The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

[Cardot]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

8-team playoff is a must, and here's the best method I've heard:

Top 8 ranked school make it in
(no conference champ auto-bids)

First 2 rounds are played at higher-seeds home field
(talk about motivation to get a 1 or 2 seed. What an advantage! And can you imagine the atmosphere at these football cathedrals for a playoff game! It wouldn't get any better!)

All 8 teams would end up in a BCS Bowl. The 4 Bowls would rotate best-to-worst game each year. So this year it would have been:

- Orange Bowl: Semifinal winners play each for Natl Championship
- Sugar Bowl: Semifinal losers play each other
- Fiesta: Highest-seeded quarterfinal losers play each other
- Rose: Lowest-seeded quarterfinal losers play each other

All the the other bowls can continue on as they always have, say for a few auto-bid tweaks here and there.

Yes, this is exaclty my preferred system. You have two weeks of playoffs in early December on campus, and then you have the typical Bowls as usual. One for the title, and then the other exibition matches where students can live out the "Bowl Experience" and fans can travel to places like Miami and Pacedena.

[youALREADYknow]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

16 teams playoffs can likely only happen if you limit the regular season games and/or title games more, its that plain and simple.

Agreed.... and that is exactly what should happen. There's no reason for a team to play 13 regular season games like some SEC or Big XII teams do every year. If injuries are really a problem, then why should a team play 13 games when they were eliminated from title contention after their 2nd loss?

11 game season + conference championships + 16 team playoff.

It's not like most teams are going to suddenly be playing 15+ game seasons now. Only 2 teams would be playing 15/16 games and 2 additional teams would be playing 14/15 games. As the system stands right now, 11 teams played 14 games this season. I don't think 1-2 additional games are going to kill an elite college football team.

[Fox1994]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

^^What about the other two BCS teams? They need to promote the Cotton Bowl to being a big bowl like it used to be so that it can be a BCS bowl and the other two teams could play in that.

[Fox1994]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

11 game season + conference championships + 16 team playoff.

10 game season + conference championships + 16 team playoff

Or maybe they can add the independent teams to the conferences with eight or nine teams... and drop down the twelve conference teams. Even it out to ten or eleven for all of the conferences so there's nto as much as a four-school discrepency between the biggest and smallest conferences.

[dkrause1971]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

I personally like the 12 team schedule with 4 byes. Its only a 3 week playoff that way and getting a Bye is a huge advantage for those teams to push for. People cannot say the regular season is meaningless with the byes is my feeling. Plus, with one less week than the 16 team playoff its easier to sell.

I just don't see the teams giving up a 12 game season in an way. The title games maybe but not 12 revenue days.

[slip3rman]

This debate can (and has) go on for years. Personally, I'm in favor of the 16-team playoff that youALREADYknow uses as an example, my friend and I had the same idea. I think it is a must, to include every conference in the championship hunt (giving relevance to every conference), even if it is with a fighters chance. Even then, it could possibly advance the parity that is beginning to emerge in college football. Good players may choose to go to "mid-major" schools for a chance at a title and having their team in a national title hunt can bring exposure to the school as well.

To comment on some things in the article, I don't know if Utah has an anti-trust case because they are given a shot at the BCS every year (by winning their conference and finishing in the top 12 BCS rankings), and were included in the BCS twice, so they are allowed to participate.

Also, I'd thought you might like to know that saying BCS Series is redundant, as the 'S' in BCS stands for series, so it's like saying Bowl Championship Series Series. Insightful article.

[speedkills]

Playoffs? Are you kidding me? Playoffs? Playoffs?? </never before heard quote from Jim Mora>

College football has the best regular season in all of sports. Lose to an Appalachian State to open the season and you're toast. And the championship *was* decided on the field. USC lost the national championship on the field in Corvalis. Texas lost the national championship courtesy of Mr. Crabtree and Co.

Ok, so Utah didn't lose it on the field but .... too bad. Either get out of that 2nd rate conference or move down to the FCS divison and have your playoffs.

Look at the NFL this year. Both #1 seeds are gone in the divisional round. Home field advantage hasn't been a factor. A 9-7 team is hosting the NFC Championship. Are you telling me if the Cardinals and the Ravens meet in the superbowl they are the 2 best teams in the league?

Keep the BCS format.

[davesandstorm]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

I've always been in favor of the 16 team playoff, with the 11 conference champs in and the 5 best at-large teams in to fill it out.

Move Temple out of the MAC, make them an independent again, or expand conferences that are smaller to fill out.

Start play the same time you do now, last weekend in August and end the weekend before Thanksgiving. 12 weeks, you play EVERYONE in your conference. If you still have smaller conferences, IE Big East with only 8 teams, you fill out your 5 games with non-conference rivalry games. This allows all the schools to play non-conference rivalry games they may have. Florida-Florida State, Georgia-Georgia Tech, Notre Dame-USC, etc.

This system SHOULD eliminate the need for conference championships, because tie-breakers would be in place. Once in a blue moon, (see Texas-Texas Tech-Oklahoma) an issue might arise.

Playoffs begin the weekend of Thanksgiving, people are already off work most of the time anyways. Play 4 games Friday and 4 games Saturday, top seeds get the home field advantage, with the top 8 ranked conferences getting those slots no matter what.

National Championship game played on January 1st.

[JeffHCross]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

Id like to see an option when starting your season if you want Bowl Games, And One, 16 team playoffs, 8 team playoffs. Could easily be done just like how baseball allows you to choose number of games.

