After the latest College Football mayhem

[tanstaafl2]

It will be interesting to see how the polls fall out this week.

Perhaps:

1. Missouri
2. WVU
3. Ohio St
Those seem to be a given. But who will fill out the top 8? I suspect Kansas will plummet, rightly or wrongly, as they have gotten no support all season but maybe they will still slide in behind Ohio St or at least somewhere in the top 8. Will LSU fall to here or further down the list? Maybe Florida gets the 8th spot? Other contenders include:

Georgia
Va Tech
OU
USC

What about Hawaii? They don't appear to be anything close to a top 8 team but will their undefeated record get them some love?

So who would be the 8 teams now if college football actually had the cojones to have a true playoff? And who would get left out?

Because you know an 8 team playoff would only shift the argument from who should be 2 vs 3 to who should 8 vs 9!

And of course, there is another week of madness to go. With LSU going in the tank and the moderately miserable Vols holding off Kentucky in 4 OTs the SEC championship no longer has much meaning. The biggest beneficiary is probably Georgia who doesn't have to risk another loss since even a win in the game likely couldn't push them to the mythical national title game, especially now that LSU is no longer #1.

Instead, the Big 12 Championship once again gets to take center stage. An OU win might give them a title shot although it seems unlikely unless WVU somehow has a complete collapse against the toothless Pitt Panthers.

But the worst impact of a Missouri or a WVU loss could be that Ohio St gets in the title game. Now that would be a travesty....

[Ritterskoop]

It will be interesting to see how the polls fall out this week.

Perhaps:

1. Missouri
2. WVU
3. Ohio St
Those seem to be a given.

[deleted]

But the worst impact of a Missouri or a WVU loss could be that Ohio St gets in the title game. Now that would be a travesty....

Given your first statement, that these are the top 3, if one of the top 2 loses, why would it be unjust for OSU to move up?

[TheCalvinator24]

My guess is that tanstaafl is not an Ohio State fan.

It was a subjective statement of preference, not an objective analysis of the situation.

[tanstaafl2]

It will be interesting to see how the polls fall out this week.

Perhaps:

1. Missouri
2. WVU
3. Ohio St
Those seem to be a given.

[deleted]

But the worst impact of a Missouri or a WVU loss could be that Ohio St gets in the title game. Now that would be a travesty....

Given your first statement, that these are the top 3, if one of the top 2 loses, why would it be unjust for OSU to move up?

I should clarify. I believe that it is a given that the first three listed will be the top 3 in the next poll release. It doesn't necessarily reflect my personal opinion of what the rankings should be.

I am neither for nor against Ohio St. I reside in Georgia but did not go to school there and am neither for nor against Georgia, nor any other particular school. If I have any rooting affiliation at all, and it would be very limited, then it would be for Ga Tech, which I did almost attend, and they certainly aren't an issue in this discussion given their lackluster season!

I do not believe that Ohio State is currently the third best team in the country and so that is why I do not believe they should move up. I am not entirely sure they are one of the 8 best but I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt on that one.

If there were a playoff system then of course it would not matter what I thought (not that it does now) as they would have the opportunity to prove they belonged in the championship game.

[tanstaafl2]

My guess is that tanstaafl is not an Ohio State fan.

It was a subjective statement of preference, not an objective analysis of the situation.

I would prefer to see it as a subjective statement of preference based on an objective (as possible) analysis of the situation.

That's my story and I am sticking to it!

It is the rare person indeed who can try to be truly and completely objective in their analysis of this subject. Even the computer rankings reflect subjective determination by someone, or a group of someones, of what gets more weight in determining the outcome.

[Ritterskoop]

My guess is that tanstaafl is not an Ohio State fan.

It was a subjective statement of preference, not an objective analysis of the situation.

I would prefer to see it as a subjective statement of preference based on an objective (as possible) analysis of the situation.

That's my story and I am sticking to it!

It is the rare person indeed who can try to be truly and completely objective in their analysis of this subject. Even the computer rankings reflect subjective determination by someone, or a group of someones, of what gets more weight in determining the outcome.

My college does not and did not have a football team. I never paid attention to the topic until about three years ago. So I am as objective as is possible. That's why I couldn't understand the first post, but Cal's explanation helped.

It was just odd, that most of your post was objective but the final statement wasn't, and there was no context for me to know you dislike OSU.

[TheCalvinator24]

I also think they need to go to a 12 team tournament with the top 4 seeds getting a bye week. I would prefer a 16 team tourney.

I'd be willing to consider a rule limiting Conferences to 2 Reps, but how do you keep Kansas out? (I am assuming OU is going to beat Missouri, but that's my bias talking).

