College Football 2012: Big Ten Wrong to Oppose 6-6 Bowl Eligibility

CBSSports.com's Dennis Dodd came out with a report today that the NCAA was considering delegating bowl eligibility requirements to its conference commissioners.

That would be a remarkable change, because in order to fill the 35 bowl games, the NCAA currently allows 6-6 FBS teams (even those with one win over FCS competition) to be bowl-eligible.

As Dodd writes, the conference commissioners are not so keen to this notion:

Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany told CBSSports.com's Brett McMurphy the 6-6 requirement is “not all positive,” while Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott said he's “concerned” it “dilutes the equity and specialness of being in a bowl.”

CBSSports.com spoke to the FBS commissioners and there isn't much support for keeping bowl eligibility at 6-6.

“I hear more support for going back to [a winning record] than I've heard in years,” ACC commissioner John Swofford said. “It's a legit point of discussion right now.”

If Jim Delany is sincerely opposed to 6-6 teams receiving bowl eligibility, he's thinking with his record book and not his pocketbook.

The Big Ten has been the beneficiary of the 6-6 eligibility standard 11 times since 2002, when 12-game seasons became the norm.

The Big Ten's record in those games is an unsatisfying 4-7 (yes, the B1G underperforming in bowl games, I'm as shocked as you are), but that's basically one extra bowl game's worth of shared revenue per year that Delany's willing to throw away for the sake of what, exactly?

What does the Big Ten get in exchange for that—$1 million or so?

Jim Delany is a very smart man whose judgment I trust--at least, in the limited scope of "does this decision benefit the Big Ten?," as that's the only scope that matters here--but, at best, this seems like a shot at ESPN.

Allow me to explain.

Removing 6-6 teams from bowl eligibility means that there's practically no chance that all 35 bowls would be able to be filled. Most of the smallest bowls are owned by ESPN.

As I wrote at CBSSports.com last year, ESPN owns, operates, and televises them because it is more in their best interests financially to stage exhibition FBS football than any other programming that could/would be available in mid-December, especially on weeknights.

Thus, ESPN's media ownership would take a direct hit if those games wouldn't be able to be played, though it's not as if that'd be anything more than a glancing blow at ESPN's overall bottom line.

So that's the most likely consequence for college football as a whole, and I can't figure out how that would play into the Big Ten's hands at all.