Yeah, we've had this discussion before, but BYU might help make a Playoff system reality. http://espn.go.com/ncf/news/2001/1205/1290450.html <I>BYU athletic director Val Hale said on Tuesday that the Cougars are seriously considering legal action against the BCS for alleged antitrust violations. BYU was notified on Monday that the Cougars will not be considered for one of the four major BCS bowls despite a perfect 12-0 record. Instead, BYU will play Louisville in the Liberty Bowl. Hale said the Mountain West Conference university presidents might consider such a move after BYU's final game against Hawaii on Saturday. BYU (No. 8 ESPN/USA Today, No. 9 AP) is 12th in the BCS standings. The Cougars will earn about $1.25 million to share with the rest of the Mountain West Conference, instead of the $13 million they would have received for playing in the Rose, Orange, Fiesta or Sugar bowls. "Their opinion is that if BYU or the conference or whomever were to proceed with an antitrust lawsuit, that we would have a great case," Hale said. The BCS guarantees berths in those top four bowl games to the champions of the six major conferences -- the Mountain West is not among them -- and two "at-large" teams. The at-large teams usually are from the six majors. Hale said that amounts to unfair exclusion and that he has received legal advice saying as much. </I> If this can kill the BCS, go for it! My personal playoff solution would be the following: 10 Team Playoff includes ONLY conference champions (the big 6, Mountain West, Conf USA, WAC, and MAC). The first round would be only two games between the 7/8/9/10 seeds. (the top 6 would get a "bye week") Seedings would be done using the polls or something similar to the BCS. The whole "playoff" system would involve 9 games, spread across the major bowls (Rose, Fiesta, Sugar, Orange, Cotton, Citrus, Holiday, and 2 others). They'd be played throughout December & January, maybe scheduling the national championship game the weekend before the Superbowl (since the NFL normally has an off-week here). The benefits of this are: (1) No wild-cards. That preserves the importance of the Conference season, but allows teams to schedule tougher / more exciting non-conference games to prepare for conference season. No more Texas avoiding Hawaii just to avoid a possible loss. If you want a chance at the title, win your conference. I think that's a fair requirement. It also eliminates teams "backing in" like Nebraska may end up doing. (for conferences like the Pac10 and Big10, it would be up to them to detemine their own tiebreaker systems since they don't have title games) (2) The secondary bowls get better teams. If 9 bowls consume only 10 teams, then the next tier of bowls like the Alamo bowls will have much better available teams. For example, this season, teams like Nebraska, Texas, OU, Florida, etc would all be going to those kinds of bowls. (3) Makes earning a bowl invitation mean something again. Right now, basically any school with a winning record gets a bowl. This year, you'd actually have to go 7-4 or 8-3 to win a bowl bid. (4) Gives every single 1-A team from Miami to Texas to BYU to Marshall a fair shot at a title. That's my proposal. Yes, the only reason I wrote it out is because I'm bored as hell.
Your system in intriguing because of its simplicity, but unfair in its application to those in better conferences. For example, a team like Nebraska would be better off joining the MAC, which it could dominate every year, thus ensuring itself an annual spot in the playoff system. It certainly wouldn't give us the "best" ten teams in a playoff. Very good teams, like Florida and Texas, would be sitting at home while mediocre clubs like Marshall played instead (likely losing a blowout game to the Hurricanes). I'd use the BCS rankings, or a selection commitee like in basketball, to pick the 12 best teams in the country, then have an NFL-style playoffs.
<B>For example, a team like Nebraska would be better off joining the MAC, which it could dominate every year, thus ensuring itself an annual spot in the playoff system</B> Agreed. However, in reality, a school like Nebraska would never join the MAC because of $$. There's no TV contracts and facing crappy competition every week is less likely to draw big recruits, etc. Thus, if Nebraska were to join the MAC, they'd probably slowly become a MAC-like program. <B>It certainly wouldn't give us the "best" ten teams in a playoff. Very good teams, like Florida and Texas, would be sitting at home while mediocre clubs like Marshall played instead (likely losing a blowout game to the Hurricanes).</B> I agree to some extent. However, no argument could ever be made that a deserving team was left out. In the 12-team BCS-like scenario, a 12-0 Marshall would almost definitely still be excluded. While we all "know" Marshall is not the best team in the country, they still wouldn't have a chance to prove it. In the conference-champions scenario, teams like Texas & Florida would be left out. But I would argue that if they couldn't win their own conference, there's at least one team in the nation better than them (whoever did win the conference), so they don't have a legitimate argument for being national champions. <B>I'd use the BCS rankings, or a selection commitee like in basketball, to pick the 12 best teams in the country, then have an NFL-style playoffs.</B> I think this would be the more likely scenario, but I think it devalues the importance of winning the conference. For example, this year, it would have been better for Texas to have not made the conference title game. If Tennessee loses this weekend, then we would have been Rose Bowl bound had Oklahoma not lost to OSU (yes, OU screwed us again in a flukely sort of way). I don't think it should ever be beneficial to not have played for a conference title. Anyway, thanks for responding, unlike the other 8 people who read this thread! I know I'm boring, but not THAT boring!!
alright, Major, I'll respond. . . only because I've felt the sting of having what seemed to me to be an interesting thread initially ignored recently. nah, seriously--your reasoning is sound, but I have an aesthetic aversion to the number 10. why not make it 12, or an even 16? the 10 conference champs plus some wild cards. after all, this is america. we love 2nd chances. plus, it could be a means of evening out some of that discrepancy between the sucky MAC champ and the 2nd-place big 12 powerhouse. what do you think?
