What is the Big East doing.......building up baseball, maybe?

Okay, so now the conference carousel continues with the addition of Tulane (all sports) and ECU (football only) to the Big East.  Of course, everyone knows that the motive behind the move is the all mighty dollar.  The big-boy conferences sold their souls to ESPN years ago, and now the mid-major conferences are selling their souls to the Regional Sports Networks.  The unfortunate outcome of this is the sacrifice of other sports such as baseball.  But here’s a crazy idea, since the Big East is no longer a big-boy football conference, are they actually working on building a big-boy baseball conference?

The Big East was formed in 1979 with a focus on basketball and has a long history of success on the court.  The conference also has a long history of in-fighting between the “football” schools and the “basketball” schools.  The past few years have brought on the defection of several of the top basketball programs (Boston College, Syracuse, Pittsburg, and Notre Dame) and several of the top football programs (Miami, Rutgers, West Virginia, and Virginia Tech).  While the core of the original basketball schools remain (Georgetown, UConn, Providence, St. John’s, and Seton Hall), it seems the conference is searching for a new identity.  Since the “football” schools never got along with the “basketball” schools, maybe that new identity is the original one, a top-tier basketball conference as well as a top-tier baseball conference.

When I look at baseball programs, the main criterion for being “successful” is regional appearances.  The secondary area I look at is winning percentage, and anything over 55% is successful in my opinion.  So I looked up the numbers for the past four seasons and this is what I found.

TEAMS STAYING IN THE BIG EAST

• Louisville; 170-83 (67.19%); 3 Reg App
• UConn; 160-87 (64.78%); 2 Reg App
• St. John’s; 149-87 (63.14%); 3 Reg App
• South Florida; 123-108 (53.25%)
• Seton Hall; 112-103 (52.09%); 1 Reg App
• Villanova; 99-110 (47.37%)
• Cincinnati; 106-123 (46.29%)
• Georgetown; 88-127 (40.93%)  

TEAMS JOINING THE BIG EAST

• Central Florida; 139-97 (58.90%); 2 Reg App
• Tulane; 135-95 (58.70%)
•  Memphis; 110-117 (48.46%)
• Houston; 97-120 (44.70%)

TEAMS LEAVING THE BIG EAST

• Pittsburg; 127-90 (58.53%)
• Notre Dame; 118-111 (51.53%)
•  Rutgers 103-112 (47.91%)

The Big East is keeping together is top baseball schools that have combined for 9 regional appearances in the past four years, while adding some quality programs that have recently invested in baseball.  Tulane may have been down the past few years, but they are a quality program with a stadium that was just built in 2008 for $10.5 million with a seating capacity of 5,000.  Central Florida brings in back-to-back regional appearances.  They have invested in their stadium in the past five years and now have a seating capacity of 3,600.  Memphis brings a program on the rise with plenty of financial backing and the opening of brand new FedExPark in 2010.  Houston has invested in their stadium as recently as this year and can seat up to 5,000.

So what are they losing?  Pittsburg has a new stadium that opened in 2011, but only has a seating capacity of only 900.  Notre Dame has some good history in baseball, but their stadium was built in 1994.  Rutgers has invested in a turf playing surface in 2007, but still only seats 1,500.  While these schools have made investments in their baseball programs in the recent past, it’s nowhere near the investment of the schools being added.  These three schools have invested in their football programs and are being rewarded with addition to big-boy football conferences.

Looks like the Big East may just be doing what I have suggested, building a top-tier baseball conference.  Based on my numbers, they are adding two schools that have been recently successful and two other that have invested in order to be successful in the near future.  All the while, losing three schools that are focusing on football, and being able to keep most of the basketball core in the conference.  Next question, will the Big East have four or more regional teams in 2013?