Getty Image / Ethan Miller
Over the past week, the biggest story in college sports has been the seemingly imminent demise of the Pac-12.
The conference has already known for a while that USC and UCLA would be leaving and Colorado recently decided they would as well.
The Colorado move came amid major uncertainty about the Pac-12’s future media rights deal.
Since they decided to leave for the Big 12, there have been reports that Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah could join them and Oregon and Washington could head to the Big Ten.
Those outcomes seemingly became even more likely when it was revealed that the conference’s proposed media rights deal is a streaming deal and pays a lot less than the deals of the other Power 5 conferences.
Somehow, it has seemed recently that they might be able to salvage the conference, but they still want to add one more awful piece to the deal.
According to Yahoo’s Dan Wetzel, the Pac-12 wanted teams to sign a grant of rights.
The Pac 12 has a meeting in the next hour to discuss its media deal and the signing of a grant of rights, as @RossDellenger and others have reported.
As bleak as things looked for the league late Thursday, numerous sources express optimism that the Pac 12 can halt most or even…
— Dan Wetzel (@DanWetzel) August 4, 2023
Luckily, the member schools seemingly had the sense not to make the same mistake that their ACC counterparts did back in 2016.
Pac-12 unable to get Grant of Rights signed this morning & "nothing has changed" as far as Oregon & Washington joining Big Ten, sources told @ActionNetworkHQ. Ducks & Huskies still expected to be Big Ten bound when finances are worked out, sources said
— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) August 4, 2023
The GOR that ACC schools signed has been a nightmare for those programs as their media rights deal is now lagging well behind the SEC and Big Ten and keeps the schools from being able to make more money by leaving the conference.
Signing a GOR would have been a disaster for any Pac-12 school as quite a few of them simply have better options out there.
Maybe the Pac-12 will come up with some other way to keep their disappearing conference together.