"The BCS is like communism"

[FirstTimer]

Congress,

Worry about the economy. Right now I think the BCS has a higher GDP than our country.

Thanks,

America

 

[FirstTimer]

In all seriousness though a playoff will do little to nothing to fix the problems with the BCS. How do you decide on a cut off for how many teams? When do you start? How do you tie in Bowl Games?

I've only heard of two plans I like. One of which is my own and the only real objective way to do it and the other is an idea that JTW posted over on MM a while ago.

 

[ThunderHorse]

In all seriousness though a playoff will do little to nothing to fix the problems with the BCS. How do you decide on a cut off for how many teams? When do you start? How do you tie in Bowl Games?

I've only heard of two plans I like. One of which is my own and the only real objective way to do it and the other is an idea that JTW posted over on MM a while ago.

Bowl games would be inter-weaved with the playoff games. the 8 team playoff would feature the 4 bowl games, then the last 3 games of the season are just regular games, other then the National Championship.

you just pick top 8, based on the 8 top teams in the nation by the BCS.

the real problem with the system is when you have a team like Utah, who went undefeated, but had absolutely no chance to even compete in the NC, they were the #3 team, and solidly beat a team that many thought was going to win the national championship in their bowl game.

I like the playoff idea, and I think it works because those top 8 teams are going to be the top teams, and we don't have to hear people bitch and whine when you have an undefeated team that wasn't given the opportunity to play for the NC.

 

[FirstTimer]

Bowl games would be inter-weaved with the playoff games. the 8 team playoff would feature the 4 bowl games, then the last 3 games of the season are just regular games, other then the National Championship.

you just pick top 8, based on the 8 top teams in the nation by the BCS.

This is where the issue starts making no sense. Hypothetically if we all agree the BCS sucks then why on God's green Earth would we use the BCS to determine who makes it into a playoff to begin with? The BCS sucks remember? That's why we are trying to find something new. Using the broken BCS to make a new system isn't going to do any good.

I for one don't mind the BCS, but if someone doesn't like the BCS and thinks it's borke why would they want to use it as part of a system designed to replace the broke BCS?

 

[ThunderHorse]

This is where the issue starts making no sense. Hypothetically if we all agree the BCS sucks then why on God's green Earth would we use the BCS to determine who makes it into a playoff to begin with? The BCS sucks remember? That's why we are trying to find something new. Using the broken BCS to make a new system isn't going to do any good.

I for one don't mind the BCS, but if someone doesn't like the BCS and thinks it's borke why would they want to use it as part of a system designed to replace the broke BCS?

I don't think the BCS system is broken...

I just think that picking the top 2 teams based off of the BCS rankings isn't the right thing to do, history has proven this.

if you pick the top 8 teams based off of the BCS ranking, you get the top 8 teams in the nation, which usually is a list that most people agree with, and you also have a way to seed the teams.

 

[FirstTimer]

I don't think the BCS system is broken...

K Congrats. Then if it's not broke why fix it? And why exapnd to only 8 teams? Why not 16? Why not 6(with Byes)?

8 is just an arbitrary number. . Doesn't seem to have any real purpose. Plus look through the seasons. How many times can you name 8 teams that had a LEGIT arument for the Nat'l Title?

The best solution I heard for keeping the BCS is take the Top 4 teams in the BCS provided they are the conference champs and have a 1v4 and 2v3 mathcup. Settle it that way.]

 

[celtsxpatsxsox]

I think a good idea would be where you take the 6 main conferences and automatically have the conference champions be entered in the tournament. Then you take two other teams from any conference like Utah or say a team in the SEC that had a very god season but couldnt win the Conference.
So something like this
ACC winner
SEC winner
Big 12 winner
Big East winner
Big Ten winner
Pac Ten winner
At large team
At large team

Of course any idea will have some problems but I think this could be a good idea.

 

[FirstTimer]

I think a good idea would be where you take the 6 main conferences and automatically have the conference champions be entered in the tournament. Then you take two other teams from any conference like Utah or say a team in the SEC that had a very god season but couldnt win the Conference.
So something like this
ACC winner
SEC winner
Big 12 winner
Big East winner
Big Ten winner
Pac Ten winner
At large team
At large team

Of course any idea will have some problems but I think this could be a good idea.

That's the most popular solution put forward and I'm not a fan of it. If you're going to do a playoff do it right and just be objective about it. Take every conference champ("BCS" Conference or not) and put them in the tourny and play it out. This at large BS is just going to give people an excuse to bitch and moan. If you just take conference champs then nobody can bitch and moan abotu not getting chosen. The only person they can blame is themselves for not taking care of business and winning games.

