Breaking News: The BCS is no more!
The conference commissioners and (I don't know why) ND AD Jack Swarbrick have agreed to a 4-team playoff. The semifinal games will be played within the current bowl system and the NCG will be given to the highest bidding city (let's go Cleveland!).
Lets do it
Thank goodness!
Well, not completely dead, there are still 2 years left in the current cycle.
"Attack the Strong, Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead!"
-Former OSU S&C Coach Lichter
So its a slow two year long death...
ND invited to the party? Why?
They should have not invited ND or invited ND, BYU, Army, and Navy.
"Attack the Strong, Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead!"
-Former OSU S&C Coach Lichter
I agree ND is irrelevant
Wherever you are, there you be!
But they are still going to have BCS bowl games right? so it is still there just no BCS national championship game right? I kind of like this 4 team playoff, I liked the BCS system, I think we are going to have just as much problem with the 4 team playoff as the BCS system. the 5th ranked team is always going to cry well I did just as much as the 4th and 3rd ranked teams why didn't I get in. there have been a lot of 2 loss teams in the past and they are all going to cry why they didn't get in, i think they will expand from the 4 eventually and then I won't like college football. They need to stay at the 4 team playoff.
Reading between the lines (as they haven't released the details), I see at least two concerns:
Slippery Slope... though if they can hold it as is I'd be happy.
Notre Dame is the only school not in a BCS conference to get an automatic BCS bid under the current system.
I wouldn't cheer for Michigan if they were playing the Taliban.
Like it or not, Notre Dame = Money. College football is all about MONEY.
TheBadOwl: What's your point? They still should not be getting preferential treatment that the other indys are not.
"Attack the Strong, Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead!"
-Former OSU S&C Coach Lichter
703...
Notre Dame was a trail-blazer who helped shape college football intot he mega power that it now is. So what if they've been irrelevant for a decade. The Buckeyes were irrelevant for most of the '80s. USC had a rough go of it for awhile in the '90s. Every program goes through rough patches. In the end though, schools like USC, OSU, ND, Michigan, Alabama, LSU, Penn State, and Texas are the "market makers". They're the ones who practically invented the major market for football. As long as ND as a Top 10 program in terms of revenue - which they are - they deserve a seat at the table. And trust me, I have no love lost for ND. But their boosters and alumni have been as instrumental as our own in turning college football into what it is today.
Humble: You're missing my point. What makes ND so special that they get a seat a table comprised of conferences? Who cares if ND was a trailblazer 100 years ago. Today, they just cling to their past status to keep some sort of relevence. Their recent irrelevence should disqualify them from getting their very own seat; the BCS made tons of money w/o ND and college football will make tons of money with or without them in the future.
"Attack the Strong, Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead!"
-Former OSU S&C Coach Lichter
ND is special because they're the only non-BCS school with the same (or in most cases, more) resources as upper-level BCS programs. They make obscene amounts of money and have a massive national fanbase. And if they felt like joining a BCS conference, I'm pretty sure any conference would take them.
I wouldn't cheer for Michigan if they were playing the Taliban.
ND is only relevant because of their money. I dont see them making the playoff anytime soon though.
"if irony were made of strawberries, we' d all be drinking a lot of smoothies right now."
I think the speculated playoff design will do more good than harm. There is still one major flaw in this design: If the games are to be held at current bowl sites, is there something setup to prevent virtual home games? I would assume that the higher seed gets the local pick? But it seems to me that other teams in other conferences have a chance to benefit from this while the B1G, ACC and Big East have absolutely no chance to gain a "home" field advantage. For instances OSU as a #1 seed playing #4 seeded USC in the Rose Bowl - this will happen and will do very little to reward OSU for the top spot.
Great....no more mythical NC. Lets do it on the field.
ND in the BCS era:
December 28, 1997, Independence Bowl L
ND 9 LSU 27
January 1, 1999, Gator Bowl L
ND 28 Georgia Tech 35
January 1, 2001, Fiesta Bowl L
ND 9 Oregon State 41
January 1, 2003, Gator Bowl L
ND 6 North Carolina State 28
December 28, 2004, Insight Bowl L
ND 21 Oregon State 38
January 2, 2006, Fiesta Bowl L
ND 20 Ohio State 34
January 3, 2007, Sugar Bowl L
ND 14 LSU 41
December 24, 2008, Hawaiʻi Bowl W
ND 49 Hawaiʻi 21
December 31, 2010, Sun Bowl W
ND 33 Miami (FL) 17
December 29, 2011, Champs Sports Bowl L
ND 14 Florida State 18
Just sayin'
i want rankings to decide who gets into the playoffs to be honest. Say what you want about the BCS but the top 4 ranked teams have always been the top 4 teams.
GoBucksOSU: This is where you and I seem to agree with the SEC. I want the top 4 teams in the playoff, I don't care what conference they're in. Sure, it would be nice to have 4 different conferences represented, but it's even better to have the 4 highest ranked teams. If it means having 2 SEC teams in a year, so be it.
"Attack the Strong, Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead!"
-Former OSU S&C Coach Lichter
I'm with GOBUCKSOSU and 703BUCKEYE! Give me the top 4 teams regardless of whether or not they won their conference. I'd much rather see LSU vs Alabama than LSU vs. whoever won the ACC this year! I know, I know... It would've been a Big 12 or Pac 12 team, but just a hypothetical.
