In the Conference Realignment Game, a Deadline Is Not a Deadline

Yet a year later, the Pac-12 is still in first gear.

The Pac-12, whose current agreement with ESPN and Fox expires after this season, found itself boxed out of several options when the Big 12 surprisingly locked in its media deal with Fox and ESPN last October, two months after the Big Ten announced its deal with Fox, CBS and NBC. The Southeastern Conference’s 10-year contract with ESPN kicks in next year, and the Atlantic Coast Conference’s deal with ESPN runs until 2036.

That leaves few openings on the broadcast schedule to showcase the Pac-12.

“The problem for the Pac-12 is all the other cards have now been dealt,” said Ed Desser, a sports media rights consultant, who noted that the only coveted spot would be Saturday night on ESPN or Friday night on ESPN, Fox, Apple or Amazon.

Negotiations have sputtered for several reasons.

First, the Pac-12 commissioner, George Kliavkoff, tried to convince the University of California Board of Regents last fall to keep U.C.L.A. from leaving, which would have given the conference the valuable Los Angeles media market to shop around. (In December, the governing board voted not to block the move.)

Also last fall, many media companies began slashing jobs nearly across the board, particularly at Disney, which owns ESPN and said it would shed 7,000 jobs as it dealt with the continuing impact of cord cutting. And while streaming platforms like Apple and Amazon might be attractive, those companies are unlikely to view sports programming (that is not the N.F.L.) as indispensable.

It quickly became apparent that the media industry’s belt-tightening would manifest itself in second-tier rights deals. Shortly after the Big 12’s deal, which was largely considered below-market at $31.7 million per school, the Pac-12 adjusted downward by 10 percent estimates of an agreement it could reach if U.C.L.A. remained.

Then came the delays.

Expectations of an agreement by the start of the Pac-12 men’s basketball tournament led to hopes of a deal by the Final Four. And then by mid-April. And then surely by the start of summer. Now, the assumption is that an announcement will be made before the Pac-12’s football media day on July 21, so that the event’s dominant story line is actually football.