Sunday the first BCS Bowl Standings were revealed to the public. In a normal world, this would create a ho-hum effect among journalists because it was pretty obvious at this point which teams were the best teams in the country and it would also be obvious there is still a lot of college football to be played. As Desmond Howard (yes, I am quoting him) said last night on ESPN, "everyone calm down" and then he began to list what each team who won the National Championship was ranked during the first BCS poll of the season...and I will give you a hint, it wasn't #1 for any of them. So ho-hum should be the reaction.
Not so shockingly, because American sports journalists are not capable of ho-hum, it has created a shit-storm of controversy where there are being articles written about how dumb the BCS is, how the new poll doesn’t clear up the National Championship picture, and of course Pete Carroll is already questioning the release of the BCS standings. I swear, I feel like the National Championship game is going to be played in less than a month instead of three months from now.
To quote Pete Carroll when he was complaining:
"Is the goal to find the team with the best record or the best team?"
Well actually, the goal is to find the best team in the country, which often happens to be the same team that has one of the best records. This is an annual tradition among NFL head coaches to complain about the BCS standings and it is usually the coach whose team lost a game early in the year doing the complaining. In this case, USC lost a game in the Pac-10 to Washington and Pete Carroll is bitching the BCS is not accurately reflecting his team's skill and his team is the best team in the country right now even though they have lost a game already. At the end of the year columnists always write something like, “USC is the best team right now so they deserve to be in the National Championship Game this year.” USC has always been consistently the best team in the country at the end of the year according to many people. Unfortunately that is not enough to get them in the National Championship game. Really it is just a bad break at this point, which results in Pete Carroll sending half his team off to the NFL, him getting more 5-star recruits and the process starts over.
If it were up to Pete Carroll the ranking system in college football would not be the BCS or any other logical system, but instead would be a system of determining the second best team in the country that will play USC in the title game. No matter whether another team in the country has played against tougher in-conference competition or have less losses, Pete Carroll like most other coaches, always believes his team is the best team in the country and then whines about it publicly. Then the coaches blame it on the BCS, like if there was an 8 team playoff there would not be teams who felt left out or like they belonged.
Taking a brief break from claiming the World Series doesn’t matter because the real World Series is between the Angels and the Yankees, Mike Celizic feels the need to chime in on the discussion. Unfortunately he adds nothing to the discussion but more panic stricken and critical comments about the BCS.
First, I will give everyone a chance to look at the BCS Standings and study them intently. For some reason Mike Celizic and I have different BCS Standings. I believe mine over his.
I am not a BCS person nor am I an anti-BCS person. I feel like the system currently in place is the best system until a better alternative can be thought of. I don’t like many of the non-BCS ideas simply because they will require a cut-off for the number of teams who can make the playoffs. I am not saying every team should be in the playoff. What I mean is that if the idea for a playoff consists of taking 8 teams and making them play each other, Teams #9-#12 are going to feel left out and will have the same problems with the playoff system that many people currently have with the BCS system. There has to be a cut-off somewhere and somebody is going to end up being pissed off. It's just a fact at this point.
I don’t think the system currently in place is the fairest system, though I do believe it causes every game every week to be important. I am not sure if this could happen in a playoff. I could be wrong. For example, USC knows they can’t lose another game or they are completely out of the BCS championship picture, but if there were a playoff system in place with 16 teams they could play poorly for one more game and possibly still make it into the playoffs.
Now on to Celizic’s column and his need for college football to be a predictable sport where all the good and bad teams are easily defined. My intention isn’t to bash the BCS or bash whatever Celizic thinks should be the system (it’s funny but many people who hate the BCS and bashes it in print never have presented a good alternative...Celizic just bitches here and doesn't suggest any other alternatives), but to point out how what he is complaining about doesn’t make much sense.
The first BCS poll is finally out, and you have to wonder if the results are due to voters and computers searching their neurons and transistors for truth or a monkey throwing darts at a board.
Do you mean much like the preseason polls amount to? I find it funny sportswriters like Mike Celizic hate the BCS because he feels it is arbitrary, but preseason rankings when college football teams have played zero games don’t bother him at all. I know preseason polls don’t mean that much in the grand scheme of the season, other than to overrank/underrank teams, but it is much more arbitrary and non-scientific than anything the BCS has ever put together.
