Best Of Both Worlds?

Ed Goren, the president and executive producer of Fox Sports, recently granted an interview to John Henderson of the Denver Post in which Mr. Goren discussed the new Bowl Championship Series television contract, which moves to Fox this season. Fox's new deal coincides with the advent of the "double-hosting" format, wherein the four BCS money bowls - the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta, and Rose - will take turns hosting a 1-versus-2 BCS National Championship Game one week after the bowl game itself. The first of these championship games will take place at the new Cardinals Stadium in Glendale, Arizona on January 8, 2007, one week after the Fiesta Bowl at the same site.

Football watchers, including Henderson, might wonder if Fox, the network that brought you music under highlights, glowing pucks, and "American Idol," plans to lobby the BCS and/or conference administrators for another BCS 'tweak,' one that could better ensure a return on Fox's investment by guaranteeing a true 1-versus-2 title game every year. Something resembling, say, a playoff system.

"First off, I do not believe we have a lot of influence," Mr. Goren said in response. "When we negotiated this deal we were very specific: It's your event. It's your sport. If you want suggestions along the way, we certainly have opinions. But we don't run it. And we're happy with the way it is right now."

'Right now,' in this case, is the honeymoon period of a new contract, just a few months after the BCS produced perhaps the greatest national championship game of our lifetimes. It would be much tougher, as Henderson pointed out, for Fox to "stand on the sidelines" had this deal been signed after the 2001 season, when Nebraska played for the BCS title despite getting creamed by Colorado just weeks earlier. Or, for that matter, after the '03 season, when Oklahoma reached the BCS title game after being hammered by Kansas State in the Big 12 Championship game.

Not even the staunchest BCS critics could argue that Texas-USC was the wrong game in '05. If I were Mr. Goren, I'd be pretty happy right now, too.

(Seeing as how Mr. Goren is the head sports honcho at Fox, the parent company of Sun Sports, may I add that he's a handsome man, a snappy dresser, and an excellent dancer.)

The NCAA conducts national championships in a playoff format in more than 30 sports at the Division I level, including rifle, skiing, field hockey, and little shindigs they call March Madness and the College World Series. In Division I-AA, Division II, and Division III, football joins the list as a playoff sport. Under the NCAA's broad playoff scope, D-I football stands alone.

Reasons for avoiding a D-I football playoff have been well-documented. The D-I conference commissioners and school presidents fall back on this one: a playoff system would extend the season through December and potentially into January, placing undue pressure on student-athletes during exams.

Funny, you rarely hear such concern from the presidents of schools in I-AA, D-II, or D-III, all of whom have student-athletes competing for spots in a football playoff that extends through late December. I guess the curriculum at schools like Furman, Hobart, and Johns Hopkins - all playoff teams last year - is far less rigorous than that of the AP Top 25.

Riiiight.

Questions of scheduling aside, the most powerful deterrent for a D-I playoff system was clearly expressed in the Denver Post article by Pac-10 Commissioner Tom Hansen, who laid it out in a refreshing - and perhaps inadvertent - display of honesty:

"We much prefer the bowl system. It's my feeling, and shared by many, that if you had a playoff, say eight teams, most of the bowls would go away because they'd be pretty much inconsequential."

And there you have it. First rule of investigative journalism: follow the money.

Bowl games make money. They make money for local organizers, for the communities that host them, and for the teams that play them. If that weren't true, there wouldn't be thirty of 'em scheduled this fall. Further, bowl organizers know that the way to maximize impact (and profit) is to position the game as the ultimate goal; the last stop for the two teams involved. They fear that a subsequent playoff would render their bowl game irrelevant. Fair enough.

But what if we could have it both ways?

Let me introduce you, via blog, to MSgt Charles T. ("Tom") Rados of the United States Air Force. MSgt Rados lives in Fort Walton Beach, and is a "dedicated fan of college football," as he told me in an e-mail last December. In that e-mail, and in follow-up documents that displayed an impressive level of research, Tom has attempted to create a Division I football playoff system that keeps the current bowls intact, but still crowns a national champion via playoff. He used last year's schedule as his example, and created a bracket that resulted in, yep, Texas versus USC. I've combed it several times, and will lay it out here, with a couple of personal tweaks. MSgt Rados's comments are noted in italics.

A few qualifiers:

-D-I teams must be limited to 11 regular-season games. Right off the top, that's a serious hurdle. The 12th game is potentially one more home game for a power program like Florida, Florida State, or Miami; one more chance to sell 70,000+ tickets, three and a half hours' worth of TV/radio/in-stadium advertising, and tons of food, drink, and souvenirs. Home games make money, too. But in the spirit of competition: how about 11 meaningful regular-season games?

-Under this format, teams must win their conference to qualify for the playoffs. Independent teams will be at the mercy of the BCS rankings. That produces 11 conference champs, and 11 playoff berths.

-Five at-large bids will be filled using the current BCS ranking system, giving us a 16-team field for our Division I playoff.

