Inside the Big Ten-SEC Playoff Power Struggle with Ralph Russo of The Athletic

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the solid verbal ull that for me. I'm
a man, I'm for it.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
I've heard so many players say, well, I want to
be happy. You want to be happy for a day?

Speaker 1 (00:12):
Edo State is that?

Speaker 3 (00:13):
Woo whoo?

Speaker 1 (00:14):
And them and tie.

Speaker 3 (00:18):
Dan Rubinstein, our guest of honor today, has not been
on this show in a little over a decade, if
you can believe it, that's how old we are.

Speaker 4 (00:27):
I could not believe my eyes when I went to
our website and saw how long it's been. Ralph Russo
from the Athletic, who is going to join us today
in too.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Long, doing a great job.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Was at the AP forever i remember correctly, and now
has been at the Athletic for a bit and does
great work. Has been reporting on all of the college
football playoff conference meetings and has done great reporting for
the Athletic. Excited to pick his brain about the whims
and concerns and slamming fists standing on the table top

(01:00):
at some sort of automatic qualifying something he's not great,
can't wait to pick his brain.

Speaker 4 (01:06):
We've talked a little bit about this subject, and we
try not to talk too too much about it because
if you do that, people start to glaze over bombers, Right,
it's bummers, it's college football business. People just want to
talk about the football. We can assure you that starting
the first week of July, we actually are going to
start talking about the football. Our previews are going to
ramp up, So make sure you hit follow, make sure

(01:26):
you hit subscribe wherever you can.

Speaker 3 (01:28):
You don't want to miss that.

Speaker 4 (01:29):
We've got our standard issue What's New in twenty twenty
five episode that's going to be coming out start of July,
and then after that the following week, we'll switch it
back up to three episodes a week and start worpping
through conferences and teams and all the actual fun stuff
that people listen to us to hear and people care
the most about.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
But before we do, we have not had.

Speaker 4 (01:49):
An opportunity to actually talk to a reporter who is
on the ground trying to cover this story, trying to
figure out, like us, where the playoff is headed, where
the postseason at largest headed, where college football as a
whole is headed. This is a very very charged subject.
So uh pretty excited that we get to bring Ralph
back on the show.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
I could have been this reporter.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
I sat right behind Greg Sank at a Cubs game,
and I didn't say anything because he didn't look like
he wanted.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
To talk about where's the dedication?

Speaker 5 (02:19):
Dan?

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Well, this was two years ago, I think, and it
wasn't my ticket. We got gifted tickets, the good good
seats at Wrigley And I was like, that dude's wearing
an SEC lapelpin.

Speaker 3 (02:29):
We'rein of just leaned over and said, where's it all going? Greg?
Eight or nine games? But what's your what's your vibe here?
What are we doing here? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (02:37):
I saw the SEC lapelpin. I was like, oh, he
must be somebody. As I'm like looking him down to
up and then I was like, that dude that is
wearing an SEC lapelpin looks like a reasonably about He
looks like Greg Sank. And I was like, wait a minute,
we might have a situation on our hands, Detective Rubinstein
and it was Greg Zank. Yeah, but I did not
say anything.

Speaker 4 (02:56):
Oh well, all right again, make sure sure you hit
follow hit subscribes that you don't miss any of our
upcoming episodes. Verbalers dot com v E R B A
L l e r s dot comments where you can go.
That is our Patreon. You can listen to this episode
all over episodes without the ads, get them a little
bit early, get access to the discord and the games
that we're gonna spin up as the season gets a

(03:17):
little bit closer, you know the drill by Now Yes,
can't wait joining us now a senior writer for The Athletic.
It has been ten whole years since we've had this
gentleman on the podcast, which I can assure everybody is
not by any devious design. Ralph Russol, Welcome back to

(03:39):
the show, my friend.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
But now you're planted that you planted that in people's heads.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
That's funny because I've actually found myself thinking, have I
ever been on their show? Yeah? Yeah, oh yeah, like
I thought I had been, but obviously now I had been.
I haven't been keeping track, just so you know, I
wasn't keeping track. But now that you have, now that
you are keeping track, maybe I should be pissed? Should
I be pissed? Should I be offended?

Speaker 2 (04:04):
He tells me all the time about guests that we've
had on the show that I've for like completely forgotten about,
and he'll say things like, yeah, we had Desmond Tutu
on to talk about the old Southwest Conference and I
was like, what those are two concepts that and then
he's like, yeah, the year was two thousand and nine.

Speaker 1 (04:19):
It was a different time.

Speaker 3 (04:20):
The last time I've got you listed as being on
our show was with our friend Nicole Auerback and it
was when I believe we were on location covering a
national championship game in Dallas in twenty fifteen. That's all
coming back to me now now I remember that. Wow. Yeah,
that's right, because mostly I was I was, Yes, No,
that's true, because I actually was offended because you brought

(04:42):
someone on with me.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
Oh that's true. Right, you have to share your shine.

Speaker 3 (04:46):
I have to share my one shot with Nicole, who
you know is a star. Yeah, you need to give
the star a little space. I was clearly like supporting
role in Wow. Okay, so now our secret guest everybody please,
he's welcome. Now here's here's what I want to start
out with. So you've been reporting on and visiting, I believe,

(05:07):
in person two meetings one yes, yes, all of these
college football playoff and conference or conference adjacent type meetings.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
What have you seen? What have you heard?

Speaker 2 (05:24):
What is the point of all of these? And if
you had to sort of top level at all. What's
going on with these conversations that are assuming rooms that
look like Davos or whatever.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
Yeah, well what I The most interesting thing thing I
saw this week in Ashville was a hawk because it's
a very nice resort resort, mountain town, and there was
a hawk circling the grounds of the Biltmore for a
lot of the time. So because they're in the meetings
and I'm just killing time, I spent a lot of
time just what kind of hawk?

Speaker 1 (05:56):
What kind of hawk? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (05:58):
Oh, you know, I'm not that person who can identify
that type of If my wife was here and I had, like,
she definitely can identify the type of hawk. I can
I identify the type of hawk, so.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
Not to derail it immediately.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
Hawk is a big hawk.

