BCS again dismisses fans by turning down playoff proposal

Even more interesting than the rejection of the concept of a plus one playoff system are the excuses that some of the participants are giving for refusing to even put it up for a vote. According to John Swofford (commissioner of the ACC and BCS coordinator) only the SEC and ACC representatives wanted to continue the discussion. Evidently talk isn't that cheap afterall.

Jim Delany, the Big Ten Commissioner, was quoted as saying that a 4 team playoff like the plus one formula would quickly lead to expansion to a 8 to 16 team playoff system and stain college football with a brush of professionalism. Maybe we need to eliminate playoffs for Division 2 and Division 3 football. That would help keep professionalism out of the game at that level.

Delany also was convinced that the current system is what the people want because the revenue continues to grow every year. Evidently what we were all starved for was more bowl games because the NCAA agreed to add two more bowls to the plethora of nameless faceless matchups between two 6-6 teams. I have already set my TIVO to record every second of both of them! I am particularly thrilled with the idea of the Congressional Bowl in Washington D.C. Who says there is a no win attitude in our nations capital?

A college president said that a 4 team playoff would dilute the regular season of college football. I am sure that if neither Ohio State or Michigan were in a position to play for a championship, the game would be played in an empty stadium without television coverage. Yea, that's going to happen.

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Several spokespeople for college football suggested that the Big 10 and Pac-10 would resist a playoff because it would detract from the tradition of the Rose Bowl. Of course those conferences jumped into the BCS even though it would mean the traditional matchup would be lost every 4th year. Money seems to count more than tradition. I wonder just how long it will be before the Rose Bowl will become the Flowers.com Bowl to pay the conferences more money. That of course would do nothing to dilute the tradition of the game.

Can anyone really look at March Madness and believe that a real playoff in college football would not capture the total nation in the excitement? If the BCS is working so well, let's cancel the NCAA Tournament and let the BCS formula or the power rankings determine which two teams play for the basketball championship. Look at all the time we could save for the fans so that they could do their St. Patrick's day shopping.

The NCAA and the BCS are moving into K-Mart mentality. K-Mart forgot who their customers were and started to see themselves as an upscale store. They replaced their lower cost goods with designer fashions and drove their company into financial disaster.

The fans want a playoff system. Most of the 119 Division I-A/Football Bowl Subdivision schools want a playoff. There's no reason that the BCS could not structure a playoff in a way that benefits all parties, but as long as the current BCS system is making people rich and benefitting the main power conferences we're not going to see a change anytime soon.

by Bill Smith
CollegeSports-fans.com Staff Writer

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro football teams and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://BrutusReport.com and has published several novels on http://ebooks-library.com/index.cfm.