Possible BCS changes
Not to say I told you so, but I told you so. Why? Because in past playoff discussions, one of the drums I've been banging is that if the misguided "monopoly" pressure gets too great on the BCS as it concerns "autobids," the BCS will dissolve before it creates a playoff....
According to sources with direct knowledge of meetings held in San Francisco earlier this week, the suggested change calls for the BCS to sever its direct ties with the so-called BCS bowls -- the Allstate Sugar Bowl, Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, Discover Orange Bowl and Rose Bowl Game presented by Vizio -- and concentrate solely on arranging a No. 1 vs. No. 2 national championship matchup.
Just like I've been saying: If this happens, the mid-majors can kiss their chances goodbye of ever seeing a prestigious bowl ever again. I've said for a while - the idea of an "autobid" is far, far overblown. The SEC and Sugar Bowl have essentially the same arrangement that the MWC does with the Las Vegas Bowl - they send their conference champion. If the Big East had a bowl tie-in instead of a BCS tie-in, the difference would be even less.
I have one beef with this article:
Under this format, the champions of the SEC, ACC, Big Ten, Pac-12, Big East and Big 12 conferences would no longer receive automatic entry into the bowls that currently make up the BCS rotation: Rose, Sugar, Fiesta and Orange. That's because the BCS would no longer be required to provide teams for those four games.
Instead, all 11 FBS conferences and their members, as well as football independents, would begin, in theory, each season with an equal chance of reaching the national championship game.
In that second paragraph there, THAT'S WHAT ALREADY HAPPENS. You see the depth to which misconceptions about this system have been propagated.
Anyways, this would be interesting; the only problem I have with the idea of sending all the bowls back to purely conference tie-ins would be the loss of the chance to go to an Orange Bowl or a Sugar Bowl or something with a really good season - someplace we wouldn't ordinarily get to go.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:08 AM ^
I like it, everyone has a chance. The only problem is the strength of schedule will have to mean alot more atleast in my mind.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:14 AM ^
Everyone already has a chance. The BCS is stupid. A playoff would also determine a true 1 v 2 matchup and much more objectively, IMO.
November 18th, 2011 at 9:47 AM ^
Then have the BCS determine the seeding of the top 4 or 6 or 8 if there is a playoff leading toward a national champion.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:18 AM ^
and Houston could play in a NC because of their cupcake schedules.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:18 AM ^
If anything, I think this proposed system would give Michigan more opportunities for a birth in a now-BCS bowl game. The Big East will get booted out of the mix, you won't have autobid or non-AQ teams getting a seat at the table, and you'll still have the possibility of the Pac 12, SEC, or Big 12 champ going to the national title game and freeing up a spot in their own bowl game (assuming the bowl wouldn't be obligated just to take the #2 team in that conference but could choose nationally).
I imagine things would shake out more like they did in the old days, when Bo went to a Fiesta, Orange, and Sugar Bowl throughout his career. Not a common occurence but definitely a possibility with a 2nd place finish in the Big Ten.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:20 AM ^
We did go to the Orange, Sugar and Fiesta in the pre-BCS era, though. All three of those would probably be smarter to keep the current at-large pick system intact to play the SEC/ACC/BXII champion than making a contract with someone other than the B1G, IMO.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:25 AM ^
You would still have that extra national championship game allowing for two more slots, and presumably you wouldn't have the hard cap on the number of teams from each conference that can go to a big bowl game. I for one would much rather see more national powers playing each other than having to ignore games like Oklahoma vs. UCONN.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:30 AM ^
You're a smart dude, PurpleStuff.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:53 AM ^
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't it used to be that only one conference had a tie-in to the bowl game, with the exception of the Rose Bowl? Nowadays outside of the BCS, almost every bowl game has two conference tie ins. It seems natural for the former-BCS bowl games to follow the same process and have two conference tie-ins as opposed to one. It would make sense for the bowls as well, since they could increase their probability for better matchups.