Speaker 2 (06:17):
This is I think it's either hawk mating season or
we just got through hawk mating season because there are
signs out where I live to watch out for hawks,
and or I think the red tailed blackbirds, red wing
they very protective red wing blackbirds.

Speaker 3 (06:33):
Excuse me, yeah, redtail hawks, red wing blackbirds.

Speaker 2 (06:36):
Correct, So you just, I don't know, keep your distance,
but yeah, the hawks are definitely like you file under that,
like the nature is metal kind of offering.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
Okay, so the top the top line take away though
from the meetings, as far as you know, to try
to be a little serious here though, really again, it
was yet another meeting where you sit there for thirty
six hours and you come away going like why did
I need to be here? Right? Like? I how did
I justify the expense report to be here? I think

(07:05):
I am a little cautious to use the word impass.
But we are at sort of we're in a corner
here with the discussions as it turns to the college
football playoff and what the future will be. We're a
little bit of a log jam because I'll try. Let
me see if I can describe the decision tree here. Okay,
the decision tree starts in the SEC with how many

(07:29):
conference games it is willing to play, if the SEC
is going to stay at eight or go to nine.
That influences the Big Ten. The Big Ten very much
still wants to do the AQS. I don't they have
not really moved off of a desire to do the AQS.

Speaker 1 (07:50):
Automatic qualifying, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:52):
Yeah, on automatic qualifying, mostly automatic qualifying four for them,
four for the SEC, two for ACC and Big twelve. Yes, right,
and maybe we go to sixteen. So it creates a
little more space in terms of at larges and that's
helpful to everybody involved. I think there's still that's still

(08:12):
where they want to land. I think if the SEC
is willing to go to nine games, you might see
a path where the Big ten and really it comes
down to the Big Ten and the SEC. Guys, like
the other conferences are going to have input. They may
think they could have more input than they frank maybe

(08:34):
they do, but it seems like the way the contract
is written, the governance gives the SEC and the Big
ten final say so they need to come together. And
I think if the Big Ten, if the SEC went
to nine conference games and said we really want this
at large heavy format five to eleven something along that

(08:58):
like with there's a lot of at large, I think
the Big ten might be willing to relent and say, okay,
well we don't want to cut off our noses to
spite our face. We are going to get more teams
in the field here because the field will be bigger.
Maybe we should do that. But if the SEC is

(09:20):
sort of adamant about staying at eight or the SEC
will only go to nine if it gets to the AQS, right,
Maybe the SEC says, okay, we want to go to
nine conference games, Greg Sanke, I think really would like
them to go to nine conference games, and they say, okay,
the protection we'll get for going to nine conference games

(09:42):
is AQS. So I don't know. I hope I explained that,
well that's where things are hitting here, it's eight and nine,
and then decisions get made from there. But there's a
little bit of a standoff where the Big ten is like, listen,
like we'd be willing to listen to something altive to
the AQS, but you got to go to nine conference games,

(10:03):
and the SEC is like, we don't want to. I'm
not really sure we want to go to nine conference games.
So what's what's the breaking point.

Speaker 4 (10:09):
In the event of a true impasse, Because they've got
this deadline now of December the first to try and
work out what is the format going to be next season.
If they can't come to some kind of mutual understanding,
then what happens? What does it look like in twenty
twenty six?

Speaker 3 (10:26):
So I think you default back to what you have
I do, But again, like I have a hard time
accepting that, Like I've been told that, well, we'll just
stick with what we got. But it kind of goes
back to what I just said about, well, isn't it
better to have sixteen rather than twelve, Like you'll get

(10:48):
more of your teams if if the concern is we
want more teams in And it's always the bottom line
in all these conversations is every league thinks it should
get more teams, right, It's just such a fundamentally they
all think they should get more teams. They all think
the selection committee does not know, does not give their

(11:10):
teams enough credit. Whether it's the Big Ten, the Big twelve,
they all have the same complaint at the core. So
I think the default is, well, we'll just stay at twelve.
We'll just keep it the way it is. But tell me,
like I'll ask you, why is twelve the way it's
set up? Now? Why is that better than going to sixteen,

(11:31):
which is still a similar setup, you just add a
few more aques. So that's why I'm a little skeptical
about them sticking with twelve, because I do think the
one thing they tend to be able to agree upon
is we'll just make it bigger.

Speaker 4 (11:43):
I mean, if the common complaint is that nobody trusts
the committee. Can they do something to put less emphasis
on the committee? We talked about it on this show,
just kind of spitballing. But can they incorporate computer formulas?

Speaker 3 (11:58):
I know the pr around that last time wasn't great,
But have there been any discussions about alternative ways of
selecting these teams and not just the opinions of some
powerbrokers in a conference room? So I think that was
the crux of this past meeting in our Ashville. The
CFP staff created, you know, kind of sat down with

(12:20):
their sports Source Analytics, which is the data provider. They
brought a few outside sources. Did I see the Google
mathematician in your article? I wanted to ask you about
the Google mathematicians. I want to ask more about that
person later, but keep going. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot.
I didn't do a very good job as a report.
I don't know if I have more details. It's almost like, Hey,
we have some friends here and one of them is

(12:42):
a Google mathematician. We'll bring him in. So I think
what they were trying to do is say, Okay, well,
we're going to provide the committee with a new metric,
a strength of record metric that incorporates a little more
of strength of schedule size the strength of schedule, and
we're going to give that to commit the committee and

(13:03):
it will allow and the committee will use that to
sort of guide their decisions. But overall, we're still in
for the committee. But I'm with you, Ty, It's like
I find myself thinking like, if the committee is the problem,
and not because they're not doing, you know, good faith work,
but if the committee is the problem, then maybe try

(13:24):
to deemphasize the committee. So it sounds like they talked
a little bit about a de emphasizing of the committee,
but not whole k like. It sounded like it was
almost like from talking to a few people after the meeting,
I came away thinking like, it's a good effort, but
if your goal is truly to de emphasize or reprioritize

(13:44):
where the committee's protocols are, it sounded like a little
bit of a half measure.

