Big East Commissioner John Marinatto finally staggered out of his darkened office. A paperweight was embedded in his computer, and empty bottles of wine lay strewn about the office. He spoke to the New York Times about some things.
Marinatto said in a telephone interview that he planned to hold Syracuse and Pittsburgh to their 27-month contractual exit obligations, meaning that they would not be able to leave the Big East until June 2014.
This was expected. There was no way the Big East was just going to tell Pitt and Syracuse to just go on their merry way. No hard feelings. Simply put, this was the opening of negotiations for Pitt and Syracuse to leave the Big East. You don’t concede your biggest piece of leverage in negotiations at the start. Not even John Marinatto and the Big East do that.
