I think the GOR is going to be absolutley iron lad, right up until the press conference announcing the ACC disbanding/realigning.
Expansion/Realignment Talk Heating Up Again
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I think the GOR is going to be absolutley iron lad, right up until the press conference announcing the ACC disbanding/realigning.
The only way I can foresee the GOR being dissolved is if ESPN wants it to happen. But I can't see that happening b/c they would be giving up teams to the Big 10 who has media rights with Fox.
Otherwise, the GOR itself is airtight. I read a 2013 copy, which was amended in 2016 to create the ACCN. For one thing, it's much shorter and simpler than I thought. Couple of pages. It more or less says "You agree to give up your media rights to the ACC and this agreement is absolutely irrevocable under any and all circumstances."
Further, you have the ACC bylaws, which almost certainly include language that blocks any attempts to dissolve the conference. In hindsight, this makes perfect sense. For the GOR to really carry any weight, the bylaws have to include language the guarantee the existence of the conference. What good would the GOR be if teams could just say "ehhh, we don't wanna be in the ACC anymore?"
So if ESPN doesn't want it to happen and if the teams have no legal course of action to make it happen, that leaves the ACC. The only option I can see would be a merger, but that's never going to happen. There are really only 2 teams anyone would want from the ACC, Clemson and FSU. As football brands, the others bring nothing to the table.
Nothing surprises me anymore, but I just can't see how it can happen.
I think it means more to the SEC than to other leagues. I think it will going forward also. All states in conference territory touch one another somehow and I believe that will continue to be the case. By the way, Indiana touches Kentucky. Just sayin'.
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No lawyer, but I think that's why the 8 team number is so important. it changes the conversation from teams leaving the conference to the conference dissolving. (Or insert another term)
I never read anything concrete, but I read so many people who seem confident the gor is a hurdle, but not an insurmountable one.
If you look back to post #110, though, dissolution most likely isn't an option. The ACC would have almost certainly planned for that contingency in their bylaws. In short from the Big 12 bylaws (if you don't care to go back and read it): if you're found to be trying to leave the conference, you are considered to have given up your voting rights.
So schools can't vote to dissolve b/c they will have already forfeited their voting rights.
I read that, and I'm not certain I buy it. I would wager that's hard to enforce, because lawyers (in their infinite ability to twist even common sense) would argue that these teams aren't attempting to leave the conference, but dissolve it.
(And that's IF the acc tried something like the b12)
I am by no means certain, so I'm not arguing too strenuously here. I just think this sounds like the "coach so and so has my complete support" statements from the AD. It's rock solid right up until it's not. And there's way too much smoke for there not to be a fire, imho.
Edit: Just had a thought. How many b12 teams does it take to alter that "you lose your vote" clause? Can the 8 team limit be because then they would have enough teams to alter things like that?
Put it this way: if it weren't insurmountable, would not it have been breached already? Not talking Maryland, now. Maryland gave rise to the current punitive, preemptive GOR arrangement the ACC has.
Also not a lawyer (obviously). I've waffled back and forth on the GOR issue. On the one hand, contracts are made to broken. On the other, you read reports that lawyers from every school in the ACC have pored over the GOR and can't find an out. If there was ANY way around it, I don't think Clemson and FSU would be pursuing unequal revenue sharing, which won't even bring them up to SEC level money.
The language in the Big 12 bylaws, though, is pretty broad and gives the other member schools a lot of leeway in how they evaluate another school's actions. "Thus, it doesn’t matter if a school that is trying to leave the conference provides notice of withdrawal or not. As soon as the other members suspect that a school is taking to actions to get out of the GOR specifically (much less leave the league entirely), those other members can deem such school to have Withdrawn from the league and lose its voting rights in the process." I'd be shocked if this isn't standard language in all conference bylaws.
I won't be shocked either way. I find it hard to believe the ACC stays intact for the duration of the GOR. I think it will take the entire conference, though, to realize it's not financially viable. If all 15 teams agree to dissolve, that's a different issue.
Doubt ACC disbands. It could take on the look of the Ivey League.
This. Clemson and FSU would not be pursuing unequal revenue sharing, which still won't bring them up to SEC money, if they had any other options.
UNC has one of the best law schools in the nation. They can't find a way out.
OK. I read something about it and got the impression that it was the ACC taking action. Clemson told USC that that restriction would be dropped but Good Ole Paul wanted out. He was gonna make USC a CFB power with his "great recruiting" without those restrictions.
In the end, it worked out great for USC even tho it took 20 yrs. USC would still be looking at, if they agreed to that GOR, being stuck in that conference with no real guarantee of a great landing spot if conference ever collapsed. The turn has wormed.
