New Alabama athletic director Bill Battle will be attending his first SEC meetings in Destin next week.  When it comes to potential discussion topics, Battle is already excited by one — the SEC Network:

“The potential there is great.  It’s premature to really know or to think about how much it really is, or to have a feel for what it is.  I know the goals are aggressive.  ESPN and the Southeastern Conference form a formidable partnership so the expectations and the goals are high and aggressive, but we’re 16 months out.  We’re a long way from launch, but it’s pretty exciting to think about…

They are working with each individual institution on their production, and they said, ‘If you produce it, we’ll air it.”  So that’s an interesting concept.  They are pretty bullish on what they think they might be able to do in the 11-state SEC footprint, and they believe there’s a market outside of the footprint.”

“Aggressive.”  “Pretty bullish.”

Those words seem to back up what we wrote earlier this month when AT&T U-verse was announced as the SEC Network’s lone cable or satellite partner at roll-out — it’s going to be an expensive channel for providers.  That or ESPN and the SEC are indeed trying to force their channel onto providers’ basic tier of channels within the SEC footprint.  Or both… it’s expensive and they want it on the basic tier.

Either way, with the words “aggressive” and “pretty bullish” being kicked around, it’s likely the fight to get the SEC Network carried by the big providers — Comcast, Time Warner, DirecTV, etc — will be a rough one.

Be prepared.

For the past year, members of the ACC have been living on edge.  It’s been the conference voted “Most Likely To Be Raided By Other Leagues.”  Money issues have been at the heart of the problem.  As in: The ACC and its schools don’t make as much money as the other four major conferences.

Before shocking the world with an out-of-left-field grant of rights deal a few weeks ago, ACC commissioner John Swofford had to make a near perfect sales pitch to league members like Florida State.  He did and all the conference’s schools signed on the dotted line.

Immediately, ACC fans (and some of us in the media) jumped to an awfully big conclusion — that the league would soon push forward a new ACC Network with ESPN.  ESPN had already stepped in to offer a bit more cash to the conference long-term in order to fend off further conference realignment, but an additional network was seen as the league’s best chance to close the financial gap on rival conferences.

However, The SportsBusiness Journal reports today that the ACC has not bought back the media rights it’s already sold off to Raycom and Fox Sports Net.  Those rights agreements run through 2027 and unless the ACC buys them back and turns them over to ESPN, there will be no new ACC Network.

This isn’t an oversight by the ACC, mind you.  Everyone involved had to know that without those rights, no channel would be possible.  Also, ESPN agreed to discuss the possibility of creating a network.  It did not agree to actually launch such a network.

For that reason, the topic of a network was not a hot one at last week’s ACC meetings.

If no new network launches, ESPN has agreed to kick in enough money to get ACC schools into the $20 million range annually.  At MrSEC.com, we’ve reported since last December that industry and SEC sources have told us that schools in Mike Slive’s conference could be making $30-35 million annually within a year or two of the launch of an SEC Network.

That network is already a done deal, thanks to a long-term agreement with ESPN.  And before reaching that agreement, the SEC bought back all of its media rights — television and digital — in order to turn them over to ESPN for use with the network.

While the ACC’s membership is clearly in favor of sticking together — they wouldn’t have signed a binding grant of rights deal otherwise — the main problem for the league has a growing cash gap.  Without an ACC Network, that will continue to be an issue for the schools in Swofford’s league moving forward.

Does this re-open Pandora’s Box when it comes to conference realignment?  No.  But it will probably give a lot of people reason enough to start writing about expansion again.  We’re heading into the blah days of summer after all.

Top 2014 Georgia RB commitment Sony Michel says he will focus on football before trying to enter the music business as a rap artist…
This after a Michigan State commitment had his scholarship offer yanked after he posted a controversial rap video online
Auburn coaches say they were pleased with the emergence of WR Jaylon Denson this spring
Georgia coaches won’t say that sophomore OT John Theus has locked down a starting spot, suggesting they want to see more from him in fall practice
LSU athletic director Joe Alleva says an expansion project at Tiger Stadium will not change the character of the stadium but “restore it”
Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott made more salary in 2011 than SEC commissioner Mike Slive or Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany
Plans for an ACC television network appear to have hit a snag over media rights which could re-open conference expansion and realignment issues
Follow the SEC all year long on MrSEC.com

Offense or defense?

Running or passing?

We wanted to know which statistics provided a more accurate gauge of overall success during the 2012 SEC football season.  When talking about the SEC, defense is usually the first word out of the mouth of any coach, fan or pundit.  Should it be?

