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By B.J. Bennett
SouthernPigskin.com Senior Editor
SouthernPigskin.com Senior Editor B.J. Bennett looks at what a potential playoff would look like. Follow us on Twitter at Twitter.com/SouthernPigskin.
Watching college football today is like watching your middle-aged uncle try to squeeze into his letter jacket from high school. It may have once looked good, but now it just seems awkward and forced; considering the growth both the former prep star and the game has experienced, what once was a point of pride just no longer fits. We hear the stories, we see the attempt to stuff the present into the past. The older you get, the better you were.
College football has outgrown its postseason format. With 120 FBS teams and 11 FBS conferences, a system predicated mostly on opinion and tradition doesn't match the needs of a game featuring as much parity as it has ever seen. Florida State, Georgia, Michigan, Nebraska, Notre Dame, Tennessee and Southern Cal? None of them are ranked. Boise State, TCU and Cincinnati? All undefeated and in the top five. The postseason format needs to catch up with an evolution that has left it behind. Here boy, 'cmon...
You must appreciate the impact bowl games have on college football. They are a huge part of the history of the game. They are a great experience for fans and teams alike. Keep them. Implement a playoff system to utilizes the bowl games, hold some over for non-playoff teams and address the transformation that has occurred in the game.
Couple recent equality and parity with both past and modern BCS consternation and you have a wonderful mix of frustration, disagreement and debate. Enter logic, codeword for a playoff system. As many can see, such a format would make great sense. Unfortunately, the BCS currently makes great dollars and cents, the latter carrying much more significance in the eyes of many. That sentiment is important and should not be overlooked. But there has to be a way to incorporate the big-money advertising, travel dollars and such into a new postseason system. We have five teams who are undefeated at the end of the regular season. Memo to the farmers in the area -- look up in the sky, you just might see pigs.
Too many major players are excluded, too much subjectivity is in play. The long layoff is resulting in more sloppy games, less competitiveness and often and rarely pairs the hottest teams in the nation at the end. In the ten BCS Championship Games played, Florida State beat Virginia Tech by 17 points, Oklahoma beat Florida State by 11 points, Miami beat Nebraska by 23 points, Ohio State beat Miami by seven points in double OT, LSU beat Oklahoma by seven points, USC beat Oklahoma by 36 points, Texas beat USC by three points, Florida beat Ohio State by 27 points, LSU beat Ohio State by 14 points and Florida beat Oklahoma by 10 points. A few great games (see Texas/USC and Ohio State/Miami), but mostly yawners and some absolute blowouts. An average margin of victory of 15.6 points per game. The NCAA basketball tournanament has been won by an average of 9.7 over that same span. For those arguing a playoff would take away the every-game drama that currently exists; in 2007, LSU lost their last regular season and played for the national championship. Last season Oklahoma didn't even win their own division and played for the national championship.
The BCS has worked in the past, but the fact that proponents point to the rare occasions when the system did work and the results were grand (see 2005) as selling points, speak directly to the inefficiency of the arrangement. Congratulations shouldn’t be given to a postseason format when it works; isn’t that what it is supposed to do? Hooray, you didn’t screw up. Hugs and handshakes for all.
The reason is simple. The BCS pairs two teams that an ambiguous system selects to play one another. This is now the second consecutive season where we have teams who have won all of their games, yet will be given no chance to win the title in the league which with they are affiliated. Then why exist? Like Auburn in the past, this season Cincinnati has gone undefeated in a BCS conference; that won't be enough to get them the opportunity they deserve.
A 16-team playoff is obviously needed. Not four teams, not eight teams, 16 teams. Like college basketball every single conference should be represented providing every single team in FBS football at least the chance to win their division championship. Perhaps some general qualifications should be implemented for lower-level teams, though that's just an idea. For all of the hoopla about how difficult it would be, Division I football has a 16-team playoff at the FCS level. And it works wonders.
A college football playoff system would promote parity, fuel competitiveness and create opportunity, all while virtually maintaining the every-week-matters persona that makes college football so great. With the added dynamic in recruiting that would come with an automatic playoff bid, mid-major programs would be able to improve instead of leveling off in a odd irrelevant FBS purgatory. The setup would be innovative, the pairings would be fresh and the results would be unpredictable. See college basketball.
Traits like a pre-season ranking, media pull and national appeal have often become the determining factors when a championship game is being decided in today's college football format -- and that's unfortunate. Computers polls, not games, have become the barometer, college football’s measuring stick. With odd percentage formulas deciding who plays who, decimal points have taken the place of the scoreboard. It’s no longer 30-27 that earns you credibility and stature, it’s .300 to .270, winner take all.
Based on current results, here is how a 16-team playoff team would look. All 11 conference champions would earn a bid with five at-large spots. The at-large spots, along with the higher seeding, would reward major-conference teams for playing tougher schedules. First round games would be played at the home stadium of the higher seeded team. The quarterfinals, semifinals and finals would be played at traditional bowl game neutral sites. Other bowl games should be retained for a non-playoff consolation tournament. See the NIT.
Teams
1. Alabama (SEC champion)
2. Texas (Big XII champion)
3. Cincinnati (Big East champion)
4. TCU (MWC champion)
5. Florida (SEC at-large)
6. Boise State (WAC champion)
7. Oregon (Pac Ten champion)
8. Ohio State (Big Ten champion)
9. Georgia Tech (ACC champion)
10. Iowa (Big Ten at-large)
11. Virginia Tech (ACC at-large)
12. LSU (SEC at-large)
13. Penn State (Big Ten at-large)
14. East Carolina (CUSA champion)
15. Central Michigan (MAC champion)
16. Troy (Sun Belt champion)
The benefits of the current bowl system are considerable. Bowl games are great fun and are a good reward to coaches and players this time of year. They are boosts to local economies and provide teams with valuable practice time extensions and fans with an extra opportunity to watch their teams play. There is no denying that. Keep the bowls, but there has to be a way to incorporate a playoff system that would address the changes college football has undergone.
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Comments
Totally agree w/ the 16 team playoff. Only way to include every team that wins a conference and every team w/ a legit chance to win it all. Four or eight doesn’t cut it.
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(1) Alabama
(16) Troy
(8) Ohio State
(9) Georgia Tech
(5) Florida
(12) LSU
(4) TCU
(13) Penn State
(6) Boise State
(11) Virginia Tech
(3) Cincinnati
(14) Central Michigan
(7) Oregon
(10) Iowa
(2) Texas
(15) East Carolina