College Playoff

[BB73]

And as a serious fan of football, I still didn't watch very much outside of Ohio State this year.

That statement is oxymoronic to me. If you "didn't watch very much outside of Ohio State this year", I'm reluctant to accept the statement that you're a serious fan of college football.

There are numerous folks on this board who are serious fans of college football. Most watch numerous games each week.

 

[NateG]

There are numerous folks on this board who are serious fans of college football. Most watch numerous games each week.

OOO OOO OOO ME ME ME!!!!!!

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

Auto racing is more inclusive because, during each race, every competitor is competing against every other competitor simultaneously. Not something that can really be replicated in college football, but the nature of the sport clearly allows it to be more inclusive than the college football system.

I don't think you're looking at that quite right. I pointed at auto racing because it - like CFB - illustrates the difference between the haves and have nots. The remark you make is more about differences in how the game is played, not how it works. I mean, no one would put all 120 teams on some gigantic field and have them play until someone wins. No disagreement. But, each race is like each week of the season... any team has a chance to win a game, just as any race care driver has a chance to win the race....

but not really...

Again, this debate entirely centers on how you define legitimacy...... I mean, we're really dealing in opinions here, whether we want to admit it or not.

(Deleted the stuff in the middle of these two paragraphs as a space saving measure.)

OK, let me change my word then from "illegitimate" to deserving. What BCS Champion was "undeserving" All I'm trying to illustrate is that the present system crowns champions just fine, and that there has not been one champion who has been crowned who was underqualified to be there in the first place.

I like that CFB, on some level, seeks to determine which team was the BEST in a given year. Playoffs don't care about who the best is... they care about who the best is right now... or not even that... who's the "hottest" right now. I could give a shit about "hot" and that's a big reason why I don't like the playoff idea. Going 19-1 is more impressive to me than going ... what.... 14-6 or whatever the NYG ended up (counting playoff game wins) The fact that the NYG beat the NE Pats in February instead of December just doesn't "do it" for me.

For my part, I think I've tried to answer this question over and over again. Team #3 in the current system has a claim to the right to compete for a championship more often than not. The further you go out, the more inclusive you get, the less valid that claim is. Team #9's claim in an 8-team playoff system simply is not as compelling as that of Auburn '04 or Cincy '09.

Yes, you, Billmac and LJB have each offered specific ideas and have addressed specific questions or points I have been asking or have made. I was trying to be "diplomatic" when I said "no one form your side"

Your question here is really all about arbitrariness. How does one determine a "deserving" team. Again, arbitrariness will never be eliminated by any system. I think most of us simply find it less arbitrary to be slightly overinclusive than underinclusive. This is because in the overinclusive system the teams that are certainly deserving of a shot at the title (BCS #1 and #2) will still have a chance to win a championship, whereas in the underinclusive system currently in use, there will generally be teams that can make the argument, often in very compelling fashion, that they should receive a shot, but will nevertheless be left out.

Right, which is just a conversation about teams on the bubble complaining. I think you recognize this as you say, arbitrariness won't be eliminated. Being "underinclusive" doesn't bother me - for the reasons I've stated before - it encoruages teams to play more important/difficult schedules, etc..

I suppose the othe thing that bothers me about the playoff side of the aisle is there seems to be some sort of "emotional" componant to it... words like "fair" and "It's not right that so and so got screwed" and "what if it happened to Ohio State"

I guess I'm just not psychologically moved by these concepts in the least. But, I also don't care when a team runs up the score, so....

How about this: An undefeated BCS conference team should never be denied the opportunity to win a championship by beating those teams ranked ahead of them at the end of the regular season. That happens in the current system. That would not happen with an 8-team playoff.

That's fine for what it is.... But, there are seldom more than 2 undefeated BCS teams. Seems to me like it's implementing change owing to the problems of one season as if they were the problem of each.