In an effort to find out, we took six key (but simple) statistics from last season and compared them to the win/loss records of each of the 14 SEC schools.  We used only stats from conference games (SEC versus SEC) and we’ve compared only last season’s conference records.  Last year’s SEC title game was not included in our study.

In this piece, we’ll look at the defensive side of the ball.  Below you will find last year’s SEC teams ranked according to their opponents’ yards-per-pass-attempt average:

2012 SEC Passing Defense / Opponents’ Yards-Per-Pass-Attempt

Observations

*  When it comes to predicting success in the SEC, this statistic is much more helpful than its offensive counterpart.  Being able to throw the ball is important, but not as important as being able to prevent your opponent from successfully throwing the football.

*  With the exception of 2-6 Missouri, every other team in the SEC that held its opponents to 7.4 yards-per-pass-attempt or less won five or more league games.  The top eight teams in this category were a combined 46-18 in the SEC last season.

*  The bottom six SEC squads in this particular pass defense measure were a combined 10-38 in league play.  Of those six schools — Ole Miss, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Auburn, Tennessee and Arkansas — only MSU managed to finish at .500.

*  The quick takeaway: If you want to win an SEC football game, passing the ball isn’t as important as stopping the other team from passing the ball.

*  You can see the breakdown for offensive yards-per-pass-attempt by clicking here.

Offense or defense?

Running or passing?

We wanted to know which statistics provided a more accurate gauge of overall success during the 2012 SEC football season.  When talking about the SEC, defense is usually the first word out of the mouth of any coach, fan or pundit.  Should it be?

In an effort to find out, we took six key (but simple) statistics from last season and compared them to the win/loss records of each of the 14 SEC schools.  We used only stats from conference games (SEC versus SEC) and we’ve compared only last season’s conference records.  Last year’s SEC title game was not included in our study.

In this piece, we’ll start on the offensive side of the ball.  Below you will find last year’s SEC teams ranked according to their yards-per-pass-attempt average:

2012 SEC Passing Offense / Yards-Per-Pass-Attempt

Observations

*  Five of the top six teams in yards-per-pass won at least five SEC games last season.  The lone exception was Ole Miss.  So why didn’t the Rebels’ win on par with the league’s other high-flying squads?  It might have been Mississippi’s turnover woes.  Hugh Freeze’s squad turned the ball over 29 times last season to rank 13th of out of 14 SEC teams in giveaways (only Arkansas had more with 31).

*  For the most part, the league’s bottom-feeders in 2012 (Arkansas, Tennessee, Auburn, Missouri and Kentucky) all ranked in the bottom half of the league in yards-per-attempt.  There were two exceptions: Florida (7-1) and LSU (6-2).  Of course, they both had pretty stingy defenses… which we’ll cover in another post.

*  The top four squads in this category all return their starting quarterbacks this season: AJ McCarron, Aaron Murray, Bo Wallace and Connor Shaw.

*  So is this a very telling stat when it comes to predicting SEC success?  You’ll see this afternoon and tomorrow that there are other measures that relate much more closely to SEC wins and losses.  For example, check out the breakdown for defensive yards-per-pass-attempt by clicking here.

It seems Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy is getting battered from all sides these days.  His decision to block quarterback Wes Lunt from transferring to Southern Miss, any SEC schools, any Pac-12 schools, or to future opponent Central Michigan is being pointed to as further proof of college football’s overall hypocrisy. 

From The Oklahoman newspaper: “The guy who flirted with job openings at Tennessee and Arkansas last December now won’t allow his former quarterback, Wes Lunt, to accept an immediate scholarship to certain schools.  Including, irony of ironies, Tennessee.”

Even those trying to imagine why Gundy might have dropped the hammer on Lunt — example: if Lunt told Gundy he wanted to transfer closer to his Ilinois home then he shouldn’t be looking at SEC or Pac-12 schools anyway — admit that from a PR sense “the negatives outweigh the positives” for Oklahoma State’s coach.

Gundy isn’t doing anything new.  Coaches have always had the power to limit departing players’ transfer options.  Some use that power heavy-handedly — ex-Tennessee coach Derek Dooley once forced a player to transfer at least eight hours away from Knoxville and his home — while others refuse to stand in their players’ way.  Georgia’s Mark Richt is one coach who feels “life is too short” to block kids’ paths.

“I want every young man to have a successful time in his four- or five-year wind to be able to go to college.  So I don’t want to impede a guy from realizing his goals and his dreams, wherever it is.”