Speaker 4 (13:49):
The other question that I had, and I know Chris
Vanini wrote something similar or something along these lines around
the time that they had the Champions League final. But
since the Big Tens seems to be dead set and
determined to go with this AQ format. Clearly the pr
around that isn't great either, but based on kind of

(14:09):
what the concerns are of the conferences, what the Champions
League in Europe does is they've got a coefficient that
determines previous performance in the tournament. They then use that
to try and figure out, all right, how many teams
from each European league should get a spot in this
broader thing. This is not to say the bigger leagues
don't have their thumb on the scale as well, but

(14:31):
at least there is something of a metric that helps
guide who gets what. Has there been any kind of
I don't know, discussion on the Big ten side about
incorporating something like that so that it's not always four
or three or two every year based on the conference.
But after we get a little bit more data, we
can rejigger this thing so that it's more more equitable.

Speaker 3 (14:53):
Yet that has been talked about. I don't It has
not been, And frankly, I think part of this string
the record conversation in terms of a metric to the committee.
It the more I hear about it, you know, you
use that term coefficient, right, I like I do wonder

(15:14):
if this metric is also hey, and we could if
we put a different light on it, it also could
be used for this, right, it's it's the old airplane.
It's a it's a it's a broach, it's a you know,
it's a hat. Right, it's so I think it could
be repurposed for something like that. Or you're not that
far away from the idea of repurposing this to sort

(15:38):
of do what you said, which is and they had
talked about this previously, this idea of like, okay, so
we feel like we're we're rigging the system, right, that's
the complaint. It's being rigged. It's pre determined. What if
we on the front end came up with a way
to justify how we get to these numbers? Now, of

(15:58):
course that could be that could be seen as as
you said, putting your thumb on the scale and still
being predetermined. But I do think that they are looking
into ways of like, let's here's what we want. Let's
figure out a mathematical way to justify it.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
Here's okay, here's an oversimplified question. Who is holding the
marker at the whiteboard if they are in a meeting room,
is it literally, Tony Petiti and Greg Sank each have
markers next to a whiteboard. And because you need to
funnel conversation through a central party for these kinds of conversations,
it seems in big business, in politics, whatever, that somebody

(16:41):
is running physically running the conversation in these rooms. Is
it actually you know, is it actually you know Tony
Petiti and Greg Sanky or is there like a central
figure who is organizing this from a central perspective in
these conversations?

Speaker 3 (16:54):
So you what you're speaking to is one of the
flaws in the system here, because when they all get together,
You're right, the person with the marker in his hand
is probably Rich Clark, the college football playoff executive director. Right.
He is trying to be traffic cop here. He is,
so he is essentially leading the meetings. But as I

(17:15):
wrote a couple of weeks ago, the fact of the
matter is this comes down to Patiti and Sanky, like,
you know, I think I wrote something like get those
two guys, like, eventually it comes down to those two
guys in a room together, right, figure it out, come
up with something, get back to the rest of us,

(17:35):
and they Because that again it speaks to the fracture. Right,
we have a room of ten commissioners and Notre Dame's
athletic director. Right, that's the big room where everybody seems
to want to get a voice. But how relevant is
that big room? And then we have the next room
is the four the power four commissioners. But the fact

(17:57):
of the matter is if Brett, you or Mark and
Jim Phillups don't have the same power, like quite literal
like influence on the system as the TD and Sanke,
then what's the point of that room? So what's the
point of the big room? What's the point of the
four room? If it's really comes down to the sec

(18:18):
in the big ten guys, just get in a room
and figure it out. But again, like that's not a
great way to make decisions. If every meeting leads to well,
then we have to have another separate meeting of four people.
And then after the four person meeting, well, now we
have to break it down to have the two person meeting.
What are we doing here?

Speaker 1 (18:34):
Yeah, let's offline this, let's it becomes a real office.

Speaker 3 (18:37):
In my in my old job, we used to say
this meeting could have been an email. Yeah, yeah, And
you know the other thing that's sort of frustrating, And
this is a little bit of a side Like so
after the ten person meeting is done, you know, Rich
Clark comes out, and god, you know, God bless him.
He's another person who has been giving a been given
a high profile job that has very little power. Right.

(18:57):
We have a lot of those in college sports. Here's
a cool title and a big paycheck. You have no
decision making power, right, Like, what again, what are we
doing guys? So, you know, he comes out and he
gives us a little bit of a little bit of
information that came up from the meeting, and I'm like,
you know what, just give us a piece of paper
about what you talked about, Like you talked about you

(19:18):
tried to come up with this metric. Just tell us
what's in the metric, Like what are we hiding here?
So it's a frustrating process to cover because of a
lack of transparency. It's also a frustrating process to cover
because there's a lot of people who are deemed influential
and having a voice here who really don't.

Speaker 2 (19:40):
Is is there an option on the table, because I
think this is again I don't have zero business background.
Is there an option on the table that sort of
adheres to the like the best deal is one that
leaves everybody a little unhappy? Is that little bummed out?

Speaker 3 (19:56):
No?

Speaker 1 (19:56):
You what is?

Speaker 3 (19:58):
Yeah? So that's what I keep going back to, this
idea of if the they can get to you know again,
it's it's this loggerheads of like I do think the
SEC going to nine conference games and having a five
to eleven sixteen team playoff with a lot of eight

(20:20):
with a lot of at large bids. I kind of
can feel like the SEC would be like, well, we
this is not exactly the way we wanted to get
to nine, but you know, we're gonna get a lot
of teams in this field, so let's just do that, right,
And the and the Big ten would be like, well,
we didn't get our aqs, but at least they're playing

(20:41):
the same amount of conference games. And guys, like the
thing with the conference games is I understand, like you know,
Bill Bill c would come on here, Bill Connley would
come on here and tell you, like, listen, the SEC
does play the strongest schedules even though they're only playing
eight games. But I don't know if I have to
even tell you guys, it's a simple math problem. If
you just sprinkle nine more losses in your conference in

(21:02):
a system where the lost column is very important, you're
being you're at a disadvantage if you're the Big ten.
So I totally understand and get the Big ten's apprehension
about the nine to eight different differential difference. So I
kind of do wonder if that's the place where the

(21:22):
two main parties are unhappy. And I think for the
Big twelve and the ACC you know, at this point,
the reason why they're so against the aqs is they
just can't codify their own inferiority, right right, But they
may be better off in a system that guarantees them

(21:43):
too in the long run, frankly, like they may be,
like the Big twelve especially, might be better off in
that system in terms of how many bids they get.
So but I think that they're just so so apprehensive
to sign up for the brand degradation.

