Big 10 and Big 12 Teams

[TheRedBoar'n]

The issue of TCU and/or Baylor getting left out ('ne hosed out ) of the playoff got me a little more interested in the Big 10 and 12 conferences. I hate to admit this, but I did not know that the Big 12 only has 10 teams or that the Big 10 has 14 teams. The Bg 12 needs to invite 2 more teams into their conference while not losing any more teams to other conferences. My bet is that the Big 12 goes the way of the SWC. Hmmm, what will be the common denominator? Perhaps out bowl opponent!

 

[razRjag]

They could always invite Houston, and RIce back, but with Oklahoma I see them and possibly Okie State heading to the big 10 eventually. Oklahoma has mentioned on several occasions that their true rival is in the Big 10 (Nebraska) plus if you look most of the team that were in the Big 8 are now in the Big 10. I think eventually the Big 12 will be done and Texas will either be independent or be in the Pac 12 like the powers that be at Texas want anyway. Not sure what will happen to the rest of the Big 12. Im sure some will join the SEC, and BIG 10, but I do believe the Big 12's days are numbered.

 

[dnhall]

You may be right and you wouldn't have to go far to find many in Big Twelve country that would agree with you. However, with only ten mouths to feed they distributed the largest amount of money to their member schools last year among power five conferences. I know your conference will get a tremendous boost from the latest negotiated tv contract, but according to our commissioner, our latest contract has escalation clauses in it that will keep the Big Twelve payouts per school very comparable with the other Power Five conferences. That money, the regional nature of most of the league(minus West Virginia) plus the multi-year media grant of rights each school agreed to will likely keep the Big Twelve around.

In essence, the view from many conference supporters about not getting into the first playoff had a lot to do with the makeup of the committee (mostly old farts that succumb to tradition even though tradition is irrelevant to today's played games), a larger fan base that Ohio State represents(got to keep ESPNSEC happy), and the fact the Big Twelve played no Conference Championship game. That latter complaint holds no water because the Big Twelve schools already played nine conference games against power five schools. All Ohio State did was play and win its ninth conference game vs. Wisconsin so does the committee expect people to believe that Ohio State's fourth non-conference game was more impactful than their conference wins in a league that was rated as weaker than the Big Twelve?

The committee succumbed to tradition, larger fan base(TV pressure), and the fact the Big Twelve potential representatives were smaller private schools. That just wouldn't do and so they chose the traditional school with the larger fan base. Barry Alvarez alone probably lobbied about how impressive the win against his Wisconsin Badgers was even though they had no quarterback that could complete a forward pass all year! Thus we have no Big Twelve school in the playoff and the people truly screwed by that committee was the players at either Baylor or TCU. I wouldn't be surprised if they prove they belong with how they both handle their bowl games. If they get throttled, then we will eat all the crow that can be cooked. We like our's medium well by the way!

 

[Smashmouth2004]

Believing in a conspiracy theories is a good way to justify not having a team in the top 4 but it comes down to SOS. Look at any publication and OSU's SOS was higher than either TCU's or Baylor's. Now if Okie St, OU, Texas had been stronger then yes they could have gotten in. I don't think it came down to a championship game although I think it will also hurt the Big XII in the future. A lot of people also didn't much like Baylor's OOC schedule. While I think TCU wants to challenge themselves, Baylor wants to go the easy way in the future.