Harvey Perlman, the Chancellor at the University of Nebraska, offers some great insight into why he believes the BCS is the best method in crowning a national champion and why a playoff isn’t the answer. Below are some excerpts from his op-ed in the Washington Times.
“The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) is the best thing that has happened to postseason college football since the invention of the bowl games themselves. I know there are football fans and sports writers who criticize any arrangement short of some hypothetical playoff.”
Perlman refutes a playoff as a replacement to the BCS and suggests crafting a “system that reflects the restraints of the real world rather than the ideal world.”
First, a system of play must recognize that the athletes who play football are also students. For the vast majority of them, their success in the classroom will have far more to do with their success as adult citizens than their performance on the football field. As presidents and chancellors, this reality must be our highest priority.
Second, not every school in Division I is equal in any field of endeavor, including football. Each university has a particular set of strengths on which it builds its reputation and on which it attracts students and faculty.
These strengths were created by conscious investments, hiring of great leaders, natural advantages, significant philanthropic donations, dumb luck, or a combination of these factors. Only in athletics is it argued that the benefits of these investments should be equitably shared with other institutions.
All students, like student athletes, can make individual choices among the strengths of the various institutions in which they could enroll, and these choices may enhance or diminish their future opportunities. This is a reality that cannot be ignored nor is it one that can be easily changed.
Third, any system designed to determine a national champion in intercollegiate football can only come about through the agreement of those universities that consistently field highly ranked teams. A system that did not involve schools from the six automatic qualifying conferences and Notre Dame could not claim to be one that is likely to produce a national champion on a consistent basis. That is not true of the other conferences.
To secure the agreement of these essential conferences, the system must provide revenue in excess of the opportunities they could obtain on their own, must be consistent with their academic values, must take into account the effect on the fans who provide their schools with support, must protect the bowl system for broad access by many institutions, must preserve the excitement and relevance of the regular season, and must honor the long-standing relationships they have had with the bowls and the communities those bowls support.
The BCS satisfies these requirements. We have yet to see an alternative arrangement that does the same.
The Chancellor also recognizes that like all sports systems, the BCS does have it’s flaws, but that it currently is the best format to match up college football’s number one and two teams.
We appreciate the ideal that a national champion should be crowned on the basis of performance on the field. But even a playoff would offer no guarantee that the two best teams would play for the national championship. There would remain arguments about which teams were selected for the playoffs and how they were seeded. The BCS turns the regular season into the “playoff” and produces an opportunity for a game between the two highest-ranked teams.
So far, this is the best arrangement we have found that provides significant access and revenue to all of Division 1 football and preserves the traditional bowls, respects the academic calendar, and celebrates the success and commitments of student athletes throughout the country.
Tags: BCS
WOW! A new website to promote the BCS and so far 0 for 43 for supporters. If that alone does not speak SCREAMING volumes, I don’t know what does!
I will give the BCS credit for this:
They have certainly not been censoring their content based on whether the posts agree with the content.
I will be interested to see how much passion is left by us fans come February here and on the INSIDEtheBCS twitter feed. I am certain the BCS intends to push onward with this and the PR firms hired will begin highlighting the real issues involved.
Until the conversation reaches a point where the BCS is willing to look at realistically considering a playoff and the fans regain faith that the BCS is truly interested in looking at developing a long term vision for college football their will be little hope for a real change.
At least the conversation is now started. The little hope we now have is better than the no hope we had when the BCS was not listening to concerns publicly.
I would have more respect if the organizers of the BCS simply came out and admitted it was all about money. I would still hate the system, but I would respect the honesty. After all college football is a business like any other (except the part where you pay the workers).
The Wetzel plan would work just as well as the 1-AA playoffs, it would allow the NCAA to make more money with more meaningful games in more conferences. Each conference would be guaranteed one seat at the table, so a conference title would be meaningful, and there would be five at large bids for the top five non-champs. Arguments for exclusion would be non-existent because if you aren’t the best team in your conference and you aren’t in the top five in the national what real argument could you have.