It probably doesn’t matter which method is being used.
Wow. What an absolutely idiotic way to undermine the entire point of the column by the second sentence of said column. So to sum it all up…the BCS sucks and the rankings make no sense, but the rankings wouldn’t make sense no matter what system is being used. This is not a page out of “Formulating An Argument For Dummies.”
It’s hard to remember a year when there’s been less certainty about which college football team is the best in the land. Seven teams remain undefeated
Awesome. How is this not absolutely fantastic? There are seven teams who could be the best team in the country, so from week-to-week each of these teams are going to try their best to not lose a game and remain undefeated. Parity is not bad in college football in my opinion. I like to see a bunch of good teams playing football games against each other. I find it much more preferable than seeing 4 excellent teams at the top of the poll and the rest of the teams in the Top 25 are just above average.
I would also expect there to be little certainty right now since the season is only halfway finished. I think this has been a problem nearly every single year in college football at the halfway point, but every year columnists claim this current year is more muddled than any other year.
Isn’t parity what the NFL, MLB, and the NBA are constantly striving for? So why is it so bad in college football? Oh yeah, because people can’t accept ambiguity or the idea a team that never lost a game may not win the National Championship. Last year Utah went undefeated and Florida lost once, but the Gators are still considered the National Champion outside of the state of Utah. The world did not end and nearly every single person considers Florida to be the defending National Champion for college football. I am not cool with Utah getting screwed, but we all got over this occurrence. Basically we all end up moving on.
Just like we all got over LSU being a 2 loss champion the year before that. Just like Boise State not getting a shot at the National Championship before that has been forgotten due to the excitement of the Oklahoma-Boise State Fiesta Bowl in 2007. I don’t love the BCS, but what I find is these “problems” and incongruities in the BCS system are largely forgotten the year after the major controversy. To my original point, having seven undefeated teams including 2 from the not from the ACC, Big East, Big 12, Big 10, Pac-10, and SEC is fantastic. There will be controversy but there will also be quality football being played.
Florida, Alabama, Texas, Boise State, Cincinnati, Iowa and TCU — but not one of them stands head and chinstrap above the rest.
Yet again I find this good, not bad. There is a reason we play the entire college football season and don’t stop the season the week after the BCS standings are released. That reason is because these 7 teams will probably not be undefeated at season’s end. I don’t want there to be 2 teams that are great and the rest are just above average because even in this crappy system we have a chance to see teams fighting to stay undefeated and have a chance at the National Championship game…in theory.
Therein does lie the problem, that only two of these teams will even have the chance to play for the National Championship, but it has happened before and the world did not end. I know what I am saying doesn’t sound fair, and it isn’t fair, but we know at least Florida and Alabama will at least lose once this year because they have to play each other for the SEC Championship if neither team loses, so that clears the picture up a little bit…if we get to that point. The rest of these teams are in different conferences so this is an example of nearly every major conference having good teams at the top, which again is not a bad thing. I would bet at least 3 of these undefeated teams are going to end up with one loss at the end of the year.
The polls should all come with a disclaimer: The opinions expressed herein do not reflect objective reality.
Newsflash big guy, many playoff results also do not reflect objective reality. Were the NY Giants really the best team in 2007? No, the Patriots were. Were the Cardinals the best team in baseball in 2006? No, they were barely above .500, but they won the World Series. Was N.C. State the best college basketball team in 1983 or Villanova in 1985? Those were just four examples of a playoff not really determining the best team, it’s not like a playoff system means every single year the most worthy or the best team will win. So unless you want to just crown the team with the best record as “Champion” (which is really impossible many times in college football) at the end of every year without bowl games or a playoff system, many times objective reality will not be reflected in the result of the polls or playoff system.
My inclinations are to rant about how college football needs a playoff system like Glenn Beck needs a Valium. But there’s no point in that.
Instead, I’ll just fulminate about what a muddle this college football season is turning out to be.
Brilliant idea. Instead of furthering an actual idea to solve an issue, Mike Celizic is just going to bitch and moan about how screwed up this college football season is…which by the way makes this college football season exactly like nearly every other college football season over the past several years. Let’s remember, the college football season is barely halfway over at this point, so there should be a lot of muddle because teams haven’t separated themselves from the pack yet.
