Sunday reader: MSU presidential strife ripples to Spartan Ventures, plus thoughts TV times, Big Ten partners

So, Michigan State University needs a new president, which also means Spartan Ventures needs a replacement for Kevin Guskiewicz on the board.

And while the news of Guskiewicz leaving has far wider ranging consequences at MSU and around the state than athletics, it’s a key pressure point to monitor through the coming weeks and months for those keeping tabs on Spartan Ventures and the changing world of MSU athletics.

The seven-member board, which included Guskiewicz alongside athletic director J Batt, was originally named in January and has overseen the ambitious undertaking that’s set to officially go online over the summer. The remaining six members of the board will presumably continue the work until a new president is named and joins the board. 

Spartan Ventures, an early signature move of Batt’s tenure, is a non-profit corporation spun off from the athletic department aimed at maximizing revenue generation for Michigan State athletics. The fledgling entity has faced plenty of scrutiny, both from MSU board members for transparency issues and questions about the influence of outside money and how it’s potentially privatizing portions of a public university’s athletic department. 

It’s also something that Guskiewicz and Batt spoke confidently about recently at a Detroit Economic Club event. And Batt coming to MSU was, in no small part, because he felt he and Guskiewicz were aligned on what to do when it came to MSU’s athletic department. The two were operating in lockstep when it came to Spartan Ventures and getting it off the ground. 

Now it’s just Batt, whose buyout got cut in half via a contractual mechanism triggered by Guskiewicz’s departure. 

Guskiewicz’s move, along with its massive ramifications at the board and institutional level, certainly puts a spotlight on the other board members and staff at Spartan Ventures as they work through the final stages before it launches for real. 

ICYMI: Early season TV times announced

The nonconference slates for the five respective Mitten teams are largely set up with TV assignments after this past week. The only outstanding nonconference game without a set time and date is Western Michigan’s contest vs. Boise State in Week 4. 

Here are the TV assignments and kick off times for all five FBS teams (all times Eastern.)

Central Michigan

• Week 1 (Sept. 5) at New Mexico State — 10 p.m. on FS1
• Week 2 (Sept. 12) vs. Colgate — 1 p.m. on ESPN+
• Week 3 (Sept. 19) vs. Wyoming — 1 p.m. on ESPN+
• Week 4 (Sept. 26) at Miami (Fl) — 6:30 p.m. on The CW

Eastern Michigan

• Week 0 (Aug. 29) vs. Sacramento State — 6:30 p.m. on ESPN+
• Week 1 (Sept. 4) vs. San Jose State — 6:30 p.m. on ESPN+ (Friday)
• Week 2 (Sept. 12) at Michigan State — 3:30 p.m. on Big Ten Network
• Week 3 (Sept. 19) at Wisconsin — 12:30 p.m. on Peacock

Michigan State

• Week 1 (Sept. 4) vs. Toledo — 8 p.m. on FS1 (Friday)
• Week 2 (Sept. 12) vs. Eastern Michigan — 3:30 p.m. on BTN
• Week 3 (Sept. 19) at Notre Dame — 7:30 p.m. on NBC

Michigan

• Week 1 (Sept. 5) vs. Western Michigan — 7:30 p.m. on NBC
• Week 2 (Sept. 12) vs. Oklahoma — noon on FOX
• Week 3 (Sept. 19) vs. UTEP — 3:30 p.m. on BTN

Western Michigan

• Week 1 (Sept. 5) at Michigan — 7:30 p.m. on NBC
• Week 2 (Sept. 12) vs. Monmouth — 6:30 p.m. on ESPN+
• Week 3 (Sept. 19) at Rice — 7 p.m. on ESPN+

There are also a smattering of #MACtion games that are on the docket for November, and Western Michigan will also play on national TV for at least one Saturday conference game: Saturday on Halloween against Bowling Green, which is slated to kick off at noon on CBS Sports Network. 

It’s also a primetime heavy slate, relatively speaking, to open the season for most of the teams. Eastern Michigan notably starts with back-to-back 6:30 p.m. kickoffs, one in Week 0 and the other on a Friday night, before what should be a good audience for a 3:30 in-state showdown with Michigan State. 

