No disrespect to the University of Alabama, who were crowned the BCS National Champions with a dominating victory of LSU on Monday night. The Crimson Tide defense stifled the Tigers to stake its claim as the undisputed champions of college football – or did they?
Unlike almost any other sport, college football is tied to the antiquated system of coaches, writers and computers determine the best team in the nation. Sure, most people will say the BCS “got it right” this year by matching up the two best teams in the land despite the fact that they’ve already played. But as long as the current BCS system is intact, Oklahoma State, Boise State and lots of other states will have to take the BCS’s word for it that they weren’t good enough to play for the title.
In major sports, there are only two legitimate types of world titles: tournament & head-to-head. For tournaments, you round up the best teams in the land, match them up and whomever comes out unscathed is the champion. There’s no speculation. No second guesses. No dissenting opinions. College basketball and the NFL postseason are tournament championships at their best. Great regular seasons put you in a position to succeed, but ultimately you have to beat everyone to claim your title.
Next are head-to-head championships. These are more common in individual sports such as boxing. In order to be the champion, you have to beat the champion in battle (for the sake of the argument let’s ignore the corrupt sanctioning bodies that routine strip fighters and award vacant titles). All-for-one sports like racing or track are similar. If you come out the victor when matched against the best in the world, you inherit the title. No debate needed.
That’s why the college football championship should be prefaced by the word “mythical” until an acceptable tournament solution is created. The top high school teams in the nation are generally awarded with mythical national championships because some random organization or person is giving their educated opinion. Going back to boxing, there are mythical pound-for-pound rankings to match up the skills of fighters in different weight-classes. Again, these are opinion based. With the BCS, computer involvement doesn’t make its championship any less mythical.
Rumors are floating about that the next BCS contract will involve some sort of playoff format. Hopefully it won’t be a +1, which will still likely cause many of the little guys to be left out. The NCAA should just use a normal, world-renowed, universally-recognized six or eight team playoff. If schools are concerned about losing out on bowl game dollars, I’m sure someone will develop an NIT-esque tourney for the other guys. Or bowl games such as the Leonard’s Chicken, Waffles and Gas Clean Diesel Mart Bowl could still exist for the non-title contenders.
But it’s high-time for chance in college football and for the lunacy to end. But for now, let’s all let the Alabama faithful enjoy their realistic domination against a legitimate foe for their mythical championship. Congratulations.