 

[Sven Draconian]

K Congrats. Then if it's not broke why fix it?

Because playoffs are better.

I'd be in favor of taking every conference champion and putting them in a playoff (plus however many at-large teams you need to make it viable format wise).

Id be in favor of taking the 6 BCS conference champs + 2 at-large (as determined by the BCS rankings) with an added amendment saying any undefeated team is an auto at-large. In the event of the undefeated non-BCS conference champs there's a play-in game (Pretty unlikely scenario though).

I don't disagree with the BCS rankings as much as I find it strange to pick only the top 2 teams. Too many variables to be that limiting. If they wanted to do top 16 I would be fine with that as well.

Is the #9 or #17 team going to complain, yup, but I don't really mind people complaining. I just want playoff games and a better system. Are we going to get a perfect system, no, but the best 8 teams playing it out is good enough for me.

 

[FirstTimer]

Because playoffs are better.

I'd be in favor of taking every conference champion and putting them in a playoff (plus however many at-large teams you need to make it viable format wise).

Id be in favor of taking the 6 BCS conference champs + 2 at-large (as determined by the BCS rankings) with an added amendment saying any undefeated team is an auto at-large. In the event of the undefeated non-BCS conference champs there's a play-in game (Pretty unlikely scenario though).

I don't disagree with the BCS rankings as much as I find it strange to pick only the top 2 teams. Too many variables to be that limiting. If they wanted to do top 16 I would be fine with that as well.

Is the #9 or #17 team going to complain, yup, but I don't really mind people complaining. I just want playoff games and a better system. Are we going to get a perfect system, no, but the best 8 teams playing it out is good enough for me.

How are playoffs inherintly better simply because it's a playoff? A playoff plan can be as dumb and as poorly run as the BCS. Simply "having" a playoff doesn't make the situation better. It depends on what kind.

 

[killgod]

the BCS can work if there is a concrete formula (which is open for anyone to learn/understand) to the process.


human opinion shouldn't be involved because humans quite simply cannot be trusted.

 

[FirstTimer]

Ok. Here's my plan.

Kind of long but try and stay with me.

For the purpose of this example treat the Independents as it's own conference.

Get rid of preseason polls and polls during the year.

Play the schedule.

Let the conferences decide Champions how they want. ie...Championship game, tiebreakers, whatever. The Conference decides how they name their champ.

You will then have Champs from:

ACC
Big 10
Big 12
Big East
Conf USA
Indys
MAC
Mtn West
Pac10
SEC
Sun Belt
WAC

Now once the 12 champions have been named then you have the pollsters rank the 12 teams in order to get your seeds. For the purpose of this example I used the Conf Champs from last year and acted as the pollster and seeded them myself.

1. Florida
2. Oklahoma
3. USC
4. Utah
5. Penn St
6. Va Tech
7. Boise St.
8. Cinci
9. Troy
10. Tulsa
11. Navy
12. Buffalo

The top 4 seeds get a bye and await the winners of Rd 1.

11 plays 12---1 awaits

5 plays 6--- 4 awaits

9 plays 10--- 2 awaits

7 plays 8--- 3 awaits


To keep the Bowls involved you have the 4 current BCS Bowls host games on a rotation.
For example: The #1 seed will play their 2nd Rd game in the Rose Bowl. The other 3 games play their games at other sites(perhaps even other bowl sites) The Semi-Finals will be played at the Sugar Bowl and The Orange Bowl. The Championship game will be played at the Fiesta Bowl.

The next year the BCS Bowls rotate. The Fiesta goes to the quarterfinal Rd. The Rose goes to the Semi's. And for this example the Sugar goes to the Finals. In later years the semi-final Bowl longest removed from the Championship game gets to advance to the host Championship Bowl Site.

All the other teams that don't make the tourny go on and can play normal bowl games the way they normally would.

I guess "subjective" human voting comes into play with the seeding but I suppose that's the one non-objective flaw here. But at least it's not deciding who is in and who is out. That's all decided on the field.

I'm off for the weekend. Have fun for 2 days shredding my idea. Just trying to find as objective a system as possible.

 

[JeremyHight]

Top 6 conference champions with the top 2 teams getting a bye. Anything more would just shit in the face of college football. I laugh at people who put the Sun Belt champion in, though, lol.

 

[jaggles82]

I'm liking your plan Firsttimer, you almost have to include all conferences otherwise people will complain, but I guess some people don't seem to give a shit if people complain. Might as well keep the BCS then.

 

[theMINI]

Yo you know what? FUCK communism.

