First off, a little programming note: I have resurrected my blog, in case you hadn't noticed (which you obviously have, since you are currently reading this). I have done this for a couple of reasons, of which I will start to explain next week, so stay tuned! I am pretty excited about what I am envisioning for this blog, and I really hope I can keep up with it in the way I intend to keep up with it.

A second programming note: I intended to post this last night (tuesday, see title) but the internet decided to delete half of what I had written. Apologies.

Right now though, I am going for a "soft" resurrection. Like I said, I will explain the new structure next week, but I thought I would start with a few new posts before we get there. This current post is also time sensitive, so I needed to get it out before it became irrelevant. So here goes:

"Trending Topic Tuesday"

If you are in any way in tune with sports or ESPN, you will have been bombarded with College Football news about the progressive realignment of major universities in major conferences. Texas A&M has been perhaps the most notable in this process, and as a former student, it has obviously peaked my interest. To catch you up to speed here is a primer:

• The Big 12 (conference under which Texas A&M is affiliated with) operates under a premise of unequal revenue sharing among the teams within the conference. What this means is that if you bring in the the most meat from your hunt, you get to eat the most meat at the tribe barbeque. If you don't bring in the meat, you get to still eat some, but not enough. The hunter assumes that the non-hunters are ok with this setup because they still get to eat off of the big kill, and the hunters are obviously ok with it because they get to eat until they are full. But the flaw is that at some point the small hunters of the tribe will want more and believe that they deserve more (natural to the human nature to want more).
  
• The Big 12 conference is in agreements with 2 tv networks to carry their games (fox and ESPN), and these contracts would be breached if these TV networks deemed that due to realignment, the return on investment has decreased. This would almost certainly be the case if the Big 12 were to lose A&M. Say all you want about the failures by A&M to field a winner in Football for the past 16 years in the Big 12; but if you know anything about Aggie fans, the next year is always going to be the "big" one for the Ags, so no matter how awful things seem, televised games will still be watched. A&M has one of the most loyal fan bases, which equals TV tune-ins, which equals dollars, which equals value to ESPN and Fox. Without A&M, their contract with the Big 12 is breached. Long story short, if A&M leaves, the Big 12 is screwed.
  
• With the Big 12 being screwed, the naturally progression would be for schools that have the opportunity to recoup lost TV revenues to do so by joining the highest paying, enticing, conference; with the hopes that the conference wants them. That being said, not all of the Big 12's members will be recruited; meaning that the bottom rung of schools "left out" will be taking the inherent screwed nature of the Big 12 onto their shoulders. Not a burden you want to bear. If you are anyway theologically inclined, this would be the opposite of what Martin Luther called the "Great Exchange" (1 Cor 5:21).

So how would one go about saving the Big 12? Well, I wouldn't want to take up that challenge; although if you know Dan Beebe personally, I wouldn't mind taking a swing at it, if given the opportunity. But here is what I think could be a solution, and if not for the Big 12, maybe for another conference looking to win big and set themselves up with staying power in a future where Superconferences of 16-20 teams exist. I don't want to speculate on super conferences just yet, so I am going to go at this solution as if the Big 12 still is in existence, including the membership of Texas A&M.

And the grand word of the day is: Relegation. If you have noticed, it seems that while America obsesses over a plethora of sports, the rest of the world seems to be engrossed in a sport called Soccer. Within this soccer mania, there is a league that hosts the biggest and best teams that the soccer world has to offer, not to mention the money: The English premiere league.

Central to this league is this idea of Relegation. What it entails is constant accountability. The process is simple, win or go home. In the EPL, there are multiple tiers of teams; with the 1st tier being the big show (think BCS Conferences, MLB teams, etc.), and the tiers below representing the "minor leagues". Tier 1 is where the ultimate champion is crowned. But here is where the fun part happens. The teams competing in Tier 1 are not guaranteed to compete there next year. Relegation takes the bottom 3 teams from each Tier, and bumps them down to the tier below as punishment and a way of leveling the playing field. Also, to make room for those 3 teams, they bump up the 3 best teams of the tier below to the tier above. Thus every team involved in the EPL has a chance to win the championship, although it might take a little bit longer for the smaller teams than the established major powers.

So here is where I think the NCAA conference realignment shuffle can gain from relegation. Take the Big 12. They would be the de facto top tier in the southwest region. We can fill in the other tiers with othe conferences in the southwest region who might not have immediate qualification into BCS bowls for their champions. For instance, in 2010, TCU went undefeated in the Mountain West Conference, which happens to be a non-automatic qualifier for BCS bowls. Because of this, they were not picked to be in consideration for the BCS national championship game; although they did get an invite to a BCS bowl as an "at-large bid". So if we take a couple of other regional smaller conferences, we can set up a few tiers under the Big 12. Lets take the MWC, WAC, and Sun-Belt conferences. All 3 would align under the Big 12 as a new entity, and then they would go attract TV contracts that would broadcast games from all 4 tiers, not just the Big 12 (although the Big 12 would get the most broadcasts and therefore revenue). The money would be split up equally within each tier, but unequally between the tiers (as it should be, the top tier gets the most money). This gives the top tier teams something to fight for, if their record isn't enough of motivation. For the team that consistently finishes last in the Big 12 (lazy tribesman who benefits from the hunter), they now have to fight for their food or else they have less to eat next year. What this creates is hunger all around. And more importantly, this creates compelling TV. Why would ESPN want to air a Tier 3 battle of best teams within the WAC? Because they are fighting for Tier 2 status, recruiting, broadcasts, reputation, and most importantly, money! Likewise with the desire to broadcast the battle between worst team #4 and worst team #3 in the Big 12; the loser does the walk of shame, do not pass go, give back the $200 we gave you, and lose those recruits that only want to play in the Big 12. talk about compelling TV!

Now I agree that this is a radical way to bolster new TV contracts, but if you can get a major carrier to buy into this system and see the consistently intriguing games, I think it would be worth more. And now, the carrier has openings in 40-50 TV markets and fan bases, instead of the 10-12 they had with just airing Big 12 games.

Just from a fan basis, I would love to see this happen. Good college football doesn't have to involve 2 good teams, but rather 2 equally matched, hungry teams. With the tribe's food shrinking; I think we might be looking at pretty hungry teams.

What do you think? Any suggestions? This would qualify as a rough draft, and many kinks would need to be worked out; but could this work?

-peace.

Brett