Getty ImagesThe idea of a college football playoff, however small or mildly adjusted as it may be compared to the current BCS system, has gained more support than it ever has in recent years among college football’s powers that be.
For the immediate future, meaning 2013 or ’14, a plus-one seems like the most likely alternative. Down the road, that could expand to, say, eight teams. Perhaps, one day, 11*. It is, after all, the consumer’s natural instinct to want more to the point of saturation (see: bowl season).
But a four, eight or 11-team playoff, as realistic as those ideas may be, is child’s play compared to what one group is considering.
The Coalition on Intercollegiate Athletics, a group of over 50 university professors and faculty members, met over the weekend to discuss changes they feel are necessary in collegiate sports. The Associated Press report details the COIA’s wide-ranging agenda, but one idea catches some attention:
Among the topics: Should COIA advocate changes in the BCS?
Not surprisingly, the dividing lines on many issues among the 50 or so faculty members were often split between those who represent schools from automatic-qualifying conferences and those who don’t. One of the ideas that came through on the BCS debate was to exchange some of the noncompetitive “guarantee” games at the beginning of the season for a 64-team playoff at the end and use the TV money from the playoff to recoup losses from the missing regular-season games.
It’s a proposal that could puncture the long-held contention of college presidents that a playoff would take too many athletes out of the classroom for too long. It’s also the kind of proposal — a December version of March Madness — that resonates with fans who have grown tired of the BCS; a pie-in-the-sky idea for sure, though some faculty think a little dreaming isn’t bad for a group such as this one.
“This is my first time here and I’m seeing very little dreaming,” said Timothy Ross, a civil engineering professor at New Mexico. “I’m seeing people wedded to the current model and asking, ‘What tweaks do we need to make this work?’ Well, it’s not going to work because the thing is spiraling out of control.”
That’s not to say a 64-team playoff is a top choice — it’s not even a realistic idea if you want to talk about spiraling out of control — but it does show how far some people are willing to go to get away from the current postseason format.
Would it be fun? Maybe; the first 48 hours of March Madness might be the best two days in sports. But you can’t really link college football to college basketball in determining what’s best for the game.
The important thing is that ideas are being put forward, and almost any idea at this point is better than the status quo.
(*note: agree with Barry Tramel or not, he has a great column and an interesting idea)
Its only gained support because the greedy powers that be in the SEC, Big 10, Pac 12 and the NCAA realize that fans are fed up and beginning to tune out. Lower TV ratings show just how pissed the public is.
Ben posted: “The important thing is that ideas are being put forward, and almost any idea at this point is better than the status quo.” That may be the saving grace in all the plans, though as Ben stated, a 64 team plan is quite unworkable for Div. 1A FBS teams.
With the recent death of Coach Joe Paterno and other news, this topic slipped back a few notches, but will now re-emerge as the dominant conversation among major college football fans everywhere. No one I know or have heard of has a plan which has been embraced by the NCAA university presidents except one that preserves the bowl venues in a playoff arrangement but those are very general thoughts of the presidents with no details. Hopefully, one NCAA school president will request Emmert to begin presenting ideas for a playoff. Emmert has already said the NCAA has numerous scenarios already completed and can provide more as imput and consensus builds.
The players and schools really enjoy the bowls (according to all reports by those players and schools we have seen over the past many years). It may be that any plan that does not at least use the bowl stadiums may not be acceptable.
Several CFT posters have presented well thought out, very articulate, and detailed playoff scenarios in past threads. We hope they will re-present those again for all new CFT readers to enjoy and spark their continued involvement in this process as it unfolds.
how many games do you want these kids to play……make that how much more money do you think you can make off these kids blood, sweat and tears before you finally get some push back.
running backs are coming out earlier as scouts have been weary of wear and tear as nfl teams have realized that on average backs only have so many carries in their lifetime. additionally we see the nfl has a “pain cocktail” that players inject before games as the 16 game season is long and the playoffs longer. at some point soon you are going to see players skip the bowls altogether, especially the lesser ones. at what point does a guy like luck just say enough with it. apart from skipping the bowl games how will the extra games influence players from coming back for their junior or senior season.
insane what greed will do to otherwise intelligent people.
yes there needs to be a playoff system in place, but to even discuss a 64 team playoff is just a waste of time. They aren’t going to have a 6 week playoff, making the championship teams play something like 17-18 games, and the schools aren’t going to be willing to shorten the regular season and lose the revenue they are guaranteed from the regular season schedule and guarantee revunue in place. It will start at 4, maybe some day be 8, but to expect more than that is stupid.