At a point when teams normally show why we should believe in them, it seems as if there was a contest going whose object was to show which top team is least deserving of its exalted ranking.
So we have 7 undefeated teams who all suck because they had close games? I don't see that way. I guess I must enjoy a different type of college football from Mike Celizic. Honestly, I would bet he doesn't even follow college football that closely. I enjoy games that are close and don’t necessarily believe because a team has a couple close games that means that team is a weak team, but instead believe it could mean that team has to play other great teams yet still found a way to win each game.
Sportswriting is clearly not a science. On one hand we have Gregg Easterbrook who thinks anytime a team blows out other teams it is because they are all teams that are easy to beat, and on the other hand we have Mike Celizic who believes a team is not strong if it has a close game or two.
Florida, No. 1 on the coaches’ and Harris charts and No. 2 in AP hearts, needed a big assist from the zebras and some new heroics from Tim Tebow to eke out a comeback win over Arkansas,
That second link is to College Football Talk, which alleges SEC officials helped the Gators win the game. How SEC officials are helping Florida over Arkansas, who is also in the SEC, is beyond me. I thought the pass interference call was a good one and I don’t really know too much about the other penaltybecause I was at dinner and could barely see what happened on the television.
The simple fact is Arkansas had plenty of chances to win that game and they did not. Ohio State won the National Championship over USC a few years ago because of a semi-arguable pass interference call in the end zone and USC got an arguable good non-call from the officials when Reggie Bush pushed Matt Leinart in the end zone against Notre Dame. I don't think USC won the National Championship that year but it shows good teams do get breaks every once in a while and it is not a sign a team is weak.
a team that was drilled by Alabama three weeks ago.
Simply because Florida barely beat Arkansas and Alabama whipped Arkansas, Celizic uses this as an argument the Gators are a weak team. I like how he uses the BCS margin of victory measurement to show Florida is not a good team, yet Celizic also hates the BCS because he finds the measurements it uses to be arbitrary. Ironic huh?
Here is another fun little fact Celizic overlooks, Florida will have a chance to play Alabama if they meet in the SEC Championship Game…so really comparing the two teams until they meet serves no purpose because the odds are really good these teams will meet.
The Gators will probably finish undefeated and get one berth in the BCS’ mythical championship game, but it would be nice if they could at least show that they have something going for them other than Tebow.
This is what makes me think Celizic doesn't watch much college football, I am not sure he is aware there is an SEC Championship game. Florida will have a chance to show they are a good team when/if they play in the SEC Championship Game potentially against another undefeated team like Alabama. The Gators really can’t get a better chance than that to show the world they have something going for them other than Tebow by playing and defeating another undefeated team at a neutral site. Also, the comment inferring Florida doesn’t have talent, other than Tim Tebow, is just plain stupid. They are loaded on defense and offense.
But, while Mark Ingram’s nearly 250 yards rushing were impressive, ‘Bama’s offense still has scored just two touchdowns in its past nine quarters. It’s as if the Tide seems determined to test the adage that defense wins titles.
If a team has a dominant defense then obviously that team can’t be considered one of the best teams in the country according to Celizic. Who cares if Alabama is #1 in the country in total defense? Who cares if the offense is 21st in the country in yards per game and 13th in points per game? That’s not impressive to Mike Celizic because the offense has only scored two touchdowns over the last nine quarters. He is so clearly wrong here because Alabama isn’t just a defensive team, they can play some offense also. He just wants us to ignore this and focus on his own cherry picked statistics that show Alabama isn’t a team of National Championship caliber, which is absolutely not true.
Texas, the No. 3 team in every poll, hardly looked impressive in slipping past Oklahoma 16-13. The Sooners played without reigning Heisman Trophy winner Sam Bradford for most of the game, but Texas insisted on playing as if he’d been replaced by Brett Favre. On offense, alleged Heisman Trophy candidate Colt McCoy performed like a man playing the flute while wearing boxing gloves.
I am going to ignore the absolutely horrible flute analogy and say Celizic needs to stick to talking about the Yankees and the Red Sox because he is shading things incorrectly here again in an effort to prove his point. Oklahoma is #8 in the nation in total defense, so it isn't exactly easy, Heisman Trophy candidate at quarterback or not, to score against them. If Celizic is inferring the Longhorns should have blown out the Sooners because of the absence of Sam Bradford, then I will respond by saying Landry Jones isn’t exactly a joke at quarterback. He was highly recruited and played pretty well in the absence of Bradford earlier in this year.
