I absolutely agree. West Virginia could win the Big East with 4 losses. They win the playoffs by some mismatching and some luck and suddenly they are the best team in the nation? I don't buy it. Give them a cool bowl to shut them up. Every saturday is a playoff game, and the next 2 are the biggest for us!
If West Virginia would happen to win the playoff that sadly we don't have it wouldn't be because of any mismatching. They would be a low seed and would have to beat somebody like LSU, Oklahoma, Ohio State or USC in the first round. If WV or any other team were capable of doing that and continuing to win all their playoff games it wouldn't be because of luck. It would be because they had overcome their earlier adversity and were the best football team in the country at the end of the season just like LSU can make a strong argument that the Tigers were among the best 2 teams in the country at the end of the 2001 season. If WV could do that they would have proved that they are more deserving of the National Championship than the teams they beat that went through the regular season undefeated or with one loss who were not able to win in the playoffs. Can anybody say that the Florida Marlins didn't deserve to be World Series Champions because they didn't win as many regular season games as the Yankees, Braves or Giants?
I have a feeling that Oklahoma is not an automatic victor in the Big 12 Championship game and that Ohio State could get clocked by Michigan this week. But what would it matter anyway unless LSU beats the Ole Miss crew in Oxford who will be playing this one game, with two weeks of preparation, for the right to go to Atlanta? Florida didn't take Ole Miss seriously, and that one game will probably end up costing them the SEC East title. LSU should put every ounce of focus on this game..!!
If players can't get focused for this game, then they don't deserve to be in Atlanta! They'll be more than ready to play Ole Miss...
You really think Florida didnt take them seriously? A perennially mediocre team that beat them just one year prior coming into their house. The reason Florida lost that game is not because they overlooked UM but because they were still very green. Leak had not yet come of age. If they played again, UF would rape them. About the Big 12 CG and Ohio State, I feel the same way, and I really hope that we are right.
I think Florida probably figured that they had very little chance of losing in the SWAMP for the third time in one year. The whole Florida team is still inconsistent. Florida should have lost at South Carolina last week if it were not for Holtz calling a fake punt play that gave Florida the chance to get back into the game. Winning late at South Carolina by a 24-22 score tells me that playing Ole Miss again would be more of a matter of what Florida team would show up. I hope Florida gets waxed by Florida State in a few weeks. Zook has yet to beat an instate rival.
Sorry, I don't buy that comparison between West V and the Florida Marlins, and how that is the reason we need a playoff system. Should 4 loss teams be compared to undefeated teams? Should 4 loss teams have the same chance at a NC as undefeated teams? And if they should, how on earth does that make the regular season as important or as exciting as what we have now. I'm sure I don't need to go into the differences between MLB and college football (12 games vs 162; 30 something teams vs 117; pro vs. college; etc). In the arguement, it is stated that a 4 loss West V team could be the best team in the country at the end of the year, and that playoff supporters would respect that. Meaning a 4 loss regular season would mean nothing when competing for the NC, and in the eyes of playoff supporters the 4 loss WV team would have EARNED it (even more so than past NC winners who went undefeated, b/c they went through a playoff system). Thus you lose any meaning givien to the regular college football season, something playoff fans say won't happen. And like with MLB, you will have fans only tune in once the "real season", the playoffs, start. All of a sudden a 4 loss BCS conference team can and according to playoff supporters, should be a NC contender in a playoff format. Yet, many of these playoff supporters want to keep undefeated non BCS conference teams out. It doesn't make sense. Why rank teams anymore, if 4 losses can win you a NC, then the rankings are really meaninless as well (a 16th ranked team has the same chance at the NC as a #1 ranked team). Why should a 16th ranked team with multiple losses even be considered for the NC? The NC is not about who is playing the best football at the end of the season. It is about the team who played well throughout the entire season, and then won it's bowl game. Going undefeated in a BCS conference all but promises you will get a share of the NC, a reward for winning all your games in a 12 game season. Granted, it is not as clean as a playoff format, but it is the best system we have to be fair to all 117 teams. You can't compare college football to other pro sports or even college baseball and basketball. While a playoff seems like a neat and clean solution. No one can promise that 4 and 3 loss teams won't start winning NC's, and once that happens, the magic of the college football season will be a thing of the past . . . and the college football season will be no more exciting than the NFL. A team that is 1-4 after 5 games will still have a chance for the NC (if they are lucky enough to be in a BCS conference), and that doesn't make the system any better, just the same as everything else and about as exciting.
