[Numbers Guy]

It's a sham- and fans should vocally and vigourously demand a playoff system!

Okay, let's set up a playoff system.

Do we take 8 or 16 teams? You really think the #16 team should be playing in a tournament?

Next step, we do what all the columnists want us to do and play the playoff games at various bowl sites. Now here's an interesting question: Suppose you're an LSU fan. Suppose LSU makes a run to the title game, so they play four games in four weeks, at various sites. How in the heck are you going to be able to afford to go to those games unless you're a millionaire? You try to fly anywhere on 7 days' notice--FOUR straight weeks?

So you're not going to have a ton of fans of the teams at these neutral site bowls unless one ends up in the team's backyard (and is it fair that this will disproportionately happen to southern teams?).

And that means we'll have a bunch of locals at the games, not into the games, sitting on their hands. And the early round games likely won't sell out--the NCAA has trouble selling out 15-20,000 seat arenas for 1st/2nd/3rd/4th round basketball games even though people there get two games at a time until the regional finals.

So we'll have empty seats and quiet crowds, other than the rich boosters rattling their jewelry.

Okay, here's an alternative: Home field advantage, like the NFL. Top seeds get to host the first two or three rounds, with the final at a neutral site.

And how is Bobby Bowden going to feel about having his first round game being played in a snowstorm in Lincoln? Dan Fouts is still whining about that Jan 1982 AFC championship game in Cincinnati.

And, as I mentioned elsewhere, you've just greatly devalued the regular season. The Michigan/Ohio State game this year was one of the most intense, exciting athletic events I've ever attended. If it was a battle for seeding or first round home field advantage it would have been far less compelling.

If people want a playoff, here's a different proposal: Restore the bowl tie-ins. Make the bowls meaningful. *After* the bowls are played, pick two teams to play for a title. That can be through some messy BCS system, or maybe just a smoke-filled room of people who can figure things out.

A one game playoff *after* the bowls. It keeps the pressure on during the regular season (btw, I'm a Michigan grad, I should want a playoff, we're playing well after stumbling on special teams earlier in the season). It keeps the conference championships meaningful. It guarantees large and enthusiastic partisan (bi-partisan I guess) crowds at bowl games. And it makes the people who want a "playoff" happy so they can say someone won a playoff.

[dennis1x]

the BCS in hands down the best system that College Football has ever had...the previous bowl affiliation was terrible with #20 playing #1, etc....

so its either the BCS or a playoff...i personally HATE the idea of a playoff system as the regular season and especially the last couple games of a season could become meaningless.

[Lunatic Fringe]

Here's my plan....

Divide the playoffs into regional contests between Conference Champions... ACC vs. SEC, Big East vs. Independents, PAC-10 vs. WAC. Big 12 vs. Big 10. Sun Belt vs. Mid-America. Conference USA vs. Mtn West.

Rotate these matchups every year to make in interesting, if you like.

Set the first round of these games up in late December in traditional bowl games. Single elimination tournament play every week until Early January, just before school starts again. May the best team win!

[Robert A Cook PE]

Good arguements!

(Best I've ever heard AGAINST a playoff systems.....)

But you forget a few things, important in football, not critical in EVERY other college sport/national/professional sport.

College football involves and twists the whole campus - Yes, it's not politcally corrupt to remember that, and not every college is as warped as the A&M, or the other top 25 teams, but it really warps the campus at the top colleges.

Fine - for a known season of only 10-11 games. Have fun, have parties, travel, bring a 200-person band, cheer squad, 100-150 traveling with the team, and get 30,000 - 60,000 to the game.

But again, and again, and again for a 16, 8, or even 4 team playoff?

Not reasonable. Not gonna happen. Don't need it.

Shouldn't happen anyway.

Let the proponents argue.

Heck, most seasons (8 out of 10, 18 out of 20) there IS no reason for a payoff = the winner is clear. The two or three seasons out of 20 that a clear arguement exist don't justify a playoff system.

And for those three, let them argue!

If there were a "playoff" - let it happen as one game AFTER the Dec 31 - Jan 1 games. By that day, every team BUT 2 are eliminated.

[kwyjibo]

You sound just like me at this time last year. Let me warn you, though. The rest of them think that all these neutral site games will be jam-packed and that somehow the TV money will enrich the conferences to a far greater degree than the current system. I don't see how a conference like the Big 12 (8 bowl teams this year) gets more money from a playoff than the current system.