Jon Wilner
The Hotline mailbag publishes weekly. Send questions to wilnerhotline@
In case you missed it, last week’s mailbag examined how the Protect College Sports Act would impact realignment throughout the FBS.
My guess is that Fox, CBS and NBC will put up more money for the first-round games of a 24-team playoff than ESPN is paying now for the 12-team CFP. How do you see it? — Bud R
The 18-month stalemate over College Football Playoff expansion, with the Big Ten and Fox on one side of the negotiating table and the SEC and ESPN on the other, reflects the sport’s troubled core.
The network ATM machines that fund the industry, along with their primary conference partners, are coded to compete and possess zero incentive to work in the best interest of college football.
That power play was clearly visible with the conference realignment that unfolded in 2021-23 and impacts the CFP’s future format in the following manner:
ESPN is the exclusive rights-holder for a 12- or 14-team event and, for all practical purposes, a 16-team field.
If the event balloons to 24 teams, the 12 games of additional inventory would become available to other networks at market rates.
Fox, which opted not to bid on the 12-team format a few years ago — that was a big mistake, by the way — wants a piece of the action and thus favors expansion to 24. ESPN wants to prevent its rival from gaining a foothold and prefers a field size of either 12 or 16 teams.
Their partner conferences are, of course, similarly aligned.
If the Big Ten and SEC cannot agree on the expansion model by Dec. 1, the current system will remain in place for the 2027 season.
Which brings us to the central question: How much are the 12 additional games worth?
With a 24-team field, conference championship games would be eliminated. But those are valuable TV properties, especially for the SEC.
Based on information gathered from industry sources and media reports, we can reasonably estimate the following values for Power Four title games:
SEC: $100 million
Big Ten: $75 million
ACC: $40 million
Big 12: $40 million
That’s $255 million annually for the quartet.
To make CFP expansion financially viable, the 12 additional games must generate at least $255 million and probably more, because the SEC, at least, won’t eliminate its championship in order to break even.
So let’s presume the new playoff inventory would need to generate roughly $300 million to make the mammoth change to 24 worthwhile.
That places an average price of $25 million on each new game, which seems like a low bar for playoff matchups given what the Big 12 and ACC title games generate, except: The 12 games available to the highest bidder would be the eight opening-round matchups (No. 9 vs. No. 24, No. 10 vs. No. 23, etc.) and half the second-round games (No. 1 vs. No. 16, No. 2 vs. No. 15, etc.).
Using last year’s CFP rankings to illustrate the inventory, the array of opening-round games would include Alabama vs. James Madison, Miami vs. Iowa, Texas vs. Tulane, BYU vs. Houston, USC vs. Arizona and Vanderbilt vs. Virginia.
Those are not $25 million games, folks.
That said, other factors would help define the market for new CFP inventory.
Atop that list: competition. If Fox is forced to bid against NBC or CBS, the price could climb.
Also, owning a piece of the CFP enhances the value of Fox’s other college football properties in terms of both eyeballs and advertisers: the Big Ten and Big 12 regular seasons and conference title games.
Admittedly, we can’t assign a specific value to that component, but it’s considerable.
Based on its year-long push for the 24-team field, the Big Ten clearly believes the finances work. Presumably, commissioner Tony Petitti has discussed the money matter with Fox executives and is confident that taking 12 early-round games to the market would produce the windfall needed to offset the $255 million lost by eliminating conference championships.
If that proves correct, the CFP will grow to 24 teams in either 2027 or 2028, much to ESPN’s chagrin.
College football is going towards a 24-team playoff, which means 20-team conferences, which means conference realignment, which means larger media contracts in the 2030s. Do you agree or disagree? — @JimSkin70758794
The Hotline completely agrees with each of the changes cited, but not with the connective tissue.
Those four moves aren’t necessarily related, particularly the first one: The CFP almost certainly will expand to 24 teams in 2027 or 2028, but there is no clear, subsequent link to conference realignment.
The propellant behind the drive to 24 is access: Schools spending $30 million or more on rosters want a reward (i.e., playoff berth). In our opinion, that’s a terrible reason to double the size of the playoff, but executives from the Big Ten, ACC and Big 12 are fully on board, assuming the expansion financials work.
Meanwhile, realignment will be driven, as has been the case for decades, by the quest for more cash from media rights contracts for regular-season inventory. The next rights cycle begins in 2030, with the Big Ten, followed by the Big 12 in 2031 and the SEC in 2034.
And yes, those deals should be more valuable than the current agreements because live sports are a goldmine for the media networks.
So the media dollars will impact realignment, but we don’t envision CFP expansion affecting conference membership decisions in the short term.
After all, the grant-of-rights contracts are locked in: Schools cannot move until the final years of the existing rights cycle.
Is there anything that prevents the SEC, Big Ten and Big 12 from ripping the ACC apart just before the Protect College Sports Act possibly passes in September? Grabbing the best teams and going over 19 members per league before the vote. — John W
For those unfamiliar, the PCSA, as written, prevents conference membership from exceeding 19 schools. We call this the Notre Dame clause, because it allows the Big Ten to add the Irish without violating the requirement.
(Why there are any requirements in the PCSA related to expansion, we cannot answer. Or fathom.)
Now, to be clear: The bill faces a narrow and treacherous journey through the Senate and, especially, the House of Representatives. The expansion provision very well could be removed at some point.
What if it remains in the bill? Yes, membership would be capped at 19. But the current PCSA also forces Power Four schools to compete as Independents for five years before joining another Power Four league. (Notre Dame is exempt from the holding period because of its ongoing Independent status.) Nobody wants to deal with that.
