Love 'em or Hate 'em: Volume 2 The BCS

[SnDvls]

Terrell Owens was our Volume 1 with an overwhelming 79.78% of the responses in the Hate 'em category. Even with everything he has achieved on the field it's the off the field antics that seemed to be the root of all the "hate".

This week since we're coming to the stretch run of the college football season I thought we'd tackle another topic that brings up a lot of debate...the BCS.

The BCS was started in 1998 to match up the #1 and #2 teams to play for the BCS National Championship. The system has not been without controversies through the years from excluding non-BCS teams to including a team in the title game that did not win their conference among others.

The arguments for the BCS are that each game matters in the season and unlike the NFL playoff format, ensures each team doesn't pull players to save for a playoff run. Another argument for the current system is that in the past we would rarely see a #1 vs. #2 matchup due to bowl agreements and this creates that.

for more information see the official BCS site at www.bcsfootball.org or the wikipedia site at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowl_Championship_Series

So let it be known....The BCS....Love 'em or Hate 'em

[Kodos]

I also dislike the bowl system.

[st.cronin]

I'm ok with it.

[hoopsguy]

I think this is a more interesting one than TO, as I don't see a contingent of people who "Love TO" even among fans of his current team.

This one seems to inspire passionate debate on both sides, however. Personally, I would like to see a playoff system and voted "hate" since the BCS is the current mechanism (or at least the face of the problem) blocking this from happening.

[Noop]

I don't hate it but i would perfer that they use it to pick the top 12 teams in college football so we can have a playoff.

[Pumpy Tudors]

I'm fine with it.

[Atocep]

The BCS serves its purpose.

I don't love it, but its much better than any playoff format I've seen.

[CU Tiger]

Everything else in thee world>>>>BCS>Being analy raped by a pissed of gorilla>>>>>TO

[rkmsuf]

so wait

you'd prefer being anally raped by a pissed off gorilla to TO?

interesting.

[tucker342]

It's nice that they did something to match up the two best teams but I think the system is flawed. To me a playoff would be ideal... have the top four teams, or even eight teams in a playoff that way they could keep the rest of the bowl games. Hell, they could even use the BCS to pick the eight teams. Yes there would still be controversy over who should make it, but the number 9 team getting left out is better than the number 3 getting left out in my opinion.

[path12]

Tradition isn't always a reason to keep something. The bowl system is an anachronism, and the BCS 'solution' to work within it is ultimately flawed because it does not involve a playoff.

Use a combination of polls/computer rankings to determine the top 16 teams, and have a four week playoff. If you must keep some bowls, use them as rotating venues for the playoff in order to keep neutral fields whereever possible.

[Atocep]

A 16 team playoff would bring mediocrity into play and would favor teams that play soft schedules. I want to see the best teams playing for the national title, not 2 or 3 loss teams.

You knock the BCS all you want, but it makes the regular season a whole lot more interesting and forces teams to schedule the tough non-conference games everyone loves.

[sabotai]

They need to split Division IA and IAA into several leagues and create a promotion/relegation system.

[Pumpy Tudors]

Originally Posted by sabotai

They need to split Division IA and IAA into several leagues and create a promotion/relegation system.

I could actually go for this. Unfortunately, people keep trying to relegate Temple, and the Owls just keep coming back.

[path12]

Originally Posted by Atocep

A 16 team playoff would bring mediocrity into play and would favor teams that play soft schedules. I want to see the best teams playing for the national title, not 2 or 3 loss teams.

You knock the BCS all you want, but it makes the regular season a whole lot more interesting and forces teams to schedule the tough non-conference games everyone loves.

Good football teams go a lot deeper than 16 teams. And if you put a RPI schedule factor into the computer component like basketball you should get around the soft schedule problem.

[Lathum]

I voted love it but am in middle ground.

I would prefer a playoff but the BCS creates alot of discussion and meaningfull regular season games.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by path12

Good football teams go a lot deeper than 16 teams. And if you put a RPI schedule factor into the computer component like basketball you should get around the soft schedule problem.

The problem is college football has a 12 game regular season. That means that if you play in the SEC and have a tough conference schedule it would be much, much better for you to schedule easy wins in non-conference games and ride that into a playoff. 1 loss in 12 games is much different than 1 loss in the 30+ games that college basketball teams play. No RPI will fix that. A playoff would drastically reduce the number of great non-conference games.