I imagine the resulting shake-up would see something like the following:
Rose: B1G #1 and Pac-12 #1
Fiesta: B12 #1 and Pac-12 #2
Sugar: SEC #1 and B1G #2
Orange: ACC #1 and SEC #2
I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised if something like that happens.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:36 AM ^
That's true but I'm not exactly sure how that happened. The Big Ten had a contract to send their 2nd place team to the Citrus Bowl. How did the Orange/Sugar/Fiesta get to take Michigan instead of the Citrus Bowl?
Now the only time a bowl gets to pick from a conference it doesn't have a conference with, it is choosing from the terrible 7-5 or 6-6 schools that are hanging around at the bottom of the bowl order.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:47 AM ^
I don't know either, I was a long way from being born and neither Bentley nor Wikipedia has any information on the selection procedure.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:51 AM ^
Well I hope you were born in 1999 when they played in the Orange Bowl. Otherwise, GET BACK TO BED!
But I was also too young to think about how bowl selections were made. I was too busy laughing about the idea of a Toilet Bowl. Ha! I killed on the playground.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:53 AM ^
I was talking about 1976. 1999 would have been in the BCS era.
November 18th, 2011 at 1:07 AM ^
Oh yeah. You're right, 1998 or 1999 was the start of the BCS. So I guess that doesn't count.
Anyway, I think the point is that it's less likely that Big Ten teams will go to other big bowl games then. Each bowl will probably lock in a second tie-in like Vasav says above (although hopefully not a 4th SEC-Big10 matchup).
There were a lot of not good things about the BCS, and some of the matchups weren't great. But there were a lot of really great bowl games that we got to see in the last 12 years that would never have happened without the BCS. On the whole I would say that the BCS was a major positive.
November 18th, 2011 at 12:37 AM ^
I don't understand what they have against a playoff. Most of these Bowl Games don't matter, and the schools lose money on them. In a playoff there would probably be MORE postseason games and each one would have National Championship implications.
November 18th, 2011 at 1:19 PM ^
A 16 team playoff would only give you 15 games. Right now there are over 30 bowl games and 60-70 teams that get to participate. Even a big playoff gives you less than half the TV commercial time of the current system (which is where the big money is). That is what the powers that be have against it.
November 18th, 2011 at 1:30 PM ^
I have a way in which the powers that be could have their cake and eat it too - that is, have both playoffs and bowls. I think it'd be completely terrific. The thing that makes me anti-playoff despite that is that I'd be awfully disappointed with most any other playoff system. I've never seen another one that I both like and think would also be liked by the shot-callers.
November 18th, 2011 at 1:31 AM ^
Am I missing something, but who cares about the BCS? Their contract runs out in a few years so the pressure for any changes is on the NCAA. The BCS will do anything they can to continue raking in money on behalf of the NCAA.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:24 AM ^
As Maize said above (sorta) this increases the disparity between the "AQ" conferences and "non-AQ" conferences.
Now, if Boise or Houston or another team finishes in the top 14, they are automatically required to get a spot in a prestigious bowl. If the new system goes through, it doesn't matter if Boise is 12-0 and #3 in the country, they'll be off to the Las Vegas Bowl to play against like UCLA or something.
If the stated goal is to cut down on conference realignment, this is like putting out a fire by lighting a match doused in gasoline on top of a volcano. These changes will force teams to seek out more favorable conference affiliation in probably the Big 12, Big 10, SEC, ACC, and Pac-12 in order to have a shot at the Orange or Rose or Sugar Bowls. No longer can a program get national recognition (see Boise vs Oklahoma Fiesta Bowl) because you're in Conference USA and you won't get a shot at the National Championship unless every SEC, Pac-12, and Big 10 school has two losses.
It may also force a lot more teams to go independent and play Notre Dame-type schedules because Boise or whomever can't afford the scheduling hit playing also-rans in the Mountain West or Big East or C-USA requires.
The NCAA is literally the most ineffective organization in America. They can't enforce their rules, the rulings they do make cause outrage in many cases, and they find no way to organize and take advantage of what could be their biggest cash cow.
It's maddening.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:55 AM ^
All teams not in the B1G, B12, PAC, ACC, SEC should drop to FCS, then agree to eliminate FCS/FBS play.
