So, is a Tournament REALLY the best way to determine a champ?
All the time we hear how football should determine a TRUE champion, and play it on the field. But how often does that really finish with the best team on top? In best of 7 series, you can usually feel assured the best team won. But is that the case with one and done?
We just had Kansas go down. Were they the best team? Maybe not. But were they really not one of the top 16 teams? Riiiigggghhhhttttt. For every NC, there's some team that has just had the seas part for them.
It's true in other sports too. Saints-Colts were probably the two best teams. But were the Sterlers-Cards the year before? Were the Giants in any way a better team that the previously undefeated Pats?
And closer to home? How many times has Michigan been the best team in hockey but been bounced out of the Tournament?
It's exciting, no doubt. But is it the best way to crown a champion?
This is so stupid. How, exactly, do you want to determine a goddamn champ? Patty cake? Rock, Paper, Scissors? The highschool popularity system? Why don't you go and tell 95% of the sporting world their system for determining a champ is bullshit?
I'm getting off my soapbox now.
I think we should let sports writers vote.
This just in, Yankees win next 42 world series!
March 20th, 2010 at 10:10 PM ^
How will this be different from what we have now?
March 20th, 2010 at 11:08 PM ^
Is wrong.
Not that I condone commemorating the Yankees' 27 World Series Championships...
Best of series usually prove who's the best. No one thinks you win multiple 4 of 7 series and aren't the best team. Proves you didn't have one lucky or one bad night.
There's a reason NFL teams don't play 3 games a week.
That works for B-Ball and Hockey...but not other sports.
As for why they can't do that in college football and basketball...simple. They aren't getting PAID.
Best of seven for each round? Why don't you just ask them to drop out of school? The system in place is already bad enough at letting players be students.
But I give you credit for acknowledging that they might be better off playing no post-season whatsoever, and make it all a little more...intramural. No hypocrisy on you (seriously...sometimes that doesn't come across in text).
And I am not saying they should change. The Tourney IS fun. Just saying we may be fooling ourselves when we insist that this is the best way to determine a true champion.
It's really the only fair way.
My slammer is metal and has a holographic skull on it. I'll gladly allow the Michigan teams use it if it will help.
Many European soccer league championships are given to the team that has the most points (best record) at the end of the regular season and there is no playoff. Although I personally hate this system because it's extremely anticlimactic, but one could easily argue that this is the best way to crown a champion as long as it's feasible to have every team play each other at least once.
The point of a tournament is not that every underdog should lose, it's that the team that wins is the best. If a 9 or 10 seed wins, that would prove that they were the best team in the tournament. You can't get lucky enough to win the tournament without being a very very good team.
kansas losing today PROVES that they were not the best team in the country
Let's ignore 98% of their body of work ie the regular season.
March 20th, 2010 at 11:44 PM ^
body of work got them a #1 seed. Now, they did get rolled into a shitty bracket but they did have a #1 seed.
Best team in the country? I'm not do sure. Not everybody has equal teams to play. OSU could get to the Final Four never having played anyone higher than a six. Who knows what Duke will go through. Easier road than playing an 8, a 4, and a 2. More likely to be upset. And really, are you the best team for the year, or hot for a couple of weeks? If they played again, how many times would NC State, or a Villanova beat their opponents in a Championship series? More than one game, and pressure ebbs and glows on teams. One and done, and all the pressure is always on the favorite and the underdog has nothing to lose.
Well then by your definition of a true champion, we'll never know. There's no feasible way to determine an absolute champion from a field of 300+ teams. This is the best option, IME.
But it would suck. You could take the champ from each BCS Conference (how many not from there have won the title), and 2 at large (in the case of a UNLV, or great 2nd team in a Conference). 8 game best of series would still take 3 weeks. If you were really worried about class time, you could make it best of 3's taking the same 4 days the Tourney takes now in a week, and/or have them play home games.
Wouldn't nearly be as exciting, but it could be done. Logistically, if not in actuality politically.
LLLLAAAAAAAMMMMEEEEEE
No, it would not prove they were the best team in the tournament. It only proves they were able to beat the six teams placed in front of them, unless you believe in the 100% absolute infallibility of the transitive property in sports.
Thank you.
Well, I believe so. I think given the format of NCAA sports, there are far too many teams to truly determine the "best". It's all about defining a tournament, selecting the a top number of teams, and have them battle it out.
