Even if we go SEC, which would be the most badass possible thing probably (and which we won't), I'll still feel for I-STATE0.
If we all go to 16, I feel pretty comfortable in the thought that I-Stateo goes to the Big Ten.
I think that if Texas goes PAC and ND goes ACC, there's no way the Big 10 expands past 12. They would be set up to make far more per team than any other conference. I do think that a playoff with 4 16 team conferences would mean more money for those 64 teams than just about anything else. However, what has been lost in all of this discussion is that the goal of an athletic department is to win games. Athletic departments pursue money because it helps them win games. I think the Big 10 is smart enough to see the benefit in making less money in the current system while still making more than everyone else, rather than making more in a playoff system, but probably making less than the PAC and SEC.
You can't keep thinking about the "current system".
The end result of this does not have to be a playoff. That's a media thing. The bowl structure can still thrive in this environment.
Last year, one of the things being kicked around with the Pac-16 was two automatic BCS bids for the conference. If you get a new BCS rule in place where a conference gets two automatic BCS bids if they have sixteen teams, you'll see a move to sixteen much, much more quickly. That still allows two-at large BCS bids every year for Notre Dame and some non-AQ team that potentially will qualify. Or you can save one for ND and allow some MWC/C-USA merger have the other spot.
This can fit inside the bowl system. That's not a problem.
Two auto-bids or not, the 12 team model in the Big 10 is proven to be viable. I'm not sure how lucrative the contracts for 16 team conferences will be from a TV contract standpoint, especially in the case of the ACC, where all the teams play in the same time zone. With 12 teams, the Big 10 will get 2 bids just about every year, even without an extra auto-bid. I really think that the BCS would give auto-bids to the MWC and Conference Reject before they give a second auto-bid to all 16 team conferences, anyway. It's better for the bowls to have more at large choices than less.
