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I love football. Several years ago I told my wife that I would never complain about football (college or pro) if two things happened: instant replay and Division I-A playoffs. I got one, but it looks like the other may never happen if ABC, the six biggest conferences and the bowls continue to have their (flawed) way.
The bowls and the BCS are all about money. Everyone knows that, but no one who works for
the NCAA, the conglomerate that is Disney/ABC/ESPN, or the major college franchises (Notre Dame, Florida State, Nebraska, Ohio State, Michigan, Miami, Florida, et al) will ever admit as much. The BCS is a contrived way for Notre Dame and the six biggest conferences (Big 10, ACC, SEC, Big 12, Big East, Pac 10) to keep all of the major bowl money among themselves and out of the hands of upstart teams who happen to have a good year (ie-Marshall, Tulane, BYU, etc.).
The pro-BCS people talk a good line. They will tell you that college teams play a lot already. They will tell you that college kids are amateurs and shouldn't be required to "work" more. They will tell you that the bowls are about tradition. They will tell you that the bowls are about rewarding the best teams in college football with an extra game at the end of the season. They will tell you that the smaller conferences (MAC, WAC, Mountain West, Conference USA) aren't as tough as the big six. That's a crock of hooey.
Let's start with the first point: College kids play too much already, and that adding a playoff is too many games. Say What?!?!!?! Last I checked, a number of teams already schedule twelve games in the form of a season opening "classic" game that is about generating even more money. If they play in the SEC, the Big 12, or the MAC, there's a chance they'll play in the conference championship game. Add on a bowl, and there's the possibility of playing 14 games in a season.
Sure that's more than the 11 "regular season" games, but I don't think you'll hear any kids from Division III Mount Union (who will be playing for their fifth National Championship in six years next weekend) complain about a fifteen game season, and they don't get scholarships (By the way: Go Purple Raiders!)
Point two: College kids aren't pros. When asked if he would play in a playoff, Derrick Brooks (LB, Florida State) replied, "Yeah, if they paid us." You know what? Brooks did get paid. Maybe not in cash (although there's no guarantee of that anymore), but last I checked he got five years of free college education at Florida State University which was worth about $8-10K a year (tuition, fees, books, room and board, medical treatment, etc.) while he was at FSU. And that's at a public school.
How many of us would have liked to get a free ride at the school of our choice? Better yet, how many of us would have liked to get a visit from a representative of that school begging us to come and study there? College athletes are paid; if they're smart they take advantage of the $50-125K
worth of education they get at no charge.
Point three:
:in Fidler on the Roof voice:: ) Tradition!!!! Tradi--what?? What's traditional about the Insight.com Bowl or the Outback Bowl or the Micronpc Bowl? How about the Nokia Sugar Bowl, the FedEx Orange Bowl, or the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl? Bowl games are supposed to be named after fruits and agricultural products, not companies. Didanyone but me notice that there probably won't be a Pac-10 and Big 10 team playing in the Rose Bowl Presented by AT&T this year? Tradition? Bah!
Point four: Bowls reward the best teams in football. The hell they do. It was absolutely criminal that Hawaii (9-3) was not invited to a bowl this year, especially after manhandling BYU 72-45. Last year, Toledo kicked Penn State to the curb, finished 10-1 and found themselves at home in December and January. Meanwhile, the eighth place SEC team can go 6-5 and get into a bowl. There are so many conference tie-ins with bowls that it is impossible for the small conferences to get their #2 and #3 teams in because the ACC, Big 10 and Big 12 conferences have their #7 and #8 teams
already scheduled.
Point five: No, the smaller conferences from top to bottom are not as deep as the larger ones. But get a kid from Linebacker U. last year to tell you what a creampuff Toledo was. Or why doesn't someone ask Colorado how easy Fresno State was to walk all over this year? And don't the six big conferences have cakewalks of their own (Vanderbilt, Rutgers, Northwestern, Duke, Baylor, Cal) that they barely acknowledge? The competition may not be there every week, but the smaller conferences have done a good job in the recent past to show that they can be competitive with the big schools.
Here's how we fix it: 16 team, four round playoffs. Every other major college sport has playoffs, including Division I-AA, Division II, and Division III football. So why not for Division I-A football?
Sixteen teams will guarantee that everyone with even the slightest chance at the national championship will be invited to play. Each conference champion and all of the undefeated teams are automatically invited. The remaining spots (up to six) will be determined by a panel of sportswriters, NCAA officials, and coaches.
To keep the season from going to too long, the conference championship games and the "classic" games will be abolished; they're only about money anyway and if the "classic" happens to be a rivalry, schedule it every year like Florida-FSU, Georgia-Georgia Tech, Army-Navy et al. The playoffs will start the week after Thanksgiving and end on New Years Day.
Similarly to the basketball regions, football will have four brackets (North, South, East, West) with four teams each. All games will be played on neutral sites with the championship being played in a roving venue. Each site will take the name of a traditional bowl to preserve the lineage and history. For the teams who don't have a shot at the national championship, there will be a second tier similar to the NIT.
Will this way be perfect? No. There will always be one or two teams who could argue they should have been the #15 and #16 seeds. But would they have a chance at the national championship? Probably not. It would guarantee each conference an even shot at the national title, and allow the smaller schools a glimmer of the glory, if for no other reason than to be that year's Gonzaga.
Who will hate this system? The SEC. The Big 10. Notre Dame. All of the big conferences who want to keep all of the money. But you know what? With the level playing field that limited scholarships have brought to college football, the big schools are no longer as dominant as they once were. And the smaller schools are getting better.
The is absolutely no reason why the national champion must be determined by computers, fickle voters who play favourites and men in back rooms. Hell, a fortune teller with a Ouija board and a Scrabble set could get it right better than the BCS. It's time for all of the debates to stop: for Colorado to shut up about how they kicked the crap out of Nebraska but dropped two of their own, for Miami to quit whining about how they were cheated out of playing Oklahoma last year, for Maryland and Illinois and Oregon to win their conferences with one loss each but get shunted out of the national championship game. It's put up or shut up time.
The Division I-A football national champion must be determined on the field; there's no rational reason not to have a playoffs and the BCS monstrosity has managed to dodge the bullets for three years, but it's time is just about up.
Sorry to go on so long; hope I didn't lose anyone. For my part, I urge all fans of college football to boycott the BCS in person and on TV; I certainly won't be watching any of the games. Plus you should write/call/e-mail everyone associated with the BCS and tell them what a sham it is. Then watch Mount Union take on Bridgewater (VA) this weekend.
[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: HighLordDave ]