No one is going to watch Texas/Wyoming anyway, except Texas fans, Wyoming fans, and guys like me, who watched part of that game on a stream because it was unexpectedly close early on. If we had a playoff, I still would have watched that stream because (1) I'm a college football junkie, (2) a huge upset is a huge upset and fun to watch no matter what, and (3) Texas losing to Wyoming could still have very real ramifications regarding who gets in to a playoff, given that we play a 12 or 13 game regular season in college football, not a 30-60 game regular season.

Precisely my point. BB73 actually made it much more directly. The existence of a playoff or not doesn't make Texas Wyoming any more, or less, unwatchable. It depends on who you are.

I don't see how you get here. Pitt and Cinci would have certainly been playing for a spot in the playoffs. Nebraska would have been playing for a spot and had they pulled it off, there would have been a question about whether Texas would get in. Florida and Bama may have both still gotten in, but it still would have been entertaining football and there would have at least been SOME question as to whether the loser would have gotten in. If we had an 8-team playoff, and BCS conference champions get an auto bid, here was the situation going into week 14:

BCS Rankings:

1. Florida
2. Alabama
3. Texas
4. TCU
5. Cincy
6. Boise State
7. Oregon
8. tOSU
9. Iowa
10. Georgia Tech

Conference champions were in. That's 6 teams. Two spots remain. Those realistically vying for those spots included: the loser of the SEC championship game; TCU; Boise State. Point being, the SEC championship game wasn't irrelevant at all. A close game means that the loser may still get in.

Florida fell to #5... that's in the BCS top 8 last I looked. They're in. Cinci maybe would have fallen out, but a Texas loss, I think they're probably still top 8.

I don't know... maybe these games, on the level, would have been just as meaningful if a playoff was implemented instead of the BCS... But, Ohio State Michigan wouldn't have been... Ohio State clinched v. Iowa. Now, as Ohio State fans we can't comprehend The Game not mattering. Trust me, it can lose it's relevence. Don't believe me? Ask the Illibuck.

 

[RhodeIslandBuck]

I don't think you're looking at that quite right. I pointed at auto racing because it - like CFB - illustrates the difference between the haves and have nots. The remark you make is more about differences in how the game is played, not how it works. I mean, no one would put all 120 teams on some gigantic field and have them play until someone wins. No disagreement. But, each race is like each week of the season... any team has a chance to win a game, just as any race care driver has a chance to win the race....

but not really...

(Deleted the stuff in the middle of these two paragraphs as a space saving measure.)

OK, let me change my word then from "illegitimate" to deserving. What BCS Champion was "undeserving" All I'm trying to illustrate is that the present system crowns champions just fine, and that there has not been one champion who has been crowned who was underqualified to be there in the first place.

I like that CFB, on some level, seeks to determine which team was the BEST in a given year. Playoffs don't care about who the best is... they care about who the best is right now... or not even that... who's the "hottest" right now. I could give a shit about "hot" and that's a big reason why I don't like the playoff idea. Going 19-1 is more impressive to me than going ... what.... 14-6 or whatever the NYG ended up (counting playoff game wins) The fact that the NYG beat the NE Pats in February instead of December just doesn't "do it" for me.

Yes, you, Billmac and LJB have each offered specific ideas and have addressed specific questions or points I have been asking or have made. I was trying to be "diplomatic" when I said "no one form your side"


Right, which is just a conversation about teams on the bubble complaining. I think you recognize this as you say, arbitrariness won't be eliminated. Being "underinclusive" doesn't bother me - for the reasons I've stated before - it encoruages teams to play more important/difficult schedules, etc..

I suppose the othe thing that bothers me about the playoff side of the aisle is there seems to be some sort of "emotional" componant to it... words like "fair" and "It's not right that so and so got screwed" and "what if it happened to Ohio State"

I guess I'm just not psychologically moved by these concepts in the least. But, I also don't care when a team runs up the score, so....


That's fine for what it is.... But, there are seldom more than 2 undefeated BCS teams. Seems to me like it's implementing change owing to the problems of one season as if they were the problem of each.


Precisely my point. BB73 actually made it much more directly. The existence of a playoff or not doesn't make Texas Wyoming any more, or less, unwatchable. It depends on who you are.