The ACC was against USC because of McGuire's great recruiting and coaching. They were used to a W when playing the GCs. Some said they were gonna refuse to play USC in MBB because of that brawl and the biased ACC Commissioner took their side when it should have been an auto L with their refusal. What could have been with Grosso. I think Duke was behind his being disqualified. They treated USC, a founding member that deserved respect for that fact, shabbily and were giggling behind closed doors when USC withdrew.
Still POes me to this day.
That's why I hope, hope the ACC collapses.
Change one thing and other things are apt to change - just like everything else in life. I was seconds away from never meeting my wife - 53 years ago. I was literally getting in my car to leave the place I was supposed to meet her for the last time. Two children, three grandchildren, choices in where to live and where to work - all turned on those fateful seconds. Under other circumstances the ACC certainly develops along different lines as well - and maybe the SEC also. Just sayin'.OK. I read something about it and got the impression that it was the ACC taking action. Clemson told USC that that restriction would be dropped but Good Ole Paul wanted out. He was gonna make USC a CFB power with his "great recruiting" without those restrictions.
In the end, it worked out great for USC even tho it took 20 yrs. USC would still be looking at, if they agreed to that GOR, being stuck in that conference with no real guarantee of a great landing spot if conference ever collapsed. The turn has wormed.
The ACC was against USC because of McGuire's great recruiting and coaching. They were used to a W when playing the GCs. Some said they were gonna refuse to play USC in MBB because of that brawl and the biased ACC Commissioner took their side when it should have been an auto L with their refusal. What could have been with Grosso. I think Duke was behind his being disqualified. They treated USC, a founding member that deserved respect for that fact, shabbily and were giggling behind closed doors when USC withdrew.
Still POes me to this day.
I agree with this. An extra $10M/yr isn't going to make a dent in the gap that's going occur over the next few years. But they're playing happy about it b/c they have no other choice. They have no one to blame but themselves.
Can't the ACC get together and change they're own bylaws?
There was not a feeling of pressing "need" to leave the ACC until lately. There was dissatisfaction with the contract, but not until the newest numbers that are being discussed by the B1G and SEC that a sense of change was needed. (@18IsTheMan made a good point on this thought on post #66).
3 schools (FSU, Clemson ,Miami) just made the initial push for change, and now have 4 (5) other schools that have aligned themselves for the same. If you happen to pick up on the comments by the AD's of the initial 3, there was a not so veiled message, (and I'm paraphrasing), we're committed "for now"
You should not expect any imminent movement, but you should not expect a status quo for a prolonged period either.
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No idea what the process would be, but it hasn't been done so I guess there's a reason why.
I don't see how they can redistribute the revenue in a way that closes the gap between the top ACC schools and their SEC/Big 10 counterparts without absolutely kneecapping some of the other schools. That's just me. The difference in ACC money is just too great.
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The schools are the members. My guess is to change by laws it takes unanimous consent...or something more than 50%. Further, I've seen agreements written such that if either side enters into legal action against the other, BOTH sides have to cease operation until the legal matter is resolved. No idea if that's in the GOR. But I'd be shocked if there wasn't some kind of mechanism to keep it from litigation. So both sides have interest in not taking any actions that would result in a lawsuit. If 8 teams try to dissolve the ACC all together, there's 100% chance of it going to court.
It won’t which is why this will solve the issue for this year and maybe next but they will be right back here. Just because the GOR hasn’t been challenged doesn’t mean it’s air tight. It just means it’s tight enough to keep teams from spending the money to try so far. What I’m saying is the desperation level has not reached maximum level, yet. This is far from over. They may not have landing spots. Who’s going to challenge it without a home?
Now if a 60 team league were to happen, then all bets are off.
The way I see it, football drives everything. So you've got schools like GT, BC, UVA, Cuse that just don't bring much to the table football wise. They don't want to be a UCONN when the Big East split. So they're probably just agreeing b/c they're not going to have a nice landing spot like others.
I don't think I'd pretend in this matter. And I'll take it a step further: once they enact this graduated disbursal, friction will develop among their top tier around who gets more. That's why I hope the premier leagues never consider such as this. You know where WE would fall. The very ability to compete would be further undermined.
Any other conference would have to be given 100% assurance that there nothing would impede their ability to gain TV rights of the schools. I don't know how they do that. And it's certainly not something that would be easily or quickly resolved. I don't see the ACC office just going silently into the night.
Yep. It's the beginning of the slow death of the ACC. Same thing happened to the B12. There's a reason that 5 different SEC teams has won NCs in the last 20 years. I think a much better approach if there ever starts to be friction at the top is to keep the share, and mandate that every program has to reinvest X% into their AD. That way you don't have some schools just pocketing money. Which I don't think we have in the SEC. Seems like every program is investing heavily in FB, baseball, and basketball.
