The Big Ten/UCLA Train Seems to Be Leaving the Station Without the Regents - Part 2

We noted yesterday that the Regents' agenda for September is now available, and it shows how the UCLA/Big Ten deal is going to be scheduled. The actual direct discussion will be behind closed doors. The more general discussion - about delegation of authority to the campuses to make such deals - will occur in open session. It's quite possible that the Regents will do something in the open session about policy going forward. But that won't change the existing deal.

Behind closed doors, and even before the meeting, it must be dawning on the Regents that they could only create new problems, costly litigation problems, were they do try to undo the deal. Moreover, after appearing (behind closed doors) at the July Regents meeting to make his displeasure about the deal known, Governor Newsom hasn't said anything recently about this issue. It's not clear what got him involved in the first place. The best guess is presidential ambitions and the need to show he cares about something that he thinks Joe Six-Pack cares about. 

We know the governor didn't appear at the public session of the special Regents meeting on August 17th. We don't know for sure whether he appeared at the closed door part of that meeting. But it is likely that, if he had come to the closed door session, word would have leaked by now. So, it seems that the governor's interest has passed. Maybe Joe Six-Pack wasn't all that concerned after all. 

Those columnists in the sports media who write about such things are still looking at alternative scenarios in which the various college teams continue to realign themselves in response to the USC and UCLA moves to the Big Ten.* What's interesting about such alternative scenarios is that they don't include a case in which the Regents seek to "block Block," i.e., order UCLA Chancellor Block somehow to void the deal. The Block Block train appears to have left the station. And, of course, the Regents have no power over USC.

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*See Mercury News columnist Jon Wilner's alternative scenarios at: https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/09/08/pac-12-survival-our-vision-for-the-future-of-the-conference-and-college-football/.

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To hear the text above, go to the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/alternative%20scenarios.mp3