Most Fans of College football want a 16 team playoff (which prove most fans are dumb)

Graham Watson at Yahoo Sports has done a series of blogs about the discussion BCS conferences and how they are most likely moving to a playoff involving 4 teams.  He asked the fans what they wanted and the overwhelming response was summarized by one response.

"A 4 team playoff would be really weak, barely better than what there is now," wrote Andrew from College Station. "8-12 is better, but it would still find ways to snub teams."

Overwhelmingly, those who responded seemed to be in favor of a 16-team playoff (an idea that I liked) that would include all 11 conference champions and five at large teams.

"I would propose a 16 team playoff with each conference champ included," wrote Chris from St. Louis. "The remaining 5 at-large bids would go (to) teams with (the) highest ranking. Would almost always have the top 8 - 10 teams included and give the little guy a shot. Makes winning a conference championship worth something."

I hate this idea because with 5 at large teams it makes the regular season meaningless.  I also hate it because there is no way the MAC, Sunbelt, WAC, Big East, Mountain West, or Conference USA should get an automatic bid.  More than that though it is naive and ignores some really big issues.

Logistics
Currently the college football season starts the last week of August and continues for 14 weeks (12 games and 1 bye plus one week for the conference championships).  To have a 16 team playoff you'd need a 4 week playoff.  Many that propose this system say you should put the conference championships the week after Thanksgiving.  Using this season as an example this would be the schedule:

Start of college football season: August 25th
End of college football season: November 17th
Conference championships: November 24th
1st Round: December 1st
2nd Round: December 8th
Semifinals: January 1st
Championship: January 8th

This would mean a few things.

• The start of camp would be moved into July meaning players which is a time when many of them are taking classes which allows them to take a lighter load during football season.  
• Fans expect the season to start in early September after Labor Day.  Moving it earlier could affect ticket sales/viewing (though I admit this is a weak argument)
• College football's regular season would end on November 17th and bowl bound teams wouldn't have another game for well over a month.

None of these individually is a deal breaker but will be a concern for the presidents/commissioners that run college football.  This will be used as a smoke screen for the bigger issue in the next section.

Revenue Sharing
Most people believe that the only reason the BCS commissioners are meeting is because the BCS system isn't giving us a true champion.  That is important to the commissioners but it's about 10th on their list of importance.  Things above it are all about protecting the regular season, protecting the bowls, and protecting the BCS conferences share of the money.

I've touched on it in other articles but the main reason the commissioners are meeting is 1) the BCS contract is up in 2 years and they need to develop a new one, 2) they are tired of inroads the small conferences have made into college football, and 3) they are worried that the government is going to get involved and force them to do something they don't want to do.

The ratings in the last BCS bowls were terrible and that caused ESPN and the NCAA to panic.  That is why they are meeting but if you think we will ever have a 16 team playoff you are dreaming.

The New College football playoff: Part 3 - How would it look?

Just to see what we might expect, I put together a quick spreadsheet and made a few assumptions.

• I used the last ten years rankings from the BCS 
• All teams are now in their conferences as of 2014 
• Only one team could be a wildcard (non-conference champ) 
• Conference champs were given precidence over other schools 
• The Big 5 conferences were given precidence over the others 

I also made the following assumptions for bowls:

• Rose Bowl will be the site of a semifinal if qualifiers include a B1G and P12 team 
• Cotton Bowl will be the site of a semifinal if qualifiers include a SEC and B12 team 
• Fiesta Bowl is the 1st alternate site for the B1G and P12 
• Sugar Bowl is the 1st alternate site for the SEC and ACC 
• Orange Bowl is the 1st alternate site for the B12 and ACC 

As you can see from the above the SEC has the most appearances followed by the Big 12 then the B1G / Pac 12 and far behind is the ACC.  This seems reasonable based on the results of the past ten years.  I considered putting Notre Dame in for 2005 but think since they aren't in a conference they'd need to finish in the top 4 (Ohio State tronced them in the bowl that year).  The only non BCS team would have been Cincinnati in 2009 (Note: they lost to Florida by 40 in the actual bowl matchup that year).  There were only 12 appearances by non BCS teams in the top 15 with Boise State being 5 of them.

All in all if they go with a system like this I'd like it though as I've said before I'd love an 8 team playoff with the first round on home fields.

The New College football playoff: Part 2 - Money split

One question that has been brought up about the playoff system is how will they split the money.  Estimate are that the payoff will more than double from the $200 million payout of last year.   Like with the bowl matchups there are a few goals here too.

Maximize the money that goes to the conferences that drive the ratings
Don't encourage schools to leave their conference just so they can get additional revenues from the playoff

There won't be a return to the system used in the 70s that the invitees are paid a certain amount as school budgets can't take that kind of uncertainty.  So there will be some sort of guarenteed payout but how to split it and keep most of it from the small guys?

