National media often find it easy to poke a jab at Joe Paterno and his old style of thinking and when he does think outside the expected box he still seems to be an outsider at times.

For instance, take the fact that Joe Paterno wants the Big Ten to expand to twelve teams.  As you likely know at this point, a 12th team in the Big Ten would qualify the conference for a conference championship game (MONEY!) and help to ease the criticisms the conference receives due to the long lay off from the end of the regular season and the bowl games.

ESPN’s Ivan Maisel reports that Paterno spoke out about expansion in the Big Ten Thursday night at a booster meeting.  Paterno points out the major fallacies of the Big Ten when compared to most of the BCS schools; no games for six weeks and no conference championship game to bring in a payday from television rights.  He later would go on to say that he has recommended to league officials to seriously consider bringing in a 12th team and mentioning Rutgers, Pittsburgh, and Syracuse by name as options from the northeast.

But as ESPN’s Big Ten blogger Adam Rittenberg explains, Paterno seems to demonstrate just why Penn State is viewed as an outsider in the Big Ten;

His comments somewhat reinforce Penn State’s place as an outsider in the Big Ten, though that’s a debate for another day.

“You know, it’s a conference that’s dominated by a couple of people,” Paterno said. “If I start talking, they’re polite, but they snicker. They don’t know I know they’re snickering, but they’re polite. …I wish I were younger and going to be around [more] 20 years.”

Let’s brush aside the idea that Paterno won’t be here for another 20 years (we all know he’ll be coaching the grand kids of Jerry Collins, future grandson of Kerry, some day.  Once again, Paterno is right about the Big Ten.  The conference is one of the most tradition laden in the sport of college football and seems to refuse that expansion would be a good thing over all.

The Big Ten may have explored possibilities of expansion after Penn State joined in 1993, but how seriously have they investigated it?  The ideal scenario will always be the day when Notre Dame sucks it up and realizes they need to be in a conference (and the Big Ten would be the most logical fit), but we all know that the Irish will never do that.

Paterno always wants to do what is best for college football it seems, but he is always trying to sell his ideas to the wrong group.  Paterno once tried to build an all eastern football conference from scratch but was shunned by some of the current Big East schools who believed that they could not compete in a conference with Penn State (guess what – they would have been right) and now Penn State finds themselves in a conference that probably still uses typewriters in their offices and cranks their cars to get to work.

Will the Big Ten ever add a 12th team?  Perhaps, but it will not be anytime in the near future.  Should Paterno continue to speak out about expansion?  Yes.

Paterno is an icon in the sport and when he speaks, people do listen.  This isn’t some old man complaining about things and how they should change.  This is Joe Paterno addressing growing concerns for the Big Ten.

I’m a little new around here, so I am curious as to what your opinion on Big Ten expansion is.  For it or against it?  Who would you add (throwing Notre Dame out of the mix); Pittsburgh, Missouri, Rutgers, Syracuse, anyone else?  Or are you like me and wish Penn State would buy their way out of the Big Ten all together?  Leave your thoughts in the comments.

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