If this move is a product of capitalism, then capitalism saved many of UCLA's olympic sports and will single handedly bring our athletic program out of debt.
This aging Bruin has seen his days in the sun when every move he made on and off the court made headlines in the sports world. His irreverent commentary may irk some people but his basketball knowledge is second to none still.
My freshman year at UCLA was Walton's senior year. He was frequently seen on campus with the late Dave Meyer, captain of the Bruins' 10th championship team the year after Walton graduated. We loved to chat with them. Walton usually smiled, never said much and deferred to Meyer to do the talking.
To this day, many in Oregon still appreciate him for bringing them their one and only NBA trophy.
I do want to hear from him also regarding this epic development in NCAA athletics.
Loser: Us old farts who grew up with the Bruins from the 60's with the West Coast rivalries with Stanford, Washington, and Cal, and the periodic, exciting intersectional games with Big 10 teams like Penn State, Ohio State, and Michigan. Would also be concerned about the Rose Bowl, but it's such a distant memory!
-----the UCLA football brand is not exactly the strongest thing in the world. Sure, they are a historically-strong program,-----
Under what metric has UCLA football been a historically-strong program?? Basketball yes, football, not even close!! At least Colorado and Washington have won national championships outright. In the last two decades, UCLA football has been a disaster. In the Big10, UCLA will be lucky to even be considered middle of the pack at best! The decision to move to the Big10 will bring in revenue but any hopes of winning even a Division title are practically NONE! The competition there will be brutal.
even though CU and UW have a national championship, UCLA's football program is historically stronger, if that's even saying anything. 1 national championship does not excuse decades of mediocrity. Then again, we've had our own share of mediocrity. Yay Alamo Bowl lol.
UCLA football historically has been slightly above average in the Pac10/12. Like a student that shows so much promise but fails do homework and flops during the pressure of midterms and finals! :) :) Guerrero takes a lot of blame for hiring the wrong coaches and taking forever to fire them!! Let's see who Jarmond will choose for UCLA's next football coach after Kelly!
agreed, but slightly above average in a weak conference? That's about on par with constantly fighting to crack the top 25. i.e. mediocre. Man, Guerrero was so bad.
I agree but I just read that Jarmond gave Kelly a contract extension. I am not sure that was a good move. A mediocre season gets you a four-year extension, really? May be things haven't changed that much at UCLA! :( I haven't been following sports in a couple of years. How do UCLA fans feel about this contract extension? Do you guys think Kelly is your guy going forward? Curious!
Careful what you wish for with Chip. UCLA very often gets someone worse when we fire a coach. Is Chip really an improvement over Mora? I'd kinda have rather stuck it out a few more years with Jim. Was Mora an improvement over Rick. Then there's obviously the Alford disaster.
Even if our current financial dilemma is about to go away, it still exists today. If we fired Chip, we probably would have rolled the dice with an unproven candidate.
Agree. Tough situation to be in but a 4 year extension after an 8-4 is inexcusable. 8-4 seasons get coaches fired all the time in programs that are serious about success. It sends the wrong message. It's not like other programs were begging for Kelly's services...
Well, one metric would be all-time AP Poll Rankings, since that was, historically, the most recognized ranking in college football, no?
When aggregating yearly rankings since the AP Poll began in 1936, UCLA is #18 all time (for what's its worth, we're #17 in the all-time UPI/Coaches poll rankings as well) and one of only 3 schools ever to be ranked in the AP Top 10 in EVERY decade since the poll began in the 1930's (thank you, Brett Hundley for keeping that streak alive!) along with Alabama and Notre Dame.
To be fair, while UCLA is not one of the clear top 8 "football bluebloods" (Oklahoma, Alabama, OSU, Notre Dame, Michigan, $C, Nebraska, Texas) who are all at least 100 rankings points ahead of everyone else (and the Top 5 are all over 150 points ahead of #6 $C for that matter), historically, we are clearly, solidly in the next tier of programs and just as clearly, "historically successful" compared to the vast majority of programs around the country - and, by the way, we're also one of only two schools in the all-time AP Top 25 who's program didn't begin until after WWI (along with Miami-Fla) which means the others in that Top 25 all had at least a quarter-century head start by the time we left the SCIAC and started playing a major college schedule in 1928, 8 years after varsity athletics were started at UCLA...
By the way, among what were Pac12 schools before this move, only $outhern Cal is ranked higher (#6)... UDub is #23, Stanford is #30, and Oregon is #31 with Colorado is #32 (nearly all as a member of the Big 8/12). We are also ranked higher all time than the vast majority of B1G schools - behind only "A" State University in Ohio (#3), Michigan (#5), and Penn State (#9) - much of which was achieved as an Independent - one spot ahead of Michigan State (#19) and four spots ahead of Wisconsin (#22)...
UCLA *is* a historically successfully football program - even if we've underachieved terribly compared to that historical standard in the last 20+ years since the damn wristbands and Melsby's knee being down - which is why some of us are so crabby and impatient with what we've been watching in the 21st century!
After reviewing all your claims, I concede! UCLA has underachieved the last two decades! UCLA has a decent list of historical achievements in football! I have a feeling that it was difficult for UCLA to make it back to the historical standard when you have not only USC but also Stanford and Oregon doing what they do. I think UCLA's chances in the Big10 are lower but it is up to Jarmond to make a spectacular hire after Kelly. Guerrero is gone and we'll see what the new AD will bring to the table. Good luck to you all!