Good teams do go deeper than 16 teams. Good teams shouldn't be playing for the national championship when theres such a short regular season.

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

A 16 team playoff would bring mediocrity into play and would favor teams that play soft schedules. I want to see the best teams playing for the national title, not 2 or 3 loss teams.

You knock the BCS all you want, but it makes the regular season a whole lot more interesting and forces teams to schedule the tough non-conference games everyone loves.

Don't base it on W/L record, base it on conference titles.

[Lathum]

The problem is even with a playoff someone is always going to be snubbed.

If you have an 8 team playoff the ninth team is going to be snubbed

If you have a 16 team playoff the 17th team is gonna feel snubbed.

rinse and repeat...

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by Lathum

The problem is even with a playoff someone is always going to be snubbed.

If you have an 8 team playoff the ninth team is going to be snubbed

If you have a 16 team playoff the 17th team is gonna feel snubbed.

rinse and repeat...

I don't understand this argument and it's used all the time. Yeah, someone will always get screwed, but is it better to screw the 3rd place team, or the 9th or 17th place teams?

[Klinglerware]

Originally Posted by Lathum

The problem is even with a playoff someone is always going to be snubbed.

If you have an 8 team playoff the ninth team is going to be snubbed

If you have a 16 team playoff the 17th team is gonna feel snubbed.

rinse and repeat...

And if you start giving out autobids to everyone and their mother, people are still going to question whether the best possible field is represented in the tourney...

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I don't understand this argument and it's used all the time. Yeah, someone will always get screwed, but is it better to screw the 3rd place team, or the 9th or 17th place teams?

Best way to solve it:

12 team playoff (4 teams get byes determined by drawing names out of a hat)

Each conference (11 of them) get one bid which goes to the conference winner. The major independent with the best record (regardless of record strength) gets the last bid. Then you play the games. Easy. Simple. Rewards teams that improve throughout the season, and does not punish teams with tough non-conference schedules that prepare them for their conference games. Conference Championships mean something, and everyone is on the same page and it is all played out on the field, no politics, no polls, etc. are needed because all bids are based upon getting into the field by winning your conference.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I don't understand this argument and it's used all the time. Yeah, someone will always get screwed, but is it better to screw the 3rd place team, or the 9th or 17th place teams?

I'd still rather see them try to get the 2 best teams together for 1 game than have whichever team gets the hot or gets the best matchups playing for the national title.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Warhammer

Best way to solve it:

12 team playoff (4 teams get byes determined by drawing names out of a hat)

Each conference (11 of them) get one bid which goes to the conference winner. The major independent with the best record (regardless of record strength) gets the last bid. Then you play the games. Easy. Simple. Rewards teams that improve throughout the season, and does not punish teams with tough non-conference schedules that prepare them for their conference games. Conference Championships mean something, and everyone is on the same page and it is all played out on the field, no politics, no polls, etc. are needed because all bids are based upon getting into the field by winning your conference.

So Troy would have a better shot at the national title than the 2nd place team in the Pac 10, SEC, or Big 12 simply because they won their crappy conference?

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Klinglerware

And if you start giving out autobids to everyone and their mother, people are still going to question whether the best possible field is represented in the tourney...

You not necessarily looking for the best field. They don't do that now, even the NCAA Basketball tourney does not try to do that.

What determines what the best field is. Most every football guy says that LSU is the best team. How close is LSU to having two losses? Sure, they look damn good when I've seen them, but if they are so good, why do they almost have two losses?

At some point, a team needs to do something. We can't rely on who beat who, rankings, our preconceived notions, etc. Look at OSU and ASU. Who has played the tougher schedule? Who is ranked higher? Who is more deserving of the title game if they go undefeated?

What about Michigan? Sure, they lost to a I-AA school. But are they the team that started 0-2, or are they the team that has run the table since? I don't know. What if they beat OSU? Are they really a good team that had a couple of bad days, or was OSU not that great? I guarantee that if they beat OSU, we're all going to say that OSU sucks, they didn't play anyone, blah, blah, blah. If Michigan runs the table, and LSU loses one more game, how do we determine which 10-2 team is better? Compare losses? Compare wins? Is there any way to figure this out?

Without teams playing each other, there is no clean system to determine this. That is why the way any playoff system needs to be done is based upon Conference Championships. No wild cards. No second bids. We need a Tournament of Champions.

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

So Troy would have a better shot at the national title than the 2nd place team in the Pac 10, SEC, or Big 12 simply because they won their crappy conference?

