So much for the argument against playoffs
Posted by BillFromTampa
An argument from the anti-playoff crowd is that players would miss class.
Well, the Cotton Bowl that has never kicked off a game later than 3:30 on New Year’s Day announced today that the game starting in 2011 will be played on January 7th which for many schools is the first week of classes of the winter semester.
By my ad-hoc count that would make at least three college games being played after Jan 1.
That, in my opinion, shoots the argument against having college football playoffs out of the water.
So it’s got to be about one thing because it sure isn’t about worrying whether the players miss class or not. Money. When the powers that be get the price they like then that’s when you will see a playoff.
That’s also when they need to start paying the players. But that’s a different topic altogether.
Just for the record, I’m against a college playoff as well. But only because I think it would take away from the playoff format we already have called the 12 game regular season.
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Nole4ever on 
Luvunoles on 
Abe Fr0man on 
CC, if a playoff were just started the week after the conference championship games, what would be the problem? It wouldn’t run any longer than the BCS does now, and there could still be bowl games at the same times for those not in the top 8 or whatever the criteria.
DK,
You’ll have to ask Bill From Tampa what he thinks (he posted this) for his opinion.
My unrelated opinion is that an 8 team playoff still forces us into a BCS like situation for the #7 and #8 team. A 12 or 16 team playoff would get all of the conference champs and some at larges, but then you’re in the position of having the tournament run longer.
BFT,
The argument of classes and players is so phony, I completely agree. It’s one of those things that makes me laugh, much like how it’s okay for schools to sell images of players, but nobody else. It’s not about protecting the student athlete, it’s about protecting the almighty dollar.
DK
Whether it is 8 or 16 teams I don’t know if that can work in terms of incorporating the bowl games into them. I don’t think you can ask fans to travel to neutral sites in consecutive weeks. Most people don’t have that much time or money.
And I don’t see them having the games at the home of the highest seed b/c that eliminates the bowl games (of which there are too many of them now IMO). So that would take us back to adding more games and I don’t think you could do more than 4 teams if they want to keep the bowl games.
This plus one format has really mucked up the works IMO.
The whole thing is a nightmare.
I agree with you on neutral sites being a bad idea, because the fans simply won’t go more than once or twice per year, especially in this economy.
What I would propose would be to have the BCS games as the quarterfinals, which would be neutral sites right after the conference title games, and then maybe to have the semifinals at the higher seed (which would raise controversy, I’m sure), and then to have the championship as they always do, at the pre-determined bowl location. I think the season would run the same length, and then bowl week could be the week before the national championship game. Obviously there are still problems, but this is what I’ve thought about.
For that to work here’s my opinion. Obviously with just 8 teams you leave out some conferences of the playoff. I think you would have to give those conferences left out a cut of the take those games will generate. That I’m sure would be a sticking point for some.
Yeah, the money would definitely be the determining factor. It would be interesting to see how they would determine the 8 teams, whether they’d use the automatic conference bids they have now, or just top 8 BCS overall, I’m not really sure of the best manner of selection. But however they’d do it, I’d prefer it to the system we have now.
If there was a playoff my initial preference would be the top ranked eight teams in the BCS poll although I see problems with that. I have thought about the automatic bids of the conference champ of the top conferences. There are only 6 of those however. And what do you do about ND?
If I’m doing it, I’ll take the top 6 conference champs and then the top 2 BCS teams left. To ND I’d say tough luck, basically. If they’re good enough, they’ll be in that top 2, and if they’re not, it’s their fault. It’ll be tougher on them for choosing not to be in a conference and raking in the money they do with their TV deal. They play a watered down schedule, too.
The problem with ND is when they are good (or even when they are bad) they have a huge following. The old joke was ND always plays a home game even when they aren’t playing in South Bend. So that’s a huge audience to toss aside. I’m not saying it’s right b/c I’m not a fan of ND at all. But college football is business like it or not.
I agree, it would draw some controversy. But i think that their hype is so big, even in a season where they had one loss, they’d be ranked highly enough to get into the playoff.
Oh no question a one loss ND team would get into a playoff. And then watch the controversy explode if say Fresno State goes undefeated but is left out of the playoffs. I don’t think there is a perfect solution the way college football is set up. And really I would not like to see a clone of the NFL if that is what they have to do to make a playoff system work.
What do you guys think about something like this:
1. Shorten the season by 1-2 games (basically ditch the crappy 1-2 non-conference games that most teams play. This hurts FSU in the sense we’d miss out on some good teams, but it would allow Florida to remain on the schedule).
2. Force all conferences to have a Championship Game the week before the playoffs start.
3. A 16 team playoff including all Conference Champions and 5 at-large slots. The BCS formula can be used to determine the seeding of 1-16. This would take place the first 3 weeks of December and the first weekend of January for the championship.
4. Higher seeds play home games.
For this to work, the sponsors of the playoffs would have to pay for team travel expenses, imho. Also, I think the generic pot of money the teams get goes to the conference for the conference to determine how to split it up. IE, pool all the money all of the teams get from your conference for the playoffs.
I’d like to see it. The problem I see is revenue. Fewer home games means less revenue for the programs. So, the teams with home games in the playoffs would want the revenue from those. But, so would the BCS because they only end up getting one neutral site game rather than 4. And most teams would have lost the home game revenue for good.
Yeah, the revenue thing I think would be an issue esp with escalating costs on such things as coaches’ salaries and facilities.