Speaker 4 (22:01):
The other thing that I know we talked about here
when we tried to cover this, just following your reporting
and that of others, this whole idea of transform. I'm
trying to use the terminology they used transforming. They used
a very fancy uh, marketing term for this Conference championship week. Right,
it's not just going to be Conference championship week. We imagine, reimagine,

(22:24):
thank you, thank you.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
We're going to have like these play in games now
where the three plays the six and the four plays
of five, and we're going to make a whole like
play in tournament weekend out of this championship week. Yeah,
like we weren't really asking for that.

Speaker 4 (22:38):
I don't know if you were, obviously, Ralph, Like, where
is that at right now relative to all these other
conversations that are going on.

Speaker 3 (22:47):
Well, so that's pivotal to the AQ conversation because that
because one would trigger the other. Okay, the Big Ten
very much wants that what you're talking about, and which
is also goes back to the problem with the AQ model.
I think the SEC and SEC country that wasn't their idea.

(23:08):
That was the Big Tens idea, the reimagining of the
week of the weekend and three six all these play
in games now. I remind you here, Tony Battiti came
from Major League Baseball. And if you think, if you're
Major League Baseball fans at all, and I am, if
you think that there was a point where baseball sort

(23:29):
of like a light bulb went on and they were like, boy,
our final weekend of the season, if we have play
in games and they're tiebreakers, like we can create high
stakes small series or play in games that do great
like that. People really love them, right, So that's what
the Big Ten is trying to recreate, like these high

(23:51):
stakes playing games on the final weekend of the season,
and if you have aqs you can do them. And
I think the SEC was like, huh, that kind of
sounds like a pretty interesting idea, but it's not their idea.
They're not married to it. And the problem is with
the other conferences. They're like, well, we can't do that
because we don't have as many bids, like we can

(24:11):
play one play in game. So you're creating all this
new like interesting inventory for yourself, Big ten, but we
can't do that, So why should we sign up that
allow you to do that. I don't really mind those
I actually think it's kind of an interesting idea, and
I think it might be fun to have a weekend
where there's like three or four very high stakes games,

(24:34):
Like I think, I don't know if I'm down with
the AQ model, but I find myself being interested in
these play in games, and again, they are tied together.
You can't have them without the other. If you have
an at large bid situation, I think you're probably eliminating
the AQS, though I wouldn't be shocked if the Big

(24:56):
Ten tried to come up with a way to in
corporate them in some way, shape or form.

Speaker 2 (25:02):
Do you get the sense that there's anybody in the
room that listens to all of this and says, guys,
we're making this sport so difficult, we are making this
so much it's already an impossible sport to sort of
leap into as an outsider, between recruiting and NIL and
the portal and coaching movement and a postseason that changes

(25:23):
every two or three years. At this point, is there
anybody that's like, guys, what are we doing?

Speaker 3 (25:29):
So? I don't. I think it might be And I
hate to sort of paint Greg Sanke as the Knight
in shining Armor coming in to save the day, because
I don't think that's the case. But I do think
he has been through this more than any of the

(25:50):
other people in that room. Well, I would say this again,
not a lot of influence, but good perspective. John Steinbrecker
is I think the longest serving FB commissioner. He has
been through a lot of these conversations, and I think
he is a person who will say, you know, when
you have conversations with I think understands the idea that, like,

(26:13):
you know, making this really complicated is a problem. But
I don't know how much influence he has, but I do.
But but but what you're saying, Dan is so true,
and I don't know if that message is really getting through.
And I do wonder if anybody within the group is
really like sort of grabbing them by the lapels.

Speaker 5 (26:36):
You know.

Speaker 3 (26:36):
Bill Hancock understands this too, But again he's gone, and
I don't know if anybody was listening to him anyway,
because again, these it's it goes back to you have him,
you have, you have a title, but you have no power.
So I hear you. I don't know if that that
voice is really rigging through. I do think Sankee understands
a couple of things because he's been through the wars

(26:57):
here the complication pece. But also if it's unpopular, that's
a bad idea, Like don't jam through something that's unpopular
with your fans. I do think that there is an
somewhere in his in his attache of you know, accumulated knowledge,

(27:20):
he understands that, like, we can't make this hard to
understand and unpopular.

Speaker 2 (27:26):
Well, what seems I appreciate that word unpopular is what
it seems is from our perspective, and we have, you know,
a couple dozen listeners that we've built up through the
years that one of the most unpopular ideas of this
sport and how it's evolved is the power that the
big ten in the SEC wield in the national landscape.

(27:48):
That they have the power because they are swallowing up
these teams from smaller conferences to add cachet and brand
power and value to these conferences, and that this direction
where the PAC twelve is gone, the Big twelve was
on the brink, that the ACC has recently been on
the brink. It's not fun for a lot of fans,
including fans that have long rooted for Big ten teams

(28:11):
and SEC teams. Is there self awareness in this room
that thumbs on scales is not something that is going
to drive increased passion about this sport among at least
a good percentage of fans in our experience, but who knows.

Speaker 3 (28:25):
So I don't think so. I don't think that self
awareness comes until you're on the wrong side of the scale, right,
So I think the Big twelve and acc are now
having that moment of self awareness. Oh now we're the
ones being marginalized. You're right, Dan. It speaks to such
a much broader issue here, And I mean we could
go down a rabbit hole of the future of the

(28:47):
sport and super leagues and where this all might be
heading in twenty thirty two. But my biggest concern can
be summed up this way. At what point are you
going to marginalize the large fan bases to the extent
where you you you undercut your system, you undercut the sport.