I don’t know why Celizic is under the impression the top teams in the nation should run all over the teams they are playing, because I don’t think this is true at all. Close games are not necessarily a sign of a team being weak.
For some reason, USC is fourth.
Actually they are seventh in the poll I have linked, but let’s pretend Celizic is right and USC is ranked fourth, just to play devil’s advocate. They currently have 3 big road wins to their credit at Notre Dame, Ohio State and California. Those are not easy road games to play. I am all for the little guy coming up and busting the BCS Standings, but I do find it hard to reconcile ranking Cincinnati and TCU above them. TCU barely beat Air Force, and Cincinnati hasn’t played any really good teams yet. Boise State may have an argument more than any other team for this spot, but they are #4 in the BCS Standings, which they deserve.
We’re all familiar with Boise State crying about not getting any respect, and it doesn’t. But it’s for good reason: If you want respect, play in a respectable conference, or at least have the decency to lay a decent whupping on Tulsa, instead of sneaking away with a one-touchdown win.
It may not have been impressive, but they won the game. That’s all that really should matter. I don’t get the infatuation with having a bunch of teams that blow out their opponents and think this makes for good college football to watch. I know Celizic is used to watching the Red Sox and Yankees dominant in the AL East but parity in college football is not a bad thing, quit acting like it is.
If they were Ohio State or Michigan and had the same results, they’d be ranked no worse than fourth; they’d certainly be ahead of USC. But because they’re Iowa, they have a big climb ahead just to get into the Top 5.
As usual, Mike Celizic is cherry picking games, leaving out Iowa beating Northern Iowa by only 1 point and Arkansas State by 3 points. It’s easy for him to not include those games because it doesn’t go to serve his point that Iowa is getting screwed by the BCS system. Unfortunately this supports his own theory that Iowa is not a dominant team and the voters see the same thing knowing that Texas and Florida struggled against Oklahoma and Arkansas respectively, but Iowa struggled against vastly inferior competition and ranked the Hawkeyes accordingly. I also don't think the comment if Iowa were OSU or Michigan they would be ranked higher has too much basis.
But no matter what TCU and Boise State do, they’re still not going to rise into one of the top two rankings — and a shot at the BCS’ big crystal football
This is an absolutely incorrect statement. Either Florida or Alabama are going to have a loss at by the end of the year which would probably vault Boise State over one of those teams, and then if Texas loses during the season or in the Big 12 Championship game Boise State could easily play in the National Championship game. Matter of fact, I am pretty sure the eventual National Champion over the last 3 years has never been ranked #1 in the initial BCS Standings.
TCU probably does not have a shot and I don’t think that is necessarily a bad thing to be honest. They are a good team, but I don’t believe they are one of the best teams in the country. I will be proven wrong this weekend if they manage to defeat BYU, because that will give them a little more credibility in my mind. I respect them but they haven't played incredibly difficult teams so far...but I am not going to bury them quite yet. I am not ruling them out, but I would not put them higher than Boise State, Iowa, or USC.
For this week, it’s still about the teams that have been marked as the nation’s best since before the season began. Florida, Alabama and Texas remain undefeated, but as we watch the season enter its final month, we’re left to wonder when any or all of them will start to play up to their rankings.
Florida has beaten a good LSU team on the road, Alabama has obliterated Ol’ Miss on the road and South Carolina at home, and Texas has beaten Oklahoma and it’s very good defense at a neutral location. Simply because they did not blow these teams out doesn’t mean they are not good teams or the BCS Standings have it all wrong. Parity in college football is not a reason to get rid of the BCS system and this parity is actually something that should be celebrated. It may make it hard to rank teams midway through the season, but it makes for good football discussions and games.
Good teams win close football games, they don’t just win football games by large margins.
The BCS is not a perfect system, but until a perfect system comes along it is the system we are currently stuck with having to deal with. The National Championship picture is not any more muddled this year than it has been in the past several years, it’s just early in the season now and teams haven’t played enough games to set themselves apart from each other by winning or losing the games remaining. Every year we get these columns stating what a mess college football is, yet it remains a popular sport, and interest from the fans never goes away.
