NYT & JB Follow-up on Playoffs

General NCS Football38

Good read from the NY Times regarding college football playoffs:

Despite pleas from fans, coaches and the news media, Division I-A football is nowhere near instituting a postseason like the N.C.A.A. basketball tournament or the N.F.L. playoffs. The idea is rarely the subject of formal discussions by those who essentially make the decisions: the 11 Division I-A conference commissioners and Kevin White, Notre Dame’s athletic director. They all see a need to protect the interests of the conferences, bowl organizations, college administrators and athletic directors, and the integrity of the regular season.

For more on the playoff topic, Jeff provides the following commentary:

Once again, the college football season will end with the clear-cut national champion that everyone in America claims that they long to see. Yet, once again fans and media all over the country whine about the need of a playoff system to (supposedly) create EXACTLY what they already have — a system to crown a National Champion based on the body of work of an entire season. I continue to be confused about the logic.

Almost every year we end up with a pretty clear National Champion. And almost every day of every year we have fans and media clamoring for the ‘need’ to give the 5th and the 6th and 7th and 8th best teams in America a shot at a National Championship without any understanding that these teams have already had their chance to play for a National Title — it is called the regular season.

We have some great conversations here on SFN, and the college football playoff argument is one of the best. I am not going to re-hash all of the points that I made in this entry and the entries linked within it but I think that it is very important for you to read that entry.

It is also very important for everyone to denote (and admit) that the (regular and bowl) season have WORKED again. You are getting EXACLTY what you claim to want — the two teams that performed most impressively throughout the season playing for a National Championship.

After USC’s throttling of Michigan yesterday – there is obviously no doubt about the results of this season. USC had two losses in this past regular season after winning a league that has proven it was over-rated through their bowl performance this year. NOBODY is clamoring that USC deserves a right to play for a National Title. What about multi-loss teams like Michigan? LSU? Notre Dame? Arkansas? Others? Of course these teams do not deserve a chance at a title when you compare their performance with that of Ohio State and Florida.

With this said — what is the complaint? Why do some of you lobby so hard to give schools a chance to win a title that you admit don’t deserve to even play for the title?!?

I harken back to previous comments that have played themselves out (again) this season:

Throughout the entire history of college football there have been times when two teams could lay claim to deserving a shot at a national championship after the regular season.

Throughout the entire history of college football there have been a few times when three teams could lay claim to deserving a shot at a national championship after the regular season.

Throughout the entire history of college football there have been very few times when four teams could lay claim to deserving a shot at a national championship after the regular season. This year ends up no different.

Why, then, do so many people WANT to give undeserving teams chances to win a National Championship?

If you want to argue about ‘Boise State’ – then argue somewhere else. When your body of work consists of the following schedule, then you forfeit any right to complain:

Sacramento State
Oregon State
at Wyoming
Hawaii
at Utah
Louisiana Tech
at New Mexico State

at Idaho
Fresno State
at San Jose State
Utah State
at Nevada
vs No. 7 Oklahoma

Boise State actually PROVES my point about ‘playoffs’!

How many of Boise State’s regular season games did you watch this year? The reason that you watched so few are because they played no interesting games. Get used to watching less football because there will most definitely be a lot less interesting games to watch. If you were so disinterested in Boise’s games, why then would you want to create a three month regular season where everyone schedules like Boise?

If a playoff system existed almost all teams would migrate towards the Boise State scheduling model to pad their records and avoid as much regular-season risk as possible. As it stands today, top teams realize that the regular season is their playoff and we therefore get super matchups like Texas-Ohio State; Michigan-Notre Dame; Florida State-Florida; Oklahoma-Oregon; etc.

With playoffs sitting at the end of the regular season there would be way too much risk for Michigan and Notre Dame to need to play during the season. Today, these teams NEED to play to potentially boost their regular season resume to help their rankings. In the future, losing such games while the Boise’s of the world are playing Sacramento State could keep them out of the playoffs. Say goodbye to college football’s regular season as you know it.