-Among those 16 teams, the BCS standings will determine seeding. Teams that made the field of 16 but were not ranked in the BCS will be placed on the ladder according to overall record, with ties broken by conference record. Using that criteria, here's how the first round would have looked in 2005, based on actual performance of the teams involved (the number before each team is their mythical playoff seed):

1 USC vs. 16 Arkansas State
8 Miami vs. 9 Auburn
5 Oregon vs. 12 Florida State
4 Ohio State vs. 13 Boise State
6 Notre Dame vs. 11 TCU
3 Penn State vs. 14 Tulsa
7 Georgia vs. 10 West Virginia
2 Texas vs. 15 Akron

Two notes on the mythical 2005 bracket: one, a Miami-Auburn first-round matchup is an excellent example of why I'm warming to this idea. And two, kinda eerie that Georgia and West Virginia, who met for real in the '05 Sugar Bowl, meet in the first round here.

What next, MSgt Rados?

The first round of the playoffs would be home games for the higher seeds. I'm not sure about that one. One reason why the 5-12 matchup at March Madness is considered even money is precisely because of the neutral site. On last year's schedule, opening round games would be played on December 10th, one week after most conference championship games.

For simplicity, I picked all the higher seeds to win...teams that lost in the opening round still qualify to play in a bowl game.

Interesting. We have 8 first-round winners, so we'll need four bowl-playoff games for the second round. The 8 first-round losers may now accept bids for bowl games that do not factor into the playoff system that year. In a sense, the first-round losers could have as many as three postseason games: their conference championship game (if they have one), their first-round loss, and a subsequent bowl game.

After the first-round games, the bowls not included in the playoff bracket start extending their bids, and the non-playoff-bowl season goes off as usual. Meanwhile, the winners in the first round move on, playing each other according to seeding. Here's MSgt Rados's scenario from 2005, with games played on December 17th:

1 USC vs. 8 Miami - Poinsettia Bowl
5 Oregon vs. 4 Ohio State - Music City Bowl
6 Notre Dame vs. 3 Penn State - Motor City Bowl
7 Georgia vs. 2 Texas - Cotton Bowl

His note: I picked the [second-round] playoff bowl games at random, trying to provide a close home game for the higher-seeded team. This does not have to be the system at all. Over the years, bowls could bid for selection as a playoff bowl.

Tom also notes that last year, the Motor City Bowl featured Memphis against Akron. Under his format, they would have had Notre Dame and Penn State. I wonder which game would have sold more tickets.

Let's assume the higher seeds win again. National semifinals, December 24th, 2005:

1 USC vs. 4 Ohio State - Fiesta Bowl
3 Penn State vs. 2 Texas - Sugar Bowl

Remember, the four BCS bowls still rotate hosting the true national title game each year. Two of them get those national semifinal games, one gets a "consolation" game (a weak link, in my view - tough to convince the Rose/Sugar/Fiesta/Orange people to take that matchup once every four years), and one gets the title game.

Here it is, with higher seeds winning again:

January 3rd: West Virginia vs. Alabama - Orange Bowl (his note: Bowl selection Sunday would be on December 11th, after the first round. On that day, the "consolation" bowl - in this case, the Orange - gets first pick of the two best teams not playing in the second round, or otherwise not in the mix. In this case, the Orange picks 10-2 West Virginia against 9-2 Alabama.

January 4th: 1 USC vs. 2 Texas - Rose Bowl

His postscripts: With 11-game seasons, no team would play more than 16 total games. That is only three more than USC and Texas played in 2005...the season does not go any longer than the current bowl schedule...coaches get continuity week to week instead of the four-week layoff period before a major bowl game.

Logistically, this is pretty close to workable. Philosophically - and I explained this to MSgt Rados in several e-mails - it's a challenge.

The Rados System places an enormous premium on winning your conference, which, to a football purist like me, is fine. However, this system removes much of the flexibility currently enjoyed by bowl committees in selecting teams. Examples: the Poinsettia Bowl will always have one eye on Navy, given the enormous military presence in San Diego. The Citrus Bowl in Orlando loves Midwestern teams like Wisconsin, because they always travel well. The reverse is true for Miami, which historically does not travel many fans and must be viewed cautiously by any bowl game that's not on the highest tier. It would take spectacular diplomatic effort to convince all thirty bowls to buy into this system and voluntarily cede their right to invite teams that generate interest at the gate.

In short, a playoff CAN be achieved using the current bowl system. An Air Force master sergeant just laid it out for you with 16 teams - I would think that a commission of athletic directors, school presidents, and conference commissioners could easily knock out a playoff script for, say, eight teams. But given the number of cooks in the kitchen, the odds are stacked. Still, it's an intriguing concept, one that, in some form, could finally produce an honest national champion in Division I college football.

By the way, I sent MSgt Rados an e-mail with a link to this blog, and received a response that confirmed its faithfulness to his model - "There were about 10 Air Force folks reading it over my shoulder and all completely agreed with your comments as well as mine," he wrote.

Tom also mentioned that he has asked his wife to tape all the Monday night episodes of our new "Tailgate Overtime" program that he may miss, starting in November - when he deploys to Iraq.

Note to Mr. Goren, conference commissioners, and organizers of the BCS: I've saved Tom's Air Force e-mail address. He'll be a little busy this winter, but you might want to drop him a line someday.