Serious Repercussions Loom Over College Football as Big 10’s Tony Petitti’s Alleged Intentions Confirmed

Well, it has been two years since Big Ten had their new commissioner, Tony Petitti. He took over for Kevin Warren in what many would describe as one of the most powerful positions in all of college sports. Now that the position comes with a lot of power, it might be difficult for Petitti to do the honors of his role. Even though he walked into a stable and lucrative gig as compared to Warren, he will now have to play mind games to keep himself and the Big 10 floating among other conferences. 

Right now, Petitti is the new conductor of the Big Ten train. Having a degree from Harvard Law School, he did work for some time at the New York law firm of Cadwalader, Wickersham. After that, he joined ABC Sports in 1988 as a general attorney. Until Petitti took up his role in the Big Ten conference, he had been an outsider. He had been in charge of rights acquisition deals for a variety of sports leagues and events, including the NFL and March Madness, but now that he’s in the college football world, he’s going all in. After all, he had to for the conference he was in charge of.

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On John Kurtz’s podcast, the host sheds light on the grim reality. “Big 10 is the best example of it because they have so much crap at the bottom of that conference. That’s the perfect way to take care of it.” After all, not every team is Notre Dame Fighting Irish, enough for them without belonging to any conference. The Big Ten has programs that aren’t big names or flush with cash.

However, the current revenue-sharing model isn’t exactly equitable. Any Big Ten team reaching the playoffs brings in a $6 million check for the semifinals and another $6 million for the national championship game, which is then divided equally among all conference members. This means the smaller programs benefit significantly from the success of the larger ones, even if they aren’t contributing as much.

With all the conference shake-ups and player revenue sharing on the horizon, everyone’s looking for ways to make some extra cash. Private equity investments have become a hot topic, and even though Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti previously said he wouldn’t go there, it looks like he’s changed his tune. They’re now apparently open to hearing some preliminary offers. This adds another layer to the financial complexities facing the conference.

So what can Petitti do? One option is to enforce a fee model. This would allow him to generate revenue from the lower-performing teams rather than letting them enjoy the Big Ten privilege without contributing proportionally. “Hey, you guys can hang on; you can still get the benefit of being a Big 10 school, but we’re gonna start taking up some of your money, and they avoid the headache of having to cut off these schools that have been with you, you know, for decades,” stated Kurtz.

In that way, the bottom feeder would no longer take things for granted, and the winning amount distribution wouldn’t hurt Petitti that much. Looks like the uncertainty fever is too contagious.

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What’s the ACC’s mode of survival?  

Not just the Big Ten; the ACC too now finds them in a tough spot. All thanks to their legal proceedings with Clemson Tigers and Florida State. Just like Tony Petitti might be too worked up with introducing a fair model in Big Ten, there seemed to be a disparity in ACC as well. After all, that’s what fueled the urge of the Tigers and the Seminoles to swap wagons and go for Big Ten or SEC. The numbers that came forward have been indeed shocking. 

The programs that belonged to the SEC earned $51.3 million each in 2023 from their total of $853 million. For the Big 10, the amount was a bit less. As per the reported figures, they generated $880 Million in the same year with $60.3 million going to each team. Now what about ACC? The total revenue generated was $706 million, which ended up with programs receiving $45 million each.

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Before things went out of hand, ACC whipped up a master plan to retain its powerful teams. They now have a nine-year extension of its TV deal with ESPN. So, the middle-tier schools now have found out their way to squeeze in more money from the conference. In that way, Tony Petitti must tread with extra care in Big Ten.  

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