Though there have been a few good games, quite a few of this year’s Bowl Games, have been yawners. I would go as far as saying, the selections for this years bowl games could have been better made by weather-forcasters (Seriously, what other career can you be so inaccurate and still have a job? Maybe we should just read the Farmer’s Almanac and call it good.).
When I think of the bowl games at the end of a NCAA Division I Football season, I think the teams selected should be the best of the best. I’m obviously biased to the SEC, but I could have picked better match-ups this year, simply by choosing my two championship contenders from the SEC and then pairing other teams, throughout the country, with each of the remaining SEC teams. After all, short of a handful of outside teams, there is no better football than SEC football.
We are all lead to believe wins, losses, strength of schedule and quality of wins/losses, make up the ranking system for the BCS (and individuals, performing the best, on teams within the highest ranked teams, make up the Heisman Trophy selection – what a joke!). I think this year, more than any other on record, calls this system into question. There was very little “quality” from teams outside the SEC… maybe a little, but not a lot. There are SEC teams ending their years with worse than a .500 record, which could have beaten many of those teams selected for bowl games this year.
If you aren’t playing in the SEC, you have no strength of schedule. So, next year, why don’t we start by ranking the SEC, 1-14, then rank the rest of the country? Even if there were undefeated schools, somewhere in the US, I suspect they would get clobbered by one, two and three-loss SEC teams. At the very least, the games would be way closer and a lot more exciting.
Okay, okay…
I know my method is definitively not a fair way to select bowl contenders or even award a national title. Though, Being a die-hard SEC fan, I’m glad to see how many SEC teams made it to bowl games this year. I’m glad to see the number of bowl wins the SEC has so far (though a couple more wins would have been better – Come on Georgia/Vandy!). I’m glad the two 2012-2013 SEC newcomers (Missouri and Texas A&M) had solid performances in winning their bowl games. And…
I’m glad two SEC schools are playing for the National Title (Roll Tide!).
My point is, even my absurd method, of bowl selection, would be more accurate than the current method. The NCAA bowl system sucks, even with my strong SEC bias.
This year’s bowl games were way more about creating advertising venues, than they were about football. Big corporations, who don’t even care about who wins or looses, put their names and products in front of specific markets, via bowl game branding. Let’s face it, when a shady, Multi-Level Marketing company (MLM), running a questionable pyramid scheme, can get their name on a bowl game (The AdvoCare V100 INDEPENDENCE BOWL), something has gone way wrong!
What’s next? Will we soon have “The Bernard Madoff, Investment Bowl” and “The Ponzi Scheme, Fraud Bowl” as bowl games?
Did you happen to pay any attention to the number of visibly empty seats in the stands this year? I don’t know how many times I heard “Sell out crowd” from the announcers, during the bowl game broadcasts, but it was obviously a media stunt to hype each game. You can sell out a stadium, but that doesn’t mean the seats are filled.
Sold out means only a limited number of seats were made available to each school and fans. The rest of the seats are purchased/held for “upity-ups” working for advertising/promotion companies, who probably don’t even like football, and will not show up, even if their ticket is free.
The fact is, most bowl games this year, were played in front of far smaller crowds than ever before.
So, how do we fix the bowl series?
Easy! PLAYOFFS!
Just about everyone, except for the bowls and bowl sponsors agree, establishing a playoff system is the most fair way to determine who is the best of the best.
The most used excuse for not having playoffs in NCAA Div I football has been the time-frame and schedule. However, I think this year also proves that excuse isn’t viable. Seriously, why are there so many weeks between the end of the regular season and the end of the championship game. I could run a 64 team tournament in that amount of time. To keep the advertisers happy, they could sponsor specific games of the tournament and the BCS bowl games would be the last seven games of the tournament.
Why is this so hard for those who are supposed to be far better sports minded than me? It works for Pro/College Basketball, Baseball, Hockey and Pro Football. So you have to be an incompetent moron to deny it will work in NCAA Div. I football.
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