But, who needs a wonderful three-month season when you can make three weeks in December so much more important? Why not just shorten the game that we all love while you are at it? Oh yea…they’ve already succeeded in doing that.

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General NCS Football

38 Responses to NYT & JB Follow-up on Playoffs

  1. BoKnowsNCS71 01/02/2007 at 3:59 PM #

    Dan — yeah Logan likes the former EVU Ass coach who go the BC job. It let Logan be the X and O man that he prefers to be. His apility to cope with the mundane parts of the job like schmoozing the faculty, fans, media, et al just gives him a short fuse. Now Logan can be Logan. And BC will be a little bit better than I anticipated.

  2. choppack1 01/02/2007 at 4:01 PM #

    “We’d still go even if our team wasnt in the NC playoff. You might lose the bottom tier bowls during the reshuffle. Hell, if there is a playoff next year and NC State wins 9 games, loses in the Championship Game and settles for the Peach, will we still not go? The playoff is in additional to the bowls. Not in place of. Yeah, we will all shed tears for the Blue Carpet Bowl.

    Second. A National Chamionship playoff TV contract will blow the BCS contract out of the friggin’ water. The problem of course is that it gets divided among all teams and not just 6 conferences. Still, a playoff doesnt take money out of the system. It adds money to it.”

    I’m sure we’d go after long “droughts” like we showed up for those NIT games when we hadn’t played in the post-season for 6 years. However, what you’d see is a gradual withering on the vine of ALL bowl games until they became as relevant as the NIT.

    IMHO, if there’s going to be a discussion of changes. The party seeking the changes should be forced to address the following issues honestly and realistically:

    1) The likely minimization of ALL non-tournament bowl games.
    2) The likely decline of fan interest for most middle and lower tier football programs (including NC State.)
    3) The greater likelihood that you will see traditional powers win the NCAA football than you have even today.
    4) The logistics of adding at least 3 games to the football schedule – and the logistics of having the millions of fans attend these games.
    5) The minimization of the only other regular season in sports that is worth watching on a week by week basis.

    If after you’ve pondered these questions and have accepted the possible worst-case scenario – that this move will hurt college football and will hurt the football experience at NC State – then you should be for it. If these concern you, I recommend you think twice before jumping on the playoff bandwagon.

  3. mwcric 01/02/2007 at 4:29 PM #

    If this is what you want, the bottom line is that the truest, best way to determine a one-bowl win national champ is to abolish conferences altogether and develop a tiered system like Europe does for soccer. Based on your previous year’s ranking, you get placed in a certain spot among the 117 or so 1-A teams; let the NCAA make your schedule accordingly based on your tier. For example, if you have a three-tier system, and you’re in the top tier, you must play verus eight other top-tier teams, and you get two matches with a middle-tier team and two with a lower-tier team. You’re battling with your peers to maintain a presence in the top tier for next year, as well as manuevering for a chance at the national title, while at the same time the mid- and lowe-tier teams have a fair shot to beat you and move up in position. If you’re mid-tier, you play eight peers, as well as two above and two below, etc. No conference patsy gimmes, no debates over multi-divisional conferences have one division clearly superior to the other, no penalizing the Boise States of the world for playing the schedule they’re dealt (as if the players pick and chose the opponent).
    If you’re clamoring for a totally fair one-game championship bowl, this is the way to go. Too bad it’s too unrealistic.

  4. wolfpacker420 01/02/2007 at 5:07 PM #

    if Boise State is so bad then oklahoma should never be in a national title game again, even if they are undefeated like umm Boise State!!! There needs to be a playoff for that reason alone!! put that in your pipe and smoke it, whom ever wrote this ridiculous article!!!!

  5. choppack1 01/02/2007 at 5:20 PM #

    wolfpacker420 – I think OU’s past performance in big games should be considered. It’s also worth noting that before this game, they lost arguably their other “biggest game of the year” – vs. Tejas.