(29:08):
Because it's one thing to say, hey, Bowling Green, Yeah,
this isn't really for you. Well you know what, a
lot of MAC fans also root for Big ten teams,
and I think those fans kind of understand that, like, hey,
we're tangentially part of this thing, right, But as you
keep going up the ladder here and say no, no,
you guys don't count, No, no, you you guys don't

(29:30):
And now we're at the point of like, hey, Oklahoma State,
you might be marginalized too. Well, that's a big fan, Like, hey, Syracuse,
you're sort of second class citizen here. I worry that
as we not just for the playoff immediate discussion, but
the trend line here if we are heading in that

(29:50):
trajectory like that's that seems to be very bad for
the sport. Like I don't like, this is a big
tent sport. And if we're witt this down and marginalizing
Big twelve and ACC programs to try to like focus
on thirty five or forty sec Big ten and you

(30:10):
know what, then what happens then to the you know,
the next level of that. So I think that is
a bad trend line for the sport as well. And
I'm hoping that these discussions maybe a light bulb goes on,
but I'm not necessarily scheeing that.

Speaker 2 (30:28):
Who is among these conference commissioners Actually, let's limit it
to brett or Mark and Jim Phillips from the Big
twelve in the ACC. How have they been in these conversations?
How savvy a negotiator with limited leverage? Are these guys?
Is there anything creative that they're doing to try and
get their own priorities in play more than obviously they've

(30:49):
been recently, how have they been at the table?

Speaker 3 (30:52):
So I would I would say this. I always awn
little apprehensive to give credit when.

Speaker 5 (31:00):
Nothing has been accomplished, well, when nothing's been accomplished, no,
because like you never know like what like who is
positioning to themselves to take credit and who is actively
behind the scenes doing things.

Speaker 3 (31:14):
So that's a caveat to this answer. I think I'll
give Brett Yormark credit for this, and not that I
don't want to, not that I want to throw Jim
Phillips aside, but I feel like the Big Twelve was
a little more proactive on this front when we pivoted

(31:34):
away from the AQ model. Part of that was I
think the Big Twelve in the ACC and I think
the Big Twelve understood this a little more aggressively. We
need to convince the SEC, like what can we do
right to put forth an alternative that gets the SEC

(31:55):
to go, hey, you know what the Big ten was doing.
We don't really love that. So they were more agreat
and I think I think your mark in the Big Twelve,
I believe I think it's fair to say we're a
little more aggressive about Hey, how about five to eleven SEC.
You guys would like that, right, boy? You could get
like eight or nine teams in How cool would that
be for you? I think the Big twelve recognize that

(32:20):
that was a good strategy, and I think your Mark
recognized that it was a good strategy at that point
to appeal to the SEC if it was also in
your best interest and it's in the ACC's best interest too.
I'll give your Mark in the Big twelve a little
more credit for being proactive going down that road. I'm

(32:41):
not sure the ACC doesn't deserve any credit. Like I'm
sure that they weren't just sitting on their hands there,
But it did seem like the light bulb one on
in the Big twelve office that like, oh, I know
the way to do this. Appeal to the SEC and
break those and become and create a format that might
create a wedge between the SEC. See in the Big ten. Gosh,

(33:01):
you've just described the plot of Inception two, but the
college football bent to it.

Speaker 1 (33:07):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (33:08):
There wouldn't be a whole lot of people watching that
other than us. But yeah, they got to try and
do whatever they can, I guess to make it work.
How much talk has there been about breaking away entirely,
either in the short term or longer term. I know
that was also a headline in the like.

Speaker 3 (33:21):
Really, we're gonna thirty minutes in, We're gonna we're gonna
open that portal. Okay, I think more than ever before
that is a possibility. Now I still think it is
a remote possibility. But I think if the power for

(33:45):
literally just created another body, right, this this new enforcement body,
this College Sports Commission, it's its oversight is only gonna
be over the money rules, right, the stuff that came
out of the settlement, and I l roster caps and
nil cap and the and the revenue sharing cap. But

(34:07):
once you create a new body, because the other thing
I would always say is why would why would you leave?
You just have to create another NC double A. Right, Well,
they just created something that took away some of the
power from the NC double A. So that seems to
be they just I think they just built an off ramp. Again.

(34:31):
I think there's a lot of complicated legal questions as
to why they might not want to take that off ramp.
But I do find the creation of the off ramp
there's also another thing going on, and I think it's
within the non FBS and non power conferences, especially the
non FBS conferences. I think there is a little bit

(34:51):
of sentiment, maybe not overwhelming, of you know what, just
go right, like at this point, maybe you should just
go now Again, I think if I think that, that's
a frustration thing, and I think if you pulled them
away and gave them, gave them a scotch and told
them to calm down, they would go, yeah, you're right,

(35:12):
Like that's not a good idea. They shouldn't just leave.
But I do think we are hitting a point where
there's enough frustration on each side where they have to
take it seriously. But I would also say this that's
not imminent. Twenty thirty two is going to be when
I think we have like a new landscape. And the
one thing I would say to both of you guys
is because people ask me all the time, where is

(35:34):
this heading? And I say, I don't know. My imagination
is not that good, Like I don't have a strong
enough like what is what is the state of higher education?
What is the state of the media, Like there are
too many outside in.

Speaker 1 (35:50):
The cable industry, Yeah, the.

Speaker 3 (35:52):
Cable there's too many things outside of college sports, influencing
the direction of college sports. What is the state of
the government that could be running parts of this at
some point. So it's hard for me to determine, because
I don't think we're on a linear trajectory.

Speaker 1 (36:11):
We might be.

Speaker 3 (36:12):
We might be on a linear trajectory where it's just, oh,
the SEC grabs a whole bunch more and the Big
ten grabs a whole bunch more, and now they're the
AFC and NFC. That's the that's the that's the linear path.
But I think it's I think it would be foolish
for us to think that there's some kind of other
disruption that's possible that creates a bend in this path,

(36:35):
A new timeline might one might say, yeah, might create
a new time, reimagined timeline.

