College Football: 5 biggest storylines to follow during summer 2020

1. Will the Pac-12 ever figure it out?

In what has become a disturbing trend out west, the Pac-12 once again finished a season as the least successful of the Power Five conferences in college football in 2019. Oregon and Utah had strong seasons, finishing 12-2 and 11-3 respectively, but beyond that, it was another disappointing, largely irrelevant season.

That word “irrelevant” is an important one regarding the Pac-12. One could argue the football in the Pac-12 was stronger than the ACC in 2019, but it wasn’t nearly as relevant. As the ACC launched the ACC Network, affiliated with ESPN, the Pac-12 continued to trudge along with a conference network that most people in America can’t watch.

That, ultimately, is the Pac-12’s problem. The play on the field can improve, but when no one can watch it, what does it matter?

If you want to watch the SEC, ACC or Big Ten networks, you can get them on every cable provider, and nearly every streaming service. DirecTV, YouTube TV, Dish Network, it doesn’t matter. Anywhere you can watch TV, you can access those three conferences.

The Big 12 doesn’t have a conference network, but it has partnered with FOX Sports and ESPN to insure that nearly every game in the conference is just as available as the SEC, ACC and Big Ten networks.

Larry Scott and the Pac-12, however, have taken the opposite approach. Their network is not available on DirecTV or YouTube TV, the two primary services for sports fans. Through the first three weeks of the 2019 season, a total of 16 Pac-12 games were hidden from a majority of college football fans.

If recruits can’t turn on the TV on Saturday and see you, why would they be excited about coming to play for you?

Not to mention, there was already an inherent anti-Pac-12 bias that existed east of the Mississippi River before the days of conference networks. In an era that should have been about putting the product in front of the whole country and showing them that there is real football out west too, it’s instead been an era where the Pac-12 has become even more forgotten.

You can see Vanderbilt take on The Citadel on any cable provider or streaming service, but games like Washington State-Arizona State, USC-Arizona, Stanford-Washington State and Cal-Stanford were all kept off of the nation’s top cable provider and top streaming service.

The top games on the marquee went to ESPN or FOX, but the middle of the conference has had its visibility gutted by the failures of Larry Scott and conference officials. They’ve made the Pac-12 out of sight and out of mind.

If a tree falls in the forest, and no one’s around to hear it, does it really make a sound?