I was having a little writers block this afternoon trying to decide what to write about tonight. While out this evening, I turned the radio to ESPN Radio hoping to get a little inpsiration. They came through for me in a big way. I tuned in just in time to hear an interview with BCS Executive Director, Bill Hancock. About all I took away from the interview as that as long as he is in charge there will be absolutely no possibility of a playoff. Not even a discussion about it. I know this is the most popular debate and everyone has an opinion on it and people are getting tired of hearing about it, but this is about me and my opinions, so I'm going to weigh in on the subject.
Now I don't know Mr. Hancock personally, so it's not fair for me to judge his character solely on a 5 minute interview. But he came across as one of the most arrogant people I've heard. The general tone of this interview was that he as well as the conference commissioners, university presidents, etc. want nothing whatsoever to do with a playoff system. I as well as most of America know that it's mostly about the money. But seriously, Mr. Hancock, you need to come up with some better material and excuses. One of his "reasons" was that it would interfere with the students and their classes. That's a good reason, if it were true. How does it work for the 11 or 12 "regular season" games?? Those games don't interfere with the students classes?? How is a few extra weeks gonna be any different than the first 11 or 12?? Not to mention that 2 or 3 of those weeks are on Christmas break where there are no classes whatsoever. One of the many downsides of the current bowl system is the layoff between the last game and the bowl. Teams can not simulate game situations and also loose any momentum that they may have. As a viewer there is not much to watch in the meantime as well. Another question asked was why division 1AA, 2, and 3 can have an effective playoff system but they can't. His repsonse was that those are smaller schools dealing with 20,000 to 30,000 fans and they are bigger schools dealing with 70,000 to 80,000 fans. That's all you got?? Seriously?? Gonna have to do better than that. He was also asked about a +1 game. While this would be better, he actually made sense. I might not have agreed with it, but it made sense. He said that would still not be a solution and it would lead to further expansion. 6, 8, 12, 16, and where would it stop?? This could go on forever. I understand that it's going to take a LOT of work, changes, etc. to develop a playoff system and it can not happen over night. It's a process that would take years to work out. But their has to be a willingness to compromise or at least listen to the other side. I took from this interview that he and the people in charge will not even listen or consider an alternative to the current system. So, in reality, the BCS system is probably the best format we are ever going to get. Everyone has their version of how the college playoff system would work. So I'm going to share mine.
I would suggest using a system similar to the NFL. You could use the current BCS formula to rank the top 12 teams. You could still include the power conference automatic qualifiers. More than likely they will be included in the top 12 anyway, but it's similar to the NFL's division winner rule. For example, the Seattle Seahawks. UCONN would be the same. They were not even in the top 25 of the final BCS standings. Use the BCS standings to seed the teams. The top 4 seeds would get a bye for the first weekend. Under this format would next extend the season any longer. You would start the first round of the playoffs the weekend after the conference championships. The semi finals would be the weekend of new years, and the national championship would be the following week, which would be the exact same night that Auburn and Oregon played this year. 3 of those 4 weekends would probably be during the student's Christmas break. The only setback would be where to host the games. The college campuses would probably not be able to handle hosting that important of a game. So use something similar to what they do for the NCAA basketball tournament. Select "neutral" sites. You would only need 11 sites. I don't think it would be very hard to find 11 warm weather or dome neutral sites that would work. I don't mean to take anything away from Auburn or Oregon. They did what they had to to get into that game, and it was a very entertaining game. But I feel pretty confident in saying that if there were a playoff in place, neither team would be playing in that game.
I know, this is just speculation, just like every other playoff proposal. But, I wanted to "officially" get my shot in the arguement. I have always figured that there would never be a playoff system on place. But, like most people I had a hope that eventually it would happen. But, after hearing that interview tonight I have relized that it will never happen. We are more likely to go back to the Pre-BCS days of the Alliance Bowls than a playoff system. So, let's face the reality of it and accept what we have because it's the closest we are ever going to get. There may be some impurities and there have been a few questionmarks in who gets into that game, such as Nebraska in the 2002 Rose Bowl. But most of the time there has been no argument that the formula found the 2 best teams. The weaknesses will work themselves out of the next few years. TCU moving to the Big East is a step in that direction. There will never be a playoff in Division 1 football so schools might is well accept this fact and conform to the BCS rules and regulations. TCU is doing that. Boise State, Nevada, Utah, and other NON-BCS schools that want a shot at that need to "move it on up." With conference expansion in the future, they will all fall in line. In a few years these schools will all be in a BCS conference so that will no longer be an issue. There is no perfect system. Even the system in the greatest league in professional sports has flaws. For all we know a playoff system wouldn't be any better than the current BCS format. If they did select a playoff format, let's face it. We would pick at that just like we do the BCS and the NFL formats. Nothing will ever be right or good enough. So, we might as well just accept what we have and enjoy it, because "it's as good as it gets."
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