Your arguments would have more credibility it you didn’t already have playoffs in almost every other NCAA sport…Gotta go, UNH has a playoff game against McNeese State
Vapid, inane and disingenuous are just a few words to describe your Ari Fleischer inspired propaganda campaign. The BCS is a bigoted system that in any other industry would be deemed profoudly unfair. Could you see this structured unfairness happening in business? In K-12 or college education? I am willing to answer all of your vacuous questions on your website about the six difficult questions to answer about a playoff, and fix your system, for the amount of money you are paying BCS executives. Until that time, remember the most pertinent quote by Lord Acton, uttered in the late 1800s that still rings true today, “Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.” BCS potentates, take note.
OK, aside from the insane scheduling, impossible presidential pronouncements, and ridiculous predictions, can someone tell me why my BCS Playoffs wouldn’t work?
http://www.radicalruss.com/wp-content/uploads/bcs-playoffs.gif
I created it before this week’s games, so some of the records would be wrong, but why wouldn’t it work? I mean, aside from explanations that end with “money”.
16-teams, winners of the 11 conferences and next five highest BCS-ranked teams.
That leaves 104 of 120 FBS teams. Half of them (52) can play in the 26 Ridiculous Corporate Sponsor Bowls that won’t be a part of my playoff plan. Mediocrity will continue to be rewarded. 6-5 teams with connections and “tradition” can still go to a bowl.
First two rounds, home games at higher-BCS-ranked schools. Yes, it gives you Florida/Troy and Texas/Central Michigan in the first round, but how is that any worse than a late-season Florida/FIU or Alabama/Chatanooga game?
Eight first round losers paired off by closest ranking into four non-BCS “consolation bowls”. So for their heroic but doomed first round efforts, Troy gets to play Central Michigan in the Outback Bowl. (OK, big problem, that bowl makes little money. Maybe we give this to the New Mexico Bowl. There are still kinks to be worked out.) By matching rankings, these consolation bowls could be good games.
Your second round losers would play in the two of the BCS bowls (Fiesta and Sugar, but these would rotate annually among the BCS bowls.) This gives you two games with likely Top 8 teams.
Your second round winners play the semifinals in two other BCS bowls (Rose and Cotton, and yes, I promoted the Cotton Bowl to BCS status.)
The winners play the National Championship game and the losers play each other in another BCS consolation bowl (Orange).
Every team that goes to the playoffs plays in at least one playoff game and one bowl, the four best teams in the playoffs play two playoff games and two bowls. Half of the teams that don’t go to the playoffs still play in one bowl game. How does this not make money?
I’d like to enter into the debate this plan to realign conferences resulting in a 16-team playoff. This shows the new conferences along with where teams would be seeded through Week 12. College football, you can pay me later.
http://poolsville.blogspot.com/search/label/Project%20Playoffs
Dear BCS,
I have seen what a wonderful job you’ve done with college football, and I was wanting to ask you a favor. Could you suggest for me your favorite brand of pig lipstick? I just thought you would be a good group to ask.
Thanks!
It is not surprising that the chancellor of Nebraska would approve of the BCS. Nebraska benefited directly from one of the BCS’s greatest transgressions. Lets take a trip down memory lane:
At the end of the 2001 regular season, the Colorado Buffaloes routed the number two ranked Nebraska Cornhuskers and then edged the number three ranked Longhorns in the Big-12 title game, sending the BCS rankings into a tizzy. The Ducks ended up with a number two ranking on both the AP and Coaches polls, but the computers dropped them down to a number four ranking, eliminating them from the national title game. Instead, the Huskers went on to play the Miami Hurricanes for the national title at the Rose Bowl. This caused the BCS committee to alter the ranking system for subsequent years to a formula which, if applied in 2001, would have placed Oregon in the national championship game. The Ducks instead played at the Fiesta Bowl against Colorado. Oregon’s run defense stifled Colorado’s running game, holding them to just 49 yards on 31 carries. Harrington passed for 350 yards and led the Ducks to a 38-16 win.
