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It seems that at this time of year there's always a lot of talk about the need for a playoff system in college football. I know that I'm in the minority here, but I don't think it's a good idea. Or, to be more accurate, I don't think it's something that can happen, so we might as well stop wasting our time talking about it every year. Here's why:
Bowl games are important for building programs. The purpose of a playoff system would be to choose a champion from the top four or eight teams. But what would a playoff system do for the other programs? What happens to the team that has a breakout year and manages to win 7 or 8 games for the first time in decades? The current bowl system provides incentives and rewards, while a playoff system would simply place that team in a large group with the "also rans". A bowl game for this team provides national exposure and a chance to build fan and alumni support. It's a chance to cash in on merchandise sales and put a feather in their cap for recruiting purposes. And it's a chance to give the underclassmen a few more weeks of experience in preparation for next year. Under a playoff system, these benefits would be reserved for only a small number of teams each year.
So let's say that the bowls are left in place and some sort of an "and 1" situation is set up. Under this scenario, teams 1-4 would play in two of the BCS games, and the winners of those two games would play for the national championship. There are, however, a few problems with this. Most importantly, how do you decide who the best 4 teams are? If the final BCS rankings from this season were used, Oklahoma would play Alabama and Florida would play Texas, with the winners playing for the title. Guess who's on the outside looking in? The number 5 and 6 teams are USC and Utah, respectively. I don't think there's a college football fan in the nation that wouldn't agree that they should probably have a shot in a playoff situation.
The second problem with an "and 1" scenario is that it would be a step backwards in several regards. One reason cited for adding the national championship game as a 5th BCS game was to allow more teams the opportunity to play in one of them. Under the current system, a strong team from a "mid-major" conference can look forward to the possibility of a BCS bowl berth. In a 4 team playoff, that possibility all but vanishes. Especially if the champions of the major conferences continue to be given automatic berths. In addition to this, does it really make sense to ask a team to spend all of December prepping for their semifinal bowl game, and then give them a week or less to prep for the national championship? And will the teams that advance to the final game get a second BCS-level payout? And how will teams sell tickets to the BCS games if a large number of their fans decide to hold out on the chance that their team will play for a title the next week?
Another option would be to add two more bowl games (Probably Cotton and either Capital One or Chik-fil-A). Now you've got 7 games and can have an 8 team payout. This, however, doesn't solve any of the problems that we had in the "and-1" scenario. In fact, it compounds the problems of concentrating the payouts and prestige among fewer teams, and trying to prepare for, travel to, and sell tickets to, up to three games in a couple of weeks. Sure, more teams are in the BCS, but only because you've added two more games. And you've STILL got fewer teams in than you do under the current system. For this situation to work, you would also have to completely scrap conference tie-ins and automatic bids. Oh, and there's always going to be a #9 team that doesn't get in. This year, that team is Boise State. What's the purpose of a playoff if one of the undefeated teams doesn't get in?
Please don't misunderstand me here. I'm not saying that there aren't problems with the BCS system. I'm not saying that I'm happy with the way things are. But it would be inappropriate to talk about a playoff system as some sort of magic bullet that would fix everything. In order for it to work, you would have to completely scrap the bowl system. Let in 24 teams. Set up a 24 team bracket, giving the major conferences and a couple of highly ranked at large teams a first round bye. If the first round was played at the beginning of December, the whole thing could be finished up by the middle of January.
I guess my point is this: the only way that a playoff system would work is if we make it big and completely replace the current bowl system. This isn't going to happen...there's too much at stake. Until that time, there's not much point in trying to have a conversation about a college football playoff.
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