That's not a typo. I said it. The BCS has done something right. One thing. That's all I'll give them credit for. And if you've read my tweets in the past, even giving them credit for one thing is amazing. The BCS is an old and blighted system created to make rich teams richer and keep small conferences out of the big-time loop.
You may think the one thing they did right is to create a 4-team playoff. And that does seem like the direction of a right idea. But I don't think they've quite made it yet. Because those four teams will mostly likely be the "entitled" teams. No, the one thing that I like about the BCS: they don't say a word til week 8.
The one thing that drives me crazy about college sports is that they are so dominated by their rankings. In professional sports, if you win your division or league or conference or whatever, you make the post-season. Plain and simple. But because there are so many schools involved in college football, the rankings become important. And I feel like a sport that is so dominated by rankings should have to give it a little more time before ranking the teams.
There are pre-season rankings. So based on the reputations of certain teams or players or coaches, some teams are expected to do well the next season. Before the first snap, some writers and some coaches tell everyone who they think will do well. It's the one part of the game I never understood. I know that not everyone can play the same schedule. I know that some teams, because of the scholarships and prestige, can attract a higher quality of player, thereby creating better teams. But I feel like there should be more time to figure that all out.
My case-in-point came last night in the opening weekend. Now, for the most part this weekend, the teams that were "supposed to" win, did win. But there was one big marquee match-up last night. That was number 2 Alabama taking on number 8 Michigan. Both have prestige. Both have dynamic players. Both are expected to do very well. But apparently, there's a big rift between being number 2 and number 8. Alabama was up 21-0 by the end of the first quarter, and won 41-14 by game's end.
Now, because of this one loss, some will begin to say, 'well, apparently Michigan isn't as good as we thought', and rank them much lower next week. Now is Michigan much worse than they thought? Perhaps. Or maybe Alabama is just that good this year. But the rest of the season, Michigan will have to fight to get back up high in the rankings because they will be knocked down.
The situation is even worse for a team to get knocked down by a team they weren't expected to be beaten by. No ranked teams lost this weekend. But if a lower ranked team were to lose to an unranked team, even if they were to win a majority of the rest of their games for the rest of the season, they may never appear on the top 25 again.
Conversely, a team like Florida State, currently ranked 7th, plays in a perennially weak ACC. Many assume them to win the ACC. Because of this, they will remain ranked high throughout the season, even though some other teams may play a tougher schedule. I'm not saying that Florida State is not susceptible to the upset.But if they lose once, because they are already ranked high, they are more likely to stay on the top 25 list, possibly over some teams that have an undefeated record but come from a less prestigious conference.
So while many times, the BCS screws up who deserves to play in what bowl when, the one thing I think that all rankings should adopt is the fact that the BCS doesn't rank anyone in any way until 8 weeks into the season. It could really change the way the new playoff system works out.
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