Play off? Play on?

I feel like the last guy on college football Earth not to want to see a playoff. It is a lonely planet over here when even female casual football fan friends are making comments about needing a playoff. There are only so many ways it can play out, and I don't think any of them are good. The NFL model breeds a particular brand of football that, as a college fan, I do not want to see replicated in the ranks of the NCAA. The analogy frequently drawn to basketball is not appropriate because the number of games to reach a similar model to that simply cannot be played. Quite frankly, the criticism that the system "gets it wrong" is a little overstated, as well.

Looking at the NFL, the regular season gives a more representative schedule during the regular season in order to identify quality of teams, because they play more games in a smaller league. Upscaling the number of games is not realistic; downscaling the number of teams (to include just BCS teams, or something similar) is probably equally unpalatable. However, structurally, the biggest weakness for college in this model is that non-divisional games are equally weighted. The divisional games are equally weighted in college, but non-conference ones definitely are not. The NFL also creates a strange situation towards the end of the regular season when teams have clinced the best available playoff berths or have been mathematically eliminated from contention. Starters getrested, games become less meaningful, and backups see substantial playing time.

This doesn't happen quite so much in NCAA basketball, and I doubt it would be a huge issue in any iteration of an NCAA football tournament arrangment, either. The field is big enough and common opponents limited enough in basketball that it is less common to see Kentucky or Michigan State not play their starters at all against Alabama or Northwestern, but they definitely see less playing time once their resumes have been established. The other half is that football is a lot more expensive and location driven that the NCAA basketball tournament model doesn't fit so well. Games are played at least a week apart at every level of football, and so the baseball model of NCAA tournaments would be challenging as well. But what if Wake Forest earned the right to host a tournament game? Their stadium is illsized for tournament play (which is certainly a factor in both baseball and basketball location assignments). Sure, Charlotte and BoA Stadium is not too far away, but that wouldn't be homefield advantage. Or if it follows the basketball model and places a low ranking 1 seed somewhere like Detroit -- would a Wake -- Boise State game be profitable in Detroit? DC? Nashville? How close would it have to be and how big a fan base would the other team need to be for a team with a smaller following? If this lost money for the participating schools, this would unquestionably impair the product on the
field, which is to be avoided at all costs.

The argument about the lower divisions of football is legitimate. Div I-AA plays a 16 team tournament with higher seed hosting with considerations to minimize travel, until the championship game, which is held in Chattanooga. Those travel issues, however, are substantial and mean big money and cannot be simply sidestepped "to minimize travel." The fan experience is a big part of the DI experience, and while I cannot speak for DI-AA or DII, but I can speak for DIII and it's not the same. The hardship on the potentially 3 or 4 games in a tournament is something that has not been figured out. The old Bowls and Polls system was partway there, where the conference champs played other conference champs according to conference tie-ins and at large picks. This system birthed the current system, because of its inability to guarantee a clear winner. The loudest complaint of the current BCS is that it has not bee nable to achieve that either.

While there have been a few concerns about non-BCS conference teams making the BCS bowls, the title winner has been pretty well done. There are really only two years of questionable performance: 2003 and 2004. In 2003, LSU got the nod over USC and they beat an undefeated Oklahoma. In 2004, Auburn missed out on the opportunity to get trounced by Southern Cal. LSU should not get penalized for the Pac10 not having conference title game and it seems a bit of a stretch to think that Auburn was 40 points better than Oklahoma when they barely squeaked by a Virginia Tech team that USC also beat. Is there really compelling evidence that the wrong champion was crowned in either year? If there was a playoff, would we have a better explanation than that? Look at the 2008 Patriots. The NFL playoff crowned the Giants the winner, a team they beat in the regular season. One is more legitimate only because they agreed to it beforehand, and the regular season matchup had less meaning. That never occurs in the current college football construction.

