Jon Joseph

Charles, thanks for another great editing job. Looking at schedules and the odds, I think OBD, Ohio State, and Penn State will all return to the playoff, with at least one of the three having a 1st round bye and a good chance for the other two to host 1st round games. Many PO projections have No. 10 Miami playing No. 7 Oregon in Autzen. 😁 The B1G multi-million dollar question is whether the B1G will repeat with four teams in the PO field? Illinois returns 16 and not 18 (my bad) starters. Indiana has plugged its personnel losses through the portal. We may witness an unofficial playoff play-in game when Illinois travels to Bloomington in Week 4. The Illini will have played a tough out-of-conference game at Duke. Indiana will have chomped down on three cupcakes. Two things stood out to me from the first day of B1G media days. Cignetti justifying dropping a home-and-home series vs. UVA and replacing the Cavaliers with a G5 donut hole as being 'SEC-like scheduling.' CFB still relies on humans to determine the at-large playoff participants, no? The playoff committee last season was dumped on by the SEC and the SEC's buddy, ESPN, for giving a spot to an Indiana team that had a weak SOS. Do Cig's comments help the Hoosiers' playoff 2025-26 cause? Illinois in 2024 was the antithesis of USC, going 5-1 in one-score games. Will the ball bounce Illinois' way back-to-back? The schedule helps. Illinois plays Purdue, Rutgers, Maryland, and rival Northwestern, a B1G scheduling Superfecta, and plays USC and Ohio State at home. No OBD, Penn State, Michigan on the schedule. In addition to the game at Indiana, road games at Duke and UW will not be easy wins. Illinois does have an off week before traveling to Seattle, while UW plays at Michigan the week before. This does not thrill UW coach Jedd Fisch. (The other coach whose comments were not in line with preseason coach-speak was Maryland's Mike Locksley, repeatedly admitting that he 'lost the locker room in 2025.' Lost it because there was friction between the NIL Haves and Have Nots. WOW!) If Michigan can figure out the QB position, the Blue (fitting) Chip Roster Wolverines have a schedule to make the playoffs. Michigan has a Week 2 marquee OOC game at Oklahoma. Win this game, and the nation will notice a Wolverines team that would be 3-0 in its last three games against SEC opponents. In the conference, Michigan draws Purdue, Northwestern, and Maryland, and misses OBD, Penn State, Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa. The Blue play UW, Wisconsin, and Ohio State in Ann Arbor. Games at Michigan State, Nebraska, and USC could be challenging. It would be something for OBD to join the three B1G brand names in the 2025-26 playoffs.

If you boil down all of Petitti's and Sankey's PO discussion, this is about the Big Ten playing nine conference games and the SEC and ACC playing eight conference games. Petitti has all but said that if the SEC plays nine conference games, the B1G will support the 5-11 model in some fashion. In addition to the SEC playing nine, I think Tony wants significant changes to the selection and seeding process. With huge money at stake, I imagine we will see some compromise between the Power 2. But 16 teams in 2026? It will be difficult for the SEC to unwind current out-of-conference schedules by 2026. Sankey is more likely to back the B1G AQ model than Petitti is to go 5-11 without the SEC at nine conference games. I thought that Game of Thrones had no new episodes? 😁

Great point. Riley was also shored up by having one of two Blue Chip rosters in the B12, and Texas not having its Sierra together. On the other hand, and I don't like giving Riley another hand, last season USC went 1-5 in one-score games. Conversely, 10-win Illinois went 5-1 in one-score games. I think SC has a good shot at going 9-3 this season and possibly 10-2. Michigan, Michigan State, and Iowa play SC in LA. SC is odds-on to lose in South Bend and Eugene, but has a shot of winning road games at Illinois and Nebraska. SC will be odds-on to win games vs. Missouri State, Georgia Southern, Purdue, Michigan State, Northwestern, and UCLA. SC was 4-2 at home last season, with a loss in OT to Penn State and two late in the 4th quarter 90+ yards pick-sixes versus Notre Dame. SC put up more yards against Notre Dame in 2024 than any other Irish opponent. The bowl win over an A&M team that had a 17-point lead late in the 3rd quarter was a terrific comeback victory that will help with QB Jayden Maiava's confidence coming into 2025. Last season, Riley too often went away from a very good run game, but did not do so versus A&M. In 2025, SC plays three teams: Michigan, Notre Dame, and OBD, with rosters equal to or better than the Trojans Blue Chip roster. In the penultimate game in the 2025 regular season, SC could be coming into Eugene in contention for a PO spot.

