BCS Really Does Stand For Bull Crap System

Oklahoma in the Big 12 title game over Texas, who beat them earlier this season. Once again, the computers have made their decision, and as usual, it was a bad one. Will we ever get this right?

I’m not a Texas fan, I’m just a fan of college football. When will Division 1 learn that a playoff is needed. Whether its an 8 team or a 16 team playoff, or just a +1 game after the BCS bowls, something needs to change. There are so many teams who deserve a shot at the title this year. Can you imagine the ratings, and the matchups. What about a Cinderella team like Utah or Boise State. A playoff would be great for all involved: the teams, the fans, everyone.

From the Associated Press:

College football is careening toward its most unsatisfying conclusion in the 10 years since the BCS took control of the postseason, and that’s no coincidence. With more parity in the sport and more schools playing 12 games during the regular season (and 13 for those from conferences with title games), the chances that teams will separate themselves from the pack by going undefeated seems less with each passing year.

If Florida beats Alabama in the SEC championship game, Oklahoma beats Missouri in the Big 12 title game (more on that in a moment), and USC beats UCLA, all on tap for the final weekend, this regular season will conclude with seven one-loss teams from the six major BCS conferences and almost as many potential headaches.

At the moment, Texas looks like the recipient of the BCS’ annual “life-isn’t-fair” award. The Longhorns have already been denied the chance to play for their conference title, despite beating Big 12 South division rival Oklahoma in a head-to-head matchup and finishing with the same 11-1 record. And Texas Tech, a third member of the Big 12 South, could make almost as good an argument.

The Red Raiders also went 11-1 and beat Texas, but got hammered so thoroughly by Oklahoma that unlike his counterparts at both schools, coach Mike Leach hasn’t wasted much of his breath lobbying. He suggested using graduation rates to break the three-way deadlock. Instead, the Sooners will play North division survivor Missouri because the Big 12’s fifth tiebreaker rule — higher BCS rating — gave them the nod over Texas.

That decision is wrong on so many levels, it’s hard to know where to begin.

The BCS ranking is made up of three equally weighted components: the USA Today coaches’ and Harris Interactive polls, and six computers. The machines aren’t entirely without bias, since they process whatever information they’re given. But the chance that grudges and favorites might have affected voters in the human polls can’t be dismissed, since the only ballot that’s made public is the final one.

Texas coach Mack Brown and his Oklahoma counterpart, Bob Stoops, spent most of the past week either lobbying those same voters or talking about how unseemly it was being forced to do just that. The names and schools getting hosed changes each year, but whining by their coaches has become as much a fact of life at this time of the year as the cold weather sweeping across most of the country.