re: So Sankey pretty much let the SEC be the appetizer lead-in to the Big Ten this season...

The relationship with CBS soured because the SEC signed a long term deal with them long ago. The early years of the deal heavily favored SEC. As time went on the deal began to favor CBS. SEC wanted CBS to walk away from the good deal they were now in and restructure the contract . CBS wouldn’t.

Lesson here is don’t sign long term deals if you think the value of the product will keep increasing. Or structure the payments in such a way that they increase yearly at an acceptable level.

Just money people on both sides being counts.