Thanks, 30. The valuation of a team's worth included a separate valuation for football revenue. One B1G problem is that the folks who put this together included the 2023 COVID season, a season when the B1G only played six games. Thus, the revenue numbers for football are skewed in favor of the SEC. An interesting exercise by amateurs and not by a private equity group.

No surprise that Tony Petitti's opening statement today mirrored his interview with Yahoo Sports that NJ Duck was good enough to post. I missed a call from Brother Charles, who left a message questioning, in particular, why fans would support PO play-in games when their team could have already secured one of The B1G's four automatic PO qualifying bids. Would fans support a system where a team could play the same conference opponent four times in a season? Both are excellent questions that I will try to answer. First, some context. College football (CFB) has seen more change in the last five years than in the prior 100 CFB seasons. The biggest change to the 'student-amateur-athlete' paradigm came recently when the House settlement was approved, with schools now able to pay athletes directly. The cap on direct revenue sharing in year one post-settlement is $20.5 million. OBD is blessed to be one of the very few schools to have an athletic department in the black. The majority of athletic departments, if they were stand-alone businesses, would be functionally insolvent. So, the most pressing question for college athletic departments is 'how do we bring in more dough?' In theory, the B1G's 4-4-2-2-1-3 16-team PO format (B1G format) would provide three additional sources of football revenue. The media, in this case Disney/ESPN, will pay more for a 16-team PO inventory than for the current 12-team inventory. With AQs in place, Petitti believes schools will schedule more challenging out-of-conference games, which in turn would mean more media income. No doubt a Football Challenge between the B1G and the SEC would generate significant revenue. Teams would not be penalized for scheduling and losing games such as Texas vs. Ohio State, Oklahoma vs. Michigan, and Alabama vs. Wisconsin, scheduled in 2025. Play-in games would be decided only on in-conference game results. Rivalry games would be played in the penultimate game of the regular season. In my earlier example of what the play-in games would have been in 2024, I erred in using 12-game regular-season records and not the standings after the 8th conference games were played. The conference schedules in 2024, after eight conference games were played, would have had No.1 Oregon vs. No. 2 Penn State, with both teams automatically qualifying for the PO regardless of the score of the Conference Championship game. The first-place and second-place teams would be in the PO. The champ game result could affect seeding but not PO participation. No. 6 Iowa would have played No. 3 Indiana. No. 5 Illinois would have played No. 4 Ohio State. The winner of these two games would advance to the PO. These three games would not have included a rematch. It's possible but unlikely that teams would play one another three let alone four times. The PO committee would determine the PO seeding, but the B1G would decide on the four AQ teams and their B1G seeding. This would be the case for the other three power conferences. The PO committee would not be able to change the order in which B1G teams were seeded by the conference, but of course, could change where teams are seeded one through sixteen. Three impactful flex-scheduled games played on the final week of the regular season would generate far more dollars than one championship game played a week after the conclusion of the regular season. Four teams would be in the mix for the final two AQ PO spots. In addition to the increased media revenue, play-in games would help level the in-conference scheduling in a given season. In 2025, a sixth-place Wisconsin, with the most difficult conference schedule, would have a shot at the PO. Nebraska and OBD's relatively easy 2025 conference schedules will be more difficult down the road. Not sold? I get it! A 12-team PO in 2025-26, this time with teams seeded as ranked by the committee, is just as likely as expanding the field to 14 or 16 teams. Petitti, in his opening remarks today, made it clear that a 16-team 5-11 format is not going to happen unless all of the Power conferences play nine conference games.