Not coincidentally, UCLA football’s 20 year streak of mediocrity coincides with Dan taking over the Athletics Department. And that’s a big part of why the PAC-12 is in deep shit now.
I wrote this in the comment section on one of John Canzano’s articles, but it’s ironic that the LA schools are crying about money when it was their administration who made failed hires in the coaching department, helped enable Larry Scott and drove their revenue sports to the ground which, let’s face it, made it harder on the rest of the conference to showcase what are supposed to be all of their best brands.
The silver lining is Jarmond (to me at least) has proven to be forward thinking, and will position UCLA to capitalize on all its strengths to become a dominant athletic program again in all sports. I just wish the LA schools didn’t force something like this because of their incompetence.
LA schools crying about money? UCLA does have a deficit of 62 million or is it 102 million? but I am not sure about USC. What is true is that both programs are/were undervalued in the Pac12. Larry Scott is primarily responsible for that plus other factors (like most Pac12 schools underperforming in post season play etc). The truth is that the Big10 comes calling with nearly twice the shared revenue and it was easy for both LA schools to say yes since they were not contractually obligated to stay past 2024. Had the Pac12 been able to lure Texas and Oklahoma, we would be singing a different tune but Texas had a lucrative deal and moving to the Pac12 would not work out for them. At the end of the day, we are moving to a two super conference reality where athletes will be compensated for their talents as they should have been all along...
To clarify, I’m talking about the grumbling from USC (and UCLA?) leadership about equal revenue distribution thinking they deserved more of the pie, when they’ve been underachieving for the last 10-20 years now depending on revenue sport.
Agreed that the LA schools are worth far more…when they maximize their potential. But they shot themselves in the foot with their incompetent administrative hires, which is why we’ve only recently started to see life from their revenue sports now that Jarmond and Bohn are leading the programs.
Also, you can’t talk about other PAC-12 schools “underperforming” when the LA schools barely gave themselves a shot to be in the conversation the last 10 years because of said incompetent leadership. Stanford and Oregon dominated the 2010s and Oregon went to the Natty twice. Washington at least made the CFP.
Outside of that…what have the LA schools done exactly to warrant criticizing the other programs for not pulling their weight? At least USC won a Rose Bowl in 2017. Other than that and a decent run in the Mora era, the LA schools were miserable on the gridiron and completely dysfunctional.
If those are supposed to be the PAC-12s flagship programs, no wonder the perception of the conference—and the brand value of each school—took a hit.
And there was never going to be a Pac-16 — Texas was simply leveraging us against the Big 12 and ESPN to get their own network and a bigger piece of the revenue pie every year. That was a pipe dream.
I will say that despite his many failures, Larry was on to something with trying to go after streaming partners like Apple and Amazon, just about 15 years too early. But he was absolutely moronic not to agree with ESPN to share distribution right of P12N, if only for the more proportionate exposure we would have gotten vs the other conferences that had deals with them.
But for as badly as Larry positioned the conference in the current CFP/media paradigm, USC and UCLAs combined incompetence before Jarmond/Bohn/Folt took over their the programs positioned the Pac-12 into the next media right negotiations from a place of severe weakness.
For as…extreme…as they were, the old BN guard was right. The LA schools killed the PAC-12. They just happened to be well positioned enough for a lifeboat.
When i talk about other schools not pulling their weight, I think Cal, Arizona, ASU, WSU, OSU, CU. UW and Utah sniff a conference championship every once in awhile, but every once in awhile is the definition of mediocre.
Same could be said for a lot of the so-called dead weight in the ACC and the Big 12. Which, like us, comes down to bad leadership. I wouldn’t put Utah in there though, they were on the rise in football before all of this happened.
But that’s why it was silly for either of the LA schools to rest on their laurels. Even Keyshawn said USC got way too comfortable in recruiting and just fell back on their brand, when the product on the field didn’t match what they were selling.
You are partially correct when you look at the LA schools on field FOOTBALL only performance but there is more to it. The LA schools are worth more also because of the media market they are in. That is why the Big10 added them so quickly. At the end of the day that's what this realignment is all about. Had it been just based on football performance, UCLA would not have been invited to join the Big10 (but wait, UCLA does perform well in other sports so that makes them valuable). There are other factors to consider as well. Night games in the west coast would air at 11pm to 1pm in the east coast (I am talking about start times) etc etc. You could easily make the argument that the other Pac12 schools DIDN'T deliver the goods when they had their chance or is it supposed to be USC only in football and Arizona and UCLA in basketball? USC and UCLA are going through and have been going through down cycles (normal) but where were Oregon, Stanford and Washington bringing National Championships to the Pac12 when it was their turn....and probably those schools would have delivered had it not been for the dominance of the SEC/ACC recently...way too many factors to consider. The fact is that soon we will have two or three super conferences.
The move was a brilliant long term business decision. By 2026 the athletic department should be in the black, and then things really get interesting in terms of reinvestment for football and both basketball programs
Actually, I have a feeling we’ll be alright. If Gene Block signed off on this move, clearly someone got across to him the importance of making a move like this and what was at stake for the overall brand, athletically and academically.
