Dorsey not if favor of playoff?

Here's my proposal, and I like the 8 team playoff.

Drop the schedule back to 11 games. Don't hold a conference championship game, instead, begin the playoff that week. That gets you down from 8 teams to 4. Hold all the bowls as normal, with 2 bowls hosting the remaining 4 teams in the playoff, you can rotate those 2 bowls. After new years, you will be down to 2 teams, and a week or 10 days later, you play the +1 game for all the marbles.

 

First, it's important to note that the question posed to Dorsey assumed that a plus-one system was OK with him, and he did not appear to correct that assumption. Looking back at the history of the BCS, there are many years when a plus-one system would have helped avoid controversy.

Second, a good point was brought up recently by a columnist (cannot find the link right now, so I can't give credit) - due to differences in the rules between the NCAA and the NFL, college games have more plays each game. According to the columnist, a 12 game season in college has almost as many plays as 15 NFL games. So, instead of dropping back to 11 games and eliminating the conference title games, the NCAA could simply modify the rules of the game that affect the length of the games (I know they tried shortening games last year, but their changes were mostly stupid, so they changed most of them back), they could effectively cut back on plays, without cutting back on games.

Third, a 4-team playoff (or plus-one system or whatever they call it) would still leave a lot of time for finals, rest, practice, etc. Two games on New Year's Day, and then the winners play a week later. An 6-team playoff would give the top 2 a bye week, with teams #3 vs. #6 and #4 vs. #5 playing the week of Christmas (possibly as a home game for the higher seeds to avoid too many traveling issues). Then the winners play #1 and #2 on New Year's Day, then the championship the next week. And 8-team playoff could be the same thing except #1 and #2 don't get a bye week - they'd play #7 and #8.

 

Re: Dorsey not in favor of playoff?

Good point:thumb:

 

Re: Dorsey not in favor of playoff?

Here's how Div. 1-AA seems to work (not sure if it's the same for Div. II and III):

Each team has 11 regular season games.
Playoff teams with a higher seed host the first two rounds.
The third round is the championship game, and it's hosted elsewhere (not specifically at a home venue, in other words).

So the two teams that make the final championship game play in 14 games total.

My suspicion is that going to these playoff games are not as time-consuming as a Div. 1-A bowl game - media interviews, the bowl committees want the teams there 5 or more days ahead of time, etc.

 

Re: Dorsey not in favor of playoff?

The more I think about it, I don't really care for a playoff. I think the +1 would be okay, but otherwise, I believe the season, itself, which is so incredibly dramatic would be less so if we had a playoff.

 

Re: Dorsey not in favor of playoff?

Well, we sort of have a playoff now (albeit a one-game playoff ), and no matter what people say, a plus-one system is also a type of playoff.

Here's my thinking... we already know that there are many times when a 2-team playoff (what we have now) does not work very well. Let's go with a 4-team playoff and see how it works out over a few years. Then we can see if a larger playoff is needed. Maybe a 6-team system is "good enough" - it'll give an incentive for teams to keep trying to finish in the top two, by giving them a bye week. Yet it allows 6 teams to have a chance at the national title. I'm still partial to the larger playoffs (12 or 16 teams) myself, but I'll keep an open mind if we try a smaller system that works out well and eliminates the current limitations/problems.

 

Re: Dorsey not in favor of playoff?

Exactly.
As I have said before, be careful what you wish for. The basis of arguments I keep hearing supporting a playoff is “let the championship be decided on the field”. Whether you have a plus 1, an 8 team or a 16 team playoff, you have one glaring problem – how do you decide who gets in and who is left out. Looking back at the recent seasons - would Boise State, Utah or Hawaii been in an 8 team playoff?

Would a Georgia – who was defeated by South Carolina and Tennessee this year, have made it into the playoff? How could you have kept Hawaii out of the playoffs this year? They are Division I and they were undefeated. Yet, does anyone really think they would have belonged in such a system?

Most, if not all, playoff plans cut back the regular season and cut out conference championships. So we have 11 games. Does that mean LSU plays the other 11 members of the SEC and has no out of conference games? How would teams in conferences with less than 12 teams fill their schedules – lower division teams? Oh, maybe we just do away with the conferences. Right – good luck with that.

We have the ACC, the Big East, the SEC, the Big 10, the Big 12, the WAC, the Mountain West, the MAC, the Pac 10, C-USA, the Sun Belt and the major independents like Notre Dame, Navy and Army in Division I. That’s 11 conferences plus the independents. Who gets left out? Do you limit it to one team from certain conferences and then the “best team” from the other “underprivileged” conferences? Look at this year. What happens if you have a LSU, Georgia, USC, Kansas, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Ohio State, Virginia Tech and Hawaii – 9 teams. Who is left out? Virginia Tech lost to LSU in September – LSU or Georgia with two loses each and not having played each other? But does anyone really think Hawaii is better?

The point is that a true “playoff” will never actually happen – 8 teams, 16 teams or whatever you make it. It will not be much different from the system we have now. The problem – people will pick the teams – somebody who deserves to be in or believes they deserve to be in will be left out.

This doesn’t even begin to address the problem of all of the other teams who will not go bowling anymore – or if you keep bowls they will not last because the fictional “playoff” will overshadow them. How would fans of Arkansas, Texas, BYU, Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Illinois, Auburn, Tennessee, Texas Tech, Alabama and others feel about their season ending in November and not being able to look forward to their teams playing over the holidays? How would LSU have felt a couple of years ago? I certainly enjoyed watching us play Miami and would be very sad if we did not have the chance.

End of rant.
ldskule: ldskule: ldskule:

 

Another benefit of not having playoffs is that we (the real Tigers) get to play in NC games when we lose 1 or 2 games, but AU (the paper tigers) don't get to when they go undefeated.

(I just realized how mean this was, I hope no Aubbies see it... all in good fun.) All SEC fans get shafted when an undefeated SEC team does not play in the NCG. The Auburn arguement is probably the best arguement for a 4 team playoff, but it does not solve the problem. The problem would still occur whenever 5 teams go undefeated (maybe never), or more often the case, whenever 5 or more teams have one loss. If the 4 team playoff doesn't really solve anything, then why do it?

I think they are doing the best thing that they can do. Try to figure out who 1 and 2 are and let them play.

 

Playoffs would make the regular season a bit less dramatic, but honestly isn't that a good thing because that means the playoffs will be a whole lot more dramatic? I mean compare the NFL playoffs to the BCS games. Some incredible games so far and we're still not at the Superbowl. With the BCS bowl games, 4 out of 5 were blowouts. Can you imagine the excitement around, let's say, Georgia vs. USC and Ohio St. vs. LSU with the winners of each playing for the NC? Instead we got stuck with Georgia vs. Hawaii, USC vs. Illinois etc

 

So two years ago you would have been just as excited about watching a playoff among other teams while LSU stayed home and did not play after the Arkansas game and did not get the chance to play Miami. that is what an eight team mythical "playoff" would have done to our season. Do you really feel that way?