re: Halfway to Realignment Status Report

I think the small conferences made out like bandits. they were never aiming for a shot at the national title, but they got something better: a guaranteed slot in one of the major bowls. Sure, only one Group of 5 team goes, but it is guaranteed one goes, which is a much better situation than before, or any point in college football history. They have access to the money pipe, albeit on a restricted basis. But it's better than they had, and they have a locked in place at the table. That's a huge deal for the smaller programs.

I'm not sure ESPN is a big loser in the current makeup. I won't speculate about the future, but ESPN essentially controls every major conference team EXCEPT the Pac-12, and that's the conference dying on the vine. They own virtually every bowl and they own the most powerful conference network (SECN). They also just created their ESPN+ model which will put all of the games behind a pay wall. People will buck, and then eventually pay because if we're serious about cutting the cord, ESPN+ is obviously the future, and it maintains a revenue stream. The network is reasonably priced, and it has a massive inventory of virtually every NCAA game. And it's still cheap than GamePlan used to be, by several orders of magnitude. And with more selection.

Amazon and Netflix don't have live TV yet. Maybe they will in five years, as Hulu is now in the game. But the streaming services have not shown they can do live TV, much less sports. ESPN+ has a huge leg up on them. I won't say it can't happen in five years because the world changes fast, but I do think we might be speaking ESPn's eulogy far too early. They are still the most powerful force on college sports.