However, if the league/conference has a small enough number of teams, and each team plays each other at least once, maybe twice, then I'd be comfortable going with "Best regular season record" as the deciding factor. That isn't the case though; at least not in college sports.
In my opinion, the best way to determine a champion is to have either a two-part season, with the top teams after the first part of the season advancing into a round robin competition in which the top team out of the round robin. This however, makes for little excitement, and sports exist to entertain, hence a single elimination tournament in which what came before holds no weight.
kansas losing today proves that they aren't one of the top 16 teams in america. they just lost to northern iowa, how does that mean a tournament isn't the best way to decide a champion?
Actually, the only thing Kansas losing proves is that they weren't better than No. Iowa TODAY...that's really it.
They'll still end the year as one of the top 16 teams in the country regardless of who you ask. The tournament's job is to crown a national champion based on a single-elimination tournament, not to decide w/o question the best 65, 32, 16, 8, 4, 2, or single best team in the country.
double post
Because they played for 5 months against all types of teams and showed they were. Syracuse lost their game right before the Tournament, but could win and be champ...but if you lose the next one you can't. The 7th game has a WHOLE lot less value than the sixth to last. It's arbitrary.
Kansas losing today means that Kansas wasn't better than Northern Iowa on March 20, 2010. The Tournament crowns "a" champion of the tournament, not necessarily the best team in the country. The BCS does the same. Nothing is perfect, so let the majority vote rule. Basketball says 64 team tournament, football says top 2 as voted by coaches. I imagine this topic is going to "essplode" into a pro- vs. anti-BCS thang in 3...2...1..
because it is decided on the court, or field, and not by a vote of coaches, writers, or a computer formula. Kansas had their chance to show that they were the best team in this tournament but they blew it. N. Iowa lead the entire game and did not win on a fluke or lucky last second shot. The handled Kansas all game and was the better team today, but like you stated above, Kansas would probably win a 5 or 7 game series. But 99% of the time in College Basketball the best team wins it all and there is never a disputed champion, unlike football.
i agree with M-Wolverine. I have been saying this for a long time when defending the BCS. No system is perfect and doesnt always determine the best team, but rather who was the hottest team. BCS at lease puts the two best teams throughout the regular season and allows them to play to determine who the best team is. there will be some teams who dont get that chance however.
Look at the playoffs in NFL two years ago. Arizona was one drive away from winning the super bowl. What were they in the regular season? 8-8 or 9-7? If they won can you really say they were the best team? I dont think you can. However they were the hottest team when it came to the playoffs.
The NCAA tournament is another example. You can possibly have teams with rather mediocre records winning the NCAA championship. They may have been just average but when it counted the most they got hot and were the best team at that time. If kansas plays N.Iowa ten times outside of the tournament how many wins do you expect them to win? 8,9, maybe all 10.
there is no perfect system in determining who the best team is.
But as a fan, wouldn't you rather have a system that gives you games like the Kansas game we just had? What's wrong with that?
So, Kansas won't win the 'ship. I don't give a shit - that was awesome, and in a best of 7 series, it would have been near meaningless.
And I never said they should change it. Just asking if philosophically it is the truest method to determine a championship.
As a college basketball fan I'd rather have a system that gave the overwhelming portion of a team's body of work- the regular season- more weight. No one cares about the regular season now and that's the flipside of this.
March Madness' popularity has everything to do with people betting on it- almost no one has even heard of half these teams before the bracket's announced.
March 20th, 2010 at 10:15 PM ^
I don't know how you propose to give the regular season more weight than the post season. Winning a NC is always going to be bigger than what is accomplished in the regular season. Ask any high school kid if they would rather win the league championship or the state championship, the answer is obvious.
People do care about the regular season and it does matter. Kansas probably sold out every home game this year, people do care. Kansas did get a #1 seed, so they were rewarded with an easier road to the finals than say Northern Iowa, you think they should have been given more, I think they should have taken care of business today.
March 20th, 2010 at 10:27 PM ^
How do you give the regular season more weight? Make the postseason more restrictive. Give higher seeds more of an advantage, like playing at home rather than at a neutral venue where the crowd almost always goes for the underdog. Maybe the best of the best could get a bye or two.
