Obviously, my roots are in the old Big 8. OU lost 3 long time traditional opponents when CU, Nebraska, & Mizzou. While A&M came from the SWC they were a good rival. Now, except for Texas & Oklahoma State, we have few rivalries that are considered rabid or traditional. The idea of re-seeding is intriguing and would still allow for a "one true champion" set up. The CCG is all about the extra money. I do not think re-seeding makes any sense for other conferences but its hard to divide the current Big 12 into divisions so re-seeding does make some sense.
owen, I have a question for you. It's hard to really find anything on this when searching online. Why wasn't there some consideration given to having Nebraska/OU be a permanent cross-division game when the Big 12 was created in 1996? It made sense to divide the conference like the did, North/South and place the Oklahoma schools with the Texas schools. What doesn't make sense to me, at least, is the cross division format they chose to use. Three on, three off, playing a home and home with 3 schools from the other division, then a home and home with the other 3. So in 4 years, you've played home and homes vs all 6 schools. That's nice and all, but it destroyed that Nebraska/OU yearly game. Why didn't they choose a format more like the SEC's which protected rivalries with teams in opposite divisions? The game would have probably needed to be moved up from its usual late November date so as to avoid a potential rematch the next week in the conference title game, but still. Moving it seems better than losing it on a yearly basis.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. I'm not sure it would have ultimately saved the Big 12. But it seems to be one of the things that stuck in Nebraska's craw. It really hurt them, IMO. The Colorado rivalry always seemed a bit forced to me.