A bigger problem is that there are too many bowl games, especially the 5th BCS bowl. Sure, this allows non-BCS teams more access, but there should be a priority on quality wins, not just avoiding losses. Auburn was penalized in 2004 largely because its schedule was weak; it is undeniable that in an average year non-BCS teams play lesser competition. An improvement would be to extend the season and add a conference game (pressure the Big Ten, Big East and Pac 10 to add a conference championship) or add BCS caliber opponents. Fewer bowl games would make it meaningful again, 0.500 records should not be sufficient to make a bowl game. Also, from a traditional point of view, the title game ought to be played over New Year's weekend and not on a Monday night afterwards.

There needs to be more encouragement to play out of conference games. The financial advantage of hiring an instate cupcake needs to be alleviated somehow. If neutral site games like the ones Alabama has pursued against ACC opponents in recent years work better than home-and-homes, then fine; the college road trip, though, is more traditional for the sport and all teams involved so far (Bama, FSU, Clemson and soon to be VT) have home stadiums comparably sized (or bigger than) the Georgia Dome (or Jacksonville Stadium, in FSU's case). Something that would be great to borrow from college basketball to this end would be matchups akin to the ACC-Big Ten Challenge, particularly against non-traditional matchups. Big East-Pac10? Big Ten-SEC? ACC-Big XII? Yes please.

Ultimately, I think all college football fans want the same kinds of things: an elevated level of competition, a quality product on the field, and the evasion of boredom that comes with some stale NFL games (although the NFL experience is primarily limited by the tv market restrictions more than the gameday experience). Adding a playoff will not solve the problems that the sport is faced with, but will simply change them to another issue.

Which conference is the best?

This stretch of the offseason is pretty rough on us. It is pretty much the worst part of the year, aside from dentist appointments. The only thing college football fans really have left to do are to play video games simulating the sport and argue about it. I have done both. As a result, I find myself catching some guff from my friends (and even my girlfriend!) over some of my opinions. Hopefully we will have the opportunity to explore some of those unpopular opinions here, some of the other crazy opinions of the other bloggers, and some of the commenters’.

The one that gets me in trouble, particularly here in Augusta, is that I do not immediately buy in to the fact that the SEC is the de facto king of the hill because they are the best conference, top to bottom, in the NCAA. They are the best conference at the top, and have been for a few years running. However, I am hesitant to acquiesce to that fact that they are so good that they deserve this pass that the media has bestowed on them.

Before we get into dissecting the conferences, I also want to point out that the out of conference games are not particularly impressive. Auburn missed its change in 2004 because its OOC schedule was so poor. The counter is, of course, the weekly slog in conference is so tough that they don’t need to augment their schedule. I don’t think it is that tough, though; at least, the SEC schedule from any given team’s perspective is no harder than a single team’s perspective in any other power conference. Except maybe the Big Ten.

For the purposes of my argument, I will do some hand waving here and say that the depth in the conferences Big Ten, Big East and Pac 10 is questionable compared to the 12 conference teams without a good deal of support other than there are fewer teams. Each of them has strong teams at the top, of course, but drops off quickly. That’s not really the point right now, and maybe we can discuss this further later. The other two, though, the ACC and the Big XII, can make valid comparisons. In the interest of full disclosure, I am a Clemson alum, but I will do my best not to color the conclusion.

If we take a look at these three conferences and divide them into four team thirds based on where they finished in conference, I think we can see some things shake out.

ACC	SEC	Big XII
VT GT FSU BC	UF Bama UGa Ole Miss	Oklahoma Texas Texas Tech Mizzou
UNC Miami Maryland Wake	LSU Vandy Arkansas So Car	Ok St Nebraska Kansas Colorado
Clemson NCSU UVa Duke	Tennessee Kentucky Auburn MSU	KSt Iowa St Baylor TAMU

The thirds are not exactly ranked within each bracket; the only division is that the top group is the best four teams, the middle the next four, and so on. The SEC’s upper third is arguably the best, as it has 2 head to head wins against the Big XII’s top third (UF over OU and Ole Miss over Texas Tech) and splits 1-1 with the ACC’s (UF over FSU and GT over UGa). However, it is worth noting that 2 middle third SEC teams have wins over ACC upper third teams (LSU over GT and Vandy over BC) and the ACC has one middle third win over an upper third SEC team (Wake over Ole Miss). In the middle, the ACC has a win over the SEC (Wake over Vandy) and the ACC has two bottom third wins over middle third SEC teams (Clemson over So Car and Duke over Vandy). There are a few other matchups where teams in higher ranked thirds beat teams from lower ranked thirds (for instance, Bama over Clemson and So Car over NCSU), but that is less notable; that is the expectation. There is less play against the Big XII from either of these conferences (the only ones I see are Miami over TAMU and Nebraska over Clemson, which really fall in line the way they were supposed to).

