and you're 100% wrong, as to both. It has been explained repeatedly and confirmed many, many times that the "option" is for ESPN to extend its media rights contract with the ACC from 2027 out to 2036. The contract was, obviously, written that way in order to provide the parties a "look in" and decide whether things were going great or there were things that needed to be addressed; this is not uncommon to see in this type of contract with a lengthy term. Lest you ask who died and made me Warren Burger, it's very easy for you or anyone else that wants to confirm this with a very simple Google search, and the "source" will be ESPN's own reporting. The GOR, which actually does reference 2036, is a grant of rights from the member schools (and this may be the part that is difficult for you and others to really wrap your head around) for the ***explicit purpose*** of the ACC fulfilling the media rights contract with ESPN. What that means, in layman's terms, is that if ESPN declines to pick up the option as-is, and extend its current media rights agreement with the ACC until 2036, then the GOR goes up in smoke, because its entire stated purpose will have become moot. Again, if you think I'm blowing smoke, the GOR has been posted online many, many times at this point. The ACC member institutions granted their media rights to their home contests to the ACC for the sole and exclusive purpose that the ACC could in turn fulfill its media rights agreement with ESPN. The membership did not just give the ACC unfettered ownership of their media rights for the ACC to do whatever it wants with them until 2036. This is not some difficult, arcane concept to understand. There is no real mystery to be found here.