Unverified Voracity Likes The Great Eye

an idea to improve sports that are boring - like soccer.  I suppose it could be adopted for basketball too if as Commissioner Larry Scott says the game needs fixing.  I suggest that every fan that shows up to a game receives a slingshot and 20 marbles.  Now you have entertainment!

90% of the Rutgers & MD games without any issues. Purdue vs MD or Iowa vs Rut wouldn't draw a competitive audience.

With presumably 7 games each Saturday during conf play and only 3 real time slots (12, 3:30 and 7:00) on BTN, ESPN and/or ABC can still pick and choose 2-3 games.

No skipping UM or OSU games against them might start a riot ...

From the article:

"McVay made more than the CEO of the American Red Cross, which has revenues of $3.5 billion."

True, but most bowl organizations are less corrupt then the ARC.

Salvation Army >>> Red Cross

I like the eye configuration but suggest a few tweaks. The inner eye (of the soul? the soulful?) has seven schools. That's an uneven number. So we might add Minnesota to the mix, for an even eight.

However Minnesota has a natural rivalry with Iowa. (Or unnatural rivalry: who knows what they do with Floyd of Rosedale through those long winter storms?) So I suppose we should add Iowa too.

Unfortunately that gets us back to an uneven number. I notice that Wisconsin is between the original seven and the newly added pair, so perhaps we can include the Badgers.

Now we're at an even ten.

That only leaves the question of what to call this big grouping.

Jabberwock,

It's not a 10 year war. It's a 100 year war. Here are the top Schools:

42 Michigan

34 Ohio

...and then

18 Minnesota

Interesting that Kovacs mentions norfleet as impressing at tailback in the Chesson/Darboh article.

I see the advantages of the "all-seeing eye" conference, but I am just drawn to the Big 10,11,12,13,14 being split into the NW and SE divisions.  It makes sense geographically and evens out the travel objections.  To be honest I havn't thought about other ramifications except that osu gets a game each year in some fertile recruiting ground and UM doesn't.

Can we please just change the division names.  At first I didn't mind but for some reason I just don't like them.  And change the conference name too.  It just feels rediculous that we have 14 teams in the Big 10.  I get the brand reason, but it just doesnt work.

Please forgive me for whining.

The east-west proposal splits IU and Purdue, which I assume means we'd still have protected crossovers. I think they're a bad idea b/c they screw up competitive balance (huge advantage to Sparty to get IU every year while we get tOSU), but in this alignment it might work to our benefit, since it seems like the obvious pick for us would be Minnesota, to preserve the Jug game on an annual basis.

I assume the Big Ten will incorporate a nine-game conference schedule in the near term.  It might take a few years to implement given the currently contracted non-conference games and the financial penalties that would occur if they're cancelled.  But any division alignment should assume the B1G will have nine conference games.

Since Michgan and Ohio State fans are so resistant to the idea of playing one another on a date other than the last games of the season, the two programs have to be in the same division.  While the stakes of The Game may change from being the Big Ten champion to a slot in the B1G conference championship game, I submit that it's changed already.  We've seen Michigan beat Ohio State and end up in the Orange Bowl (1999) and lose to OSU and end up in the Rose Bowl (2005) against a non-Pac 12 team (Texas).

Beyond that, of course, is that the team's ultimate goal will be changing in 2014.  With a four-team playoff, getting a berth as one of the "College Football Final Four" should be UM's goal. Is that best served by being in a situations whereby UM would have to play OSU in back-to-back football games?  My answer to that is no.

I have a confession to make though--I live in the Washington DC area.  The prospect of having Michigan play Maryland and/or Rutgers out here on the east coast is one of the big reasons why I'm happy those two programs were added to the Big Ten.  It Virginia and North Carolina were also added to that list, I'd be ecstatic.  That's one of the reason why I support the east-west alignment.

Having said that, I think the conference will have to make a decision on what's the best option for promoting not only the B1G in the mid-Atlantic, but to also ensure the Big Ten Network (BTN) has the best chance of getting onto basic carriage from western Connecticut to northern Virginia.  I suspect that having three major brands associated with the east--Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State--will be the best way to achieve exactly that goal.  Getting UM, OSU and PSU playing games on an annual basis in the NYC/NJ area and the DC/Baltimore area is an important part of that  of that strategy.

The one thing I would do with the divisional alignment is place Michigan State in the west and keep the two schools in the state of Indiana in the east.  With a nine-game conference schedule, MSU becomes UM's protected rival and the conference adopts a 6-1-2 scheduling set up with six division games, one protected cross-divisional game per year and 2 games a season among the six other teams in the other diivision.

With Indiana, Purdue, Michigan State and Ohio State as regulars on the schedule, it means UM fans based in the state of Michigan don't have a long haul to get to those games.  Conversely, the large body of east coast alumni would be in a better position to attend Michigan games against Rutgers, Maryland and Penn State in person with the east-west setup.  This should help maximize the presence of UM fans at the opposing teams stadiums, especially if the Rutgers and Maryland games are played at the pro stadium in New Jersey, Baltimore and outside Washington DC.

