Well part of my new Job, I get access season tickets to Michigan I will be at the opener on Saturday. I am pumped for one reason, Brock Mealer is going to walk the team out of the tunnel. Brock suffered a major spine injury, and was told he would never walk again. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmT_IRmvtyM Take a look!!!!
LOL Did you see how they split up the big ten this morning? Big complaining over the Michigan and Ohio State rivalry. As for Germ very cool indeed and who do they play for the opener? Ben=ND? Oh boy!
As long as they preserve the Ohio St/Mich rivalry with them playing every year (setup much like the SEC with a yearly rival in the other division), what does it matter that they are split up?
Phil my bad they might get to play each other 2 times which is cool it sucks for Wisconsin. Damn old age blows!
The geographic east/west divisions would of made much more sense IMO. East: OSU PSU Mich MSU Purd Ind West: Neb Iowa NW Wisco ILL Minn Now you preserved the rivalries without having to use up one of your crossover games as locked game. Just my 2 cents.
The biggest reason they didn't want to put OSU and UM in the same division is because they couldn't play in the conference championship game. They are historically the two best teams in the conference, by far. It is the only conference rivalry that gets national attention, and now they could play in back to back games. I think its great. "Commissioner Jim Delany said creating football divisions with competitive balance was the top priority and No. 2 was maintaining a cross-division rivalry game for each team.Commissioner Jim Delany said creating football divisions with competitive balance was the top priority and No. 2 was maintaining a cross-division rivalry game for each team." Money is the top priority, and he knows it. Its why he split OSU and UM.
So they set up the whole conference based on the two top (historically) teams and they want them to play the last game every year but hope they play again in the conference championship? If what you are saying will take place and both teams will have their division locked up already when they play the first time. Then all you are going to have is the first time they meet (last game of the season) during the regular season not meaning much other than bragging rights. Both coaches will be concentrating on the conference championship and not that final game. It's idiotic if you ask me.
Its all about money. You can't pick any two other teams from the conference and get close to the same ratings. Now they could play two national televised games, back to back. You know they will hype a "rematch" when it happens. Money, money, money.
If you did it my way tell me there would not be extremely competitive balance since 1993 (which was when PSU joined the Big Ten was their benchmark starting date for the seeds). If you look back, either Michigan or OSU has been very strong. Rarely have they finished 1-2 since then. I think my way actually provides better balance.
I don't buy that quote from Delaney. I think he listed priorities 2 and 3. The best possible scenerio (read: money) for the conference is to have OSU and UM play each other in the conference game. After they split those two, they tried to figure everything out from there. Penn State is the only other team that has national relevance. If they play OSU or UM, you still won't get the same ratings.
I do love it, and I understand its about money. I never said the money thing was bad. I think its smart of them to make money the top priority.
The problem is we probably won't see those "huge ratings" for a few years until UM gets it act together and gets rid of RR. By then the Big Ten could very well be 16 teams and a completely different divisions.
I am going to make a prediction we do not see an OSU/Mich title game before 2015. Maybe longer. Also I am going to say it only happens at most every 3 years after that. If I am right and it happens are rare as I think it will, this is an epic fail in terms of money. If I'm wrong and they both win their division regularly, then it is a success (I guess).
I think what is going to happen is the Big Ten will end up with 16 teams in the next 5 years. They are going to see how this works and then re-evaluate this then depending on who else joins. I'm actually overall fine with it but think they could of done a lot better. I think it would be neat if OSU and Mich were bitter rivals in their own division. I feel strongly that the final regular season game when they both their divisions are locked up is going to be a joke. Maybe they should have Mich/OSU play earlier in the season which would prevent this?