Thanks, NJ, for posting Tony Petitti's thoughts on the future PO format. Tony is being skewered for his 'radical' format, but IMO, he makes perfect sense. Also, he is not opposed to, for example, a 5-11 format if the Power 4 conferences all play nine conference games—an entirely reasonable condition. In the NFL, every team plays 17 conference games; half of the league does not play a USFL opponent in the penultimate week of the regular season. This is the case for NFL teams currently playing in a weaker division, as well as the teams playing in the toughest division. In 2025, one SEC team, Florida, plays 11 Power 4 opponents. Two SEC teams, Alabama and South Carolina, play 10 P4 teams. 13 B1G teams play 10 P4 opponents. At least the 16-team SEC has title success to support its staying at eight, the 17-team ACC has Clemson in the PO era, and that's it. I know that many on the OBD Forum do not like the idea of PO play-in games. Allow me to explain why I think play-in games make sense. 1st - Teams in 1st and second place, the penultimate week of the regular season, are in the PO no matter the winner of the game in the flex-scheduled final game of the regular season, the conference champ game. The winners of six versus three and five versus four receive the other two automatic PO bids. 2nd - Using the play-in flex-scheduled format allows the conference championship game to be played a week earlier, which moves the first round of the PO up a week, meaning fewer games going against NFL competition. 3rd - Mega-conference schedules are far from equal. Compare Florida's schedule in 2025 with that of Missouri. Compare Wisconsin's schedule to OBD's schedule. Teams competing for the same title do not face the same gauntlet of competition. In 2025, OBD plays two teams, Penn State and Indiana, ranked in the preseason top 25. Two of the four conference road games in 2025 are against Northwestern and Rutgers. In 2027, OBD plays at Michigan, Nebraska, and UW, and plays Ohio State, Penn State, and Iowa in Autzen. In 2027, a 4th-place Oregon could be 9-3 through 11 games, but better than an OBD team that could finish with two or fewer losses in 2025. 4th - Whether I like it or not, today, money matters more in college athletics than ever before. As a result of revenue sharing with athletes, we've witnessed schools dropping sports and cutting athletic department staff. (I acknowledge that this is also the result of poor management of athletic departments.) Three impactful games in the final week of the regular season, one for seeding purposes and two for PO participation, will bring in more money than a standalone conference champion game. Rivalry games would be played in the 11th game. In 2024, we would have seen 6 Iowa at 3 Penn State, 5 Illinois at 4 Ohio State, and 2 Indiana at 1 Oregon. There would be rematches in a given season, but not in 2024. These three games would draw multi-millions of viewers. 5th - I believe Tony Petitti is correct that with automatic qualifiers, we would see better out-of-conference games. The B1G/SEC (Show Me the Money) Football Challenge could come to fruition with fans watching Oklahoma and Texas in Autzen instead of Oklahoma State and Baylor. 6th - Paying no attention to history, which seems to be the norm these days, allows for seeing Petitti's AQ PO format proposal being 'radical.' If you go back to 1998, the first season with a BCS 'One True Champion', and use the final regular season rankings through the 2024 season, the B1G and the SEC would have placed four teams each in a 16-team PO field in almost every season. Why leave PO participation to a committee whose processes are opaque and last season ranked a G5 team the ninth best in the nation. I agree with Tony Petitti, if the B1G and the SEC cannot agree on a revised format, stay at 12 teams. If three-loss SEC teams are not included in the field, and millions more dollars are not generated by expanding the field, that's on Greg Sankey. The B1G is the undisputed No. 1 bottom-line conference, and staying with 12 teams will not alter this fact.

GUTSY! Along with LaBron, how many Clevelanders are Pennciling Out their subscription? 😁 OBD, Number 3! 🤬

Echoing My Bellagio Call. YES!

Media Days B1G Questions - https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/burning-questions-for-2025-big-ten-media-days-can-ohio-state-reload-is-penn-state-ready-to-be-the-hunted/

As noted above, GOLF, Flog spelled backwards, is frustrating. 🤬 YardbarkerSergio Garcia plays final round of British Open without d...Sergio Garcia played most of the final round of The Open Championship on Sunday without a driver, but that was not his plan at the start of the day. Garcia was unhappy with his tee shot on the 2nd...

Hats Off to Wyndham! YardbarkerWyndham Clark excels at Open, keeps anger in checkIt's no stretch to say Wyndham Clark had a much more pleasant time at The Open at Royal Portrush this week than the previous major tournament. Clark has been unable to put an incident at Oakmont in...

Danno digs the new Digs. 100% donor-funded. YardbarkerOregon Ducks' Dan Lanning Addresses 'Unbelievable' Footba...The Oregon Ducks are synonymous with Nike, cool uniforms, loud Autzen Stadium and state-of-the-art facilities. The Hatfield-Dowlin Center in Eugene is a leader in college football that ranks as the...

