Mailbag: The super league’s fate depends on the Big Ten, Pac-12 media rights, Cal QB angst, time zone matters and more

The Hotline mailbag publishes weekly Send questions to wilnerhotline bayareanewsgroup com and include mailbag in the subject line Or hit me on the social media platform X WilnerHotline Particular questions have been edited for clarity and brevity Thought experiment Somewhere around the Big Ten and SEC decide to form a College Football Playoff subdivision Pick a number of teams Who makes it Do they bring along anyone from the ACC or the Big And what happens to the remaining FBS schools Paul T Brown This is a twist on the super league concept that s specific to the postseason format In our opinion it s an all-or-nothing situation Either the super league is formed for the regular season and postseason or there is no super league whatsoever Yes the Big Ten and SEC threatened to create their own playoff as a means of leveraging control of CFP negotiations back in - but the dynamics have changed on numerous levels It s laborious to envision the two conferences winning the political battle that would ensue both at the state and federal level if they formed a separate and unequal postseason But at a broad level it s a timely issue Within the next four-to-six weeks we should know if the long-theorized super league remains a possibility Why Because the Big Ten s consideration of private capital is a direct threat As part of the proposal to accept a cash infusion of at least billion from an outside investor Big Ten schools would be required to sign a -year extension of the conference s grant-of-rights That agreement binds each school s media revenue to the conference and effectively makes leaving the Big Ten for another entity financially unfeasible In other words Ohio State and Michigan would be bound to the Big Ten until Without the Buckeyes and Wolverines there is no super league While the conference has myriad reasons for considering private capital killing the super league is perhaps near the top of the list at least for commissioner Tony Petitti A super league would leave Petitti without a conference to lead authority to exert and paychecks to cash The same goes for Greg Sankey SEC Jim Phillips ACC and Brett Yormark Big The super league would have its own governance structure and executive crew separate and distinct from the current Power Four conferences How likely are the Big Ten presidents to approve the private capital infusion A new dynamic entered the calculation Friday when U S Senator Maria Cantwell D-Wash who has been heavily involved in college sports decree sent a letter to each Big Ten president chancellor questioning the endeavor In exchange for the billion loan and accompanying return the private capital investor would own percent of a new commercial arm of the Big Ten Cantwell s letter obtained by the Hotline includes the following The sale of university assets including assets that are subsidized by taxpayer dollars and favorable tax healing to private investors should be diligently considered and not driven solely by the Conference and its leadership And this Your university s media revenues as of now are not taxed because they are considered substantially related to your tax-exempt purpose However when a private for-profit investor holds a stake in those revenues it raises questions whether the revenue loses its connection to your institution s educational purpose How this will play out we can t speculate But to this point Petitti doesn t have the endorsement of the two schools that matter majority of Michigan and Ohio State Just as approval of the private capital would effectively kill the super league rejection of the proposal would give the concept a second life The timing of conference media rights contracts make any new competitive structure unlikely before the early-to-mid s the schools exclusively cannot leave their current homes before that point What if there s traction for a super league Our view has constantly run counter to mainstream thinking and the handful of proposals brought forth by outside entities It won t feature or teams all the Power Four schools and a handful from the Group of Five That structure makes no sense for the media companies Why would Fox or ESPN or Netflix pay immense sums to broadcast Virginia vs Illinois or UCF vs South Carolina To attract the eyeballs that generate the dollars the super league would need or teams Perhaps you could squeeze in a sparse more but there cannot be any fat Yes there are problems with that concept not the least being the losing Schools that have been fruitful enough over time to warrant inclusion in the super league are not used to losing and someone would have to lose Is Michigan ready for - Is Georgia Another predicament which we ll mention briefly here If the top brands create a super league for football what happens to their Olympic sports But let s envision a scenario in which the Big Ten rejects private capital and a super league of teams emerges in the mid- s with the backing of major media companies and its own governance structure Which teams make the cut Competitive success and media value would be the determining factors Here s a guess based on the current landscape Independent one Notre Dame ACC four Clemson Florida State Miami and North Carolina Big five Arizona State BYU Colorado TCU and Utah Big Ten eight Iowa Michigan Nebraska Ohio State Oregon Penn State USC and Washington SEC Alabama Auburn Florida Georgia LSU Mississippi Oklahoma Tennessee Texas and Texas A M That leaves room for four more if the super league has teams and it supposedly would be a tad bigger because of the need for championship inventory Who knows it could encompass teams broken into four regional divisions of Admittedly we excluded particular schools that would have strong cases for inclusion But that s one reason success over the final half of the decade is critical for Indiana Michigan State Louisville Texas Tech and others If the opportunity comes momentum could determine the final invites There are too several unknowns to count when it comes to size shape and membership But thanks to the Big Ten we could know in the next limited weeks whether the super league has a chance to become reality or gets stopped dead in its tracks Why doesn t the Pac- brain trust approach Cal and Stanford again The ACC makes no sense for them and the Big Ten isn t calling There are grumblings amongst