https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/big-12-considering-private-equity-investment-of-up-to-1-billion-for-as-much-as-20-of-conference/
obviously, the devil's in the details. but this is about future earnings potential of the new conference, not the past. so an investor looks at the portfolio and says: relative to its peers, this conference is substantially undervalued. i can invest in it and make better than bank rates and other investment alternatives.
how you say? well basketball is clearly worth more than they're getting for it. that needs to separate from football as a standalone entity and be marketed accordingly. yormark has already proposed that. football has added some undervalued entities, four of them actually.
so for me, this is a good place for a long term investment. down the road i can sell my 15% share for way more than $1 billion and in the interim gather dividend income that beats bank rates.