The easy part is already done because they've already eliminated 3 BCS tie in's which will allow the major conferences to be invited to bowls that aren't in the semi's.  For example, I could see something like this:

Rose: Big Ten - Pac 12
Cotton: Big 12 - SEC
Sugar: SEC - ACC
Orange: Big 12 - ACC
Fiesta: Big Ten - Big 12

They could even add bowls to the mix like the Outback with lower payouts with the unwritten rule that if a school outside the top 5 conferences qualify, they'd play there.  That means all the monies from the bowls would be going to the big conferences.

What about the little guys?  They are being paid for their part in the championship process and most importantly the championship game itself.  Let's say of the total $400 million payout that half or $200 is coming from that game.  The question is how do you split that?  One proposal is to use BCS ranking since 1998 as a barometer.



This isn't a bad way but I doubt the Pac 12 / Big Ten will allow a system where they are paid less on a per team basis than their counterparts in the the south.  My guess is they will fix the number on a per team basis for the top 5 conferences for their league size in 2014.  That will discourage anyone from expanding just to expand.  The biggest issue is what to do about leauges like the Big East and Conference USA which shouldn't get a full share.  My suspicion is they will come up with a metric and give percentage based on their alignment in 2014.

A bigger question is BYU.  I'd expect Notre Dame to get something similar to what they get today.  $1-2 million each year plus a full share if they get invited.  BYU is a different case as they don't play well enough to get a full share but the makers of this system don't want to encourage other schools (Boise) to leave their league like BYU just so they get a bigger piece of the pie when the playoff method is finalized.  I'd expect language to fix a school to a conference and for BYU to get something similar to the Big East share.

In the end I'd expect 3 tier system something like this:

Payouts from the 5 bowls: $40 million each / $20 per team invited.
Payout from the Championship:



These are just estimates but it goes where I'd bet they are thinking.  In the end the big conferences end up with almost $360 million of the totall $400 and the small conferences get the scraps.

See what happens small schools when you try to steal the lunch money from a bigger kid?  I wish you luck trying to make it to the playoff as we all know voters are subjective and you know that all ties will favor the big guys.

The New College football playoff: Part 1 - Why?

It has been reported that the college football commissioners have decided a new playoff method and there's a lot of uproar on the interwebs about things that it should be 16, 12 or 8 games but as usual people are missing the point.  This was never about making fans happy or getting a better national champion.  I'm sure the conference commissioners had that somewhere in the back of their mind but moreover they needed a change to the system that would cause 3 things:

• Increase Bowl ratings to make the television networks happy
• Protect them from government interference
• Stop the little conferences from their continued attempts at trying to get more of the BCS money

If fans got a playoff and were happier, that was an ancillary benefit.

In recent years the BCS bowl games have gotten increasingly poor ratings and with matchups like  Cincinnati vs Boise State, is it any wonder?  These teams have complained for years to be included in the BCS but the truth is when they do make it, no one cares.  These schools don't have big alumni or nationwide fan bases and the ratings and attendance for these games show that.  A few years ago UConn had to pay over 1 million dollars to attend the Fiesta bowl because many of their fans didn't buy the 20,000 tickets allotted to them at $100 face value despite it being their first appearance ever in a bowl game.

Money has always made the bowl system work and it works because of the symbiotic nature of a few fans willing to travel to see their teams.  This gives every school with a winning record a nice experience to end the season despite the result on the field.  College presidents, athletic directors, coaches, players, and fans all like the system and despite the clamor for a national playoff, most would hate any system that totally elminated the bowls.

As falling television ratings have shown the BCS to be a failure, what could the conferences commissioners do to make everyone happy.  Their biggest issue is bowls only work for the schools in the major conferences and while many were arguing about different playoff methods, they dealt with this reality.

Their solution is simple in its brilliance.  Get rid of the BCS and return to the 70s with one simple change.  Create a committee that will work with the bowls to place 4 teams with the expectation that the winners would play in the national championship game.

They haven't gone into details but my expectation is certain bowls will be put into the rotation to be included.  Fiesta, Orange, Sugar, Rose, and Cotton with the possible addition of the Outback as Orlando has become a major destination since the bowls were first set up.

Think about what that does.  Let's say the top 4 teams are Ohio State, Alabama, Texas, and USC.  The committee could place those 4 into the Rose and Cotton respectively.  What if it were last year's Alabama, LSU, Oklahoma State, and Oregon.  My expectation would have been LSU-Oklahoma St in the Cotton and Alabama-Oregon in the Fiesta/Orange.  Wisconsin would have played Stanford in the Rose Bowl.