Florida fell to #5... that's in the BCS top 8 last I looked. They're in. Cinci maybe would have fallen out, but a Texas loss, I think they're probably still top 8.

I don't know... maybe these games, on the level, would have been just as meaningful if a playoff was implemented instead of the BCS... But, Ohio State Michigan wouldn't have been... Ohio State clinched v. Iowa. Now, as Ohio State fans we can't comprehend The Game not mattering. Trust me, it can lose it's relevence. Don't believe me? Ask the Illibuck.

That would have nothing to do with the possibility of having a playoff. Michigan was a bad team this year and Ohio State was a good one, Ohio State had already clinched the Big Ten and the Rose Bowl. As a Buckeye fan, I know that it was a huge game because it's Michigan and in my mind it' always the biggest game of the year, however, in the grand scheme of things, the game really didn't matter. I see now way how The Game could lose it's relevance on a regular basis.

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

That would have nothing to do with the possibility of having a playoff. Michigan was a bad team this year and Ohio State was a good one, Ohio State had already clinched the Big Ten and the Rose Bowl. As a Buckeye fan, I know that it was a huge game because it's Michigan and in my mind it' always the biggest game of the year, however, in the grand scheme of things, the game really didn't matter. I see now way how The Game could lose it's relevance on a regular basis.

All things being equal, you're probably right. I can see a situation where a win over Michigan, even a bad Michigan, might mean a chance to go to the Championship game though, while at the same time - in a PO system - a loss to them means "well, so what? You're still the Big 10's conference champ you're in regardless"

That's what I was trying to illustrate.

Really, as I've contemplated this a little bit this AM - my "real" problem with playoff people isn't so much about the institution of a playoff itself. A few posters have managed to put together situations where a playoff doesn't necessarily take away from the season, etc.

My real problem, I think, stems from the assumption that playoffs are a better way to determine a champ in every situation. They're not. My real problem comes from the idea that football has to be "nice" and include more people. My real problem comes from tossing around words like "fair" when playoffs aren't necessarily so. My real problem comes from the assumption that playoffs generate "true" champions.

At the end of the day, there are workable playoff solutions that wouldn't necessarily kill the things that are presently great about CFB. I have no particular stake in the BCS itself - I just think implementing change for the sake of change, and with the various risks I've outline before, isn't worth it - to the extent that the same problems remain. So, again, it's not necessarily that playoffs won't work.... it's that they're not "better" and they're not "more fair" and they're not a way to generate more legitimate champs.... they're just another way of doing it. I don't mind if people prefer that meathod. But, call it a preference and leave it at that, I guess is my point.

 

[Meyer]

I talked about what I think in another thread about this. Ohio State's games down the stretch this year would have meant a lot more, not only to us, but to everyone around the country because we would have been playing for a playoff berth and a chance at a National Championship. It wouldn't have been just a B10 title and a Rose Bowl berth, it would have been a B10 title and a chance to play our way into the championship. We would have cared ten times more about the games of the teams ranked ahead of us. The teams behind us would have cared ten times more about our games. It makes the season more compelling in my opinion, not less. And then there's the undefeated teams that will be sitting at home watching the National Title game, instead of playing it out on the field.

 

[Meyer]

All things being equal, you're probably right. I can see a situation where a win over Michigan, even a bad Michigan, might mean a chance to go to the Championship game though, while at the same time - in a PO system - a loss to them means "well, so what? You're still the Big 10's conference champ you're in regardless"

Seeding, home field advantage are important in a playoff..

Who would like to see some SEC teams come up here in December for a playoff game??

ME!!!!!!!

 

[sepia5]

All things being equal, you're probably right. I can see a situation where a win over Michigan, even a bad Michigan, might mean a chance to go to the Championship game though, while at the same time - in a PO system - a loss to them means "well, so what? You're still the Big 10's conference champ you're in regardless"

That's what I was trying to illustrate.

