College Bowl Championship Playoffs - Demystified

Let's get to the brass tax on this whole College Bowl Playoff Championship madness.  To understand it, a little history is in order.  

Years ago, like, before 1998, college football teams would play their regular games, week in and week out.  This was before 24 hour tv, the early days of ESPN, and frankly, a period of years when college football took place on SATURDAYS, and we focused on other things during the rest of the week, like feeding our families, mending socks, and trying to figure out if Captain Kangaroo was a creepy old guy or not.  Nowadays, we have college football on weeknights, all day Saturday, and yes, the "big game" every Saturday night. 

 


So back in the good old days, after the games had been won or lost, two groups of "voters" would cast their votes for the top teams.  There was, and still is, the AP poll, made up of sports writers, and the Coaches poll, made up of.....ok, nevermind.

By the end of the season, enough teams had lost enough games that the Champion would boil down to maybe three teams who had remained undefeated through the regular season.   They would all move on to their respective bowl games, not necessarily playing other undefeated teams, but at the end of the day, or at the end of the bowl games, ideally someone was left as the last team standing.  If more than one team ended up undefeated, the AP pollsters and the Coaches went back to the polling booth to cast votes for the winner.  Wierd right - voting on who wins - WHO DOES THAT?  (block out the presidential election for the moment).

So in the 90's, we couldn't take any more of it.  I don't mean we moms, I mean, we, as a nation, who love a clear winner with no controversy or question about exactly who was the winner. (block out the 2000 presidential election) 




You see, a lot of times, when the AP and Coaches finished their final poll, the argument continued.  So in 1998, the official BCS (Bowl Championship Series) began.  This arrangement allowed for a National Championship game to be played at one of the four major bowls each year, allowing for, yes, you guessed it, a clear winner.

Not so fast.  The argument continued, because those teams who ended up on the championship game were still being decided by voting each week.  Why not just the schedule?  Well not all of the teams play each other.  So, for example, if Ohio State is undefeated, and Notre Dame is undefeated, and Georgia Tech is undefeated, who are the two teams to get to go?  Voting.  It just wasn't fair.  The votes were often based on something called, "strength of schedule."  In other words, whichever team had played the harder schedules were the ones who received the most votes.  But of course, everyone has a different opinion as to who had the toughest schedule and so on.  I like to thinkof it in this way:

Let's say your daughter, and your sister's daughter are both trying out for the school musical.  Your sister lives in Beaverdale, IA, population 952.  You live in Cleveland.  Your daughter scores the lead in the musical, beating out 52 other amazing girls all of whom have trained for a minimum of 7 years each.  Your niece beat out one other gal who showed up late and wears a mowhawk.  Your sister comments, "Talent must just run in our genes!" 
You want to punch her.  Her "strength of schedule" was nothing compared to yours.  So even though the national championship game seemed like a solution to the problem, it wasn't, because several teams played kids with mowhawks, so to speak. 

Now, the solution is to have a four team playoff, and the two teams who win the semi finals will play in the championship game.  Easy right, no controversy?  Hardly.  For some reason the powers that be did not want to rely on the AP or Coaches poll, so instead, they formed their own committee of experts.  These folks have been tossing out their "top four" for several weeks and the madness is even worse.  They announced today the final four who will go into the playoffs - Alabama, Oregon, Ohio State and Florida State.  TCU (Texas Christian Univ) and Baylor got hosed.  Tune in to any sports station and you will hear the ongoing debate.  uffice it to say the discussion and controversy will go on year in and year out. 

This entire discussion does bring about one option.  Not for football, but for the presidential election - instead of voting, let's just have a punt, pass and kick competition between the candidates.  May the best man, woman, or team win.