Two-thirds human. One-third computer model. Three-thirds controversy. 100% needed in a season with out two lone undefeated teams from major conferences.
The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) exists to ensure the two best teams meet in the National Title Game. That title game cycles through four sites and bowl committees, as such has some relevance as to selection for those games each year – Rose, Fiesta, Sugar and Orange.
The BCS was designed to balance out the human voter biases by introducing computer rankings, which of course just led to different arguments after settling the original ones. In other words, there is no perfect system so the BCS is about as well constructed as it can be. The only hole in the deus ex machina is the USA Today’s Coaches Poll, widely derided since no coach has the time to watch enough games to make an informed decision – they have their own team and next opponent to worry about!
So how does this system affect this year’s top six teams and their fans so deeply committed to them? Brought to you in partnership with research director Matt Ryan, pros and cons below:
Americans simply want a meritocracy where the best survive and the weak do not. The Boise State Broncos embody that spirit as one of the winningest programs in college football while not being one of the economic power elite.
Fantasy College Blitz, and all who root for underdogs, carry the flag for Boise State in 2010 (Icon SMI)
So, do us a favor and throttle Nevada on Friday Night. Disarm the Wolfpack pistol. Make a burger out of the Turbo Ostrich Colin Kaepernick.
Coach Chris Petersen- you likely know this, but we who seek chaos in college football’s existing regime salute you. Be the successful outsider whose wins based on talent and heart, not on connections and money. We want the Broncos to be an agent of chaos.
While Top 25 ranked Nevada is the underdog in this week’s de facto WAC Championship game, Boise is this nation’s choice of underdog to root for.
Saturday will be quite an interesting day in the Big East. For the first time all season the conference will have all of it’s teams playing each other on the same day.
Pitt's Dion Lewis is ready to high-step into Step Up Saturday! (Icon SMI)
The eight Big East teams will be in action in a conference that is separated by just 2 games from first to worst. It is, as being called by only me:
Step Up Saturday!
On Step Up Saturday the stars have to shine in order to lay claim to the Big East crown, or their teams could end up playing in the BBVA Compass Bowl! No really, that’s a real bowl game, I looked it up.
Let’s breakdown the four games with the players and defenses that will step up on Step Up Saturday (see, it’s catching on!). Read the rest of this entry →
From reader Steve via e-mail, rock solid research and based in fact, but I fear this will likely go the way of the “Barack Obama was not born in the USA so he cannot be President” campaign. But let’s see if we can break down this BC-Mess, shall we? Please forward to your favorite blogs, websites and writers:
It appears that either the USA Today Coaches poll members must re-vote in order to recalculate the final BCS standings, OR The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame, Inc. should move up the University Cincinnati’s football team to play the University of Texas football team in the BCS Championship game.
At the bottom of the AFCA page with the Coaches Votes it specifically states:
Even though they appealed, the infractions are not set aside per below NCAA Bylaw:
32.10.2 – Determinations of fact and violations arrived at by the Committee on Infractions shall not be set aside on appeal. http://www.ncaapublications.com/Uploads/PDF/2007-08_d1_manual8716ea01-9388-4d68-bb93-2b6ff5ba2e36.pdf Based on these circumstances, the University of Alabama football team is required receive 0 (zero) points from the USA Today Coaches poll, giving them a recalculated BCS average of 0.6656, thus moving them down to number 8 on the BCS final standings:
Fantasy College Blitz welcomes back Matt Ryan after a long sabbatical (kid, job loss, kid, job found) and he comes back with a vengeance. Known to veterans of our site as the quantitative statistic leader of our writers up to 2007, Matt has always opposed the Bowl Championship Series and he created The Solution to bring the playoffs to the Bowl Subdivision, just like it exists at every other division of collegiate football. For your review (VM): Read the rest of this entry →
