Plus, Cincy goes to the title game. I’m pretty sure that beating Pitt will put them over TCU in this weirdo system. Basically, Nebraska beating Texas has lost all its mid-major helping luster.
This is why a team should NEVER switch uniforms in the middle of a title run. Florida did it with their helmets. I mean, they look better then their Gators helmet, but why now, with two games left in the regular season? Couldn’t they wait for next year?
Other examples: the St. Louis Rams changing their uniform’s colors after the Greatest Show on Turf won their Super Bowl from the very sweet looking blue and yellow to the stupid gold and blue. Also, the Pittsburgh Penguins switching from the Skating Penguin logo to the Corporate Pigeon logo. They did not win Lord Stanley’s Cup again until the Skating Penguin was back.
Brendan Loy
Yes, David, I know that. I discussed this dilemma in a blog post a couple of days ago. Of course, we’re assuming the Fiesta Bowl takes Iowa to play Nebraska, rather than Boise or TCU/Cincy (or, if perchance they take TCU/Cincy, assuming the Sugar Bowl takes Iowa rather than Boise State to play Florida). Alas, these are probably valid assumptions.
Brandon, I think it’s a tossup between TCU and Cincy if Nebraska wins. Very much depends on what the voters do, and that’s hard to predict. Amazing that a missed PAT by Pittsburgh could have such a huge impact on the college football landscape. In any case, I’d rather see Cincy in the title game than boring old Texas — the Big East is practically a mid-major itself — so I’m still rooting for the Huskers… if only because I love chaos and confusion.
Jazz
Do y’all remember when Boise State jumed up to 5th in both polls at the end of September, and Stewart Mandel, among many others, said that if Boise State wins out there would be a serious credibility problem if they were jumped in the queue? As the link shows, at the end of September they were behind only the holy trinity of Texas/Florida/Alabama, plus LSU. Cincinnati and TCU, who stand to benefit from a Nebraska win, were 10th and 11th at the end of September – now that Boise has no shot at a championship, Mandel must conclude that there is a credibility problem. Mandel may not do a post-mortem, so I will.
Boise State lost its credibility when…when…when? The crappy back to back games against UC Davis and Tulsa? The lackluster effort against Louisiana Tech? The east coast media realizing that turf really was blue?
Some critics have said that the BCS is basically a beauty pageant. Maybe that’s not critical enough. The BCS is like a beauty pageant where one of the contestants is really really ugly, but an indeterminate number of judges think that contestant is like really hot.
Seems to me that Boise’s bizarre 2009 fate is about the best argument for a Jazz-ian playoff with all 11 conference winners getting an auto-bid into a playoff.
And now it’s 10-9 Texas in the 4th. quarter. As I said on Twitter: the Big XII: it’s a WAR!
Jazz
And returning to our earlier discussion, David, about the benefits of bringing the two best teams together rather than have a playoff, should Nebraska win one of those two teams will be TCU or Cincinnati, either of which was 5 or 6 spots behind Boise State when Mandel wrote that it would be intolerable for a team behind Boise State to jump them.
I bet more than one of you recalled that Mandel column from the end of September and were like “Oh, yeahhhh, Boise State couldn’t defensibly be jumped”. And then you thought about how Boise State got jumped anyway by TCU and Cincinnati and were like “Yeah, that’s fine”, even though when you read Mandel in September, you were like “No way!” to such a possibility.
If we could find a couple of genetically-altered humans (like the pre-cogs in the movie Minority Report) to manage the selection process of the two final contestants, then maybe. Problem is, you’re asking us mere mortals to handle that task.
And we empirically suck at it.
David K.
I read an interesting, yet pretty flawed article that pointed out that the champion in NCAA Div-1 is more often than not the team with the best record. Most other sports have done much poorer in comparison, so in the sense that the champion is ONE of the best overall teams from the season the BCS has that going for it.
