Time to dust off the playoff argument

I want to tackle this issue before it becomes the hot topic of the season, if only because it seems to turn into the hot topic of every season. So what exactly is the answer to the age-old question – “Why not a college football playoff?”

School presidents, conference commissioners, and the BCS big wigs often seem to play the "what about our athletes’ educations?" argument. Frankly, it is both tired and weak. College basketball can have a playoff/tournament without a problem, college football games are played (mostly) on Saturdays (no classes!), and the season has already stretched into mid-January. Asking top-flight teams to play one or two more games (without having to take 40 days off between games) is not going to cause anyone to flunk out who wouldn't have flunked out anyway.

Before you start thinking you’re going to read over another list of reasons in favor of a playoff system, think again. I like the system the way it is – my biggest problem with it is the half-hearted reasoning we’re consistently fed for why it should remain as it is now.

It seems like every year, the team left on the outside screams for a playoff system, but only after they’ve been left out. I’m sorry 2008 Utah, 2004 Auburn, 2003 USC, 1994 Penn State, and others... you’ve established the system, you live by the system, you profit from the system. If you’re going to argue with the system, you can’t do it after you’ve been hurt by it.

While I'd like to see a legit champion – and I don’t deny the fact that the current system does not give us a legit champion – I personally like the fact that every game means something now. Say we're heading into Rivalry Weekend, and Ohio State has locked up the #3 seed in the playoffs and Michigan is mathematically eliminated -- do you really think Ohio State is going to play its starters all game and risk fatigue or injury before the next week's playoff game?

Also, how would we qualify the "top eight teams?" College basketball has 31 automatic bids, so everyone has a chance to guarantee their spot – not the case in college football. When you have 34 at-large teams, a team has a fairly weak argument when they scream, "We're the 27th best at-large team, we should have gotten in!" Figuring out who is #34 and who is #35 is a lot easier than figuring out who is #2 and who is #3.

How would college football do it? The obvious guess would be to take the six BCS conference champs and two at-large teams.

In 2008, a 6+2 playoff would have meant (records pre-bowl game) Virginia Tech (9-4), Oklahoma (12-1), Cincinnati (11-2), Penn State (11-1), USC (11-1), and Florida (12-1) automatically get in. So that leaves two spots for Texas (11-1), Texas Tech (11-1), Ohio State (10-2), Ball State (12-1), Utah (12-0), TCU (10-2), Alabama (12-1), and Boise State (12-0). How exactly do you pick two out of those eight? And how can you say Virginia Tech (9-4) or Cincinnati (11-2) is more deserving than almost any of those teams?

While a playoff would certainly be exciting, let’s hope the folks in charge deal with college football’s other problems first. If we can bring back some meaningful non-conference games and standardize conference schedules and conference championship games, maybe we’ll weed out the pretenders from the contenders and not even need a playoff system at all.