<B>the 10 conference champs plus some wild cards. after all, this is america. we love 2nd chances. plus, it could be a means of evening out some of that discrepancy between the sucky MAC champ and the 2nd-place big 12 powerhouse. what do you think?</B> True -- you could do that with the BCS-like system SamCassell described. The only problem with that is you're going to have people feeling left out again (one of the big problems with the BCS). For example, this year, Nebraska, Texas, OU, Florida, and Tennessee (if they lose this weekend) would all claim they deserve one of the two wild-card spots. (Note: I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I agree that my system has problems too -- namely leaving out teams like Nebraska. In the 10 team playoff I described, it would be hard to say an 11-1 Nebraska team doesn't deserve to be in there)
Have you considered the travel that would be required for both teams and fans? Unless the higher seeded teams hosted till the semi-finals, I don't see this becoming a reality. Then the lower tiered bowls would get upset.
I think your system is flawed in having only the conference champions play; however, it is a unique system. My former high school American History teacher, who is a college football fanatic like myself (and we have remained friends), has always talked about what he would do if he was the ruler or the "Czar" of college football. He and me have talked about re-aligning conferences and dropping some teams (including my alma mater, Middle Tennessee State University - MTSU) back down to I-AA. However, that is a whole other issue in itself. The plan would be to use the BCS and the top 8 teams ranked by that system. All games, including the Army-Navy game, must be finished by Thanksgiving weekend. The first weekend in December would be reserved for the championship games in the Big 12, SEC, etc. By the second week of December, you have 1-8, 2-7, 3-6, 4-5 play each other on the higher seed's home field. The next week would then be the semifinals and 2 of these 4 bowls would be used and rotated - Rose, Orange, Sugar, and Fiesta. There would be a week break and then the final game would be played during the weekend of January 1 or around that time. That final game would then be in one of the 2 bowls that was not used in the semifinals. The one left out would automatically host the NC game the next season. You would have a playoff, but still controversy over who is #8 compared to #9. Plus the BCS rankings in themselves would spark controversy; however, college football has always seemed to feed on this. As for all the other bowls....they can still be played with the teams that don't make the field of 8. BTW - Major, I read your post when you first did it, but I didn't have the time to do this post in response. I think I speak for many here that you are not a boring poster, but one of the best on the BBS.
manny--no way a big bowl like the rose, sugar, fiesta, or oragne bowl would ever to agree to not have a game--even if they were guarunteed the NC next year. Another thing, just having the top 8 teams STILL doesnt give teams like BYU or a good MAC team much of a chance...whether they deserve it or not.
Smokey -- no, I didn't even think about travel issues. I'm not sure of a good way to deal with that, but that definitely throws a crimp into this particular playoff system.
SCF, You are right about the big 4 bowls. However, I still would want teams that finished 1-4 to be able to play a playoff game at home. Factoring this in, there are only 3 games left, so my system is a little flawed in that respect. However, I don't think that I did a good job in explaining that the one bowl out of the 4 would not simply get a bowl game. They would still have a game....it just wouldn't be any BCS teams. Really, you could probably do away with the Fiesta. I remember growing up as a kid and the big 4 bowl games that were always played on New Year's Day were the Cotton, the Rose, the Orange, and the Sugar. Somehow, the Fiesta has taken the Cotton Bowl's place in the big 4, but it used to not be a big bowl game. Probably the '87 Fiesta Bowl which saw Penn State upset Miami 14-10 is what got it started on the road to be a big-time bowl game.
I don't see a problem with traveling. Basketball teams travel more in one week then these football teams would travel in the playoffs. They would play in one bowl then the next week another bowl, that's a road trip in football or basketball, sometimes football teams go on the road for 2 or 3 straight games, and that is basically a playoff stretch, especially with there being 1 week between bowls. I say the lesser bowls could have a playoff-type system on a lesser scale like the NIT. Besides look at the NCAA tournament. In order to get to the Final Four the team and the fans would have to travel to 3 different places across the country. If you choose the top 8 teams and put them into the playoffs that's literally a trip to the FInal Four because you only have to play 3 games. Expenses isn't any different then conference road trips.
I prefer a BCS type system starting with the top 8. However, I would make a provision that any undefeated team not in the top 8 gets to play a "qualifer". For instance, this year BYU would play the BCS #8 to get the actually #8 seed. If there were two undeated teams not in the top 8 (e.g., say Marshall and BYU made it) than the qualifier involves the #7 team as well. I can't see how this isn't fair, if you go undefeated you get your chance, period. If you lose 1 or 2, well, whether you win your conference or not it just depends on your overall resume (BCS type system). I think this the best way to encourage schedulling tough non-conference games (reward schedule strength, beating good teams) even if you slip up 1 time in conference. By the way, I don't feel sorry for BYU too much. Now if Fresno ran the table and got left out they would have been totally screwed, but Fresno went out to schedule as tough as non-conference games as they could, BYU didn't.
