Happy July 4th! As you get your day started or as you ready for fireworks if you're reading this later in the day, I thought you would enjoy a little discussion on conference expansion.

 

Ah, yes, conference expansion. That topic you thought was left behind when West Virginia fled a sinking BIG EAST to join the prestigious Big 12. Well it's back.

 

Oklahoma President David Boren stirred things up again this week when he publicly stated his desire for the Big 12 to expand. Boren also took a thinly veiled shot at rival Texas and the fledgling Longhorn Network by saying “The elephant in the room remains the network south of us that has struggled and has in a way as long as it’s there,” Boren said. “And we have done quite well with our network and if anything ever changed, it has value to it, which we see. But someday, maybe we’ll get past that other problem as well. It’s a problem.”

 

Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby says there is no appetite among league members to expand at this time. So far, all of the league presidents and AD's have toed the company line publicly. Side note: keep in mind though, when you get 10 strong-willed leaders in a room there is going to be disagreement. Despite what they say publicly, you can bet some (we now know of at least one) schools are interested in adding schools.

 

All of this expansion talk is interesting. In my mind, it's a weird narrative that has popped up nationally around this topic, and the Big 12 specifically.

 

The Big 12 has suddenly been thrust into the role of "weakest Power 5 school" by many in the national media. How did that happen? How did we get here?

 

Is it simply because no Big 12 teams made the first college football playoff? Is it because the Big 12 is the smallest of the Power 5's with only 10 schools? Is it a combination of those things?

 

West Virginia thought it was leaving those conversations behind when it paid $20 million to leave the old BIG EAST and join the Big 12. National respect for the league and therefore, WVU, was thought to follow instantly. No more worrying about defending the school or the football program when it came to questions of "well, who did you play?" This was the big time. Texas, Oklahoma and others in the Big 12 would provide WVU with a seat at the big boy table.

 

Now a mere four years later and here we go again. Talk that the Big 12 is the least stable, least respected Power 5 is a topic of conversation.

 

How many times over the years did you have to defend West Virginia and the BIG EAST when it came to discussions about college football powers? Almost constantly, right? Certainly during the regular season. Thankfully, BCS wins over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl, Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl and Clemson in the Orange Bowl helped back the argument that West Virginia was big-time regardless of what you thought of the BIG EAST as a whole.

 

Now, incredibly, we seem to be going down the same road perception-wise. Is expansion the way out of this situation? Will adding Cincinnati and BYU instantly change the perception that the Big 12 isn't up to par with the other Power 5 leagues?

 

This is where I get lost in the conversation. That argument makes no sense to me. I like the way the Big 12 does things now. I'm a huge fan of playing every team in the league. I know the Big 12's tagline, One True Champion, turned into a punchline last year, but quite frankly it fits. If you play everyone else in the league it's pretty obvious who the league champion is.

 

Why don't the other leagues get criticized for NOT playing everyone else in the league? How can you really determine a true league champion if you haven't played everyone. This seems so logical to me, yet I rarely, if ever, hear anyone criticize other conferences for not having games against every team in the league.

 

Is expansion the right path to follow for this league? We've heard a bunch of candidates thrown out when it comes to expansion: Cincinnati, UConn, UCF, USF, Memphis and BYU to name a few.

 

I'll say it again … for the life of me I can't understand how adding any of the above mentioned schools makes the Big 12 a better league, particularly in football.

 

One of the strengths of the league is its depth in football and basketball. Take football...Yes, Kansas is bad right now. Iowa State is struggling as well. Outside of that, you've got a really balanced league and have two of the top 4 teams in nearly every major preseason poll heading into the 2015 season.

 

Plug in any of the teams above and tell me how that changes the league for the better. BYU could fit into the category of 'other.' Not bad like KU, but far from elite like a Baylor. In my opinion, you will a collective 'meh' from the rest of the country if the Big 12 adds any of those teams.

 

Now, if you want to begin to build a case that the Big 12 needs to add schools (and more specifically TV markets), in order to start a Big 12 Network, then I'll change my tune a little. This to me is where the discussion about expansion makes sense and has a place.

 

Rather than me taking up the space here to explain this idea/concept, I encourage you to read this article by Clay Travis, http://foxs.pt/1RWd0id.

 

This to me is the way in which you can begin to discuss expansion. If viewed the prism of financial gain, and let's be honest here, that's basically what college sports have become about these days, expansion makes some sense.

 

If suddenly you get paid based on the number of people in a market, rather than a TV network's arbitrary appraisal of a particular school, I see some value in adding Memphis, a Florida school or Cincinnati.

 

To steal Boren's line, the elephant in the room when it comes to the topic of a Big 12 network, is Texas. What would it take for them to give up on the Longhorn Network? Money is the easy answer. The longer, more difficult answer is: how do they get the money back they would lose by doing away with the Longhorn Network? Does every school in the Big 12 have to kick a part of its profits back to Texas as Travis' article suggests? I can't imagine other school presidents and AD's are going to like the option of kicking some of their profits up the line to Texas.

 

History has shown us, when leagues have members that have their own deals, separate from the rest of the league, you've got trouble. You may not see it initially, but it's there. You saw it with the BIG EAST, you will most likely see it somewhere down the line with the ACC and their side deal with Notre Dame and you will most likely see it in the Big 12 with Texas. Side deals create hard feelings. Hard feelings create problems.

 

In fact, given David Boren's comments earlier this week, I think you can argue you're already starting to see the hard feelings bubbling back to the surface.

 

What does it mean for West Virginia? Maybe nothing right now. But, bad relationships rarely improve themselves over time. They generally get worse. OU fired the first shot. Stay tuned for what comes next.

 

If the Big 12 expands, what team would you like to see included. Leave a comment below or tweet me @bradhowe07.

 

Editor's Note: Top photo shows new WVU Athletic Director Shane Lyons who will likely be in the middle of any league expansion talks, while the distinct Big 12 logo is shown in the end zone at Mountaineer Field. In the third photo, the Big 12 has added new revenues to help with improvements to the Coliseum, which may not have been possible with the revenue that was left from the dying Big East Conference. In the bottom photo, former AD Oliver Luck is shown. It was Luck that helped WVU get into the Big 12. All photos by www.benqueenphotography.com.