All this talk of 'stalling'..

If we have a nationally relevant season, I don't think it's naive to think we could be let into the party. Our TV numbers are better than the talking heads would lead you believe, and if we win they get better......

I think Grayman started a thread where he listed our TV numbers, which were much better than I would've thought.

No offense, but I'm pretty sure it's been written that Barnes has been in contact with the Big 12 on several occasions.

If they want us, at all, and things are so bleak as some people think, a deal probably would have been done already.

A great year raises our value, could be leveraged a couple different directions, and not necessarily in terms of going to a current power 5 conference.

Those things are all likely true...but irrational dreams are what make this country great!

Big 12 ain’t big enough. To the B1G!

No one has talked about this yet. Winning helps viewership numbers. But it does not help "attractiveness" to another conference. Why is Vanderbilt in the SEC? Because you can schedule a victory. The B12 doesn't have automatic wins. There's no powerhouses either, but why travel to the northwest to pick up a loss? It doesn't make sense for average, at best, TV numbers.

If we’ve got to travel and are looking for prestige, the SEC would be the league to get accepted into. I’m personally not all that Keen on the Big 12, doesn’t excite me. I’d rather rebuild the PAC or get into the league nobody got into and prove ‘em all wrong.

Yeah, I talked about TV viewership in starting the So What Gives? thread.
What this is really all about is TV money and its availability as opposed to how many slots a conference might have open for expansion.
The Big 12 has a pro rata clause in its contract with ESPN but not with Fox. So it comes down to how many more slots ESPN is willing to allow for or if Fox can be worked with to add more (they apparently did so with the four Pac-12 additions)
I believe Yormark has the immediate ability to add at least two more schools. I think the conference will eventually add four for a total of 20 but that could be way down the road.
So the current situation is up in the air. IMO, Yormark wants to wait until at least the end of the football season and probably until the offseason to even start looking again. There have been reports that he is looking at the ACC, primarily Clemson and Florida State (good luck on that).
So why would he choose schools like Colorado and Arizona State over OSU when the Beavers get significantly better TV viewership? Those schools are closer. Arizona was taken for men's basketball alone.
But if the Pac-12 had broken up closer to a couple years ago when Texas and Oklahoma announced that they were leaving, I have no doubt that OSU and WSU would be in the Big 12 today.