PAC 12 2020 Season Thread

[CatsbyAZ]

Listening to Cowherd’s radio show last week, and during Danny Kanell’s guest appearance, the business of PAC 12 football was discussed:

Cowherd:

The only thing that works now in linear TV is pro sports, so going forward pro sports franchises are going to be well capitalized. Meanwhile, college sports is slowly dying because they're not as well capitalized. College football is the last remaining college sport that's viable. And though they aren't like college basketball being eaten by the NBA here's what I think is the problem with college football - it's becoming too regional. The PAC 12 in turn is dying. And here's potentially the saving grace – the NCAA is now going to allow players to be paid for their likeness. Well guess where YouTube is located? Google? Apple? Hollywood? It could be the saving grace for the PAC 12. The Stanfords. The USCs. The UCLAs and the Oregons.

Kanell:

I think the PAC 12's biggest problem is that it's been deemed irrelevant due to the playoff format. The fact that there's only four teams...I think playoff expansion would help the PAC 12 way more than the name and likeness policy that would be implemented. But I do think it can help somewhat because a lot of those programs would have fans and boosters and supporters who would pay athletes to come to, say, maybe a movie premiere in LA? Maybe it's a Nike store opening in Eugene? But here's the problem, I don't know if that type of fanaticism would match that of Alabama fans, Texas fans, Auburn fans, Florida fans, Ohio State fans.

Cowherd:

It would not but at Apple last week, a story broke that they were interested in PAC 12 sports...why? Because Apple sees the future: if you pay kids for likeness, Apple could create companies to play PAC 12 football players thousands more than the Big Ten or SEC could.

Kanell:

If Apple did something with the PAC 12...because the PAC 12 network television deal has not been what the PAC 12 conference thought it was going to be - and there's a very specific reason that the Big Ten and SEC dominated this draft we just saw - it's because they bought the best players in the country. And when I say they bought the players I'm not referring to bagmen money under the table. SEC recruiting budgets are three times what some of these PAC 12 schools are. They're spending more to recruit the best players in the country. And that's where success comes from. College football is a talent acquisition business and if you're the PAC 12, and you can't spend as much because the revenue isn't coming in, then you're going to be at a disadvantage. That's why the Big Ten and SEC own college football right now. But, if you brought a player like Apple into the equation, who could have a really strong influx of cash into the PAC 12 schools, then all the sudden you're talking about a different landscape, where they could match the recruiting budgets of other conferences.

[CWSooner]

So West Coast fans will show up for college football games in greater numbers if school recruiting budgets are bigger?  Time will tell, I suppose.

But the evidence against that is that Pac-12 teams have relatively small recruiting budgets precisely because they have fewer fans who will attend their games week in and week out.

[CatsbyAZ]

More PAC 12 thoughts from Cowherd:




“My other theory is that the PAC 12 cannot hang with the SEC and the Midwest in terms of interest in boosters. And the PAC 12's television contracts are terrible. Whereas the Big Ten and the SEC, they have dynamic TV deals because there's less pro sports in the cities those schools are located in. PAC 12 teams are located in cities with pro sports and so the PAC 12 conference is dead. And the PAC 12 TV deal stinks.

So Apple is now where a lot of PAC 12 graduates work and Apple TV is considering buying the PAC 12 and what does it mean? It means likeness, YouTube, all this stuff which the NCAA is moving toward favors Apple and favors the PAC 12, as our President would say, bigly. And I think Apple is going to buy the PAC 12 conference. It's going to be a massive, massive, billion dollar win for the PAC 12. And it's the only way they can now compete with SEC and Big Ten sports going forward. So two weeks ago when I saw the story about Apple is interested in the PAC 12, I thought ahhh...that's it! So that's my latest theory.”

[CWSooner]

How will Apple money translate to more fans at Pac-12 games?

[OrangeAfroMan]

How will Apple money translate to more fans at Pac-12 games?

How Nike money translated to more Oregon fans at games?  Money - facilites - recruiting - winning - fans?

[CWSooner]

USC couldn't fill its stadium when it was winning NCs back in the '00s.

[Cincydawg]

I'm not much likin' this likeness thing.

[CWSooner]

I'm not much likin' this likeness thing.

Nope.  I don't either.
The amateur model has long been broken.  This could break things even worse rather than fix them.

