Expansion has done nothing to boost ACC play at this point

PINEHURST, N.C. -- There are better ways to enter the marketplace.

How do the ad slicksters put it -- product rollout, brand launch?

Can the Hurricanes finally become the ACC's showcase team? (Getty Images)

There are even more inventive ways to tap dance around the issue at ACC media days. The hell with the corporate buzzwords. ACC football has disappointed. As a brand, it is branded, arriving underdeveloped in 2004 and going into 2007 overhyped.

The ACC league presidents are still on the hook for delivering a beta version too soon, with too many glitches. Three years ago, that quickie expansion forced an awkward, gi-normous 11-team league to kick off without Boston College. Two years ago, league champion Florida State lost five games.

Last season, the league went Van de Velde, limping home with Miami and Florida State both at 7-6.

"Outside of the conference (the perception is) yes, one of us, or Virginia Tech, need to be their showcase team," Miami offensive lineman Derrick Morse said.

The fact that the ACC is still launching football is the biggest clue to its underachievement. Check your preseason magazines for confirmation. The conference is rated somewhere below the SEC, Pac-10, Big Ten, Big East and Big 12 heading into this season.

Pretty much where it was before Florida State, Miami and Virginia Tech came onboard.

Check the outside world. It has not been kind to the ACC. BCS league teams are 16-6 against the ACC. The SEC is particularly harsh, having gone 7-1 against the reconstituted ACC. The league is 1-8 in BCS bowls, the only victory being Florida State's 2000 Sugar Bowl win.

Against the top 10, the ACC is a staggering 3-31 since 2000.

There is a segment of the population that would give up a kidney in return for ACC Tournament tickets. A similar segment wouldn't give you a can of kidney beans for tickets to last season's football championship game between Wake Forest and Georgia Tech.

There is not a bigger difference in perception between the two money-making sports in any major conference.

"When a Wake Forest can win a league with Florida State, Miami and Virginia Tech in the league that's something to be respected ... " commissioner John Swofford said. "If that fits Madison Avenue, fine. If it doesn't, that's fine too."