Yes. If the second place team in the Pac 10, SEC, or Big 12 deserved to be in, they should have won their conference. This format removes the conference bias out of the system. How do we know that Troy isn't better than Georgia, Texas, or USC? If they don't play each other we don't know.

If we didn't play the game earlier this year, who would have though Appalachain State would have beat Michigan? Imagine the hysteria if Troy beat USC? Take Boise State beating Oklahoma and increase it an order of magnitude.

EDIT: This also makes the regular season mean something. I mean all the talking heads and BCS lovers talk about how the entire season is meaningful in college football, using only the conference champions preserves that aspect of the current system. We never had a problem considering the best team in a conference as the team that represented one of the big conferences in the Orange, Sugar, Rose, and Cotton Bowls back before the BCS. Why can't we consider the conference champ the best team in the conference when we are talking about playoffs?

[lordscarlet]

It amazes me that people have no problem with a playoff system in professional sports, in Division IAA, in Division I basketball, etc, but Division IA Football fans gets people all upset at the mention of a playoff system.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Warhammer

Yes. If the second place team in the Pac 10, SEC, or Big 12 deserved to be in, they should have won their conference. This format removes the conference bias out of the system. How do we know that Troy isn't better than Georgia, Texas, or USC? If they don't play each other we don't know.

Troy has a loss to Florida and Arkansas this year and actually plays Georgia next week. With a loss they'll be 0-3 against the SEC.

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Troy has a loss to Florida and Arkansas this year and actually plays Georgia next week. With a loss they'll be 0-3 against the SEC.

So what? How many of those games were on the road?

The question you need to ask is, what do you want? Do you want each team to play a series of games, and then have a voting contest to see who the best team is? Do you want each team to play their games, and then have a bunch of people vote for the top two teams to play? Or do you want each conference game to mean something and then let each conference winner have a chance to prove they are the best team in the land by playing the game?

What cracks me up is how people gripe about the BCS and the bias in the system, but then come back and scoff when you come up with an unbiased system.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Warhammer

So what? How many of those games were on the road?

The question you need to ask is, what do you want? Do you want each team to play a series of games, and then have a voting contest to see who the best team is? Do you want each team to play their games, and then have a bunch of people vote for the top two teams to play? Or do you want each conference game to mean something and then let each conference winner have a chance to prove they are the best team in the land by playing the game?

What cracks me up is how people gripe about the BCS and the bias in the system, but then come back and scoff when you come up with an unbiased system.

I said above, the BCS serves its purpose, much more than any playoff would. It gets the top 2 ranked teams to play each other for the national title. Can a playoff accomplish that?

The only change I'd make to the BCS is put margin of victory back into the equation and have the computer ranking carry more weight than the human polls.

As for Troy, they have a 20 point loss to a mediocre Arakansas team and an 18 point loss to a 3 loss Florida team. Home or road isn't going to matter there.

There is no such thing as an unbiased system. The system you just mentioned has a team that is 0-3 in against the SEC playing for a shot at the national title over the 2nd place SEC team. Hawaii played two 1AA schools and plays exactly one meaningful game all season. The team with best record in the MAC lost 70-14 to Clemson and also lost to North Dakota State.

The bias in this system would be you're simly choosing teams because they play in X conference. It doesn't look for the best teams and makes no attempt to give the best teams a shot at the national title.

[lordscarlet]

And a team can be 0-12 against, say, the NL East, have a worse record than the third place team in that division, and still get in (I have no idea if this has ever happened). What's your point?

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by lordscarlet

And a team can be 0-12 against, say, the NL East, have a worse record than the third place team in that division, and still get in (I have no idea if this has ever happened). What's your point?

Well, my point was there is no unbiased system and that the BCS serves its purpose.

Your counterpoint to that is to show that playoff systems are flawed in all sports?

[st.cronin]

This thread has really had some surprising posts.



NOT.

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by Pumpy Tudors

I could actually go for this. Unfortunately, people keep trying to relegate Temple, and the Owls just keep coming back.

I don't even know why Temple still has a team. They should just burn down the stadium....

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

I said above, the BCS serves its purpose, much more than any playoff would. It gets the top 2 ranked teams to play each other for the national title. Can a playoff accomplish that?

The only change I'd make to the BCS is put margin of victory back into the equation and have the computer ranking carry more weight than the human polls.

