Big 12 future in doubt, but there is one important move to make

In the wake of Texas’ and Oklahoma’s chaos-inducing plans to move to the SEC by 2025, the Kansas athletic department sure picked an interesting time to tweet last week that 2.5 million people live in the Lawrence-Kansas City area and that the Kansas City International Airport is poised to add a new terminal in two years.

It had all the subtlety of a soon-to-be single spouse, anxiously awaiting divorce papers, unartfully crafting their first Tinder bio: I’m available! I’m on the market!

All that was missing was a Big Ten hashtag.

With the Big 12 destabilized and its future in question, members of the league’s Left Behind Eight can swipe right, so to speak, all they want to try to find a home in another Power 5 conference. But unless interest is mutual, efforts are futile. Whether the solution is merging with the Pac-12 or adding at least two schools, the best course of action for the eight schools is clear: Stick together.

Tuesday’s meeting between Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby and new Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff — The Athletic reported the possibilities of a scheduling alliance or merger being broached — is the first true indication that the Big 12’s initial countermove to the pending departures of OU and Texas is to attempt to move forward … together. A key issue is maintaining the designation of a Power 5 autonomous league, which impacts the amount of revenue received from the College Football Playoff and maintaining a louder voice on legislative matters. 

Bowlsby telegraphed that strategy during Monday’s Texas state senate select committee hearing on the “Future of College Sports in Texas” when he said “there may be opportunities for mergers, there may be opportunities to add members, there may be other opportunities that are currently unforeseen.”

He made clear that the eight schools remaining together in lockstep probably is the best option now, adding, “Our eight members are steadfast in moving forward.”

So, what is next?

At the moment, there are few practical alternatives. There is no evidence that any of the eight — added independently — would provide significantly more value to another Power 5 conference. A former longtime high-ranking Big 12 official, when asked if any of the eight is an attractive addition for another Power 5 conference, said bluntly: “A Power 5 league? No. They are not Texas or Oklahoma, so I don’t think they are attractive” by themselves. 

The revenue pie is sliced up in more pieces when conferences expand. For moves to be justified, the additions need to contribute to the overall pie growing proportionally so everyone receives a larger slice.

West Virginia reportedly wants to join the ACC. But what is the value for the ACC in expanding its footprint to the Morgantown, W.Va., area? Iowa State has one of the nation’s most respected coaches, Matt Campbell, who has spurned others to remain in Ames. But why would the Big Ten take the Cyclones when it already has a foothold in the state with the University of Iowa?

Kansas possesses one of the nation’s most tradition-rich men’s basketball programs. Baylor won the men’s basketball national title four months ago. And Texas Tech nearly won the men’s basketball title in 2019. But anyone who believes basketball plays a meaningful role in the calculus behind conference realignment hasn’t been paying attention.

These are football-driven moves fueled by the potential of lucrative TV media rights deals: $28 million of the $34.5 million given to each Big 12 school during the 2020-21 fiscal year came from TV revenue. As Neal Pilson, the CBS Sports president in the 1980s and ’90s, told On3, “The right question to ask is not where the schools want to go but whether there is added value. ESPN may look at its ratings and say, ‘You know, we are pretty soft in certain states. We might see more people wanting to hold onto ESPN rather than cut the cord.’ ”

In terms of media markets, TCU’s Dallas-Fort Worth (fifth) and Kansas’ Kansas City (32nd) are the only remaining Big 12 markets that rank among the top 65 nationally. For the most part, the eight schools exist in college communities where they are the biggest game in town — but don’t necessarily attract a lot of eyeballs outside those areas. To that point, The Athletic reported that in 2018-19 (pre-pandemic), 27 of the league’s 30 most-watched regular-season games involved Oklahoma and/or Texas.

In 2016, Iowa State athletic director Jamie Pollard said the quiet part out loud in an interview with IHeartRadio. “The Big 12 exists because we have Texas and Oklahoma in the room,” he said. “If we take Texas and Oklahoma out of the room, we’re the Mountain West Conference and we’re getting $3 million (per year in TV revenue).”

Next Big 12 TV deal will drop in value

So without OU and Texas, as Bowlsby on Monday and two prominent TV executives said, the diminished Big 12 is eyeing the prospect of a new media rights deal — its current one with ESPN and Fox expires in 2025 — carrying maybe 50 percent of its current value. The implications are far-reaching.

Baylor president Linda Livingstone said during the Texas state senate hearing that she feared not being in a Power 5 league could “erode” enrollment. Baylor AD Mack Rhoades, whose school harbors plans for a new basketball arena and football operations facility, conceded, “Even if the Big 12 remains vibrant and stays Power 5, I think it’s really difficult to envision a scenario where we remain whole, no matter what.”

He added: “We need to make sure that for this state of Texas, that this is not a demotion for us three schools because that is what it feels like right now.”

The Big 12 was caught flatfooted when the Houston Chronicle first reported the possibility of the departures July 21. While the timeline of how the move unfolded remains opaque, Jay Hartzell, who became Texas president last September, said the impetus stemmed from a conversation with Oklahoma president Joe Harroz in which they shared mutual concern over issues in college athletics. Monday, Hartzell called uncertainty over a potential Big 12 media rights deal a “serious source of financial risk,” adding that the SEC would provide more security and stability than the Big 12 by 2025.

Another former longtime Big 12 official said, even with what he considered Texas’ inflated sense of its football program’s place in the national landscape, the onus was on the league to placate the two flagship schools. “I can tell you the number one job, in my mind, if you’re the Big 12 office is keeping Texas and Oklahoma happy,” the official said. “And you can’t say it publicly. But the other eight schools, they all get it. You’re not going to give a guy a player of the year award over another just because it’s Texas. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about administrative stuff and things like that.”

Now, a future without Oklahoma and Texas is coming into focus, and Bowlsby is rightly moving toward trying to keep the league intact. The prudent move, whether through a merger with the Pac-12 or through poaching two (or more) schools from the AAC, is to keep the Left Behind Eight together. That would preserve the Power 5 autonomous conference designation. 

They’d keep an important seat at the legislative table. And they’d avoid, as TCU chancellor Victor Boschini told senators Monday, their annual revenue share from the league free-falling from $35 million all the way to $5 million. 

As Boschini said, “Everything is better when you’re in the Power 5, except parking.”

(Top photo of Bowlsby: Cooper Neill/Getty Images)