Really, as I've contemplated this a little bit this AM - my "real" problem with playoff people isn't so much about the institution of a playoff itself. A few posters have managed to put together situations where a playoff doesn't necessarily take away from the season, etc.

My real problem, I think, stems from the assumption that playoffs are a better way to determine a champ in every situation. They're not. My real problem comes from the idea that football has to be "nice" and include more people. My real problem comes from tossing around words like "fair" when playoffs aren't necessarily so. My real problem comes from the assumption that playoffs generate "true" champions.

BKB--I'm just curious, but would you advocate eliminating the BCS championship game and simply crowning a champion at the end of the regular season? It seems to me that one of your big sticking points is that, with a playoff, the #6 or 7 or 8 team could very well get hot at the right time and win a championship, even though that team wasn't the "best" team all season. (In some situations--generally, where the #6/7/8 team didn't play and lose to any of the teams in front of them during the course of the season--I would challenge the notion that the #1 team at the end of the regular season really is/was "better" than the #6/7/8 team during the course of the season, given the relatively inbred system of scheduling used during the regular season and the horribly soft out-of-conference scheduling employed by some teams. But that is beside the point here.) In other words, you seem to feel that the regular season and the pollsters' impression of that season is a better litmus test for determining a "champion" than a system that uses a regular season to select a number of teams that will compete against one another in a playoff in order to determine a champion. You seem really put off by the notion that a really hot team (think Georgia 2007) could be a good team all season, but really start clicking at the right time and win a championship as a result.

It seems to me that, if you follow through with this reasoning, it's advocate would be in favor of just eliminating the BCS National Championship game and instead either going back to the ordinary bowl system at the end of the year or just crowning a champion at the end of the regular season. Is this where you're at?

 

[sepia5]

Florida fell to #5... that's in the BCS top 8 last I looked. They're in. Cinci maybe would have fallen out, but a Texas loss, I think they're probably still top 8.

Either we or others have gone back-and-forth on much of the rest of your post, but I did just want to point one thing out here. If we're talking about "excitement" as it pertains to the final week of the season, then the proper inquiry is not how the BCS standings shook out after the final week, but how they looked going into the last week of the season. I pointed out why Florida-Bama would have still been an exciting and interesting game with post-season ramifications in my previous post to which you were responding. Yes, it turned out that Florida would have been the last team in an 8-team tourney (the 6 conference champs + BCS #4 TCU + BCS #5 Florida). But there would have been a real question as to what the pollsters would have done with the loser of the SEC championship game. The SEC championship game had tons of ramifications no matter how you looked at it, playoff or not.

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

BKB--I'm just curious, but would you advocate eliminating the BCS championship game and simply crowning a champion at the end of the regular season? It seems to me that one of your big sticking points is that, with a playoff, the #6 or 7 or 8 team could very well get hot at the right time and win a championship, even though that team wasn't the "best" team all season. (In some situations--generally, where the #6/7/8 team didn't play and lose to the #1 team during the course of the season--I would challenge the notion that the #1 team at the end of the regular season really is/was "better" than the #6/7/8 team during the course of the season, given the relatively inbred system of scheduling used during the regular season and the horribly soft out-of-conference scheduling employed by some teams. But that is beside the point here.) In other words, you seem to feel that the regular season and the pollsters' impression of that season is a better litmus test for determining a "champion" than a system that uses a regular season to select a number of teams that will compete against one another in a playoff in order to determine a champion. You seem really put off by the notion that a really hot team (think Georgia 2007) could be good team all season, but really start clicking at the right time and win a championship as a result.

It seems to me that, if you follow through with this reasoning, it's advocate would be in favor of just eliminating the BCS National Championship game and instead either going back to the ordinary bowl system at the end of the year or just crowning a champion at the end of the regular season. Is this where you're at?

Yes, I would have zero problem going back to the "old way" of simply voting for champions like we did before the Bowl Alliance. One of the things I have always loved about CFB is that it attempts to crown a champion which is on some level, and by some measure, "the best" for an entire season, not just some limited handful of games.

