What Goes into Conference Membership

[dorepleganger]

As I understand it, conference realignment is largely motivated by football, TV rights, and associated money. "Name brand" football drives viewers, thus the value of Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia, aTm, Michigan, USC (So. Cal) etc.

Media markets are a secondary factor. To that end, US State populations, and their respective media markets, drive value. Tennessee is the 15th most populous state and has two major media markets - Nashville and Memphis (Chattanooga isn't there, yet).

Can someone help me understand why there is concern about Vanderbilt being "asked to leave" the SEC, but not Ole Miss, Miss. State (#34), Arkansas (#33) South Carolina (#23), Kentucky (#26), or even Missouri (#18), being asked to leave. None are a "name brand" football team with national cache or a national championship (in modern times).

Sure, if the SEC expels Vanderbilt, it can still claim the state market with UTK; however the potential for the state market to be fractured or "invaded" by another hostile conference for access to the Nashville media market would seem to be more of a reason to keep Vanderbilt in the SEC, than not, no?

Also, we're also like the Las Vegas of the SEC, currently. It's a destination location to watch "your team." I can't believe the SEC wants to lose that.

Also, one random fun thought I had was what would Kirkland Hall do if the Ivy League asked Vanderbilt to join? Maybe Stanford, Northwestern, and Duke all join the Ivy League, at this point, too?

[BrentVU]

All the talk about Vandy being expelled from the SEC is just blather and clickbait. Vandy could decide to leave the SEC on its own, but why would it? If you’re a member of the most exclusive club, why look around? It makes no sense financially.

Nashville is a great city and a good-sized media market, that much is true. But Vandy does not traditionally draw a lot of eyeballs for its games… otherwise the big networks would want to televise its games more often. But that is because of Vandy’s recent record and lack of competitiveness. Start winning more games, and that would change. Casual fans want to watch a compelling game. In college football it’s less about the size of the media market than it is about the meaningfulness of the game.

[vandy05]

I know that USCw is headed to the Big 10. But if the SEC could choose them or us, who do you think the conference would take? Geographical boundaries have not been a thing since WVA joined the Big 12 15 years ago. USCw could go to the Big 10 for four years and then move to the SEC. The LA market would move the needle. I don't think we can dismiss such outlandish talk as trivial. What we have seen in the last ten years with conference realignment has been pretty big and its only going to get crazier.

[coachinwaiting]

Expulsion from the SEC is never going to happen because "you don't win enough", or "aren't committed enough", in my opinion. If VU is ever out of the SEC, it will be by their choice, or because the SEC as we have always known it ceases to exist. I know the SEC is not now or ever will be the same as it was pre-1992 expansion, but I mean it may be totally blown up at some point as a new organization wrests control away from the NCAA/CFP/ESPN/FOX consortium that runs college football now.

[MikenNashville]

Expulsion from the SEC is never going to happen because "you don't win enough", or "aren't committed enough", in my opinion. If VU is ever out of the SEC, it will be by their choice, or because the SEC as we have always known it ceases to exist. I know the SEC is not now or ever will be the same as it was pre-1992 expansion, but I mean it may be totally blown up at some point as a new organization wrests control away from the NCAA/CFP/ESPN/FOX consortium that runs college football now.

Coach I completely agree with your assessment. IMO we’ve got the 22 and 23 seasons of where we are now. However, with the CBS SEC contract ending after 23, USC and UCLA to the big in 24, and my guess OK and Tex move to SEC by 24 as well plus the gelling of NIL over the next two years, by 2024 or 2025 we could be seeing something totally different at the top level of college football.

[coachinwaiting]

Expulsion from the SEC is never going to happen because "you don't win enough", or "aren't committed enough", in my opinion. If VU is ever out of the SEC, it will be by their choice, or because the SEC as we have always known it ceases to exist. I know the SEC is not now or ever will be the same as it was pre-1992 expansion, but I mean it may be totally blown up at some point as a new organization wrests control away from the NCAA/CFP/ESPN/FOX consortium that runs college football now.

Coach I completely agree with your assessment. IMO we’ve got the 22 and 23 seasons of where we are now. However, with the CBS SEC contract ending after 23, USC and UCLA to the big in 24, and my guess OK and Tex move to SEC by 24 as well plus the gelling of NIL over the next two years, by 2024 or 2025 we could be seeing something totally different at the top level of college football.