I love the Rose Bowl. I love the Cotton Bowl. I love the meinecke carquest bowl. And of course the Tostitos Fiesta Salad Bowl. The traditions run way deep, the drama is intense. For most of my 14 years of existence, my life has been centered around and spirals down into the Bowls. My life would change dramatically if this rich and long tradition were to disappear. Please don’t change the past – I’ve lived too long with the rich BCS tradition! Think of our grandchildren!!!
“Third, any system designed to determine a national champion in intercollegiate football can only come about through the agreement of those universities that consistently field highly ranked teams….To secure the agreement of these essential conferences, the system must provide revenue in excess of the opportunities they could obtain on their own”
Translation: If we have to share we will take our ball and go home and tell our mommies.
Also, if this is true, I’m pretty sure Boise St, Utah and TCU this decade all fit your profile and they’re SCREAMING for a playoff.
I wish the AP voters would man up and vote anybody but the winner of the sham “title game” the national champs. I’m pretty sure TCU is the best team in the nation. Wouldn’t it be great if they had a chance to prove it?
Q: Who would participate?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: How many automatic qualifiers?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: What would be the criteria to qualify?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: What would be the criteria for seedings?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: Where would the games be played?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: When would the games be played?
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Q: If you could resolve all that would everyone be satisfied? NO!!
A: Ask Div I-AA, II, III and NAIA how they do it.
Morons. That’s who runs the BCS. Complete morons. You guys are so full of crap. Let’s vote on whose going to the Super Bowl this year. Since the Saints and Colts are #1 and #2, they will play for the national championship.
This is all a joke. Every other sport figures out the those “tough” questions. It is insulting that they publish this nonsense. It is not only because they think the bowls will pay more $$ but it does so without giving the non power conferences an opportunity to succeed on the field and subsequently with recruiting. It now has gotten to a corrupt level with the bogus SEC referee calls to guarantee Florida and/or Alabama are in the game.
This is pathetic… we all want a playoff system except for the limited few who are worried about their pockets… great ideas for a playoff here:
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-playoff112707
A playoff would ruin college football. LONG LIVE THE BCS!
As a University of Texas alum, I say KEEP THE BCS.
It is in the best ineterest of my University. I don’t care about Rice, TCU or BYU. They need to understand and stay in their place.
This is TRUE imperative of the BCS: “To secure the agreement of these essential conferences, the system must provide REVENUE IN EXCESS of the opportunities they could obtain on their own”
There is only so much revenue and there is no reason to dilute it by including minor college.
Life is not fair and neither is the BCS. All the playoff boosters just need to deal with it.
A playoff system is certainly needed but not if it in anyway includes the BCS ranking system. The BCS ranking system is flawed because it includes the polls which are themselves flawed. Anytime you take a poll there is going to be bias based upon the history of that university. Take for example Notre Dame. If Notre Dame wins 9 games they are going to be ranked in the top 10 regardless of who they played. They will simply be ranked because they are Notre Dame. Same goes for schools such as USC, Alabama, etc.
The playoff system needs to be based simply on rather or not you win your conference championship. Combine all BCS schools into 8 conferences each with a conference championship game. Each Conference Champion would go to the playoffs. Any school who does not make the playoffs would go to the bowl games.
The University Presidents say the season would be too long but what have they done in the last several years? Increased the season by two games. If they went back to a 10 game season the season would be only 1 game longer than it is now and that would only be for the 2 teams that play in the National Championship game.
It is time that the NCAA does what is right for College Football.
This is the same guy who will NOT schedule Boise State, even though they have an open date and Boise State is offering to play AT Nebraska with no return date to Boise required….sorry, but to call him un-biased is to take us all for fools.
Amusing how many reasonably worded, clean-language comments arguing for a playoff get deleted here.