@GABUCK - Out of curiousity, what were your thoughts on Oregon at #5 and Stanford at #4? Oregon beat Stanford, but lost to #5 USC (in AP poll) and #1 LSU, while winning the Pac12; Stanford didn't play for the championship because they lost to #5 Oregon. In your opinion, who had the stronger resume? This is why I like the idea of a selection committee, because I think they would take Oregon here. Again, this isn't a common case, but it merits discussion nonetheless.
You bring up a darn good point Hodge. I think that if the voters had to put the "top 4" teams into the BCS, Oregon would've snuck up to the #4 spot. It's kind of hard to relate the rankings last year to future selection rules, though. Winning your conference and having the head-to-head advantage SHOULD (I say that because who knows what voters will do) get you in.
I read a stat today on one of the ESPN articles that "In the 14 year BCS era, 42 of the 56 teams that finished in the top four of the BCS standings won their conference championship." So, we might not need to worry about a situation like you say where #1 LSU plays a 13th-ranked ACC champ because on average you'll have 3 of the top-4 be conference champions. In general, the final rankings are usually a ranking based on the # of losses you've had. In the case of ties, conference champions will get the nod.
I think if you had a committee last year, we may have gotten LSU, Alabama, OK-St, and Oregon as your playoff teams. I think that would have been just as boring because LSU already played and beat 2 of those teams. But, if the all came out and played like they did in the bowls, Oregon may have won the rematch by a blowout margin, and Alabama-Oklahoma State would have been must-see-TV to see who was really #2...and that's what it's all about.
@Hodge ---- That is a debatable scenario but what is not debatable is "who is better, Alabama or Oklahoma State?". Ok State lost to an unranked 6-7 Iowa State team and Bama barely lost to the #1 team in the country. Tell Ok State that if they did not lose to Iowa State they would have been in the BCS title game. Now about the oregon Stanford issue, I would say Stanford deserved to be higher than Oregon. Simply because Oregon lost 2 games in the regular season and Stanford won @ USC while Oregon lost a home game to USC. #4 Stanford lost a close game to #3 Ok State and #5 Oregon won a close game to #10 Wisconsin. I would say the rankings are accurate.
Of course Bamas wins were much weaker than OK States. Not sure why people keep focusing on who they lost to? How about who they beat based on rankings at the time of the win?
Plus, OK State lost on a last second field goal that might not even have been good.
i personally think Alabama was better, but there is absolutely no proof tha OK State wasn't better than both LSU and Alabama.
GOBUCKS, Oregon clobbered Stanford at Stanford...both tied for 1 loss in the Pac-12, Oregon got the Pac-12 North title in doing so. That has to mean something if we're talking about who gets to go to a playoff. All things being equal (particularly record or what have you), winning a regional championship trophy should (and will) come into play.
The argument about Alabama and Oklahoma State is getting very tired. Alabama beat exactly 3 teams that finished with a winning record. Oklahoma State beat 7. Alabama jumped Oklahoma State in the BCS poll because 4 coaches, including Nick Saban, voted Oklahoma State 4th in the nation instead of 3rd or 2nd. Oklahoma State played a tougher overall schedule according to the computer models.
Maybe it's a good thing that this happened because it means we're getting a playoff out of it.
@CPLUNK - You are absolutly right that there really isn't a way to determine who is better between 2 teams (not in the same conference that don't play each other), but that is exactly the benefit of a playoff. We get to find out!
I guess the point that I was trying to make is that I really like the fact that Delaney pushed for the selection committee. I understand the "best four" sentiment, and am also not ready to concede that all four teams necessariily need to be conference champs. What I do think, though, is that this system will create a better playoff.
As has been previously mentioned, the fact that coaches' polls are used in the BCS rankings has to be the biggest crock of shit in sports. It's an almost ESPN-level conflict of interest. But, at least for me, this in an ancillary concern; there's enough stopgaps in the BCS formula to almost alleviate that issue. My real umbrage with the top four model is one that our own commisioner called out from the get-go; it has the potential to dilute the regular season.
I really like the "best four" sentiment, and in leagues with relative parity (read: the NFL), it works beautifully. The issue with College Football is that it lies on the opposite end of the spectrum, there's absolutely no semblance of parity in Division I. So why is this an issue, you ask? The answer lies in how you can scam the system: by scheduling cupcakes as out-of-conference opponents, a team can easily pad their resume with "style points" whilst simoutaneously securing an unblemished record headed into their conference schedule. This isn't good for anyone, especially fans who will be robbed of marquee out-of-conference matchups like UM/'Bama and LSU/Oregon. With a selection committee, "dark horse" teams willl no longer be held at a disadvantage for not intially being highly ranked. Instead, a select few will determine a team's entire resume: who they beat, by how much, and what they accomplished; a method far superior to the current one--an undecipherable formula being spit out on an excel spreadsheet.
Until I see the BCS buried 6 feet under with a stake in it's heart I won't believe it's dead. At this point I feel like the BCS is like the guy from Monty Python and the Holy Grail: I'm not dead yet! I'm feeling better!
"Anything easy ain't worth a damn." - Wayne Woodrow Hayes