[CatsbyAZ]

More from Cowherd relating to PAC 12 football:

“One of my theories I've talked about is my Green Plate dilemma in college football where the western kids are getting smaller because veganism is more popular and 'health and wellness' is much more of a West Coast thing than a Southern or Midwest thing. Mom's vegan, dad supports mom. More vegetables on the plate. Less meat. And as son gets smaller so do Pac 12 athletes. Kids are just getting smaller in California, the lineman are. That's one of my weird theories. But I've told this to Urban Meyer and others around the country. And coaches buy into it. They're seeing it too – it’s my Green Plate theory.”

[CWSooner]

More from Cowherd relating to PAC 12 football:

“One of my theories I've talked about is my Green Plate dilemma in college football where the western kids are getting smaller because veganism is more popular and 'health and wellness' is much more of a West Coast thing than a Southern or Midwest thing. Mom's vegan, dad supports mom. More vegetables on the plate. Less meat. And as son gets smaller so do Pac 12 athletes. Kids are just getting smaller in California, the lineman are. That's one of my weird theories. But I've told this to Urban Meyer and others around the country. And coaches buy into it. They're seeing it too – it’s my Green Plate theory.”

Could Asian immigration be playing a part in that?  2nd- and 3rd-generation Asians in America typically have grown up bigger than folks in their ancestral countries, but still tend to be smaller than black and/or white American natives.  Increasing veganism could work to reverse that growth pattern.

[CatsbyAZ]

Could Asian immigration be playing a part in that?  2nd- and 3rd-generation Asians in America typically have grown up bigger than folks in their ancestral countries, but still tend to be smaller than black and/or white American natives.  Increasing veganism could work to reverse that growth pattern.

Though I don't think that's anything Cowherd wanted to get into on his radio show, I absolutely think the West Coast's demographics play into not just (somewhat) waning player development, but fan interest and filling stadiums as well.

Asians males generally don't play high school football, much less college football, even if they grow up watching it. And though Hispanic males are active in high school football across the west, you don't see their numbers translate into college football as much as African Americans, of which both demographics have similar population size in the US.

However, Hispanic males do fill football stadiums and provide a huge TV audience for football, albeit mostly NFL. Working on a number of industrial job sites across Arizona and California, even the older Hispanic men who barely speak English have an NFL team. I've seen so many Cowboys, 49ers, Raiders, and Broncos stickers on hard hats of Hispanic construction workers. They just don't pay the same attention to college football.

To extend this to college football, let's compare UCLA to Michigan State or Auburn. Both the latter actively cultivate their students into lifelong fans and season ticket holders through a number of ways. It's a family thing, a campus wide thing, a local media thing, a statewide talking point. 

At UCLA there's almost no undergrad interest in going to the football games. The population is not just Asian (American) heavy, but it's also boasts large foreign Asian numbers that've never come across football until a few days after landing at LAX. UCLA casts a global admissions net resulting in the type of highly competitive undergrad, even within the US, that doesn't see the college experience as also rooting for the campus teams. 

Michigan has figured out to have it both ways. They net a plenty of foreign students and academically uphold a global reputation, yet Wolverines football is from what I can tell the single most followed team in the state of Michigan, whether college or pro, and fill their stadium. 

[fezzador]

Could Asian immigration be playing a part in that?  2nd- and 3rd-generation Asians in America typically have grown up bigger than folks in their ancestral countries, but still tend to be smaller than black and/or white American natives.  Increasing veganism could work to reverse that growth pattern.

If you count Polynesians as Asians, they are some of the largest human beings on Earth.  The PAC-12 and BYU have the Hawaiian/Samoan market cornered.

[CWSooner]

If you count Polynesians as Asians, they are some of the largest human beings on Earth.  The PAC-12 and BYU have the Hawaiian/Samoan market cornered.

I was thinking about Polynesians too.  But I think the Chinese-, Japanese-, and Korean-Americans on the West Coast far outnumber them.  Especially among P5 college students, which is where you build lifelong-fan relationships.

[fezzador]

I was thinking about Polynesians too.  But I think the Chinese-, Japanese-, and Korean-Americans on the West Coast far outnumber them.  Especially among P5 college students, which is where you build lifelong-fan relationships.

Don't forget about the ever-increasing numbers of South Asians (i.e. Indians, Pakistanis).  Loads of them can be found on West Coast campuses as well.

I don't have the numbers to back this up, but I'm pretty sure there are more medical doctors of South Asian descent in the U.S. than East Asian.  But there are more East Asian engineers than South Asian.