I have read most of the previous postings on this topic and found the postings of some who presented possible playoff systems very interesting and possibly workable. I don’t know why anyone would even discuss a 64 team playoff for major college football. As warhawko4 said, it “is just a waste of time.”
I do want something different than what we have now. I want something more akin to a national playoff as the FCS has each year. I was able to watch some of the FCS playoff games this year and it was fun to watch! Of course, I like some, only some, of the FBS bowl games this year also.
This is a great article because the various playoff scenarios need to be fleshed out so a concensus proposal can begin to gain traction. Here are a few thoughts I’ve had realting to this whole topic:
1) In some form or fashion, I would be willing to bet just about anything that the NFL is behind this entire assinine BCS/bowl system. College football abandons December and the NFL reaps all the financial rewards of that foolish approach. I love the NFL, but it’s long overdue for college football to take December back.
2) An ideal playoff system will need to reward conference champions as automatic qualifyers, especially those who win conference championship games. Furthermore, those teams should be given a bye as incentive to win their conference. Playoff byes allow for more teams to participate in the entire system. For example, an 8-team system could easily expand to 12 if the top four had a first round bye.
3) Regular season schedules do need to be limited, and I think 10 is a good round number. Thus, even if a team plays two additional conference games (which will happen with super-conferences) that still limits the pre-playoff total to 12 games max.
4) People who gripe about the number of games played are being shortsighted. The team contending for the national title won’t complain, they want to be there wining it all. Think about this example: when the NFL had the lockout, the NFLPA was dead set against an 18 game schedule. Yet come playoff time, the Super Bowl teams play either 3 or 4 extra games beyond the regular season’s 16. Yet I have never heard ANY of those players complaining about all the extra games. They love being there, and so will the college players.
So with all that in mind, I would devise a system that limits the regular season to 10 games. The playoff system has 12 slots. Conference champions are automatic qualifiers, and the top four teams get a first round bye. A total of four extra weeks are used to play 11 games. Four games the first weekend, four games the second weekend, two games the third weekend, and the championship game the final weekend. The 7 largest bowls are used in rotation for the final three weeks of playoff games. Build in a week off between conference championships and the first round of the playoffs. Then the final game will fall at roughly the same time on the calendar it does now.
64 teams seams a little crazy but I would love to see championships won on the field and not by voters who couldn’t possibly have watched every team play.
Also given the small sampling of quality OOC match ups we get every year its almost impossible to tell who has played the toughest schedule or which conferences are better than others. Everything is based on perception and not facts. Although I do agree the SEC West is the best division right now.
As a USC fan I would have loved to see some of Pete Carroll’s teams go up against Urban Meyer and the Gators. I don’t care if it was in the first round of the playoffs!
Professors?!?! We’re all screwed now.
64 Teams!? that is way unecessary.
Says a lot of the education of the professors if they came up with this stupid plan.
64 may be unworkable, but 32 would be.
1. Players and schools do NOT enjoy a large number of the bowls. Not all of the bowl venues are in tropical cities or “party cities”. Mobile, Shreveport, Birmingham, El Paso, University Park TX (Dallas/Ft.Worth), Detroit, Nashville, Houston, Jacksonville, Memphis, Atlanta, Charlotte, D.C., Boise, etc. Any number of players have quietly (and a few not so quietly) that these destinations, no matter their positives at other times of the year, suck in December and January. Most bowls don’t come near to selling out which is an easy way to see that fans and alums don’t like them.
