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Post by n00b on Mar 11, 2023 16:11:09 GMT -5
This just seems like backward thinking to me. I think it’s simply wrong that something “for the fans and media” isn’t also inherently “for the benefit of the teams themselves”. Doing things for the fans is how you grow the game. It seems like there is a segment of volleyball fans who would prefer to be a niche Olympic sport like field hockey. I don't think it's necessary to play a large amount of conference tournaments with 4 matches in 4 days to grow the sport. I believe it's growing fine without it. I think it's fairer to say I'd prefer the team I root for not to be forced to play in a conference tournament. I'm not interested in it. I also don't think it's necessary in the top conferences. But if the smaller conferences want to do it, have at it. I don't think that's going to grow the sport one way or another, but I don't think those conferences are going to produce teams that go on deep runs for the most part anyway, or if they do, they're going to dominate in the conference tournament just like they did in the regular season. I don't know how much benefit conference tournaments actually give fans and media, either. How much benefit does it bring to the Big East? When I talk about being "for the fans and media" I'm not saying it's to their benefit necessarily. I'm saying that's the only potential benefit, since it is not to the teams' benefit, and it may not be to their benefit, either. It's not to my benefit as a fan. I know that. Again, I'd say the exception is the Big 10. I could see a conference tournament for them creating a lot of excitement. But I don't think it would move the needle much in the ACC, SEC, or Big 12. I don't know what to think about the PAC. There are some existential issues there. And I continue to disagree. Do we think all of these men’s and women’s basketball players dislike conference tournaments? I don’t get why athletes wouldn’t want an extra weekend of win or go home pressure. And for what it’s worth, only teams who don’t finish in the top 4 would have to play more than 3 matches to win the tournament.
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Post by mervinswerved on Mar 11, 2023 16:19:53 GMT -5
FWIW, I think FOX would cover the hell out of the B1G tournament. Depending on dates/times, could see at least one match on big FOX. ESPN would likely get very into the SEC/ACC, as well. Maybe something similar to their very good coverage of the women's ACC tourney now.
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Post by slxpress on Mar 11, 2023 16:52:49 GMT -5
I don't think it's necessary to play a large amount of conference tournaments with 4 matches in 4 days to grow the sport. I believe it's growing fine without it. I think it's fairer to say I'd prefer the team I root for not to be forced to play in a conference tournament. I'm not interested in it. I also don't think it's necessary in the top conferences. But if the smaller conferences want to do it, have at it. I don't think that's going to grow the sport one way or another, but I don't think those conferences are going to produce teams that go on deep runs for the most part anyway, or if they do, they're going to dominate in the conference tournament just like they did in the regular season. I don't know how much benefit conference tournaments actually give fans and media, either. How much benefit does it bring to the Big East? When I talk about being "for the fans and media" I'm not saying it's to their benefit necessarily. I'm saying that's the only potential benefit, since it is not to the teams' benefit, and it may not be to their benefit, either. It's not to my benefit as a fan. I know that. Again, I'd say the exception is the Big 10. I could see a conference tournament for them creating a lot of excitement. But I don't think it would move the needle much in the ACC, SEC, or Big 12. I don't know what to think about the PAC. There are some existential issues there. And I continue to disagree. Do we think all of these men’s and women’s basketball players dislike conference tournaments? I don’t get why athletes wouldn’t want an extra weekend of win or go home pressure. And for what it’s worth, only teams who don’t finish in the top 4 would have to play more than 3 matches to win the tournament. Yeah, I don't think I'm looking for agreement on this as much as a polite sharing of views.
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Post by slxpress on Mar 11, 2023 16:54:47 GMT -5
FWIW, I think FOX would cover the hell out of the B1G tournament. Depending on dates/times, could see at least one match on big FOX. ESPN would likely get very into the SEC/ACC, as well. Maybe something similar to their very good coverage of the women's ACC tourney now. I will point out there's less competition for bandwidth at this time of year than there is in November/December. But yeah, I do feel like a Big 10 conference tournament would generate a great deal of excitement from all stakeholders. Maybe that leads to something.