The problem has just about never been that a team that DIDN’T deserve got in. So the real question is, how do we make sure no truly deserving team is left out. In that case I’d be willing to accede that 4 maybe 8 team playoff would be reasonable, but no more than that. Rules for getting in? First, you have to have won your conference. Second you can’t get in unless all the teams that have better records than you are in.
Jazz
On a certain level you’re right, David, since the BCS championship game, while not necessarily getting the matchup “right”, at worst is close. I suspect that the vast majority of fans will agree that the Texas/Alabama championship matches the two best teams, with maybe a few TCU/Cincinnati holdouts, as well as those three remaining fans who remember Mandel’s credibility manifesto about Boise State in September.
In a strange way, the problem with the BCS, most evident this year, is that it lends a “spurious accuracy” to the crowning of the champion. If you accept the process, then Texas/Alabama is a near-consensus choice for best championship game. In a way, though, the process itself enhances the legitimacy of the champion (even though a USC can still win that other, “inferior” championship, such as 2004).
But you as a Husky fan, assuming you have a long memory, have maybe the best reason to revolt against the spurious accuracy of the BCS championship. When BYU won its mid-major national championship 25 years ago, they finished their season by defeating a “RichRod-bad”-esque Michigan team in the Holiday Bowl.
The two best remaining teams for New Year’s day bowl that year were Oklahoma and Washington squaring off in the Orange Bowl. There was a poll of voters before that game about whether they would really let the WAC Cougars be champions? The voters said: If Washington, with their one loss, wins the Orange Bowl, then BYU is champion. If Oklahoma, with a loss and a tie, wins, then Oklahoma is champion. Washington won, BYU won the title, and the rest is history.
Even though we were flyover country, Pac-10 skeptics, I recall my brother and I wondering why the hell 1-loss Washington wouldn’t jump BYU but 1-loss, 1-tie Oklahoma would. I’m sure there’s a few folks in the Pacific Northwest asking that question to this day. With a mythical national championship, that conversation can continue in Washington for as long as the Huskies would like. The spurious national championship suppresses such talk – no fun!
Alabama rolls Florida, 32-13. Now: GO NEBRASKA! BEAT TEXAS!
You realize if Nebraska beats Texas, Boise State gets left out of the BCS right?
Plus, Cincy goes to the title game. I’m pretty sure that beating Pitt will put them over TCU in this weirdo system. Basically, Nebraska beating Texas has lost all its mid-major helping luster.
This is why a team should NEVER switch uniforms in the middle of a title run. Florida did it with their helmets. I mean, they look better then their Gators helmet, but why now, with two games left in the regular season? Couldn’t they wait for next year?
Other examples: the St. Louis Rams changing their uniform’s colors after the Greatest Show on Turf won their Super Bowl from the very sweet looking blue and yellow to the stupid gold and blue. Also, the Pittsburgh Penguins switching from the Skating Penguin logo to the Corporate Pigeon logo. They did not win Lord Stanley’s Cup again until the Skating Penguin was back.
Yes, David, I know that. I discussed this dilemma in a blog post a couple of days ago. Of course, we’re assuming the Fiesta Bowl takes Iowa to play Nebraska, rather than Boise or TCU/Cincy (or, if perchance they take TCU/Cincy, assuming the Sugar Bowl takes Iowa rather than Boise State to play Florida). Alas, these are probably valid assumptions.
Brandon, I think it’s a tossup between TCU and Cincy if Nebraska wins. Very much depends on what the voters do, and that’s hard to predict. Amazing that a missed PAT by Pittsburgh could have such a huge impact on the college football landscape. In any case, I’d rather see Cincy in the title game than boring old Texas — the Big East is practically a mid-major itself — so I’m still rooting for the Huskers… if only because I love chaos and confusion.
Do y’all remember when Boise State jumed up to 5th in both polls at the end of September, and Stewart Mandel, among many others, said that if Boise State wins out there would be a serious credibility problem if they were jumped in the queue? As the link shows, at the end of September they were behind only the holy trinity of Texas/Florida/Alabama, plus LSU. Cincinnati and TCU, who stand to benefit from a Nebraska win, were 10th and 11th at the end of September – now that Boise has no shot at a championship, Mandel must conclude that there is a credibility problem. Mandel may not do a post-mortem, so I will.
