Best Reason to keep BCS

[HB Pony Dad]

This was the most reasoned argument I have read to not implement a playoff system in College Football...

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-pla ... 831.column


Bill Plaschke
November 5, 2008

Pete Carroll is off-base when he says the Bowl Championship Series 'stinks.' The Trojans made their own BCS bed when they lost to Oregon State.

Once upon a whine, another traditional powerhouse college football team got jobbed.

Four autumns ago, another great college football team was denied a chance to play for a national title because it was a lousy year for its conference.

Auburn, undefeated and unrecognized in 2004, could not complain because it was surrounded by a bad SEC.

USC, overpowering and anonymous in 2008, cannot complain for the same reason.

The Pac-10 reeks. USC is tarnished by the stench. The Trojans could be unbeaten and they still might not be among the top two teams in the country.

As it is, they are a one-loss afterthought, no longer part of the national discussion, playing out their weak schedule with a forced smile, waiting for their bowl assignment like a yawning man waits for the bus.

They are BCS busted. And their usually measured coach, for the first time in his eight-year career here, is publicly fuming about it.

"I think it stinks," Pete Carroll said at his news conference Tuesday.

I don't think it stinks. I think it works. What has happened to USC is fair, and even appropriate.

If the Trojans can run over Auburn to the national championship game in 2004 because they won a terrific Pac-10 that featured quarterbacks such as Aaron Rodgers and Trent Edwards and Derek Anderson . . . then they can be denied during a season in which the Pac-10 has been unable to scale the Mountain West and been mostly WAC'd out.

Yes, they beat Washington by 56 points and dropped two spots in the BCS standings, but are the Huskies really any better than Louisiana Monroe and the Citadel, two teams that Auburn beat in 2004?

In the BCS, you are judged by the company you keep, and here are some of USC's buds:

Cal, loser to Maryland. Arizona, loser to New Mexico.

Oregon, beaten by Boise State. Oregon State, beaten by Penn State and Utah.

Washington and Washington State, crushed by darn near everybody.

The conference has but one great team, and USC would probably be favored over any other college team right now, and has outscored its last five opponents, 214-20.

But it doesn't matter. Nor should it.

Those who long for a college football playoff system need to understand, thanks to the BCS, there already is one. It's called the regular season.

Two years ago, the Trojans lost in the national semifinals to UCLA. Last season, they lost in the fifth round to Stanford.

This season, the Trojans lost in the third round to Oregon State, and even if they continue to breeze through the loser's bracket, it's too late to turn them into champions.

You want college football to adopt March Madness? It already has three delightful months of it -- every game counts, every play counts, the most important regular season in sports.

In this tournament, nobody has felt the toe of the glass slipper more than the Trojans, and whose fault is that?

"The really interesting thing is, who is making these decisions. . . . We don't even know who this is," Carroll said. "It's kind of like the Wizard of Oz. Somebody behind that screen there, but we don't know who it is."

Here's who makes the decisions. It's those USC players who decided to not show up against Oregon State. It's that USC coaching staff that couldn't figure out how to beat former Trojan Mike Riley.

In the past, Carroll has publicly treated the BCS like a crazy uncle, simply shaking his head and clucking his tongue and changing the subject.

That he is now publicly scolding it shows the frustration of a defensive coach who has the best defense in the country and nowhere to show it off.

It's sincere and well-intended. It's also too late.

Even those longtime BCS critics like myself have to finally admit that the imperfect system has perfectly transformed the sport from a Saturday afternoon cookout to a national obsession.

The TV ratings and accompanying buzz have pushed it to the No. 2 spot in the national landscape behind the NFL.

The lack of a playoff system has pushed everyone's attention to the brink, with games like last Saturday's Texas-Texas Tech duel drawing double the viewers of any other show on a usually slow Saturday night.

The rich bowl system keeps the presidents happy. The weekly drama keeps the TV executives happy. And more than his basketball brethren whose entire season happens over three weekends in March, the college football player learns the importance of consistency and accountability.

