BCS presidents vote down playoff proposal

Do you think there should be a playoff system in college football?

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    13
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Superman

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Bowl Championship Series presidents have rejected the Mountain West Conference's playoff plan.

The conference proposed an eight-team playoff system that would allow greater access to the national championship game to teams outside the six most powerful leagues. The BCS presidential oversight committee rejected the concept during a teleconference Wednesday.

"There was no overall support for the proposal, although some conferences were interested in considering certain elements of it in the future — particularly those related to revenue, access and governance of the BCS arrangement," said University of Oregon president David Frohnmayer, the outgoing committee chairman.
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I don't understand the BCS' reluctance to have a playoff. It would make college football's postseason more exciting. You don't even have to get rid of any bowl games to do it.

It's promising that some elements might be considered in the future, but I hope they get it together soon.

Here's my proposal:

You keep the voting and BCS polls the way they are right now, and at the end of the season, you take teams 1-6 and put them in a single elimination playoff. (The next four teams can have a consolation tournament, which means a maximum of two more games for teams 7-10.) The #1 and #2 teams get a first round bye, while #3 vs. #6 and #4 vs. #5. Then #1 vs. the lowest remaining seed, and #2 vs. the other winner. That's four games, all of which can be BCS bowl games, and rotate year by year who gets the first round games and who gets second round games (Sugar, Rose, Orange, Fiesta). The last two standing play in the national championship. (By the way, the matchups don't matter; if you want 3 to play 4, or whatever, that's fine. It still works for me.)

The only thing is that they would have higher TV ratings and higher interest than the current BCS bowl games, because right now, you only watch the bowl games if you like one of the two teams playing. With a playoff, you're interested in who is going to advance, you're anticipating and hoping for certain matchups, and you're not hinging the success of your whole season on a bad conference loss in October.

So, last year, Oklahoma and Florida would have had byes, Texas plays Utah and USC plays Alabama (who wouldn't have enjoyed either of those matchups?). The consolation would have been Texas Tech vs. Ohio State, and Penn State vs. Boise State.

Pay me my money, BCS.
 
Playoffs or just go back to the old bowl system and let the polls sort it out on their own. The BCS is the worst of both worlds.
 
pdxKingsFan said:
Playoffs or just go back to the old bowl system and let the polls sort it out on their own. The BCS is the worst of both worlds.
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I don't understand why you would think that.

The current BCS system is a "playoff", it is just a two team playoff. In my opinion, a four team playoff would be better, and an eight team playoff would probably be best, but why would you say that either an eight team playoff or no playoff is better than a two team playoff?
 
uolj said:
I don't understand why you would think that.

The current BCS system is a "playoff", it is just a two team playoff. In my opinion, a four team playoff would be better, and an eight team playoff would probably be best, but why would you say that either an eight team playoff or no playoff is better than a two team playoff?
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Because it gives a false sense of legitimacy to a mythical national champion each season when they consistently year in and year out get the matchup wrong. Then when everybody knows a team is better the poll voters are contractually obligated to vote for the winner of this game as #1 anyway. In the process they have completely ruined the rich history of some of the better bowl games while reducing the non-BCS games to jokes.

I love college football, I love the traditional bowl matchups, particularly the Rose Bowl and I want a playoff. There has to be some way to maintain the tradition of the bowls and still work in a playoff at the end to determine a true national championship. But the BCS is a proven failure and needs to go away.
 
uolj said:
I don't understand why you would think that.

The current BCS system is a "playoff", it is just a two team playoff. In my opinion, a four team playoff would be better, and an eight team playoff would probably be best, but why would you say that either an eight team playoff or no playoff is better than a two team playoff?
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A two team playoff is just a title game. It's not really a playoff, in the true sense of the word.
 
pdxKingsFan said:
But the BCS is a proven failure and needs to go away.
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Your argument does make sense, so I think I now understand your point. I disagree that it is a proven failure or that it has gotten the matchup consistently wrong. The matchup has been consistently controversial, but that is inevitable. The only solution to that is to increase the number of teams and decrease the relevance of the controversy.

