I absolutely love college football during the regular season and absolutely hate college football when the post-season comes around. The BCS and the college bowl system make my stomach churn for a number of reasons.
Corporations Have Completely Taken Over Post-season Play:
Each time I hear the name of a corporation in front of a bowl game, I am convinced even more that the people in control of this ridiculous system care more about making money than they do about the student athletes. Example #1- Bowl representatives justify picking School A over School B to play in their game because School A’s fans will travel, and sell its allocated amount of tickets and School B won’t. Example #2- Some of the companies sponsoring these bowl games are virtual no names until bowl season rolls around and then we are bombarded with their commercials.
Chik-Fil-A and Outback Steakhouse (even though red meat is restricted from my diet) are two of my favorite places to eat and I do not personally have a problem with TicketCity, TaxSlayer.com, Bell Helicopter, Franklin American Mortgage, GoDaddy.com, BBVA Compass, Little Caesars, Famous Idaho Potatoes, Northrop Grumman, Gildan, R+L Carriers, or the San Diego County Credit Union. These companies may provide products and services beneficial to society in general, but corporations combined with college athletics are totally wrong. The only thing these companies should do to promote themselves is stand in line to hire these student athletes when their playing days are over.
Awarding Mediocrity:
30 bowl games are way too many for even a college football fanatic like me. A team that has a 6-6 record has no business playing in the post season what so ever. It reminds me of today’s version of little league sports, when everybody gets awarded for participating. Other than the teams and their fans, nobody wants to see 6-6 teams like Ohio State, Florida, Arizona State, Purdue, Iowa State, Illinois, Mississippi State, Wake Forest, Texas A&M, or Northwestern play in a meaningless bowl game.
A Playoff Makes Sense:
The BCS method for determining the national championship is the worst system in all of sports. College football does not need mathematicians, gurus, computers, or some complicated formula to determine which teams get a shot at playing for the national championship. A playoff system works well at every level of college football accept at the major college football level because playing in a bowl and the money involved is more important to some people than doing what is right by the student athletes. Major college basketball, baseball and hockey have playoff systems that work extremely well. With the exception of the college basketball selection process, very seldom do people complain about which teams make the playoffs and which teams don’t.
Ridiculous Layoff:
A three, four, and potentially five week layoff makes this system even more absurd. Imagine this; if we had five weeks between the end of the NFL season and the Super Bowl? Or if the top two teams in each conference played in the Super Bowl after the end of the NFL regular season and likewise in the NBA? Or if the number one and two ranked teams in college basketball or college baseball played for the national championship when the regular season ended?
These few reasons exemplify just how messed up the major college football system is. The student athletes who are bringing in millions of dollars to these universities have no say in a system that only benefits the rich and powerful.
Originally published by Steve Maynor Jr. on January 5, 2012 via Blogger.com
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