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Excellent college football playoff column

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by IGotQuestions, Nov 27, 2007.

  1. da man

    da man Well-Known Member

    Why does a playoff mean there are no other bowls? Why can't non-playoff teams get bowl bids just like non-BCS bowl teams do now?

    The SEC and Big 10 could still have seven teams playing in December and January. The Holiday Bowls of the world won't mean any less in that scenario than they do now.
     
  2. rascalface

    rascalface Member

    So long, New Year's Day as a college football holiday.
     
  3. da man

    da man Well-Known Member

    Hasn't that already been watered down in recent years with the championship game and other bowls being played after Jan. 1?
     
  4. Oz

    Oz Well-Known Member

    It's already dead. Remember when the Cotton, Citrus and Gator bowls went early, with the Rose and Fiesta bowls mid-afternoon and the Orange and Sugar bowls in prime time? Or when the Fiesta made you decide among three games in prime time? Long gone.

    This year -- or season, more accurately -- there will be six New Year's Day bowls. The Cotton and Outback bowls will start in the 11 a.m. hour (Eastern time) with the Gator and CapOne bowls at 1 p.m. That leaves the Rose at 4:30 p.m. and the Sugar at 8:30 p.m. And if those prime-time games are blowouts, there are no others options, you're stuck.

    Same applies to the bowls that follow New Year's Day, which are the Fiesta (Jan. 2) and Orange (Jan. 3) this season. And that's not even taking into account the BCS title game on Jan. 7, which means six of the best teams in the country will not be playing on New Year's Day.

    The holiday that was New Year's Day college football died years ago.
     
  5. Baron Scicluna

    Baron Scicluna Well-Known Member

    I don't think you'll see a college football playoff for some time, and here's why. I think I read it in a Sports Illustrated or something, although my memory is a little hazy:

    About 10-15 years ago, an NCAA committee was all set to send to the membership approval for a playoff. The committee members were all excited over the potential revenue that a playoff would produce. However, the one 'student-athlete' on the committee (I think it was Derrick Brooks, who was at Fla. St. but I could be wrong), asked one simple question: "What's in it for the players?"

    Some committee guy started telling Brooks about how honorable it would be for players to compete in a playoff. Brooks pointed out how players would have to practice for another month, without additional compensation, and have a higher risk of injury, and thus, hurting potential NFL careers.

    The committee, which didn't want to look at the issue of paying players, decided not to approve a playoff.
     
  6. MU_was_not_so_hard

    MU_was_not_so_hard Active Member

    Bill Curry's being interviewed on Mike and Mike right now and he just threw out a couple of major economic issues AGAINST having a playoff. One of the things he brought up was Title IX.
     
  7. D-Backs Hack

    D-Backs Hack Guest

    It was a nicely-written column, but a 16-team playoff with automatic bids to all 11 conference champions? Wetzel's not exactly breaking new ground here.
     
  8. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    I heard that interview, Curry made great points with those economic issues but Golic and Kuselias blew right past many of them to go back to their "settle it on the field" arguments and questions about specific matchups current to this season. That crap is just so tiresome. I'm a mature enough sports fan (I'm a man! I'm 33!) to handle a reasonable discussion about season lengths, economics and academics, why can't anyone discuss that instead of creating brackets or scenarios or harping on whatever-team-No. 3 that will be left out of the national title game? Of course, the latter is the cheap and easy way out and plays to the lowest common denominator, i.e. the jilted fan whose 11-1 team was left at the altar.
     
  9. Boobie Miles

    Boobie Miles Active Member

    Exactly. That's the lamest excuse people against the playoffs use -- that the other bowls will mean less. Ignoring the fact that they mean next to nothing right now.

    I think maybe you play the first round of a 16 team tourney on campus and then play the next three rounds at pre-determined sites. That way even say the Orange Bowl as a national semifinal game means much more than whatever two teams are playing in it this year.

    As for the money I don't understand why there's automatically more in a bowl system than a playoff? As I said I don't understand all of the economic ramifications of both, but it would seem to be tv ratings would be bigger for a playoff, hence greater money.

    And I don't buy the Brooks/players thing. Might have happened, but every other college sport has a tournament, including I-AA, so the players would adjust
     
  10. BBJones

    BBJones Guest

    There certainly could still be bowls, but the interest level, already very small for many of them, would shrink even more. And what interest would the networks have in paying to broadcast games with even less meaning than they already have?
     
  11. BBJones

    BBJones Guest

    There wouldn't be more in a bowl system -- just more for the power confernences. This is why Delaney torpedoes playoff ideas. It would cost the Big Ten millions. Believe me, these numbers have been crunched. If a playoff were more profitable, there would be one.
     
  12. beefncheddar

    beefncheddar Guest

    When will there be a playoff?

    When the NCAA and all its member institutions believe there will be one cent more made through a playoff than through the bowl system.
     
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