Correct. The 2013 GOR reads (and I'm sure the same language is continued in the 2016 revision): "Each of the Member Institutions hereby (a) irrevocably and exclusively grants the Conference during the Term (as defined below)...."
It later states, just to close up loopholes, "Each of the Member Institutions acknowledges that the grant of rights during the entire Term is irrevocable and effective until the end of the Term regardless of whether the Member Institution withdraws from the Conference during the Term or otherwise ceases to participate as a member of the Conference"
And...this one is the "nuts in the vise" paragraph:
"that execution and delivery of this Agreement by Member Institution and the dis duties contemplated herein by Member Institution will not, with or without the giving or the lapse of time, or both: (i) violate or conflict with any of the provisions of the document, bylaws or other governing documents of such Member Institution; (ii) violate with or result in breach or default under, or cause termination of any contract, license, other agreement, document or instrument to which Member Institution is a party or b Member Institution may be bound; or (iii) violate any provision of any law, statu regulation, court order. judgment, or decree, or ruling of any governmental authority, b Member Institution is a party or to which Member Institution may be bound; and Member Institution, either alone, or in concert with an affiliated entity that has exec agreement to be bound by the provisions of this Agreement, owns all Rights granter Conference in paragraph 1 above. Each of the Member Institutions covenants and agrees it will not enter into any agreement that is inconsistent with the provisions of this Agreement and (y it will not take any action, or permit any action to be taken by others subject to its control, including licensees, or fail to take any action, that would affect the validity and enforcement of the Rights granted to the Conference under this Agreement."
They thought of everything. The GOR is irrevocable and exclusive, even if you leave the conference, and you agree not to enter into any agreement or take any action that conflicts with the GOR.
This is what conferences originally were, and probably still function as such in D-II & D-III.
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Missouri Touches Kentucky as well, even though there's no fixed crossing over the Mississippi River connecting the two states.
If geography mattered even more, they would have sought to bring back Georgia Tech and Tulane rather than expand into non-traditional SEC territory.
Actually, they were against McGuire's violating the spirit of the 800 rule. He found a loophole in recruiting Grosso which arch-enemy Eddie Cameron despised. Again, the ACC had nothing against USC per se; USC was in the cross-fire of a feud between Cameron and McGuire which went back to McGuire's days at UnCarolina. Up until USC won the 1971 ACC tournament, the only non-big-4 school to win it was Maryland in 1958 (the year after McGuire's Tar Holes won the national title). I haven't read anything about the ACC or the big-4 having it in for Maryland post-1958.OK. I read something about it and got the impression that it was the ACC taking action. Clemson told USC that that restriction would be dropped but Good Ole Paul wanted out. He was gonna make USC a CFB power with his "great recruiting" without those restrictions.
In the end, it worked out great for USC even tho it took 20 yrs. USC would still be looking at, if they agreed to that GOR, being stuck in that conference with no real guarantee of a great landing spot if conference ever collapsed. The turn has wormed.
The ACC was against USC because of McGuire's great recruiting and coaching. They were used to a W when playing the GCs. Some said they were gonna refuse to play USC in MBB because of that brawl and the biased ACC Commissioner took their side when it should have been an auto L with their refusal. What could have been with Grosso. I think Duke was behind his being disqualified. They treated USC, a founding member that deserved respect for that fact, shabbily and were giggling behind closed doors when USC withdrew.
Still POes me to this day.
Had it been left up to McGuire, USC would never have left the ACC. GCJerryUSC, you are, however, spot-on re: Dietzel.
Just glanced over at TNET and saw no comments about this. I did see a thread where they made fun of our perception of our SEC schedule. It makes me speculate that maybe they are coming to accept their lot for the foreseeable future.
Couple things. First, I've read before, and someone states earlier in the thread that the internet version is not the real version.
Also, all of this is reads to me as the ACC gets the rights to the teams that leave the conference. If I was wanting to get out of it, I would disband the ACC, and there wouldn't be a conference to claim those rights. But you would probably need a majority of the teams to do that. And they would need to each know they had a landing spot before they pulled that trigger.
I'm also curious what percentage of the institutions would be involved in modifying the gor agreement, or if it would have to be unanimous.
Missouri touches Arkansas also, does it not, and Tennessee?
Georgia Tech left because the SEC was athletically too tough and academically too soft. They didn't like it when an Alabama boy kicked one of their players in the head.
They are probably less stringent academically than they were but now they are less desirable. Bobby Dodd ain't over there anymore.
Tulane, in my lifetime at least, has never been more as an SEC member than an easy in-state rival for LSU, about as Vandy is to Tennessee. The league doesn't need another rivalry of that kind.
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