Carroll's biggest complaint is that the BCS system rewards the team that plays the best over the entire season, not the team playing the best at the end of the season.

"I think there's a difference there," he said.

Indeed, USC has been among the country's top two teams at the end of virtually every season since 2002. That the Trojans have only two national titles is a reminder of Carroll's own celebrated words, that to succeed in life one must "always compete."

Not only in November. And that's no BCS.

[SMU2007]

I've always agreed with this line of though. it's one of the things that makes college football great is the importance of each and every week. the entire season is LIKE a playoff. you lose and you seriously hurt your chances to win a title. i agree there are some problems with teams really hard vs easy schedules but overall i would hate to see the importance of the regular season diminished by a playoff system. that's one of the reasons that people tune in to watch oregon state upset USC. if it didn't really affect USC at all in the long run - no one would watch that game.

[PK]

That's all fine and dandy for those in the BCS, but everyone else is still shut out by the very existence of the BCS. Now you may say that the other conferences are too weak and that is mostly true, but part of that is because of the monoply created by the BCS. The rich get richer and the poor just struggle to stay alive...money wise and recruiting wise.

[NavyCrimson]

You nailed it PK. There are no opportunities for those outside the BCS-BS. That by itself says its wrong & should be illegal.

[Stallion]

the only way the BCS falls w/o legal action is if second tier reputation teams like Texas Tech, Oklahoma St. wake up and realize that it really isn't fair to them either. Yes it gives them a pass to one of the BCS bowls but most of the time they will get shafted by the more glamorous team like Alabama, USC, UT, OU, Penn St, Notre Dame et al. when it comes to the BCS Championship or when sloting the other BCS Bowls.

[jtstang]

the only way the BCS falls w/o legal action is if second tier reputation teams like Texas Tech, Oklahoma St. wake up and realize that it really isn't fair to them either. Yes it gives them a pass to one of the BCS bowls but most of the time they will get shafted by the more glamorous team like Alabama, USC, UT, OU, Penn St, Notre Dame et al. when it comes to the BCS Championship.

Why do you think the have-nots have not (punny) challenged this under the antitrust laws yet?

[PoconoPony]

The BCS is a very imperfect system set up by the "haves" at the time they were in power, to the exclusion of the majority, for their own best interests $$$$$$$$$. The system is better than nothing, but not much better. You can make a strong argument this year that the Big East, ACC, and PAC 10 do not even have a team that deserves to play in a major bowl. These conferences are currently down and have been down for a long while. Penn State played the 2d weakest 4 game pre-conference schedule of any BCS school then catches the Big 10 (11) on a down year beating the only quality team Ohio State ( winning based only on fumbles by OSU frosh QB Pryor) and OSU's strength is very debateable. That leaves the real national power teams in the SEC and Big 12 where they chop each other up. We need a limited play off system to rectify the glaring inequities in the system. All NCAA sports have a national championship protocol including the the lower tier football divisions. Stallion is absolutely correct when he writes that nothing is going to change until the " second tier reputation teams like Texas Tech, Oklahoma St. wake up and realize that it really isn't fair to them either."

[NavyCrimson]

Do you know why this is such as sham?!

Just look at the CWS in Omaha when Fresno State won it all!!! You never know what can happen in sports!!!

Need I say more!!!

They were the best team in baseball & they overcame all the odds & were #1 bar none!!!

All this is is a power grab (like someone said earlier) & nothing else.

The biggest crime of all is all the non-BCS-BS schools that refuse to fight it!!!

Thank you Pres. Jerry Turner, et al.

[DiamondM75]

...Stallion is absolutely correct when he writes that nothing is going to change until the " second tier reputation teams like Texas Tech, Oklahoma St. wake up and realize that it really isn't fair to them either."

