What’s it worth to shut up a supposed partner?
That’s not rhetorical. It’s a real question the ACC must consider — especially now, after news broke late Tuesday night that the league and its noisiest two schools, Florida State and Clemson, are discussing a proposal wherein both universities would drop their lawsuits against the conference. All the ACC has to do to make that so?
Oh, you know. Nothing too wild. Just adjust its revenue formula (again), embrace another unequal distribution model and funnel as many dollars as possible to its schools 1) with the biggest brand values and 2) that drive the most television viewership …
Aka, the two schools actively suing the league.
During a regularly scheduled meeting of ACC presidents and chancellors on Tuesday, there were discussions (among other topics) about alternate revenue models, a person briefed on the meeting confirmed. Hours after that meeting, ESPN and Yahoo! Sports both reported that FSU and Clemson would be open to staying in the league if financial adjustments — more like concessions — are made. Gee, how kind of them.
Then there’s the second part to Clemson and FSU’s supposed pitch, reported by ESPN: potentially shortening the league’s grant of rights, possibly to 2030, which aligns with the expiration of the Big Ten and Big 12’s media contracts.
So just to be clear: The Seminoles and Tigers are floating that they’re considering remaining in the ACC — the league they’re contractually bound to, which owns their media rights, via its grant of rights, through at least 2027 (and likely 2036)? Uh … who wants to tell these guys the bad news? That date is likely to extend to 2036 come February, after the ACC and ESPN have a “look-in” period regarding their television deal; if that option is picked up — which is the widespread industry expectation, as The Athletic reported earlier in September — then FSU and Clemson have basically two options:
Stay, or pay a gobload of money to get out early.
Define “gobload?” Sure thing! The ACC’s current withdrawal penalty is about $140 million. But FSU’s lawyers estimate that, also factoring in the cost to buy back the school’s media rights for a decade-plus, it could cost around $542 million for the Seminoles to leave the ACC early.
FSU and Clemson, shocker, don’t want to pay that. Why would they? (It’s not like every school that ever prematurely withdrew from a conference had to pay its way out … right?) So, instead, Door No. 2: suing the league to skirt around that pesky grant of rights. Only, nine months into what would almost certainly be a years-long legal battle, the only thing FSU has earned in court is a healthy number of attorney billable hours. The same applies to Clemson’s six-month slog in court. There has been no indication that either school has a legal leg to stand on with its respective arguments — and even if they did, the ACC has made clear it will proverbially kick the can as far as possible, via time-consuming appeals and counter-suits.
It’s almost like FSU and Clemson should’ve thought more, and “barked” less, before sinking thousands and thousands of dollars they supposedly need to compete into long-shot legal Hail Marys.
Which brings us back to the latest developments. Since when are FSU and Clemson the ones with the leverage here?
This new revenue proposal — which stemmed from court-mandated mediation in Florida — isn’t too dissimilar from what Clemson and Florida State proposed to their ACC brethren years ago, if we peer into the not-so-distant past. (Also, importantly, these discussions are so premature, so early on, that they’re more like … the concept of a plan.) Clearly, though, there wasn’t an appetite for such a structure at the time; the ACC instead settled on its current “success initiative” — which distributes new revenue, mostly from the expanded College Football Playoff, based on schools’ on-field and on-court success — as a way to close the growing revenue gap with the SEC and Big Ten. That initiative, in theory, should have benefited Clemson and Florida State more than anyone, as the league’s preeminent football powers. But when you start 0-3, as the Seminoles have, or when you get your clock cleaned by Georgia on national TV, as the Tigers did, that pool of “success” dollars suddenly isn’t so guaranteed.
Of course, FSU and Clemson are not proposing a new revenue distribution plan solely after a few weeks worth of games. This is about continuing to claw for status, for comparable resources, against the types of schools those two consider their equals: Georgia, Alabama, Ohio State, and so on. Really, it’s just a small-scale example of modern college athletics, where money — and more of it, always — matters more than regional rivalries, or geography, or history, or anything else.
So, tell me again: What reason does the ACC have to acquiesce to any of those schools’ demands, when they’re realistically powerless to change their situation for anywhere from three to 12 more years?
It doesn’t have one. Or, it shouldn’t. Because FSU and Clemson have been, strictly speaking in professional terms, bad partners. They have complained, loudly, about perceived wrongs. They’ve taken “family” business and made it public, messily, with no apparent benefit in sight. They’ve tried to shirk a bill that historically, and presently, many other schools have paid, including Oklahoma, Texas, USC, and UCLA in the past three years. And now, perhaps the most ironic sin of all: falling short on the football field, the one thing driving all their behavior in the first place.
This is not a situation where the ACC needs to, or should, extend an olive branch to FSU and Clemson to convince them to stay, for stability’s sake or simply to end the public clash. Now, if you’re commissioner Jim Phillips, in-fighting ain’t a good look. It has, understandably, made the league something of a laughingstock, a constant PR nightmare from which there is no clear solution. And while that may eat at Phillips, you know who else it definitely eats at? ESPN… which, yes, is probably coming into that February 2025 “look-in” with some serious questions.
So if a revenue model based on branding and television viewership — ignoring all the thorny particulars of deriving such things — silences all the noise? If it gives the ACC an easier sell job come February? Well, then you can at least understand a curiosity from the league office, even if certain league members — looking at you, Boston College — probably aren’t going to be very pleased.
But the facts remain the same. The ACC holds every ounce of leverage, and Clemson and FSU saying they’ll stay in the league only under their terms is the ultimate walk-back, a desperation play. Which in turn means if the ACC goes along, it’s only offering those schools the dollar-lined off-ramp they’re desperately seeking.
So, what’s it worth to shut up a supposed partner?
Depends which side of the courtroom you stand on.
(Photo: James Gilbert / Getty Images)
