The sport is standing at the precipice already. Too much money, too much consolidation of power, too much control by the media. If they go down this PE path, it will be a running start leap off the cliff with no parachute. They might appear to fly for a little while, but the journey will come to an abrupt end eventually. As much as I love my VT sports, I think they need to be safe and accept the level we are at and do the best we can. The window to bigger things is closed and anyone who tries to get in will be risking a lot of money to likely fail. College football is just another business now, producing weekly TPS reports for the three bosses (ESPN, FOX, CBS). It won’t be long before new fees show up and prices for everything at games goes up. ** Edited by HokieAl at 3/3/2025, 9:09:05 AM

brings little of substance to the situation. PE is a last resort of doomed and/or failing entities. The only question comes down to who will be the last sucker left holding the bag? That is rarely, if ever, the PE firm and the list of potential candidates runs the gamut from employees to lenders to future and/or former investors. PE is the ***** without the happy ending for anybody other than themself.

...a PE partnership that resulted in a better product and improved working conditions for employees. The PE investors care about one thing only: maximizing the return on their investment. The long-term ramifications to the entity that the PE is being invested in is of no consequence to the investors. They only want their ROI.

at what they do which is size up an entity, devise a plan to maximize THEIR return and orchestrate THEIR exit, a lot of times before they are even fully involved to start with. Gordon Gecko while a fictional movie character has many real life imitators.

1. Yormark announces his finalists for his PE plan. Now all of a sudden the mighty, self-righteous, too-big-to-fail Big Ten changes course? LOL. You hate to see it 😭. And BTW, you gotta hand it to Yormark--for better or for worse, he's not gonna let the Big XII be destroyed without a fight. Although I think he'd like to see the B12 being the only major conference to do this for some time. But it looks like the B10 might not allow for that now. 2. College football has obviously become more professional over time. But this is next level. Reminds me of the professionalization of club soccer in England and the rest of Europe. Started out as factory athletic clubs for the recreation of their workers and communities and has grown into something unrelated to the original. The administration on campus will have less and less control about what goes on anymore. I say this without passion or prejudice.

To answer your question first: Some people, I'm sure, will be turned off. Heck, I'M already turned off. However, the plan is to turn it into an even bigger money making operation. The turned off fan might become just a voice in the wilderness as they go after new fan bases and new markets. The sad thing is that the old school alums and fans might find the new version of their "team" unrecognizable. Going back to soccer, here is an interesting story of the history of SV Austria Salzburg. They were basically taken over by Red Bull. And there became a brand power struggle that the traditionalists lost. So they started the old club back up somehow under the old colors. This has gone down over the past two decades, and the two clubs just met for the first time recently. This is an extreme example, but could;d it happen to a school here? Or to the entire sport?

Wikipedia page for the club. Read the first section under the History entitled "The color dispute and the Violet-White initiative". The whole thing is worth reading though.