  6. ncdan 01/03/2007 at 9:14 AM #

    Jeff-

    I’m truly puzzled why you take this stance. You’ve written this article twice now, and both times have gotten some very well posed counter-arguements. It’d be nice if you responded directly to some of those (RAWFS, LSUTigerFan, and Dan’s to name 3), rather than rehash the same points blindly.

  7. choppack1 01/03/2007 at 9:57 AM #

    Not to carry Jeff’s water or anything since I’m one of the few here who apparently disagrees w/ him, but I don’t see anyone considering if a playoff is worth the worst case scenario I outlined above. So I’ll put it to you and others (especially Pack fans) so impassioned about a playoff:

    Are you still for a playoff if it will hurt college football and will hurt the football experience at NC State?

  8. choppack1 01/03/2007 at 10:17 AM #

    edit – I agree w/ Jeff that I playoff is not necessary.

    If you can create a playoff that won’t have a negative impact on the regular season and will preserve what is IMHO, the most spectacular sporting season on earth, I’m not against it.

  9. BoKnowsNCS71 01/03/2007 at 10:22 AM #

    My bet is that if there ever is any type of play — it will be the plus 1 system where two undefeated teams (or teams recognized as being the best) meet 2 weeks after the season — in the week before the Superbowl. It probably will still have controversy at times. It will be about money — not satisfying the fans. If FLorida beats OSU then who should (would) play this year. Boise vs. Flordia? USC vs. Boise? Florida vs. USC?

    Personally I think that if OSU loses they should crown BSU the national champ and piss off everybody. They are doing a great job of that now.

  10. choppack1 01/03/2007 at 10:39 AM #

    BoKnows – But really – how much of this is legimate anger/frustration and how much of it is media-driven aggrivation?

    If I was an LSU, USC, or OSU fan, I’d be all about a playoff. However, as an NC State, I believe that our best chance for something truly special in football lies in the current structure. If we somehow ever run the table, depending on our OOC schedule and the strength of our conference, we’ll have a decent chance of playing in the championship game. If we do go undefeated and another 2 other undefeated teams trump us, depending on our schedule and strenght of conference, I may understand is being passed over. However, if we ever win our conference championship, I’ll go to the BCS bowl game – and I won’t be b*(&*ing about a playoff…

  11. BoKnowsNCS71 01/03/2007 at 12:34 PM #

    It’s all media driven aggravation. Without controversy, those guys wouldn’t have jobs.

    As for the current structure, I like the structure before it where you could have two national champs when it was never decided. At least that does not reward the elitest schools who are always in the run. The BYU’s, Georgia Techs, Clemson’s national championships were hard fought and probably one would have been denied under the current ssytem.

  12. RedTerror29 01/03/2007 at 2:31 PM #

    I wouldn’t label college football’s regular season today as perfect. Every year there are a couple of weekends with absolutely no good games because every decent team is playing a patsie. For BCS schools, the easiest route to the NC game is to play a cupcake OOC conference and survive your conference unscathed. There’s very little upside to scheduling tough opponents out of conference.

  13. choppack1 01/03/2007 at 2:51 PM #

    “For BCS schools, the easiest route to the NC game is to play a cupcake OOC conference and survive your conference unscathed. There’s very little upside to scheduling tough opponents out of conference.”

    Well, tOSU and Tejas played each other this year and last – and both of those match-ups gave them a legit claim to superiority if 3 teams ran the table and one of those used, shall-we-say, the Auburn method. tOSU’s opponent, Florida – had a more difficult schedule than 1 loss Wisconsin and Michigan.

    The current system does allow for punishment for a weak schedule – especially since it relies so much on the voting. The computer rankings could be tweaked to do this as well.

    I can tell you this – if NC State ever wants to win a national championship in the current system in the near future, they will need to schedule quality OOC teams. If we run the table and don’t have a decent schedule, we’ll get Auburned by the teams who have a head start in the polls.

    However, if you want to see cupcakes scheduled, go to a playoff system. There will be very little incentive for BCS schools to schedule quality OOC opponents. Each year we see several schools w/ 2 and 3 losses – 3 losses would likely eliminate a team from a 16 team playoff…

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