For now, it sounds like the college football world will be blessed with another six years of the Big 12 soap opera. What will it take to keep the conference viable beyond that?
Redefining “Conference”
There are really two different ways to look at the concept of a conference.
Today, all athletic conferences have morphed into alliances of schools that come together to increase their bargaining power in the marketplace. By banding together and surrendering some autonomy in the process, they all stand to benefit.
The problem with that model is that the conference in and of itself is nothing more than a marriage of convenience. Once it outlives its usefulness or members find a better deal, the alliance no longer has a purpose.
The Big 12 exists as a conference in this most limited sense. We’ve seen what kind of environment that fosters. Everything is a negotiation between the economic engines driving the conference and those along for the ride, and everyone is looking to leave as soon as a better offer comes along.
The strongest conferences – the Big Ten, the SEC – go a step further than mere economics. They represent a culture, a club of like-minded individuals united in the common sensibilities fostered by their regions.
The current members of the Big 12 probably should recognize that they’re not in conferences like the B1G and Pac-12 for a reason. Quite simply, they don’t “fit” there.
Commit To The League
Oklahoma president David Boren botched his fair share in realignment, but – lip service or not – his emphasis on “stability” is appropriate.
The individual members of the longstanding leagues don’t fight to squeeze every dollar out of every opportunity that comes their way. Instead, they sacrifice those dollars today to ensure their conferences continue to thrive, which effectively guarantees that more dollars keep coming their way in the future.
To this point, the Big 12 business model has focused on serving the interests of its key economic drivers and treated the rest of the schools like they’re lucky to be along for the ride. The message to both categories of members is that the league is a marriage of convenience. The little guys give the big dogs the opportunity to strut their stuff in exchange for the opportunity to scarf up the monetary scraps.
What the Big 12 needs is a complete re-orientation. It needs members who can commit to building a great league as much as great programs. If the current members decide to expand, they can’t make TV markets the be all, end all. Rather, they need to look for schools that share the same vision and attitude.
Practically speaking, that probably means planning for a future without Texas and acting accordingly. Likewise, the Big 12 member institutions need to scrap the plans for individually branded networks – looking at you, Oklahoma – and instead focus on working together to harness their resources and leverage the ongoing competition in the media marketplace for college sports content.
Above all, the conference needs to bunker down and find its own Larry Scott to lead the charge. Not an industry crony who thinks in terms of how things are already done, but someone with a vision of how they should be done and the authority to affect that kind of change.
So, Big 12, best of luck.
