Welcome to The Holy Land of Hoops

https://twitter.com/ADimeBack/status/11 ... 0764372993


6M a year per team would be great for just basketball. Hopefully it is around that figure.

Would be excellent, but Dodd was pretty quick to delete it so I'm not so sure about its validity.

In addition to uconn:

-Gavitt Tipoffs
-Big12 challenge
-Increased inventory with 20 conference games

We had none of these when the contract with Fox was signed. I am feeling pretty good about our chances.

Husky_U wrote:Would be excellent, but Dodd was pretty quick to delete it so I'm not so sure about its validity.

It's going to be interesting. If the poster on your board is legit - and he certainly appeared to be legit, based upon what he disclosed of his position/resume - then it is logical to believe that the BE as it currently is performing warrants a bump. Adding you guys to the mix certainly serves as an accelerator to that.

I suspect we'll know where the dollars settle sooner than later.

I don’t know about the contract, but I just want to say the twitter and message board content this move has created has been tremendous. I’m enjoying it immensely.

https://twitter.com/ChadBrendel/status/ ... 6681466883

UC is confirmed #notmad #notworried

Welcome Husky U...hope that figure is accurate. Glad to have you guys back...even if we hate you but it's okay since you hate us too. I hope UConn gets back to being a basketball power here and I'm sure you will.

https://theathletic.com/1081183/2019/07/17/aac-media-days-left-questions-answered-and-unresolved-for-uc/

I won't copy and paste the full article (since it is behind a paywall), but there was/is definitely friction behind the scenes of the AAC. UC's AD emailed Aresco (copying counterparts at UCF and Temple) over concerns over production costs associated with increased ESPN+ digital streaming content, as well as the media rights payouts that includes "a merit-based distribution component.” Aresco responded that those concerns would be answered after the AAC-ESPN TV deal would be signed, and that that those concerns can be addressed "later" since the ESPN+ production costs won't kick in until 2021. It should be a huge red flag when a commissioner commissioner cannot (or will not) answer direct questions with regards to costs and/or payouts of a TV deal. The fact that the AAC is locked up until the 2030's under these terms is pretty alarming.

https://mattbrown.substack.com/p/what-we-actually-learned-from-media

From Matt Brown:
"The TL;DR here is that the ~$7 million deal isn’t exactly ~$7 million, because schools now also have an increased production cost factor to consider, since they’re producing even more programming to fill those ESPN+ slots…not just football and men’s basketball, but other sports too. Those costs aren’t so high as to torpedo the deal, obviously, but I’ve been told it can cost thousands of dollars to produce say, a women’s basketball game. Depending on what infrastructure existed at the school beforehand, those $7 million dollars might be closer to like, $6.3. Maybe less. The devil is in those details, and it would appear not all of those details have been completely resolved."

It definitely becomes clearer why and when UConn decided to bolt the AAC when it did. UConn was making - between AAC TV payouts and exit fees - ~$10 million annually from 2013-2019. The new payouts were/are nowhere close to that, and have the added expenses of carrying production costs for ESPN+ on the school's dime. If UConn was told that they would be making ~$6 million in the Big East under its new (and eventual TV deal), factoring in future tournament credits, reduced travel and increased fan support and interest in more regional games, not to mention prime exposure in NYC (and at the BET), then it makes perfect sense. For Football, any TV payouts it can acquire will be icing on the cake, in addition to more geographic matchups that will help with travel costs.

Even without UConn, there are still pretty big institutional differences between the rest of the schools. It’s a Southern league…with Cincinnati and Temple. A league of mostly non-flagship state schools, but also Tulane and SMU. It’s a league that cares a lot about football and talks about parity with the P5 (lol), but also includes Tulane, East Carolina and Tulsa. It isn’t a league with deep, historical rivalries or common institutional ties. Most of these schools have played in lots of different conferences.

That makes hashing out the money potentially problematic. What Cincinnati wants, needs, and deserves is going to be different from what Tulsa or Tulane can bring to the table in the short-term. Ohio State and Northwestern can paper over those differences because they’ve been playing football for a hundred years and shit, everybody is still getting rich.

That’s not the case in the AAC, even with this new TV deal. The potential for real tension is still there.

The article above stomps all over the AAC. It also brings up a great point that I never really thought about in that there are still teams that are happy to just be in the AAC. How funny would it be if the P5 hopeful teams break off and form the AAAC

Stever, your ball. The clock reads 5 seconds and the AAC just got posterized by Val. By the way we are up 30 pts.