Of course I also realize that polling systems have their own problems - some of them significant (ie voter bias) - but pound for pound, they tend to 'get it right' in the long run. The only year I can think of where a team won a MNC which I seriously do not believe was the "BEST" team was BYU 1984. I do like how the BCS has eliminated a BYU sort of champion for all intents and purposes.

Now, can we argue if Ga. Tech or Washington was the better club in 1990 (or 1991?) sure... but they are both "legitimate" in my mind. That is to say, I might think Washington was better, but... It's not like Ga. Tech was some also ran. Their stake on the MNC is 'legitimate' As soon as a playoff crowns some 3 loss team instead of a 1 loss team, CFB will no longer be alone in the sports world as trying to find out who is the BEST team of a particular year.

You can be a champion without being the best. I don't like that.

 

[Meyer]

You can be a champion without being the best. I don't like that.

If you're the clear cut best team in the country, you win the games. Right noww, you can be a champion without being the best. I would venture a guess that a playoff determines who is the best more than a computer.

 

[scarletmike]

Except that everyone is human and that undefeated team WILL have an off night. They may have avoided that bad night for 11, 12, even 13 games. Add another 3 games in with a playoff, and especially in football, the chance that the team will have their off night increases by quite a bit.

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

If you're the clear cut best team in the country, you win the games. Right noww, you can be a champion without being the best. I would venture a guess that a playoff determines who is the best more than a computer.

If your first statement is true, then there is no need for a playoff (or any post season at all). Your second statement is wholly unsupported, as there has been NO BCS champion which was not in the conversation as the best team in the nation. Your third statement is also wrong in as much as my second statement is true, and playoffs give us Villanova 1985 possibilities.

In short, you'd have been better off not to post that one.

Though, I would like to hear what's so wrong with Computer rankings. I mean, I know it's en vogue to say computers suck... but.. what's the problem with them specifically? In as much as they are merely a factor, and not the sole determining factor, I guess I am unmoved...

 

[Zurp]

Though, I would like to hear what's so wrong with Computer rankings. I mean, I know it's en vogue to say computers suck... but.. what's the problem with them specifically? In as much as they are merely a factor, and not the sole determining factor, I guess I am unmoved...

1. I like the computer rankings. And I dislike that they have a diminished part of the BCS standings, compared to the human polls since the 2003 formula.

2. I think that most people don't like that the computers don't actually watch the games. The No. 1 team can kick a last-second field goal to beat the No. 25 team, or they can pummel them for 60 minutes, and the computers won't know the difference. Fans think that the last-second field goal scenario warrants some slip in the polls, which is no more likely to occur in the computer rankings.

3. I think you're right. It's "en vogue" to hate the computer rankings. The human polls come out at the beginning of the season, and we all know where our teams stand before the season even begins. However, the computer rankings come out 7 or 8 weeks into the season, and they don't necessarily match up with the human polls. Stinky State University wins a couple of big games early, and is ranked Number 1, whereas they are just cracking the top-25 in the human polls because no one has actually watched their games.

4. That may be the first time I ever said "en vogue". But I don't think it counts, since I was just quoting BKB.

 

[Buckeyefrankmp]

3. I think you're right. It's "en vogue" to hate the computer rankings. The human polls come out at the beginning of the season, and we all know where our teams stand before the season even begins. However, the computer rankings come out 7 or 8 weeks into the season, and they don't necessarily match up with the human polls. Stinky State University wins a couple of big games early, and is ranked Number 1, whereas they are just cracking the top-25 in the human polls because no one has actually watched their games.

We all know that teams get ranked at the start of the year for various reasons. Some of them include what they did the previous year, school reputation and history, conference affiliation, and coaching personalities. Who was in this year's preseason top ten that should not have been? USC, Oklahoma (I understand that Bradford's injury had something to do with their downfall.), Virginia Tech, Mississippi, Oklahoma St. Who was left out of the preseason top 10 rankings that ended up there? Cincinnati, TCU, Oregon, Boise St. So in fact, we do know where we stand, but we don't know where we should stand.