Special guest post by Adam “Indiana” Kendall
[Editor’s note: Adam Kendall, a sharp-shooting basketball forward from Roosevelt High in Seattle, is a lifelong Duck fan. He tweets prolifically under the handle”The WisequacK” and eschews capitals, much in the manner of e.e. cummings]
the BCS (Bowl Championship Series) is GOD AWFUL!!
if you follow college football like I do, you know what I mean & you know just where i’m going with this..
it’s time to ditch this flawed system that decides who are national champion is
the BCS puts #1 vs #2 in a national championship game to decide who the champion of college football is, who the best team in all the land is
who #1 and #2 are is decided by a coaches poll, a media poll (the Harris poll) and a computer ranking that has its own flaws
the flaws of the BCS are that so many teams share similar records, yet only two get to play for all the marbles
the major problem with the BCS is that it is all politics, schools have to lobby about who’s better and why they deserve to play for the Title instead of settling it on the field.
the flaws of the coaches poll is that coaches are too busy coaching their own teams that they don’t have enough time to watch other games and make a well thought out educated based poll. on top of that, coaches all too often vote teams in their own conference higher than teams in other conferences, even if teams in other conferences are cleary better than teams in their own conference.
the Harris poll is the best poll as it mostly resembles the AP media poll, which is the best most accurate poll there is because the media watches all the games. they tend to have regional biases (cough *east coast bias* cough)
the computer ranking is based off of strength of schedule, but its one flaw is that it doesn’t take into account margin of victory. so a 40 point win over a 5 win team is the same as a nail biting last second field goal win
because of all the flaws of the BCS, there is always debates about who should play for the championship and often times there are teams who don’t get to play for it all who people feel got robbed.
the BCS says its goal is to put the #1 and #2 teams together in a championship game. the BCS actually has NOT failed in that department. the problem with the BCS is that it leaves questions as to just who the BEST team in college football is.
the reason why title games are sometimes, more often than not big blowouts, is because the two best teams weren’t matched up. voters just decided that team A was better than team B because team A beat 6 teams that went to a bowl game while team B beat only 3 teams that went to a bowl game so therefor team A goes to play for the championship instead of letting the two teams play each other to see who is actually better. Team A gets blown out in the championship game while team B kills their opponent in the Rose Bowl, leaving everyone screaming that team B got robbed of a chance at the ‘Natty
a much better way to determine who really is the BEST team in the country is by having an 8 team playoff
not a stupid 16 team playoff cause a 9-3 team ranked 16th is CLEARLY not the best in the country
it’d be an 8 team playoff, and it’d be based off of ranking, not conference affiliation. so if win the Big East but are unranked, too bad you didn’t earn it.
the 8 team playoff would be played at the current BCS bowl sites, and in addition to the playoff, there’d be 3 other BCS games, you’ll see why when i explain my playoff model
PLAYOFF MODEL:
8 team playoff. the four first round games would be #1 vs #8, #2 vs #7, #3 vs #6 and #4 vs #5
the final four, football style would be winner of 1 & 8 vs winner of 4 & 5, other game would be winner of 2 & 7 vs winner of 3 & 6
the national championship game would be between the winners of those two games
there’d be 3 other BCS games, with the conference champions of an AQ conference not in the playoff going there. there’d be 3 games to fit 6 spots, one for each AQ conference. obviously most AQ conference champions would be in the playoff so they’d become at-large bids
all the BCS games, playoff and not would be played at the Orange, Sugar, Cotton, Fiesta and Rose Bowl
to give an example of how this would work, i’ll take this weeks current BCS rankings
the BCS playoff would look like this:
#1 LSU vs #8 Virginia Tech
#2 Oklahoma State vs #7 Clemson
#3 Alabama vs #6 Arkansas (i know this wouldn’t seem right but stay with me here)
#4 Oregon vs #5 Oklahoma
say the first round games are gonna be held at the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta and Rose bowl
the top 4 teams get rewarded for being in the top 4 and get to pick which place they’d like to play at, with #1 picking first going in order 1-4
so LSU would no doubt pick the Sugar Bowl for home field advantage
Oklahoma State would no doubt pick the Fiesta Bowl cause that’s closest to them
Alabama would pick the Orange Bowl cause Miami is a lot closer than Pasadena
that would leave Oregon with the Rose Bowl, which of course would’ve been Oregon’s pick anyways
for this year, say the 2nd round games are at the Sugar Bowl and Fiesta while the national championship game is at the Cotton Bowl
each year the Sugar Bowl & Orange Bowl would trade off on who gets a 2nd round game, while the Cotton Bowl and Fiesta Bowl would do the same.