As for Troy, they have a 20 point loss to a mediocre Arakansas team and an 18 point loss to a 3 loss Florida team. Home or road isn't going to matter there.

There is no such thing as an unbiased system. The system you just mentioned has a team that is 0-3 in against the SEC playing for a shot at the national title over the 2nd place SEC team. Hawaii played two 1AA schools and plays exactly one meaningful game all season. The team with best record in the MAC lost 70-14 to Clemson and also lost to North Dakota State.

The bias in this system would be you're simly choosing teams because they play in X conference. It doesn't look for the best teams and makes no attempt to give the best teams a shot at the national title.

What are you talking about? The current system takes the two that people think are the best at the time and puts them in a single game. What other sport do we take two teams that people think are the best and just have those teams play. What happens when several teams go undefeated or all have 1 loss?

A few weeks ago we would have had a USC vs. LSU championship. Now that we've played a few more games we are complaining because OSU or ASU can get there without playing anyone? Come on... Let's just pick two teams at the start of the year let them play it off and call it a season.

Again, what do you look to accomplish? If you want to only pick two teams, there will always be a debate. Got two undefeated teams? Let's consider their schedule. Who is better the team that beats every team by 40+ points but hasn't played anyone in the top 25, or the team that plays 5 teams in the top 25 but only wins by 5 points on average? What happens if you have a third team in the mix that lost one game to one of the undefeated teams, stomped the rest of their schedule by 25+ points per game and only lost to the one undefeated by 1 point on the road.

Do you want the regular season to mean something?

Do you want teams that improve over the course of the season to be rewarded?

Do you want teams to play challenging schedules and not be rewarded for playing cream puffs?

Do you want to remove the bias inherent in the current BCS system?

If you said yes to these questions, read on!

What is the most unbiased way to select teams? Easy, have them prove their worthiness on the field. How can we do this with a minimum of fuss? Simple, we can use the current system in place. Most conferences select their BCS representative based upon a team winning their conference championship (either a single game or by conference record).

But, what about the crappy teams in the worse divisions? There are few ways to look at it. First, if the teams are not that good, they'll be knocked out after their first game. Second, how do we know that they aren't that good? Sure, maybe at the start of the season they lost a game to another foe, but we can say that about any team that is not undefeated. So that is a specious argument. Additionally, we are proving this on the field. Third, what if they win? What if they go through and get lucky and beat a team? They still have at least two more games to win to be champions.

What else is good about selecting conference champions? You don't have to worry about leaving X team. Under this system, there is no way that two teams from the same conference will play in the title game. That is true, but remember how everyone howled last year that it was possible that Michigan and OSU might have a rematch in the title game? Unless you are from the SEC, you won't want to see a two teams from the same conference play in the title game anyway.

Have someone that complains about not being in the playoff? Win your conference!

If you want a team to win a title, if you want a team that has to beat the best each conference has to offer, if you want a Tournament of Champions this is the system for you.

If you want some teams arbitrarily selected because back in Week 3, they beat Central Michigan and statistically dominated the game and that was more impressive than another team beating Ball State narrowly than stick with the current BCS.

EDIT: One more thing, this also allows a team that loses a significant player for a few games to conceivably not lose their entire season due to that injury. If they play well enough they can recover.

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Well, my point was there is no unbiased system and that the BCS serves its purpose.

Your counterpoint to that is to show that playoff systems are flawed in all sports?

From Webster's Dictionary

unbiased
One entry found.

unbiased



Main Entry: un·bi·ased
Pronunciation: \ˌən-ˈbī-əst\
Function: adjective
Date: 1607
1: free from bias; especially : free from all prejudice and favoritism : eminently fair
2: having an expected value equal to a population parameter being estimated

Under this definition, using the conference champions is free from all prejudice and favoritism based upon conference affiliation. That is an unbiased selection process.

You say it is biased towards what conference you are in. It already freaking is! If you are in a BCS Conference it is MUCH easier to get in the BCS game. From top to bottom, I think we can agree that the BCS conferences are better than the other conferences. However, it does not mean that the champion from a lesser conference cannot be better than the champion of a BCS conference. A playoff system as I described removes that bias that the current system has in place to take teams from the BCS conferences.

Let us not forget the primary reason for the BCS was to allow the major conferences to line their pockets more than they already were. The BCS was originally designed to take the two best teams from the BCS conferences and Notre Dame. Outside of that, they wanted to make sure that teams from the major conferences would go to the major bowl games.

