Welcome to the Friday Feedback, which fixed up the time machine this week and went back to September 2011. We were prompted, of course, by Oliver Luck regaling Brett McMurphy with Luck’s “favorite story that hasn’t been written.”
What Luck shared was interesting: There was thought given to a Big East/Big 12 merger and that thought gained some traction.
I love time capsule and anthology stuff, so that was fun to look at from a different place and at a different time. But unless you’re new here, you’ll remember we talked a whole lot about that way back then. I mean, it was literally part of the first story I filed on the expansion debacle. And not only that, but Bob Huggins was on board with the idea.
Anyhow, that idea had legs here from the beginning and it never went away — but it was never confirmed the way Luck did for McMurphy.
Why?
That’s a good question. I remember going on the radio a day or two after that and getting mocked … as the guest. I hung up. Haven’t been invited back since. (I was in a weird place then, I guess. You’ll remember that followed a messy argument on the air with a college football coach over another matter.)
I really didn’t know Oliver back then. He’d been on campus a while, but most of our interactions were … well, they wouldn’t put me in a position to expect him to tell me secrets. Are you firing Stewart? Are you hiring Holgorsen? Are you aware the replacement was kicked out of a casino? Are you aware the incumbent is torpedoing the replacement?
So on and so forth.
The idea came from somewhere else. And it was out there and people were talking about it because it was nuanced and unusual and bold and sort of irresistible. Still, not everyone wanted to believe it, and to be honest, it had its demerits and those led to detractors.
I’m not sure what heights of popularity it ever reached and I always suspected the Big 12 wasn’t in love with the idea of Gen. Marinatto rowing ashore and saving the village. I always suspected the Big 12, perhaps stubbornly, believed it’d be OK. I’m also pretty sure the way Luck and Jim Clements involved and proved themselves appealed to those who would soon be their new brethren.
But what cracks me up about this as I revisit it is it wasn’t written about very much. When it was, it was derided. JackBo devoted a lot of space to the possibility and people thought he was overdosing on argyle. I remember editing one of his columns and then Tweeting that people’s heads were going to explode when they read it a day later. I got bludgeoned for that, because the column wasn’t new as much as it was insistent, and people hungered for something new every day. But that was my point. It wasn’t new information that was going to split skulls. It was this lingering idea abut a merger that people weren’t wrapping their minds around that’d do the mind boggling.
Turns out that was my favorite story that no one wanted to believe.
Onto the Feedback. As always, comments appear as posted. In other words, don’t screw up.
MontanaEer said:
This will be fun:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pK5HmuCMBM
I’m irate the student section egregiously and unforgivably dropped the ball on an entire season of Remi Dibo. There’s no way that didn’t play a part in him leaving for France. There wasn’t a giant Zeus Lester head in the crowd. I never saw a beach cruiser. No one wore plaid flannels buttoned to the top. When he checked into the game, the Coliseum never told us “Dibo coming. Di-bo!” Then again, I never got to use my “When the Remi’s in the system, ain’t no tellin’ Will I brick ’em? Will I swish ’em?” line. But my point is this can’t happen again. So help me go if the kids whiff on Billydee Williams. I’ll never, ever, ever forgive them.
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