members in the ACC about advance and they are correct They gain nothing by playing Cal or Stanford Larry E We agree the situation is nonsensical On so various levels the Bay Area schools would be better off in a West Coast-based conference or as the fifth and sixth schools in the Big Ten s western wing But Stanford and Cal have legally binding contracts with the ACC through and the escape cost likely would be in excess of million Also the schools have no interest in joining the reconstituted Pac- Call it arrogance call it whatever you d like but they feel zero athletic or academic alignment with the new version of their former home That alignment does exist with the ACC membership which features a slew of high-level academic schools that field elite Olympic sports teams Even if the Bears and Cardinal requested to return the contracts would prevent it But they don t When is the final media contract for the new Pac- going to happen Is there a few sort of deadline btarvin First keep in mind that there could be more than one media deal remaining The conference has secured agreements with CBS and The CW but there s no reason it cannot have four in total One doable holdup Warner Bros Discovery i e TNT and TBS a anticipated suitor for Pac- rights is a takeover target The corporate machinations could have slowed any deal with the Pac- and its adviser Octagon A firm deadline doesn t exist In theory the Pac- could go several months before finalizing the media deal s But from a practical standpoint the sooner the better for scheduling purposes At this point we fully expect the conference to have eight football-playing schools next year and nine for basketball There are so countless issues the process is akin to five-dimensional chess The membership issue impacts competition inventory which impacts media deals And don t forget the poaching-penalty lawsuit the College Football Playoff format uncertainty and the unsettled bowl lineup the conference must account for a slew of scenarios So too do the expected media partners There are several series set between the new Pac- and the new Mountain West Fresno State-San Jose State Colorado State-Wyoming and San Diego State-Hawaii Could this be the groundwork for a future scheduling alliance between the conferences NateJones Consider us skeptical The three series noted above are regional rivalries that date back decades and make sense for the schools at a local level It s arduous to envision the respective conference offices working on behalf of the full membership reaching an agreement on the color of the sky much less a scheduling partnership After all they are in the present fighting in court over a scheduling partnership In our view the two remaining members of the Pac- Washington State and Oregon State want no part of binding agreements with the Mountain West and we suspect that will remain true long after the lawsuit is settled And keep this in mind The Mountain West hasn t disclosed a media rights deal or gotten clarity on its financial situation because of the legal proceedings At this point there s a non-zero chance the conference dissolves in - If transiting at least two time zones is such an issue for college football teams why doesn t it seem to be an issue for NFL teams draywilson First the NFL players are older and more mature and have more experience dealing with long flights AFC and NFC West teams do it multiple times per season year after year Related Articles CFB recruiting Blue chippers to watch USC-Michigan and Indiana-Oregon Big Ten mulls billion in private capital to extend grant of rights College football picks Oregon-Indiana Michigan-USC Big Ten journey ATS Holy War Why Big was smart to schedule Utah-BYU in mid-October College Football Playoff passes on Phoenix again as host for championship battle NFL players aren t going to school they are less prone to distractions and they are more focused on issues like sleep and nutrition Also the vast majority of NFL games fall into one of two Sunday broadcast windows a m and p m Pacific whereas college teams have four attainable broadcast slots a m p m p m and p m They play earlier and later Whether the NFL material tracks with the Big Ten trends communicated on the Hotline a scarce days ago we cannot say Just a wild shot What if a state like Arizona passed measure that prohibited its constituents schools from starting games later than p m local time or before p m local time The p m start times really suck Maybe Idaho Utah Colorado and Nevada follow f ted We ll respond to that question with a question How often do the Arizona schools have home games that start at p m local Most of night games kick at p m and once the time changes start times are typically at p m in Arizona or at the latest The same is true for early games Rarely does Arizona or Arizona State start before p m local Generally the issue doesn t seem worthy of state legislatures After all the schools willingly accept the TV broadcast slots when they sign grant-of-rights agreements and approve media rights deals Is Cal quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele in the transfer portal yet Paul S Humor is constantly welcome on the Hotline although this isn t a chortling matter for the Cal faithful worried Sagapolutele will enter the portal this winter and take a mega-offer from one of the sport s blue bloods It s a reasonable concern The freshman is supremely gifted and will be a star once he gains experience We can t predict what happens when portal season arrives this winter but would urge Cal fans to keep in mind that Sagapolutele has already done the grass-is-greener thing He was committed to the Bears in the fall of but signed with Oregon which made a better offer and spent a limited weeks on the Ducks roster in December as they prepared for the Rose Bowl And it didn t work The personal connection and comfort level Sagapolutele felt with Cal s coaches didn t exist with Oregon so he transferred to Berkeley and was enrolled in time for the spring semester Put another way He did exactly what suitors will ask him to do this winter In our view that makes him less of a flight danger than if he had never ventured to Eugene last year Granted the Bears will need to make a respectable financial offer and we fully expect that to happen Send suggestions comments and tips confidentiality guaranteed to wilnerhotline bayareanewsgroup com or call - 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