👍👌❤️ I smell Bobcat poontang! 😁Gopher is also on the menu. 😊

Now, Wait a Minute! Urban Meyer is not sold on PSU's new group of WRs. Saturday BlitzUrban Meyer casts serious doubt on Penn State's wide rece...One of the biggest stories of the 2024 College Football season was the wide receiver room at Penn State. While the Nittany Lions had a potential first round pic

4 Aces! Michigan is the first program with 1st round picks in the NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB drafts. On3Michigan makes major sports history following first round...On Sunday, Michigan made a jaw-dropping piece of draft history with the selection of second baseman Mitch Voit.

'Facts are stubborn things.' John Adams On3's list of the most difficult and the easiest out-of-conference (OOC) schedules in 2025 does not bolster Greg Sankey's argument that the SEC should continue to play eight conference games and four games OOC. Florida is the sole SEC team with one of the eleven most difficult OOC schedules. Deservedly so as the Gators play Miami and Florida State OOC. No B1G teams make the list. However, one-third of Michigan, Ohio State, and Wisconsin's OOC schedules are against SEC teams, Oklahoma, Texas, and Alabama. In 2025, two SEC teams play 10 Power 4 opponents, and Florida plays 11. 13 B1G teams play 10 Power 4 opponents. The SEC captures six of the 11 easiest OOC schedules: Vanderbilt, Georgia, Tennessee, Missouri, Ole Miss, and Auburn. The B1G's Indiana, Maryland, and Penn State make the list. It's frustrating, but not surprising, that the majority of 'sports journalists' report Greg Sankey's SEC SOS stuff as gospel. On3Toughest, easiest nonconference schedules of 2025 seasonWith the season just five weeks away, On3 is looking at the toughest and easiest nonconference schedules of the 2025 season.

Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of Pigskin. 😁(Sorry, Will.) Thank you, Darren, for a summary of all the new faces in new places. I would love be with you so I could buy the next round of Mai Tais. In truth, I'd love to flip the calendar to August 30 so I could score my first 2025 OBD football fix. 🤪 This season, many of the preseason projected top teams will see many a newbie on the field on both sides of the ball. Top B1G conference contenders, Ohio State and Oregon, as you so noted, are reloading on both sides of the ball. This is also the case with Texas (although it does seem that Arch-Madness has been here for decades), Georgia, Alabama, and Notre Dame. Notwithstanding the turnover, all of these six teams are among those with the best odds to the 2025-26 title. Seven of the top ten teams in the updated Sporting News preseason composite rankings will be starting new QBs. Clemson and Penn State return many starters, including experienced QBs, and both check this championship box: In the last eight seasons, no team that returned less than 11 starters has won a title. (I know, I'm one of those guys who loves his stats when he should be in the swimming pool. 😴) In 2023, the B1G released conference football schedules from the 2024 season through 2028. OBD is fortunate that this season, with only five starters returning, the Ducks have the easiest conference slate of games in this rotation. Four games for the Ducks to get their feet wet before playing Penn State in a night out White Out. Thanks again, Darren, and Blast the Bobcats!

Wyndham Clark finished tied for 4th place at the British Open, won today by Scottie Scheffler. Wyndham shot a final round 65, one off the best score of the week. In the opening round, Clark shot a 5-over 76. He persevered and finished strong. The winner of the US Open at Oakmont, JJ Spaun, finished 1-under par by making a 64-foot putt for birdie on the final hole of the tournament. The best golfers in the world and only one broke par on a stupid-hard Oakmont track. Should Clark have taken his frustration out on a locker? Of course not. He profusely apologized for doing so. Golf icon Bobby Jones never stopped apologizing for walking off the course at his first British Open because of his poor play. Last week in the final round of the Scottish Open, Rory McElroy was frustrated to the point of tossing his club a good fifty yards down the fairway. Golf is a brutally hard and frustrating game. Wyndham will proudly represent the USA in the Ryder Cup from September 26 through September 28, at the Bethpage golf course just outside of New York City. He will join OBD Peter Jacobson, a two-time Ryder Cup participant, in representing the USA in one of golf's premier events. I will be cheering for the USA and Wyndham. His behavior at Oakmont was childlike, but then again, unless a ten-dollar Nassau counts, I've never been what Teddy Roosevelt referred to as 'The Man in the Arena.'