The “Playoff is a bad idea” line of argument (regardless of the supporting points) is more than a little hypocritical – every other NCAA sport (including non-D1 football) has playoffs.
It is also noteworthy that this website/marketing effort is backed by the BCS folks, not the NCAA. As Ari should know from DC – those entrenched in the power/money roles (the BCS folks) will fight extremely hard to maintain their position & access to the stream of money. I’m disappointed in Ari for taking this assignment – not so much because I feel strongly about the BCS/Playoff argument, but because it strikes me as a transparent effort by the BCS folks…
Best of luck tilting at this windmill.
So, pushing your version of ‘reality’ again, Ari? Didn’t work when you were selling W either!
if this is all about money then it cant go on forever. people are getting fed up with this crappy BCS system which insults college football fans. people will start tuning out if nothing changes. mark my words
“The BCS turns the regular season into the “playoff” and produces an opportunity for a game between the two highest-ranked teams.”
This is the dumbest argument I keep seeing for the BCS.
The regular season does not qualify as a “playoff” for two reasons:
1) In a playoff – BOTH teams in a game have the same thing at stake – the winner continues with a chance to win it all while the loser is gone
2) In a playoff – it is cut and dry who is out. In a single elimination playoff, you know, when your team loses, its over. Not so in the BCS. How was the LSU-Arkansas game of 2007 “like a playoff game” ?!?! LSU was one loss, and ranked #1 or #2, then loses to Arkansas. If its “like a playoff” that should mean LSU is done for at that point. But I think we all know who the 2007 BCS National Champion is.
This is just hogwash. Even major sports league in the country uses some type of playoff system to distinguish the “best” team. While the propoganda would have you believe that the BCS has created a #1 vs #2 all the time (or a good portion thereof) the selection process to determine who is 1 and 2 remains largley an inigma. The process is to keep power and money in the control of the BCS Conferences (in particular the Big 10) and does very little to settle who is the best team in the country. IMO, the SEC could probably place the #1 and #2 slots almost every year because they have what I feel are the best teams in the country. Call me bigited, but since AU got jobbed a few years back the BCS and it’s present “playoff lacking” system have me feeling like it is more a popularity contest then deciding who really is the best team in the country. You can spin “that” any way you sish.
When a website has to be created to defend its position then you know there is something wrong. A playoff option is the only fair solution. The BCS can continue down the same road, but soon Universities are going to end their contracts and may possibly go down the independent road like Notre Dame does.
BCS days are numbered, the writing is already on the wall.
We know that a playoff works, every other level of college football does it. BCS supporters say it would make football too much like basketball. But would any basketball fan support a basketball championship being decided by one game between #1 and #2? No, you’ld have to take the NCAA basketball tournament out of their cold, dead hands.
Sure, if if there was an 8 team tournament, #9 would feel snubbed. But that snub is far, far less than snubbing #3. The BCS is based on the assumption that the #1 and #2 teams are really the two best teams in the nation. But that is by no means clear.
Consider this – if it was really certain that the #1 team was the best, why would there be a national championship game at all? If it is unclear whether #1 is really the best, and unclear whether #2 is the second best, what reason do we have for assuming that they are the 2 best teams? The uncertainty is so great that the real best team can easily be left out in the cold.
There’s a reason you don’t see the NCAA basketball tournament hiring a PR firm and creating a site with the address ncaabballtourneySUCKS.com. Probably because it might be the most popular postseason format in sports. If this is such a solid defense, then why does this site induce anger to the point of being irrational from the average college football fan? Why don’t you listen to us instead of fighting us?
the ” they are students” argument is just plain stupid. How does literally every single other sport during the same season as football have a playoff? They are students too!!! They have a playoff because these sports know how to crown a national champion. The other argument ” would you guys rather have the national championship format before the BCS?” That’s just another stupid argument because what kind of idiot creates the other format! whoever created that needs to visit a mental hospital. BCS is an improvement but only an improvement in generating revenue for these top officials.
