Has anything been so hated, yet continued to function? I feel like I'm living in communist Russia, except the USSR is the NCAA, the KGB is the BCS conference commissioners, and the local communist leaders are the university presidents. Any self-respecting fan of college football wants a playoff, but every year we get the same mumbo-jumbo, controversy brewing after every week on who should play in the Championship game.
One ESPN writer said the BCS wasn't wrong, just different. Like home-schooling your kids is different. I will admit that the BCS is better than the old process. But it's definitely wrong compared to a possible playoff. I liken anybody that supports the BCS (mostly old, dumb announcers) to the same people who think that TV should still be analog, football should be played with leather helmets, bunting is the most effective way to move runners over, and that candles are better than light bulbs. It's just an old way of thinking. Get with the times! We've found ways to improve our lives, so shape up or ship out!
I hated how everybody just assumed that the winner of the SEC championship would go to the championship. Has anybody checked the non-conference schedules of the SEC? We always just assume they're the best, and for all we know, they could be. But I did some research and figured out what the record of each conference was versus other BCS conferences:
| Conf | W-L | PF-PA |
| ACC | 12-8 | 486-526 |
| Big East | 7-6 | 334-384 |
| Big 10 | 4-5 | 248-226 |
| Big 12 | 7-8 | 495-415 |
| SEC | 6-9 | 364-349 |
| PAC-10 | 5-5 | 265-292 |
The ACC had the best record, but was negative in the point differential. The Big 12 had the best point differential, but was under .500. Just for fun, the MWC vs. BCS:
| MWC | 9-4 | 336-321 |
What's most telling about this is the amount of BCS games these conferences had. If you divide the BCS games by the number of estimated non-conference games each conference had, you can see how weak each conference is making their schedules:
| 42% | ACC |
| 33% | Big East |
| 20% | Big 10 |
| 31% | Big 12 |
| 31% | SEC |
| 33% | PAC-10 |
You see here that the ACC is the most aggressive at scheduling bigger names. The Big 10, (surprise, surprise) schedules a bunch of poofters. And, just for fun:
| 36% | MWC |
I have 2 points to prove with these stats:
1. There is NO WAY of knowing which conference is "better". The ACC had no dominating teams this year, yet they had the best non-conf record. The SEC and Big 12 had the most dominant teams, but their record was suspect. I personally believe the Big 12 has the best teams this year, but that's just a guess. The SEC is always rated very highly, but this year I don't believe it was justified. Preseason favorites like Georgia, Auburn, and LSU all ended up doing badly. So why not USC and Penn St for the championship instead of Florida and OU? The BCS is essentially a hype machine. Whoever generates the most buzz will get the votes, as long as you win your games at the right time.
2. There is no motivation to schedule tough match-ups in non-conference play. Why play USC when you can play Troy and not get dinged for it? There were only a couple of interesting non-conference games this year: USC vs Ohio St, and...I can't think of another one.
Because there is no playoff, I must have a pretend playoff, which is somehow still better than watching the last 5 minutes of the Poinsetta Bowl. I've taken the 11 conference winners and added 5 at-large bids using the top 5 non-champions in the BCS. I've seeded them according to the BCS poll as well, and had play begin 2 weeks after the regular season:
December 20th
1. Oklahoma
16. Buffalo
8. Penn St
9. Boise St
4. Alabama
13. Va Tech
5. USC
11. TCU
3. Texas
14. Tulsa
6. Utah
12. Cincinnati
7. Texas Tech
10. Ohio St
2. Florida
15. Troy
I moved TCU and Cincy since you wouldn't want someone from the same conference playing in the first round anyway. That'd be boring. But look at the match-ups! Obviously you have the Cindarella games against crappy teams (Troy, Buffalo) which will probably be blow-outs, but you never know. But the other games make me salivate: Texas Tech vs Ohio St! Penn St vs Boise!
