I did some digging into the proposal Pac-12 Conference commissioner Larry Scott has pitched his bosses.

The “Pac-12 NewCo” plan involves selling a 10 percent stake in a newly created media-rights holding company to private-equity investors. The deal is designed to infuse a one-time $500 million jackpot into the conference’s cash-disadvantaged athletic departments.

However, Scott’s proposal is based on a dreamy $5 billion valuation of the media enterprise. And we all know it’s not likely worth anything close to that.

Getting someone else to invest in something you’ve struggled to monetize yourself is a wonderful idea. Except, I talked with a couple of experts in the field, and it turns out tough questions will be asked.

That could be bad news for the Pac-12.

Endeavour Capital is exactly the kind of private-equity firm that the Pac-12 should be interested in partnering with. Its offices -- Los Angeles, Portland, Denver and Seattle -- sit in the conference footprint. And Endeavor Capital understands the challenges in funding higher education, having been an equity partner in the lucrative transition Grand Canyon University made from non-profit to for-profit more than a decade ago.

John von Schlegell co-founded the firm. He doesn’t blame the conference for exploring private investment, but also, von Schlegell said before the Pac-12 gets a nickel from a sophisticated investment firm, conference headquarters should expect a deep drill into their world.

“It will be a proctological exam,” von Schlegell said. “'Trust me'... is not going to work.”

Scott is on his third Pac-12 Network president. He’s cycled through three Chief Financial Officers in the last 19 months, and Scott has employed a couple of Chief Operating Officers during his tenure.

Anyone asked to invest $500 million -- or even $50 million -- will have questions about the conference’s executive-level turnover. Especially given that those employees were highly compensated vs. peers in their industry.

They’ll also want to know their return on investment won’t be undercut by expenses that include chartered aircraft, limousines, apartments, lavish parties, and bloated executive-team salaries.

Scott and his top-five salaried staffers made a combined $8.4 million a year in the last fiscal year reported. That’s more than double what SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and his top-five salaried lieutenants make. More than double, too, what Jim Delaney and the top-five employees made at the Big Ten in the same period.

The Pac-12 also distributes significantly less to its members than the other Power Five Conferences.

Hence, the need for a Pac-12 emergency-cash infusion.

An equity investor might request exit-style interviews with those departed executives. But to get that, they’d need to ask the Pac-12 to tear up the non-disclosure agreements it had those executives sign.

An outside audit of the conference financials might be entertaining to us and helpful to an investor. But, problematic for conference leadership.

Again, if I’m investing, I’d want to know my dollars weren’t being used for any purpose but to make more of them.

Scott’s contract ends in June 2022. The Pac-12′s lease on the downtown San Francisco headquarters expires later that same year. The conference’s media contract runs out in 2024.

“Their time-frame fits private equity,” von Schlegell said. "Private equity fits for a three, four, five, six-year window. There’s digital-media upside that would yield value creation that private equity would need... but my first thought when I heard about their plan was that it was weird, but probably worth exploring.

“The market will tell him if he’s crazy.”

von Schlegell is smart and shrewd. He has two degrees, including an M.B.A. from Stanford Graduate School of Business. He’s a rancher, and the co-founder of a successful equity firm. He sits as a board member on about a dozen entities, including the Oregon State Board of Higher Education before it was disbanded in favor of a trustee system.

If your company is looking for a financial proctology exam, Endeavour Capital and companies like it will be happy to provide one. But given what we learned about the Pac-12 financials in the four-part series late last year, I doubt the conference will want to operate with true transparency to an outside entity.

The numbers aren’t a good look.

In the last three weeks, I sent inquiries to all 12 members of the Pac-12 CEO Group, asking a question -- have they asked for an independent review of the conference’s finances?

Not the cursory drive-by look at the books that is typically done.

Not a cozy internal audit by Scott’s lieutenants.

A deep dive, like the one a private-equity firm would conduct.

Six members of the CEO Group responded. None of them indicated an outside audit had been ordered. Oregon State’s Dr. Edward Ray suggested I email the conference commissioner to ask him directly. So did USC interim president Dr. Wanda Austin. Arizona State’s Michael Crow passed the request to his vice president of communications.

Katie Pacquet, at ASU, issued a statement: “The conference is audited according to conference policy.”

A non-answer, essentially.

Oregon president Michael Schill didn’t respond. But a spokesperson for Schill, Kelly McIver, reached out via email and wrote: “Heard that ASU’s Michael Crow may have delivered a response on behalf of the rest of that CEO Group... does that match what you had?”

Um, no.

Hard to believe the old-guard president at Arizona State would think he spoke for the entire CEO Group, especially since Colorado chancellor Phil DiStefano is now the chair. DiStefano, by the way, is among the new-guard campus leaders, and he’s on record in support of a potential equity sale and seems to speak just fine for himself.

I emailed the conference headquarters to ask whether an external audit of finances had been ordered by the CEO Group. Andrew Walker, the Pac-12′s vice president of public affairs and head of communications, responded with a statement he said I could attribute to the Pac-12 Conference.

It read: “The Pac-12 Board annually approves the operating budgets of the Conference and Networks. They also regularly benchmark expenses against peer group conferences and networks as part of sound fiscal hygiene. No outside auditor has been engaged to support this regular review process.”

