Lou Pickney's Online Commentary
BCS Silliness
Saturday
November 2, 2002
(Note -- I inadvertantly overlooked Virginia Tech when I put this list together. But keep in mind, V-Tech and Miami will play before year's end).
There's a chance that there could be six unbeaten major conference football teams at the end of the college season -- Miami, Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Georgia and North Carolina State (ok, I know Notre Dame's football team isn't in a conference per se, but play along here). It would cause mass chaos. You don't know how bad I want that to happen.
This week Miami will likely fall out of the BCS Top 2 based solely on the fact that they play Rutgers. Rutgers has only one win, and that will hit Miami hard in the strength of schedule department. They'd be better off with a bye week this week.
Clearly, a playoff system like the Division I-AA teams have would make more sense (top 16 teams in the poll square off in a single-elimination tournament). But cash is king, and there's no way the big conferences are going to give up the money and power they currently control.
But if you have a scenario with the six teams above mentioned running the table, and then maybe the college football powers that be will wake up and recognize the farce of a system currently in place.
The BCS has been lucky before. A few upsets in those awful "conference championship" games (follow the money there -- they do little or nothing to help a team reach the Top 2, but if you lose you can forgettabout a national title) and the BCS has avoided that multiple undefeated scenario.
Now, I'm a realist, and there probably won't be SIX unbeatens. But I'd take four or even three. Enough to shine a bright light on everything that's wrong with college football's setup.
And for those of you who say "What about the bowl games?", the plan is quite simple.
First round games- higher seeded team at lower seeded. For the quarter, semi and finals, use the bowl games. The uppity bastards who are obsessed with the Rose Bowl would probably scoff at being a quarterfinal -- fine, let that always be a semi or final game. But we're talking about BILLIONS of dollars to be made. And enough leftover (and potentially new) bowl games to cover the rest of the good-but-not-good-enough teams. Capeche?
Onto other sports thoughts... The Tampa Bay Lightning's start is very exciting to me. Definitely want to hit the now-former Ice Palace for a game before the end of the year. In a side note, the St. Pete Times forum is the second-worst arena name in the country, right behind the Gaylord Entertainment Center in Nashville (formerly the "Nashville Arena"). Why do cities I love get saddled with these horrible arena names? What's next, Huntington builds a new arena and it's called the "Tampax Centre"?
I played NBA Live 2003 for the PS2 last night. That game is FUN. Scott Massey might as well be a salesman for EA Sports, cause I'm solidly sold on that game. Great court movement, instinctive passing, smart defense, and old-school jerseys! I broke out the old green Dallas uniforms with the M with the hat logo; Scott used the old Hawks mid-80's uniforms, which are some of the coolest this side of the Chargers' powder blues jerseys in the NFL.
With classic sports uniforms becoming popular on the hip hop scene, I'm still waiting for a rapper to come out wearing a 1976 Chicago White Sox uniform (complete with the bermuda shorts they wore against the Royals on August 8, 1976). Now that would be something to see.
Why did I sign for a Yahoo! fantasy hockey league? I really don't know that much about individual players. I mean, try as I might, I just don't follow the NHL closely enough to know who's who on all the teams. At least my NBA fantasy team, the Bourbon Street Flashers (clever huh), has a chance to win.
Then there's the case of my fantasy football team, the Tampa Bay Detectives. No, I'm not going back to the old "Snipers" name -- it's been tainted I think beyond the point of no return. But names aside, my team is 8-0 and I've clinched a playoff spot, and all but clinched the #1 seed for the playoffs. No team has ever gone unbeaten in the league, and frankly I don't expect to be the first (next week Drew Bledsoe and Travis Henry have a bye and Peyton Manning plays at Philly). But I care more about winning in the playoffs -- that's when it counts.
Evansville's men's basketball teams have done away with the sleeves. This made national news when word finally came out (Aaron Thompson gave me the heads-up about a month before it went public). I have mixed emotions about that. I'll always have much love for the 1998-1999 Evansville team that went to the NCAA Tournament (losing to Kansas). But Steve Merfeld is ready to take the team in a new direction, and that includes a new uniform look. Good luck to him and my alma mater.
I have a $5 handshake bet with Toby from master control at WTSP on today's Florida/Georgia game. He took Florida straight-up, so I took that friendly wager that today Georgia will finally get the monkey off its back. Plus it's always fun to cheer against the Gators.
Yesterday's commentary about Diet Vanilla Coke is also available on Carligula.com. I plan to do some occasional writing for that site (run by some old friends of mine from college). It's worth checking out -- their sense of humor is pretty sharp...
Finally, my best wishes to Bill Simmons of ESPN.com Page 2 on his new endeavor as a writer for the new Jimmy Kimmel late-night show on ABC. I'll miss his one-of-a-kind writing style on his columns (which will continue, but in less frequent form), but I know he'll add a unique element to the Jimmy Kimmel show (not sure what the title of it is yet). Can't wait to see it...
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