So here are the scores:
1. Oklahoma 56
16. Buffalo 3
8. Penn St 19
9. Boise St 15
4. Alabama 31
13. Va Tech 3
5. USC 14
11. TCU 12
3. Texas 64
14. Tulsa 35
6. Utah 38
12. Cincinnati 10
7. Texas Tech 52
10. Ohio St 28
2. Florida 41
15. Troy 27
So I didn't pick any upsets for round 1. But we still had a few close games, and the matchups for round 2 are staggering! OU vs Penn St, USC vs Bama, Texas vs Utah, Tech vs Florida. Let's check the scoreboard:
December 27th
Rose Bowl
1. OU 55
8. Penn St 14
Orange Bowl
4. USC 28
5. Bama 27
Fiesta Bowl
3. Texas 45
6. Utah 17
Sugar Bowl
2. Florida 40
7. Tech 55
Watching Florida go down would be AWESOME! So now we have the Semifinal games, which need no introduction:
Jan 3rd
1. OU 17
4. USC 20
USC's D shuts down the spread and their handsome QB engineers a 45 second drive to kick a field goal as time runs out.
3. Texas 49
7. Tech 21
With no home-field advantage this time, Tech is no match for Texas. That leaves us with the pretend champeenship of the teams with one loss who got left out of this year's ACTUAL championship, also a rematch of Matt Leinart vs Vince Young:
Jan 10th
4. USC 22
3. Texas 21
Now just look at all those games. 15 football games that even the most casual football fan would be interested in! Tell me, how many bowl games will you watch this year? Maybe 2, 3, maybe as many as 5 to 10. I'd watch all the major MWC bowls (3) and the championship, maybe a couple others. As many as 8 if I was in town. And I'm a pretty big football fan. Your casual fan? Maybe 1 or 2. Max. So if the money-grubbers that don't want a change think that they'll lose money by switching to the playoff, I insist they're wrong. TV revenues would double, I promise.
So what's stopping us? Why can't the NCAA just say "Okay, screw it, it's time for a change!" Why can't they just take charge and force everybody to comply? If some universities don't like it, what can they do? Play club football?
This November, the people of America voted for change. But, in my eyes, the only change that really matters is the change to playoffs. Tell your local politician it's time to shake things up. Yes we can! (I didn't vote for Obama, but if he gets the NCAA to have a playoff, then I will consider his presidency successful.)
10 comments:
I did not understand one word you just wrote. That's how out of the sports loop I am.
Not one word.
That was a beautiful post. Probably the first one ever to make me cry.
It's interesting you picked USC to win it all, because that's who I've actually been the most impressed with. They've given up 83 points all year, with a third of those points coming in their fluke loss to Oregon State. They're at least as dominant defensively as Oklahoma is offensively, and we all know what USC can do offensively from the past several years. I also don't doubt Texas would eliminate both Tech and Oklahoma (and probably Florida, too) if played on a neutral field--after all, they've already beaten the Sooners on neutral turf.
Predictably, I'm boycotting the BCS FedEx bowl, and not because I work for UPS. My top three hated teams in college football:
1. Florida
2. Florida
3. Oklahoma
Months ago I was hoping for a Texas-USC rematch, with different players. That would've been dude. Oh well. Only in Kent/Kurt's universe (in 'mine'). USC 27, Texas 13.
I'm so disgusted by the BCS atrocity, I've officially made it a swear word in our house. I'll watch two bowl games this year: Las Vegas Bowl, Sugar Bowl.
Well, The only disagreement I have is that Cincinnati would beat Utah. WATCH OUT FOR THEM BEARCATS!
TCU's two losses are to Oklahoma and Utah.
BYU's two losses are to TCU and Utah.
The MWC has a great core of teams and then a few bad ones. But the above mention, plus Utah's undefeated season are argument that the MWC should be involved big time in the BCS.
Another thought that has crossed my mind is a playoff between the WAC champ and the MWC champ so that there aren't any bitter feelings between Boise St and Utah. These are two up and coming conferences that deserve more recognition. The winner of the MWAC championship game would go to the BCS.