If the same situation of having 7 undefeated teams in the country exists after the bowl games have been announced, then yes there may be a problem or it really was just a crazy year. The National Championship picture is always muddled halfway through the season and it’s what makes the sport so intriguing to watch. Mike Celizic doesn't really pay attention to either of these facts and instead just decides to start a panic by writing that there are no good teams and the BCS is screwing up the country.
I don't like the idea of a playoff because I think it undermines the gut-wrenching possibility that every game in the season is an elimination game. I'm not that crazy about the current BCS system, but part of the problem is they tinker with it every year to try to make it fit what they think the last year showed.
ReplyDeleteIf Pete Carroll wants to win a national championship, maybe he should beat a bad Washington team and blow out Notre Dame.
Oh, and since the brainiac sportswriter wants to apply the transitive property of college football, I'd like to point out that Washington beat USC by 3, and Notre Dame beat Washington by 7, therefore Notre Dame beat USC by 10. Kindly disregard the results on the field last Saturday, and adjust your statistics accordingly.
I don't hate the idea of a playoff, but really I think most of America needs to get over this infatuation with having to know the exact best team in the country. It would be nice, but a playoff system in no way guarantees the best team wins. Plus, I do like the fact I can turn on the television and see a game and think, "if X team loses this game, they aren't going to be in the National Championship picture."
ReplyDeleteThose opposed to the BCS get too caught up in the playoff system naming the best team when that doesn't always occur...just look at every other sport with a playoff system, even a system with 5 or 7 game series.
That's exactly what I am thinking. You want to win a National Championship, don't lose to Washington, Oregon State or Stanford.
I really don't believe Hat Guy knows anything about college football. He expects all the good teams in the country to never have close games, which is just insane. I wish he wouldn't talk about it because he doesn't understand what he is talking about.
This has nothing to do with college football and is off topic, but I just now heard this on the radio. Apparently Jamarcus Russell has a QB rating 2 points higher than Mark Sanchez this year. Is this true? I didnt think any QB in the league was approaching the level of bad that is Russell. I havent bothered to look it up yet, but just hearing it kind of shocked me. I mean, Sanchez has been bad the first 2 games, but he wasnt that terrible in the first 4.
ReplyDeleteOk, I actually went and looked it up. Sanchez is at 56.7 and Russell is at 51.0. Not the same as 2, but still way closer then I thought it would, or should be.
ReplyDeleteWell obvioulsy the "best" team doesn't always win in a playoff...but the most derserving team does. And thats what matters. You could say this about every single playoff in every single sport.
ReplyDeleteI personally feel they should have a playoff. And the teams that make it are all the conferance winners. If you win the Big Ten, you make the playoffs, if you finish 2nd, tough shit. If you can't win your own conferance, then you don't deserve a chance to win a National Title. This would still allow all the teams regular games to mean a lot.
There are 11 conferances and a "independent" conferance. So you have 12 teams in the playoffs and figure out the seedings based on final rankings or BCS rankings, or whatever they want.
Or limit this to the top 10 conferances. Kick out the MAC and Sun Belt.
Come on Fred, you are just baiting me. There is no way Sanchez is that close in passer rating to Russell. So you are telling me that JaMarcus Russell, the guy I think is the worst QB in the league, barely has a worse passer rating than Mark Sanchez, the guy I had doubts about coming out of school? I am going to wait a few more weeks before starting to roast Sanchez because I want to be fair because he is a rookie...but then I may start mocking him. He has really fallen the past couple weeks hasn't he?
ReplyDeleteAJ, I am not an anti-playoff system person, I really don't care what they do as long as I get to watch good football every week. I just think a lot of the diehard proponents of the playoff system seem to believe it to be answer to all questions, which will help us finally crown the true champion, which isn't true. The team most deserving will win, but it won't answer the question necessarily of who the best team in the country is.
I like the idea that the conference winners get to go to a playoff because it will stop the whiners who didn't win their conference but think they deserve a shot from continuing to whine. That idea would cause the SEC to shit it's pants though because either Alabama or Florida won't make into the playoff and they could be among the Top 5 teams in the nation regardless of who wins in the SEC Championship.
