It’s the 2010 NFL Wildcard Weekend. The 7-9 Seattle Seahawks, due to winning an incredibly underwhelming division, earned the right to host the defending Superbowl champion New Orleans Saints. The Hawks have already stunned the entire football viewing universe by being up 34-30 with 3:37 remaining in the fourth quarter. Seattle has the ball on their own thirty two yard line. At 2nd and 10, all the Saints need is a stop here to, more than likely, have good enough field position to take this one home and move on to round two. Then, Matt Hasselbeck handed the ball to Marshawn Lynch and the soul of every member of Who Dat Nation was crushed in a matter of seconds.
In case you don’t remember, Lynch seemingly ran through and over the entire Saints defense on his way to a game sealing touchdown and one of the most astonishing upsets in recent memory was in full effect. To everyone other than Saint’s fans, naturally, that was an unforgettable game and even better ending from an entertainment standpoint. Prior to that game, many, myself included, questioned whether a sub .500 team deserved to be in the playoffs at all even if they did win their division. I know this: had they not been allowed in, we would have been robbed of a great moment in NFL playoff history.
Now, if you follow sports and specifically football, you are familiar with the BCS. In case you aren’t, in summary, it is a combination computer/human “expert” grading system that the NCAA uses to rank its football programs each week. Even if you win, depending on how good the team is you play and how good you look beating them, winning does not guarantee you will not move down the rankings. After the conclusion of the regular season, the BCS determines who their final number one and two teams are and deem them worthy to play for the National Championship.
The issues and complaints about this system are well documented; however, I wanted to look at it from another angle. Let’s take another example.
Most of you are aware that the 2010 Green Bay Packers won the Superbowl. This team’s story is a special one. Throughout the course of the season they put almost an entire starting roster’s worth of players on Injured Reserve for the entire season. Not scrubs either, I’m talking key contributors to that teams success. They persevered, battled through, guys stepped up and they made an incredible run on the road to proving that they were the top team in the league.
If the BCS ran the NFL, this never happens. Why? Glad you asked.
Remember, there is no playoff in college football. The National Championship game is set up at the end of the regular season. Once week 17 had concluded, the Packers were 10-6. That is the equivalent of being a three or four loss team at the college level. With the BCS running things, the two teams who play for the title have the best records in the game, always. Only exception is if a large school has one loss and a small school is undefeated, the larger school will get the bid.
That injustice aside, This means that Superbowl XLVI would’ve been more than likely played between the New England Patriots and the Atlanta Falcons, the Falcons being the team Green Bay beat down 48-21 on Atlanta’s home field in the divisional round of the playoffs. If you can look at that scenario and feel that the BCS would have gotten that one right then I call into question your right to possess an opinion on football and you should probably stop reading this, like, now.
Playoff football is an event like no other. In the NFL, January means you bring your A-game or your sitting at home next week watching your opponent continue to play for a ring. Some of the greatest moments in all of sports have taken place during the NFL playoffs. Under the rules of the BCS, you can take Seattle’s upset, Lynch’s run, Green Bay’s ring and all of your favorite playoff game memories, toss them into a garbage can full of gasoline, light a match and drop it in. They would not exist as we know them.
There is something so fundamentally wrong with all of this. Football is a game of men that takes place on the field of play. Nothing off the field should ever be used to determine winners, losers, champions, or anything else for that matter. The only exception would be a player getting in trouble or injured somehow outside of playing the game and, in that case, it’s on the player as an individual.
Really, why do you keep track of records? Once a team loses more than one game, their record is no longer relevant. Sure they may make the Sugar Bowl, but really, who gives a damn. There is one champion at the end of any season and the only game that matter in that regard is the National Championship. So, you're leaving the process incomplete. You track each team’s record, have them play out a full schedule, then say "you and you, play to see whose best."
Why even keep score? If you're going to allow a group of "experts" and a computer program to determine whose worthy of being the best, then just turn off the scoreboard, let the teams throw down and have 3 guys in the press box determine who looks better during the course of the game. Sounds ridiculous, but it isn’t too far off from what’s happening.
This is not about touting the NFL as the superior brand of football. It isn’t “Look at how great this is and you suck because you aren’t like this.” My point is that, as great as college football is, look at what the playoffs and a system that allows the season to unfold on its own has brought to its fans. Imagine being able to infuse some of that playoff magic into what we already have in college football.
This isn’t about dogging the game; it’s about the potential for it to be so much better than it already is. Whether or not you like the end result, regardless of what your team accomplishes over the course of a season, there is no denying the Superbowl champion. It was determined by on the field play that they are the best. Not by a computer or by a group of people who debate who beat better teams or who won better.
Sure, you have blown calls and in game injuries that regularly alter what may have been the end result of a game, but that is still on the field and a part of the game. That’s football. Shouldn't football decide football?