Speaker 4 (36:40):
Reason how we can we can classify it on a
personal level, Ralph, when you are covering this story because
it is so charged and so many people care about it.
On one hand, you may have some I regret to
call them lesser conferences, but conferences with let's say, not
as much power as the Big two clearly trying to
mount something of a pr campaign turn public opinion against

(37:03):
some of these ideas that might be their best ploy
to gain some leverage. Meanwhile, you've got the Big Two
obviously they are at something of an impass as well.
How do you report this story and be accurate because
there are so many competing interests, and I mean just
from Afar, it's hard to discern who is being genuine
with what they're saying versus who is just trying to gain.

Speaker 3 (37:24):
A little bit more leverage in the court of public opinion. Yeah,
it is. It is tricky, and you find yourself my
I tend to try to take a little bit of
a less is more approach, which is a little frustrating, right,
because as a reporter, you want is I want to
get more details and more information. I want to push more, like, Okay,

(37:45):
give me what you what you think on this, Let
me get your perspective, let me get your perspective. But
because it is, it tends to be a little tinged
with well, your perspective is your is your is is
your is your spin? Right, So you want to try
to filter out some of the spin and just keep

(38:05):
it and boil it down to more narrow issues. That's why,
like where we started, I was like, here's the main thing,
here's the decision tree, So let's kind of keep it
within the realm of the decision tree. The other thing
I think you try to do is or I try
to do, is take a little bit of a step
back from the palace drama and the personality this person's upset.

(38:28):
Oh that there's you know, there's friction here, and there's
you know, discontent there. You know, like, yeah, definitely, But
how relevant is that is hard to weigh. So I
try to try to filter out some of that stuff

(38:49):
and stick to just where this is heading and the
sort of relevant facts without getting drawn into the personal
drama and who's not talking to who? Right? Who's pissed
off it?

Speaker 2 (39:01):
Wait a minute? Wait a minute, who's not talking to who?
Though no, a few years ago there was a lot
more of that. One of the I will say, like,
the people do matter here, right, If the people in
real matter, Like the fact that sank and Petiti get
along is a really big important deal. Like the fact
that the two people who probably hold the most power

(39:22):
in this situation sort of like each other and can
have like respectful conversations and respect each other's opinions. I
think is a reason why we will get to some
kind of resolution as opposed to I don't know, just
being stuck in a ditch. Well, here's the interesting thing
about them getting along specifically, so they get along, which

(39:44):
is good because they clearly have the most leverage in power.
And it's also interesting because that they have a working
relationship because behind the scenes, I'm not so sure Disney,
ESPN and Fox are completely enamored with each other. They're
obviously competing for teams and conferences and windows and ad dollars.

(40:07):
ESPN is the one right now who holds the leverage
ESPN Disney because they are the short term owner of
this playoff and the broadcast rights that they obviously have
the ability to sub license out to TNT. At this point,
what does ESPN want, Even if they're saying that's not
up to us, that's not our responsibility, what do they
actually want?

Speaker 3 (40:28):
Yeah, interesting dynamic in this, and I'm glad you got
to it because I think there is an assumption that
ESPN is the puppet master of the playoff and it
gets whatever it wants. And I very much tell you
that if there's ever been a negotiation or an event

(40:49):
that sort of belies that idea, it is this okay, folks.
I don't think ESPN wants any expansion, Like they are
running out of windows to put these games and exclusive spots.
They're another thing too, ESPN is not on the hook
to pay more money for these for more playoff games.

Speaker 1 (41:09):
Or more SEC games at this point, right, they would
be in the hook for more.

Speaker 3 (41:14):
SEC games, but I think they do kind of want
some more of the SEC games. Sure, but when you
talk about like play in games, like I think Fox
has a lot less inventory. Yep, big ten play in series. Oh,
that sounds like a cool idea, We'll do that. I
don't think the ESPN is like really dying for an

(41:34):
SEC Championship weekend with a bunch more games. You know,
they just did great numbers on the first for the
first SEC Championship game they've had in years. So I like,
like ESPN's role in this is weird because like, I
don't think they're dying for any of the things that

(41:56):
are being talked about. But they but again, they you know,
unlike what the perception is. They don't just say do
this and the and the group jumps, right.

Speaker 2 (42:09):
Is there is there conversation regarding expansion around well, the
NFL well around a schedule that requires Tuesday games, Thursday games,
Friday games, which is obviously not you know, a traditional
window for major college football games, and the unique nature
of college football as a huge sport trying its best

(42:34):
to mimic the bigger, domestic version of this sport, whereas
college baseball is different than Major League Baseball, and decidedly
so their postseason. They're you know, the format of the games,
the equipment used in the games. The NCAA tournament stands
alone with regard to you know, a one and done
basketball tournament as opposed to a series, and it's just

(42:56):
very different. The way the games are played, the way
that the postseason and now college ball is saying, we
want to get closer and closer to this thing that
is going to continue to swallow us in terms of attention.
Is their self awareness there that college football, with each
passing day is saying, let's get away from the main thing,
which I guess was bulls and try to mimic this

(43:20):
thing that's always going to dwarf us.

Speaker 3 (43:23):
So the thought process is not as philosophical as you're
making it. Okay, you are far more thoughtful.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
It's the off season yeah, thank you.

Speaker 3 (43:31):
Yeah, their issue, they're not concerned about the morphing into
the I don't think. I don't sense that there is
a real concern about morphing into the NFL and then
trying to compete against the NFL by becoming the NFL.
I think it's a much more base level problem which

(43:53):
we just referred to. Where do we play these games
so we're not being in gulf by the NFL like
it literally is just a proximity issue. We have to
create some space where we can be the thing at
a time when the NFL, which is the biggest thing,
is taking over everything. So how do we balance that

(44:17):
from a schedule perspective, where and when we play the games?
How much are we burying ourselves? How much do we
have to go head to head here? I think they've
swallowed to a certain degree. Yes, at some point we're
just going to have to eat it and go sort
of head to head against the NFL. But it also
speaks to again the ESPN issue of them going like, hey,

(44:39):
we paid one point whatever billion for this thing, and
now you're giving us games that are played against Chiefs bills,
Like that's not what we signed up for. Some of
this stuff might sort itself out by the NFL going
to an eighteen game schedule, putting in some extra buys. Now,

(45:02):
all of a sudden, the NFL goes deeper. You've created
a little more space on the calendar for college football
not to be swallowed up. So it's a logistics problem
for the college football for college football and college football playoff.
I don't think it is an existential issue to the
idea what you're talking about, Dan, in terms of what

(45:22):
do we want to be? Right?