I am so grateful the Hansen boys are able to pull through and give Kent's post the attention it needs. The level of detail Kent has made my head spin, and I like to watch some college football. But I enjoy the spectating more than the analyzing. However, I agree that a playoff would make more sense.
Yeah, Cincy sure pounded the impressive Hawaii Warriors. They could probably beat Utah...State.
Here's an interesting anti-BCS link to look at (analysis galore about the BCS, even a $3 donation-link to help eliminate it!), provided by Dad's chum Dick Harmon:
http://www.aaaw.us/
Well put Kent. But no upsets in the first round and only one in the second? College football is great because of the upsets that continually happen, but they are impossible to predict. That would be the beauty of a playoff - the perennial favorites against the surging upstart. What I suggest doing for next year's edition is assigning a probability for each game and then run a random number generator - or whatever - to get the winner.
Kurt, did you mean to put the Gators as the number 1 and 2 hated teams? I agree - I hate the Gators, but I grew up in Tallahassee, where it is a requirement to hate them. Why do you hate them?
I will do you all one better - I will not watch any bowl games this year. Though I don't really have a choice in the matter.
Baldwin should sign his posts as "Baldwin" so there would be no confusion. This is the REAL Brian Hansen, Melanie.
Of course I agree with a playoff. I'm not stupid. But Obama should keep out of it. The last thing we need is more government intervention. Obama apparently feels like he's got power to do anything he wants.
I would say we should have 12 teams. When the Sun Belt Conference proves itself worthy of top-16 talk, let alone national champeenship talk, then we can rearrange things. But I say the 6 champions of the BCS conferences, plus the three best non-BCS teams, and then three more at-huge BCS teams would make up a good field o' 12. See how things go from there; then we might reshuffle. This year we'd have, in seeding arder:
1. Oklahoma (Big 12)
2. Florida (SEC)
3. Texas (Big 12)
4. Alabama (SEC)
5. USC (Pac-10)
6. Utah (MWC)
7. Penn State (Big 10)
8. Boise State (WAC)
9. Ohio State (Big 10)
10. TCU (MWC)
11. Cincy (Big E)
12. Va. Tech (ACC)
(No more than 3 per conference. Of course I'd rather see Texas Tech than Ohio State, and they have only one loss. But maybe that would be switched if they'd played at USC instead of Ohio State.)
If Ball State had stayed undefeated, they may have been favored for that over TCU. I'm all for that: no undefeated team should be left out, no matter how cupcake the schedule. Well, maybe in some cases.
I know there are flaws with my system, but I think just about any would have some flaw. In any case, it's better than the dagnabbed BCS.
Obviously you sat through the boringest sacrament meeting ever, followed closely by a regularly boring Sunday School class. No way were you working on these stats at home.
I would keep with the 16 teams but would start on Dec 13th (BCS selection show is on Dec 6th after the Heisman presentation.) Schools should have everything wrapped up by 7pm that night. That gives 14-15 weeks for everyone to finish their seasons.
Then after the Home Field games on the round of 16 played on the 13th, the round of 8 (4 games) is played on the Saturday before Christmas - This year on the 20th.
The Final Four is than played on New Years day to add some spice to that Day. And all of the lesser bowl games can be played between the 20th and Jan. 1st. In fact, teams that got eliminated from the round of 16 can still play on NY day if they wanted a "second bowl game".
The Final game should be played a week after New Year's day.
Actually, we already have it in our power to create a playoff. What do you do when somebody produces something you don't like? Do you keep buying it? Of course not; instead you stop. So if the college football fans would stop "buying" the college football product - that is, stop going to football games, watching them on TV, surfing the internet scouring news about them - in an effort to get the playoff they want, surely the powers that be would yield.
Obviously that would take a monumental organizational effort, and it doesn't seem like this is something sufficiently important to try it on, but if they can organize an election day, they can organize a football walk-out. If fans would be willing to give up their precious football for a few games, I'm certain the NCAA would yield within a few weeks.
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