My reasons for a playoff: 1) Every other collegiate sport has one (including every other division of college football and they’ve never had any problems whatsoever) so why is Div. I somehow different? 2) Every other sport in the history of mankind has a playoff. Imagine how idiotic it would be if all other sports adopted the ludicrous system Div. I is using. Yeah, let’s use computers and polls to take 2 teams from the NFL to play in a Superbowl and just skip the playoffs!!!! Do you see how utterly ridiculous the system is if you just implant it in another sport? 3) The BCS claims that playoffs diminish the regular season and that every game counts. Well, how can every game count if you can go undefeated and still not have a chance? Just ask Utah last year and now Boise State, TCU and Cincy this year. They won all their games and have absolutely no chance whatsoever at playing for a national title…that’s ridiculous!! 4) The NCAA does not recognize a national champion in Div. I. That should tell you alot right there. All we get at the end of the year is a mythical national champion. 5) Clearly the only reason there isn’t a playoff is because presidents and bowl committees of the larger conferences want to keep their control of postseason revenue from the bowl games. 6) In every poll taken over the internet, over 85% of college football fans want to see a playoff. All you have to do is look at the diatribe spewing from fans on this site to see what fans really want. I could keep going but I’ve made my point. It’s time for fans to step up and boycott college football completely until the NCAA is forced to step up and give us a playoff once and for all.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-ncaafplayoff120709&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
Check this site out… pretty much says it all! Can’t wait for the book to come out with all the proof that is needed!!! Bowls are stupid… Is it really a harder discussion over BYU, OREGAN, GT, LSU, (2 OR 3 Loss teams)etc… or over ALABAMA, TCU, CINCY,BOISE,TEXAS (all undefeated and deserving title shot) for who gets Into the Playoff or Big Game? If you believe this, you are seriously lacking in the common sense field and you are probably uneducated!!!
FYI… The 2 best teams in country aren’t playing for the title… 1 Cincinatti, 2 TCU, 3 BAMA, 4 Texas and 5 Boise!!!
On this website’s homepage:
In every sport, brackets began with a few teams. Then schools felt slighted, and so the brackets grew to accommodate more teams. And grew and grew and grew. It is known as “bracket creep.” The NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship started with eight teams. It’s now 65, and some college officials want to expand beyond that. The NCAA’s Football Championship Subdivision began with a four-team playoff years ago, and now it’s been expanded to 20 teams. Think about what bracket creep would do to college football: it would greatly diminish the importance of the regular season, and would forever change the bowl system.
So I guess “bowl game creep” or exponentially expanding the number of bowl games every year is better? At least college basketball’s bracket rewards great regular seasons and conference winners instead of 6-6 teams that play weak schedules.
At the end of last season, I decided to boycott (watching or attending) any games that don’t involve my favorite team… Penn State. Thank you BCS.
This is truly pathetic. “If BCS Not Completely Broken, Don’t Fix It”???? Deep. If your car’s engine breaks down, but the tires aren’t flat, don’t fix it? The BCS is completely broken. Three of five unbeaten teams are denied a chance to play for the championship. Essentially the message to them is that they never had a chance at the title, even before the season started. Define broken?
These are just the obvious flaws with a playoff system. So what happens if everyone jumps thru the hoops to please the whiners, our 4, 8 or 16 team playoff system now yields Alabama vs. Florida, both now beat up after the extra games and levels of competition, and Florida wins in a last second, maybe even conested 13-12 game. Do we ignore the pounding Alabama gave them just a couple weeks back? Is Florida crowned the champion? How many fans are going to scream that the system is BS yet again? BCS as it is now is tough to improve on. NO PLAYOFFS!
Here are the Answers!!!!
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-ncaafplayoff120709&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
I concer with others saying we need a playoff system! Why can’t a confortable medium be established. Even the President says you guys need one. I can’t stand him, but he is right. C’MON. MAN!!!
