The Sun Belt is booting Idaho and New Mexico State after 2017. The Vandals seem likely to end up in FCS, and nobody has any idea what NMSU might do. It's probably not the start of any sort of trend. But what if it was?

For the sake of argument, let's say several other struggling programs left FBS. Let's say FBS lost enough teams to shelve Conference USA, the mid-major conference with no real identity. Let's also say we rearranged the remaining non-powers into four even conferences that made geographic sense.

If we used 10-year S&P+ averages, for instance, and escorted the bottom dozen teams to FCS, we might have something like this as the entire mid-major level, plus the independents:

American 10-year S&P+ MAC 10-year S&P+ MWC 10-year S&P+ Sun Belt 10-year S&P+ GA Southern 46 Cincinnati 40 Boise State 8 Houston 54 USF 52 Toledo 64 Utah State 66 Tulsa 62 ECU 56 UConn 77 Nevada 67 Southern Miss 76 Navy 63 NIU 78 Fresno State 74 LA Tech 82 UCF 65 BGSU 83 Air Force 75 Troy 90 Marshall 73 WMU 91 SDSU 84 Arkansas State 92 App State 79 Ohio 94 Hawaii 95 SMU 93 Temple 89 Ball State 97 CSU 96 Rice 101 WKU 99 CMU 98 SJSU 100 South Alabama 105 MTSU 103 Kent State 108 Wyoming 102 UL-Lafayette 106 Memphis 104 Akron 113 UNLV 107 UTSA 111 FAU 109 Buffalo 114 New Mexico 110 UTEP 112 Avg 78.2 Avg 88.1 Avg 82 Avg 90.3

The MAC would be mostly unchanged, the Mountain West wouldn't change at all (good job, MWC!), and the best of the others would group up pretty easily.

Would this be better? Apologies to fans of Charlotte, EMU, Georgia State, Miami (Ohio), North Texas, Old Dominion, Texas State, Tulane, UMass and ULM ... and Coastal Carolina and UAB, I guess. Teams could still fight their way back up. This is why college football needs promotion and relegation anyway.

This is now the third Read Option in a row about rearranging conference stuff. This is March.

Elsewhere!

This is a cool mini history of college football: a tour of the 23 all-time offenses that grade out as perfect in one system.

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Appreciate the excellent Warrick Dunn, who's still working to help single parents become homeowners.

Same. Gus Malzahn's delightful response to the latest Jim Harbaugh holler topic: "Yeah, whatever." (While the Wolverines are in Florida, an Ann Arbor linebacker committed to Ohio State.)

LSU's president says the budget thing threatening the school's football is no joke.

Let's revive a bunch of dearly departed conferences, cutting up the bloated old SoCon and WAC into divisions and what have you.

Bill C team of the day: well, it was already gonna be Idaho, awkwardly enough.

If you treat NFL Combine drills like Olympics medal events, then Ohio State won, followed by Cal and TCU.

Somehow, Alabama found room for another recruiting ace in its building, as former Maryland assistant Mike Locksley comes aboard as an offensive analyst. He can't recruit players, but he can help network, and Bama needs all the help it can get, folks.

Ivy League coaches are giving up on full-contact season practices. This is probably a worthwhile idea.

Podcast Ain't Played Nobody welcomes Ryan Nanni to discuss the vital importance of never failing in Florida.

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