Van wrote:Seems like a lose-lose for the Pac 10. They lose the ability to play every team in-conference, and in adding Colorado they gain nothing of any real value. Picking up the Denver media market isn't going to mean much, since Denver doesn't seem to give a rat's ass about the Buffs. Denver seems to be a professional sports-oriented town, with little patience for or interest in their meh local college program.
I'd rather ditch Washington St while adding BYU, Utah and Texas. That'd be some meaningful hopey-changey stuff. Adding Utah and Colorado merely gives them a farcical money-grab CCG, which they don't need. It would likely also mean going back to an eight-game conference schedule, which would mean more OOC cupcakes for most teams.
Screw all that. If all they're going to do is add Utah and Colorado, nah, it's not worth it. There's nothing to get excited about there. Leave it alone.
I see your point. But conference expansion isn't about what's best for the fans any longer (if it ever was). Instead, it's about power-grabbing, getting the biggest piece of the pie you can get for yourself and shafting everybody else. And if the Big Ten expands, you can bet there'll be plenty of pressure on the Pac-10, whether self-made or not, to expand as well.
In that regard, Pac-10 expansion and the much-balleyhooed possible Big Ten expansion aren't worlds apart.
We've all seen the candidates for Big Ten expansion that have been proffered by any number of
experts internet yayhoos with big mouths. How many of those names will be exciting to Big Ten fan? By my count, three (ND, Texas and Nebraska), of which at least two (ND and Texas) are schools the Big Ten has next to no shot at landing. The name you saw thrown around in the most serious manner was Pitt. Does Pitt excite the typical Big Ten fan? Probably not, but it does, as King Crimson pointed out, shore up the conference's current outpost (Penn State). It also would give the Big Ten a CCG and would weaken the Big East. And not necessarily in that order of priority for the Big Ten.
In many ways, the relationship between the MWC and the Pac-10 is similar to the relationship between the Big 10 and the Big East. In both cases, there is a little bit of an overlap between otherwise neighboring conferences. The Big East is the biggest athletic threat to the Big 10 of neighboring conferences, as is the MWC to the Pac-10. As expansion by the Big 10 potentially weakens the Big East, expansion by the Pac-10 similarly weakens the MWC. Yes, there are differences -- most notably, the Big East is a BCS conference whereas the MWC is not. Even there, of course, both conferences are pretty close calls in that regard.
So yeah, the Pac-10 could very well expand, if for no other reason than to weaken the bargaining power of the MWC, while strengthening their own bargaining power.
As for Colorado, they're the most likely addition to the Pac-10 among current BCS-level schools. And they're located in a neighboring state to Utah (as well as a state that form part of the four corners with Arizona), so it's not as huge a reach as you make it out to be. Colorado-Utah could become a rivalry if both schools were added to the Pac-10 at the same time. It wouldn't be any more contrived a rivalry than, say, Michigan State-Penn State in the Big Ten.
) automatically become the only other team in the conference who will ever be a threat to win a national title.