Pretty sure Jarmond, with his ACC and B1G experience, was the one behind that. Which means he’ll be doing everything possible to set us up for success.
It is so sad to reminisce about this. Each new (mediocre) coach he hired actually came with fan fare and legit excitement. And it was justified by great recruiting classes in the beginning. Even Dorrell somehow managed to put together a great roster. Rick had some truly splendid recruiting classes. Mora started out hot too. And they all fizzled. Shitty coordinators.
I said before and I'll say it again to antagonize UCLA fans a little bit. UCLA is more likely to win a national championship in basketball than it is in football. With the move to the Big10, you can cement that in stone!! :) :) I am just kidding! The reality is the UCLA has it in their blood and knows the way to basketball championships. At the end of the day, I blame the fanbase!! :) :) :) Just kidding here. The fanbase allows the mediocrity to exist at UCLA. Guerrero never felt the wrath he deserved. Coaches stayed WAAAY too long...Kelly has been at UCLA 3 years too long! Bold and decisive actions needed to be taken right away but somehow the fanbase allows this to continue at UCLA. I am just rambling but what if there is some truth to what I am saying... :) That is why I started my thread by saying that UCLA has consistently underperformed in football, some took the bait and defended UCLAs performance! Anything but Rose Bowls/BCS bowls and national championships is underperforming. Having marginally winning seasons is not good enough. Beating USC is not good enough. Winning the Pac12 South is not good enough etc etc etc. Don't take less than what you can really accomplish. I am sort of kidding and in good humor. Don't want to offend anyone.
Agreed that basketball has a better chance to win a national championship, but i think this move helps footballs chances. I think this move will help recruiting big time. We will have better teams and if we get lucky and have a really good year, say finish 2nd in the Big 10, we'll have a better shot at getting into the playoff which i believe will expand. I don't think we were ever getting into the playoff unless we won the pac 12 outright with a maximum of 1 loss. With Oregon and USC in the conference, that was always going to be a tough task.
I am really not sure the recruiting will improve for UCLA. We couldn't keep Oregon out of our backyard taking a lot of our most talented players and now the BIG ONES from the Big10 will have access to our rich southern California talent. You think it was tough for UCLA to win in the Pac12 because of USC and Oregon? USC is moving to the Big10 and probably Oregon and Washington so that part of the equation doesn't change for UCLA. What does change is that now you have to compete against Ohio State, Michigan and Michigan State. Not an easy task but the money will be good, so good that Jarmond will have enough to correct the mistake he made by extending Kelly after a mediocre 8-4 season and firing him right away after 2024... :(
Loser - The Rose Bowl. At least in the sense of the traditional Pac-10/12 vs. Big 10 rivalry. I imagine they'e still going to have a Big 10 team each year, but I'm curious to see who they prioritize playing against.
Thank you for your analysis, Dimitri! Although I agree with most of your points, I think you are wrong to list UCLA Olympic sports as a winner.
First, you mention the possibility of some Olympic sports being eliminated as a consequence of UCLA's debt. You then reference Stanford's recent effort to cut 11 Olympic sports (men's and women's fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men's rowing, coed and women's sailing, squash, synchronized swimming, men's volleyball and wrestling). This deserves some context to understand clearly what Stanford attempted.
Stanford has 36 varsity sports compared to UCLA's 21. When the cuts were announced, Stanford AD Bernard Muir said "We came to this decision only [after] exhausting all other viable alternatives. It recently became painfully clear we would not remain financially stable and support 36 varsity sports at a nationally competitive level." So, to be clear, Stanford's AD insisted that cutting these programs was the ONLY viable path to financial stability. Then student-athletes, parents and alumni complained. Two lawsuits were filed. Suddenly, Stanford found a solution and all 11 programs were saved! To be fair, the miraculous survival of these sports coincided with Stanford squeezing additional funds from boosters, but the bottom line is that Stanford's AD's claim that cutting these programs was the only viable option was untrue. The claim proved to be a tool, not a goal.
Second, as San Diego State discovered, cutting programs in a manner consistent with a university's Title IX obligations is not simple and straightforward. In that regard, if UCLA were to attempt to cut some of its teams, the men's Olympic sports programs would be at far greater risk than the women's teams. With this consideration in mind, it's hard to see UCLA's women's teams as being significantly more secure in the Big Ten than in the Pac-12.
Third, in a comment in your previous blog post, I attempted to quantify the step down in quality for baseball and softball in moving to the Big Ten. Based on the metric I used, the Pac-12 is quite substantially better than the Big Ten in these two sports. Now, as you note, this may not have much of an impact in terms of UCLA's post-season seeding, but it will certainly have an impact when it comes to recruiting. If you were a softball recruit, would you be more interested in competing against Arizona, Oregon, Stanford and Washington, or would you prefer April road trips to Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana and Ohio? Recruits care about these things. If they are considering UCLA, they want to compete against the best. This consideration may work in our favor for men's basketball and football, but for many of our Olympic sports, the prospect of playing Big Ten opponents instead of Pac-12 opponents works against us in recruiting.
