That creates an interesting situation.

• Atlanta, Nashville and Orlando are not the only significant TV markets in the current SEC footprint. Add Memphis, New Orleans, Louisville, Tampa, Jacksonville, Birmingham, etc. Granted, those markets don’t equate with LA, Chicago, NYC, but they’re not chopped liver. And the % share of market actually tuned into broadcasts of SEC games in its markets is higher than other conferences in most of the non-SEC markets you mention. Is Miami forced to watch exclusively ACC games? I don’t know for sure, but I doubt it. Add Houston and Dallas when, not if, A&M joins.

• The SEC needs to expand further, I agree – for the sole reason, if not others, that it needs to reach whatever threshold is required to renegotiate its television contracts. The PAC-12 has the largest current contract – add OK, Tex and their little brothers and, again I agree, it grows substantially. But until some league proves differently – and it will NOT be then enlarged ACC – the national championship still goes through Atlanta. That alone ought to warrant renegotiation – if it does not, expansion should supply the requisite pretext. The next SEC TV contract with hopelessly-conflicted ESPN should include an escalator clause, like that of the contracts of several head coaches, which automatically makes the SEC’s package with that network the most lucrative; when the PAC-? gets a bump, the SEC should automatically leapfrog.

Thanks for all you do.

Notice that Texas fans never have their facts straight. All they can bring to any conversation is how great they are and how inferior everyone else is. One says it, the other claims it as fact.

If that isn't enough bird reference for you, Texas has messed it's nest in both it has been in. The only people who don't know this (reference articles on any sports network or blog) are the Longhorns. Arkansas left the SWC because of Texas, Colorado and Nebraska did too, and now A&M is doing the same thing.

Good luck on getting the Colorado vote for Pac entry.

Unless you're speaking of a 16th century English dynasty, I think you mean tutor, not tudor. (Everyone makes typos, but when you're posting about how dumb everyone outside of Austin is, you might want to hit the spellcheck before posting.)

Also, according to US News and World Reports, Texas is the #45 school in the country while A&M is #58. Both are members of the AAU as well. It seems you might have your nose a bit too high in the air.

John

We didn't call Texas A&M a leftover. Missouri and West Virginia — the schools we discuss in this piece — are the leftovers. Like it or not, fair or not.

John

A&M is good for the SEC academically, but if you check the AAU listings, research budgets and most college rankings you'll find that the Big 12 ranks on the low end of the scale along with the SEC. The Pac-12, Big Ten and ACC are the high-brow leagues. The SEC and Big 12 ar for jocks. And the Big East is for commuters. Generally speaking.

John

Fact is, the SEC can't really do all that much in expanding its footprint at this point, other than Mizzou/WVU. They're not going to bow down to UT's demands and OU has always wanted to go to the Pac-10. So, while other conferences try to simply expand their footprint, the SEC can stick to their values and try to maintain themselves as the best football conference in the country. That means adding FSU/Clemson, which would further hurt the ACC's drawing power, in terms of football. Considering the move to a basketball-centric conference, I think FSU and Clemson would both listen.

I also disagree with the recruiting rankings for FSU in the prior article. Does FSU add tot he SEC's foot pront? No so what is the upside to taking FSU? The ACC teams are locked out of show casing their schools on a yearly basis with the FSU game. How valuable is this? Clemson has not won an ACCC title since they lost their yearly matchup with UGA. Clemson always depended on Ga. talent to win the ACC. All in all FSU going to the SEC would create less competition for Florida, S. GA. and S. Alabama recruits for SEC schools

FSU announced their plans to form a committee this past week. Have they even had a chance to form the committee or did the committee meet in secret within the last few weeks? I have a hard time believing that whatever FSU put together came to the conclusion that adding Pitt and Syracuse was in their best interests within two days. And that is ignoring the highly likely event that the talks between Pitt/Syracuse and the ACC have been taking place for quite some time now. There is no way the whole thing went down in less than 48 hours from the beginning of the process until conclusion.

Absolutely. Eventually the Big East would eat the ACC or vice versa. The ACC acted first and will survive. Swofford and his presidents didn't worry about potential legal issues, either.

