I think jwb is suggesting that we abandon the BCS and revert back to the way things used to be...conference tie-ins for major bowls and 3 human polls. That oughta solve everything.
I'll have more time to go in-depth after work, but here's what I think: The conferences form a great apparatus for the NCAA in determining championships...but the problem is, in football they don't use them! Think about it: conference games and conference championship games are essentially a long, drawn out round-robin playoff in and of themselves. But the CFN plus-one formula falls into the same trap as a lot of the "solutions" out there - it ignores the conferences. The current system essentially ignores them as well: some conferences have championship games, others don't. It isn't fair to the teams in the conferences that have them. And in 2003, Oklahoma didn't even win their conference but came a few plays away from hoisting the crystal ball. I guess that shows what the current system thinks of conference championships! A good place to start in coming up with a good system is forcing the conferences to have championship games, and using only those winners in your postseason format. From there, you can go several different ways, and dealing with the mid-majors and independents (Louisville and Notre Dame) would be an obstacle. But the plus-one to me is a band-aid whereas I think we need an overhaul and make conference championships have a vital role.
You can go as indepth as you want but the fact is they are never going to have a full blown playoff in the words of the presidents. The plus one is a meaningful topic because it could actually become a reality whereas the other options are just fodder for barroom conversations.
except it's a host of problems with the teams ranked 5th through 8th or so, rather than ranked 1st through 4th. The system isn't perfect, but if you go undefeated in a major conference - you get your shot at the national championship. You lose one game, then maybe you get a shot & maybe you don't depending on some luck & yes, the biased polls. So what, atleast it's the biased polls picking numner 3 & 4 rather than number 1 & 2.
I agree that, ideally, conferences should somehow tie into the national championship. I see no reason to include all 12 conferences, why not just the BCS ones? Huge problem: Only in-conference games matter in your scenario though. This could mean two things: Teams schedule nothing but cupcakes to give their team a break, or teams schedule great opponents to test themselves because it "doesn't matter" if they lose.
Here's my similar idea (which I probably stole from someone else): The four highest-ranked conference champions play (1 vs. 4, 2 vs. 3) on New Year's Day in existing BCS bowls - what a double-header that'd be! Then, approximately a week later the winners would play for the championship. jwb0581 has taken some heat in this thread, and I can sort of see why, but he is right about the conferences - make winning your conference even more important, and who is really going to be legitimately complaining? "Wah! we were better than that other team!" Reply to them - "Well, you should have won your conference and/or played a tougher schedule". Oh yeah, I'd also do whatever's possible to encourage conferences to have championship games. And this system wouldn't be limited to only BCS conferences, but they'd probably comprise most of the spots most years, due to the way the polls and computers seem to play out...