The Spartans will also be playing the Friday night of Week 1, as has become tradition for Michigan State, not impeding on the potential to use the Labor Day weekend as a final chance to head up north. 

That does leave a bit of a dead spot on the Saturday of Week 1 for all these teams, as EMU and MSU will have played the night before (the second game of the season, in the case of the Eagles) and Michigan and Western Michigan won’t kick off until 7:30 p.m.

CMU again opens the season with a trip west, and will cap the night with a 10 p.m. kickoff. Getting on linear TV for that game against Miami in Week 4 is also nice. And as someone who watches #MyOrange (Syracuse alum reveal) from time-to-time, I can attest to The CW doing a really good job on their broadcasts.

But back to Week 1: No need to get up early that Saturday to catch GameDay, likely including Lane Kiffin’s Week 1 reputation laundering antics, as the show comes from Baton Rouge for the LSU-Clemson matchup. 

Just have your coffee ready as the Chippewas and Lobos battle into the night in Albuquerque.

Would you rather: MSU-Notre Dame on NBC primetime, or UM-OU getting Big Noon’ed?

What’s been a brilliant programming gambit for FOX itself with its Big Noon Kickoff continues to chagrin fans. The latest flare up comes from Michigan fans miffed at the Week 2 matchup against Oklahoma getting played at noon on FOX. 

To explain briefly for the uninitiated, as part of the Big Ten TV deal that split rights between FOX, CBS and NBC, FOX gets the first pick from the slate of games each week. And rather than trying to go head-to-head with ESPN/ABC and its SEC properties in primetime, FOX has opted to show the games at noon, riding big audiences from pregame shows into big-time matchups in a window that can, otherwise, be a bit sleepy. 

It’s produced plenty of great ratings and FOX doesn’t seem intent on letting up with the ploy any time soon, especially if the games continue to rate. But fans of the programs constantly jammed into this early window for the biggest games of the season are really quite sick of it. 

The complaints are two tracked: For one, teams would like to play in front of raucous crowds at night for the best home field advantage, perceived or real; it also cuts into tailgating the ability to do something else on a Saturday. 

Ohio State fans will recall getting to host Texas at noon in Week 1 last year, and are probably not going to love getting to see a rocking Darrell K. Royal Stadium in primetime in Week 2 for the return game (which is ironically the game FOX is trying not to go up against with Michigan and Oklahoma.)

Similarly, Michigan played at night in Memorial Stadium in Norman last year but won’t get a chance to bring the Sooners to a similar environment, all in service of a TV partner. It might make sense on a spreadsheet and with the returns from Nielsen, but it’s lame in practice for fans — especially when just a handful of teams in the league seem to always end up in the slot. 

Also, for what it's worth, FOX is relatively bad at game production and direction insofar as showing enough replays, using flag graphics correctly and communicating basic information about the game — still the ostensible point! — to the viewer.

And were this article on FOX, there would have been 14 commercial breaks already.

Perhaps adding one or two games a year where FOX flexes to primetime and NBC or CBS move up to the noon slot could be a nice fix. 

Because right now, the NBC primetime game is a vastly better viewing experience. Todd Blackledge and Noah Eagle have evolved into a deft duo in the booth and the production chops from the folks that make Sunday Night Football so excellent show up plenty. Josh Perry, one of their pregame analysts, might be the best in the business — especially when it comes to the Big Ten. 

And that’s the treatment Michigan State will get on its trip to Notre Dame, though with the Notre Dame home announcers as this game is part of Notre Dame’s NBC deal for home games. (Swapping Blackledge out for Jason Garrett is, without a shadow of a doubt, a downgrade.) But generally it should be a top-notch TV product showcasing a great crowd under the inky skies of South Bend — a crowd that got to spend the day tailgating and, for MSU fans, visiting Notre Dame for the first time in a decade. 

And no amount of Gus Johnson excitedly erupting in the booth can make up for the structural issues that have made Big Noon Kickoff such a drag for fans. 

As for CBS? It still feels like my southern uncle got the dates wrong and came to town the weekend before the family reunion every time I hear Gary Danielson — a Purdue alum, no less! — on the call of a Big Ten game. Good TV product, but the vibes still aren't right.