For intraconference competition, look at the top thirds. The SEC has three teams (UF, Bama and UGa) whose conferences losses only came from within their own top third. The same is true for the Big XII. Both BCS records were 1-1, while the Big XII’s loss came to the SEC. I think I am prepared to concede that the SEC’s top third is better than the other conferences’ top thirds.

The middle third, though, is where the SEC defenders’ main argument gets tested. Only the ACC had four bowl eligible teams in this group, while the other two had three. Each conference had two wins, the ACC had two losses and the other two had one. The ACC had three teams in the middle third that beat teams in its own upper third (and Wake beat Ole Miss in the SEC’s upper third), while the SEC only had two (So Car and Vandy both beat Ole Miss). Only Oklahoma St beat Missouri in the Big XII in this grouping. I think this shows that the ACC’s middle third is the strongest across conferences.

The ACC also wins the bottom third, pretty clearly, in fact. There are two bowl eligible teams here, where none of the other conferences have any. Duke has a win over Vanderbilt, Clemson has a win over South Carolina, and a reasonable showing intraconference. The bottom thirds in the SEC and Big XII were abysmal.

Let’s break this up in another way. Showing the thirds does a better job in conference than out. If we assign every team in each conference one of six categories -- Elite, Very Good, Above Average, Average, Below Average, Very Poor – we can discuss a little bit of the weekly slog.

	ACC	SEC	Big XII
Elite		UF Alabama	Oklahoma Texas
Very Good	VT GT	UGa Ole Miss	Texas Tech
Above Average	FSU BC UNC Maryland Wake Forest	LSU	Mizzou Nebraska Oklahoma St Kansas
Average	Clemson Miami	Vandy So Car
Below Average	Duke UVa	Arkansas Tennessee Auburn Kentucky	Colorado Kansas St Baylor Texas A&M
Very Poor		Mississippi St	Iowa St

The thing to point out is that the SEC has the fewest teams in the Above Average category or higher. The argument that you can never take a week off in the SEC is disingenuous, and was definitely so last year, particularly if you are Florida or Alabama. The disparity in team performance was dramatic, and because Florida is so much better than the rest of the conference they can “take games off.” In the SEC’s defense, last year was had anomalously bad years out of Auburn and Tennessee, but even if they were above average per usual, that doesn’t take away from the rest of the bottom of the conference.

The other thing is that this is only a one year snapshot. But by and large, there is fluidity in college football and it is a zero sum game (you cannot have five 10-2 teams in a single conference), and it is rare that you have a division like the Big XII South year in and year out. The SEC East, for instance, will have the best team in the country this year, an above average team, and four teams that are only of local interest.

The “weekly slog” fits more inline with the ACC or the Big XII South, looking at this chart. At the end of the day, though, if you are UGa, there are teams on your schedule you expect to beat, there are teams on your schedule you expect to lose (well, a reasonably observer looking at an UGa schedule), and there are some that are tossups. The number of tossups really determines how competitive the conference is, and how much the conference members “just beat up on each other.” Oklahoma and Texas are expected to win every game in conference except the one against each other. Florida is expected to win every game on its schedule. There is no ACC team for whom that is an appropriate statement.

Sure, Vanderbilt is not the pushover it traditionally has been, and that is good for both the SEC and college football in general. But you cannot say that and not take not of Wake Forest, North Carolina, Missouri, and Kansas. The SEC two or three of the fifteen best teams in the country, but after that, they’re everybody else. The question at the top of this post does not really make any sense.