The beautiful thing in the above example is that the Rose and Cotton would be included if both the B1G/P12 or B12/SEC both had teams in the top 4.  If one league were excluded then the secondary bowls would be used instead.  If there were a system like proposed they could also avoid a situation where LSU would be forced to play a team they'd already faced like what happened with both Oregon and Alabama last year.  A committee could make sure the matchup is best for TV.

The key is the bowls along with the committee would determine the matchups.  The part that most people are missing is beyond the bowls chosen for the semi's, the bowls are individual organizations and can invite whomever they want.  Since these are individual enterprises they can invite whoever they want and exclude the little guys.  That protects them from government interference and better yet, makes it easier for the big conferences to keep a lion's share of the money.

In the end this system should be great for college football.  It makes the end of the regular season more important, bowl matchups will be better due to going to a system based on people instead of math, and the government/small conferences won't be able to complain.

It's win/win/win as long as you are in a big conference.

The Big Ten, The SEC, and Bowl Posturing

College football playoff conversations are reaching a fever pitch and like usual people are missing the point.  It's not about making the fairest matchup or protecting the student athlete.  College football hasn't ever been about that.  It's about the money.

Someone made this comment on the Ozone forums:

I thought Delaney conceded on the first round playoff games being played at home (which the SEC was fighting), so we could have a playoff with all conference champions. What happened? It appears the SEC is rolling the B1G again.

And got the following response:

Don't do what the Media Fruit Flies are doing. They are taking public statements as something more than...posturing. It isn't. As Delaney said, none of the people commenting and publishing opinions are "in the room."  The Fruit Flies seem to think that the SEC positioning itself for its perceived best interests is somehow superior to the B1G and PAC 12 doing the same thing. 

I agree with that line but went a little further:

I think most of the posturing is the Big 4 masking figuring a way to exclude the rest of the conferences from the system.  Just an example...

Imagine if the B1G/P12 keep pushing to protect the Rose Bowl and a plus 1 system. Wouldn't that "force" the B12/SEC to put their champions in the new bowl they just announced? It's just too bad they 4 couldn't come to some sort of agreement (snicker). Wouldn't the fact that the winners of these games would most likely face each other a week later in the plus 1 game push the tv money for these 2 games into the stratosphere?  Wouldn't it make most of the other bowls pale in comparison? That would expecially be true if Delany "forced" the SEC to agree that only conference champs could play in the plus 1 game. I'm sure there would be years that a team like Florida State, Miami or Notre Dame (j/k) could sneak in but this is about money not making the fans happy. That will only happen (imo) if they ever to an 8 game playoff but Delany isn't interested in that.

In the meantime, the Big 4 will lament that it is too bad they couldn't come to an agreement as they take their piles of money to the bank and the lesser conferences slip into mediocrity.

One thing I didn't say was just how important do you think the conference championship games would be if they were the "quarterfinals" to these games.  Can you imagine if these 4 leagues agreed not to schedule anything opposite each other and the 4 games ended up in prime time the week after Thanksgiving?  Every day the media would focus on each conference game and the nation would tune in. With Super Bowl ads getting $4 million a minute is it unthinkable that the networks could get $1 million for the 60+ minutes of commercials during these game plus more money for the pre and post game coverage?  The money we are talking about could rise into the stratospheric for the 4 leagues.  Everyone else would be left behind.

It's like an argument I got into on the ESPN forums (pointless but silly fun).  Someone said -

B1G you screwed up by not coming out with one voice as a conference. With this confusion in the B1G, lack of solidarity, compared to the Big 12 And SEC, I am now seeing the big 4 as PAC, Big 12, ACC, SEC.

My response was:

This is all posturing. What they are really doing is giving Delany options so he can try to negotiate for the conference. Delany is the one voice for the B1G and the presidents trust him to get the best deal.

Perlman's comments were the best indicator of this when he made the veiled threat if things didn't go the way they wanted they'd walk away entirely and go back to the old BCS system. Don't believe what you read in these articles. Most of what is released is just conference spin and we have no idea what is going on behind closed doors.

Conversations like this make me laugh as most fans don't think like a commissioner or a college president.  The goal here is to maximize money and there are two goals in the playoff talk -

•  improve their product on New Years Day to improve ratings and 
•  keep as much money in the hands of the conferences that drive television ratings (B1G, SEC, B12, and P12).  

Everything else is secondary and while I'm sure the SEC/B1G aren't 100% in line in their thinking they both have these two goals in mind.  The problem is public opinion and more important is doing this in such a way that the government doesn't have a reason to get involved.

Public bickering is a good smoke screen.

Stay tuned.  It should get interesting to see how this all shakes out but anyone that thinks that Delany and the B1G won't end up with the best deal possible is kidding themselves.