Everyone comes out more or less ahead... Texas gets the big television payday it wanted and the shot at a profitable network it doesn't have to share with anyone. Nebraska and Colorado both move into conferences they consider better academic and cultural fits. Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, Missouri and, yes, Baylor hold on to their spots in a big-money conference and aren't forced to seek refuge in the Mountain West, Conference USA or Big East. The Big Ten and Pac-10 (assuming it makes a play for Utah out of the Mountain West) both pick up a 12th member that facilitates a conference championship game. Assuming the Big Ten is content at an even dozen – Missouri is presumably locked into the Big 12 for the foreseeable future, and Notre Dame remains by all appearances firmly committed to independence – the once doomed Big East will remain intact without losing a single member. Even if it loses Utah, the Mountain West picks up the slack with the addition of Boise State, a net boost (albeit a small one) in the MWC's bid for an automatic BCS bid in 2012.

The Pac-10 ultimately whiffed on the blockbuster score it was hoping for, but it did expand in exactly the (relatively modest) fashion everyone expected when it first announced its plan to add teams. No one is in worse position as the smoke begins to clear than they were when the fires started burning.