I'll be shocked if the conferences (including the powerful and highly profitable ones today) continue as they are for the next decade. I might not be around to collect, but I would wager a sizeable sum that the SEC will not be around in anything more than name to celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2033.

[admin]

If anything, If we ever wanted to leave the SEC, I think we should look at becoming a D1 independent. Then we could set our own schedules, keep all the bowl money when we go to a bowl, and keep all the TV money when we play a home game with some of these SEC schools and other power conference teams. As mentioned earlier, Nashville is a destination city. Everybody wants to visit Nashville. If we schedule some Big Ten or ACC teams those fans would be pretty excited about coming to Nashville. We could make our living on home and away arrangments. For the non-power conference schools, we could offer a 2 here, 1 there deal.

The big elephant in the room question here is what about our other sports? Like baseball, bowling and some of the other non-revenue sports. I think baseball would still thrive but leaving the SEC would hurt in recruiting. Bowling could keep doing what they've been doing, they are not in the SEC as well as Lacrosse. How about a schedule like this for the 2027 football season? Notice one particular scumbag school is not on the schedule.

@ UCLA
Liberty
@ Tulane
Tennessee State
@ Georgia Tech
Mississippi State
@ Michigan State
Oklahoma
@ Florida Atlantic
Wake Forest
@ Indiana
Tulsa

Keep in mind though, that none of this will ever happen.

[coachinwaiting]

If anything, If we ever wanted to leave the SEC, I think we should look at becoming a D1 independent. Then we could set our own schedules, keep all the bowl money when we go to a bowl, and keep all the TV money when we play a home game with some of these SEC schools and other power conference teams. As mentioned earlier, Nashville is a destination city. Everybody wants to visit Nashville. If we schedule some Big Ten or ACC teams those fans would be pretty excited about coming to Nashville. We could make our living on home and away arrangments. For the non-power conference schools, we could offer a 2 here, 1 there deal.

The big elephant in the room question here is what about our other sports? Like baseball, bowling and some of the other non-revenue sports. I think baseball would still thrive but leaving the SEC would hurt in recruiting. Bowling could keep doing what they've been doing, they are not in the SEC as well as Lacrosse. How about a schedule like this for the 2027 football season? Notice one particular scumbag school is not on the schedule.

@ UCLA
Liberty
@ Tulane
Tennessee State
@ Georgia Tech
Mississippi State
@ Michigan State
Oklahoma
@ Florida Atlantic
Wake Forest
@ Indiana
Tulsa

Keep in mind though, that none of this will ever happen.

I wouldn't be quick to discount the possibility of something like this. It is beginning to look like football may be held back by conferences to the point of leaving them to the other sports and going their own way. An athletic conference, including football, has little interest or need in a program that doesn't enhance it's overall brand when football has become the most important aspect of it. On the other hand, those non-football factories often bring with them some marquee value in MBB, WBB, BB, SB, and other sports that have taken a back seat to football.

We already see programs like ND that participate only slightly in conference for football while maintaining a level of independence, but being more involved in conference play with other sports. There are SEC schools that participate in other leagues like the Big XII in minor sports that not all SEC schools participate. The same goes for sports like hockey where upstart SEC programs participate at lower levels than jumping in with the elites.

As conferences get bigger and bigger, we could see them become multi-tiered at some point. The SEC and B1G could evolve into 24 team leagues with 2 levels of competition. I'm not sure how it would work, but at some point there is likely to be a conflict between the NCAA and the powers-that-be running the CFP and the power struggle will be epic and money will rule the day, as always seems to be the case. If and when that day comes, conference traditions and long-standing arrangements will be an afterthought.

[Commodoredave]

I don't think the SEC is looking to kick us out because Nashville is such a great city in the regional landscape.

That said, this is a business about putting eyes on the TV screen where it generates the massive dollars we are benefiting from now. Realistically, Vanderbilt does next to nothing to draw audiences to the sports that pay the bills, and thus we clearly do not generate ratings/media revenue on a par with anyone in the league. We just don't have the numbers.

As for leaving on our own- absolute suicide. Why on earth would this be mentioned when the SEC and Big 10 pay members $60m, while independents and mid-major leagues don't make 10% of that? Giving up that money crushes all of the non-revenue sports and athletics in general.

[Go Vandy!]

The SEC distribution is soon to be $100 mil per school. Vandy might make 10% (but likely less) of that in those scenarios. They will never VOLUNTARILY leave the SEC.