That’s not just talk from Richt.  Georgia’s coach is so player-first that he’s at times gotten involved and tried to help departing players find landing spots in the SEC… even though it could (but hasn’t) come back to bite his team in the rear.

Still, it’s time for the NCAA to take coaches out of the mix when it comes to student-athletes’ transfer rights.  If Mark Emmert is looking to kickstart his reform movement, transfer policies might be the perfect point to begin.  Again.

Obviously, not everyone can be allowed to transfer without restrictions.  While it might not be fair that players are bound to a school more than their coaches are, it is a necessity.  If there were no transfer limitations whatsoever, a coach’s departure could lead to an entire roster’s departure from a program.  On the surface that might look good for the players, but it would certainly be bad for any schools hit with such mass defections.  And such a massive shift in the college sports landscape could certainly lead to a decline in popularity and in finances which could in turn hurt athletes in the end.

That said, the restrictions placed upon a player’s options could be made uniform with a single new NCAA rule stating the following:

Read the rest of this entry »

SEC Football

1. Vanderbilt coach James Franklin makes it clear he’s no fan of going to a 9-game SEC schedule: “If it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it…Who’s going to play Oregon or Ohio State out of conference now?”

2. Tennessee A.D. Dave Hart on coach Butch Jones: “He’s passionate, he’s genuine and I think he’s off to a very, very good start in terms of galvanizing our fan base.”

3. Can Kentucky’s 2013 offense compare to the 1997 Air Raid offense of Hal Mumme?

4. Incoming Ole Miss freshman Robert Nkemdiche: “It is nearly inconceivable that an 18-year-old can have the build of a rookie in the NFL, but Nkemdiche does.”

5. Johnny Manziel: “The best summer anyone’s ever had continues, and it’s not even summer yet.” More here on his day in San Diego including a personalized jersey with a Heisman Trophy Patch.

6. Nick Saban on preparing for Manziel: ”I think that’s an ongoing process around here.” Aggies with most offensive and defensive snaps in the SEC.

7. 2014 draft-eligible SEC cornerbacks to keep your on this fall. Past five NFL drafts – SEC with 229 picks – Big 12 with 136.

8. Auburn right tackle Avery Young on playing in a hurry-up, no-huddle offense.  ”I’ve seen how it goes when playing against a team that’s not used to it.”

9. Gus Malzhan “has had seven different starting quarterbacks in seven years at the college level.”

10. Thanks to U.S. Open tennis shifting to ESPN, we could see more early SEC games on CBS starting in 2015.

Perspective on Nick Saban’s Week

11. 111 NFL players coached or recruited by Nick Saban - 33 of them at Alabama.

12. Robbie Andreu on Tim Davis’ comments regarding Saban: “Those being critical of his “devil” quote need to relax and understand that he was only kidding.”

13. Duane Rankin: “Davis’ comments are going to serve as motivation for Alabama, too.”

14. David Climer: (Saban) “gave him a job at two different levels of football. How about a little appreciation here?

15. MrSEC: “One man’s dream boss can be another man’s nightmare.”

NCAA News

16. ACC coaches want the coaches’ poll to be part of playoff criteria.

17. ACC TV Network? “ACC is able to proudly proclaim it has the most population (107 million) and most TV households (38 million) within its 10-state footprint of any conference.”

18. USC A.D. Pat Haden made $2.2 million in 2011 - second among athletic directors only to Vanderbilt’s David Williams (who held multiple titles that year). USC coach Lane Kiffin made $2.6 million that year - father Monte made $1.8 million.

19. Matt Hayes on Pat Fitzgerald’s Big Ten team:  ”Northwestern was the only Big Ten team to beat the mighty SEC in a bowl game, the program’s first bowl victory since 1949.”

20. Georgia Tech and the strangest recruiting Photoshops of them all.

SEC  Basketball

21. Is 45-year old Coleman Coliseum a long-term venue for Alabama?  A.D. Bill Battle: ”Right now, I think the answer’s yes… if we outgrow Coleman, we’ll address that when that time comes, but we’ve got a ways to go before we get there.”

22. Auburn’s Tony Barbee may have the hottest seat of any coach in college basketball this year.

23. Kevin Stallings may add an assistant at Vanderbilt.

24. Why the next six weeks may determine if former Missouri guard Phil Pressey will have an NBA career.

Extras

25. Former Alabama cornerback Dee Milliner fires his agent for not being drafted in the top five.

First things first… football and basketball are two completely different sports.

