For a long time, I thought the BCS was a sham. I was convinced that the mythical ranking system that the college football Gods used was flawed and didn't accurately a team's strength. I figured that if a team didn't lose a game, then there was no way that they should be ranked over teams with a loss, or even two. At the time I didn't understand the system. Nowadays people are saying that the BCS is showing its flaws more so than ever with its current rankings. Ironically, this season has lead me to appreciate at least the reasoning behind the BCS, if not the system itself.
When I hated the BCS, I didn't understand strength of schedule. I figured that schedules were picked at random among teams, like the NFL was. I didn't realize that schools schedule games between themselves, and that they have control over whom they face. With such a system in place, it's quite easy to establish a dominant schedule (Case in point, Hawaii this year.)
What does this mean? For such a league with an absurd amount of teams, one would think a complex mathematical polling system would have to be used to determine the best team. Since there's no way every team could play every other team, one has to rely on a ranking system based on stats accrued. The big deviation that people are clamoring for is a playoff system, where the season gets cut a few games short, and a 16 team playoff ensues over the course of 4 weeks. This seems good, but there must be a system in place like the BCS rankings to determine which 16 teams are worthy of the playoffs.
While fans make a large bruhaha about their team's rankings, it's important to remember that they have control over whom they play. If they want to establish themselves as the sure best team, they can play all the best teams in the league. Despite this, teams continue to schedule themselves against some of the best teams, and some of the worse teams, and as such the polling system I believe is the best direction to take. It's not perfect, but the system can always be changed, and as such I think College Football should stick with it until they get it right.
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7 comments:
There is already a playoff system. Every game in the season counts. However, the BCS system did leave out in USC, in 2003, Auburn in 2004,and is leaving out OU as we speak. Oklahoma beat the #1 team in the country last weekend... for the second time.
As far as a playoff system, I mean cut to a single season bracketed tournament at the end.
And yeah, leaving out OU is a pretty big flaw, that would lead many to more clamoring for change, but this seems bound to happen. You also have to take into account that they lost to two unranked teams (Texas Tech and Colorado.) It's not as simple as "This team should be there cause they beat the best team."
I'm not saying its a perfect system, but I think that the College Football powers that be need to stick with it and keep tinkering until it gets it right. They're getting closer.
Seems as if you lose a game late in the season. OU lost twice this year. LSU lost twice in triple overtime. I don't know if they figure in that fact or if they are just losses. The SEC, however, is murder. See it played out in the BCS game when LSU posts a huge win. They have too much speed for an OSU team that wasn't even as good as last year's edition that got trounced by Florida, another SEC team. I spend a lot of time in the South. And I realize how football is king. The Big 12 may have its Oklahomas and its Texases. The Big 10 may have Ohio State, Michigan (and Penn State and Wisconsin too) but the SEC is murder every week.
Meant to say that if you lose a game late, it's like a poison pill. LSU benefitted from WVU losing. They're better than last year but they're not that great. And Missouri was a product of the Big 12 North. Kind of knew they'd lose a second time to OU. And KU, not Missou goes to a BCS Game. Seems unfair given the circumstances.
Yeah, I don't know why Mizzou isn't in a bowl game either. Seems pretty silly. I just think that the system at this point shouldn't be discarded, and a playoff also doesn't seem like the answer.
It seems like any sort of system with this many teams will have flaws--if they cut to a 4 team playoff, there would always be clamoring by the 5th ranked team, etc.
It's Division I football! It's the Big 12! It ain't intramurals!
Go play intramurals brother... go play intramurals.
But I need 3 weeks to compile my argument for the BCS...not just two...
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