Absolutely correct. I have been saying for years, "How long will the Texas Techs, Oklahoma States, Texas AM, et. al. put up with the constant dominance by the UT's and OU's of the world? But what can they do? They get a lot of money for consistentantly being #2s. They can't just leave the Big XII, or could they.

If the second tier teams of the Big XII decide to leave and start their own conference, what would happen to Texas and OU? At least the threat of doing this might scare the hell out them.

[PoconoPony]

NavyCrimson makes a very important point to the effect that in all the other NCAA sports it is common for a total underdog and/or team from a "lesser" conference to win it all or appear in a championship game. During the last 10 years there has been a considerable shifting in the balances of power with far greater parity in all NCAA sports. For that reason a Boise State can knock of Oklahoma in football or a small college like Davidson can climb right to the top of the NCAA basketball playoffs. Boise State was almost an exception because they were given the chance where everyone else is excluded with no opportunity to compete. For this reason a limited playoff system is long over due. Again, it is all about control by the few power brokers and their quest for the $$$$$$$.

[NavyCrimson]

Thank you - Pocono'

[Pony Soup]

This is a pretty poor argument to keep the BCS. I am not going to type out why but you can go look up my argument in the PLAYOFFS thread.

It is clear it won't change until schools on the outside (including stal's argument) get together and do something about it.

Either way, the bcs sucks and fails to determine which team is the best in the country.

[EastStang]

Think about March Madness, now multiply it by 100, that's what a college football playoff would look like. And the Bowls, would the New Orleans bowl rather have Rice vs. Troy State. Or Tulsa vs. USC or Utah vs. Texas in the first round of a playoff. A 16 team playoff takes four weeks. A 20, 24 or 32 team playoff takes five weeks (pretty much equal to the current bowl season). The Big Ten and the PAC 10 have long fought a playoff because they own the Rose Bowl. But maybe if USC gets added to the screwed list of PAC 10 teams (like Oregon) then maybe the PAC 10 will start calling for a playoff. And if PSU gets left behind by the BCS, then maybe the Big Ten will decide that a playoff is worth looking into.

[PoconoPony]

Think about March Madness, now multiply it by 100, that's what a college football playoff would look like. And the Bowls, would the New Orleans bowl rather have Rice vs. Troy State. Or Tulsa vs. USC or Utah vs. Texas in the first round of a playoff. A 16 team playoff takes four weeks. A 20, 24 or 32 team playoff takes five weeks (pretty much equal to the current bowl season). The Big Ten and the PAC 10 have long fought a playoff because they own the Rose Bowl. But maybe if USC gets added to the screwed list of PAC 10 teams (like Oregon) then maybe the PAC 10 will start calling for a playoff. And if PSU gets left behind by the BCS, then maybe the Big Ten will decide that a playoff is worth looking into.

Right on. March Madness would pale to a football playoff. Think about using the current big Bowl games ( some rescheduled for exclusive prime time viewing) and making them part of the playoffs system still using their sponsorships and make them really count. Think about the TV ratings, TV revenues charged to advertizers who will actually pay better dollars for huge audiences, bodies in the seats instead of half full stadium for a large number of the current bowl games, conferences sharing $$$$ from several more cash loaded games and a final championship game filling the void the week before SuperBowl. Most of this could be done the last 2 weeks in December plus the New Years games which are dates after semester finals thereby negating the weak arguments by college President that the season interferes with too much school ( basketball teams miss mucho school not football teams). Involved would be 16 teams and a total of a 3 round playoff involving the top 11 bowls. The final could be a rotating New Years bowl game. The only big sticking point/complaint would be the Rose Bowl which needs New Year's day only. The rest of the lesser bowls could host teams in an NIT second tournament format so that the equivalent number of teams could still play in a bowl game with the possibility of multiple game $$$$ to the teams and again to conferences. Finally, some of the real weak and lesser bowls are so bad/pathetic that it might not be a bad idea for them to go away saving everyone the hassle of their justification. and paultry pay outs.

[ThadFilms]

Blatant USC bias.