Basketball coaches usually wrap up their own non-conference schedules just months ahead of their next season.

In football — with much more money on the table — athletic directors handle the non-conference scheduling.  Typically any “big” games are lined up at least a year or two in advance.  Aside from neutral site money games (Atlanta, Arlington, Houston, etc), most all games between BCS-level foes are scheduled three, four, five or more years in advance.

For that reason, it’s much easier to pull off a two-conference “challenge” type event on the hardwood than it is on the gridiron.  There are only 12 football games per season (as opposed to 27-30 regular-season basketball games).  Each one of those 12 games has an enormous impact on an athletic department’s year-end revenue.  And with a playoff on the way, the top-tier games on a school’s schedule will have to locked down for strength of schedule purposes.

All that said, in recent months, with conference realignment talk filling cyberspace and the airwaves, talk of conference challenges and scheduling alliances has still generated more talk than ever among football fans… and between actual conferences.

The Big XII admitted that it had had talks with the ACC about such a scheduling partnership.  Then — just as we suggested on this site — it was learned that some talks between the Big XII and the SEC had occurred as well.

Just this week news broke that the Mountain West and Pac-12 are exploring a possible scheduling deal.  That’s the same Pac-12 that had initially reached such an agreement with the Big Ten.

And what do all of those alliances — Big XII/ACC, Big XII/SEC, MWC/Pac-12, Pac-12/Big Ten — have in common?

Not one of them has actually gone from theory to reality.  Not one.  But they sure look neat on paper, don’t they?

On this site, before John Swofford pulled a grant of rights agreement out of his hat, we suggested that the SEC could help save the ACC — if it wanted to — by agreeing to a scheduling alliance with that league.  The ACC was looking for extra cash — cash that ESPN is now stepping in to provide in an effort to halt further realignment — and a series of neutral site games against SEC squads all branded under a corporate sponsor’s logo would have been worth some nice cash for both the SEC and the ACC.

An ACC/SEC partnership would make sense in non-financial ways, too.  Already Florida/Florida State, Georgia/Georgia Tech and South Carolina/Clemson meet annually.  With Louisville set to join the ACC, the Kentucky/Louisville game would become the fourth built-in tilt between the leagues.  Vanderbilt and Wake Forest just wrapped up a series of games suggesting those two schools could form a fifth partnership.  If those five games remained/became annual events it would leave nine schools from each league — not counting part-time ACC member Notre Dame — to match up on a rotating basis.  The best matchups could be moved to NFL stadiums in Atlanta or Nashville or Charlotte or Washington or Pittsburgh.  ESPN would love it.  In-season “bowl” games.

Just as a random example, imagine the following as one season’s lineup of games:

Not every game would be a winner but even the worst games would beat matchups with FCS squads.  And again, the above is just an example.  (Please, look at the possibilities and don’t get hung up on who we matched with whom and where… this isn’t about the specifics).

In the above scenario there would be a battle between two corps of cadets.  A new border battle.  Extreme North versus extreme South.  A David Cutcliffe Bowl.  Plus some good games between traditionally strong programs.

Slap an AT&T logo on all of them, give them to ESPN (potentially for its SEC and ACC networks) and let everyone rake in the cash.

But that’s just one option for an SEC scheduling alliance.

We also suggested that with the ACC reaching out to the Big XII for a series of games, the SEC could damage Swofford’s league’s chances of survival — if it wanted to — by stealing their dates, so to speak.  Sources claim the Big XII and SEC had some discussions at some level about the possibility of an alliance.  The two leagues have already broken new ground with their co-ownership of the Sugar Bowl.  They’ve also just officially announced a basketball challenge.  If two leagues appear to be getting chummy at the moment, it’s the SEC and the Big XII (ironic considering the moves of Missouri and Texas A&M).

In theory — there’s that word again — the four existing SEC/ACC rivalries could be left intact with the 10 remaining SEC teams lining up games with the 10 squads from the Big XII.

Imagine this draw as a possible slate of games:

Under that plan you’d have Nick Saban coaching against his home state school.  Mike Gundy would face the team whose job he didn’t take.  There would a We-Hate-Tommy-Tuberville Bowl.  There would also be showdown between Bears and Black Bears.  (Sorry, Rebel fans.  It had to be done).

Throw a Dr. Pepper logo on that “SEC/Big XII Challenge” and split the games between ESPN and FOX depending on each game’s location.  Money, money, money for all.

