Subject: Friendly Caution from Big 12 Territory

Dear Mr. Slive,

I did a bit of online research to find your contact info. As a company officer and equity owner, I seek and crave feedback and opinion from my customer base about the performance of my company so we can make improvements. So I felt that in your role as SEC Commissioner you might be interested in my thoughts as a consumer of your product, fellow business leader and member of your target audience.

I reside in the heart of Big 12 territory (Austin, Texas) and am a passionate college football fan. I also frequently travel in the southeast and elsewhere around the country on business and love talking football while not working. So l always enjoy watching the top tier SEC teams in action, especially when playing head to head or in matchups with other conferences and during bowl season.

The reputation of the SEC as the nation’s best collection of teams is well deserved. But the halo of being the best conference is tarnished by the mediocre (at best) performance and questionable judgment of SEC officials. Fan bases around the country are beginning to deride the officiating of SEC games and making comparisons to televised wrestling matches. When obvious calls are ignored, missed or poorly handled it detracts from the quality of the product you are putting on the field and sullies the outcome of the games. And when the poor handling of the games seemingly favor a particular team or teams it really draws attention. Even the national media seems to be picking up on this. In fact articles and comments I noted on Sports Illustrated and CBS Sportsline this morning prompted this note.

It is genuinely sad to see the play on the field between great teams overshadowed by the officiating crew and creating the perception that there is a preferred outcome to these match-ups. One would expect a demand for excellence in every phase of your operations. I suggest and recommend you take a more aggressive approach to policing the performance of your officiating crews. Otherwise fans may begin turning off the SEC games and questioning whether the top teams in the conference really deserve their rankings.

Sincerely,