I would provide automatic Bids to the champs of:

ACC
Big 12
Big East
Big Ten
Conference USA
Mountain West
PAC 10
SEC
WAC

That leaves 3 At Large Bids. If we have to limit the automatic bids to the current BCS conferences, I could live with that.

Under my system, A lot would depend on next Saturday's games, but here's how it might look using the current AP rankings (BCS isn't out yet) and some subjective seeding by me

1 Missouri (if they beat Oklahoma)
2 West Virginia (assuming they take care of business against Pitt)
3 Ohio State
4 LSU (Assuming they beat Tennessee)
5 USC (Assuming they beat UCLA)
6 Virginia Tech
7 Georgia
8 Hawaii
9 Kansas
10 Arizona State (assuming they win)
11 Tulsa (I'm assuming they will beat UCF. If not, UCF goes here)
12 BYU

So, we get these matchups:

5 USC vs. 12 BYU winner faces LSU
6 VaTech vs. 11 Tulsa winner faces Ohio State
7 Georgia vs. 10 Arizona State Winner faces West Virginia
8 Hawaii vs. 9 Kansas Winner faces Missouri
If we go to 16 teams and the same assumptions, I'd go with:

1 Missouri
2 West Virginia
3 Ohio State
4 LSU
5 USC
6 Virginia Tech
7 Georgia
8 Hawaii
9 Kansas
10 Arizona State
11 Florida
12 Oklahoma
13 Illinois (gets a bump up to avoid a conference matchup in Round 1
14 Boston College
15 Tulsa (I'm assuming they will beat UCF. If not, UCF goes here)
16 BYU

[tanstaafl2]

My college does not and did not have a football team. I never paid attention to the topic until about three years ago. So I am as objective as is possible. That's why I couldn't understand the first post, but Cal's explanation helped.

It was just odd, that most of your post was objective but the final statement wasn't, and there was no context for me to know you dislike OSU.

As I already noted, while it might be a reasonable conclusion, Cal is mistaken. I have no particular dog in this hunt and no specific bias against Ohio St or for any other team. In most years, and in this year in particular, there are perhaps 8-10 teams that could beat any of the other teams on any given day. But amongst those teams if one were forced to apply some ranking I believe in my best effort to be objective that Ohio State is not the third best and is nearer the bottom of the list than the top.

Of course a play off would go a long way to help clarify that.

My reference to it being a travesty was an apparent poor attempt at humor and to "stimulate" comment.

[tanstaafl2]

I also think they need to go to a 12 team tournament with the top 4 seeds getting a bye week. I would prefer a 16 team tourney.

I'd be willing to consider a rule limiting Conferences to 2 Reps, but how do you keep Kansas out? (I am assuming OU is going to beat Missouri, but that's my bias talking).

I would provide automatic Bids to the champs of:

ACC
Big 12
Big East
Big Ten
Conference USA
Mountain West
PAC 10
SEC
WAC

That leaves 3 At Large Bids. If we have to limit the automatic bids to the current BCS conferences, I could live with that.

A reasonable alternative although I would not want to cap the number of bids for any one conference and if you were to give an automatic bid to the 3 conferences not currently part of the BCS it would certainly be better to go to a 16 team format.

[TheCalvinator24]

How about we leave it at 12 teams. Only guarantee the 6 current BCS conferences plus any non-BCS team that is in the Top 12 of the Rankings. This year, I believe that would only include Hawaii, so you would still have 5 At Large bids.

1 Missouri
2 West Virginia
3 Ohio State
4 LSU
5 USC
6 Virginia Tech
7 Georgia
8 Hawaii
9 Kansas
10 Arizona State
11 Florida
12 Oklahoma

[andrewjackson]

My preference is for a 16 team playoff.

All 11 conference winners qualify plus 5 at-large.

Or a 12 team playoff with all 11 conference winners plus 1 at-large.

Either of these would mean that every single team in the top level of college football would have a chance no matter what anyone voted on. I know that the MAC, SunBelt, and C-USA teams would probably have no chance but if they are going to count as top level teams then either let them in or kick them out.

Either way:

Dec. 15 - first round at either home fields or neutral sites
Jan. 1 - second round at the big 4 bowls; Orange, Sugar, Fiesta, Rose
Jan. 12 - national semifinals
Jan. 26 - championship game

That's two weeks off between games and only two teams playing beyond January 12.

The other 27 bowl games could still be played between Dec. 17 and Dec. 31.

As an intermediary step, I can see having a 12 team playoff with the 6 BCS conference winners and 6 at-large. Same schedule as above.