Missouri looks to be well on its way to joining the Southeastern Conference. Although the SEC offers stability and financial security, Missouri will regret leaving the Big 12 when all’s said and done.

Can you blame Missouri for getting hypnotized by the bright, glamorous lights of the SEC? To be fair, this is the conference that has won the last five BCS National Championships and sends more players to the NFL than any other conference.

But let’s be realistic: Missouri is not Alabama, LSU or Florida. Missouri is a football program that did not start seeing consistent success until 2003, and as much as Missouri wants to believe that it can compete for SEC titles, the Tigers have never won an outright Big Eight or Big 12 title. Missouri’s lone Big Eight championship was a shared title with Nebraska in 1969.

Kansas fans know better than most about the difficulties of sustaining success in football. The 2008 Orange Bowl win over Virginia Tech seems like a distant memory considering the current state of the football program. The upgraded competition on a weekly basis in the SEC could ultimately send the Tigers to bottom-feeder status along with Vanderbilt and Ole Miss.

Missouri has to consider that much of its success is due to head coach Gary Pinkel’s recruiting prowess in the state of Texas. Missouri’s football team currently has 35 players on roster from Texas, but Pinkel can expect that pipeline to shrink considerably if the school moves to the SEC.

Yes, the Aggies will provide the SEC with a Texas school, but merely Texas A&M’s presence in the SEC is not reassuring to families that want to see their sons play annually. Texas A&M is expected to be in the SEC West division, while Missouri will reportedly join the SEC East. As a result, it could be years until the Tigers ever step foot in College Station.

Missouri will also regret turning its back on the 120-year rivalry series with Kansas. It’s been well-documented that the Kansas-Missouri rivalry will end if Missouri leaves the Big 12, and the Tigers will find themselves lacking a true rival in the SEC.

Not only do long-standing, heated rivalries excite fans, but it also provides a financial boost to the rival universities and communities. Though it rarely gets the national attention of the Red River Rivalry or Michigan-Ohio State, the KU-MU rivalry is one of the most intense and culturally significant rivalries in the country. It is unfortunate that Missouri is so willing to throw that away.

In a conference built on the foundation of tradition, Missouri will lack exactly that in the SEC.