -- but dropped football and went to D3.. Moreover, I don't get the sense that the Regents care much about big time athletics either. (they will start, however, once they realize how much money that they are on the hook for for the collapse of the pac)
OC Bear: You are right about the University of Chicago model that some of the faculty would love to adopt. However, as I've mentioned many times in WFC, their unofficial motto is "where fun goes to die". Granted, there is a place in higher education for a small, elite, liberal arts college that is hyper-focused on academics, especially the liberal arts. But is that really the kind of place that we want our alma mater to become? One of the reasons that I cherished my time at Cal so much was because we had outstanding academics AND an amazing college experience that included athletics. The no-sports model may have worked back in 1939, but it would be disastrous for Cal if they eliminated their two biggest revenue sports and tried to rely solely on academics and Olympic sports for national exposure. Undergraduate applications would steadily plummet and probably alumni donations as well.
The sad part is that Cal grads back in 1939 were on top of the world - top academics and 5x national champs!
One thing I’d like to point out is getting into either the Big 10 , SEC or Big 12 won’t be a utopia. Rutgers has been in the Big 10 for a decade and they still haven’t turned a profit let alone broke even.
Their Admin sounds about as incompetent at Cal's. (but note, Rutgers still does not receive a full share which only reinforces your point; if Cal gets in, they get a small share)
They could rebuild the Pac 12 conference but it really wouldn’t be ideal but it is doable. It would require them to immediately take Rice , SMU then get Idaho and Idaho State along with Montana ,Montana State and Wyoming and South Dakota state to move up to FBS.
It would require some of those institutions to invest in their infrastructure, Idaho and Idaho state would have to build new stadiums as their current facilities only seat about 12 to 15,000. But if those schools felt that they could get into a power five conference they might be willing to do it.
The biggest obstacle would be CAL’s administrators who might have a case of Judge Smails in that they would turn their nose up at the prospect of having schools located in Rapid City, South Dakota & Moscow, Idaho joining their conference but if they want to survive as a conference that’s really the best option because those schools would not have big buyout fees unlike the mountain west where each of those schools would have to come up with 34 million to exit the league. It would create a really good rivalry between Idaho and Washington state as those schools are only separated by 9 miles. The PAC 12 predicament brings to mind the scene in Argo where Affleck’s character tells the Secretary of State that there are no good options is just choosing the best bad option.
Ted: Cal playing schools like Rice, Idaho and Idaho State would be an absolute disaster. I can't think of one television network that would pay to broadcast that. Cal to the ACC actually seems like a much better fit based on academic excellence and it consists of teams that Cal could actually compete with on the football field. Becoming Big-10 cannon-fodder only makes sense if we are getting a full share (or even UW or OU shares) to join.
Cal’s travel cost would be enormous in the ACC and their students athletes would be affected. They would have to do 2 huge road trips to mitigate the costs being gone 2 weeks at a time. The closest ACC school is Tallahassee, Florida the only school in the Central time zone. Every Cal & Stanford game would be at 10 AM or 4 pm. It really isn’t a sustainable business model.
Ted: As much as I hate to say this, extensive travel is going to be the rule for all major conferences moving forward, especially schools located on the west coast. There is no way to get around it, which is why Cal needs to make sure that their student-athletes are justly compensated with NIL opportunities. It's too bad that the idiots in charge of the Pac-12 didn't think about this until it was too late.
And that school in Tallahassee may not even be in the ACC soon.
FSU Doesn’t have the financial means to exit the ACC. That’s why they listed Chase Bank to help them find a private equity partner.
Why does everybody leave out UNR? I know the media market is small (if you think the only market for UNR is Reno) but they seem to have better basketball and football programs than UNLV.
Those schools would have to pay $34 million to pay and they are no where near Cal & Stanford in academics.
Does this open the de-commitment flood gates?
It's hard to envision a scenario in which it wouldn't. But I expect that will also be the case for the NW and LA schools as well. There is all of a sudden less incentive for west coast athletes to stay coastal.
Not just that if Cal can’t get into a different conference how are they going to schedule games? When the Big Ten and SEC and big 12 eventually move to 20 teams and yes eventually they will move to 20 teams they will no longer play nonconference games. There’s no reason for them to play nonconference games because they will have enough opponents in their league. So who is Cal going to schedule outside of Stanford,Notre Dame, Oregon State and Washington state that leaves them with seven more games they need to complete their schedule.
Big 10 already proposing a 10 game season. Quality OOC about to become a casualty of the realignment wars
Wow, even though he makes considerably more than his boss, it must really suck to work for someone like Knowlton.