New SEC Deal Is A Game Changer In The World Of College Football
by Jay Coulter on Jul 24, 2009 1:00 AM CDT
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In a world where we are constantly inundated with stories of loss and bankruptcy due to a recession that seems to take no mercy, we often forget that not everyone sees things the same way. McDonald's executives would argue the economy has been a blessing for them and its thousands of franchisees. Sales are through the roof the past year as Americans scale back their spending on dining out.
It's all about perspective.
We got plenty of that on Wednesday when commissioner Mike Slive addressed the media at its annual SEC Media Days gathering in Birmingham. In an era where other conferences are looking for additional revenue just to stay afloat, the SEC is awash in billions of dollars in new cash thanks to a television contract deal that will give conference members an advantage similar to what the New York Yankees have in baseball.
The money is mind boggling - not to mention the unprecedented exposure each SEC school will receive over the next 15 years because of the deal. Over the life of the contract the conference will receive more than $3 billion in revenue from CBS and ESPN. That averages out to more than $17 million a year for each conference member. It's the equivalent of every member institution getting a BCS bowl payout annually until 2024.
Matt Hayes of The Sporting News puts it into perspective: "The ACC earned $75 million for its last television deal with ABC and ESPN. Vanderbilt, which hasn't won an SEC Championship in the 70-plus year history of the league and played in a bowl game last year for the first time since the early 1980s - will make more than that in the first five years of the new SEC deal."
Beginning this season, every SEC football game will be televised by either CBS or ESPN (including its partners). This deal will stay in effect each year for the length of the contract. Take that Notre Dame. During the life of the deal, ESPN and its partners will televise more than 5,500 SEC events. That averages out to 365 live events each year.
With the majority of league schools already landing top 25 recruiting classes yearly, the new contract promises to push the SEC even higher. If you are the Big Ten, Pac 10 or ACC, how do you compete against this juggernaut?
The big winners in the deal are likely to be your traditional mid and lower tier conference teams - Arkansas, Ole Miss, Miss State, South Carolina, Kentucky and Vanderbilt. This infusion of cash will lead to upgraded facilities and bigger recruiting budgets that will allow them to compete better with other programs around the South. Of course this means even more competition in the SEC which brings along its own set of problems, primarily in the game of recruiting. That's a story for another time.
What will be interesting to watch in the coming years is how the on-air personalities at ESPN treat teams from the SEC. Will Kirk Herbstreit change his tune and now get in lock-step with the league that's generating his paycheck? When there's an argument over whether Auburn or Oklahoma should be ranked second, will Kirk and crew suddenly shift their allegiance to the SEC?
Who knows the answers to these questions. But it should be fun to watch. And with every football game televised, we will be doing a lot of watching.
I can hardly wait.
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It will be interesting for sure......
to see how this helps the likes of Vandy, UK, Mississippi State, Ole Miss, and South Carolina. These are teams that have generally taken a back seat to the rest of the SEC. Some because of academic standards……particularly Vandy and to some extent South Carolina and some because of having a poor percieved location and/or facilities…..particularly Mississippi State and Ole Miss. I wouldn’t be surprised to see both Starkville and Oxford step up the facilities in the near future…..but to what extent and will this become a moot issue with the upper echelon of the SEC also upgrading facilities? One thing is for certain it will challenge the rest of the BSC conferences to keep up with the SEC atheletic departments as a whole. The Mid Major conferences that continue to make a push towards recognition as legitimate contenders with the BCS conferences I think will be left to the wayside as a veritable arms race ensues. In my opinion this is both a good and bad thing. A good thing in that obviously our AU tigers along with the rest of the SEC is on top. A bad thing for college football because it threatens the parity in college football as a whole if the mid majors fall too far behind. I as many of you know still believe that the MWC is as deserving if not more deserving of BCS status than the Big Least…..they are in my opinion the most top heavy BCS conference along with being the smallest, two things that in my mind should’nt coincide. Regardless of how it turns out all I can say is that its good to be among the haves rather than the have nots in this situation.
I would have gone to bammer if my grades hadn't been good enough to go to AU
That's A Great Point
Will that bias shift to the SEC now? It’s a tough question…either way ratings will be high. This media coverage is going to come down hard on other conferences trying to make themselves heard during the season.
For years I though Herbstreit was pushing Univ SoCal, Oklahoma, Ohio State over SEC teams because ESPN/ABC owned the majority of college football games. CBS had the SEC games. Therefore, ESPN had a vested interest in pushing those conferences that were televised on their ABC/ESPN networks.
All that may change now.
Anyway, how embarassing it must be for all the other conferences to keep claiming superiority when SEC teams keep winning the national championship.
I will always remember how angry I was (and still am) when the BCS picked Oklahoma over Auburn to play for the NC, and Oklahoma choked like a bunch of pansies.
I've said it a 1000 times
and I’ll say it again. Let an SEC team go undefeated now and NOT play in the Nat’l Championship like Auburn in ’04 and the backlash and outcry would be incredible.
War Eagle
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