In order for a wave of realignment to unfold before the bill becomes law, schools must buy out the remaining years on their grant-of-rights agreements.
For Florida State, Clemson, Miami and North Carolina, the cost to exit the ACC a decade before the grant-of-rights deal expires runs well into the hundreds of millions.
Also, they need landing spots. Would the Big Ten and SEC be interested? Perhaps. The specific moves would hinge on a variety of factors, including Notre Dame’s plans.
(None of the top ACC schools want to join the Big 12, by the way. Don’t spend time pondering that endgame. Their sights are set on the SEC and Big Ten.)
All of which is to say this: If the PCSA fizzles, realignment likely will remain on pause until the end of the decade, when the next rights cycle begins; if the PCSA gains momentum, then things could get wild sooner than later.
With the recent settlement between the Pac-12 and Mountain West over $155 million in poaching penalties and exit fees, does this put UNLV and Air Force back in play for Pac-12 expansion? — Gary C
Let’s reframe the issue: Does UNLV want to join the Pac-12 even though the settlement terms — less than 50 cents on the dollar for the Mountain West — mean the Rebels won’t receive the full amount promised?
UNLV’s administration seemingly views dominating the Mountain West (big fish, small pond) as the best path to eventual membership in the Power Four.
The school had multiple chances to join the Pac-12 and declined.
Also, would the Pac-12 even want the Rebels? That answer seems obvious — yes! — but what if the proverbial banana stand has no money?
Put another way: What if the Pac-12’s media rights deals with CBS, The CW and USA Network lack pro rata clauses that ensure any new member enters the conference at a full revenue share? (We believe that to be the case, by the way.)
In that situation, the Rebels would have to join at a discount, and the nine existing members potentially would have to give up cash in order to split the revenue pie into an additional slice.
It’s difficult to envision either scenario becoming reality.
At this point, the Hotline sees the likelihood of UNLV joining the Pac-12 as somewhere south of 20 percent.
If the Protect College Sports Act does not pass, what’s to stop a rich donor from turning his favorite college team into the Dodgers, buying and stockpiling all the best talent? — @NateJones2009
If the PCSA fizzles, or if it becomes law without limitations on roster compensation, then life will carry on as we have come to know it these past few years. Schools with a single, uber-rich donor will have an advantage. Texas Tech will continue to outspend the rest of the Big 12. Oregon, Texas, Ohio State and a few others will repeatedly reset the market.
Exactly what that means, time will tell. Currently, the most expensive rosters are believed to cost $45 million to $50 million.
Without the PCSA, the only thing preventing donors from funding $70 million rosters (i.e., well above current market value) is common sense — well, common sense and playing time.
The top talents want to play. If a receiver views himself as one of the best in the country, for example, he would be more apt to sign with a team in need of a WR1 than with a team looking for a WR2.
The PCSA might, as the schools hope, lend some parameters to the spending. But we wonder: Is that legal without a collectively bargained agreement with the players? Perhaps not.
What agency or organization takes the lead in policing the NCAA, NIL, player payments and the portal? Or does it remain the Wild Wild West? — @MrEd315
The College Sports Commission was created by the power conferences last summer, in the aftermath of the House v. NCAA settlement, to police NIL spending using enforcement authority conferred by the schools themselves.
Let’s just say the process has not gone as planned, which largely explains the plea for help from Capitol Hill — help many schools eventually came to regret (partially or completely). The CSC has struggled mightily to monitor NIL spending and enforce the rules.
Of course, anyone who thought the schools would fall in line and allow the CSC to police the NIL landscape hasn’t been paying attention for forever.
Everyone in college athletics wants accountability … for their competition.
For themselves? No thanks.
Since joining the ACC, Stanford has won only one football game on the East Coast. A better arrangement would be for Stanford (and Cal) to join the Big Ten, but that looks extremely unlikely. Would the more realistic move be for Stanford to join the current Pac-12 that became financially feasible? — Alec S
Yep, the Cardinal are 1-6 in ACC affairs in the Eastern and Central time zones the past two seasons, plus a loss at Notre Dame.
The lone victory came in the program’s first conference roadie: at Syracuse in September 2024 (on a walk-off field goal). Since then, each trip has ended in defeat, usually by multiple touchdowns.
And yes, Stanford and Cal would have been better served as part of the Big Ten’s western wing. Their presence would reduce cross-country travel for the West Coast schools and for the 14 schools based on the eastern half of the country.
But Fox didn’t have the money to make membership for the Bay Area schools work, so they opted for what executives on both campuses viewed as the next-best option: life in the ACC.
To your question, it’s difficult to map a scenario in which the Pac-12 could offer the Cardinal and Bears a better financial package than they are receiving in the ACC, even at their reduced revenue shares.
Here’s why:
ACC schools will receive roughly $14 million (each) under the terms of the new College Football Playoff distribution plan, which begins this fiscal year and runs through the 2031-32 season. Meanwhile, Pac-12 schools will take home about $1.8 million, save for Washington State and Oregon State, which collect $3.6 million.
We see little chance of the CFP powers-that-be allowing Stanford and Cal to maintain Power Four revenue if they moved to the Pac-12. Perhaps they could negotiate a deal similar to WSU and OSU. But even so, that would mean a $10 million annual haircut.
Also, and we cannot overstate this: The Cardinal and Bears don’t want to join the new Pac-12.
Despite the grueling travel associated with life in the ACC, they want an academic association with Duke, Virginia, North Carolina (and others) and the competitive connection to ACC teams, especially in the Olympic sports.
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