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Yup. I wonder if most SEC fans realize that they’re subscribing to the groomer network to get their games. The main function of the SEC in today’s media ecosystem is to drive subscriptions and generate a huge passive income stream to the worst of woke Hollywood. Disney/ESPN doesn’t care about the integrity of the sport any more than it cares about making quality films; it’s all about clicks.

The way the college game now works, tv money calls the shots. If Disney wants to do SEC-MCU tie-ins, maybe an expanded universe, ESPN and the SEC would jump right in. Alabama can wear Spiderman themed uniforms. LSU gets Black Panther and can rename its stadium Wakanda. The “champion” gets to wear its choice of Captain America, or if that is too patriotic for the leftist faculty and students, Iron Man. Think of the theme park and merch potential.

The ESPN buttboys will run SEC commercials right up until the day that contract expires. Then Disney will get into a huge bidding war for a piece of the BIG tv package, and the SEC will be shopped around to the highest bidder.

The BIG footprint is bigger and the television package is richer. Maybe the BIG’s next expansion targets should be Florida, Texas, Georgia and LSU. Alabama is a low population flyover state. Maybe the SEC could be emptied to the point that ‘Bama could be competitive again.

Oh well. There should be no three loss teams in the playoff. None. Period. Because that opens the door wide to brand bias, and the tv networks are in charge of that.

The SEC brand sniffers will always conjure reasons why a three loss SEC team should be included over a worthy one or two loss team from one of the lesser conferences. (Or an independent.) That raises the other side of the playoff selection issue: if the playoff isn’t going to be locked into a brand-driven battle of the two superconferences, with everyone else shut out, teams with really outstanding records in lower-status, lower-tv ratings conferences have no way of playing themselves into the discussion.

The BIG and the SEC seem clearly to want to go the superconference route. That could work. But to do it right, CFB would have to be restructured to resemble European soccer, with a hierarchy of tiered leagues, relegation and promotion. Let the bottom four BIG and SEC teams each season get cut, drop to a lesser league, and take their chances of playing their back up in time. But if there is one certainty in CFB today, the people in charge won’t do it right. They’ll just take the biggest check.

Hyperbole aside (and here, hyperbole may be about ten years ahead of reality), college football is destroying itself. It is now running on fumes, with older fans drunk on nostalgia suspending disbelief and pretending that they are still watching college sports. That won’t last long.

P.S. The BIG is just as bad; it’s run by a bunch of money grubbing whores who sold out college athletics long ago. If there’s a difference, the BIG is so BIG that its tv package is split among different carriers. That gives it a little broader perspective.