By golly, I've got some more Big Ten expansion links

I'm done talking about the disaster in the Gulf after getting told off in a note that said this:

Enough about BP and the oil spill. There are risks with producing oil and gas products. Also risk in buying these from terrorists.

I only hope all the major news organizations and environmental groups and Gulf Coast crybabies are listening. Hey, it's only an ocean.

So I'll try something radically different here and dwell on ... Big Ten expansion.

Here's an excerpt from a recent piece by Dennis Dodd, CBSsports.com:

Anything less than Notre Dame or Texas, and the Big Ten would be expanding, and demolishing the NCAA infrastructure, for no good reason. Right now the Big Ten is a man among boys, one of the two most powerful BCS conferences (along with the SEC) thanks to its unique combination of academic excellence, geographic enormity and Big Ten Network revenue. As it is right now, holding steady at 11 schools, the Big Ten is a lean, mean, money-making machine. Even though other conferences have more schools, the Big Ten is -- as I said -- a man among BCS boys.

But expanding to 16 teams without adding the muscle of Notre Dame or Texas would be like a man wanting to be bigger ... and adding 40 pounds of fat. You hear what I'm saying? I'm calling Rutgers a beer belly. I'm comparing Missouri to love handles. You know that flab that hangs off the back of a person's arm? That's Syracuse.

Adding schools like that, without adding Texas or Notre Dame, would be expansion just for expansion's sake. It wouldn't make the Big Ten stronger. It would make it fatter. It would be stupid, and in a vacuum, I'm OK with the Big Ten being stupid -- you can't protect people from themselves, you know?

But this isn't happening in a vacuum. At 16 teams, the Big Ten would be a black hole threatening to suck college sports onto itself, triggering reactionary moves from the SEC, Pac-10 and probably some combination of the ACC and Big East. When all is said and done, the implosion could lead to four 16-team super-conferences that would break away from the rest of Division I, hogging the almighty national television revenue for itself. I've written this before, so no need to belabor the point, but the talk of four super-conferences isn't idle speculation. That's what those fools are planning.

My take: I'd say this is a sky-is-falling overreaction, but ... There used to be a lot of airlines. Now there aren't. There used to be a lot of restaurants, a lot of stores, a lot of movie theaters, a lot of different soda pops. Now there aren't, relatively speaking. The big get bigger. And bigger. And bigger.

Here's a portion of Sunday's column from Randy Galloway, Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

There is talk of Armageddon across the college landscape, with the Big Ten preparing for a loot and burn campaign of other leagues to become a so-called Super Conference of 16 teams.

It is currently accurate to call Mr. (Commissioner Mike) Slive of the SEC an innocent bystander. He's not picking any fights. His conference has the national football prestige locked down. But would he stand off in the corner and watch if the Big Ten attempts to mushroom?

We all know better than that.

Slive is preparing himself and his conference for the possibility of a throw-down showdown across the college landscape.

And Texas is the prize. As in the University of. Get Texas, if it comes to that, and it trumps anything the Big Ten can and will do, including Notre Dame. The Big Ten won't get Texas. But the SEC? Maybe, maybe not.

And if it sounds like I'm killing off the Big 12 here, I'm not. I think the Big 12 will survive and prosper. But admittedly, there are people much more clued into the inside world of college football who tell me I'm wrong. Tell me the Big 12 is now an endangered species. ...

Then again, it's always about money. And the big money, from TV, in college football now goes to the Big Ten and then the SEC.

Never say never when big money is involved.

My take: Galloway wrote a good column, as he usually does. Check it out. There's a lot more to it besides the excerpt I cited.

I maintain Texas isn't going anywhere and the Big 12 will be OK, at least for those in the Southern half of it. But the SEC has a lot of potential expansion targets should it feel the need to get bigger, like Miami and Florida State and Clemson. And that league plays for keeps.

Lou Holtz agrees, which frightens me. Here are a few of Holtz's thoughts in this Al Lesar column in the South Bend Tribune:

"Does the Big Ten go to 12 (teams)? Does it go to 16?" Holtz said. "You can bet your bottom dollar the (Southeastern Conference) is going to go to 16 because of the television revenue; because of the larger revenue. The Big Ten's talking about going down South. That'll help them in recruiting." ...

"I would continue to be an independent, but (I make that decision) without all the facts," Holtz said. "You have maybe 30 sports at Notre Dame. What happens if the Big East is raided? Where are your other 29 sports going to go in order to get a championship?" ...

And then there's this:

"If I want to know something, I don't go to the monkey," Holtz said. "I go to the organ grinder. I'm the guy on the end of the chain. I don't ask questions, I don't answer questions. They play the music, I dance."

My take:

If the Big East did get raided, Notre Dame would be in a bad place. The more we discuss this and let our imaginations run wild, the more this seems like a giant game of chicken.

Without naming any school as one it would be interested in adding, the Big Ten has set off an ever-growing whirlwind of speculation and, yes, fear. What if the Big Ten annexes Rutgers and/or Pittsburgh and/or Syracuse? It will crush the Big East and force Notre Dame's hand. What if the Big Ten annexes Missouri and/or Nebraska? It will whittle down and force Texas' hand.

What if the Big Ten is interested in one school and one school only, namely California-Santa Cruz?

OK, that's enough for now. What shall we talk about next?