Lenn Robbins in his column today unfairly slammed Rutgers and Pitt, who were horrified last year at the prospect that the Big East would accept a below-market deal. There were no ulterior motives beyond that. The only saboteurs in the Big East live in Providence. Beyond that, Robbins reports that Mike Aresco thinks the Big East can still get $100 million dollars. Here's why my PURELY SPECULATION theory comes in. We know that Mike Tranghese is pulling the strings here. Could that be the case either because Tranghese is angling to return to his commissioner's job in a reconfigured Catholic league, and/or is seeking to permanently wed Providence to Villanova/Georgetown/St. John's? If the split happens, for better or worse, they're stuck together forever. It's just something to think about. Tranghese has never, ever had the Big East's best interests at heart, so why would he start now? The man admitted to Mike Francesa of all people that he only cared about Providence College.

Reportedly so, as Mark Blaudschun has reported that Mike Tranghese is hanging around, and that's never good news. His wise counsel helped destroy the Big East in the first place. Watching the Big East both destroyed and to see these seven programs leave is a clearly suicidal, insane, deluded move that will have a net result that will be fantastic for Rutgers sports on many levels. Any resulting television package will be near-valueless, and they risk letting Rutgers and Louisville leave the Big East a year early, surrendering millions in NCAA payments, exit payments, and not mention the inevitable myriad lawsuits. It's just baffling to believe that this level of self-delusion could exist. The idea that they, the faction who have been calling the shots in the Big East with dictatorial powers for years, could feel slighted at the slightest notion of power sharing and are willing to reduce themselves to a mid-major merely because their pride has been wounded. What doesn't make sense is why Georgetown, St. John's, and Villanova would go along with this hair brained scheme coming out of Providence and South Orange. You never know, it might still just be another media leak designed to racket up pressure on Mike Aresco to save their precious RPI with a new division setup, or perhaps other parties are leaking this news to lower the value of the TV rights deal? It's still baffling to believe that they could be THIS insane.

If nothing else, Skai Moore's verbal commitment to Rutgers University signifies a new era in bad sports naming puns. As down as some people may be on some of the sleepers in this year's class, it's truly impossible to find any fault with Moore, a genuine blue chip prospect. He's been a Rutgers lean for a while, but some people close to Moore were apoplectic that he was not receiving more interest from traditional powers, until Wisconsin stepped in lately. Ohio State had interest too, but ultimately wouldn't take his verbal with all the blue chippers they're in the mix for. Their loss is our gain. This is probably the first commitment that can be directly tied to the Big Ten move. This is the kid of player we've always fallen just short for, and now we're getting them. So, what's next? It'll be interesting to see whether there's still room for Wisconsin LB commit D.J. Singleton. Rutgers of course is still reportedly going after a few other players currently committed to other schools on both sides of the ball.

as is Louisville. In fact, no Big East eastern division team will travel as much as Rutgers next year. No, the Big East isn't being punitive at all.... Luckily, this could be good leverage in an upcoming lawsuit. It's also short-sited, considering that Boise could just as easily leave soon too, and the Big East is probably leaving money on the table by putting all of its eggs in the Boise basket.

Here's something interesting. The firm Public Policy Polling recently polled New Jersey residents on a variety of political issues. Also included in the poll were a number of sports-related questions, which also happen to be cross-tabbed to political factors. According to the poll, 35% of New Jerseyans support Rutgers athletics, vs. 65% do not. As that 65% ranges can mean virtually anything (and is probably just passive indifference in most cases), 35% of 8.8 million people gives you approximately 3.9 million fans in varying levels of support, which is nothing to sneeze at. As a basis of comparison, the Giants are at 37%, with significant showings for the Eagles and Jets as well. According to the poll, Rutgers fans lean left, with a somewhat higher percentage of Obama supporters following Rutgers than Romney supporters. Voters of all stripes support the move to the Big Ten conference, with respondents describing themselves as somewhat liberal showing the strongest support base for Rutgers athletics. Self-described moderates had the smallest amount of support, closely followed by strong conservatives. When it comes to political affiliation, Democrats also demonstrate a significantly higher level of support for Rutgers sports than Republicans. Where the poll really skews odd is on gender. Far more men than women support the move to the Big Ten, although women are largely reporting that they are unsure instead of being in opposition. However, according to the poll, a much higher percentage of females as opposed to males like Rutgers athletics, which seems rather unintuitive given common stereotypes about sports. Women slightly edge out Obama voters (who were a big majority in NJ this year) as a larger base of support. The poll really gets interesting when it comes to ethnicity. Whites (who constitute the largest ethnic group in New Jersey, although the state is far more diverse than most) are the most indifferent to Rutgers sports, followed by African Americans, "Other" (which is quite an odd label, given the state's large Asian population), and Hispanics. Indeed, the poll states that a majority of New Jersey Hispanics are Rutgers fans, which is the highest level of support in the poll from any single demographic group. A lot of these results seem somewhat strange, and the weirdest result of all may be when it comes to age. Supposedly Rutgers lags in support among young and the middle aged, while making up ground among the elderly. This is, quite frankly, completely contrary to all past reported data on the subject. The Rutgers fanbase skews very young, younger than most, owing to its history. You might be able to argue on the other points, but this specific data point makes me want to throw the whole thing out the window.