Sports Central / Original Sports Fan Commentary Since 1998

Seven years after its inception, Congress has decided to look into the BCS in Division I-A football and why it's the only major sport without a playoff system. Those guys in the House really have their finger on the pulse. With a war waging in the Middle East, gas prices at an all-time high, and a stuttering economy, you'd think the good burghers of Washington would have better things to discuss. But a Congressman can never resist the opportunity to jump onto a fashionable bandwagon, even if it's a few years too late.

What is it with this "we need a playoff" garbage? Division I-A football should be proud of its record of returning actual national champions. Football, baseball, hockey, and basketball have all returned champions that failed to win their respective divisions or conferences. College football actually rewards regular season excellence, something that is to be admired, not condemned.

Let's go with this playoff argument for a while. Eight teams seeded with the better regular season record taking home-field advantage. There is no doubt that the lower seeds would provoke heated debate anyway (thereby filling more tedious hours of sports radio), but round one sees the number one seed knocked over by the number eight. It's been a long season and the number one is banged up, they have an off-day and lose a close game. Meanwhile, the number five seed turns over the number four in the first round and then the number three in the semifinal. A playoff final of number two or eight against the fifth-seed awaits us! And that's better than what we have now?

The pro-playoff argument seems to boil down to "every other sport has it, so college football should." Cliff Stearns, R-Fla, noted that lower division football has it. I was always under the impression that lower levels of sport learnt from the higher echelons rather than the reverse, but I'm not a Congressman.

Texan Republican Congressman Joe Barton, a well-known pro playoff advocate, might want to take a look at the bowl matchups and take note that his state's Longhorns have made the championship game without the aid of a playoff. He could be looking elsewhere for employment soon.

Let's face facts on the idea of introducing a playoff system. It's no guarantee that the two best teams will face-off for the title, and I'm presuming that's what we all want. The playoff bellyachers usually reach a crescendo when there are three unbeatens in a season and somebody misses out on a title shot (Auburn and USC, most recently). To rectify exactly such a scenario, a compromise "plus-one" idea has surfaced, where the BCS introduce a fifth game where the winners of two of the BCS bowls advance to play for the title.

What's wrong with that? Well, firstly, four unbeaten big conference teams is as rare as rocking horse dung. So that means a one-loss team gets in and there's usually a myriad of those. Which one gets in, or should we just throw Notre Dame in to pacify ABC even if they're 5-6? I can hear the mind-numbing hours of argument now and it's not pretty.

Secondly, and most importantly, what if the one-loss team wins it all? Of the four teams that started out in the "plus-one" system, three would now have one loss. Why should the last-one-standing, as it were, be automatically considered the best team in the nation? That one loss could well have been at the hands of one of the three other teams in the "plus-one" scenario, given that the Big 10 or the SEC would have a good shot at sending two out of the four teams.

Congress has implied that the school presidents are merely interested in protecting the current bowl system as it's such a cash cow. What do they think a playoff system would be? The potential revenue for a 16- or eight-team playoff is astronomical, far in advance of what's on offer now, even given the ludicrous amount of bowl games in place.

Athletic directors and school presidents are perfectly right to look to protect the tradition of NCAA football. The regular season may have its faults, like big teams scheduling puff-pastry opponents to run up impressive scores and backing out of agreements with difficult opponents in order to avoid a possible loss, but it isn't anything that isn't fixable by penalizing their ranking. The regular season in college football is also of huge interest in itself, rather than as a mere prelude to a postseason. It's not the NFL or NBA, where teams are barely interested in winning their division as long as they make the postseason.

Academic considerations should also play a part. Already 41% of this seasons bowl-bound colleges fall below the NCAA's standard and a playoff system, with increased games and pressure is hardly likely to improve that. These kids are (supposedly) at university to study.

What's the answer then to determining a national champion? Whilst I'm not a particular admirer of the BCS, it hasn't actually screwed things up any. It just seems unnecessary. It doesn't achieve anything above and beyond the old system of traditional bowls and a vote for national champion.

Eventually, the playoff bellyachers will win — it's inevitable. The networks and the media, rather than the fans, will drive it hard enough to break the schools' resolve. I just hope when that day arrives, they get the national champion they deserve — 16th-seed South Carolina.