Wow, I really need some waders here to sort through all this BCS spin.
The BCS is so flawed it’s turning off everyone outside of who gets paid for it. I for one used to like watching the bowl games as a kid with a lot of the tradition. Now with the BCS coming around, I may watch the mid-level bowls games and maybe a rare BCS game like the Oklahoma-Boise St Fiesta Bowl. That was the last BCS bowl I actually watch and I think maybe the third overall.
Anyway, as this year turns out, the TCU-Boise game would be good but it’s not as interesting as TCU/Boise against Florida/Georgia Tech. Actually give them a shot at the big boys. Boise St took it to Oklahoma. Utah took it to Bama. That is the reason the game is played. Paper decides nothing. As the infamously overplayed quote goes, “If you wanna crown them, then crown them!….That’s why we took the field.” Yes that was NFL, but still. The same principal applies. After a hot start, the Bears had all but been anointed the Super Bowl Champs. Did they win it?? NO!!
Now let’s talk your language – the almight greenback. Just get over yourselves and see that a playoff will generate far more revenue for you. The TV contract for the five games is something like nine or ten figures. Now factor that contract out to fifteen games. Each round would get more media hype and speculation as who will win. Then as the field dwindles, interest grows even more as the best teams are still out there until finally it culminates in a true championship game. So lets just say that the contract is $1 billion for the TV rights for the BCS games. By having the playoff, the contract would be for fifteen games. That’s an extra ten games to sell advertising rights to. that means more money for schools and into your pockets. Plus it would create a stiffer market for recruiting nationwide. More teams would be fighting for those sixteen slots and the regular season would get more intense and meaningful. Again, more revenue generated.
Bottom line: A playoff is a revenue machine. Plus it’s a viewer’s and fan’s dream.
Now let’s just look at the sentimental side of a playoff. Like previously mentioned, George Mason – a #12 or #13 seed – made it to the Final Four. That made major headlines and did a lot for their school and conference. Or let’s look back at Jimmy V’s NC St team who everyone except for about fifteen or twenty people (the team, coaches, and maybe the AD and President) thought that they would beat Houston and “Phi Slamma Jamma.” They did. The movie “Hoosiers” was a true story about a school with an enrollment of about 120-130 students made their way through the playoffs to win the championship over a school more than thirty times their size. Now think about how many people would tune if to see how a previously written-off mid-major team like CMU, ECU, or Troy managed to pull off an upset win over a top-level team. It would give all the underdogs hope and create a massive amount of hype, publicity, interest, and most of all – revenue.
One last point. The entire argument that everyone has a chance at the beginning of the season is completely false. It’s exclusionary. Everyone knows that unless your school name is Florida, Texas, Alabama, Oklahoma, or USC, the only talk of a national championship shot is late in the season and if and only if things play out a certain way. Then add in the fact that this is only for right now. Just fifteen years ago, it was Notre Dame, Miami, Florida State consistently at the top of the polls. All three of those schools are not suffering in a bout with mediocrity. Just like Oklahoma State was big-time a while back. Now they are a mid-level Big 12 school. Michigan is on a downward trend. USC just lost their consecutive weeks in the polls streak snapped with a loss to U of A. U of A had one of the top defenses in the nation during the 80’s and 90’s. ASU has gone up and down more times than an elevator in the last fifteen years.
Essentially the point being is that name recognition, revenue draw, and history all make a huge deal in the BCS system. Nevermind the fact that over the last seven years, Boise St has the best record out of any school or even that some schools have faded to nothing more than a blip on the current radar who were once powerhouse dynasties or vice-versa.
Just install a sixteen-team playoff. Keep the conference alignments if you want. Or since there are 120 teams in FBS, redraft the conferences to twelve conferences of ten teams each. Each team can have three OOC games and the remaining nine are against conference opponents. That’s the Pac-10 system and there’s no controversy there like in the Big 12 South last year. Whoever has the best record is the conference champ. In the case of an identical conference record, the tie-breaker is the head-to-head meeting. Each conference champ gets a spot and then the four best conference runners-up get the wild card spots. Not only would conference record play a part but look at the OOC games and how tough those are.