[Young Drachma]

People who oppose a playoff system in I-A college football are almost always fans of major conference schools. The system benefits them and if some g-dforsaken school from the netherwoods decides it's going to lay claim on the title by beating a bunch of schools in the playoffs, well...that's just not fair.

After all, if Boise State or Rutgers or Northwestern manages to get 'hot' after winning their crappy conferences, play a depleted SEC squad in the first round, advance to the quarters against a down-year Notre Dame team that got in despite being 6-6 and manages to win in the semis against the fluke champion of the ACC that year to setup a title game against the presumptive favourite from the Pac-10 and manages to win again....well, that's just not right.

I mean, they lost a game to a team that would've been blown out in [insert major 'big time' conference here] if they'd played a schedule like we did. Our team was tired. It's not fair that they had a harder run and those guys had it easier....

With the money schools invest in this NCAA silliness under the guise of doing it for the kids, the fact that we've gone this long without a playoff minimizes whatever shred of respect I had for the people who run that gulag in the first place.

There isn't an excuse for it and there won't ever be one. It's a sham the way it is now, just like it was a sham before the BCS and will continue to be a sham until there is a playoff system in place that's more equitable than what we have now. Basketball does it well, tweaks when it needs to and it gets it generally right. No reason football can't either.

[st.cronin]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

People who oppose a playoff system in I-A college football are almost always fans of major conference schools. The system benefits them and if some g-dforsaken school from the netherwoods decides it's going to lay claim on the title by beating a bunch of schools in the playoffs, well...that's just not fair.

I don't that's a fair characterization. I'm a fan of Wisconsin, which has never played in a BCS bowl ... but I just plain don't care who we say the National Champion. I just want Wisconsin to win the Big 10.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by st.cronin

I don't that's a fair characterization. I'm a fan of Wisconsin, which has never played in a BCS bowl ... but I just plain don't care who we say the National Champion. I just want Wisconsin to win the Big 10.

I said almost always.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

People who oppose a playoff system in I-A college football are almost always fans of major conference schools. The system benefits them and if some g-dforsaken school from the netherwoods decides it's going to lay claim on the title by beating a bunch of schools in the playoffs, well...that's just not fair.

I'm a fan of Marshall and WVU, primarily Marshall. I've never felt Marshall should have a shot at the national title. There were times when Moss and Pennington where there that they could play with any team on any given Saturday, but didn't make them as good or better than those teams.

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

With the money schools invest in this NCAA silliness under the guise of doing it for the kids, the fact that we've gone this long without a playoff minimizes whatever shred of respect I had for the people who run that gulag in the first place.

There isn't an excuse for it and there won't ever be one. It's a sham the way it is now, just like it was a sham before the BCS and will continue to be a sham until there is a playoff system in place that's more equitable than what we have now. Basketball does it well, tweaks when it needs to and it gets it generally right. No reason football can't either.

The problem is the size on 1A. The BCS conference schools have more money and more resources yet they're on the same level as a Sun Belt conference team. Its unfair to both parties, however, the Sun Belt teams want to be 1A because it means more money for them even if they aren't included in the BCS, so its a choice for the schools.

A playoff system doesn't crown a true champion. NCAA basketball doesn't crown a true champion. Just because more schools are included doesn't mean its a better system. The NCAA tourney is just as much about money as the BCS, so don't think they're doing small schools a favor.

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

A playoff system doesn't crown a true champion. NCAA basketball doesn't crown a true champion. Just because more schools are included doesn't mean its a better system. The NCAA tourney is just as much about money as the BCS, so don't think they're doing small schools a favor.

So the true champion of the NFL last year was who?

So the Boston Red Sox were not the champions of MLB?

What is your solution? Arbitrarily picking two teams and having them play a game can't do it because on any given Saturday either team can win, that doesn't make them a champion, does it?

I'm puzzled by your posts. You knock everything else, but yet don't really offer anything but the most arbitrary system. The NCAA does crown the best team. They take the 31 conference winners from IA basketball, add the next 34 best teams (picked by an arbitrary method, but I think debating who is #34 or the next best teams is much better than debating who is #2 or #3) and then have the teams play each other on the court.

What method is superior to playing the games and seeing who comes out on top? The reason why you have more than one game is that over the course of several games, the better teams will rise to the top. Again, I go to my LSU example earlier. Sure, they look great, but if they lose 2 or 3 games, are they really the best team? At what point do you stop being who we think you are and become who you actually are on the court or the field?

