I know it is really chic at present to mix up your conference, out maneuver the other conferences and get as big as possible, it is the talk of the entire sports world.
One thing forgotten, while football drives the bus in college athletics, basketball at the very least sits in the co-pilot seat.
So with that said, if and everything is a big if right now and can even change as I write this on Monday September 19th with conference alignment, if the Pac-12 succeeds in bringing in Oklahoma, Oklahoma St., Texas Tech and Texas, it really does nothing for basketball, it actually will bring basketball down.
Now for those who do not think basketball is that important I remind everyone who thinks that way, that the biggest sporting event in the world is not the Super Bowl, it is March Madness which just happens to be a basketball event. Quite frankly the way China is going, basketball will soon replace soccer as the biggest sport in the world.
That is why I say bringing into the Pac-12 schools that have been absolutely horrible in basketball in the last few years, Oklahoma St., Texas Tech and Oklahoma is really, really bad for what would be Pac-16 basketball. Texas will enhance the Pac-16 basketball landscape, as the Longhorns finally realized about 15 years past, that we have to maintain a basketball arena, so we better start having a good team.
I can also tell you that in addition to the above three teams that will do nothing for Pac-16 basketball, what makes it even worse is that no one was jumping up and down about this year's editons Colorado and Utah, when it comes to basketball.
As a matter of fact, I have been told by people at ESPN and Fox, they would have done the new TV deal, even if the Pac-10 would have still existed, the Pac-10 is that big of a property, with LA, Phoenix and Seattle and the Bay Area all being markets where sports fans watch a higher volume of sports on TV than other large markets.
I have written about the disgust with many that the Pac-12 will not play a round robin league schedule in basketball at least until 2021, adding four more teams as might possibly happen, makes a round robin league schedule for basketball now impossible.
Of course I can't stop any of this nonsense, I am all for progress, new inventions, creative thinking, but it appears that basketball is a sport the Pac-12 could care less about, if the Pac-16 does come about.
A much better scenario would have been to bring in Texas and BYU, two schools with a great history as of the last 15 years in both football and basketball, which would still given the Pac-12, Pac-14 a powerhouse league.
Expansion is great, exciting, but sometimes the reason most businesses fail is they expand too quickly and do not think things through. In this case the cart is before the horse and no one was watching the horse.
For all the brilliant moves the Pac-12 makes, this Pac-16 scenario might be pretty dumb.
emails to crawscorner@gmail.com, follow on twitter @wchoops
Would be hard to see the Pac pass up Oklahoma (let alone OK State and TX Tech) with the football tradition of the Sooners. I think we are seeing more and more these conference realignments are not about basketball, they are about $$$, and football is where the biggest money is.
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