so in years that 2nd round games are at the Sugar and Fiesta Bowl, the “other” BCS games would be played at the Orange, Cotton and Rose Bowl on their normal january 1st & january 2nd dates
the Rose Bowl gets to keep its annual Rose Bowl Game as a compromise to having it in the playoff
by doing this, all five Bowl sites get TWO marqee games each year, so they all get huge revenue
also, each year the national championship game rotates sites
with the current rankings, this year, the “other” BCS games would probably be this:
Orange Bowl: Big East champion vs South Carolina
Cotton Bowl: Kansas State vs Houston
Rose Bowl: Stanford vs Big Ten Champion
to demonstrate the best way i can, the bowl rotation would be this:
year 1 first round: orange sugar fiesta & rose bowl
year 1 2nd round: sugar & fiesta bowl year 1 “other” BCS games: orange cotton & rose bowl
year 1 title game: cotton bowl
year 2 first round: orange cotton fiesta & rose bowl
year 2 2nd round: orange & cotton bowl year 2 “other” BCS games: sugar fiesta & rose bowl
year 2 title game: sugar bowl
year 3 first round: sugar cotton fiesta & rose bowl
year 3 2nd round: sugar & fiesta bowl year 3 “other” BCS games: orange cotton & rose bowl
year 3 title game: orange bowl
year 4 first round: orange sugar cotton & rose bowl
year 4 2nd round: orange & cotton year 4 “other” BCS games: sugar fiesta & rose bowl
year 4 title game: fiesta bowl
just repeat that cycle of bowl rotation but if the rose bowl wanted to host the title game, the 5th year of the cycle would look like this:
year 5 first round: orange sugar cotton & fiesta bowl
year 5 2nd round: sugar & fiesta bowl year 5 “other” BCS games: orange cotton & rose bowl
year 5 title game: rose bowl
then you’d just repeat that 5 year cycle
i’m sure this isn’t a perfect playoff proposal cause nothing ever is “perfect” but its my idea to please EVERYONE.
i mean the pro’s are each bowl site gets 2 games every year no matter what, so they get double the revenue
the TV ratings would be HUUUUUUGE
college football would finally be able to determine who the best team is by settling it on the field
the AQ conferences & Notre Dame are satisfied because even if their champion doesn’t make the playoff, they go to a BCS game
also, the NCAA would be in control of this so that way schools don’t lose money by being forced to buy tickets they don’t want. also with the top 4 teams picking where to play, makes it easier for fan travel and likelihodd of a sell out
in terms of when the games would be played, its far from perfect for the players involved but i’m sure they wouldn’t mind so here we go:
the first round games would be played the thursday & friday after the Navy-Army game, so close to two weeks after the conference championship games. teams would fly to their games the day before the game and come home the day after
so two games on thursday and two on friday. one would be a 1:30pm pacific start and the other would be a 5:00pm pacific start. start times apply to both thursday & friday
for example 1 vs 8 and 4 vs 5 would play on thursday while 2 vs 7 and 3 vs 6 play on friday
both semi-final games would be played two weeks later on a thursday. by doing this, the two thursday winners get the same rest time as each other as do the two friday winners. one semi-final game would be played at 1:30pm pacific while the other would of course be at 5:00pm pacific time
the “other” BCS games would be played on their normal January 1st & January 2nd dates
the national championship game would be played on its normal date between January 8th and January 10th, still a good length break from the Semi-Final games. this way, the season isn’t any longer than most people think it would be with a playoff
by doing this, there’d be no reason to cut the regular season from 12 to 11 games, or cut it from 14 to 13 weeks
to use this year as an example, the first round games would be on December 15th & 16th, the semi-final games would be on December 29th, while the national championship would be on January 9th
see BCS supporters, we can have a playoff that wouldn’t push the season longer
so yea, that’s my BCS playoff proposal, i’m pretty sure it’d make everyone happy
sooooooooooo, what do you think?
leave me your thoughts, yea!
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