We can debate whether or not super-conferences will be good in the long run, but for now, the ACC seems to have set itself up nicely.

Thanks for reading,
John

Agree about the secrecy the ACC done this, notone mention of it in th emedia until it had already happened. All of this stuff has been in the media for weeks and 99.9% of it has not even been close to being true. So who knows what is really going to happen.

In another article I read, Swofford said that they had received calls from other schools wanting to join the ACC in the double digit numbers. But also there were 2 unamed schools in the ACC that were opposed to going to 16. In my opinion not gonna have a choice in the matter when all of the dominos fall.

I think the best scenario for ACC is UConn and ND joining up. Rutgers would be a last choice and no way that WVU is even in the conversation.

I find it interesting that the ACC could be pursuing UConn. Well the question is who is coming with them? Is Rutgers making that move as well or is it UConn by themselves? If it is UConn by themselves then I don't see the ACC having some grand strategy of putting together a 15 team conference. It doesn't make much sense. Either they are preparing to replace one departing member or a 16th team will be in tow.

If the Big Ten does not expand then Missouri is still on the board. Throw WVU in with that group and I say that that would be a successful expansion. Individual markets aside, the SEC relies on broadcasting as many games nationwide as it can and so the more interesting programs you have for national audiences the better.

The SEC was stable. But if other leagues grow past them and swallow up major chunks of the country AND have their own networks, the SEC would have to expand to keep up.

I hope the SEC will get the right pieces by taking its time. But as things currently look — the right pieces are now locked into a stronger ACC. Would you rather be the lion that charges in and grabs the gazelle… or the lion that patiently surveys the landscape and then advances to dine on scraps?

It's a fine line. We'll have to see how this shakes out before stating that the SEC has been wise or foolish. As we said in the piece, if the SEC winds up as the smallest league with the smallest TV markets and the smallest revenue, we'll have to go with foolish. But there's still that IF involved.

Thanks for reading,
John

I still don't grasp why FSU brass went public with an expansion committee if it was just talking about the ACC's moves, but the fact that FSU voted to up the ACC's exit fee to $20 million sure suggests that the Seminoles are happy where they are.

John

Great article BTW!

Of the top 28 Media markets in the US

The (proposed) PAC 16 is in 11 of them
SEC including A&M is in 4 of them.

Big difference that will eventually manifest itself on the field in time.

Dollars, revenues, facilities. Eventually Talent.

First of all, everybody has to remember that all of the conferences except SEC and B1G was stable. SEC didnt have to added teams, besides ACC has been raiding the Beast since forever, PAC-10(12) just started to stable with a new commish, Big XII was going to fail when Texas started to mussle on everything. In a business sense, they might be behind the power curve but until another conference did what the SEC did in Football, SEC still will be King.

In my opinion, all of these move are risky moves by the conferences, except SEC. SEC takes its time and doing thing the right thing by looking at the field and getting the right pieces.

If they are lucky the B1G will then invade the ACC after they get Mizou and go for Maryland and maybe a few others such as GTech before grabbing Rutgers to round things out. So if those three plus FSU are gone then maybe you can shake lose a school on Tobacco Road or Virginia Tech.

The ACC will do very well with their expansion, but I think it will take a while to catch the SEC in revenues even if the SEC stands pat with T A&M.

But who knows.

Still, I have a feeling that Slive and THE conference have been silently at work for a while for a reason. I could be wrong and Mr. Nice Guy may have made some tactical blunders by watching things unfold over the past few weeks. Yet I have a feeling things will turn out just fine for the SEC in the end.

Keep up the really great work here.

ACC North:
Notre Dame
West Virginia
Virginia
Virginia Tech
Boston College
Syracuse
Pitt
Maryland

ACC South:
Florida State
Miami
Clemson
Georgia Tech
North Carolina
NC State
Wake
Duke

SEC falling behind in Business will lead to diminished results down the road on the field..

Slive needs to grab Missouri(St Louis Market) ASAP. Looks like WVU may be coming.

A&M
Missouri
West Virginia

Who could be the 16th team?