Now, I won’t argue that the teams who do get selected to the big game in college are not among the elite, but as we see in the NFL season after season, there is no way of knowing who the best is without allowing it to take place on the field.
No disrespect intended to Auburn, Alabama and other recent title holders, but as long as college football uses the BCS as its decision engine, you will never again have a true National Champion, ever.
In case you don’t remember, Lynch seemingly ran through and over the entire Saints defense on his way to a game sealing touchdown and one of the most astonishing upsets in recent memory was in full effect. To everyone other than Saint’s fans, naturally, that was an unforgettable game and even better ending from an entertainment standpoint. Prior to that game, many, myself included, questioned whether a sub .500 team deserved to be in the playoffs at all even if they did win their division. I know this: had they not been allowed in, we would have been robbed of a great moment in NFL playoff history.
Now, if you follow sports and specifically football, you are familiar with the BCS. In case you aren’t, in summary, it is a combination computer/human “expert” grading system that the NCAA uses to rank its football programs each week. Even if you win, depending on how good the team is you play and how good you look beating them, winning does not guarantee you will not move down the rankings. After the conclusion of the regular season, the BCS determines who their final number one and two teams are and deem them worthy to play for the National Championship.
The issues and complaints about this system are well documented; however, I wanted to look at it from another angle. Let’s take another example.
Most of you are aware that the 2010 Green Bay Packers won the Superbowl. This team’s story is a special one. Throughout the course of the season they put almost an entire starting roster’s worth of players on Injured Reserve for the entire season. Not scrubs either, I’m talking key contributors to that teams success. They persevered, battled through, guys stepped up and they made an incredible run on the road to proving that they were the top team in the league.
If the BCS ran the NFL, this never happens. Why? Glad you asked.
Remember, there is no playoff in college football. The National Championship game is set up at the end of the regular season. Once week 17 had concluded, the Packers were 10-6. That is the equivalent of being a three or four loss team at the college level. With the BCS running things, the two teams who play for the title have the best records in the game, always. Only exception is if a large school has one loss and a small school is undefeated, the larger school will get the bid.
That injustice aside, This means that Superbowl XLVI would’ve been more than likely played between the New England Patriots and the Atlanta Falcons, the Falcons being the team Green Bay beat down 48-21 on Atlanta’s home field in the divisional round of the playoffs. If you can look at that scenario and feel that the BCS would have gotten that one right then I call into question your right to possess an opinion on football and you should probably stop reading this, like, now.
Playoff football is an event like no other. In the NFL, January means you bring your A-game or your sitting at home next week watching your opponent continue to play for a ring. Some of the greatest moments in all of sports have taken place during the NFL playoffs. Under the rules of the BCS, you can take Seattle’s upset, Lynch’s run, Green Bay’s ring and all of your favorite playoff game memories, toss them into a garbage can full of gasoline, light a match and drop it in. They would not exist as we know them.
There is something so fundamentally wrong with all of this. Football is a game of men that takes place on the field of play. Nothing off the field should ever be used to determine winners, losers, champions, or anything else for that matter. The only exception would be a player getting in trouble or injured somehow outside of playing the game and, in that case, it’s on the player as an individual.
Really, why do you keep track of records? Once a team loses more than one game, their record is no longer relevant. Sure they may make the Sugar Bowl, but really, who gives a damn. There is one champion at the end of any season and the only game that matter in that regard is the National Championship. So, you're leaving the process incomplete. You track each team’s record, have them play out a full schedule, then say "you and you, play to see whose best."
Why even keep score? If you're going to allow a group of "experts" and a computer program to determine whose worthy of being the best, then just turn off the scoreboard, let the teams throw down and have 3 guys in the press box determine who looks better during the course of the game. Sounds ridiculous, but it isn’t too far off from what’s happening.
This is not about touting the NFL as the superior brand of football. It isn’t “Look at how great this is and you suck because you aren’t like this.” My point is that, as great as college football is, look at what the playoffs and a system that allows the season to unfold on its own has brought to its fans. Imagine being able to infuse some of that playoff magic into what we already have in college football.
This isn’t about dogging the game; it’s about the potential for it to be so much better than it already is. Whether or not you like the end result, regardless of what your team accomplishes over the course of a season, there is no denying the Superbowl champion. It was determined by on the field play that they are the best. Not by a computer or by a group of people who debate who beat better teams or who won better.
Sure, you have blown calls and in game injuries that regularly alter what may have been the end result of a game, but that is still on the field and a part of the game. That’s football. Shouldn't football decide football?
Now, I won’t argue that the teams who do get selected to the big game in college are not among the elite, but as we see in the NFL season after season, there is no way of knowing who the best is without allowing it to take place on the field.
No disrespect intended to Auburn, Alabama and other recent title holders, but as long as college football uses the BCS as its decision engine, you will never again have a true National Champion, ever.