Lastly, to the extent that our student-athletes spend more time travelling and less time learning, the student-athletes and the university lose. For football players, this is perhaps less of a problem as they play once a week and will have about half a dozen road trips. It becomes a bigger concern for teams that play several times a week and have more road trips. It will certainly be to our benefit if UCLA can negotiate a favorable schedule to minimize the extra travel, but I don't see how additional time spent travelling can be seen as anything but a negative.
Overall, I am still struggling to see any substantial benefits for UCLA's women's teams by moving to the Big Ten. The security of these teams rests primarily with Title IX, not increased funding. Moving to the Big Ten diminishes the quality of competition and consequently the appeal of our program to recruits. Additional travel time is a negative for all student-athletes.
I concede that, in principle, our men's non-revenue sports *could* be somewhat more secure against threats of elimination with additional revenue for UCLA Athletics. However, given the historical incompetence in the financial management of the department, and given the fact that Olympic sports have seen no substantial benefit from past revenue boosts, it's difficult to imagine a change in the balance between revenue and non-revenue sports in the budget process. The security of these programs rests with competent financial management and recognition of the value of these programs beyond the revenue they produce.
Our non-revenue sports are only more secure until the next financial catastrophe inevitably hits the Morgan Center. UCLA athletics may be able to receive a huge windfall, but unless it fundamentally changes its ways, it's just going to dig a new hole.
The thing that really aggravates me is all of the Pac12 schools have multi billion dollar endowments, they could easily spend the pittance required to keep their programs successful if they had the will. I wonder how much of Riley's salary is paid by Caruso and how much by the University.
the big ten cannot add stanford unless its understood they would not play football in a 50k seat stadium. stanford has to add a tier or something like that, as ND did (beautifully I might add) or agree to play at Levi Stadium whenever a real team shows up. incidentally the small stadium size - commensurate with lack of interest - is a big part of the reason you'd look first to UW for another add.
stadium size will have nothing to do with it. The school won't even have that much to do with it. The draw to UW is the Seattle media market. Bay Area is also a good media market though, and the Big 10 would not say no to a market because a stadium only has 50k. Wouldn't even be the smallest, or second smallest, in the Big 10.
That said, if more schools bail the Pac 12, i think they are going to the Big 12. Merger with ACC more likely though.
Stadium size has almost nothing to do with it and neither does performance - its almost all about market size. Rutgers' on-campus stadium capacity is 52,454 and Stanford's is 50,424 and Rutgers has been terrible at football forever - I think the last "national title" or only #1 ranking they've ever achieved was after they won the first college football game ever played over Princeton in 1869 - at least for one week until they lost the rematch! BUT they bring the NYC/NJ media market so they got a golden ticket...
I also said "almost all" because, as much as some on this board may discount it or "pooh-pooh" it, the B1G actually does factor in whether a school is a Tier 1 research university and a member of the AAU - traditionally, the Pac has factored that in as well, which was one of the things that has always gotten in the way of San Diego St or any CSU getting in, even when SDSU was playing in an NFL stadium and in a far larger market than Corvallis or Pullman...
Not to reiterate what I speculated in an earlier discussion, but I think Stanford is a decent bet to join the B1G but only if Notre Dame comes as well. That scenario might lead to UDub and Oregon getting a lifeline to get to 20. The other "direction" could be ND & Stanford + some combination of UNC/UVa/GaTech (who seem to be the best potential fits with the B1G) or all three of those and not Stanford to get to 20. If ND keeps delaying a decision (and remember, if NBC steps up & they can still have a path to the CFP, whatever that becomes then ND has the leverage here), and no one can work out the Grant of Rights with the ACC, then I'd bet the B1G will hang at 16, not split the broadcast $ any further, and see what the next moves are.
Why the dismal 2023 to date? Aren't Mick and UCLA a sexy and desirable enough program? If just one commits, then I think it will snowball, but jeepers, we've got to nab that one!
Short answer is NIL. UCLA is only now getting a collective put together for basketball, because the AD has been really active in discouraging any potential formation of one up to this point out of some misplaced fear of the NCAA (hint: the NCAA will not do anything about this because they don't want to get taken to the cleaners in court again). It's basically made it hard to be competitive when other schools can offer money above the table. The new collective should go a long way towards fixing this, but UCLA is more than behind the curve on this front.
Given that I'm a dinosaur with a correspondingly small brain, I can't navigate the current landscape where recruits prioritize dollars, shoes and pt to determine their destination. How long do you project the Bruins to be behind the curve?
If this move is a product of capitalism, then capitalism saved many of UCLA's olympic sports and will single handedly bring our athletic program out of debt.
it's 2022, are we still talking about carbon foot prints? 'Cmon man. Let's stick to sports.
Loser - Bill Walton - The former conference of champions!
totally agree, but from Bill's perspective (I think) UCLA leaving for Big-10 is a loser.
the Big 10 will just become the new conference of champions when he's on the air
Please leave Bill alone.
This aging Bruin has seen his days in the sun when every move he made on and off the court made headlines in the sports world. His irreverent commentary may irk some people but his basketball knowledge is second to none still.
Hi Henry - I love Bill too. I'm truly interested in what he thinks about this.