The statement raises two quick follow-up questions: Who does it consider a peer conference? And who does it consider a peer network?

Walker didn’t reply.

I’ll give it a try.

The Pac-12 doesn’t have a real peer as an athletic conference. It postures like a Power Five Conference member, but doesn’t perform like one in major sports. And the Pac-12 Network isn’t ESPN, which has 86 million subscribers. With only 17.9 million subscribers, the Pac-12 Network is more comparable to Comedy.TV.

Two sources familiar with “conference policy” on internal auditing told me that the annual internal Pac-12 audit of finances isn’t an extensive probe. Rather, it’s a cursory check to make sure the numbers add up.

The Pac-12 operation is ripe for a comprehensive examination. And the conference is inviting one by opening the door for a private-equity firm.

Said one high-ranking Pac-12 employee with knowledge of the expense and salary structure: “If you asked me to do some quick math, and you told me we needed to find $10 million a year in savings, it would take me three minutes.”

It’s understandable the old-guard university presidents and chancellors (ASU, Oregon State and UCLA) don’t view saving a few million dollars in expenses as a high priority. They created this thing. If it’s broken, it’s not just an indictment of Scott, but also their leadership. Some of the newer members of the CEO Group might be more interested in cleaning up the bottom line.

That said, the presidents and chancellors are charged with managing multi-billion dollar budgets on their own campuses. They’ve been focused on things such as funding, the government shutdown, sexual-harassment claims, and suicide-prevention initiatives. In the end, the woes of the athletic conference don’t occupy prime real estate on their desks.

“If I were a president, I’d want to get to the bottom of it,” said another current Pac-12 employee.

Here’s another economic viewpoint. David M. Carter, an associate professor at USC, works as a consultant in strategic marketing in the sports and entertainment world. He’s consulted for the NHL’s Anaheim Ducks, the City of Los Angeles, the Rose Bowl, and was an expert witness in the lawsuit pitting Oakland Alameda County Coliseum Authority v. Golden State Warriors.

“It certainly feels like a cash-advance of sorts that the presidents and chancellors and ADs really want because they can’t afford to lose pace,” Carter said. "It may have just been Larry Scott raising this up the flagpole to see what kind of debate, development or business opportunity he could get.

“($500 million for 10 percent) is a dreamy valuation. But the value is what someone believes they can do with it.”

The Pac-12 fashions itself a media company. Scott said it in his news conference before last season’s Pac-12 football championship game.

We all know it’s not a good one. The expenses are high. The distribution is poor. And the revenue generated for its members has been a raving disappointment.

Said Carter: “Running an international media company is not a core competency of the conference. You want that institutional knowledge. That’s where securing the proverbial smart money comes in.”

As in, the Pac-12′s wisest move would be to partner with (and give up control to) an existing media company. That’s a proposition Scott has balked at whenever it’s brought up. Remember, the Pac-12 has boasted for years that it owns and runs it own network. Giving up the keys would be a major about-face.

There’s reasonable doubt an existing media company would view the Pac-12 Network and its current subscriber base as a must-have acquisition. As Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News recently reported, the numbers are far worse than anyone imagined.

One high-ranking Pac-12 official told me this week that when the Pac-12 Network was formed, Scott approached ESPN, FOX, CBS and Discovery looking for a potential partner.

“Nobody on the outside knows this,” the official said. “We weren’t wanted.”

It’s why headquarters insiders have speculated Scott could turn his focus to China, where he’s cultivated a close relationship with Alibaba Group Executive Chairman, Jack Ma. Or that Scott might be forced to deal with private-equity firms that don’t add the value of media-rights expertise.

Potential partners will ask tough questions and cut costs. That’s what companies do when they’re looking to turn a profit and maximize value. Also, they’ll want to be more than a silent (10 percent) partner. They’ll want control. And that’s how a proposal of $500 million for 10 percent dwindles into a counter-offer of significantly less in cash in exchange for 51 percent control.

Private-equity money isn’t cheap.

A sophisticated firm won’t let public-records laws get in the way of a dig into the financials. It will want a favorable valuation. It will ask for an industry-standard 11-15 percent return on a $500 million investment. The conference athletic directors, who were promised a windfall when the network was formed, will hear that and fall over laughing, kicking their feet at the ceiling.

They were suckered by Scott’s projections years ago.

The Pac-12 isn’t performing well in revenue-generating sports. It didn’t put a team in the College Football Playoff for the second straight season. It didn’t win a single NCAA Tournament game in men’s basketball last season, and it may only get one NCAA Tournament bid in men’s basketball this season.

The Pac-12 has some success stories. Women’s basketball, softball, volleyball, baseball, gymnastics, swimming, tennis, rowing and track and field have all mattered nationally in recent seasons. But the financials show those successes don’t grow profits, just proud alums.

If nothing changes, David M. Carter at USC thinks the Power Five Conferences could eventually split into two factions -- big-time and small-time.

“Even though you have this great geographic conference (in the Pac-12). You can win all the championships you want but if you’re not competitive in football and basketball it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy that you attract only Olympic-caliber sport athletes.

“It’s difficult to monetize that.”