What if.....two simple words that often fill sports debate at bars, restaurants and offices across the country-when the world is normal.
But this "what if" could be unprecedented.
For years, college athletics has lived in a world of expansion and realignment and rumors. And typically those discussions center on teams being poached to join a bigger league where money and stability are the main reasons to move.
But what if the biggest and most valuable brands of a conference decided to use their leverage and make a stand and ultimately decide to do something?
What if Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska and anyone else in the Big Ten make it clear to the rest of the league and the administrators of the Big Ten: "Reverse the decision to not play college football this fall or we will leave the league. Reverse the choice, not voted on by school presidents, but made in a meeting that no one now remembers how the decision to not play was made."
Hold on! Slow down! It's not that simple. After all, to whatever degree they played, Big Ten school presidents seem to still be backing the plan to not play football. And there's the medical advisory board the league trusted to advise them and their position was to not play for the reasons they stated.
It is worth noting that there are voices in the medical community challenging the key study the Big Ten medical advisory board used in expressing the concerns of myocarditis. It is a main reason why conferences that are still moving forward to play have medical experts saying that data is important but not a sole reason to not play.
Back to the idea of a breakup. While no school president has stated any desire to break from the league decision, there are no shortage of people screaming for such a move. That group includes coaches, players, parents, media, local business owners and stadium workers. That alone is not a reason to reverse the decision of not to play.
But what if those schools used their leverage and wanted to play? Could a group of 6-8 teams from the Big Ten go rogue and play games against each other? The Big Ten was the first to call and plan for a conference only schedule.
There are things like "Grant of Rights" and the formal agreement each school has with the Big Ten regarding membership. Grant of RIghts is where schools agree to give the conference their media rights for years and years. But does such an agreement state that you need to actually sponsor a sport for me to give you my media rights. If the Big Ten is not playing football do you still own my media rights?
No conference pays out more per member in media money than the Big Ten. Each school received $54 million in the last payout (Rutgers and Maryland do not yet get a full cut). And projections show that by the end of the decade that number will reach $90+M per school.
But what is the Big Ten without Ohio State and Michigan? The same can be said for the Big XII without Texas and Oklahoma. You are not the same league. But is this the moment the Buckeyes and Wolverines walk away from the oldest conference in college athletics that was founded in 1896 as the Western Conference before becoming the Big Nine?
I doubt it gets to this. But the next few days might be interesting. Justin Fields' petition was a nice social media story. But the Ohio State quarterback's effort had no formal ending. There is no promise that if he got 500,000 names on a petition the league would reverse its decision. Letters from parents to the league office and moms and dads openly highlighting plane tickets to Chicago hoping to meet Commissioner Kevin Warren are nice to generate twitter traffic but it won't sway anyone.
The only thing that would get Warren and other league officials and school presidents to even think about reversing course is if the biggest brands that give the league its value make a stand and say "Let us play or you have no league."
The legal challenges would be many and such a conference has no shortage of lawyers who want a piece of the battle. But what if the Buckeyes and Wolverines don't want to wait until March to play? Ryan Day and Jim Harbaugh might actually stand shoulder-to-shoulder on this one.
Eight schools make a majority in a conference with 14 members. If eight decide they want to play, what does the Big Ten do? Could the richest conference in the country be pushed to the brink of extinction?
For all the expansion and realignment in the past 20 years, nothing would compare to something like this....if it happens.
Final note: Nebraska tried to join the Big Ten in 1900 and 1901 and both times were denied entry into the league.