Pat Forde has an obligatory "we need a playoff" post, using the election theme and reviewing the same crap that’s been proposed about 10,000 times already. Take a number of teams and use the bowl system to determine a national champion. He then proposes calling your university president and screaming at them on the phone.
Add to that including his fantasy of getting an award from good-looking woman and you too can conclude he spent about 10 minutes thinking about this article and 30 writing it.
Tangent - I’ve wondered about whether or not we should have like a girl-type mascot "love interest" thing here like Forde does in this column, but it seems really creepy to me. Maybe it’s because I’d probably choose a Nebraska cheerleader or volleyball player, and then it would kind of be like stalking. What do you think?
The BCS is too complex, clearly because genius and uber-hyper USC coach Pete Carroll can’t figure out how it works. Pete can run an entire football team, dealing with assistant coaches, NCAA compliance issues, and over 100 young men, but we’re to believe he’s an idiot when it comes to the BCS:
Is it to pick the team that has the best season, that has the season that you like the most and feel best about voting for? Or is it the best team at the end of the year, the team that would win a playoff system if you did have it?" he said.
It works like this, Pete. If you play in a weak conference where you should easily beat all of your opponents you have to do that in order to get to the national title game. If not, you get to play in the BCS Rose Bowl, the greatest bowl game ever, right in your own backyard. You’ll most likely beat a cold weather team who’s had to uproot themselves and travel across the country, well, except that you can’t whine about that.
Then you get Bob Stoops’ take on the issue. He’s for a playoff, but at least he doesn’t sound like just showed up from another planet and unlike Carroll makes some very valid points:
Stoops’ Sooners, which play at Texas A&M on Saturday, compete in the toughest division in college football. The Big 12 South boasts four teams in the Top 10. That’s a contrast to other teams, like undefeated Penn State, which has an easier path to the BCS national championship game because of a weaker schedule.
"I'm with you guys," Stoops said. "Anymore, I'm for (a playoff). "That's something, though, I still see, timing-wise, with the schedule and number of games, it's still going to be difficult to put together."
Hmmmm... Penn State, weaker schedule, weaker conference, no title game. Maybe instead of taking Forde’s advice and screaming at your own university’s president we should collectively lobby the Big 10 and Pac 10 to add more members so they can have a conference title game. Wouldn’t that be more like a playoff? Would it be good enough?
Dr. Saturday uses a common theme - the election of Obama means change (as if this is somehow different than every other presidential election), and that change could mean a college playoff is in the future.
Whatever.
Talk is easy, it takes money to buy whiskey.
We’re going to be hearing much more about the BCS-playoff issue. It’s good timing. It’s early November, there is plenty of football to be played. Things usually straighten themselves out, so now is the time for ranting.
However, there are two kinds of articles that should be eliminated from any serious consideration in the debate between BCS supports and playoff supporters:
- Coaches whose teams will most likely miss the national title game. If they were for a playoff, they’d be harping about it and campaigning for it during the off-season. Coaches like Carroll are not genuine, therefore don’t bother with them. They’re like dogs barking as long as you’re near their territory.
- Mass media, pundits, or bloggers who propose playoff systems but don’t state specifics about logistics, i.e. where the games will be played.I could stomach a guy like Forde if he made a case for a playoff including the bowls while also making the case as to why that would be better than what we have now.
With regards to logistics, I’ve said this many times already here - No Northern (cold weather) school should EVER agree to a playoff system that takes advantage of the existing bowl system. Warm weather schools have had a huge advantage for around 100 years and there is no reason to give them any more of an advantage.
This is why it won’t happen. Southern schools won’t give up their huge advantage. Northern schools shouldn’t have to put up with it anymore. Given the majority of my readers are Nebraskans, would you still want a playoff if it meant the Huskers had to play consecutive weeks on the road?