Karl Benson is the Sun Belt commissioner. He’s also detached from reality.
Benson said he wants Sun Belt teams to try to shed their “addiction” to lucrative, nonconference games against heavily favored Power Five opponents. He wants to improve the Sun Belt’s chances of having an undefeated team to reach a College Football Playoff access bowl and increase the league’s portion of CFP money divided among Group of Five schools.
“This isn’t anything new I’m saying, but it’s the first time we’ve had all 11 schools around the table that had been with the Sun Belt for a period of time for stability,” Benson told CBSSports.com. “Rather than playing multiple million-dollar payday games, we’re better off to get a return on our investment, so to speak, on the back end by being able to win games against our peer opponents.”
As Solomon points out, there are two rather sizable holes in his gameplan. One is Marshall’s experience last season, going unranked by the selection committee despite its gaudy record because its schedule was deemed too soft. It’s great to aspire to be king of the dipshits, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get to date the homecoming queen.
Second, he’s seriously underestimating how much his schools need the upfront money.
… Also, money games produce a likely loss on the field but guaranteed money to help balance athletic department budgets. This year, the Sun Belt’s 11 teams combined play 19 of their 35 nonconference games against teams from the SEC, Big Ten, Pac-12, ACC and Big 12.
There’s no way that extra pop from the access bowl – which Benson himself estimates was worth about $2 million last season – is gonna make up for dumping that. But, hey, it never hurts to dream.
Get The Picture 
But he’s not the only one.
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Dude needs a lesson in NPV and risk analysis.
Talk about winging it and ignoring economic reality, hear there may be an opening at UAB soon, sounds like he would fit right in down In B’ham.
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Benson should have been a fun of the late Johnny Burnette’s “Dreamin”. So am I. LOL.
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Doubt Georgia Southern at your own risk.
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Yes, he needs to win those payday games and become somebody. When the quit playing you because you’re no longer a pushover, call them out in public.
That’s how FSU did it. Southern Miss was heading down that path until they fired Jeff Bower.
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“It’s great to aspire to be king of the dipshits, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get to date the homecoming queen”
Your best one liner of the year…
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He’s either:
A). That stupid
B). Secretly knows the playoffs are expanding next year.
C) All of the above.
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Ga Southern grad and lifelong Dawg. I would disagree with Mr. Benson, what we need to do is beat them when we play them. We had Tech and NC State beat last year and let them both off the ropes. Had we done that we might have made some noise in the polls (at least until we yakked at Navy). I don’t expect to compete with UGA this year, but I expect to give WVA one heck of a game in the opener.
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It’s not that Commissioner Benson is detached from reality. It’s just that he cannot do math well.
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