Your second paragraph is weak sauce. I would bet the least compelling game in the Tournament draws as good or better ratings than just about any regular season game regardless of how compelling it is. And when you quantify it in dollars it's not even close.
March 20th, 2010 at 10:33 PM ^
Maybe make the underdogs sleep outside the arena in tents, that would certainly give the higher seeds a leg up. When all is said and done you have to win your games to be a champion, no matter the format. Seems like either you don't like upsets or you picked Kansas to go all the way.
I have been to many a first round NCAA Tournament games with half filled arenas and relatively uninterested attendees.
March 20th, 2010 at 10:55 PM ^
Yeah, but those games are broadcast on network television unlike any regular season game. I do like upsets, but I also like seeing the team with the best resume be rewarded because that's the mark of a good system.
So you would prefer any method that shows that Kansas is the best team, because that was your pre-conceived notion?
Tournaments don't crown "the best team", they crown a champion. Kansas lost. Would they beat UNI the next 5 times they played? Maybe. Probably. But they didn't, and it was awesome.
I, personally, want a playoff in football because you would get more awesome games like the hoops game we just watched. I like football. I'd rather watch football games than vote for title participants.
But was it fair?
And would you feel the same way if it was Michigan who was above everyone else?
What? Did UNI play with six guys and nobody told me?
No UNI did not play with 6 but Kansas players did have to wear weighted vests of expectation.
Not the game. N. Iowa deserved to win. Did Kansas deserve to have their championship hopes derailed by one game vs. a team that will not win the championship? UNI may have been 1. underseeded by the Committee 2. May have just been hot today 3. May be a lot tougher than other 1 or 2 seeds have to play at the same juncture 4. For all teams puts all the pressure always on the favorite and never on the underdog (anyone who watches 7 game series can see the shifting pressures due to game results prior)...and others, but I'm getting boring.
I'm not really all that upset for Kansas...I have no love for them. And I'm not angry about the Tourney imploding for me, because I'm hardly the only one. I've actually plussed Gordie and others for making good or amusing points to the contrary. I've just seen it happening a lot in various sports, and i'm realizing more and more it's for entertainment value, rather than sport.
You've been seeing it happen in a lot of sports because that's how sports go. It's been happening since always.
The playoff isn't unfair, it's just hard. If you can win your games, you win the tournament.
fuck yes it was fair
what was unfair about it?
Michigan has been at both ends of this. In 1989, we won the national title when we were a #3 seed (and beat an Illinois team that had previously blown us out twice along the way). In 1992, we reached the national title game as a #6 seed. On the other hand, we were a #1 seed in 1985 and lost in the second round. For most major programs, it tends to even out.
Having to play single-elimination increases the possibility of randomness, but you can't say it's unfair to anyone. Kansas was favored to win today. If they'd played to the best of their ability, they'd have won. But they didn't. They didn't run their offense for long stretches and struggled to defend the perimeter. The single-elimination format didn't make them play a bad game. They did it to themselves.
If it's equally "unfair" to everyone, it's fair to everyone. Yes, teams gets better breaks by Committee bracket design than others, but everybody knowing the rules and the inherent difficulties within them, it may not always crown the best team, but may reveal who is best at dealing with those (known) parameters.
March 20th, 2010 at 10:00 PM ^
You're really dodging the issue here which is that ideally tournaments crown the best team champion. In college basketball it's all about whatever team gets hot at the right time. That's a shitty way to choose a champion.
March 21st, 2010 at 12:21 AM ^
But that is the nature of the beast that is American sports. Hockey playoffs favor a hot goalie, football is another crazy single elimination playoff and basketball has less randomness -- but still favors the team that gets hot at the end of the season.
You have a choice. You can award championships by who wins the regular season a la European Football or take the randomness of a tournament. I choose the tournament. It is SO much more exciting.
What fun is a championship that can be decided before the last game?
March 21st, 2010 at 12:28 AM ^
There's a balance to be struck. Right now if you're one of the 10 most talented teams in college basketball you can underperform all season and if you pull it together in the last few games it barely matters. It's horribly unbalanced and that's why no one cares about the regular season.
All of your points are true -- but that is the nature of all major American sports save college football. Both models are completely valid. There is no one superior system.
I prefer the tournament model to that of the BCS. The majority of the excitement happens on the field, instead of through the team selection process.