BCS vs. Playoff

[¯\_S.(ツ).L.I.D._/¯]

Hey. So I felt like making a thread about this, because I'm in to college football. I feel like this could be a nice, laid-back discussion about a topic that (hopefully) interests some Debaters in here.

In short:

The BCS is a five-game showcase of college football. It is designed to ensure that the two top-rated teams in the country meet in the national championship game.

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The system also selects matchups for the other prestigious BCS bowl games. The ten teams selected include the conference champion from each of the six BCS conferences plus four others. The BCS was created by formal agreement among six conferences, and has evolved to allow other conferences to participate to a lesser degree.

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Now, in recent years, teams from lesser conferences, especially Boise State from the WAC and TCU from the Mountain West, have performed very well during the season. But because of the fact that they are in these lesser conferences, they have not been included in the National Championship game, despite having undefeated seasons recently.

Basically, it has been suggested that the BCS should be completely scrapped, and instead replaced with a tournament, consisting of 16 teams, that would function like a smaller version of the 64 team NCAA basketball tournament.

This idea was first seriously discussed (to my knowledge) after the 2007 Fiesta Bowl, in which #9 Boise State upset #8 Oklahoma (who was favored by 7.5 points). If put in place, the College Football playoff would give a chance for the top 16 teams in the country to play for the title, and give any of those teams a chance to win the National Championship, as opposed to the current system, which only allows the top 2 teams in the country to play for the title.

Personally, I think the Playoff system would be great. It seems like every sport (other than college football), at a college or professional level, has a playoff system, and I feel like it would greatly benefit college football. Unlike with the BCS, any of the top 16 teams (if that were the size of the playoff) would have a shot at winning the title. The teams from smaller conferences, like Boise and TCU, would have a shot to compete with the big boys as opposed to being stuck in 2nd tier bowls based on the conference they are in and their strength of schedule.

But what do you guys think?

Should the Bowl Championship Series be eliminated and replaced with a Playoff instead?

 

[Jam Stunna]

I've heard some good arguments for and against the BCS, but I definitely think there should be a playoff system. Playoffs are more exciting. Nothing matches the hype and the intensity of March Madness, and that's because of the (good) insanity of 65 teams in a giant playoff. College football would only have 16 teams, but they could still generate alot of excitement and fun as opposed to the BCS, with five games but only one of them really means anything.

Also, the BCS makes the college football season too anti-climactic. Some people argue that because of the BCS, college football is the only sport where every game matters, because only undefeated teams have a shot at the national title. That's true, but it becomes problematic when schools start losing in weeks 6 and 7 and you already know who's going to be in the national title game.

It also creates a problem in the big conferences. Anyone who watches college football knows that the SEC is by far the best football conference in the nation, and you end up in a situation where the SEC title game becomes a de facto national title game. Last year, #1 Alabama and #2 Florida played in the SEC title game, and Florida got bumped from the national title game as a result. Now I'm no fan of Florida, but it seems pretty messed up that Texas got into the national championship game simply because Florida and Alabama had to play their conference game. Big conferences like the SEC and Big East cannibalize themselves, and you end up with #1 facing #2-by-process-of-elimination. It's a broken system.

 

[thegreatkazoo]

Here is some food for thought: Every single single collegiate sport in the NCAA & NAIA has a bracketed playoff system which is primarily seeded by skill. There are variations to it (like with the College World Series), but it follows those guidelines fairly well.

There is only one that doesn't: Division I FBS Football.

 

[KrazyGlue]

I agree there should be a playoff system. While the bowl system has provided some great matchups, teams from confrences like the mountain west are completely neglected by this system. And it's not as if that's a weak conference. Think about it: last year, the mountain west had TCU, Utah, and BYU. They also finished with a 4-1 bowl record, second best of all conferences. Yes, that means they were better than major conferences like the SEC, Pac-10, Big Ten, Big 12, etc.

 

[¯\_S.(ツ).L.I.D._/¯]

I agree there should be a playoff system. While the bowl system has provided some great matchups, teams from confrences like the mountain west are completely neglected by this system. And it's not as if that's a weak conference. Think about it: last year, the mountain west had TCU, Utah, and BYU. They also finished with a 4-1 bowl record, second best of all confeences. Yes, that means they were better than major coferences like the SEC, Pac-10, Big Ten, Big 12, etc.

Exactly. Now imagine if they were put into a playoff. They'd actually have a chance to win. While I agree that bowls have made good matchups, if you think about a playoff, it would create amazing matchups throughout the whole tournament, not just the final. And people would have to fight through the best teams in order to win, not just beat one team in order to win the National Championship. BCS is kind of a joke.