I think playing tougher competition year and year out better prepares us to play well.
Be careful going down that road. I can agree to disagree about Oklahoma State, but if you want to attempt to say MSU is better off by playing tougher out of conference teams ie BCS conference teams, you're going to get destroyed. Since 1992 (modern SEC schedule), these are the results of doing just that:
1992: Texas, W, ended 7-4
1995: Baylor, W, ended 3-8
1998: Oklahoma State, L, ended 8-3
1999: Oklahoma State, W, ended 9-2
2000: BYU, W, ended 7-4
2001: BYU, L, ended 3-8
2002: Oregon, L, ended 3-9
2003: Oregon, L, ended 2-10
2006: West Virginia, L, ended 3-9
2007: West Virginia, L, ended 7-5
2008: Georgia Tech, L, ended 4-8
2009: Georgia Tech, L, ended 5-7
So, as you can see, it really matters not what comes of that OOC game. If anything, it HURTS us in years when we are mediocre, such 2009, when we could have been bowling had we not played Georgia Tech, who was highly ranked at the time. Would you rather play Georgia Tech during the season or play Michigan in the postseason? Unfortunately many MSU fans I think would say the former. Ignorance.
And it's also another reason that this Oklahoma State game doesn't affect our season much at all, except for one extra W/L, whatever it is. So why not play a sure win and focus our efforts on beating Auburn/LSU/Alabama? Time and time again it has been shown that even if you play an easy schedule, no one cares if you beat a good team or two. Nobody gave two ***** about Texas A&M's cadaver non-conference sked last year, because they beat Alabama. If we had pulled out the Auburn or South Carolina games in 2011, no one would care about our OOC sked back then either.
It's really this simple. Do you want to talk about the payday and the national audience for playing this game? Sure, I can buy those reasons. But trying to say it 'helps' MSU and prepares us better? Get that weak crap out of here. We'll get plenty of preparation with Auburn, Alabama, Arkansas, LSU, South Carolina and Ole Miss.