.. in exposure for BYU. B12's deal has ESPN selecting only 18 games for Tier 1. Even in a 10-team confernence, that's unlikely to produce more than 2 or 3 for BYU in a good year. Fox gets all remaining game except for one and can place those games on either F/X (comparable to Vs), one or more of their FSN regional networks, or on FCS. Fox selects one game to leave for BYUtv. In addition to our home games, our road games will be subject to the same deal, which means that perhaps half or more of those games will end up on a Fox regional channel or on a local affiliate.

As an indy, we have a minimum of 4 home games guaranteed on ESPN and we can write our own scheduling deals with our opponents to ensure that games don't get buried (like OSU, scheduled pre-indy). Bottom line is that this season, all but one of our games, home & away are on ESPN. Under a B12 package, we'll likely get 3 to 5 on ESPN, 1 on BYUtv and nearly half on F/X, Fox regionals or even local/online only networks. People should also remember that it's not just BYU that would have concerns here, it's also ESPN. If BYU just plugs into the B12 TV deal, ESPN loses several contracted games to Fox.

This has been an issue in joining the B12, especially when they needed the 10th team to replace A&M in the Fox deal as is to preserve it (remember, the Fox deal is signed with each of the 10 schools individually). This "minutae" as some fans call it, is in reality more described as the devil being in the details. BYU learned a whole lot from the MWC TV debacle. They're not going to repeat those mistakes in the B12.

Bottom line is it may be far better for BYU to not be #9 or #10 replacement school, but #11 or #12 instead, with some negotiated exceptions. The current Big 12 schools all have regional fan bases. The B12 TV deal is structured for those regional fans. BYU has a national fan base and likely needs some tweaks to ensure the vast majority of its fans can see nearly all the games like the fans of all other B12 schools. With exposure and fan access being the BOT & BYU's top priorities, they're going to negotiate hard in this area.