But face what the ACC has that is a drag down all the time. WE only have 2 schools with truly large football fans bases. Making that worse, we have the smallest schools in a Major conference and the most private schools among Major conferences. WE have only 2 state flagship universities (2 and a half if you buy the FSU claim about itself), only 3 state land grant schools. All those things mean the ACC will always be held down. Winning can change none of that.
So what do we need done: Fewer small privates and more larger state schools, especially flagships and/or land grants, but also large as FSU is large, and located on. state with a lot of football history and football passion.
Specifically what would I do along those lines? I would want ESPN to tell me how much more we woqpuod get by dropping Wake and BC and replace them with WVU and Cincinnati. The fact is that for virtually 10-0% of games every season, both WVU and Cincy will draw more viewers, up to a million more, per game than will Wake and BC against the same opponents.
I now think that if something like that cannot be done to get the ACC more money, then the ACC as we know it is headed right toward death.
I am not worried about saving the ACC. Whether the ACC survives or not is immaterial. What is material right now is that the 14 schools that make up the ACC are are bound together by the GOR. The bonds cannot easily be broken, it does no good to pretend that there is an easy way out (simply disband the ACC, ignore ESPN's rights, forget that all 14 schools need a soft landing or there is no incentive to even pursue disbanding the ACC or attempting to negotiate with ESPN, etc.)
I don't think the ACC will drop any team in otherwise good standing, nor will any other conference for that matter. Doing so will destroy the conference .
I agree with you that the ACC should be working with ESPN for real hard number on projections and increases (there are two more look-ins during the contract). I suspect that some are in contact with ESPN, though I would have no doubt the mouth from FSU is not a part of that team.
I add that your assessment may seem bleak, but the truth is that there are positives, too.
- Several of the top 10 populous states are within the ACC footprint,
- that though the northeast is not CFB dominant it is hoops dominant,
- SU is New York's de facto State school in the P5,
- SU and Miami are large private schools,
- the ACC footprint is projected to increase in population, most of the B1G will decrease or stagnate in projections,
- too many top dogs in the B1G and SEC will fall to the middle of the pack, interest will wane
- FSU and Miami are on the rise. SU and Pitt are on the rise. UNC under Mack is decent. Some old powers can boost the ACC value.
- Thirteen years is a long time, the GOR buys time for teams to prove up. If not, then teams will go their own way.
- The Big12 will want more teams and more east coast exposure. Even if they take the PAC teams, the east coast is not likely to watch many of the Big12 games. The present teams are not heavily followed in the east and the exciting teams have left the Big12 and PAC.