If you've been following college sports realignment than you know that San Diego St was part of a package deal with Boise St to become football only members of the Big East Conference. Since then the Big East has lost Automatic Qualifying status to the BCS, which is being replaced by a 4-team playoff and a system of "access" bowls, as well as a few members--Rutgers to the Big Ten, Louisville to the ACC, and the seven non-football schools to a new yet-to-be named conference. After considering all of this and the travel subsidies that they were going to have to pay the Big West for being their conference of convenience Boise st opted to renig on the Big East and stay in the Mountain West, which gave them a sweetheart deal to stay.
Part of the deal the MWC made with Boise St is that San Diego St has the right-of-first-refusal until January 31st. What this deal didn't specify was what terms the MWC had to offer San Diego St. So San Diego St is sitting in limbo. The MWC schools are being childish and trying to take the Aztecs to the cleaners for their transgressions (which Boise St encouraged them to make but somehow has gotten forgiven for).
San Diego is stuck in this bad situation where they are stuck in between the Big East and Mountain West. The Big East deal wasn't incredibly awful for SDSU. It meant paying a ton to fly the football team to the other side of the country but in the long run the athletic department was set to save $100,000 a year compared to what they would pay as an all sports member of the MWC by having the rest of their sports in the Big West which is essentially a California bus league (+Hawaii).
San Diego St is in a position where the MWC makes the most sense but the MWC has opted to be dicks about the situation and make San Diego St pay for a move that was ultimately Boise's idea. Where on the other side you have Mike Aresco of the Big East begging you to stay in his league.
Personally I would like to see the MWC wisen up, drop the air of pretension and recognize that SDSU is essential to the health of the MWC. San Diego is one of the MWC's biggest television markets so it makes sense to hold onto the Aztecs. Also, it seems in poor taste to be creating bad blood with San Diego St. If these schools are going to coexist peacefully in the same league then they need to drop the threats of not admitting SDSU and let them in and waive their MWC exit fees and MWC entrance fees. Leaving the Aztecs in the Big East is bad for business. A Jilted Aztec program is going to be looking to get back at the MWC and potentially deprive it of Frenso St or UNLV by working with the Big East and Big West to bring them into a football membership in the former and all sports member of the later.
No comments:
Post a Comment