Speaker 1 (45:24):
Is there anybody in that room thinking long term?

Speaker 3 (45:28):
Oh? I think no.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
I think there are Okay, because that's the first question, right,
If you're thinking long term, it's what do we want
to be? Where is this going?

Speaker 3 (45:36):
Yeah? No, but I think what they want to be. So,
but you have to understand part of the reason why
we switched to this expanded playoff. I like to sometimes
describe it as like this. Don't think of it as
an expanded playoff. All they did was take the BCS,
not the BCS, the the New York six games, New

(46:00):
York City. I'm already forgetting the terminology changes every few years.

Speaker 1 (46:04):
It's okay, the.

Speaker 3 (46:05):
Old New Year six games. All they did was say, Okay,
now you're playoff games, right, We just wanted to put
relevance on those games at a certain point. What they're
going to do is the Citrus Bowl, we just want
to make that relevant. Well, what if we made it
a early round playoff game when we expand to twenty

(46:27):
four at some point. Now, that's not happening anytime soon.
By the way, just to be clear to your listeners,
they're not talking about a twenty fourteen playoff, right. But
I think that's the philosophy of how do we keep
our postseason games relevant? How do we keep the race
to the postseason relevant for more and more of our schools. Well,

(46:48):
how do you do that is you just take the
bowl games and say you're a playoff game. Now that
same Iowa Tennessee game is now a playoff game. It's
a playoff game. The players show up, people are excited
about playing into it, people are excited about the result
of it. If it's just the bowl game, nobody cares

(47:10):
about the fact that you're playing to get in it. Right,
the November stretch to get to the Citrus Bowl, nobody
cares about anymore. And the Citrus Bowl itself is become
just something that like, you and I care about it
because we care about all this stuff, right, and the
betters care about it because they can bet on it.
But so I think that's the crux of playoff expansion

(47:33):
is we have all these postseason games with good teams,
with fan bases that care about those teams, but if
they're not playoff games, nobody cares about them. So what
do you do? Wave your magic wand turn into a
playoff game?

Speaker 2 (47:47):
So what's next? What is the next step on this journey?
Obviously the latest stories were just like they have thrown
up their hands and they're starting all over.

Speaker 1 (47:55):
Yeah, what is the next step? What is the next meeting? Okay, continue?

Speaker 3 (47:59):
Yeah, I'm not sure if it's a total restart, because
I don't think you're necessary. I do think you're okay sixteen.
We're kind of cool with sixteen. I don't think the
big ten is relinquishing AQ and the idea of that.
In fact, I think maybe more than ever that ends
up being and guys, I pivot every day, Like if
you called me next week, I could tell you something

(48:20):
different here. But I actually think that maybe the compromise
is because the secs there's a faction, and the faction
being the guy who leads the damn league. Greg Sanke
would so very much like to get them to go
to nine games that maybe they go, Okay, they get
to let's go to nine conference games. Will have the aqs.

(48:43):
We'll get on board with what the Big ten wants.
That gives us the protection that we want for playing
these games. It allows us to have a series with
the Big Ten, and that makes us more money too.
So I do find myself wondering if the Big Ten
might end up getting its way here, because the SEC
sees that as the better path to getting not necessarily

(49:06):
the ideal playoff, but to getting the ideal revenue generator
throughout their entire football operation. His name is Ralph Russo.
He is a senior writer for the Athletic. We'll be
watching your reporting like a North Carolina red tailed hawk. Ralph,
if it was a red tailed HOWK if it was

(49:27):
the best tail, it was the best thing you ate
in Ashville good food town. It is a good food town,
and so I will I will plug. My colleague David
Oven from the Athletic is obsessed with food to an
extent that I like, like I was a little taken aback.
Like every moment with David was either eating or talking

(49:47):
about where we were going to. Love that. Okay, so
I'm like, I'm a healthy person. I like to eat.
Like I'm Italian, I like to eat. But it was
a bit much like that, the constant steering back, because that, frankly, guys,
that's what my eighty year old parents do in Florida.
They're either eating a meal or they're talking about what
the next meal will be.

Speaker 2 (50:08):
I would I would get along with them. So well, continue,
You're going to be a great retireing. Thank you so much.
That's the best thing.

Speaker 3 (50:13):
You're going to be retiring. So the best thing I
ate was there's a place called the Liberty House Cafe.
It's a go in, order your food at the counter
and they bring it to you. It's a lovely spot
by the way garden outside seating. They do a it
seems like, I think a baked sour dough buttermilk pancake. Yep,

(50:33):
it was really really yummy. I mean it was really
really he like now again, David, most of the conversation
over the next thirty six hours was about the pana pancake.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
Yeah, the sour dough pancakes.

Speaker 3 (50:44):
I'm still getting texts about the pancake, right, it was
a real but I will say it was a really
good pancake. I have blueberries in mine. It was an
excellent pancake.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
I continue.

Speaker 3 (50:54):
I have nothing further. Okay, I have nothing further. His
name again, Ralph Russo. Find all of great work out
at the Athletic. Keep doing good things. We're gonna be
following it. We're gonna be counting on you, Ralph. Thank
you so much. Thanks guys. It was a pleasure and
an honor and all those things, and uh yeah, very
much of what Maybe maybe we can make it less

(51:14):
than ten years. We're really sure.

Speaker 1 (51:16):
Next the next pizzas on me.