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Post by JT on Mar 11, 2023 17:08:27 GMT -5
so each team would play one of the other teams twice? and it still wouldn't be a "pure" champion, as it could still be unbalanced as far as who got home matches against other top teams compared to who had to go on the road Yeah, my math was off by one, but you get the gist. Play each team once. Along with who you played at home (or away) versus other teams' schedules, with 15 matches, half of the B1G teams would play 8 home and 7 away matches, while the other half would play only 7 home, and 8 away matches. Not at all balanced. (Heck, even a double round robin has balance issues... though I don't know that you can readily get a closer to balanced arrangement than that, without shrinking down to a 6-team conference, so you play everybody else 2x at home, and 2x away, allowing you to better balance for when and where each team plays the others.)
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trojansc
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Post by trojansc on Mar 11, 2023 17:44:19 GMT -5
I really would have liked to see the SEC/PAC/Big 10 tournament teams in a tournament this past year particularly because of their bubble teams, particularly ones who could have made a big push at the end.
P5 bubble teams/bubble-SEED teams have a ton of upside in these tournaments. Yes, it's true they can lose to a lower ranked team (though that could happen if they had normal scheduled games anyways), they just have way more upside than anyone else that outweighs that negative when looking at the big picture/# of teams.
The best teams from the non-P5/top conferences are generally the ones who have no upside and can get hurt. There are some scenarios though where there are two teams in a weaker conference who get benefitted by a conference tournament, especially when they only take like 6 teams and they can get an extra Top 50 win and possibly steal an at-large berth. Only one off the top of my head is James Madison/College of Charleston situation a few years back, but, I'm sure there's more examples.
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Post by bbg95 on Mar 11, 2023 19:59:26 GMT -5
I really would have liked to see the SEC/PAC/Big 10 tournament teams in a tournament this past year particularly because of their bubble teams, particularly ones who could have made a big push at the end. P5 bubble teams/bubble-SEED teams have a ton of upside in these tournaments. Yes, it's true they can lose to a lower ranked team (though that could happen if they had normal scheduled games anyways), they just have way more upside than anyone else that outweighs that negative when looking at the big picture/# of teams. The best teams from the non-P5/top conferences are generally the ones who have no upside and can get hurt. There are some scenarios though where there are two teams in a weaker conference who get benefitted by a conference tournament, especially when they only take like 6 teams and they can get an extra Top 50 win and possibly steal an at-large berth. Only one off the top of my head is James Madison/College of Charleston situation a few years back, but, I'm sure there's more examples. Yeah, at least when it comes to basketball, a bubble team losing in the first round of one of the stronger conference tournaments isn't really what keeps them out. The real issue is that they don't improve their resume, while other bubble teams in other conferences do, so they can end up slipping to the wrong side of the bubble because they get passed (and there are also bid thieves). But as you said, they have a huge opportunity to pick up another key win or two.
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Post by big10+4 fan on Mar 11, 2023 20:13:55 GMT -5
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Post by jagdpanther on Mar 11, 2023 20:44:58 GMT -5
FWIW, I think FOX would cover the hell out of the B1G tournament. Depending on dates/times, could see at least one match on big FOX. ESPN would likely get very into the SEC/ACC, as well. Maybe something similar to their very good coverage of the women's ACC tourney now. Why would FOX have the slightest interest in this other than by default because they're the most powerful TV partner of the Big Ten starting next season? This is a popular sport, but that's a very relative term. FOX, CBS, and NBC are not going to disrupt routine programming for something like this. At best it'd be almost entirely on their streaming services with *maybe* the semis but probably the final on regular TV.