In regard to the six remaining teams, Michgan would play them each two times over a six-year time period.  The could be paired up among the stronger and weaker programs as such:

Nebraska/Minnesota

Wisconsin/Illinois

Northwestern/Iowa

Here's what UM's six-year conference schedule set up might look like:

Year 1 (5 Home/4 Away)

Ohio State, at Nebraska, Penn State, at Michigan State, Purdue, at Indiana, Rutgers, at Maryland, Minnesota

Year 2 (4 Home/5 Away)

at Ohio State, Nebraska, at Penn State, Michigan State, at Purdue, Indian, at Rutgers, Maryland, at Minnesota

Year 3 (5 Home/4 Away)

Ohio State, at Wisconsin, Penn State, at Michigan State, Purdue, at Indiana, Rutgers, at Maryland, Illinois

Year 4 (4 Home/5 Away)

at Ohio State, Wisconsin, at Penn State, Michigan State, at Purdue, Indiana, at Rutgers, Maryland, at Illinois

Year 5 (5 Home/4 Away)

Ohio State, at Iowa, Penn State, at Michigan State, Purdue, at Indiana, Rutgers, at Maryland, Northwestern

Year 6 (4 Home/5 Away)

at Ohio State, Iowa, at Penn State, Michigan State, at Purdue, Indiana, at Rutgers, Maryland, at Northwestern

With three non-conference games on the schedule, Michigan will likely have one home-and-home series plus two buy in games.  UM would be hosting its major non-conference opponent in Ann Arbor in the years with four home conference games, i.e., Years 2, 4, and 6 on this rotation.  Those are the same years where the Ohio State and Penn State games are on the road, which will generally mean there's a good balance of challenging home/away games each season.  

This would be in contrast to the current situation whereby UM plays Notre Dame, Ohio State and Nebraska all at home or all on the road.  

you wanna stick all the newbs with Iowa, Minnie and Wiscy? I think we should pick up 6 more teams, put them in a division with PSU, Neb, Maryland and Rutgers and have a bowl game for the winner of each division to decide who's best.  We'll call it the Orchid Bowl.

First and foremost, basketball is going to play a factor here.  The "eye" alignment puts 6 of the 8 best basketball programs in one division, and yes I think there will be divisions for basketball.  The reason being it works for functionality - (play divisional opponents twice, home and home, while playing all other divisional opponents once for a total of 19 conference games in basketball).  The other reason I like east - west is because I don't want to see Michigan play Purdue, Illinois, Northwestern and Indiana in football every year.  I am tired of lackluster football match-ups.  Having those 4 in your division guarantees 2 body bag B1G games per year.  I would much rather see Penn State and Sparty rotate on and off with Ohio and our best cross over game.  Also, I think there is something to be said for creating an SEC West type of division.  Alabama, Auburn, LSU and Arkansas have all benefited from it.  Kids want to play in big games on national tv with everyone watching.  Michigan v. Purdue-Indiana-Illinois-Northwestern is not on national tv in primetime.  Michigan v. Penn State-Ohio will be on national tv.

Bilbo is going to be so pissed that Ace brought Sauron back to life.

Keep adding teams until there are 10 divisions so that the name Big 10 makes sense.  You'll probably need to look outside the US to get enough teams though.  Get into the emerging markets before it's too late and the SEC gets there first.  China is basically one market, just one school and BTN will be included in the basic package for all 1 billion people.  India might require more teams to be profitable, but think of the potential.

Guys, the obvious choice for new divisions is simple:

Red Division - Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio State, Nebraska, Rutgers, Maryland, and Minnesota

Non-Red Division: Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State, Illinois, Purdue, Iowa, and Northwestern

It's a helluva lot more sensical than the Eye of Sauron.

Scalping is definitely the cheaper way to go, but I always buy through the UM athletic depatment because that is how bowls determine who "travels" better.  If UM can consistently sell more tickets to bowl games than other teams then we will potentially get better bowl bids in the future.  That is one of the reasons we ended up in the Sugar bowl last year and in the Outback bowl this year.  So for me I understand face value is much higher than what the tickets will be scalping for, but I am hoping to contribute to better bowl games in the future.

So how does this scoring stuff work? I posted (my first post) what I thought was pretty darn good joke, suggesting a split that ends up with the 10-member Big Ten, circa 2000. Good or not, I thought it was an extreme enough "suggestion" that the joke would be obvious, without needing to be explained. (I dislike explaining jokes. Kinda kills the humor.)

For that joke, I get 2 points. The person who didn't get that it was a joke, and helpfully explained that my "suggestion" would mean lopsided divisions of 10 and 4 also gets 2 points. The next person, hinting at the joke, gets 2 points.

So as long as you write something you get 2 points?

(Note: Explaining the Subject heading joke, "swish," is the word occasionally used when a basketball goes through the net without touching the rim, resulting in a score of 2 points.