TV networks offered big money to recruit 10 Pac-12 schools to various conferences but denied a chance for George Kliavkoff to survive: Reports

The Pac-12 has gone through a lot of turmoil to the point where it's on the brink of extinction. However, it seems as if once the USC Trojans and UCLA Bruins were on the outs from the Conference of Champions that some people were ready for a drastic shift in conference realignment.

National columnist for USA Today Sports Dan Wolken posted about the incompetence of Pac-12 Commissioner George Kliavkoff as reportedly multiple TV networks were ready to help:

"The fact that the TV networks would pay various conferences to add 10 of the 12 schools in the Pac-12 but the Pac-12 couldn't get a TV deal that kept them in the same league is one of the biggest failures by a sports executive we have ever seen."

While it is not known which TV networks were involved or even speculating on the process, this shows the lack of approval Kliavkoff had from outside partners. This will be interesting to see if things become more publicized and we learn about which networks were looking for the massive conference upheaval.

What was the final straw for the Pac-12 before it reached the point of no return?

The Conference of Champions was once arguably the biggest in all of college athletics but has rapidly declined in the last few years. Commissioner George Kliavkoff has only been part of the conference on July 1, 2021, and things continued to decline.

While the conference still had all 12 members, he was unable to find a media rights deal with any of the television providers. That allowed the USC Trojans and UCLA Bruins to look elsewhere, and seeing the league's top two programs leave for a rival conference was the first step into the grave.

The final one was the fact George Kliavkoff approached media providers, including ESPN, asking for $50 million per team after USC and UCLA announced their departures.

ESPN offered $30 million per team, and Kliavkoff asked for almost double that and expected that to go well. While negotiation skills are not necessarily the only thing to have to be a successful commissioner, having someone in the room who has that trait would have gone a long way.

That asking price was ridiculous, and seeing the Apple TV deal be the only offer brought to the Pac-12 presidents feels symbolic of the dumpster fire that has happened in the conference.