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Post by bbg95 on Mar 11, 2023 21:50:26 GMT -5
FWIW, I think FOX would cover the hell out of the B1G tournament. Depending on dates/times, could see at least one match on big FOX. ESPN would likely get very into the SEC/ACC, as well. Maybe something similar to their very good coverage of the women's ACC tourney now. Why would FOX have the slightest interest in this other than by default because they're the most powerful TV partner of the Big Ten starting next season? This is a popular sport, but that's a very relative term. FOX, CBS, and NBC are not going to disrupt routine programming for something like this. At best it'd be almost entirely on their streaming services with *maybe* the semis but probably the final on regular TV. FOX is the majority owner of the Big Ten Network. I thought he meant that it would be on that channel, not on FS1 (or maybe just the title game).
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bluepenquin
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Post by bluepenquin on Mar 12, 2023 8:00:55 GMT -5
This would be smart move by the Big Ten IMO. 15 game conference season - with a conference tournament to end the season. They could make this into a big profit making event (that will continue to grow - and grow the sport) - much like the ACC did in basketball many decades ago. SEC should follow suit once Vandy is up. Another smart move by the Big Ten - play non conference matches during the 'conference season' - which a 15 game season would allow. 16 team conference is setup great for this (balanced regular season conference schedule - full conference tournament). I am guessing players and coaches would love this (we already know at least one coach does). Related - adding USC/UCLA with a regular 20 match conference season may do weird things to those previous RPI's and impact tournament seedings and bids. Be pro-active.
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Post by mervinswerved on Mar 12, 2023 8:11:01 GMT -5
FWIW, I think FOX would cover the hell out of the B1G tournament. Depending on dates/times, could see at least one match on big FOX. ESPN would likely get very into the SEC/ACC, as well. Maybe something similar to their very good coverage of the women's ACC tourney now. Why would FOX have the slightest interest in this other than by default because they're the most powerful TV partner of the Big Ten starting next season? This is a popular sport, but that's a very relative term. FOX, CBS, and NBC are not going to disrupt routine programming for something like this. At best it'd be almost entirely on their streaming services with *maybe* the semis but probably the final on regular TV. I said FOX because FOX has the B1G rights. Networks are constantly looking for live programming. I would expect every match of a B1G tournament on some combination of FS1/2/BTN linear networks. If it goes well (and I think it's likely it would), a match on broadcast, too.
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Post by n00b on Mar 12, 2023 8:45:16 GMT -5
This would be smart move by the Big Ten IMO. 15 game conference season - with a conference tournament to end the season. They could make this into a big profit making event (that will continue to grow - and grow the sport) - much like the ACC did in basketball many decades ago. SEC should follow suit once Vandy is up. Another smart move by the Big Ten - play non conference matches during the 'conference season' - which a 15 game season would allow. 16 team conference is setup great for this (balanced regular season conference schedule - full conference tournament). I am guessing players and coaches would love this (we already know at least one coach does). Related - adding USC/UCLA with a regular 20 match conference season may do weird things to those previous RPI's and impact tournament seedings and bids. Be pro-active. A 15-match conference season seems like a lot of lost revenue for the programs that sell out their arenas. Power 5 coaches recently led the push to change the match limit to 32 matches instead of 28 dates so they could play more. But now Shondell thinks they are playing too much? I didn’t know there was a movement to play less 2 matches per week. That seems unnecessary to me.
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Post by Brutus Buckeye on Mar 12, 2023 8:58:49 GMT -5
Fwiw, Volleyball is the only Big Ten sport without a post-season Conference Tournament of some sort.
I wonder how they exempted themselves from a seemingly conference-wide mandate?
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Post by n00b on Mar 12, 2023 9:16:13 GMT -5
Fwiw, Volleyball is the only Big Ten sport without a post-season Conference Tournament of some sort. I wonder how they exempted themselves from a seemingly conference-wide mandate? I doubt it’s a mandate. For some reason volleyball coaches are the only ones who fail to see the value in it.
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