The BCS is...Broken.

The BCS is broken. Ok, so I don't completely like the word broken there. Broken, to me, suggests at some point it was working. That phone number with only 6 digits that you got from that pretty girl? It's not broken because it never worked. She knew it, and figured you wouldn't notice until it was too late.


The same goes for the BCS, it was introduced as a better way to determine the best team in FBS football each year. While it has provided match ups between top teams that previously wouldn't have occurred in the old system, it's still only 6 digits when 7 are required to place a call.


The good news is, change might be coming. Variations have been discussed and possible new models are expected to be presented by June. Despite the growing support for a change in the system, some argue that everything is working and change will only make things worse. I decided to check out what the BCS itself claims to be, and came up with a few things that the current system just isn't accomplishing.


The following statements come from the Bowl Championship Series official website.

• "[The BCS] is designed to ensure that the two top-rated teams in the country meet in the national championship game, and to create exciting and competitive matchups among eight other highly regarded teams in four other bowl games...It has been undeniably successful in achieving those goals."
• Undeniably successful? I'm really interested to know what their definition of undeniable is, because I think mine(and Webster's) is much different. Consider the Orange Bowl this year. Competitive? Not at all; and the only reason it was exciting was the chance that West Virginia's football team could score more than the basketball team had earlier that day (Final: WVU basketball-85, WVU football-70). If you want exciting and competitive in college sports you'll have to wait for March Madness. At least in a playoff situation if a blowout occurs, it just brings that much more excitement for the winning teams next game. Sorry WVU's blowout Orange Bowl victory doesn't have me absolutely giddy for it's September 1 match-up with Marshall...
• The other point here is that the two "top-rated teams" play for the national championship. And I guess I can't argue that one, because they get to decide who is top-rated. But what about "most deserving" or "the 2 best teams". I don't want a championship with the two top-rated teams when these ratings are determined by computers and people who don't even watch the games, I prefer to see a championship between two teams that proved they deserve to be there by outperforming all other competitors on the field. Which leads us to their next argument.
• The BCS allows for preserving the significance of the regular season
• Most BCS supporters will say that the every regular season game is a playoff game. As far as I'm concerned, after the events of this season, this argument can never be used again. If it were true, then Alabama obviously lost their playoff game to LSU in the regular season and should have been knocked out of contention(or did I miss the clause where SEC teams get a double elimination regular season playoff). The real problem here, is that for most teams in the country, the regular season loses most of it's meaning(as far as national championships are concerned) very early in the regular season. For 52 teams, their hopes at being crowned the best team in the nation ended before they played their first game this year. Let's face it, under the current system non-AQ teams aren't going to get to the big game. Since the inception of the BCS in 1998, 11 non-AQ teams have finished the regular season undefeated(Tulan '98; Marshall '99; Utah '04 and '08; Boise State '04, '06, '08, and '09; Hawai'i '07; and TCU '09 and '10) without being given an opportunity to play for a national championship. And by mid-season, all but a handful of teams have been eliminated from the discussion. In reality, as the college football season rolls on, it becomes more and more meaningless. And don't try to argue that all the other bowl games are meaningful...oh, they already did.
• All bowl games provide meaningful season-ending opportunities to teams.
• These people really need to check the definition of meaningful. How many times each bowl season do we hear those announcing the game say something along the lines of "these guys don't seem like they want to be here." with their partner responding "you're right, these guys had their sights set on something bigger and to find themselves here is a bit of a disappointment." A program with a long bowl drought will find the game meaningful, and of course we want our team to win each of their games, so we get excited about a bowl victory. But every bowl game, except one, means nothing more than the rest of the regular season(and most would be 4th or 5th on a team's list)don't let anybody convince you otherwise.

The BCS really isn't accomplishing what it was created to do, and America is frustrated. Here's to hoping the that powers that be will take note and help to make our beloved college football more exciting and meaningful from the first kickoff of the season until the best team(not top rated) lifts the crystal football.