THE CHEAP SEATS with STEVE CAMERON: Maybe Apple could save the Pac-Whatever after all

The voices are getting louder.

These people are both righteous and, well, right.

They’re blasting the realignment (in truth, call it prostitution) involving so many of America’s great universities at the altar of football — and the millions that flow from essentially two media networks.

Fox and ESPN.

Coaches, administrators and various other stakeholders FINALLY have gotten around to noticing that almost all non-football athletes are going to suffer mightily with brutal travel schedules that restrict study time, chances to have a normal college life, etc.

In the collapsed Pac-12 alone, there are roughly 5,000 golfers, gymnasts, volleyball players and all the rest who are being sacrificed so that their schools can chase cash in the Bigger Ten, the Bigger 12, and so forth.

Even as I type this, universities I used to follow and admire growing up in the Bay Area — Stanford and Cal — are on their knees, begging for acceptance to the ATLANTIC Coast Conference.

I am embarrassed for them, and disgusted.

Stanford has won 160 national championships, mostly in Olympic sports and women’s basketball.

The growing opposition to this selling out of entire universities to football money is getting louder than a hip-hop concert in your garage.

So, who’s listening?

NOBODY who matters.

In other words, the university presidents and chancellors who ceded decisions to conference commissioners, who ceded it to the TV networks.

Look, we know that rapacious Big 12 boss Brett Yormark doesn’t give the tiniest damn about Colorado’s softball team.

Of course not.

He’s paid to bring in the bucks, and football provides around 85 cents of every dollar in media rights money.

You can’t blame Yormark, any more than you’d blame a hedge fund manager for unfettered greed.

That’s their game.

But the university presidents?

These men and women are charged will making decisions for entire schools — emphasizing sports only as a sideline to academics (a bit like college cultural life).

As the regent of a Big Ten school put it: “Are there no adults in the room?”

By now, we get it.

College football is ALL about business at the FBS (Division I-A) level.

Washington State president Kirk Schulz said in an interview this week that he was shocked to hear the news that Washington and Oregon were headed to the Big Ten.

Schulz said that all the remaining Pac-12 presidents (Colorado had already “Prime Timed” to the Big 12) agreed to sign a grant-of-rights with Apple that would have guaranteed each school $25 million — plus escalating amounts as subscriptions to the conference’s package on Apple TV were sold.

Then, on Aug. 4, just prior to the meeting in which the deal was to be finalized, Oregon and Washington announced they were leaving.

The amount of money promised to the two programs (half a share of TV rights) will hit something like $35 million or a bit more in the six years of the Big Ten’s current deal.

Strategists in the industry have estimated that the Big Ten would have had to come up with about $350-375 million to meet those new obligations.

What happened?

Did Rutgers come into cash from a flush donor, or what?

Nope, said Schulz.

Look at Fox and/or ESPN.

BEAR IN mind, Schulz has been chairman of the CEO group that was working with Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff on media rights opportunities.

He’s been a hell of a lot more tuned in than just a guy sporting a crimson coat in Pullman.

“We’ve got just a couple networks that are making the real decisions about who goes where based on the dollars they want to put into it,” Schulz said.

“I do think if I was Fox and ESPN, I’m not sure I want Apple in the marketplace, frankly.

“I don’t want somebody with pockets that are that deep as a rival if I can afford it.

“People can say, ‘Kirk, put on a tin-foil hat. That’s kind of a conspiracy theory.’

“But on the other hand, I can see making a business decision — I’m not talking about the value of the schools or any of that — that might be seen as more strategic to have a corner on the marketplace.”

Schulz’s theory has gained considerable traction across the Pac-12 footprint, which could be making some predators nervous.

Schulz wasn’t kidding about those pockets, and if Apple wanted to bully its way into re-doing all this, we’ve already established that money talks.

Apple has taken its live sports streaming into baseball and soccer, and clearly intended to get its start in college football.

Hey, the Big Ten’s deal with Fox expires in six years.

As for ESPN, (pause for giggle) Apple could own it by then.

AS OF Thursday, Apple’s net worth was $2.81 trillion.

Fox traded the same day at $15.4 billion, Disney (parent of ESPN) at $160 billion.

ESPN, according to analysts, makes up about $50 billion of Disney’s total net worth — and is widely believed to be for sale.

Ironically, Apple HAS been considered the most likely buyer.

If you want to put those money numbers into context, Fox and ESPN together are worth roughly $65 billion — compared to Apple, which if we take the unfathomable trillions out of the equation, hits $2,811 billion (or 43 times the total for Fox and ESPN combined).

If I get a chance, I’ll have two questions for Kirk Schulz.

First, if Apple hadn’t been blindsided at the last second, could the tech giant simply have bumped each Pac-12 share to a guaranteed $35 million — running off the competition?

Second, if some combination of schools (beginning with Wazzu and Oregon State) can hang on to the Pac-12 as a legal entity and recreate the conference, will Apple TV come back to the table?

Since it’s all business (even when it shouldn’t be), I wonder if Kirk has heard from Apple.

At least 5,000 non-football athletes in the Pac-12 are looking for a savior.

That WOULD be a blessing.

Email: scameron@cdapress.com

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press four times each week, normally Tuesday through Friday unless, you know, stuff happens.

Steve suggests you take his opinions in the spirit of a Jimmy Buffett song: “Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On.”