[FayetteDore]

How about a schedule like this for the 2027 football season? Notice one particular scumbag school is not on the schedule.

@ UCLA
Liberty
@ Tulane
Tennessee State
@ Georgia Tech
Mississippi State
@ Michigan State
Oklahoma
@ Florida Atlantic
Wake Forest
@ Indiana
Tulsa

Keep in mind though, that none of this will ever happen.

Well, kudos for creativity with that schedule, I guess.

Can't help but remember in late 2012 when CJF cancelled scheduled games with Northwestern and Ohio State -- and you want to add Oklahoma, UCLA and Michigan State in one fell swoop?

If we played that sked THIS fall, I'd estimate we'd go 3-9, if we're lucky. But hopefully CCL will have turned things around by 2027, which is deep into his 10-year plan.

[AuricGoldfinger]

The two biggest challenges of independence in football would be money and scheduling, both of which are virtually insurmountable. There will soon be only four independents left: ND, UConn, UMass, and Army. The latter three would likely be on our schedule every year. Then, very few Power Five programs are going to be willing to come to Nashville, even if it's a swell destination, as part of a home-and-home. So, we'll be playing a lot of guarantee games at places like Oklahoma and Alabama. We'll get the occasional home-and-home with teams like Tulsa, and maybe some of the P5 programs that have been willing to travel to Group of Five schools. Perhaps we could strike up a home-and-home with MTSU or WKU as part of an I-24 or I-65 rivalry to close out the season. But it's also possible we'd lose our bye week because no one will schedule Vandy as an opponent on Thanksgiving weekend, when everyone else's regular season ends.

Money is the obvious one, of course. Vandy will be much less able to cover the costs of running an FBS football program using student activity fees, in large part because the enrollment is much smaller than at places like UConn and UMass.

In short, we'd be a non-scholarship DI football program at the FCS level in no time. At best.

[FayetteDore]

Also, one random fun thought I had was what would Kirkland Hall do if the Ivy League asked Vanderbilt to join? Maybe Stanford, Northwestern, and Duke all join the Ivy League, at this point, too?

If left to Kirkland Hall and the Faculty Senate, they'd rush the acceptance letter to the Ivy League the same day they received the invitation - because more than anything else, they aspire to being up in that same stratosphere. Who needs U.S. News & World Report when you've got that Ivy League imprimatur.

Personally, I'd love it. We could don our raccoon coats in the fall, carry our pennants on sticks, open our flasks and enjoy some wins for a change. 8-) Boola boola! Veritas!

[admin]

How about a schedule like this for the 2027 football season? Notice one particular scumbag school is not on the schedule.

@ UCLA
Liberty
@ Tulane
Tennessee State
@ Georgia Tech
Mississippi State
@ Michigan State
Oklahoma
@ Florida Atlantic
Wake Forest
@ Indiana
Tulsa

Keep in mind though, that none of this will ever happen.

Well, kudos for creativity with that schedule, I guess.

Can't help but remember in late 2012 when CJF cancelled scheduled games with Northwestern and Ohio State -- and you want to add Oklahoma, UCLA and Michigan State in one fell swoop?

If we played that sked THIS fall, I'd estimate we'd go 3-9, if we're lucky. But hopefully, CCL will have turned things around by 2027, which is deep into his 10-year plan.

Yeah, but we lose Georgia, Florida, Alabama, LSU, Texas A&M and others. I'll be shocked if we win 3 this season. I think we can but we are Vanderbilt.

[vandy05]

Also, one random fun thought I had was what would Kirkland Hall do if the Ivy League asked Vanderbilt to join? Maybe Stanford, Northwestern, and Duke all join the Ivy League, at this point, too?

If left to Kirkland Hall and the Faculty Senate, they'd rush the acceptance letter to the Ivy League the same day they received the invitation - because more than anything else, they aspire to being up in that same stratosphere. Who needs U.S. News & World Report when you've got that Ivy League imprimatur.

Personally, I'd love it. We could don our raccoon coats in the fall, carry our pennants on sticks, open our flasks and enjoy some wins for a change. 8-) Boola boola! Veritas!

The money is the really hard part to leave behind in the SEC, but I wouldn't hate the idea of this either. Truthfully, it would be more in line with who we are. But it would likely have to be football only as we couldn't afford to shuttle our other teams all over the country on a consistent basis. But the way things are going, nothing is/should be out of the question.