I still say 16 is the way to go. If we started today and took conference champs and the rest of the top BCS teams it would be a pretty competitive tourny. If these teams played today, I'd say there would only be one or two sure higher seed wins.

1) Ohio St.
16) Florida Atlantic

8) Va. Tech
9) USF

5) Oklahoma
12) Hawaii

4) Arizona St.
13) BYU

3) LSU
14) ECU

6) Oregon
11) Florida

7) WVU
10) Kansas

2) Boston College
15) Central Michigan

army56mike Wrote:I still say 16 is the way to go. If we started today and took conference champs and the rest of the top BCS teams it would be a pretty competitive tourny.

The catch will be firming this format amidst a changing 1A landscape. The moment 1A moves to a playoff I guarantee more schools/conferences from AA will move up: Given the $ suggested such a format would make, there would be no need for programs maxing their AA scholarships to remain in the lower tier. At which point you're asking the power conferences to relinquish more of their status and pull. Is 16 enough if we have 14 D1 conferences? Will the PAC 10 and BE moan when those now-rarer second playoff entries seemingly always go to the SEC and Big XII? Or will there be a BCS-like calculation for qualification that leaves some conferences on the outside completely? (In which case, why have a playoff?) If you're still reliant on such calculations and rankings for things like qualification or first-round home field advantage, will there be changes in the voting membership with a much larger D1 (thus putting the "BCS" schools into a minority)?

Find a playoff format that resolves these issues and leaves the BCS schools in the drivers seat and then they'll readily fall in line.

There will never be a playoff with automatic bids for all conferences.

This is not basketball. You can only play one game per week in football, so the max entries the schools will allow is 16. (Which means 4 weeks, 1 more than the NCAA tourney)

With 11 conferences (probably more since many schools will try to make the jump if a auto-bid playoff is announced), you're talking about at most 5 at larges. Plus probably some bullcrap ND rule. You're also talking about years where a top 10 team might not make the play-off while schools like Kent State and North Texas does.

If you think the Big 6 are ever going to support a system where a 7-5 Eastern Michigan gets in over a 10-2 Michigan or 6-6 Arkansas St over a 9-3 Arkansas then I have some nice swamp land in Florida to sell you guys.

Remember the Big 6 is deciding here, not D-1A football. Until a playoff benefits the Big 6, there will never be one. And a playoff that benefits the Big 6 will probably hurt the non-BCS more than the current status quo.

ccbfan Wrote:Remember the Big 6 is deciding here, not D-1A football. Until a playoff benefits the Big 6, there will never be one. And a playoff that benefits the Big 6 will probably hurt the non-BCS more than the current status quo.

For that reason I like the idea of a plus one. The problem with the current system is that a good, not great, no loss team from a weaker conference, like the ACC of the Big 10 (BC and OSU) has an easier route to the title game and better, one loss, teams from tougher conferences like LSU and WVU.

When tht becomes clear, the title game becomes meaningless. A good example is the overranking of OSU and Michigan last year. Florida completly exposed the fantasy that OSu was great. But here we are again this year. Of course the big 10 and the Pac 10 dont' wnt the plus one. Basically, all you have to do now is go undefeated in conference, add on some cream uffs and you get a national title. If your conference is only a two- team conference like the Big 10- yo should be able to play for the title just about every other year, as long as you keep a weak OOC schedule.

At least a plus 1 gives the top four teams a shot at the title. and chances those top four will come from four different BCS conferences. The current system may as well let Hawaii play for the title. There is no REAL title in football under the current system.

frogman Wrote:When tht becomes clear, the title game becomes meaningless. A good example is the overranking of OSU and Michigan last year. Florida completly exposed the fantasy that OSu was great. But here we are again this year. Of course the big 10 and the Pac 10 dont' wnt the plus one. Basically, all you have to do now is go undefeated in conference, add on some cream uffs and you get a national title. If your conference is only a two- team conference like the Big 10- yo should be able to play for the title just about every other year, as long as you keep a weak OOC schedule.

Michigan does a decent job with their non-conference schedule. OSU looks like they need to add at least one quality out of conference game a year.

Too bad they don't have a requirement that every BCS school needs to play at least 10 BCS games on a home and home basis.

LaRue777 Wrote:

frogman Wrote:When tht becomes clear, the title game becomes meaningless. A good example is the overranking of OSU and Michigan last year. Florida completly exposed the fantasy that OSu was great. But here we are again this year. Of course the big 10 and the Pac 10 dont' wnt the plus one. Basically, all you have to do now is go undefeated in conference, add on some cream uffs and you get a national title. If your conference is only a two- team conference like the Big 10- yo should be able to play for the title just about every other year, as long as you keep a weak OOC schedule.

Michigan does a decent job with their non-conference schedule. OSU looks like they need to add at least one quality out of conference game a year.

Too bad they don't have a requirement that every BCS school needs to play at least 10 BCS games on a home and home basis.

That would kill most of the non-BCS teams in D1A.

Many school stay alive by playing money games. And for schools like USM/TCU/BYU/ECU/BSU. It will be that much harder to schedule BCS teams. Most BCS teams will now only schedule cream buffs since they already have to play 10 BCS schools.

Plus this puts a stone wall divide among the BCS and non-BCS. That 2 extra game that BCS teams play will be treated like that IAA game many teams now play.