 

[St. Francisco]

I'm going to attempt to avoid a debate with FirstTimer and JeremyHeight on this subject...our opinions are very clear, from the MM debates.

I say you take the top eight teams, and seed them. First round in the BCS bowls, two more semi-final games after that, and then the BCS national championship game. Really, the only thing that has to happen for this to work would be to dissolve the current automatic bids that conferences get in the BCS bowls, and add two games. That's it. All of the non-playoff schools keep their bowls. Also, I don't care how you pick them...committee, BCS, some new-fangled polling system. Don't give a fuck. But I feel the BCS does a decent job at determining the cream of the crop in football. However, anytime two teams out of 120 are the only ones given a chance at the national title, the system is seriously flawed.

On the subject of all conference champions...it's ridiculous. First off, anything over eight teams does in fact begin to water down the regular season. I'd be ok with a four or six team playoff, but eight is the magic number for me. You would include all of your major players nearly every year. Secondly, anyone who thinks Tulsa, Navy, Troy, and Buffalo deserve a playoff spot over Texas, Alabama, Ohio St., Texas Tech, etc. just because they managed to win their shitty conference is laughable. THIS IS NOT THE NFL, NOT ALL CONFERENCES ARE CREATED EQUAL. Hence the reason we have at-large bids in the BCS bowls. At-large bids are necessary to ensure the best teams in the country are given a playoff shot. That's what this should be about. And for those saying the 12 conference champions is fair...no it's not. It's not fair to reward a non-BCS team for playing a shitty schedule and winning a shitty conference over a team like Texas. Besides, if you want to get 100% truly fair about, we should just throw all 120 teams in a playoff. Let's not get ridiculous about this.

The whole point of a playoff is to walk a fine line between maintaining the integrity and passion of the regular season while create a fair system for determining a national champion.

 

[Sven Draconian]

How are playoffs inherintly better simply because it's a playoff? A playoff plan can be as dumb and as poorly run as the BCS. Simply "having" a playoff doesn't make the situation better. It depends on what kind.

Playoffs are better simply because they are playoffs. This should not be debated. I don't care if the plan is dumb and poorly run, it is better than the BCS. Why? Playoffs provide more meaningful games than the BCS (which provides exactly one).

It could be a 64 team tounry, it could be a +1, it could just teams that start with M-Q and it would be better than the BCS.

Bowl games=scrimmage. Its unfortunate, but true.

With the amount of bowl games they play, making a bowl is no longer meaningful. The effort just isn't their as a whole. The huge layoff, the looming combine/senior bowl (for some).

What is the motivation for the alamo bowl? The Gator bowl. The capital one bowl. It's not some great honor to get invited. It's 5 weeks of extra practice to play in a scrimmage. (Well, and a vacation).

For a major program, those bowl games are consilation prizes. You're gunning for a conference title and a national championship. You lose the conf championship game...and you're reward is the cotton bowl. AWESOME. The players don't give two shits about that game.

Watch the passion and energy of a March Maddness game, and then watch the International Bowl.

 

[Awesometrax]

Here would be my plan:

First of all, force the Independents to join a conference, and that includes Notre Dame.

My system would have 16 teams in the playoff, with the 11 conference winners and 5 at-large bids.

Every conference would also be forced to have a championship game to determine who gets an automatic berth to the playoff.

The first round games would be at the site of the higher seed. Every round the teams would then re-seed, like in the NHL and NFL playoffs. However, in the second round, only the two highest seeds remaining would get home games, the other two games would be played at a neutral site (preferably one of the BCS game sites). This way, there is an incentive to having one of the top two seeds. (Eg. if all the higher seeds win the first game, in the 1 vs. 8 and 2 vs. 7 games, it would be at the higher seed's home, while 3 vs. 6 and 4 vs. 5 would be at a neutral site) And in the semifinals, only the top seed would have a home game, while the other game would be at another neutral BCS game site (Eg. 1 vs. 4 would be at the 1 seed's home, while 2 vs. 3 would be at a neutral site). This giving an incentive to have the #1 overall seed. The final would then be played at a neutral site.

Thoughts?

 

[Bmore]

I think a good idea would be where you take the 6 main conferences and automatically have the conference champions be entered in the tournament. Then you take two other teams from any conference like Utah or say a team in the SEC that had a very god season but couldnt win the Conference.
So something like this
ACC winner
SEC winner
Big 12 winner
Big East winner
Big Ten winner
Pac Ten winner
At large team
At large team

Of course any idea will have some problems but I think this could be a good idea.

]
What about the WAC and Conference USA?

 

[St. Francisco]

]
What about the WAC and Conference USA?

Not sure if sarcasm...

:joker: