Independent and Big East Hoops

[Chip]

I'd like an invite from Jennifer Aniston or Mariska Hargitay.

I figured this was the thread to say crazy ***t so why not.

Good for you sticking by the older ladies.

 

[orange79]

How much of that money goes back into football?

A quick google search says Syracuse spent $27.7M on football in 2019. Is that true? I don't know, but it sounds reasonable.

So, all other things being equal (and they're not), that would mean if we dropped football and moved to the BE, we'd be making about $7M less than a "comparable" ACC payout and would need to find a way to make up that difference for all other sports. If we went independent in football, we'd have no way to make up that deficit.

 

[OrangeXtreme]

I figured this was the thread to say crazy ***t so why not.

Good for you sticking by the older ladies.

Mariska is 4 months younger than me.

 

[Cusefan95]

I'm certainly not going to forecast 40 years into the future. I think 10-20 years is a reasonable time frame in that regard.

Football is THE most popular program on TV. And I'm defining "TV" as broadly as possible = video that is consumed on a device.

Every week, 100 to 150+ million Americans watch football, college or pro. Nothing compares to it. That habit isn't going to wither away this decade, or next.

If sports rights suddenly deteriorate, the one sport that will maintain its value is football. There are really only three broadly followed national leagues: NFL, college football, and the NBA. That's it.

MLB is arguably more popular than the NBA, but it has become a broadly followed regional sport and thus it's TV value has been diminished. Everything else is either regional or niche.

So that's my rationale. If the sports rights apocalypse is coming, football will be the one sport that survives.

I had a business school professor who predicted the US was going to fiscally implode in 2033. Since he also predicted the housing crash which hadn't happened (and in fact I remember articles from the early 2000s from economists predicting we knew how to control the economy and recessions were a thing of the past...), I'm at least open enough to that idea that I wouldn't predict much beyond a ten year window myself.

I think the problem is that a lot of the cable broadcast rights fees are subsidized by Aunt Sue who never watches. As cord cutting continues, somehow they need to either figure out how to dupe Aunt Sue into paying for ESPN/FS1, massively jack up standalone fees for sports channels - or cut the broadcast rights for leagues. That problem effects the NFL the least (due to limited inventory, popularity of gambling, games on over the air channels, etc.), college football probably second least - so on one hand I think your assessment is right.

On the other hand, I'm not 100% sure the death of cable isn't going to be apocalyptic for sports leagues, none will survive in anything close to the form they are now - and this is really like standing in a morgue arguing over which dead body is the least dead.

 

[Cusefan95]

OK, you seemed to be responding on my behalf.

If it makes you feel any better, it was pretty obvious to me Millhouse was, as usual, doing his own thing.

 

[Cuse181]

When faced with the decision to pocket a free 30-40+ million a year for just showing up every week, only an idiot would say "eh, throw it away because I want to play UConn more"

 

[Scooch]

I had a business school professor who predicted the US was going to fiscally implode in 2033. Since he also predicted the housing crash which hadn't happened (and in fact I remember articles from the early 2000s from economists predicting we knew how to control the economy and recessions were a thing of the past...), I'm at least open enough to that idea that I wouldn't predict much beyond a ten year window myself.

I think the problem is that a lot of the cable broadcast rights fees are subsidized by Aunt Sue who never watches. As cord cutting continues, somehow they need to either figure out how to dupe Aunt Sue into paying for ESPN/FS1, massively jack up standalone fees for sports channels - or cut the broadcast rights for leagues. That problem effects the NFL the least (due to limited inventory, popularity of gambling, games on over the air channels, etc.), college football probably second least - so on one hand I think your assessment is right.

On the other hand, I'm not 100% sure the death of cable isn't going to be apocalyptic for sports leagues, none will survive in anything close to the form they are now - and this is really like standing in a morgue arguing over which dead body is the least dead.

Your last paragraph is precisely my point. If there is indeed a media apocalypse, and sports is devastated, the last entities to be harmed would be the NFL and college football. They're going to be just fine for quite some time.

I also don't think there's going to be said "apocalypse". Change is here and much more is coming. But, for the most part, there will be adaptation. There is still a TON of money in media, and the one programming genre that unquestionably lures in subscribers, viewers, advertisers and sponsors, is sports.

 

[CousCuse]

Your last paragraph is precisely my point. If there is indeed a media apocalypse, and sports is devastated, the last entities to be harmed would be the NFL and college football. They're going to be just fine for quite some time.

I also don't think there's going to be said "apocalypse". Change is here and much more is coming. But, for the most part, there will be adaptation. There is still a TON of money in media, and the one programming genre that unquestionably lures in subscribers, viewers, advertisers and sponsors, is sports.

Armageddon is looking possible.