My freshman year at UCLA was Walton's senior year. He was frequently seen on campus with the late Dave Meyer, captain of the Bruins' 10th championship team the year after Walton graduated. We loved to chat with them. Walton usually smiled, never said much and deferred to Meyer to do the talking.
To this day, many in Oregon still appreciate him for bringing them their one and only NBA trophy.
I do want to hear from him also regarding this epic development in NCAA athletics.
he's a national treasure
All good except I despise effing Norte Dame, I hope they do go ACC. I hope Bill Walton will continue to do Ucla games.
Loser: Us old farts who grew up with the Bruins from the 60's with the West Coast rivalries with Stanford, Washington, and Cal, and the periodic, exciting intersectional games with Big 10 teams like Penn State, Ohio State, and Michigan. Would also be concerned about the Rose Bowl, but it's such a distant memory!
can still brag to all the USC alumni we work with. They are everywhere, alas. Also lots of Michigan alumni on the west coast.
-----the UCLA football brand is not exactly the strongest thing in the world. Sure, they are a historically-strong program,-----
Under what metric has UCLA football been a historically-strong program?? Basketball yes, football, not even close!! At least Colorado and Washington have won national championships outright. In the last two decades, UCLA football has been a disaster. In the Big10, UCLA will be lucky to even be considered middle of the pack at best! The decision to move to the Big10 will bring in revenue but any hopes of winning even a Division title are practically NONE! The competition there will be brutal.
even though CU and UW have a national championship, UCLA's football program is historically stronger, if that's even saying anything. 1 national championship does not excuse decades of mediocrity. Then again, we've had our own share of mediocrity. Yay Alamo Bowl lol.
UCLA football historically has been slightly above average in the Pac10/12. Like a student that shows so much promise but fails do homework and flops during the pressure of midterms and finals! :) :) Guerrero takes a lot of blame for hiring the wrong coaches and taking forever to fire them!! Let's see who Jarmond will choose for UCLA's next football coach after Kelly!
agreed, but slightly above average in a weak conference? That's about on par with constantly fighting to crack the top 25. i.e. mediocre. Man, Guerrero was so bad.
I agree but I just read that Jarmond gave Kelly a contract extension. I am not sure that was a good move. A mediocre season gets you a four-year extension, really? May be things haven't changed that much at UCLA! :( I haven't been following sports in a couple of years. How do UCLA fans feel about this contract extension? Do you guys think Kelly is your guy going forward? Curious!
Careful what you wish for with Chip. UCLA very often gets someone worse when we fire a coach. Is Chip really an improvement over Mora? I'd kinda have rather stuck it out a few more years with Jim. Was Mora an improvement over Rick. Then there's obviously the Alford disaster.
Even if our current financial dilemma is about to go away, it still exists today. If we fired Chip, we probably would have rolled the dice with an unproven candidate.
Agree. Tough situation to be in but a 4 year extension after an 8-4 is inexcusable. 8-4 seasons get coaches fired all the time in programs that are serious about success. It sends the wrong message. It's not like other programs were begging for Kelly's services...
Well, one metric would be all-time AP Poll Rankings, since that was, historically, the most recognized ranking in college football, no?
When aggregating yearly rankings since the AP Poll began in 1936, UCLA is #18 all time (for what's its worth, we're #17 in the all-time UPI/Coaches poll rankings as well) and one of only 3 schools ever to be ranked in the AP Top 10 in EVERY decade since the poll began in the 1930's (thank you, Brett Hundley for keeping that streak alive!) along with Alabama and Notre Dame.
To be fair, while UCLA is not one of the clear top 8 "football bluebloods" (Oklahoma, Alabama, OSU, Notre Dame, Michigan, $C, Nebraska, Texas) who are all at least 100 rankings points ahead of everyone else (and the Top 5 are all over 150 points ahead of #6 $C for that matter), historically, we are clearly, solidly in the next tier of programs and just as clearly, "historically successful" compared to the vast majority of programs around the country - and, by the way, we're also one of only two schools in the all-time AP Top 25 who's program didn't begin until after WWI (along with Miami-Fla) which means the others in that Top 25 all had at least a quarter-century head start by the time we left the SCIAC and started playing a major college schedule in 1928, 8 years after varsity athletics were started at UCLA...
By the way, among what were Pac12 schools before this move, only $outhern Cal is ranked higher (#6)... UDub is #23, Stanford is #30, and Oregon is #31 with Colorado is #32 (nearly all as a member of the Big 8/12). We are also ranked higher all time than the vast majority of B1G schools - behind only "A" State University in Ohio (#3), Michigan (#5), and Penn State (#9) - much of which was achieved as an Independent - one spot ahead of Michigan State (#19) and four spots ahead of Wisconsin (#22)...
UCLA *is* a historically successfully football program - even if we've underachieved terribly compared to that historical standard in the last 20+ years since the damn wristbands and Melsby's knee being down - which is why some of us are so crabby and impatient with what we've been watching in the 21st century!
After reviewing all your claims, I concede! UCLA has underachieved the last two decades! UCLA has a decent list of historical achievements in football! I have a feeling that it was difficult for UCLA to make it back to the historical standard when you have not only USC but also Stanford and Oregon doing what they do. I think UCLA's chances in the Big10 are lower but it is up to Jarmond to make a spectacular hire after Kelly. Guerrero is gone and we'll see what the new AD will bring to the table. Good luck to you all!