Superman said:
A two team playoff is just a title game. It's not really a playoff, in the true sense of the word.
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Maybe, maybe not. That's why I quoted "playoff". But my post isn't really concerned with the word definitions. One should be able to get the point either way. ;)
 
uolj said:
I disagree that it is a proven failure or that it has gotten the matchup consistently wrong.
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Seems to me they are at best .500, but the BCS games where teams got in following a big loss in their conference title game seem to make it appear even worse.
 
pdxKingsFan said:
Because it gives a false sense of legitimacy to a mythical national champion each season when they consistently year in and year out get the matchup wrong. Then when everybody knows a team is better the poll voters are contractually obligated to vote for the winner of this game as #1 anyway. In the process they have completely ruined the rich history of some of the better bowl games while reducing the non-BCS games to jokes.

I love college football, I love the traditional bowl matchups, particularly the Rose Bowl and I want a playoff. There has to be some way to maintain the tradition of the bowls and still work in a playoff at the end to determine a true national championship. But the BCS is a proven failure and needs to go away.
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I'm sure that I'm in the minority, but I'm not all that concerned with the traditions associated with the bowl games. For one, if the PAC-10 winner and the Big Ten winner meet in the national championship, does anyone really care about seeing the second best vs. the second best in the Rose Bowl? It might be a cool matchup, but it doesn't have any national championship ramifications, and I'm sorta tired of seeing USC beat up on clearly inferior Big Ten teams. I'd rather see all the BCS bowl games be a part of the BCS championship every year.
 
pdxKingsFan said:
Because it gives a false sense of legitimacy to a mythical national champion each season when they consistently year in and year out get the matchup wrong. Then when everybody knows a team is better the poll voters are contractually obligated to vote for the winner of this game as #1 anyway. In the process they have completely ruined the rich history of some of the better bowl games while reducing the non-BCS games to jokes.

I love college football, I love the traditional bowl matchups, particularly the Rose Bowl and I want a playoff. There has to be some way to maintain the tradition of the bowls and still work in a playoff at the end to determine a true national championship. But the BCS is a proven failure and needs to go away.
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+1

They won't change for the same reason USC gets away with bending the rules. Money.

In addition, why would the BCS Presidents give up a share of guaranteed money? It'll take something like the Cotton Bowl throwing money at two highly ranked teams to get the BCS to change, but unfortunately, it's a pipe-dream, and it would take a school to turn on its conference...or an undefeated independent team who couldn't care less about the BCS & the "championship" to do so.

Call me cynical if you will, but it's a grim state right now.
 
Superman said:
Senate to hear matter

The Utah senator is making a stink because the Utes didn't get a bid, but he is carrying the torch that a lot of college football fans have been asking someone to carry for a long time.
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This is a step in the right direction. However, for years I have hoped that a university, such as Utah, would sue. The BCS violates anti-trust laws (at least that could be argued) and costs universities such as Utah millions of dollars. The BCS seems to only care about money, so sticking it to them with a lawsuit is the only way they are going to change.

I freakin' hate the current system. It goes against everything about a fair and balanced playing field.
 
Superman said:
Senate to hear matter

The Utah senator is making a stink because the Utes didn't get a bid, but he is carrying the torch that a lot of college football fans have been asking someone to carry for a long time.
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I think the playoff system would do nothing but wonders for College Football. The fanbase would greatly increase and teams like the Utes would have a much better chance at winning a national title.
 
As great as a playoff would be, I would say the chances of Utah being invited would jump from about 1 in 10 for the BCS to 2 in 10 for a playoff. They'll still likely need to go undefeated and then wind up with a mid level or lower seed at best. But at least they'll get a chance. They aren't going to be invited by going 10-3 and winning the MWC.
 
Is it that hard for the likes of Utah to schedule a tough enough schedule that they mirror the strength of the major conference team schedules?
 
Allegedly it is. Between 4 of the 6 BCS conference teams pretty much unwilling to schedule tough OOC teams and almost never on the road, the lack of respect beating an average Pac 10 team will earn you and the fragile state of the Big East their best shot would be taking 2 or 3 away games and hoping they could work a multi-year home and home agreement with USC, Cal or Oregon.
 
Does that work for anybody not named Notre Dame? The last of the other big Indies joined up around around 1990 or so right?

Best shot would be trying to get into the Pac-10 with Boise State or BYU.
 
Of course, that doesn't solve the problem. Some other team not in a major conference will just end up in the same place.
 
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