Good idea, but the NCAA license prevents EA from giving us this option. One of the downsides to entities taking more control of their license than they have in the past.

[rudyjuly2]

Playoffs? Are you kidding me? Playoffs? Playoffs?? </never before heard quote from Jim Mora>

College football has the best regular season in all of sports. Lose to an Appalachian State to open the season and you're toast. And the championship *was* decided on the field. USC lost the national championship on the field in Corvalis. Texas lost the national championship courtesy of Mr. Crabtree and Co.

Ok, so Utah didn't lose it on the field but .... too bad. Either get out of that 2nd rate conference or move down to the FCS divison and have your playoffs.

Look at the NFL this year. Both #1 seeds are gone in the divisional round. Home field advantage hasn't been a factor. A 9-7 team is hosting the NFC Championship. Are you telling me if the Cardinals and the Ravens meet in the superbowl they are the 2 best teams in the league?

Keep the BCS format.

I agree. Everyone thinks playoffs are perfect but they reward the hot team more than the deserving team at times. Pittsburgh will have to beat Baltimore three times this year if they want to win it all. If they lose on Sunday, your champion could be a Wild Card team that went 1-2 against Pitt on the year. Not exactly a great stamp of approval.

[youALREADYknow]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

I agree. Everyone thinks playoffs are perfect but they reward the hot team more than the deserving team at times. Pittsburgh will have to beat Baltimore three times this year if they want to win it all. If they lose on Sunday, your champion could be a Wild Card team that went 1-2 against Pitt on the year. Not exactly a great stamp of approval.

Championships should be won on the field. Show me another professional (or even amateur) sport that does not have the champion crowned through a tournament.

If Baltimore beats Pittsburgh on the road, then they deserve to be in the Super Bowl. Home field advantage is what teams get for performing well in the regular season.

[bigjake62505]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

8-team playoff is a must, and here's the best method I've heard:

Top 8 ranked school make it in
(no conference champ auto-bids)

First 2 rounds are played at higher-seeds home field
(talk about motivation to get a 1 or 2 seed. What an advantage! And can you imagine the atmosphere at these football cathedrals for a playoff game! It wouldn't get any better!)

All 8 teams would end up in a BCS Bowl. The 4 Bowls would rotate best-to-worst game each year. So this year it would have been:

- Orange Bowl: Semifinal winners play each for Natl Championship
- Sugar Bowl: Semifinal losers play each other
- Fiesta: Highest-seeded quarterfinal losers play each other
- Rose: Lowest-seeded quarterfinal losers play each other

All the the other bowls can continue on as they always have, say for a few auto-bid tweaks here and there.

This is the best situation IMO. I cannot understand anyone not wanting a playoff system in place, to determine a champion on the field. And why does a playoff make the season not count? Do you not have to win/be a good team to make it? No. Also a playoff system would weed out the lesser teams so there would be no one hit wonders. The smaller conference teams do not face the same tough teams each week like say SEC or Big 12 so in a playoff they would have to face some tough competition for consecutive weeks. I not saying a Utah or Boise State are not great programs but they would earn their spot and there would not be all this talk about "who is the champ". I dont get the fact that there are still questions about who is the National Champion after the season is over.

[HokieB]

Playoffs? Are you kidding me? Playoffs? Playoffs?? </never before heard quote from Jim Mora>

College football has the best regular season in all of sports. Lose to an Appalachian State to open the season and you're toast. And the championship *was* decided on the field. USC lost the national championship on the field in Corvalis. Texas lost the national championship courtesy of Mr. Crabtree and Co.

Ok, so Utah didn't lose it on the field but .... too bad. Either get out of that 2nd rate conference or move down to the FCS divison and have your playoffs.

Look at the NFL this year. Both #1 seeds are gone in the divisional round. Home field advantage hasn't been a factor. A 9-7 team is hosting the NFC Championship. Are you telling me if the Cardinals and the Ravens meet in the superbowl they are the 2 best teams in the league?

Keep the BCS format.

And Oklahoma lost the National Championship to Texas in the Red River Shootout, and Florida lost the National Championship in the Swamp to Ole Miss... oh wait!

[HokieB]

Re: The BCS Quandary and How Video Games Can Help

I agree. Everyone thinks playoffs are perfect but they reward the hot team more than the deserving team at times. Pittsburgh will have to beat Baltimore three times this year if they want to win it all. If they lose on Sunday, your champion could be a Wild Card team that went 1-2 against Pitt on the year. Not exactly a great stamp of approval.

I just don't understand these arguments in favor of the BCS.

Rewarding the hot team? That is solely what the BCS bases its decision on! Texas beat Oklahoma head to head and both teams ended up with one loss. But Texas lost later in the season, so Oklahoma was the "hotter" team. Had Texas lost to Texas Tech BEFORE beating Oklahoma, I guarantee Texas would have been in the NC.

Florida loses AT HOME to Ole Miss, and USC loses on THE ROAD to Oregon State, both teams end up with one loss, but USC lost later in the season and is punished.

And to suggest that a team that wins ON THE FIELD is undeserving because they just happen to be the hotter team is crazy talk

And to address the theory that a team with a crappy record could just get hot and win it all, if you have an 8-team playoff (top 8 teams in the BCS, no conference auto-bid) then it would be nearly imposible for a team with more than 2 losses to make it in.

BTW, this is my favorite debate in all of sports

[jmik58]

Congress has been working on an act of legislation (since last year I think) that would make it illegal for the words "National Championship" to be linked with any BCS bowl games.

It's a clever concept that says "create a playoff system" without literal application.