I don't know if they would like the idea a "lesser" conference winner gets to make it while they don't get to make it because their competition was tougher. Again, though under the BCS the loser of the SEC Championship probably won't have a shot at the title anyway since they will have one loss. What I am saying is there needs to be set rules on who makes it to the playoff system bracket because if it is the Top 12 teams in the nation, the teams #13-#16 are going to be pissed off...under your idea the "major" conferences will get pissed their 2nd best team who possibly could beat half the teams in the bracket won't make it to the playoff.
I like your idea but those in power would never let it happen. Actually, I like any idea, I just want everyone to quit bitching and start thinking of solutions. If there were a playoff system I would have 8 teams and take the top 8 teams in the country and put them in the playoff bracket. Feelings would be hurt, but it's going to happen regardless.
Those for the BCS act like there can't be a better system and those for the playoff act like it is the only "fair" way when the same problem of teams being left out will occur.
I don't really have any issue with the BCS. Personally, I would prefer it go entirely back to the computers, but it is what it is. I just want to watch good football.
ReplyDeleteI am not against playoffs, but I think they are impractical for multiple reasons.
If I recall correctly, the NCAA has basically declared that they will not allow more than 14 games in a season. Thus, to implement a playoff, you have to remove regular season games.
To do a 12-team playoff would require a potential 4 games, plus a potential championship game, and now each team only has 9 or 10 regular season games.
Let's consider the ramifications of this reduction
1) Most conferences play 8 or 9 conference games. For a 9 or 10 game regular season, this basically means each team has one potential non-conference game.
2) If we assume at large bids, then that one non-conference game will have an incredible weight on the rankings (as conferences are not able to be well rated compared to other conferences).
3) If we assume at-large bids, then the smaller schools don't get the non-conference games which (I think) are a huge portion of their athletic budget.
4) If we assume conference champions, then the non-conference games have no meaning whatsoever, except maybe as a tiebreaker (since conference record is what determines the winner)
5) Who do the independents play in a conference-only playoff setup?
Plus the major powers want/need 8 home games a year, so cutting down on the schedule would make that difficult or impossible.
ReplyDeleteSportswriters assume a playoff would solve things, but it would be the worst clusterfuck imaginable. You'd start with conference champions plus one independent. Then the SEC would bitch about their #2 team, ranked third nationally, but shut out of the playoffs. So you go to champions, two independents, two conference wildcards. The next year, the SEC and Big 12 get an extra team, and the Pac 10 and the BigTenEleven scream bloody murder and say they'll drop out of the system and go back to playing their champions in the Rose Bowl, which worked well for decades. Now the playoff is the top two teams in each conference plus four independents/wildcards. And on and on.
Might as well let all 119 teams into the playoff. And play double elimination in case a team has an off day.
As I stated in the post, I am not married to either idea. I feel like we get to here a bunch of pro-playoff system talk and I am not sure those who advocate the playoff think it through clearly. It's not that a playoff system is a bad idea, it just creates a whole new set of problems for college football. So basically with many of the playoff systems currently proposed we are just trading one set of problems for another.
ReplyDeleteI think the two biggest problems, as detailed in Kent and Rulebook's posts are that it would take away home games from schools who need that money to pay for the other athletics at the school. Penn State didn't get a bye week this year because they had to have the money to pay for the other athletics and I am sure they are not the only school to have this happen to them.
So taking away home games is a problem and then there would have to be games taken away from non-conference play, which I know Easterbrook would like b/c it could decrease the amount of cupcake teams played, but it would also put the majority of the games played in-conference, which would really hurt the mid-majors chances of proving they are worthy of a playoff system bid (assuming there are wildcards)
I like AJ's idea, simply because it is an idea, but I think the inequity of allowing mid-major conference winners into the playoff system over a highly ranked "major" conference team would not allow this to happen.
Another issue I see with a playoff in connection with games being played and revenue is this: Imagine there is a 12 team tournament where the top 4 seeds get a bye. Boise State if they make the championship will potentially play 4 games. Say they lose in the first round to LSU though. The school has just passed up the chance at having revenue for 3 other games to be in the playoff. I don't see a school taking a chance and losing revenue to be in a playoff. I think a playoff will have to be an 8 team playoff at the largest or at least be a double elimination (which I hate the idea of).
