Time to fix College Football (10 Years Later)
For my first entry into Medium, I thought it would be a good time to post something I wrote 10 years ago on FB, and I think this would be a good time to reintroduce this. Some of the links are dated but I think it still applies. I edited it to include more teams (and Notre Dame has shown it’s relevancy since Kelly took over) but the logic still fits, even more so since the CFP replacing the BCS could keep its bowl structure.
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With all the controversy in college football, the time has come to finally end all the arguments. My 3 step proposal will fix all of the flaws that exist with the current CFP format.
Step one: 4 18 team conferences.
Andy Staples of CNNSI was the first to suggest it (https://www.si.com/more-sports/2010/02/17/conference-realignment); Larry Scott, the new commissioner of the (now) PAC-12 nearly pulled it off. With conferences already re-aligning, the inevitability of 4 super conferences will happen. Introducing the PAC-16, Big 16, ACC, and SEC. Roll out the conferences and lets play ball. Split each conference into two divisions each, hold a championship game for each conference, and the four conference winners are eligible for the National Championship (more on that later).
Why would the college presidents agree to this?
For one, it’s already happening. The college presidents of the PAC-10/12/16 bought into Scott’s plan of expanding to 16 teams. Had it happened, the PAC-16 would have been the number one conference, and the others would have had to scramble to compete. The dominoes are already in motion with the Big 10 and Big 12; now one will have 12 teams (Big-10) and the other will have 12 (Big-10) as opposed to the other way around. Had Scott’s plan actually worked, the fuzzy math would probably have not been so fuzzy, and we’d have at worse two 16 team conferences, with the others merging eventually to survive.
For another, this helps avoid the perception that the NCAA is a monopoly. Staples actually made a case for the 4 conferences as a competitor to the NCAA in his format (called CASH). With the competitive financial advantage that CASH would have over the NCAA, even Notre Dame would be forced to make the switch (assuming they get into one of the four superconferences) Nothing like legal action to force college presidents to act.
No more committees. No more arguing over things like strength of schedule, etc. You have to win your division to qualify. The regular season matters again. What’s more, the Conference Championships take a greater place of importance, accomplishing the same thing as an 8 team playoff.
2020 Edit: I have expanded this from 64 to 72 teams, as there are 65 Power 5 Teams with Notre Dame (which has shown they can play in a conference this year) and adding the proliferation of Group of 5 teams over the past decade. Though I doubt there are more than 5 or 6 teams that legitimately belong, I gave up to 7 extra teams, thinking there are probably 7 teams outside of the Power 5 better than, say, Vanderbilt. Say, Boise State, BYU, Cincinnati, UCF, USF, Houston, and Coastal Carolina.
While Staples has laid out the teams that play in each conference, I have an interesting twist to the model….
Step two: Similar to soccer in England, swap out the bottom two teams of each conference (the last place teams) with two other teams not among the 4 superconferences the following year.
In the 20 team English Premier League, the three worse teams are always relegated to a lower league (almost like AAA baseball) and the three best teams from said lower league are promoted to the EPL. Similarly, the last two of each superconference (basically the last place team of each 8 team division) would swap with the 8 best teams that finished in the other NCAA divisions (or independents).
By doing this, this allows the Boise States, TCUs, Utahs, etc. to finally be on a level playing field (2020 EDIT — they will make the initial cut with 7 extra slots but the incentive still remains in this model). While it may not do much for the team this year, it certainly helps with legitimacy (let alone recruiting) down the road. These teams have been consistently dominant over the last few years, and thus it’s not hard to believe that they will earn their way to CASH .
Arguments against this have already been wiped out. The notion of keeping traditional rivalries went out the window in the previous round of conference expansion (simply witness Nebraska leaving the Big 8/12 and why they did it, blaming Texas for all but killing the Oklahoma-Nebraska rivalry. 2020 EDIT Nebraska is still making noise.). Conferences have been known to drop bad teams in the past (witness the Big East dropping Temple). And while the possibility of all the incoming teams not matching up geographically with their new conferences does exist, the fact that the PAC-12’s original invite was for Texas proves that geography pretty much doesn’t matter. Plus the annual turnover would correct the problem the next year. And again — it’s not like schools haven’t jumped from one conference to another.
As for the National Championship…
Step Three: Go to the Plus-One model with the Bowls.
By returning the Bowl games back to their traditional times and playing the national championship the following week, we can satisfy both the “traditionalists” and the “progressive-minded”. With the four conference winners as the only qualifiers to the national championship, it makes sense to keep the bowl rotation where the first two bowls pick the top 4 teams to play each other, then the two winners square off in the national championship the following week at the site of one of the other bowl games. As with the current system, each of the major bowls (Rose, Fiesta, Orange, Sugar) will take turns rotating said honor. The remaining bowls can choose whomever they wish.
2020 EDIT — The CFP is already doing this. Switching to my model would allow the Bowls to stay where they are.
And that’s my proposal. Time to make it happen!
