DALLAS (AP) — In a conference room just down the hall where the 12-team college football playoff plan was drawn up nearly 2.5 years ago, the conference commissioners overseeing the postseason system embarked on the next phase of expansion: implementation. .
The 11-member executive committee met for 4.5 hours at a Dallas-Fort Worth airport hotel on Thursday for the first time since their bosses voted last week to expand CFP from four teams to 12 teams.
For much of last fall, the frustration and anger that hung over the enlargement talks and led to a few icy meetings seem to have dissipated. The aim is to solve many problems and create a new format for the 2024 season.
It’s unclear if there’s still time for that, but at least for now, it seems like all the members are heading in the same direction.
“It’s like waiting in a long queue,” said Mike Aresko, commissioner of the American Athletic Conference. “You’re finally here and you forget to wait long.”
Critical issues that need to be addressed in order to reschedule the playoffs in two years include media rights, revenue sharing, and dealing with existing contracts with ESPN and bowl partners.
“There’s a lot of moving parts, a lot of detail,” said Mountain West Commissioner Craig Thompson. “Whatever happens, not without effort.”
But first they need to know where and when 11 playoff games can be played. Availability of venues and television time slots can determine whether early expansion is possible.
“Actually, everything falls on the calendar as if it were not on the calendar,” said CFP CEO Bill Hancock.
The steering committee, made up of 10 conference commissioners and Notre Dame’s athletic director, will meet again later this month at the Big Ten office in Rosemont, Illinois.
Last week, CFP rectors and university rectors pushed for expansion and chaired a steering committee to implement the 12-team model in 2026, but possibly in 2024.
“We’re covering everything now,” said Jim Phillips, Atlantic Coast Conference Commissioner. “24, 25, 26 years old. So it slowly came together. But I’m optimistic.”
An early extension for the 2024 and 2025 seasons was not on the table in February after months of negotiations with commissioners failed to achieve the necessary consensus.
Phillips opposed the 12-team plan last year, along with Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren and Pac-12 commissioner George Klyavkov.
Presidents have other ideas, but wasting time complicates things.
“We’re not backing down on the details,” said Southeastern Conference Commissioner Greg Sankey. “Well, now the good news is that the spirit is like, ‘Hey, we have to deal with this.’ So attention is high. Priorities are high.”
Sankey was part of a four-member subcommittee that began work on the expansion in 2019. The group met here in February 2020 to develop the 12-team plan, but the pandemic put the plan on hold and it wasn’t made public until June. 2021. .
The 12-team format has four first-round games played on or near campus about two weeks after the conference championship games, which are usually played on the first weekend of December.
The quarterfinals will be played on or around New Year’s at the bowling alley, followed by the semi-finals and a championship game in mid-January at neutral venues a week later.
Last month, CFP announced the locations of the 2024 and 2025 championship games based on the four-team model, another hurdle for changing the format.
The new format through 2026 will also mean a return to the negotiating table with ESPN, which pays approximately $470 million a year for CFP, as well as $125 million for the separate Rose Bowl, Sugar Bowl deals, and Orange Bowl.
Extending the last two years of the current 12-year deal, which will expire after the 2025 season, is estimated to generate $450 million in net income for the conferences.
The estimated value of television rights for the 12-team playoffs after 2025 is approximately $2 billion per year.
A new person has been added to the steering committee this week: In August, Brett Yormark officially replaced Bob Bowlsby as the 12th Major.
Jormark said he spent most of Thursday’s meeting asking questions.
Previously, he ran the company that operated the Barclays Center and other sports and entertainment centers in New York for 14 years. He said he didn’t know the nuances of CFP well enough to appreciate how difficult early implementation would be.
But if all stakeholders are on board, it makes a big difference, he said.
“When an event is worth it, you do anything to make it happen,” he said.
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Source: Breitbart