Boise State lost its credibility when…when…when? The crappy back to back games against UC Davis and Tulsa? The lackluster effort against Louisiana Tech? The east coast media realizing that turf really was blue?
Some critics have said that the BCS is basically a beauty pageant. Maybe that’s not critical enough. The BCS is like a beauty pageant where one of the contestants is really really ugly, but an indeterminate number of judges think that contestant is like really hot.
Seems to me that Boise’s bizarre 2009 fate is about the best argument for a Jazz-ian playoff with all 11 conference winners getting an auto-bid into a playoff.
And now it’s 10-9 Texas in the 4th. quarter. As I said on Twitter: the Big XII: it’s a WAR!
And returning to our earlier discussion, David, about the benefits of bringing the two best teams together rather than have a playoff, should Nebraska win one of those two teams will be TCU or Cincinnati, either of which was 5 or 6 spots behind Boise State when Mandel wrote that it would be intolerable for a team behind Boise State to jump them.
I bet more than one of you recalled that Mandel column from the end of September and were like “Oh, yeahhhh, Boise State couldn’t defensibly be jumped”. And then you thought about how Boise State got jumped anyway by TCU and Cincinnati and were like “Yeah, that’s fine”, even though when you read Mandel in September, you were like “No way!” to such a possibility.
If we could find a couple of genetically-altered humans (like the pre-cogs in the movie Minority Report) to manage the selection process of the two final contestants, then maybe. Problem is, you’re asking us mere mortals to handle that task.
And we empirically suck at it.
I read an interesting, yet pretty flawed article that pointed out that the champion in NCAA Div-1 is more often than not the team with the best record. Most other sports have done much poorer in comparison, so in the sense that the champion is ONE of the best overall teams from the season the BCS has that going for it.
The problem has just about never been that a team that DIDN’T deserve got in. So the real question is, how do we make sure no truly deserving team is left out. In that case I’d be willing to accede that 4 maybe 8 team playoff would be reasonable, but no more than that. Rules for getting in? First, you have to have won your conference. Second you can’t get in unless all the teams that have better records than you are in.
On a certain level you’re right, David, since the BCS championship game, while not necessarily getting the matchup “right”, at worst is close. I suspect that the vast majority of fans will agree that the Texas/Alabama championship matches the two best teams, with maybe a few TCU/Cincinnati holdouts, as well as those three remaining fans who remember Mandel’s credibility manifesto about Boise State in September.
In a strange way, the problem with the BCS, most evident this year, is that it lends a “spurious accuracy” to the crowning of the champion. If you accept the process, then Texas/Alabama is a near-consensus choice for best championship game. In a way, though, the process itself enhances the legitimacy of the champion (even though a USC can still win that other, “inferior” championship, such as 2004).
But you as a Husky fan, assuming you have a long memory, have maybe the best reason to revolt against the spurious accuracy of the BCS championship. When BYU won its mid-major national championship 25 years ago, they finished their season by defeating a “RichRod-bad”-esque Michigan team in the Holiday Bowl.
The two best remaining teams for New Year’s day bowl that year were Oklahoma and Washington squaring off in the Orange Bowl. There was a poll of voters before that game about whether they would really let the WAC Cougars be champions? The voters said: If Washington, with their one loss, wins the Orange Bowl, then BYU is champion. If Oklahoma, with a loss and a tie, wins, then Oklahoma is champion. Washington won, BYU won the title, and the rest is history.
Even though we were flyover country, Pac-10 skeptics, I recall my brother and I wondering why the hell 1-loss Washington wouldn’t jump BYU but 1-loss, 1-tie Oklahoma would. I’m sure there’s a few folks in the Pacific Northwest asking that question to this day. With a mythical national championship, that conversation can continue in Washington for as long as the Huskies would like. The spurious national championship suppresses such talk – no fun!