Not coincidentally, UCLA football’s 20 year streak of mediocrity coincides with Dan taking over the Athletics Department. And that’s a big part of why the PAC-12 is in deep shit now.
I wrote this in the comment section on one of John Canzano’s articles, but it’s ironic that the LA schools are crying about money when it was their administration who made failed hires in the coaching department, helped enable Larry Scott and drove their revenue sports to the ground which, let’s face it, made it harder on the rest of the conference to showcase what are supposed to be all of their best brands.
The silver lining is Jarmond (to me at least) has proven to be forward thinking, and will position UCLA to capitalize on all its strengths to become a dominant athletic program again in all sports. I just wish the LA schools didn’t force something like this because of their incompetence.
LA schools crying about money? UCLA does have a deficit of 62 million or is it 102 million? but I am not sure about USC. What is true is that both programs are/were undervalued in the Pac12. Larry Scott is primarily responsible for that plus other factors (like most Pac12 schools underperforming in post season play etc). The truth is that the Big10 comes calling with nearly twice the shared revenue and it was easy for both LA schools to say yes since they were not contractually obligated to stay past 2024. Had the Pac12 been able to lure Texas and Oklahoma, we would be singing a different tune but Texas had a lucrative deal and moving to the Pac12 would not work out for them. At the end of the day, we are moving to a two super conference reality where athletes will be compensated for their talents as they should have been all along...
To clarify, I’m talking about the grumbling from USC (and UCLA?) leadership about equal revenue distribution thinking they deserved more of the pie, when they’ve been underachieving for the last 10-20 years now depending on revenue sport.
Agreed that the LA schools are worth far more…when they maximize their potential. But they shot themselves in the foot with their incompetent administrative hires, which is why we’ve only recently started to see life from their revenue sports now that Jarmond and Bohn are leading the programs.
Also, you can’t talk about other PAC-12 schools “underperforming” when the LA schools barely gave themselves a shot to be in the conversation the last 10 years because of said incompetent leadership. Stanford and Oregon dominated the 2010s and Oregon went to the Natty twice. Washington at least made the CFP.
Outside of that…what have the LA schools done exactly to warrant criticizing the other programs for not pulling their weight? At least USC won a Rose Bowl in 2017. Other than that and a decent run in the Mora era, the LA schools were miserable on the gridiron and completely dysfunctional.
If those are supposed to be the PAC-12s flagship programs, no wonder the perception of the conference—and the brand value of each school—took a hit.
And there was never going to be a Pac-16 — Texas was simply leveraging us against the Big 12 and ESPN to get their own network and a bigger piece of the revenue pie every year. That was a pipe dream.
I will say that despite his many failures, Larry was on to something with trying to go after streaming partners like Apple and Amazon, just about 15 years too early. But he was absolutely moronic not to agree with ESPN to share distribution right of P12N, if only for the more proportionate exposure we would have gotten vs the other conferences that had deals with them.
But for as badly as Larry positioned the conference in the current CFP/media paradigm, USC and UCLAs combined incompetence before Jarmond/Bohn/Folt took over their the programs positioned the Pac-12 into the next media right negotiations from a place of severe weakness.
For as…extreme…as they were, the old BN guard was right. The LA schools killed the PAC-12. They just happened to be well positioned enough for a lifeboat.
When i talk about other schools not pulling their weight, I think Cal, Arizona, ASU, WSU, OSU, CU. UW and Utah sniff a conference championship every once in awhile, but every once in awhile is the definition of mediocre.
Same could be said for a lot of the so-called dead weight in the ACC and the Big 12. Which, like us, comes down to bad leadership. I wouldn’t put Utah in there though, they were on the rise in football before all of this happened.
But that’s why it was silly for either of the LA schools to rest on their laurels. Even Keyshawn said USC got way too comfortable in recruiting and just fell back on their brand, when the product on the field didn’t match what they were selling.
You are partially correct when you look at the LA schools on field FOOTBALL only performance but there is more to it. The LA schools are worth more also because of the media market they are in. That is why the Big10 added them so quickly. At the end of the day that's what this realignment is all about. Had it been just based on football performance, UCLA would not have been invited to join the Big10 (but wait, UCLA does perform well in other sports so that makes them valuable). There are other factors to consider as well. Night games in the west coast would air at 11pm to 1pm in the east coast (I am talking about start times) etc etc. You could easily make the argument that the other Pac12 schools DIDN'T deliver the goods when they had their chance or is it supposed to be USC only in football and Arizona and UCLA in basketball? USC and UCLA are going through and have been going through down cycles (normal) but where were Oregon, Stanford and Washington bringing National Championships to the Pac12 when it was their turn....and probably those schools would have delivered had it not been for the dominance of the SEC/ACC recently...way too many factors to consider. The fact is that soon we will have two or three super conferences.
No arguments there.
exactly. Hopefully a modicum of competence from Jarmond will do wonders. Nice start on the B1G move.
The move was a brilliant long term business decision. By 2026 the athletic department should be in the black, and then things really get interesting in terms of reinvestment for football and both basketball programs
well, i have no doubt that the athletic department will dig itself a new hole.
