@Wild Turkey
I'll just leave this from The Athletic to wrap this up on my end. Please feel free to show how all this is wrong and Duke will earn its way into the SEC:
How nervous should we Duke fans be re: re-alignment? There is very little to do, but reading the tea leaves it seems that Duke is more likely to be on the outside looking in (of the two mega conferences) once it all shakes out. Besides the financial hit that would imply, I would hate to lose out on so many rivalry games. What’s your read/feeling regarding Duke’s standing? — Jose C.
You said it, Jose, not me. But you’re right. Conference realignment, at present, isn’t tracking in a way that favors the Blue Devils.
Without rehashing too many details, this latest round of realignment — spurred by Texas and
Oklahoma’s move to the SEC, and further amplified by
USC and
UCLA joining the Big Ten — is all about television revenue. Currently, the SEC and Big Ten outpace every other major conference in that regard … and it’s not super close. Through its contract with ESPN, each SEC member school received an average distribution of $54.6 million for the 2020-21 fiscal year, according to financial disclosure forms. During the same time frame, FOX paid Big Ten members an average distribution of $46.1 million. Then there’s the ACC, whose member schools received a comparatively-low $36.1 million average distribution, despite record revenue as a result of
Notre Dame’s temporary, COVID-19-induced conference membership.
I’m no math whiz, but even I know that lagging $10-18 million per year behind your conference counterparts probably isn’t best for business.
And that’s just the deficit before the SEC and Big Ten get their megabucks media contracts in 2024, too. It’s not inconceivable, based on
estimates provided to The Athletic, that in the next decade, those two superconferences will be paying their member schools annual distributions double (or even triple) what the ACC is.
The reason for the gap is obvious: each league’s football prowess (or lack thereof). Football is king in the modern media landscape;
NFL games top the totem pole of live TV events that command major viewership, but college football isn’t far behind. No surprise, then, that networks pay by the boatload for that inventory. But what about men’s basketball, Duke fans will ask. The sad truth is, even a men’s basketball brand as valuable as Duke’s doesn’t stack up in the broader college sports universe. Duke basketball generated about $22.5 million dollars during the 2020-21 fiscal year, per tax documents — more than half of which (roughly $12.5 million) Mike Krzyzewski earned in salary and deferred payments — but that’s pennies compared to even middling college football programs. For reference: Duke’s rival, North Carolina, saw its football program generate roughly $44.4 million in revenue over that same 2020-21 fiscal year. Obviously, Duke men’s basketball is, and historically has been, a more successful and notable program than UNC football … and yet, it almost got doubled up revenue-wise all the same. That is why football is king, and why Duke finds itself in such a perilous position.
Television revenue is tied to success, obviously, but it’s also tied to viewership. They’re not mutually exclusive, either; you can have success without crazy viewership (hello,
Wake Forest), same as you can have bad teams with rabid fan bases (looking at you,
Washington State). The most valuable programs have both. Duke, unfortunately, has neither.
Per my colleague Andy Staples, no ACC school participated in fewer games from 2015-19 and 2021 with over one million viewers than Duke did. (For reference,
Clemson topped that list with 34 such games, to give you a quantitative idea of how far apart the two programs are.) It’s not a stretch to say that Duke, which has gone 10-25 the last three seasons, is arguably the ACC’s least-valuable football program. Athletic director Nina King is doing the right things and committing resources to improve that, but it’s not an overnight fix. That’s bad news during conference realignment, where only schools who provide more value than their expected annual media rights distribution will be sought-after by the SEC or Big Ten. Ideally, Duke’s men’s basketball team is the sort of cherry on top that entices a conference to add a member … but not if that potential member is a net-negative in football. Unfortunately, any way you shake the basketball side of things, it’s a nonstarter as long as football lags so far behind.
With all that in mind, what happens with Duke? For the time being, probably nothing. The ACC’s grant of rights runs through 2036, meaning every member school’s media rights are basically locked until then. Without exaggeration, it’s the only thing keeping the conference together. But it’s also in Duke’s best interest that things stay that way, because the alternative isn’t ideal. Just look to the Pac-12 for proof; USC and UCLA were deemed valuable enough to be poached, which, great for them. But look at the Pac-12 schools left behind, from Oregon and Washington down on to Oregon State and Cal. They’re left scrambling, suddenly down their two most lucrative league partners and without clear direction of what’s next. Do they try adding teams, none of whom carry UCLA or USC’s cachet, to rebuild their conference? Or read the writing on the walls and bail for greener pastures, if that’s even feasible? Now re-think that situation, except sub “Clemson and UNC” for “USC and UCLA” — and then sub the leftovers for the ACC’s. It’s not a place Duke wants to be, that’s for sure.
If there’s any silver lining here, it’s that time seems to be on Duke’s side. The ACC grant of rights might eventually be challenged in courts, but that’s months or even years away; there’s a reason Oklahoma, Texas, USC, and UCLA all decided to wait theirs out until 2024, rather than leave early and risk a costly, uncertain litigation. But with each passing year, the cost of leaving early drops, and the incentive to join the SEC or Big Ten grows — and eventually, someone will be tempted enough by the money to take that gamble in court. Duke has that much time, however long it ends up being, to get its football program back on an upward trajectory. That (and continued men’s basketball excellence) is the best hope for the Blue Devils landing on their feet when the conference realignment dust settles.
Brendan Marks answers subscribers' questions about the Blue Devils, including what to expect from Dereck Lively II and the transfers.
theathletic.com