Don't listen to ESPN

I'm tired of the garbage that ESPN/ABC is spitting out about the BCS. I saw the Game Day crew going on about how this was such a great set of bowl matchups, and Musberger saying how great the Paterno/Bowden matchup is (FSU is 8-4 remember). They're obviously doing everything they can to entice viewers to watch. Now Pat Forde adds this column about how the "retro look" of the bowls:

Notre Dame-Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl offers an embarrassment of tradition and an enticing matchup of irresistible force against immovable object. We feel Oregon's pain -- and, by extension, the Pacific-10's, which was muscled out of a second BCS bid for a second straight year -- but any chance to put these two Cadillac programs together is good for college football.

"embarrasment of tradition," "good for college football?" Are you kidding me??!! Why can't things be decided on the field like every other level of college football and most other sports. The BCS and bowl system turns football into figure skating where judges already know who they're going to pick before the performance is over (I'm not much of a figure skating fan if you can tell).

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Phil Taylor nails it

Phil Taylor added his $.02 about the bowl system and he's nailed it:

There will be 28 bowl games between Dec. 20 and Jan. 4, when USC and Texas play for the national title in the Rose Bowl. The other 27 contests, no matter how highly ranked the participants, are nothing more than glorified exhibition games. No championships are decided, no conferences are won, no great meaning is attached. In many cases, bowl games are anticlimactic letdowns, no matter who wins them. If Auburn beats Wisconsin in something called the Capital One Bowl on Jan. 2, for instance, do you really think the win will mean as much to the Tigers as their victory over arch-rival Alabama last month?

That's exactly what I'm trying to say here. The other non-championship bowls are meaningless, there's no excitement for the general fan audience.

This is also my response to the argument that there will still be complaining about who gets into a playoff. Sure there will, but once the playoff starts, the games will be so fun, that the complaining will be a hiss compared to the uproar we have now. Plus, we don't have to complain (or listen to the complaining) for a month leading up to a bowl. Nothing's perfect, but the BCS isn't even close to a playoff in this regard.

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BCS is a bad disease

"I liken the BCS to a bad disease, like cancer. Not to take anything away from Nebraska or Colorado -- they're great football teams -- but one has two losses and the other didn't win their conference championship. We're No. 2 in both polls, but those things don't have a lot of merit, obviously."

- Oregon coach Mike Bellotti (Source: http://www.bcsorbs.com)

Mike says it like it is. This quote is in reference to the 2001 situation where Nebraska played Miami in the title game when it didn't even make it's conference championship. The BCS may have gotten lucky with the championship game this year. But, they'll screw it up again. Why do we have to keep debating it though? Decide it on the field with a playoff.

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East Coast provides some common sense

"Notre Dame with two losses is in a BCS bowl ahead of one-loss Oregon," notes the Orlando Sentinel's Mike Bianchi. "Don't you just love college football - the only sport in the world that rewards you for what you did 50 years agoover what you did this season" (Source: The Oregonian, 12/6/2005)

That's what I'm trying to say here, decide this on the field with a playoff. 8 team, 16 team, I don't care. Anything is better than the BCS. Boycott the BCS.

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More sane people

I've always like Austin Murphy at SI. Maybe it's because he's the one usually writing about the Ducks, and that experience he had in kicking camp a decade ago was one of the articles I remember most from my days reading SI as a kid.

But, he really delivers with his latest column, Wake up and smell a playoff. Mr. Murphy lays out the argument about why the BCS is messed up and how exciting a playoff would be. I'm in total agreement. Even Mack Brown, who is in the BCS title game, had this to say about it:

"Whether we like it or not, our sport is money driven, and therefore it's fan driven," he says. "I don't want to lose our fans, and right now I see more excitement in the Final Four than I see in the BCS."

I'm not sure I understand how they would lose their fans, but he's dead on that the Final Four is more exciting.

Ignore those announcers on ESPN and ABC, who keep saying how great the BCS is. Boycott the BCS, so that we can get a playoff.

