College football comes at you fast. Just last month, it seemed Washington State and Oregon State were destined to be Power Five pariahs, and in one fell swoop, their resilience, tenacity, and fortitude will soon be rewarded.
As Boise State, Fresno State, Colorado State, San Diego State, and Utah State have all joined the PAC-12, the conference is now just one member short of being a full card-carrying member of the Power Five – something unfathomable just six months ago.
It begs the question, given UCLA football’s presumed mediocrity in the BIG-10 for the foreseeable future, should the Bruins strongly consider going back to their West Coast roots? After all, adding the Bruins, Stanford, Cal, and Gonzaga, and trying again for UNLV would make a ton of strategic sense.
Here are three reasons why.
UCLA Football In The PAC-12 Makes Sense
Clearer Path To College Football Playoff
The newly configured PAC-12, based on the teams mentioned above, would instantly place UCLA at the top of the food chain in a Power Five conference. At the end of the day, even in the most optimistic case of the BIG-10 getting four playoff berths a year, the Bruins would still need to beat out at least three of the following perennial powers: Ohio State, Michigan, Oregon, USC, Penn State, and Wisconsin, every year.
In years where it’s only three playoff berths, they would need to outduel at least four of those programs that have clearly prioritized football moving forward.
For an institution that’s still lukewarm on football legitimacy in the modern era, the prospect of winning the PAC-12 outright is a much easier proposition given the Bruins’ inherent resources, alumni, campus, and market advantages relative to the other 11 in the revised PAC.
Furthermore, an undefeated season, or close thereto, would even grant the Bruins a first-round bye in the 12 or 14-team CFP configurations moving forward, enabling UCLA unprecedented opportunities for that ever-elusive football success diehard fans have been yearning for over the last 25 years.
Inherent Recruiting Advantages
A platform to stay on the West Coast would grant UCLA a unique value proposition that would separate it from USC football. The Bruins could build a southern California pipeline where top recruits play as their loved ones consistently are in the stands, they would maintain weekender traditions and in-state historical rivalries with Stanford and Cal, they would be fresher with less traveled miles come college football playoff time, have a night timeslot all to themselves with the exception of a BIG-10 contest every now and again, and basketball would thrive with an in-conference rivalry against Gonzaga to compliment an annual showdown with Arizona.
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Furthermore, the perceived lack of competition wouldn’t have any negative impact on brand enhancement – more specifically, it would elevate UCLA football to a national sparkle.
Take Gonzaga basketball over the past 20 years, UNLV basketball in the early 1990s, Memphis basketball in the mid-2000s, BYU football in the 1980s, or Boise State football in the mid-2000s to mid-2010s. None of those programs played in an elite conference but still managed to acquire a national aura few of their “bigger conference” compatriots ever have.
The Money Can Close
Here’s where most arguments break down and most naysayers rise up – how do the Bruins overcome the nearly $100M in revenue from being in the BIG-10? Well, the answer isn’t as complicated or insurmountable as most have mythicized.
The Bruins would need to dust off the Apple TV interest the former PAC-12 was flirting with and negotiate a deal for $30M in base annual revenue (the same as the current BIG-12 member schools), along with a 50/50 revenue split of all additional Apple TV subscriptions garnered from football programming by each team.
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According to a Fox Sports study last year, UCLA football had approximately three million fans worldwide. If we assume even one-third of them would join Apple TV to watch the Bruins with a 50% revenue share at a $10 monthly fee for Apple TV, it would generate one million subscriptions at $5 per month yielding an additional $60M in revenue.
That would give the Bruins athletic department $90M annually and even if they reached $70M-$75M total with a discounted subscription upside, the minimized travel coupled with the additional sponsorship opportunities from consistently fielding a winner would close that business case emphatically.
So, I ask again, if the Bruins want to be a football power, they need to either put more resources in or find a more frictionless path out, why not the latter and a chance to go back home?