Now, again, not all of those games would be home runs.  They would, however, be infinitely more interesting than the total strikeouts that are Florida versus Georgia Southern, Arkansas versus Samford, Tennessee versus Austin Peay, etc.

So if scheduling alliances look so good on paper, what’s the problem?

Read the rest of this entry »

This isn’t a particularly new idea.  We wrote of it last year as well.  But with a new playoff, a new rotation of the biggest bowls, and an almost entirely new lineup of bowl tie-ins coming your way in 2014, we felt it was once again time to push our idea for a “bowl draft.”

Now, first of all, it’s not going to happen.  Conferences like having built-in bowl slots (i.e., money) for their schools.  And bowls committees like being able to focus their marketing efforts toward predetermined partners.  So this theory just isn’t likely to become a reality.

That said, considering the following:

*  The new six-bowl playoff rotation — which will include four bowls and eight teams not in the actual playoff each year – is likely to cause confusion over who’s going where in a given season.

*  The SEC has had chats with the Belk, Gator, Meineke Car Care, Music City and Outback Bowls about creating a formula that would allow the league and the bowls to place SEC teams in those games.  Overall the SEC’s bowl prospects look quite messy at this point.

*  The ACC is reportedly leaning toward sending its second best team — if that squad is not in the playoff – to the Russell Athletic Bowl.  But John Swofford’s league has also talked with the Belk, Gator and Music City Bowls about sending its teams to those sites to face SEC squads.

*  The Big XII is looking at a new bowl lineup as well.  Currently Bob Bowlsby’s league is negotiating with the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl — as is the Pac-12.

*  The Big Ten is pushing its revamped “national” bowl lineup which stretches from coast to coast.  That conference is also planning to get involved — in some way — with the selection process in order to prevent its teams from having to travel to the same locations too often.

Yuck.  Just give us some sanity, college football bigwigs.

On the same day that the football playoff and big bowl participants are announced by football’s new selection committee, kick off a bowl draft.  Dump conference tie-ins altogether.  Just line up the bowls from the highest-paying to the lowest-paying and let them select whoever the heck they want to bring into their communities.  The best-paying bowl picks first.  The game with the smallest payout gets the last selections.

At that point, it would be up to the bowls to create interesting matchups.  They could pick teams whose fans travel well to please their local business partners.  Or they could select squads based on national rankings or national name in order to grab high television ratings and please their corporate sponsors.  The bowls could go in any direction they liked.

Such a system would please most fans, too.  Instead of watching the same SEC squads knock heads with the same Big Ten and ACC teams in the same handful of bowls each year, Southeastern Conference fans could see their favorite schools shipped to the Holiday Bowl in San Diego to face a Pac-12 team or the Pinstripe Bowl in New York City to face a Big XII squad.  That would add some interest back into the bowl season.

Imagine a bowl drafting Texas and Texas A&M for a showdown.  All of a sudden the Witch Hazel Bowl in Lubbock wouldn’t look quite so dreary, eh?  (That’s not a real bowl, though you know it could be.)

The powers-that-be — as detailed above — are trying to pump some life into the postseason by creating bowl swaps and built-in rotations.  But rotations only lead to confusion and frustration.  “Let’s see, this is the 11th year of Jupiter’s 12-year cycle around the Sun and New Year’s Day falls on a Wednesday… so it’s the ACC that gets a slot in the Dutchmasters Cigar Bowl this year.”

With a draft there’s no such confusion.  Sure, there would still be bickering over why a bowl took Team X or Team Y.  And coaches and fans would still find multiple reasons to complain.  But at least the system would be easily understood.  “The Black Label Beer Bowl picked us.”  End of story.

Read the rest of this entry »

Kentucky basketball coach John Calipari says his next team will be “chasing perfection,” something that hasn’t been done since Indiana went undefeated in 1976
ESPN analyst Mark May called Florida offensive line coach Tim Davis a “classless backstabbing coward” for calling Alabama coach Nick Saban “the devil himself”
Tennessee says it has reached a four-year deal to re-start the school’s basketball rivalry with Memphis…
Memphis officials say no deal is done yet and that future football games would be required
The Big Ten reportedly made $315 million during its last fiscal year, $42 million more than the SEC during its last fiscal year
Auburn defensive coordinator Ellis Johnson on his secondary: “We don’t want two corners, we want four corners.”
Former Wyoming punter Tim Gleeson says he will enroll at Tennessee
Follow all 14 SEC teams at MrSEC.com and twitter.com/mrsec