(03-22-2012 11:48 PM)attackfrog Wrote: Interesting take on Notre Dame's future standing in college football.
Not only will it be increasingly harder for the Irish to find a way to the Plus One without an unbeaten or 1-loss season (the last one: 1993), the days of the BCS placating the Irish could be all but over.
It wasn’t long ago that the BCS agreed to give Notre Dame $1.3 million a year just for the whiff of the potential that the Irish could actually qualify for a BCS bowl. That’s right, the renegotiated BCS contract in 2005 came with a rider that gave Notre Dame money just for being Notre Dame.
Those days, everyone, are long gone.
In years past, the Notre Dame athletic director was the strongest man in the room during BCS meetings. How else do you think the university carved out such unthinkable deals that allowed the Irish to play in the Fiesta Bowl in 1994 with a 6-4-1 record? Or get millions of dollars for simply showing up?
The advent of conference realignment has changed everything. Last month in Dallas, while the 11 conference commissioners met to begin historic change, Irish athletic director Jack Swarbrick may as well have been the commissioner of the MAC.
Read more: http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-footbal...z1pubjywdD
http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-footbal...ne-playoff
(03-23-2012 03:02 AM)ClairtonPanther Wrote: At the end of the day, if the Irish finish in the Top 5 I'm pretty sure they'll be taken over a Conference Champion. To think that the Irish will be left out is laughable at best. All the more reason this playoff will be an 8 team one fairly quickly.
I wouldn't let the opinions and poor journalism of Matt Hayes worry you guys too much.
Where is the bad journalism or poor writing?
1) The other BCS games and related payouts won't go away with a plus 1 or whatever happens short of an 8 team playoff.
2) He says a ND team with 2 losses won't make a 4 team playoff. Um, yes? Is he saying a 2 loss OU or Michigan or FSU will? Maybe only in the oddest of seasons and with ND's schedule, ND would be in position in that scenario as well.
3) His article suggests ND doesn't have the pull of the SEC or Big11. While the Big11 is debatable, does that mean ND has the same sway as the Pac16, Big12, ACC, & BigEast? Not bad for a single school.
4) He mentions ND's QB competition without mentioning Everett Golson. That alone shows that he is lazy about his journalism and research.
Additionally, he acts like ND just gets $1.3MM every year from the BCS as a gift. What he fails to mention is that ND only gets $4.5MM now when they make the BCS versus the $17.5MM they used to get years ago.
The $1.3 million and $4.5 MM figures were a compromise between ND and the BCS. He fails to even mention that. Sloppy journalism, at best.
If Jim Delany is so strong why did he get his bluff called by both ND AD Jack Swarbrick and Texas AD DeLoss Dodds?
Additionally, there are standards for ND's inclusion in the BCS right now. They can't make the BCS with only 8 wins. So if the inclusion standards aren't repealed, how does ND's position grow weaker? What am I missing?
Now, there are a couple of ways that Notre Dame's position can be weakened:
First, would be the limit of two teams per conference being eliminated.
Second, requiring a conference championship for inclusion in a playoff.
Third, the creation of a playoff outside the current Bowl System, would result in less payouts per bowl. And, if the conferences split the playoff money, it will be a financial hit to ND.
We can argue all day whether either of these things will, or could, happen. But if #2 happens, ND will be forced to join a conference. #1 could result in less access to a possible BCS Bowl, but I doubt it affects ND too much as any ND team that qualifies would be taken ahead of the #3 team from any conference.
A playoff system that requires one to win a conference championship to be eligible would effectively shut out any of the current non-automatic qualifiers from any hope of playing for the national championship.
I don't see how, politically, they could get away with creating a new system that's actually more arbitrarily unfair than the system it is supposed to replace. Whatever future playoff/BCS iteration comes down the pike will likely have to preserve an at-large option for an outlier team to sneak into the four team playoff if they're ranked in the top four.
Take away this option and you make anti-trust attention from the Justice Department more likely rather than less likely.
It also doesn't allow for a situation wherein the two best teams in the country are from the same conference. There couldn't be a rematch if a conference championship is a requirement.
As long as that door (at large option) remains open, I think Notre Dame can stay independent indefinitely.
So, all in all, the article doesn't scare too many people in South Bend. There is serious doubt that a four team playoff involving only conference champs will evolve from the BCS.