[heybrad]

Warhammer wins this thread by a mile.

[BYU 14]

You don't need to include every conference Champion, just use some form of the current system and take the top 8 Teams regardless of conference. They will still have to beat 3 of the top Teams in the country to win it all and if a Non-BCS School is capable of that, so be it. College Football has finely developed a semblance of parity and the next logical step is to capitalize on that.....In fact, Players knowing they can play for a national title at a currrent "Mid Major" school would increase parity even further, since better players could look to current Non-BCS schools because they would have a chance to play sooner and have a more productive career, with a shot at all the marbles.

The current system is a joke and the only plausible argument against a playoff system is that it creates too many games. Even that argument is weak when all schools can now play a 12 game schedule and will play 13 games if they go to a bowl. Two extra games for the finalists will not put that much of a burden on the Players and their studies.

Another argument is what about the extra revenue Teams playing 2 or 3 postseason games would get. Easy fix, each Team gets revenue only for it's first Playoff game. The revenue from the Semifinal and Final games goes to a general fund to increase stipends for student Athletes so they can live a little easier, hell that might even curtail some of the illegal Money Kids take to make ends meet in College.

A playoff system that allows every 1A team the chance to qualify is the only way to determine the true Champion. I'm sorry but I don't but the Non-BCS team getting a lucky draw scenario as a reason not to give them a chance. Should a wild card Team be disqualified because they are not a Division Champion? No, thats what makes thing interesting and Wild Card Teams have wom the Superbowl because they are playing the best Football when it counts....at the end. So the "best" Team doesn't always win.........Well guess what, some of the greatest moments in sports history have been tied to upsets and the underdogs knocking off the invincible Champion. The 1914 Boston Braves, the 1969 Jets, James Braddock, the 1980 US Hockey team.......These are the moments that make sports great and create legends. it is also the one thing that College Football is missing right now.

I don't know, it seems that somewhere out there somebody involved must be smart enough to see a playoff system would only benefit the Game.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Warhammer

So the true champion of the NFL last year was who?

So the Boston Red Sox were not the champions of MLB?

What is your solution? Arbitrarily picking two teams and having them play a game can't do it because on any given Saturday either team can win, that doesn't make them a champion, does it?

I'm puzzled by your posts. You knock everything else, but yet don't really offer anything but the most arbitrary system. The NCAA does crown the best team. They take the 31 conference winners from IA basketball, add the next 34 best teams (picked by an arbitrary method, but I think debating who is #34 or the next best teams is much better than debating who is #2 or #3) and then have the teams play each other on the court.

What method is superior to playing the games and seeing who comes out on top? The reason why you have more than one game is that over the course of several games, the better teams will rise to the top. Again, I go to my LSU example earlier. Sure, they look great, but if they lose 2 or 3 games, are they really the best team? At what point do you stop being who we think you are and become who you actually are on the court or the field?

1.) You're comparing pro sports, where talent levels are much closer from team to team, to college sports.

2.) I said I'd make minor tweaks to the BCS and thats it. College football is different than basketball. The talent levels on the court aren't as drastic as they are on the field.

3.) The better teams do rise to the top over the course of the season. Troy (using them as an example again) had two shots earlier in the year against ranked opponents and will get another shot. They've already lost two and if they lose a 3rd you still want to put them in over the 2nd place SEC team. I can't possibly see how you think that system is more fair. Yet they must be a team thats rising to the top.

What the NCAA tourney does is make the regular season less meagingful. Lets take Ohio State (in football) from last year. They were clearly the #1 team in the country and deserved over any other team to at least play for the national title. It was clear to everyone. So a playoff increases in the chances of them not playing for the national title just so people can have a false feeling of crowning a "true champion" and giving everyone an equal shot.

Ohio State vs Miami in '02. Clearly the two best teams in the country. Yet we'd have to hope one of them isn't upset on the way to the national championship game so we'd get to see that great game.

You can go back through the history of the BCS and say with solid certaintly that they crowned the correct champion in just about every season. Can you say the best team wins the NCAA tourney every year or is it just the team that gets hot late in the season?

[st.cronin]

Here's the problem with college basketball: Florida won the national tournament, but who won the SEC last year? I have no idea - my guess is it was Florida, but I don't remember. I couldn't even tell you who won the Big 10, because NOBODY CARES ABOUT THE REGULAR SEASON.