2. The FCS level already has 20 teams which means 8 of those teams already face playing 5 post-season games if they make it to the finals—the same as if you had a 32 team playoff. So, all arguments about too many games are simply disproven by existing practice. You would have to cut out the 12th regular season game, but that would be accomplished by everyone (and it is every school of consequence) dropping their game against an FCS school. You don’t need a “freebie” win to pad your schedule if you know that even 2 or 3 losses wouldn’t necessarily be fatal to getting an equal shot at a national title. Heck, even if you give out 11 automatic bids to conference champions, leaving 21 at large bids, you are likely to end up with a few 5 or even 6 loss teams with at large bids. (The at large schools would probably be selected using something similar to the RPI and Texas A&M at 7-6 finish 2011-2012 at number 14 in Sagarin’s ratings). There would be some monetary issues to be worked out, but they’re manageable. For example, maybe conferences would make up lost revenue for giving up a 12th game by giving part of the revenue that home teams would generate from hosting (yes, ditch the good old boy bowls entirely) playoff games to the conference members who didn’t make the playoffs.
I haven’t read in detail but a playoff structure of that scale or anything near basketball seem ridiculous. I am a fan of a BCS that is structured like a playoff I.E. a 4-8 team playoff while maintaining the tradition ( and money) of the bowl games.
LogicalConsideration says: The FCS level already has 20 teams which means 8 of those teams already face playing 5 post-season games if they make it to the finals—the same as if you had a 32 team playoff. So, all arguments about too many games are simply disproven by existing practice.
Not really. First off let me say that there are tremendous athletes that come from all levels of football and FCS has produced some of the most amazing players the NFL has ever seen. The simple fact though is that the draft will take the majority of their players from the 1A ranks. Many of the players of FCS want the extra games as they either have a very outside chance of playing professionally or are on the scouts radars and need more game film as their body of work will be discounted as to be played against inferior competition.
A second problem with your logic is that while the top of FCS can easily hang with the worst of 1A and in some cases can beat the best of 1A (ask UMich) the simple fact is the game on average is played at a slightly slower overall speed by lighter squads. Your lineman may be 260 instead of 310 and your LB’s may be 5’8. Having said that, that does not mean the quality of football is any less but the amount of injuries may be less.
Of course yet another problem that you of course don’t even touch on is how all of this will effect the players studies. Football players are supposed to be student athletes, not athletes. Extending the game another few weeks into the season will further interfere with exams and overall studies. With the increase in playing time you will have an increase in injuries and an increase in training room time, which of course will mean even less study time……..but who really cares about the players anyway….right????
Maybe the colleges should look to the states and the high school tournaments.
Some states allow all schools to enter. Some limit it to the top team or teams in a conference.
Indiana has almost 400 high schools, but five classes for football, thus about 75 teams per class. It used to be that they played pre-season games, then 10 regular season games. Now, no pre-season games (one ‘jamboree’ is allowed), nine regular season games, then the playoffs.
Three Sectional games, one Regional, one Semi-state, and one State Championship game per class. A potential of six additional games for the championship might be too many. Some schools begin the football season a week or two prior to the school year – I don’t think that, though, would cause a dramatic attendance loss at almost any college (without students, it might even increase revenue).
Maryland limits the number of teams by only allowing a set number of teams in the tournament (eight/class I believe). Three additional games might be too few to properly determine a college champion.
I’m sure there are various other permutations in other states that the colleges could look at, and gain some ideas.
And don’t anyone tell the principals and superintendents of high schools that the tournament interferes with school. If they did, the principals and superintendents would withdraw their team from the tournament to make sure the tournament didn’t interfere with school. They haven’t, so they make sure the tournaments don’t interfere.
I am not advocating for a particular plan, but I do think that the several states (at least most) have had time to adjust their tournaments to best meet ‘the needs’ of the schools and the tournaments.
Simply NO. A playoff system will ruin college football and it will solve absolutely nothing. Fix the BCS by eliminating human input all together and reconfigure the statistical models in place to encompass a more robust set of data and you’ll have a solution that works.