Actually, I have a feeling we’ll be alright. If Gene Block signed off on this move, clearly someone got across to him the importance of making a move like this and what was at stake for the overall brand, athletically and academically.
Pretty sure Jarmond, with his ACC and B1G experience, was the one behind that. Which means he’ll be doing everything possible to set us up for success.
It is so sad to reminisce about this. Each new (mediocre) coach he hired actually came with fan fare and legit excitement. And it was justified by great recruiting classes in the beginning. Even Dorrell somehow managed to put together a great roster. Rick had some truly splendid recruiting classes. Mora started out hot too. And they all fizzled. Shitty coordinators.
I said before and I'll say it again to antagonize UCLA fans a little bit. UCLA is more likely to win a national championship in basketball than it is in football. With the move to the Big10, you can cement that in stone!! :) :) I am just kidding! The reality is the UCLA has it in their blood and knows the way to basketball championships. At the end of the day, I blame the fanbase!! :) :) :) Just kidding here. The fanbase allows the mediocrity to exist at UCLA. Guerrero never felt the wrath he deserved. Coaches stayed WAAAY too long...Kelly has been at UCLA 3 years too long! Bold and decisive actions needed to be taken right away but somehow the fanbase allows this to continue at UCLA. I am just rambling but what if there is some truth to what I am saying... :) That is why I started my thread by saying that UCLA has consistently underperformed in football, some took the bait and defended UCLAs performance! Anything but Rose Bowls/BCS bowls and national championships is underperforming. Having marginally winning seasons is not good enough. Beating USC is not good enough. Winning the Pac12 South is not good enough etc etc etc. Don't take less than what you can really accomplish. I am sort of kidding and in good humor. Don't want to offend anyone.
Agreed that basketball has a better chance to win a national championship, but i think this move helps footballs chances. I think this move will help recruiting big time. We will have better teams and if we get lucky and have a really good year, say finish 2nd in the Big 10, we'll have a better shot at getting into the playoff which i believe will expand. I don't think we were ever getting into the playoff unless we won the pac 12 outright with a maximum of 1 loss. With Oregon and USC in the conference, that was always going to be a tough task.
I am really not sure the recruiting will improve for UCLA. We couldn't keep Oregon out of our backyard taking a lot of our most talented players and now the BIG ONES from the Big10 will have access to our rich southern California talent. You think it was tough for UCLA to win in the Pac12 because of USC and Oregon? USC is moving to the Big10 and probably Oregon and Washington so that part of the equation doesn't change for UCLA. What does change is that now you have to compete against Ohio State, Michigan and Michigan State. Not an easy task but the money will be good, so good that Jarmond will have enough to correct the mistake he made by extending Kelly after a mediocre 8-4 season and firing him right away after 2024... :(
Loser - The Rose Bowl. At least in the sense of the traditional Pac-10/12 vs. Big 10 rivalry. I imagine they'e still going to have a Big 10 team each year, but I'm curious to see who they prioritize playing against.
In that respect, the Rose Bowl died a long time ago. Are we even going to have bowls 5 years from now?
Thank you for your analysis, Dimitri! Although I agree with most of your points, I think you are wrong to list UCLA Olympic sports as a winner.
First, you mention the possibility of some Olympic sports being eliminated as a consequence of UCLA's debt. You then reference Stanford's recent effort to cut 11 Olympic sports (men's and women's fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men's rowing, coed and women's sailing, squash, synchronized swimming, men's volleyball and wrestling). This deserves some context to understand clearly what Stanford attempted.
Stanford has 36 varsity sports compared to UCLA's 21. When the cuts were announced, Stanford AD Bernard Muir said "We came to this decision only [after] exhausting all other viable alternatives. It recently became painfully clear we would not remain financially stable and support 36 varsity sports at a nationally competitive level." So, to be clear, Stanford's AD insisted that cutting these programs was the ONLY viable path to financial stability. Then student-athletes, parents and alumni complained. Two lawsuits were filed. Suddenly, Stanford found a solution and all 11 programs were saved! To be fair, the miraculous survival of these sports coincided with Stanford squeezing additional funds from boosters, but the bottom line is that Stanford's AD's claim that cutting these programs was the only viable option was untrue. The claim proved to be a tool, not a goal.
Second, as San Diego State discovered, cutting programs in a manner consistent with a university's Title IX obligations is not simple and straightforward. In that regard, if UCLA were to attempt to cut some of its teams, the men's Olympic sports programs would be at far greater risk than the women's teams. With this consideration in mind, it's hard to see UCLA's women's teams as being significantly more secure in the Big Ten than in the Pac-12.
Third, in a comment in your previous blog post, I attempted to quantify the step down in quality for baseball and softball in moving to the Big Ten. Based on the metric I used, the Pac-12 is quite substantially better than the Big Ten in these two sports. Now, as you note, this may not have much of an impact in terms of UCLA's post-season seeding, but it will certainly have an impact when it comes to recruiting. If you were a softball recruit, would you be more interested in competing against Arizona, Oregon, Stanford and Washington, or would you prefer April road trips to Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana and Ohio? Recruits care about these things. If they are considering UCLA, they want to compete against the best. This consideration may work in our favor for men's basketball and football, but for many of our Olympic sports, the prospect of playing Big Ten opponents instead of Pac-12 opponents works against us in recruiting.
