ND contract not finalized
Just thought I'd throw out a reminder that in the past month, Dave Brandon mentioned that while there was a verbal agreement to extend the Notre Dame contract to 2030 three years ago, no contract was ever signed. Wonder what effect, if any, this might have on the future of playing Notre Dame. With Nebraska coming into the conference, likely the Big12Ten might require teams to play 9 league opponents each year. Leaving only 3 non-conference games, might leave Notre Dame in the lurch.
If might mean they are joining our conference thus making such an agreement pointless.
...said this:
Brandon said suggestions Michigan and other Big Ten schools boycott Notre Dame if the Irish remain independent are “silly.”
“I don’t agree with that, that that’s going to accomplish anything,” he said.
No offense to Mr Brandon, but if he doesn't think that cutting the balls off of ND's TV contract by removing 30-40% of their scheduled games against BCS schools wouldn't put them in a compromising position, I think he ought to go back into the pizza business. Of course a boycott would be effective. What effect it would have is unclear, but it would be effective.
even hinted at a "boycott", it would be WWIII. Of course, if ND doesn't join the B10+, then it will be inevitable that Michigan, MSU, and Purdue will have to cutback on scheduling ND. They don't need to call it a boycott to not schedule the Irish.
It would just be an interesting coincidence?
Off topic, but thinking of Purdue (and Danny Hope) playing Notre Dame (and Brian Kelly) causes me to cheer for injuries both ways.
I'm glad someone with embedding skillz also thought of that.
Well, in this case I don't think you'd ever see an AD say anything different, because the moment he even hints at the tiniest, most remote possibility of a boycott ever happening in the next billion years, the media will explode that quote onto every headline ever.
And that would be a bad thing? We should all stop acting is if ND has any leverage whatsoever. If the conference wants them, they should be assertive. ND has basically no recourse here.
All they would do is schedule one SEC team (AL, FL, TN, AU, GA), one ACC team (Miami, FSU, VA tech) and one more P16 team (TX, OK, Oregon) each year to replace the lost B10 teams and we would have to do the same to replace ND. This would accomplish nothing.
If the Pac 10 goes to 16 I think the odds favor USC and Stanford also dropping ND as soon as contracts expire. The Pac 10 would be much improved with the addition of Texas and Oklahoma. SC may keep them because of the tradition, but I doubt Stanford would.
He's not going to start a media frenzy by suggesting a boycott, and I disagree that it would cut off ND's "balls off" to lose MSU or Purdue on their schedules. Those might be huge games for PU or MSU, but the reason people would tune in to watch is for ND. Replace MSU with UT and PU with Washington and I doubt ND will lose any sleep over it. Despite the fact they are no longer a dominant player in college football, if ND wants to play you I doubt most teams would hesitate in signing up.
Brandon did not say it as a threat. Frankly, I'm not sure why he even mentioned it (maybe someone asked him a question).
The B10 would be crazy to drop ND if there is any way to keep them on the schedule. These are some of the best games on MI's, MSU's and PUR's schedules each year, both in terms of public interest and ratings. The goal is to make the conference better. Adding another great conference opponent (NE) only to drop our best OOC rival (ND) hardly would be much of a step forward.