Speaker 3 (51:18):
Thanks guys, all right, one more time. That is Ralph
Russo's senior reporter, senior writer for The Athletic. We're very
pleased to have him back on the show. It's been
far too long. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:30):
A lot of his work is trying to explain, like
if you were to ask somebody like, hey, real quick,
could you give me top level about the sort of
culture and geopolitics of India, You're just like, oh man,
how much time do you have? There's a lot going
on here, and I appreciate his ability to sort of

(51:51):
make sense of it all in sort of an alchemy way,
and he's making sense of something that to a lot
of people, I think ourselves included, doesn't fully makes sense.
So always great to hear his perspective on these types
of conversations, and you know, him being very patient with
me asking questions that amount to like why are we
just why are we doing this at all? And I

(52:13):
just you know, I got to get those off of
my chest.

Speaker 4 (52:15):
Something that I think is underrated. You and I both
worked in an office setting for years. Yeah, and anybody
listening to this who goes into the office or has
been in that situation is going to know exactly what
I'm talking about. But on occasion, there's a big meeting
that everybody knows about. Maybe you're not in it, but.

Speaker 3 (52:34):
All hands, all hands meeting. It's important, it's meaningful, and
there's a lot of i'll use his word, palace intrigue
around what goes on in that room, the room where
it happens. Dan, and I know from experience that being
on the outside of those meetings, when you get like
the report as to what happened it's never really that exciting. No,

(52:56):
it's really not that exciting.

Speaker 1 (52:58):
But you kind of just want to be in the room.

Speaker 3 (53:00):
I don't want to be in a room where it happens.

Speaker 4 (53:01):
It was a whole song on Hamilton, but like, it's
never quite as exciting from the outside in. And I
suspect that if you are covering this story, it's a
lot of waiting around, it's a lot of getting secondhand information.
There is probably, on some human level, an impulse to
make it a little bit more dramatic than it actually is.

(53:23):
And so I credit guys like Ralph, like Ross Dellinger,
plenty of people out there working this beat who I
think are doing a really good job, not really ginning
this up as some sort of soap opera that's for
idiots like us to do.

Speaker 1 (53:37):
Correct.

Speaker 4 (53:38):
But Ralph has done a really good job in his
own right reporting out the facts of the story, as
he said, trying to be simple with it wherever he can,
even though it is complex in its own right.

Speaker 3 (53:47):
I appreciate that style.

Speaker 4 (53:49):
Of reporting with something like this that again is charged
and could go a million different directions, and everybody's got
an opinion on it. But he does a really good job,
just sort of presenting the fat they are.

Speaker 2 (54:02):
I totally agree. I'm here for the palace intrigue.

Speaker 3 (54:05):
Though I'm down for the palace entrigue, don't get me wrong,
but I'm just saying he does beuch.

Speaker 1 (54:09):
A weird connection, not to manufacturing it.

Speaker 2 (54:11):
You know, here's a weird connection between Jim Phillips and
Greg Sank. Their daughters actually were on the same I
was like, what nobody mentioned that. I yeah, I'm here
for it because it's all entertaining to me on a
certain level. But also it is very strange because this
seems to be the one major sport that from like

(54:33):
the NFL is like, should Jalen Hurts be allowed to
be pushed from behind on fourth and short? That's like
the big off season story. From like an administrative perspective.
The NBA teams just keep on selling. But there's nothing
terribly different, and there's questions about like, oh, the NFL
might go to eight games eighteen games, or the NBA
should go back to seventy games or something like that.
But it's not a crazy postseason organizational madness meeting, right.

Speaker 3 (54:59):
I Mean, there are only the two sports that I
can think of that right now, feel like they are
hinging on decisions being made in a conference room. One
of them is golf, which we're not a golf show.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
That you're talking about, like Live and PGA and that's
all together, yeah, in and of itself, right, college football
would be the second.

Speaker 1 (55:18):
Yeah, you know, and.

Speaker 3 (55:19):
I hate it. I hate that part of it, but
that's just reality. That's where we're at.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
I just like to think about this in terms of
other sports behaving as if college football is the path forward,
where like now there's a commissioner of the National League
Central standing on the table demanding the Brewers get a spot.
It's like it's just not an issue anywhere else. And
you know, maybe that's the appeal point, you know, the
feature or bug kind of thing. But it is funny

(55:45):
to think about how insane college football has been just
changing by the way, just a preview to the preview.
A lot of this is in Bill Connelly's forthcoming book
The Last The different roads taken by various conferences in
the sport trying to organize itself every few years, which is,
you know, without a central governing body, and then various
central governing bodies coming up and falling away it's an insane,

(56:09):
insane timeline that Bill does a really good job of capturing.
So I think that's out closer to the season forward progress.
But uh, just look out for that and we'll have
Bill on closer to that point. But all is absolutely true.

Speaker 3 (56:22):
I love it well.

Speaker 4 (56:23):
Again, big thanks to Ralph for hopping on with us
here and letting us pick his brain about what's all
going down. We'll have to pay close attention to upcoming
reports if there are any. I'm assuming there will be
over the next few weeks and months. Again, that deadline
is December of the first. Speaking of deadlines, July the
first is when we are aiming to get our first

(56:46):
preview out.

Speaker 3 (56:46):
As I said at the top of the show, we've.

Speaker 4 (56:49):
Got our intro to the season. Then we're going to
dive into the Group of six. We've got two episodes
slated for Group of six, and then moving forward, we've
got three episodes for all the power conferences, sort of
the bigger picture look, the high level stuff. Then we're
gonna go into individual teams, give you a bit of
a preview there, enough to be dangerous. Again, if you

(57:11):
read your message boards or your team sites, you're always
probably gonna know your team better than us here like
bigger picture national show stuff. But we're gonna do our
part to be as comprehensive and as thorough as we
can from our little thirty thousand foot perch and hopefully
give you reasons to care, if nothing more, reasons to
care about all of these teams and conferences.

Speaker 3 (57:33):
That's what we're here for.

Speaker 4 (57:34):
Agree, Why don't we leave it there again? Big thanks
to our guest of honor today. Big thanks to you
the verballer hood for your ongoing support, Hit follow, hit subscribe,
check out verbalers dot com for that guy over there,
my good friend Dan Rubinstein Form myself Tie Hillebrand, thank
you again, Catch you all soon, Stay solid, peace,

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