Big Ten Officially Welcomes Oregon, USC, UCLA and Washington but What's Next?

College football is America's most deeply loved sport, and the heart of that love is the game's regional character, history and tradition.

The games mean something partly because they are tied to the memories of other players and other seasons. When Dillon Gabriel takes the field for the Ducks in another month he'll take his stance where Marcus Mariota did, and Joey Harrington and Dan Fouts before him.

Realignment, NIL, the transfer portal and the expansion of the college football playoff have brought the game to a new era. That fits at Oregon because the Ducks have always been about innovation and change, but the diffused powers that be have to be careful not to transform this unique sporting experience into NFL lite, just another league where the regular season doesn't matter and greed makes all decisions.

Here's hoping that two things happen. One, the universities and athletic directors have the sense to appoint a czar of college football, a single authoritative voice with broad powers to protect the game from itself. It needs wisdom and guidance, from a figure respected enough to balance the various influences and forces that pull at its center, whether that voice be Nick Saban, Chris Petersen, Kirk Herbstreit, Josh Pate, Paul Finebaum (not my first choice,) Rob Mullens or some other figure who can cut through the noise and the ceaseless clamor for more and bigger.

Two, the realignment wheel is almost certain to spin again, probably when Florida State and Clemson wield their knife for a bigger slice of the pie on a finer piece of china. When it does, the logical move is to form a super conference of 64 teams, split into two leagues east and west, separated into divisions that look a lot like the Big 8, the SWC, the PAC-8 and the original SEC and Big Ten. Let USC and Notre Dame be independents.

Oregon ought to play Stanford, Cal, Washington, Washington State and Oregon State every year, like they've done so for more than 100 years. It's a regional game with different styles of football suited to the talent of the region and the weather. West Coast football has always featured the passing game and speed. Big Ten football, historically, has been clashes of size and strength, blue-blood programs with carefully stoked animosities.

Today Oregon, Washington, UCLA and USC officially join the Big Ten. There's universal hoorah over the move. It means big money and exposure. It will elevate Oregon's profile as a national brand with broad recruiting reach. The Ducks have the talent to compete for the league title in their first year. The other three will be in the middle of the pack, mediocrities among mediocrities.

Change is good, but the best change comes out of cohesive vision. No such vision exists today, and that's a great peril for college football.