Logistically, I see problems with the playoff system idea. It sounds sexy to be able to name an outright winner every year, but logistically it is hard to reconcile how a playoff system works in conjunction with a school's revenue and smaller schools do lose a lot of revenue from playing out of conference games.
I go on and on forever about this, but I would favor a playoff system, but the bottom line is that it doesn't benefit the schools in terms of revenue so it won't happen. Like I said in the post and Kent said, AJ's idea is good, but I can already hear the screaming from the second place teams in the major conferences when they go 11-1 and don't make the playoffs, but a 10-2 BYU team does. It would essentially be the opposite of what happens now.
Didn't get to catch Simmons show on the USFL tonight, but I caught something better on SHowtime called Full Color Football which is the history of the AFL. I thought I had seen most of this olf footage, but they had lots of new stuff and footage. For example, did you know that the exhibition season after the packers beat the chiefs in super bowl I, the chiefs beat the bears 66-24? Takes a little of the shock out of the jets future victory. Anyway, it was good and I highly recommend it. Will be interesteing to compare to Simmons USFL show.
ReplyDeleteNow they are showing Wahoo McDaniel and Ernie Ladd wrestling. Classic.
ReplyDeleteNow they tell us that Ben Davidsion of the raiders starred in behind the green door with marilyn chambes and now disccussing the infamous heidi game. This is total entertainment. Makes 30x30 look like Sesame Street.
ReplyDeleteI don't get Showtime, but that sounds really interesting. I wonder why I haven't heard about this show before...other than the fact it is on Showtime?
ReplyDeleteI did not know the Chiefs beat the Bears 66-24 in an exhibition after Super Bowl I. I guess that proves the AFL wasn't just a fluke league and the Jets' victory was memorable, but possibly not completely unexpected.
I wonder if there are previous episodes of this show on DVD or anything like that? Or is it a one time show?
Ben,
ReplyDeleteFull Color Football is a five part series. As you might be able to tell, I am a hard marker, but love this show. Next week is about the merger and how big super bowl IV was. Not 3 like you usually see, FOUR.
This is what I mean by taking a differerent take on things. Did you happen to catch Simmons USFL show?
Gene, no I didn't catch the USFL ESPN thing last night. It is so hard for me to watch shows during the week, I always end up DVRing them and then catching up on the weekend or when I can.
ReplyDeleteI would be interested to see a different take that involved Super Bowl IV and not Super Bowl III, which is the most popular one to discuss. I bet this comes out on DVD sometime, so I may try to get it through NetFlix.
Why can't the +1 be added? It's not my favorite way to get a champion but if you do this the NCAA can still have their BCS National Championship. Do it on MLK weekend. There may be conflict with the NFL but it can be worked out.
ReplyDeleteI'm exhausted hearing writers spew the same columns year after year.
I don't have any proof but it seems that there are less columnists bitching about the NCAA basketball tourney being unfair, except of course of the ones who complain about the crappy teams who were left out. It's just so easy for columnists to rewrite the same BCS crap every year. They're lazy.
I like the idea of the conference champions playing in a tourney. It'll never happen because it would add three or four more weeks. I'm a Libertarian and despise gov't intervention, but that's they only way the BCS will change.
The +1 system could work but I wouldn't doubt that it would still cause problems. For example last year USC, Florida, Utah, and Texas would all claim they have a right to play in the championship game. I don't have a problem with that happening, but it seems like the goal is to have no complaining, which is never going to happen of course.
ReplyDeleteI find it interesting there is very little complaining about the NCAA tournament too, because teams are placed in brackets and some of those brackets are stronger than other brackets and some are weaker than other brackets. Teams that are stronger than 15 other teams in the field are also left out because of automatic bids...but this doesn't bother anyone because the field is so large. Realistically, teams ARE left out that could be other teams in the NCAA Tournament. Under this idea, AJ's idea to give automatic bids from each conference could work in college football as well.
You are right, it is just so easy to re-write the same crap every year about the BCS and most columnists do exactly that...and then claim this year is the craziest year in the history of football and only a playoff system would fix everything, which is not completely true.
You are right why the conference championship tournament won't happen and that is because they would have to use those games to replace other games and would cause teams to lose revenue.
I am afraid when/if the government gets involved with the BCS or a playoff system they will only manage to screw it up even worse. I don't trust the government to do a whole hell of a lot, especially figure out how an efficient and fair playoff system would work.