Anyway you want to look at it, end the BCS as it is, stop embarrassing yourselves with this epic failure and continued defense of failure, and install a playoff system. Every sport has one at every level except for NCAA FBS.
A great read: http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/f…o&type=lgns
Wetzel nails this situation on the head.
Ok im sorry but how is a playoff system so complicated? EVERY sport system from pewe to majors have a playoff system! Football, soccer, baseball and so on all have playoff! So to sit here and tell us ” There is no way to figure out what teams would be able to play and what teams would not be able to play ” is stupid!
If we are going to convince BCS that a playoff system needs to be at least tried then we need to hurt them in the pocket book! Because after all that is the only reason why they still have this tired system!
If you guys would spend less time making lame websites to cover up the bs you could have more time to make a playoff system everyone knows that the undefeated teams should be able to have a shot at the title. Texas should not get a free ride their just because their name is texas im sorry but really how many championships do they need. Look at Tcu they have never been and when faced against texas would likly be the winner or what about alabama those boys should also get a shot at the win ur lame website is doing nothing but pissing more people off
I lose interest once a team loses their first game. Most teams have to go undefeated to have chance at being one of two teams playing for the championship. All other bowl games including BCS bowls are nothing but exhibition games. Boring.
1) I would be glued to the TV throughout the regular season seeing who will be conference champions. You can lose a game and still be a conference champion and still get into the tournament. 2) I would be very interested in who will get at large bids. 3) I would watch every playoff game because each game would be meaningful.
BCS is ridiculous. It’s funny how they can go out and hire a bunch of people to do a report that have know knowledge of football. I’m sure Boise and TCU played the whole year looking to play for number 2. what a dream! Number 2 are you kidding me. These guys just want money not the proper results. How anyone can argue against a playoff system is stupid.
Why do we even have to debate this. Isn’t the same NCAA the governing body over Div, I, II, and III. Is it really that hard to understand. We all know that the BCS is a tool to pretty much print money. Yet who is truly benefiting here? The athletes aren’t getting paid and there are a mountain of stipulations to ensure that they receive absolutely no compensation. The Universities will make money off of their football programs regardless if there is a playoff system or not. Oh wait i forgot The bowl committees and the promoters would be the only ones to loose anything. Hmmmm punish the kids and the fans of a “True Champion” so that the deep pockets a few may continue to be lined with a whole lot of new money. This is what corporate greed looks like and I swear it is ugly.
Lots of good ideas out there. Here’s one I’ve been posting (I know it still uses the current BCS ranking system to select the second set of 8 teams):
BCS College Football Fantasy Playoff – Final Version
The final update of a fantasy 16-team playoff bracket using the following rules and the final BCS:
1. Eight conference champions (current six BCS conferences plus Mountain West and WAC) get the top 8 seeds in the order of BCS ranking.
2. Seeds 9-16 are selected using the next 8 BCS ranked teams in order.
3. Top 8 seeds earn one home game in the first round – the remaining seven playoff games would be played at seven current bowl sites, and rotated so each of the seven sites gets four quarterfinals, two semifinals, and one championship game in a seven-year period.
This is just to show what the potential matchups could be in a playoff, seeds and records in parantheses:
West Virginia (#16, 9-3) at Alabama (#1, 13-0)
Miami (#15, 9-3) at Texas (#2, 13-0)
BYU (#14, 10-2) at Cincinnati (#3, 12-0)
Penn State (#13, 10-2) at TCU (#4, 12-0)
LSU (#12, 9-3) at Boise State (#5, 13-0)
Virginia Tech (#11, 9-3) at Oregon (#6, 10-2)
Iowa (#10, 10-2) at Ohio State (#7, 10-2)
Florida (#9, 12-1) at Georgia Tech (#8, 11-2)
Fell out from last week: Pittsburgh, Oregon State
As the playoffs progress, is there potential for better games than the BCS bowl games would be? You decide!
