Jon Wilner says ACC reticence is hurting Stanford and Cal two ways: in not getting ACC money and in not getting B1G money. The two are twinned. The Bay schools would have a better chance at the B1G if they had invites from the Slave States. Fox [B1G network] came up with the cash for Oregon and UW only when they had a contract offer from the Pac-12.
Perhaps it would do the same if the Bears and Cardinal were on the brink of entering the ACC.
They’re close. Four schools reportedly oppose invitations: Clemson, Florida State, North Carolina and N.C. State. If just one relents, the Bay Area schools are in. But that foursome will be a difficult bloc to break.
So subtitle this post Leadership, for here we come back to the B1G difference between the ACC and B1G. The B1G pounces, they don't analyze and paralyze. If Jim Phillips had control of his conference and wanted to become the Academic Conference the deal would be signed now and announced after, depriving the B1G of the title.
Wilner reminds of another minor factor. Per the state Board of Regents which controls the California University System that includes both Berkeley and UCLA, the latter have to indemnify the former for some lost revenue occasioned by UCLA's move to the B1G:
...the Berkeley tax, the so-called Cal-imony.
The regents retained the authority to force UCLA to subsidize the Bears, with payments ranging from as little as $2 million annually to as much as $10 million. ...
If Cal doesn’t gain membership in the ACC or Big Ten, its revenue will crater and you can bet the regents will impose the top end of that subsidy.
UCLA has a lot riding on Cal’s landing spot and, we presume, is maneuvering to get the Bears into either the ACC or Big Ten.
So which conference do you imagine UCLA would push more for? A move to the B1G would be a haul for Stanford's and Berkeley's student-athletes, which is my dominant concern, but still much less a haul than the ACC would be.