1. It chops the field down and improves the odds of getting a fair BCS champion.
2. The BCS schools will actually have to schedule decent non-conference games. For FCS schools, the lost revenue from slaughter-for-income games will be offset by a drop in 22 scholarships, with some extra revenue coming from added home games and a bump in TV revenue.
3. Small schools won't have to attend the Beef 'O' Brady's bowl at Tropicana Field where they actually lose money. The combination of fewer bowl-eligible teams and market forces should buttress the decent bowls and eliminate the shitty ones.
4. Bowl traditionalists can keep their system, and the current mid-majors are now in a division they can actually win.
Someone explain to me why this isn't a decent solution for all parties?
November 18th, 2011 at 3:16 AM ^
After the major bowls are played there is usually a consensus number 1 and 2. If these two top teams played in a BCS game in mid January then we may be closer to finding a true number 1?
Though it would be more interesting to take the winners of the BCS bowl games; Rose, Orange, Sugar and Fiesta and have a playoff. The semi finals on a Friday Night in mid January, with the Rose vs Fiesta winners, then have the winners of the Orange and Sugar play each other. Then have a College Superbowl on the Saturday before the NFL Superbowl. I would say out of the top 8 teams that enter the BCS bowl games you would find a true number 1 team!
November 18th, 2011 at 3:27 AM ^
Interesting article, but did you really have to be such a dick in how you presented it?
November 18th, 2011 at 3:48 AM ^
If you're at all familiar with MaizeandBlueWahoo, yes of course he had to present it like a dick. He's kind of a jackass. Always has been, always will. Anytime someone starts a post with, "Not to say I told you so..." you can tell the person is a dickbag.
November 18th, 2011 at 6:18 AM ^
called anyone a dickbag before. Looking forward to it!
November 18th, 2011 at 10:53 AM ^
Come here and I'll hold you til the bad men go away. It'll be alright.
November 18th, 2011 at 5:28 AM ^
He has been telling us this. And this is pretty much just like he said. We just forgot that he always said it would be like this.
November 18th, 2011 at 5:36 AM ^
....is that this change coincides with server changeouts at BCS HQ, so they need a simpler algorithm to f*ck with everyone else's minds.
Seriously though, I like the idea of moving closer to a system where deserving teams get to go to more appropriate bowls and no hard limit on the number of teams from a given conference that can go to the perennial headline bowls. I really still wouldn't mind a playoff system though.
November 18th, 2011 at 7:57 AM ^
not watching the Cincinatti Bearcats play in front of a 1/2 filled Orange Bowl I am all for them.
November 18th, 2011 at 9:23 AM ^
The only thing we can be sure of is that the system that replaces the BCS will make even less sense than the current system.
November 18th, 2011 at 9:26 AM ^
i told you so....
i've said for a while.....
YOU CALLED IT BRO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
November 18th, 2011 at 10:18 AM ^
Old Rose Bowl, Big 10 vs. Pac-12
Everything else, the old way
When all's said and done, play the National Championship Game.
November 18th, 2011 at 10:57 AM ^
for the old days that I used to bitch about. That is what was bullshit about the BCS, it was a "solution" that did not fit the problem. It was spoke of as though it was going to enhance the college football post-season, but all it did was add a national chmapionship game and F everything else up. I have always like the mythical NC game part of it, but the rest of it is god awful and has never been anything but that.
November 18th, 2011 at 10:33 AM ^
either go back to the old bowl system and add a plus 1 game a week later or have a true 8 or 16 team play-off with the opening rounds hostedy by the higher seeded team and the later rounds hosted by the old bowl sites. The inbetween grap has been terrible. The only good bowls anymore are the Rose Bowl and the national champ.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:52 PM ^
This is what Boise deserves for all of their complaining. No big bowl is going to pick them if they aren't forced to, like the BCS does now. As always, it's about money, and Boise does not bring enough to the party.
The BCS dropping the big bowls will only increase the gap between haves and have-nots. The former BCS bowls will go back to being an oligarchy run by the B1G, Pac-12, SEC, ACC, and Big XII. The open spots in the Fiesta, Sugar, and Orange bowls will be filled by second place teams in the other major conferences, based on how much money they bring in. As This Is Michigan, we are lucky that we are in the group that will benefit.