That's whats great about college football - all the games are huge.

[miami_fan]

If it is so important for the regular season to mean something and a playoff at the end would cause that not to be true, how about we eliminate all the bowls, get rid of the BCS championship game, and just crown a champion at the end of the regular season. Then the regular season will truly mean everything.

[JeeberD]

Not a fan...

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by Atocep

1.) You're comparing pro sports, where talent levels are much closer from team to team, to college sports.

So what? We're not talking about the last place teams in each conference playing. We're talking about conference champions who had to at least win something.

Originally Posted by Atocep

2.) I said I'd make minor tweaks to the BCS and thats it. College football is different than basketball. The talent levels on the court aren't as drastic as they are on the field.

So since we think talent levels on the court are not as drastic as they are on the field the perceived lesser teams shouldn't play.

Let me get this straight, should Boise State have been allowed to play Oklahoma last year in the Fiesta Bowl? Who won that game? Is that any different than George Mason going to the Final Four a few years back?

Who did Michigan lose to again? Appalachain State? They actually played that game? I mean come on, Michigan is so much better. They actually play 1A football in the Big 10! What? Appalachain State won? That can't happen! I didn't think it could happen!

Let's look at Oregon, one of the best teams in the country, and a team that drilled Michigan. Oregon was beat by Cal who was looking good, until they dropped games against UCLA, Oregon State, and Arizona State. Well those are all top teams from a tough Pac-10, right? UCLA lost to Notre Dame. Oregon State lost to Cincinnati, who coincidentally lost to Pitt, who lost in turn to Navy, Delaware, and Ball State!

Am I going to far?

I don't think so. Again, over time, your record speaks to who you are, not what we think you are. LSU is thought to be the best team in the nation right now. Sure, they've looked good. But, they are very close to being 5-3 right now. A few breaks the other way in the Auburn and Florida game and they are 5-3. Would that 5-3 team still be considered one of the top teams in the nation?

Let's take Florida, another team that everyone was calling one of the top teams in the nation even though they were 5-2. Not a lot of people are talking about them now since they lost to Georgia.

Originally Posted by Atocep

3.) The better teams do rise to the top over the course of the season. Troy (using them as an example again) had two shots earlier in the year against ranked opponents and will get another shot. They've already lost two and if they lose a 3rd you still want to put them in over the 2nd place SEC team. I can't possibly see how you think that system is more fair. Yet they must be a team thats rising to the top.

So what happens if Troy manages to beat Georgia?

You're judging everything based upon what you think or feel is going to happen. Unfortunately, the SEC doesn't play a lot of top non-conference opponents. Its hard to get a true handle on how good the conference is. I'm not here to say that Troy is going to win a playoff, they probably wouldn't. However, as champion of their conference, they do deserve a chance to prove that they are the best team in the nation. If they go out and beat LSU, OSU, and Oklahoma in a playoff, they would have a pretty dang good team.

If the 2nd place SEC/Big 10/Big 12/etc. team has a gripe, win your conference. Easy as that. You prove it on the field. Does anyone complain when someone wins the SEC title game when it is a essentially a one game playoff? Does anyone ask, "Why can't the #2 SEC East team have a shot?" No, they didn't win their division, they don't get a spot in the SEC Conference Championship Game.

Did anyone complain when Colorado beat Oklahoma (?) in the Big 12 title game a few years back? Did anyone ask why Nebraska didn't get a shot? No, people did complain about Colorado not getting a chance to play in the BCS game since Colorado had just destroyed Nebraska and had won the Big 12 title.

How can any team claim to be a National Champion when they are not even the best team in their own conference? (For the record, this is my single issue with the NCAA Basketball Tournament) Currently, you have no shot at being the NCAA 1A National Champion in Football unless you are in a BCS Conference or you are Notre Dame.

Originally Posted by Atocep

What the NCAA tourney does is make the regular season less meagingful. Lets take Ohio State (in football) from last year. They were clearly the #1 team in the country and deserved over any other team to at least play for the national title. It was clear to everyone. So a playoff increases in the chances of them not playing for the national title just so people can have a false feeling of crowning a "true champion" and giving everyone an equal shot.

So if they were clearly the #1 team in the country, why weren't they crowned the national champions? Everyone thought they were going to crush Florida. Not many people gave Florida a chance. What was the score of that game? By your logic, we shouldn't even play the game. It was clear to everyone that they were the #1 team in the country. Well, they were, until they played Florida.

