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Missouri can't hold its own in the Big 12
ANYONE vaguely interested in Missouri's interest in leaving the Big 12 for the Big Ten knows how the numbers seven and 22 factor into the decision.
Mizzou officials have told us for months about how every Big Ten team makes $22 million a year off the conference's TV network, while some Big 12 schools make as little as $7 million from the league's TV deals.
Ever since this debate began last December, when Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany said his conference might expand, there have been two more numbers Missouri folks never mention.
Four and eight are numerals the Tigers prefer to keep hidden in the closet. Or locked in the attic like a crazy relative.
Here's why: Since the Big 12 started competition in 1996, Missouri has won or shared four regular-season championships and eight titles overall when you include postseason Big 12 tournaments.
No, I'm not talking about just football or men's and women's basketball championships. That is the combined number of titles the 18 men's and women's teams have won for Mizzou over the past 14 years!
And that's counting two Big 12 North football titles. And those came against only the five other teams that make up that division.
By comparison, including tournament titles, Oklahoma has won a combined 45 championships and Oklahoma State 35. OU fields 18 men's and women's teams in Big 12 play, while OSU has 16.
Here's what underachieving Mizzou really wants to keep quiet: It's the only Big 12 school with single-digit championships. Yup, Baylor, the league's so-called weakest link, has captured a combined 36 championships.
Mizzou's telling the truth about the desire to get away from Texas. And here's the real reason why — the Longhorns have amassed 113 combined championships over the same stretch the Tigers won eight.
Yes, Texas supports the most teams in the conference and has the biggest budget. Some league members would argue that the Longhorns' 23 championships in men's and women's swimming and diving shouldn't count because several schools don't sponsor those sports.
Mizzou, however, couldn't make the argument. Of the combined 20 championships awarded each year, including indoor and outdoor track, men's tennis is the only sport where a Missouri team doesn't compete.
Nebraska, the other Big 12 school reportedly on the Big Ten's hit list, has won a combined 76 championships, which is second only to Texas' massive haul.
No wonder Big Ten coaches are in favor of adding Missouri, but want nothing to do with overachieving Nebraska.
Conversely, logic suggests that's really why Big 12 coaches don't want to lose the Tigers.
When an athletic program wins only eight championships in 14 years, that's the kind of creampuff foe conference members want on their schedules.
Mizzou apologists will contend their sports teams will become more competitive in the Big Ten because the athletic department budget will grow because of the added TV revenue.
No one is denying Missouri will make millions more if the Tigers bolt. But will all that money remain in the athletic department?
History suggests the Tigers' athletic department won't be allowed to keep all it earns.
The tight purse strings Mizzou keeps on sports is precisely why Joe Castiglione resigned from his "dream job" as Mizzou's AD 12 years ago to become Oklahoma's AD.
When I went to Columbia, Mo., to interview Castiglione about why he had made a decision that stunned Mizzou fans, he was very candid.
"It's not my intention to criticize Missouri to make Oklahoma look better," Castiglione told me in May 1998. "But I sensed a much stronger commitment at OU. Commitment is just one word, but it means everything to me."
MU's athletic budget was $13.7 million compared to OU's $24 million when Castiglione changed jobs. Today, OU's budget is $81,404,991, while Missouri's is $58,604,216.
Even though MU's budget ranks ahead of Texas Tech, Kansas State, Colorado, Iowa State and Baylor, the Tigers are dead last in the Big 12 when it comes to overall team championships.
Doesn't that suggest its athletic department can't figure out how to do more with less like the five Big 12 schools that have more titles than the Tigers with smaller budgets?
Mizzou's budget would rank ninth out of the 11 schools in the Big Ten. But given the overall strength of the two leagues, the Tigers might be right in assuming they can be more competitive for championships in the Big Ten than the Big 12.
Missouri officials insist academics will be as big as athletics in their decision-making process if they receive a formal invitation to join the Big Ten. Other Tigers aren't so sure.
"As an alum, I would like to see them stay in the Big 12," said one Mizzou graduate who has closely followed the Big Ten expansion story. "There's a be-careful-what-you-wish-for element to this. Miami joined the ACC in football and has become darn near irrelevant."
"It's a money grab disguised as 'a good academic fit' by the chancellor."
Sometimes it requires ingenuity to win titles more than just taking your ball and going to a new home. It's a numbers concept, which those Mizzou academic folks apparently have yet to figure out.
By DAVE SITTLER World Sports Columnist