Any playoff system would necessarily be forced (by media or legal pressure) to at least a 16 team minimum.
The most reasonable format would be to:
a) include the winner of all conferences (currently 11)
b) include 5 more at large teams- independents or teams that failed to win their conference.
c) seeding: by formula or by committee
d) no more than two teams per conference; teams that fail to win their conference will be seeded no higher than 12th.
e) the first three rounds would be hosted by the higher seeded team
[the big-6 BCS conferences would probably require a guarantee of a first round game, if not a guaranteed seed among the top 8 for their champions]
f) games would be played 10 days-2 weeks apart; approximately 1st and 3rd Saturdays of December and January
The last point is important for several reasons. A week is too short between games to take care of the logistics to get teams, media and fans to an unknown destination, particularly at that time of year. Two weeks would allow more time for study and to accommodate exams; as well as practice and promotion for the games. Other division playoffs, and bowl games that remain, could be slotted on the off-weak for the playoffs.
That said, there will be flaws with any playoff system.
Bear with me- just thought of an interesting alternative to the above:
First 2 rounds are hosted by the higher seed.
3rd round games (semi-finals): fold into or combine with two of the top traditional bowls, by using the same site (or city) for two games: one a playoff game, and another ‘regular’ bowl (consolation) game- either playing a double-header; or on consecutive days.
That way, the 8 teams that win the first round would know where they are headed for New Year’s, and could begin planning their trip and selling tickets; although they would not know until the results of the second round exactly who their opponent would be, or whether that New Year’s game would be a playoff game (if they won the second round game), or a “regular” (diminished) bowl game (if they lost in the 2nd round).
Two bowl sites would get to host the semifinals on any given year; a third site would host the NC game in mid-January.
[The other 8 team which lost in the first round could be slotted into other New Year's bowls.] It would also be possible to preserve some element of traditional affiliations- e.g the SEC champ would automatically go to the Superdome/Sugar Bowl unless they lost that 1st round game, on a year when the Superdome happened to be a semi-final game site. Ditto for the Rose Bowl with the Pac-10 and Big-10 champs.
It would also be desirable that the higher seeds be given some element of choice as to where they would prefer to go for their 3rd round game- perhaps to minimize repeat trips to the same location, or perhaps to avoid getting stuck in a lower-seeded opponent’s backyard.
So basically, except for the NC game, everyone would know where they are headed for the holidays by the first Sunday in December, much as it is now.
[of course this would mean that conferences with playoffs would have to eliminate either: the playoff game (yeah right!); one conference game; or a bye week (most likely) to conclude their season by the end of November.]
correction: in the example above, of course the SEC champ also would not go to New Orleans on the years when the semi-finals games were held elsewhere, if they won the 1st round.
In other words. the 8 winners of the first round games would be going to one of the two cities hosting the semi-finals (e.g. Miami and Phoenix one year; New Orleans and Pasadena/LA the next), four teams each.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/news?slug=dw-ncaafplayoff120709
If the BCS administration is incapable of handling logistics, why do they have their jobs? Any group of business execs in this country manages to determine location and scheduling in some capacity. More specifically, every athletics organization with a playoff system makes those decisions. I was dumbfounded when I read those questions on the home page.
An absolute joke that they’ve made this website to try to justify their ridiculous system. Every other collegiate sport and all the other divisions of college football have a playoff so any stupid excuse they make as to why there couldn’t be one is merely a smokescreen. The real reason there isn’t one is because they want to maintain control of postseason revenue and the bowls are a cashcow. The problem is that 90% of fans want a playoff and year after year so many deserving teams get left out of a chance to play for a national championship and that’s just not right. Don’t listen to any of this hogwash that this website is spewing out because not one single iota of it is true.