Current system too good for college football?

[CJHawkeyes]

This is the worst competitive format in sports history and these sleazeballs pretend they are protecting the game when nothing they do serves its best interests. I'm especially sick of hearing how a larger playoff won't end the controversies. Controversy exists under any format only because the rules allow teams that miss the playoffs to adopt any argument to justify their inclusion. Subjectivity creates controversy because it does nothing to define the difference between winning and losing. Anyway, I'm just sick of the dishonest arguments.


http://collegefootball.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=804383

[GatorGrad]

good article

[CJHawkeyes]

I found the opposing sentiment described at the end of the piece interesting.



I tried wrapping my head around this from the perspective of my own school, UGA. We hardly ever sell out basketball games. This is, in large part, because not only are the Dogs not a perennial NCAA tournament team, they're not even a perennial NIT team.

Had this plus-one, 4-team playoff proposal been in place for the past, say, 30 years, it's safe to say that in the years between Herschel and Richt, Georgia would not have even sniffed a chance to participate in the mini-championship tournament. How would that have affected attendance?

In 1991, $3.7 million was spent to increase Sanford capacity to 85,434, following 6-6 in 1989 and 4-7 in 1990.

In 1994, luxury skybox were added after 1993's 5-6 season (the Olympics had something to do with that, but they certainly expected to be able to use them after 1996).

In 2000, the number of luxury skybox suites was almost doubled, following 1999's 8-4 season (smack in the middle of a streak of losses to Tennessee, Florida, Auburn, and Tech - granted, Donnan was 4-0 in bowl games, but you can't lose to those four on a consistent basis and expect to remain employed).

Any time new seats were added, they sold. No question. Never any doubt.

If UGA was nowhere near getting a chance to play in a plus-one championship format during those years, they were obviously even more distant from having a chance at a championship under whatever format existed. What was the effect of this tradition of mediocrity (that might be generous) on ticket sales? Ticket sales went up to meet increasing capacity at every opportunity.

Would that happen at Florida Atlantic? Maybe not. But I don't remember seeing anywhere in that article where anyone asked the Sun Belt commissioner what he thought of Slive's proposal.


What middling programs is he talking about that won't sell out anyway? The dishonesty is so ridiculous. Under my system, 22 different shools finished in top two the past 30 seasons whereas 85 different schools finished in the top 16 and that is without auto bids. Is he suggesting fanbases will shrink if more programs get to experience the playoffs? Take the Sun Belt, their fanbases will shrink if their conference title is worth an auto berth to the playoffs? Besides that, wouldn't tv rights to nonBCS games increase in value if these schools are battling for five playoff berths as opposed to the lowest paying bowl games. It is unbelievable that he thinks fans will abandon their teams because the definition for success will go beyond a glorified consolation game.

[EvilVodka]

What middling programs is he talking about that won't sell out anyway? The dishonesty is so ridiculous. Under my system, 22 different shools finished in top two the past 30 seasons whereas 85 different schools finished in the top 16 and that is without auto bids. Is he suggesting fanbases will shrink if more programs get to experience the playoffs? Take the Sun Belt, their fanbases will shrink if their conference title is worth an auto berth to the playoffs? Besides that, wouldn't tv rights to nonBCS games increase in value if these schools are battling for five playoff berths as opposed to the lowest paying bowl games. It is unbelievable that he thinks fans will abandon their teams because the definition for success will go beyond a glorified consolation game.

MAC and Sun Belt teams would quickly gain attendance if they were playing in games that gave them berths to a championship...

IMO, the problem is wrapping a playoff around the bowl system...I just don't think you can just clean the slate and start a 16 team playoff...the system will have to evolve towards something like a bigger playoff, and in that sense, the BCS honchos are correct in their sense that it won't stop at 4

[CJHawkeyes]

MAC and Sun Belt teams would quickly gain attendance if they were playing in games that gave them berths to a championship...

IMO, the problem is wrapping a playoff around the bowl system...I just don't think you can just clean the slate and start a 16 team playoff...the system will have to evolve towards something like a bigger playoff, and in that sense, the BCS honchos are correct in their sense that it won't stop at 4

I agree with this. In fact, I don't want a 16 team playoff wrapped around the bowl system. That said, the people in charge of this sport do not care about it all. They live to protect their power and the bottom line. Even without a playoff, this sport could be so much better, but its leaders seem to push it further and further away from a sport that values competition.

[ZOOMBAG]

South Carolina sold out their 80,000 seat stadium in a 0-12 season. I don't think UGA missing the playoffs would have any effect on their ticket sales.