College Football Bowl Series

It seems like every year there is some sort of problem with how the upper level of American College Football -- Football Championship Subdivision. Given the international membership, not much need to post this to an actual sports website and sports have come up before.... and just a general need to get it out there.

Instead of just having one bowl series, Bowl Championship Series (BCS) there should be 3 tiers of bowl series. The Bowl Championship Series would be limited to say the top 25 teams. Their non-conference games would be against other BCS teams. They should also play their inconference BCS teams. It would be not be to hard thus have a reasonable ranking in the 25.

The next tier of Bowl Series, say for this example the Cirtis Bowl and the Invitational Bowl Series. Each would consist of 25 team each and scheduling would be similar to BCS as would the next tier's bowl series (Medal BS, Holiday BS, Liberty BS) .

I was looking at how European Football (Soccer) handles leagues, teams are promoted from lower leagues not individuals. So the winners from the lower level bowl series would promote to the next level of bowl series and those at the bottom of a bowl series rankings would go down a bowl series level.

• Cirtis Bowl Series: Capital One Citrus, Chick-fil-A Peach, Champs Sports Tangerine Bowl, and Cherry Bowl
• Invitational Bowl Series: Invitational [Cotton Bowl], Sun Bowl, Gator Bowl, Outback Bowl
• Holiday Series: Holiday Bowl, Poinsettia Bowl, ?, ?
• Medal: Gold*, Silver*, Insight Copper, Emerald
• Liberty: Liberty Bowl, Independence Bowl, Freedom Bowl*, Alamo Bowl

* new or renamed bowls

An Allstar/senior bowl could be create or associate with each bowl series.

I have given this problem a lot of thought over the years, being a huge college football fan. And, while your ideas have merits, you have two major opponents in this instance: the conferences and the individual universities.

There is an embarassing amount of money involved in college football, and the major conferences/schools aren't ever going to be willing to subscribe to a system that would "demote" them at any time for a poor season. There's a huge disparity between the payouts of BCS bowls and those of lesser bowls, and major schools aren't going to give that up in favor of promotion/relegation. The colleges, conferences and fans wouldn't accept that sort of change.

Division 1-A college football is the only NCAA-recognized sport that doesn't have a legitimate playoff system. The old bowl system is dying slowly, and fans/commentators (even some college coaches, athletic directors and presidents) are clamoring for a playoff system.

The idea is that all of the BCS conferences (ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big XII, SEC, Pac-10) would all have automatic berths for their champions, and either two, four, six or eight at-large berths for the remaining highest-ranked teams, and that they would play in "bowl games" that rotate through (so that each bowl in the rotation has the opportunity to host the championship).

The big problem with this is that it could seriously affect attendance at bowl games that aren't hosting the championship, as some fans would choose to wait to attend a more-important game as their team advances through the playoff tree. And, a team's fans (specifically, how well they "travel") are currently one of the (unofficial) selection criteria. A team that gets a lot of its fans to attend a bowl (i.e, a team that "travels well") would sometimes get picked over a team that doesn't.

Now, I personally think that theory is bunk, but the people who make all the money from the bowls are the hardest ones to convince.

Still, I hope that college football will see the light and set up a legitimate playoff. Heck, eight teams would be enough for me, still allowing another 20+ bowls to be played for the teams that don't make the playoffs. I'm not looking for something akin to the NCAA basketball championships, just looking to have the debate shift from the snubbing of the 3rd-best team to the snubbing of the 9th-best or 17th-best team. That's more palatable, and it also means more good football between college powerhouses. :)

Oh, yeah. Go Huskers! :)

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Originally Posted by Sea Tyger

[COLOR="Wheat"]I have given this problem a lot of thought over the years, being a huge college football fan. And, while your ideas have merits, you have two major opponents in this instance: the conferences and the individual universities.

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Not all conference are currently members of the BCS. Granted the major conferences are. Some independent members fo the BCS like Notre Dame should they really be a BCS member? Granted that they do draw a crowd when they travel.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sea Tyger

[COLOR="Wheat"]There is an embarassing amount of money involved in college football, and the major conferences/schools aren't ever going to be willing to subscribe to a system that would "demote" them at any time for a poor season. There's a huge disparity between the payouts of BCS bowls and those of lesser bowls, and major schools aren't going to give that up in favor of promotion/relegation. The colleges, conferences and fans wouldn't accept that sort of change.

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If demoting a team would give them a greater chance to play for a NIT (National Invitational Tournment) like Bowl Series, I think that most Univeristies would jump at that. I don't hear about too many college teams in basketball turning down invites to the NIT. So a BCS team that goes 6-6 would not trade for a chance for a potential 9-3 and a trip to a Bowl Series bowl as supposed to a independent bowl? I am assuming too that more money might flow to the new Series as they crown a Series Camp. It is not like they drop out of the Division 1-A. To a certain extent all nonBCS colleges have been demoted do to the existance of the BCS.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sea Tyger

[COLOR="Wheat"]Division 1-A college football is the only NCAA-recognized sport that doesn't have a legitimate playoff system. The old bowl system is dying slowly, and fans/commentators (even some college coaches, athletic directors and presidents) are clamoring for a playoff system.

The idea is that all of the BCS conferences (ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big XII, SEC, Pac-10) would all have automatic berths for their champions, and either two, four, six or eight at-large berths for the remaining highest-ranked teams, and that they would play in "bowl games" that rotate through (so that each bowl in the rotation has the opportunity to host the championship).

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There is a lot of resistant to a playoff system. I have though of that before, too. There is a playoff for the Division I-AA (now know as Division I Football Championship Subdivision). Given that Division I-A is now know as Football Bowl Subdivision that seem unlikely. At least this model will include all conferences and teams and build in the nonconference games to give better rankings in a BS. This BS model could be a good intermediate step in moving toward a playoff tournment with perhaps the demotion/premotion being the future catalyst or be a reasonable final model.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sea Tyger

The big problem with this is that it could seriously affect attendance at bowl games that aren't hosting the championship, as some fans would choose to wait to attend a more-important game as their team advances through the playoff tree. And, a team's fans (specifically, how well they "travel") are currently one of the (unofficial) selection criteria. A team that gets a lot of its fans to attend a bowl (i.e, a team that "travels well") would sometimes get picked over a team that doesn't.

Now, I personally think that theory is bunk, but the people who make all the money from the bowls are the hardest ones to convince.

Still, I hope that college football will see the light and set up a legitimate playoff. Heck, eight teams would be enough for me, still allowing another 20+ bowls to be played for the teams that don't make the playoffs. I'm not looking for something akin to the NCAA basketball championships, just looking to have the debate shift from the snubbing of the 3rd-best team to the snubbing of the 9th-best or 17th-best team. That's more palatable, and it also means more good football between college powerhouses. :)

Oh, yeah. Go Huskers! :)

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I think this tier Bowl Series setup would drop any talk about snubbing of team.

Any Europeans out there willing to give any insite to promotion/demotion in their sports leagues?