My point is that in a playoff system there is a chance that they might get knocked off, but in that case, they do not deserve to be the national champion. You're playing in a tournament of champions, each team that is there has won something tangible, they are not the #2 team in the Big 10, they are not the #3 team in the SEC East Division, they are a champion of a conference.

Originally Posted by Atocep

Ohio State vs Miami in '02. Clearly the two best teams in the country. Yet we'd have to hope one of them isn't upset on the way to the national championship game so we'd get to see that great game.

If they got upset, would they be one of the best teams in the nation? Again, after how many losses do we reevaluate our thoughts on a team? OSU and Miami were only clearly the best two teams in the country because they had not lost. Were they significantly better than the one loss teams that year? I'm not so sure.

Again, looking at this year, we thought that LSU was the top team in the country? Are they? Everyone thinks the SEC is the top conference right now. I'm not sure that they are, most teams are pretty good, but there is only one elite team, and I am even questioning them. Why do I think they are an elite team, because I have been told they are.

Originally Posted by Atocep

You can go back through the history of the BCS and say with solid certaintly that they crowned the correct champion in just about every season. Can you say the best team wins the NCAA tourney every year or is it just the team that gets hot late in the season?

There may not be debate about one of the teams in the BCS game, but there is typically a ton about who the #2 team is.

2006 - Last year Michigan or Florida. Did they get it right? Michigan lost a close game to OSU in the Horseshoe and then lost to a fired up USC team in the Rose Bowl, not a big surprise as that often happens when a team is playing in a bowl they do not want to be in.

2005 - Texas and USC were undefeated so there was no controversy

2004 - There are 5 undefeated teams, Utah, Boise State, USC, Auburn, and Oklahoma - Auburn, USC, and Utah finish undefeated as Oklahoma loses to USC and Boise State loses a close game to a 1 loss Louisville team.

2003 - Oklahoma, LSU, and USC all finish with one loss. Oklahoma and LSU play for the title, LSU wins. USC is crowned national champions by the AP. LSU by ESPN and the BCS.

2002 - Ohio State and Miami - They got it right.

2001 - Nebraska is pasted by Colorado, who goes on to win the Big 12 with 2 losses. Oregon also has one loss. But, Nebraska is selected ahead of Oregon and Colorado (who they had just lost to) to play in the title game against Miami. Now, Colorado might not have won against Miami, but that was an awesome football team that was playing the best ball at the end of the season.

2000 - Oklahoma went undefeated, but what about the #2 slot? Well, FSU was 10-1 but had lost to Miami during the regular season and was ranked behind Miami in the polls. Miami had lost to #4 Washington during the regular season, who also happened to be 10-1.

So, in 7 games beginning in 2000, there have only been two consensus games for the National Championship. Every other game had some question about who should be involved in that game. Every single other season had some debate.

In 2004, would Auburn have been able to beat USC? Would either have been able to beat Utah? We will never know. In 2001, would Colorado have been able to beat Miami? Maybe not, but they were certainly a better team than Nebraska at that time, and had proven it on the field. Would LSU have beaten USC in 2003?

We'll never know because all those games were determined in large part, not by the players, but by voters and computer polls. Do voters or computer polls determine who wins a conference? No. Do voters or computer polls determine who wins a game? Yet, these two items determine who will play for the National Championship? That is laughable.

A playoff is the one way to really determine who the best team is, and that is to do it on the field. What is the best way to determine the teams? If we select teams, we are ultimately back where we started and everyone is bitching about who the #8 and #9 teams are, or who the #16 and #17 teams are, and why does the Big East champion get a free bid, but not the undefeated WAC champion, etc. The only way to do it fairly without bias is to take the conference champions and put them in a playoff.

[Suburban Rhythm]

Hate it. Because it's all based on perception. How does a Michigan team that starts 0-2, with a loss to a D 1-AA school, now become 12th in the most recent BCS rankings? Because some beat writers think they've got more talent than a bunch of other schools, no matter that they don't do much with it.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by st.cronin

Here's the problem with college basketball: Florida won the national tournament, but who won the SEC last year? I have no idea - my guess is it was Florida, but I don't remember. I couldn't even tell you who won the Big 10, because NOBODY CARES ABOUT THE REGULAR SEASON.

That's whats great about college football - all the games are huge.

If you have 117 Teams vying for 8 spots in a playoff, all the regular Season games would still be huge, no?