Lastly, to the extent that our student-athletes spend more time travelling and less time learning, the student-athletes and the university lose. For football players, this is perhaps less of a problem as they play once a week and will have about half a dozen road trips. It becomes a bigger concern for teams that play several times a week and have more road trips. It will certainly be to our benefit if UCLA can negotiate a favorable schedule to minimize the extra travel, but I don't see how additional time spent travelling can be seen as anything but a negative.
Overall, I am still struggling to see any substantial benefits for UCLA's women's teams by moving to the Big Ten. The security of these teams rests primarily with Title IX, not increased funding. Moving to the Big Ten diminishes the quality of competition and consequently the appeal of our program to recruits. Additional travel time is a negative for all student-athletes.
I concede that, in principle, our men's non-revenue sports *could* be somewhat more secure against threats of elimination with additional revenue for UCLA Athletics. However, given the historical incompetence in the financial management of the department, and given the fact that Olympic sports have seen no substantial benefit from past revenue boosts, it's difficult to imagine a change in the balance between revenue and non-revenue sports in the budget process. The security of these programs rests with competent financial management and recognition of the value of these programs beyond the revenue they produce.
Our non-revenue sports are only more secure until the next financial catastrophe inevitably hits the Morgan Center. UCLA athletics may be able to receive a huge windfall, but unless it fundamentally changes its ways, it's just going to dig a new hole.
The thing that really aggravates me is all of the Pac12 schools have multi billion dollar endowments, they could easily spend the pittance required to keep their programs successful if they had the will. I wonder how much of Riley's salary is paid by Caruso and how much by the University.
the big ten cannot add stanford unless its understood they would not play football in a 50k seat stadium. stanford has to add a tier or something like that, as ND did (beautifully I might add) or agree to play at Levi Stadium whenever a real team shows up. incidentally the small stadium size - commensurate with lack of interest - is a big part of the reason you'd look first to UW for another add.
stadium size will have nothing to do with it. The school won't even have that much to do with it. The draw to UW is the Seattle media market. Bay Area is also a good media market though, and the Big 10 would not say no to a market because a stadium only has 50k. Wouldn't even be the smallest, or second smallest, in the Big 10.
That said, if more schools bail the Pac 12, i think they are going to the Big 12. Merger with ACC more likely though.
Stadium size has almost nothing to do with it and neither does performance - its almost all about market size. Rutgers' on-campus stadium capacity is 52,454 and Stanford's is 50,424 and Rutgers has been terrible at football forever - I think the last "national title" or only #1 ranking they've ever achieved was after they won the first college football game ever played over Princeton in 1869 - at least for one week until they lost the rematch! BUT they bring the NYC/NJ media market so they got a golden ticket...
I also said "almost all" because, as much as some on this board may discount it or "pooh-pooh" it, the B1G actually does factor in whether a school is a Tier 1 research university and a member of the AAU - traditionally, the Pac has factored that in as well, which was one of the things that has always gotten in the way of San Diego St or any CSU getting in, even when SDSU was playing in an NFL stadium and in a far larger market than Corvallis or Pullman...
Not to reiterate what I speculated in an earlier discussion, but I think Stanford is a decent bet to join the B1G but only if Notre Dame comes as well. That scenario might lead to UDub and Oregon getting a lifeline to get to 20. The other "direction" could be ND & Stanford + some combination of UNC/UVa/GaTech (who seem to be the best potential fits with the B1G) or all three of those and not Stanford to get to 20. If ND keeps delaying a decision (and remember, if NBC steps up & they can still have a path to the CFP, whatever that becomes then ND has the leverage here), and no one can work out the Grant of Rights with the ACC, then I'd bet the B1G will hang at 16, not split the broadcast $ any further, and see what the next moves are.
Great work, Dimitri. Thanks for keeping us up to date with all of this.
Off topic.
Class of 2023 might be a loser.
29 offers and no commits.
BRO did not mince words on this topic. It does look bleak as you said.
Wow. I get it's only July but to have no one at all is pretty concerning. Wonder what's behind all that.
TBH I started listening to the recent reporting podcast, got pretty discouraged, and turned it off.
Why the dismal 2023 to date? Aren't Mick and UCLA a sexy and desirable enough program? If just one commits, then I think it will snowball, but jeepers, we've got to nab that one!
Short answer is NIL. UCLA is only now getting a collective put together for basketball, because the AD has been really active in discouraging any potential formation of one up to this point out of some misplaced fear of the NCAA (hint: the NCAA will not do anything about this because they don't want to get taken to the cleaners in court again). It's basically made it hard to be competitive when other schools can offer money above the table. The new collective should go a long way towards fixing this, but UCLA is more than behind the curve on this front.
Thanks, DD.
Given that I'm a dinosaur with a correspondingly small brain, I can't navigate the current landscape where recruits prioritize dollars, shoes and pt to determine their destination. How long do you project the Bruins to be behind the curve?
queue the purists crying that they don't want student athletes who are in it for the money. We are UCLA -- we are better than that!
guess it will be a transfer season
Per SI, 7 of the 9 class of 2023 guards UCLA has offered have committed elsewhere, whereas 8 of the 21 wings and bigs with offers are unavailable.