Around the Big Ten

[hack]

I assume that they are still planning on getting bigger. It just doesn't make sense to stop at 14. You've already destroyed the conference's identity. Might as well go all in.

Yes, well put. There ought to be a payoff.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Any hope of teams like OSU, Iowa, Penn State, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Nebraska beefing up their OOC schedules is completely gone now. Get used to watching a September full of Akrons, Central Michigans, and Central Floridas every single year.

Reason #876 why conference expansion sucks.

This is crap. The league and AD's have stated again and again how upgrading OOC's is a top priority. Over the past year or two Michigan has scheduled a good number of solid games against Utah, Oregon State, Arkansas, BYU, etc. Over the past year OSU has added Texas, TCU, and Oregon to our schedules. And even Wisconsin has started scheduling better.

More misguided angst from the "it was better in 1973" crowd.

[Hannibal]

This is crap. The league and AD's have stated again and again how upgrading OOC's is a top priority. Over the past year or two Michigan has scheduled a good number of solid games against Utah, Oregon State, Arkansas, BYU, etc. Over the past year OSU has added Texas, TCU, and Oregon to our schedules. And even Wisconsin has started scheduling better.

And every single one of those games occurred before a nine game schedule (with biased scheduling) was announced. They can say all they want about how improving OOC scheduling is a priority, but it won't make fuckall of difference without an incentive or a mandate. I guarantee you incentives will never happen, and a mandate is highly unlikely.

Let's see if that scheduling continues. Here's my prediction -- it won't.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Here's my prediction: it will. You think OSU will be playing three MAC teams every year with maybe the occasional CUSA team to spice things up? You're full of it.

[Hannibal]

More misguided angst from the "it was better in 1973" crowd.

As opposed to misguided optimism from the "it's new, therefore it is automatically better" crowd?

[Dr. Strangelove]

And here's the incentive: maximize the value of the tv contract in 2017. Pitching a non-conf slate full of MAC teams won't convince tv execs or increase the value of the BTN as well as good, balanced OOC schedules.

And the 9-game conf schedule has been talked about for a long time. Wasn't just sprung on the AD's yesterday. It's their friggin idea. So tellin me that ADs will refuse to schedule good OOC games now? Doesn't pass the smell test.

You expect fans to get all morose and despondent because this means Michigan will play Nebraska more than longtime "rivals" Purdue and Northwestern? Yeah right. And I'm sure dozens of people are right now on suicide watch over the Lil Brown Jug fading further into obscurity. Maryland and Rutgers don't thrill me but I see little difference between them and the same old dogs of the conference. At least Maryland and Rutgers mean road trips to a wider variety of cities.

[Dr. Strangelove]

As opposed to misguided optimism from the "it's new, therefore it is automatically better" crowd?

Go watch your old VHS tapes of Bo matching wits with Cal Stoll and shake your head bitterly at all this change the past 40 years have foisted upon you.

Again, I don't see any difference between Maryland and Purdue. I have never felt like Purdue was a big game on our schedule, nor have I remotely considered them a rival. I have no emotions whatsoever tied to that game. Apathy is the best word to describe it. If I'm going to watch OSU play a mediocre football program that's hard to work up emotion for, I'd greatly prefer it be part of a weekend in Washington, DC than West Lafayette.

The parity-based scheduling means we'll play Nebraska and Wisconsin more than Minnesota, and I'm supposed to be upset by that? I'M PLEASED. And I guess I have far more confidence in my school's AD that they will continue to get good teams non-conference. Given the recent track record at Michigan, I guess I see where you're coming from when you feel your school is full of liars.

[WM Wolverine]

Adding another B10 game (which helps B10 inventory), along with pairing of similar opponents in opposite divisions certainly toughens up the schedule. From what I've read, I believe it's nearly a mandate that we won't see FCS teams on any B10 teams schedule.

It'll be impossible to enforce anyone to schedule 'similar caliber' opponents in OOC though I think everyone in the conference sees the need to do so.

[Hannibal]

And here's the incentive: maximize the value of the tv contract in 2017. .

Which has always been there, but has never mattered, because the conference will never transfer this incentive onto the teams as long as revenue sharing is equal.

Oh, and you don't have to go back to 1973 to find a situation that is better than adding Maryland and Rutgers to the conference, with fucked up schedulling that will inevitably lead to teams getting easy paths to the confernce championship game.

Dr. Strangelove, straw man bowling league champion, ten years running now.

BTW, were you one of the dipshits that was arguing a few years back that conference expansion would eliminate the unfair impacts of Northwestern and Wisconsin getting easy schedules? Remember that argument? Funny how that argument has disappeared, and now people are celebrating just that. You're going to have Illinois or Northwestern sneaking into the championship game by beating Rutgers, Maryland, and Indiana while Nebraska has to face Michigan, Penn State, and OSU. The Big Ten is making this a distinct policy now, whereas before it was just an accident.

[hack]

Nothin' says college football to me like a quick stroll through the Air & Space Museum before the game.

[Dr. Strangelove]

We add two teams that are no less attractive to me than Purdue, Minnesota, Indiana, or Illinois with significantly more appealing road trips.

Yes, I very much believe it is the old guard of the conference that weeps over the loss of a make-believe rivalry with Minnesota.

Again, from a fan's perspective, why should I be upset over playing Purdue and Minnesota less, and Nebraska and Wisconsin more? Why should I be upset that Maryland is on the schedule rather than those plucky Boilermakers? Does it really make a damn bit of difference?

The AD's who have been scheduling harder OOC games are the same one who dreamed up the 9-game conf schedule. And you want me to believe that they will now, after a couple years of saying otherwise, stock up on MAC teams? You've got nothing to support that argument. Nothing in OSU or Nebraska's history suggests that's the course thy will take.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Nothin' says college football to me like a quick stroll through the Air & Space Museum before the game.

So what do you do in Evanston before heading to the Northwestern game? Catch a quick engineering lecture before asking where all the cows are at? Or do you go into Chicago?

[hack]

Eh. I mean, I see your side too. Overall, I just get an uneasy feeling knowing these people are in charge of something I love and are very likely to mess with it on a half-baked basis. Nothing about any of these moves are, in a vacuum, terrible. Nor are they sensible.

[hack]

So what do you do in Evanston before heading to the Northwestern game? Catch a quick engineering lecture before asking where all the cows are at? Or do you go into Chicago?

It's football. You find the nearest place to tailgate, and you proceed as usual. Not about destinations, IMO. You see very little of them. It's not that kinda travel for me, at leats.

[Dr. Strangelove]

It's football. You find the nearest place to tailgate, and you proceed as usual. Not about destinations, IMO. You see very little of them. It's not that kinda travel for me, at leats.

Well, I'm usually not there just to drink, go to the game, and leave as fast as possible. I can drink myself silly at home. I like to make it more of a weekend, y'know? There's something to be said for college towns, but having explored the same ones multiple times (Champaign, Illinois come to mind), there's only so many pizza places you can try or have a fellow tailgaiter insist that this campus dive bar is the best bar in the world only to discover he's predominantly in love with the $3 pitchers of Busch.

I have not been to West Lafayette to be fair but am planning to go this fall. I have heard mainly negative things about the entire game experience. If you have more than a couple hours to spend (maybe you don't) it boggles the mind to hear that DC isn't a more attractive weekend. Purdue and Maryland produce the same quality product and as far as I can tell, have about the same gametime atmosphere. So any defense of Purdue here is just rallying to the familiar.