I suppose it possible, but I'd like to see how you get Ark/USC/UK to support uneven revenue sharing.
Because they’d get the same cut as the big boys….in exchange for their votes. And I think you greatly underestimate their marketing appeal. UK is pretty much a Top 15 revenue producer every year….a lot due to basketball but they also make more from football than MSU. Arkansas is consistently Top 20 and sometimes Top 15. USC bounces around from 15 ~ 25. They’re a little more up and down.
Also, it seems like crippling the schools with the smallest budgets is a good way to lower the overall value of the entire league and create enmity.
I don’t think it lowers the value of anything if 4 general bottom feeder schools (save for OM’s recent run, and Mizzou to a lesser extent) simply remain bottom feeders. But besides, who said the end game is to lower their value? They may eventually just want those teams gone, as that creates fewer pie slices for teams that are drawing more revenue than they are producing. The most palatable way to do that is death by 1000 financial cuts.
No American major professional sport league has unequal revenue distribution,
Uhh….MLB? Distribution from TV might be the same, but each team keeps its own money from licensing and ticket sales, which is where the real money is there. And you have very different salary caps from different franchises.
I have a hard time believing schools that already have enormous budgets (not named Texas) will scheme to bleed more more money out of their league partners.
I don’t know how much human or economic history you follow, but the number of case studies of enormously rich and powerful people or entities looking at their stack and saying “yep, I’m good with just this” is pretty much zero.
Schools are leaving their previous conferences to join the richer and more stable SEC/BigTen. The prestige of these conferences and TV contracts they will create will make everyone involved richer.
They’ll make everyone richer up to a certain point….but then its diminishing returns. That’s the problem for the little guys. North Carolina is a more desirable school for the SEC than at least 5-6 schools that are already here. Given the chance, a pragmatic SEC would trade MSU, OM, Mizzou, Ark, USC, or Vandy for them at the drop of a hat. But, to simply add them, they alone have to be worth $55 million or so per year added to the ESPN payout for all members just to break even. Needs to be closer to $60 million alone to add to everyone’s share. Are they actually worth that much alone in TV distribution? Doubtful. The B1G shares are even larger, so there’s even less of a case for them there. So, how would either league potentially add them? By chasing off the underperformers revenue wise, or cutting their shares.
As far as other conferences' unequal distributions, as far as I understand it, this is just a temporary "entrance fee." Washington and Oregon will be full members when the BigTen's current TV contract is up.
Correct, but that’s not until 2030. 6 years of bargain basement checks for them.
Same goes for SMU, Stanford and Cal in the ACC.
And the GOR runs until 2035. And SMU is getting ZERO dollars from the TV deal until then….with Stanford and Cal getting peanuts as well.
While I couldn't find the payouts for the Pac12 schools that are joining the Big12, UCF, Houston, Cincy and BYU will be receiving full shares next year. The SEC was the one league that was able to expand without an entrance fee.
They expanded without an entrance fee because Texas / OU paid that exit fee to the Big 12 themselves, and alone were worth way more than enough to increase everyone’s share. So it was an easy call to not lower their initial distribution. USC got a similar deal with the B1G, I think. Nobody else who bolts before the impending ACC collapse will get such special treatment.