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I'm disgusted

I'll get it out in the open that I'm an Oregon Duck fan. Though it should be noted that I started this blog before anyting was official as far as bowl matchups go.

But, this just makes me sick. Notre Dame and Ohio State, two two-loss teams in the Fiesta bowl? WTF!!?? So, the Ducks play one bad half of football all season against the #1 team in the country (did you see them destroy UCLA yesterday) and they get screwed. This is just ridiculous. That's two years in a row the PAC-10 has been in this situation (#5 team in BCS rankings not going to a BCS bowl). Not too mention when Oregon was shut out of the Rose Bowl in '01 in favor of a team that didn't even win its conference.

So, you're telling me there's no east-cost bias here? Man, it's time for the PAC-10 to secede. Tom Hansen and friends are obviously incompetent, so they need to do something to shake things up.

The BCS is wrong, wrong, wrong! Even if the Ducks got in, it still doesn't make the BCS any better (just slightly more intelligent). You cannot determine a championship based on subjective voting, fan count, and how much money a team is worth for your bowl. It needs to be decided on the field where the dispute can be cleared up by playing football, not playing politics.

You may argue that the championship will be decided in the Rose Bowl between USC and Texas. But, if that's the case, why even have all of these other bowls. They're purely a money-driven event, which exploits college athletics as much as gambling does. Determining a champion is about giving deserving teams a shot.

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Thank you Joe Barton

Joe Barton, a Texas congressman is calling for hearings on the BCS. I can't believe I'm agreeing with a republican, but this sums it up quite well

"Too often college football ends in sniping and controversy, rather than winners and losers," Barton said. "The current system of determining who's No. 1 appears deeply flawed."

But, we can do better. While the thought is nice, doing things at the government level will take time and be messy. Harness the power of consumers and boycott the BCS.

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December Madness

March madness is awesome. Each weekend of the NCAA tournament, the games get crazier and more exiting. As anticipation builds to the championship, everybody tunes in to watch, and every game counts. It's just plain fun!

Now think about football. Does anybody even care about the minor bowls other than the teams that play in them? No. Does every other level of football in this country have a playoff? Yes (so don't keep spitting out that crap about a playoff interfering with academics). Would the football playoff games equal the excitement of basketball. I sure think they would. Take a step back and see how ridiculous the bowl system is and how exciting a playoff would be. Save for one or two bowl games, they're meaningless in terms of determining a champion.

Make the sacrifice and stay away for this year. You think the NCAA would have a playoff system next year if nobody watched or attended the bowl games? You better believe it.

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Time is short, do it now!

With the final weekend of the college football regular season upon us, time is of the essence. BCS (and other bowl) selections will be made next week and tickets will go on sale.

Get the word out now. Tell everyone you know about this boycott. Blog about how much you hate the BCS (c'mon Irish fans, even though the BCS is your bitch, you still have to acknowledge that it's time for a playoff). Tag your posts with "bcsboycott" and let's see what we can do. Think about December madness. It'll be great. But, there's only one way to to make it happen. Boycott the BCS!

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Boycott the BCS

Every year we go through the same thing with college football and its bowl/BCS controversey. You know what, I'm tired of it, and I bet you are too. Is there any fan that actually prefers this system to a playoff? Do schools actually benefit from the current bowl system?

I say, throw tradition to the wind and dump all the bowls. Get rid of the whole system. Boycott them and they'll figure something out. Don't wait for the NCAA to get around to it, because it will be years before they do anything.

With these new things we have now called blogs, we can create a grassroots effort to boycott the BCS and put it out of its misery. We need a playoff and we want it by next year. How do we do that? Well, if nobody watched or attended the bowl games, I bet that would send a pretty strong message. So stay away, don't watch, don't attend.

It's one year, and while the many athletes that work hard all year deserve better, we have to think about the long run. We have no other way to force the NCAA to change other than simple economics.

Spread the word and boycott the BCS.

(note: if there's any pixel pushers out there, it'd be great to make a little badge that bloggers can put on their blogs. Let me know if you create something)

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