BleacherCoaches.com

Wow, what a year in college football. I picked a Florida-Oklahoma national championship, and although unfairly to Texas, it looks like I have a great chance at being right.

People always ask about when we're going to get a playoff and what not, and I thought about the subject of a playoff. I created a sort of complex playoff, but if you read through it, it's really easy to follow along. I doubt that the NCAA would consider this, but I believe this could challenge "March Madness" in excitement. So here it is; my proposed playoff system.

At first glance after the season, what do you see? You usually pay attention to the top ten teams ranked, while 11-25 don't get as much love. In fact, no one really seems to remember the bottom of the AP Top 25 anymore. My proposed system will change all that. As soon as the regular season ends in the first weekend in December, the final AP Top 25 will come out. The teams ranked in this poll will advance to the FBS playoffs. That's right, no more controversial conference championships. After the final regular season game, the #24 and #25 ranked teams will play in a Wednesday night game to determine who makes the official bracket; kind of like a NCAA tournament play-in game, perhaps? Once that game's over, the real fun begins.

The winner of that game will take on the #9 team in the Top 25. The matchups will be played on the Saturday of the same week of the play-in game and the games will go as follows: #9 vs. #24/25 | #10 vs. #23 | #11 vs. #22 | #12 vs. #21 | #13 vs. #20 | #14 vs. #19 | #15 vs. #18 | #16 vs. #17 | All of these games will be held at current bowl site such as the New Orleans Bowl, Ponsettia Bowl, MPC Computers Bowl, etc. The winners will advance to the next part of the bracket and the losers kiss their championship dreams goodbye.

What happened to the #1 through #8 ranked teams? They all got first round byes. Once the first round ends, the following Saturday the #1 team will take on the winner of the #16/17 matchup; #2 will take on the winner of the #15/18 matchup, and so on. You might be asking, why wouldn't you just re-rank the teams after the first round? Hey, the NCAA basketball tournament doesn't say, "hey we had a 5/12 upset. Why don't we give the #1 seed the #12 team to face instead of the #8?" That would take out the potential bracket games that the NCAA basketball tournament has.

After that, there would be only eight teams. You should know the drill now; the games in this round will be played on the following Saturday and be played at bowl game sites such as the Cotton, Outback, Sugar, and Fiesta Bowls. Then you are at your Final Four teams. These games would be held at the Rose Bowl and the Orange Bowl; as I believe they have the most tradition out of all the BCS bowls.

Finally you have your championship game. Instead of doing what the BCS does now; with two games being held at the site of the Fiesta Bowl or any other BCS bowl, find a neutral site like the Super Bowl does. I believe this system would determine a true national champion.

Thoughts? Likes? Dislikes?
I'm writing an essay about this proposition in my college English class at ACM, lol.

One quick question: How would you deal with teams from conferences that currently do not have automatic BCS tie-ins?

For example, does a 10-2 BYU team (currently ranked 18th), from such a conference, deserve a spot in the playoff above a currently ranked 26th Virginia Tech team or a 27th ranked Iowa team who arguably play more difficult schedules?

As I'm sure you've discovered, there is not an easy solution to this....perhaps a playoff system like you have proposed, with a first human poll conduced after the fifth week or something like that. I think we all would agree, that pre-season polls are a horrific (see Wisconsin) and probably should be done away with.

13 week season. Everyone has a bye once. You play everyone in your conference. Your non-conference games, ranging from 0 for the MAC to 5 for the Big East are all against 1-A opponents. No conference championship games. Season ends the week before Thanksgiving with a 16 team playoff starting the weekend of Thanksgiving. All 11 Conference champions get automatic invitations. The remaining five teams are at large and should be the best 5 teams in the country not to win a Conference Championship. Tournament concludes January 1st with the National Championship game. This makes the entire regular season mean just as much, if not more than it currently does. The end.

Oh yeah, and in the by-laws, Pitt and Penn State have to play every year on the first weekend of the season.

That's a stupid idea and I will tell you why. You play your hated, in-state rival in week 1, and that already puts you behind the 8-ball for recruiting. I think Pitt and Penn State should play every year. But not in week 1. Week 13 is regarded as rivalry week, play the game week 13.

Here's a better idea: Join the Big Ten and you get home and home's with PSU, Ohio State, and Michigan. Hello, recruits.

frostlion wrote:One quick question: How would you deal with teams from conferences that currently do not have automatic BCS tie-ins?

For example, does a 10-2 BYU team (currently ranked 18th), from such a conference, deserve a spot in the playoff above a currently ranked 26th Virginia Tech team or a 27th ranked Iowa team who arguably play more difficult schedules?

As I'm sure you've discovered, there is not an easy solution to this....perhaps a playoff system like you have proposed, with a first human poll conduced after the fifth week or something like that. I think we all would agree, that pre-season polls are a horrific (see Wisconsin) and probably should be done away with.

Very true frostlion, I would get rid of pre-season polls as well.
Maybe has a set number of teams per conference that can get into the playoffs, perhaps?
For example, if you only allowed 3-4 teams per BCS conference, then Oklahoma State and Missouri would be fighting for that final spot the Big 12. That way the regular season isn't totally diminished.

The Ancient Enemy wrote:That's a stupid idea and I will tell you why. You play your hated, in-state rival in week 1, and that already puts you behind the 8-ball for recruiting. I think Pitt and Penn State should play every year. But not in week 1. Week 13 is regarded as rivalry week, play the game week 13.

Here's a better idea: Join the Big Ten and you get home and home's with PSU, Ohio State, and Michigan. Hello, recruits.

I picked week one because I felt Pitt and West Virginia would probably play week 13.

Admittedly, I only scanned post in this thread. I am big fan of the 'plus 1'; keeping in mind the enormity of the traditional bowls (the larger ones are now paying 20 - 30 mil!!). Therefore, everything (bowl structure) remains in tact and following the bowls; like Super Bowl take a week off, hype the crap outta it then #1 plays #2.....now of course every so many yrs you may have a #3 squad feeling like they got screwed but that's life......I know not as clean as a playoff but rather easy to pull off & I believe a HUGE improvement over current BCS system!