Wait A Minute! I thought every SEC schedule was a brutal challenge like no other in the known universe! Wisconsin, Rutgers, Northwestern, and Purdue would be happy to swap schedules with Mizzou, Ole Miss, and Tennessee. The man below is laughing, even without a Drink in hand. 😁 Saturday BlitzMissouri’s soft 2025 schedule could be their ticket to th...At the start of the 2024 College Football season, Eli Drinkwitz had his most talented roster yet at Missouri making the Tigers a College Football Playoff conten

Not to be defensive, but Pro Football Focus has a top 10 Ducks D showing up for a White Out. https://duckswire.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/ducks/football/2025/07/20/oregon-ducks-football-top-10-defenses-college-football/85290569007/?utm_source=smg-duckswire-strada&utm_medium=email&u

B1G Media Day 3 - Two 2025 Opponents, Iowa and USC, are on the docket. https://www.foxsports.com/stories/college-football/2025-big-ten-media-days-bryce-underwood-nico-iamaleava-among-day-3-storylines

NO! The week before SC, Week 12, versus Minnesota has trap potential—a Friday night game after playing at Iowa, and with the Gophers not playing in Week 11. This is the only B1G hiccup in a very favorable 2025 schedule. Everyone gets up for the Trojans, even if Troy is down. The next week closes the regular season at UW, but I don't think there's a chance that OBD overlooks SC. I think over 7.5 wins at -118 for Troy is a very good bet. USC was 1-5 in one-score games in 2024. I also think UW will go over 7.5 wins. Greg McElroy disagrees. To date, Jedd Fisch is undefeated in Husky Stadium. I think UW loses at home to Ohio State and OBD, but defeats Illinois in Seattle. I think that Minnesota will go over 4.5 wins. The Gophers finished 8-5 in 2024-25 with a solid bowl win, 24-10, over VA Tech in Charlotte. On3Washington 2025 win total: Greg McElroy offers analysis o....

Keep It up! The more pressure on James, the better for OBD. After consuming three cupcakes and then taking a nap, how ready will PSU be when the ball bounces OBD's way in the Nits first real game? https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/career-defining-year-for-james-franklin-why-penn-state-coach-is-set-up-to-change-narrative-in-2025-season/

ESPN's Bill Connolly, the man behind SP+, has published his B1G preseason analysis. ESPN.comBig Ten preview: Can Penn State finally break through? Wi...As the Big Ten looks to produce its third straight national champion, Bill Connelly breaks down all 18 teams.

Here's hoping I don't get fooled again, but Greg Sankey and Tony Petitti are discussing the 2026 and subsequent playoff formats almost daily. As Sankey says, 'We're two blue-collar boys.' Heard today in a discussion devoted to the SEC were two SEC homers who believe that automatic qualifiers (AQ) are still very much in play. That Sankey is posturing to get more money out of ESPN for playing a 9th conference game. The SEC's concern about the PO Committee and the manner in which it operates has not gone away. It is incorrect, as has been stated by many football experts, that a 4-4-2-2-1-3 format caps the B1G and the SEC at four teams in the field. Yes, Notre Dame will almost certainly take one of the three at-large spots season after season, but there is no restriction on the B1G or the SEC securing one of the at-large bids. Using the PO Committee's final 2024 top 25 ranking, and using the above AQ model, this would have been the PO field by conference, and the field come 2026 would be seeded as ranked. SEC - 2 Georgia / 3 Texas / 7 Tennessee / 11 Alabama / 14 Ole Miss / 15 South Carolina B1G - 1 OBD / 2 Penn State / 6 Ohio State / 8 Indiana ACC - 10 SMU / 16 Clemson B12 - 12 ASU / 17 BYU G5 - 9 Boise State IND - 5 Notre Dame The ACC and the B1G, except for a difference in ranking, would have been the same in the 2025 12-team field. The B12 would have two and not one team in the mix. The winner hands down would be the SEC with six teams in the field. Bama would have been the SEC's 4th AQ, and Ole Miss and South Carolina would take two at-large spots. If the format had played out this way, it would have meant millions of dollars more for the SEC. So, what's Sankey's beef with the B1G's proposed format? That a format with AQs is not fair to the ACC, G6, and the B12? 😁 Excuse me, Sir, how much do you want for that bridge? 🤪