You gotta remember that Jon Wilner's audience is message board denizens like us for Pac 12 schools. He's sweating hard trying to make a juicy long-running saga of what has become a non-story.
Some sort of Pac 12/Big 12 merger was discussed and rejected because the money wasn't there from the networks. Further B1G expansion on the west coast was discussed and rejected because the money wasn't there from the networks. The big story is over, now it's just the little stories to tidy things up, starting with which side of the Fox/ESPN war the Pac 12 will team with (both sides, if they're smart).
Warren is not an actor in this drama, let's be clear, and once again this is trying to squeeze more drama out of something that has already been decided.
NBC is the party that can put a squeeze on, but they're quite happy with where they've landed in all of this. Warren and the B1G are just puppets on a string of their network partners now, rejecting high-value inventory like games against ND is something that would have been clearly kiboshed in finalizing their megabucks new deal.
It continues to be weird to me the way so many people are pining for some even grander denouement to this saga. I get where it's coming from, the place it's left the sport is both untidy and ugly, and people have become fans of their conference like it's the Marvel Cinematic Universe or something, this quasi rooting-for-corporate-balance-sheet relationship. But the war is over and the Big Ten won. Thank the heavens that it's time to get back to the actual games.