Want a playoff? ESPN is the one blocking that.

[JoeJoeBrown]

Long but good read.

It's in the math: There are 35 bowl games this season. ESPN owns almost 20% of all bowl games (not owns the broadcasting rights; actually owns) while having the broadcasting rights to 33 of them.

So the BCS coffers are now solidly in second place: Nobody is more invested in the bowl system than ESPN.

This means ESPN owns 95% of a college football postseason that is predetermined by matchups, not by a tournament, not by randomization and often times, not by merit but by potential television and stadium audience (cough cough cough Notre Dame cough).

[Hurricanes25]

I love bowl season so this doesn't bother me as much as will most people, but it is sad how much power ESPN has over college athletics, specifically, football.

[WCH]

Why not just keep all of the bowls and structure it so that a handful of them are a "tournament." Something like:

Round 1: Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl
Round 2: Sugar Bowl, Outback Bowl
Round 3: AllState BCS National Championship

Leave all of the other bowl games as they are. Maybe you rotate some bowl games in/out of the tournament to preserve tradition (the Rose Bowl comes to mind). Maybe you only have a four-team playoff (or a six-team playoff with a first-round "play-in" game).

I think that with something like this, you could keep the revenue pouring in from the Bowl format, and still satisfy the fans who want to see a tournament.

[Halsey]

I've gotten to where I don't really have a strong opinion either way on the Bowl system. Every other sport I watch uses a playoff system. There's something to be said for being different. I don't think a playoff system would make college football all that much better or worse. Yeah, the Bowls are all irrelevant, but the Championship game is usually pretty good.

Besides, college football has much bigger problems than its' postseason. There's a lot of slimy people involved in it. Cleaning out all the scum from college football should be priority #1.

[Ghost of Juice]

You could just do it similar to march madness. You have 4 regions with 4 teams in each region. Call them the Rose bowl region, Orange bowl region, Sugar bowl region and Fiesta bowl region. The winners of each region will win that bowl and move on to the final four. And just like making it to the final four in march madness is a big deal, winning a bowl region is a big deal. Anyone bowl eligible that doesn't make the tourney can still compete in the other bowl games. There you go.

[niel89]

Just give me an 8 team playoff and have them play the games at the regular bowls with the winners going on. No one honestly thinks that a huge tournament would work. 8 teams would only be 3 weeks if you really wanted to get it done.

I just dislike that at the end of the season there can still be debate about who is the best team.

[Brothgar]

Keep the rest of the BS bowls and add an 8 team playoff once we get all these super conferences tied up we can have each conference winner 3 wild cards that can be determined by BCS ranking and one out of super conference wild card (ie Houston, Boise, etc)

[Iamcanadian]

Originally Posted by broth223

Keep the rest of the BS bowls and add an 8 team playoff once we get all these super conferences tied up we can have each conference winner 3 wild cards that can be determined by BCS ranking and one out of super conference wild card (ie Houston, Boise, etc)

The trouble is, once you introduce a playoff system, only conference champions can be invited since every NCAA Div 1 conference must be included or it will end up in the courts and become quite nasty.
The majority of teams in the NCAA outnumber the major conference teams by quite a bit and they will have a large say in how a NCAA Football Championship Playoff System will be set up.
It would probably be a 16 team playoff to include all conference champions in Div 1 and maybe a couple of wild cards. This would add 3 potential games to the schedule and would mean that the college regular season would have to go back to 9 or 10 games, as you cannot expect the players to play a further 3 games and think for a moment that they won't have to pay them. This would create a total mess in college football with law suits all over the place if they don't do it right.
This is the real reason why we don't have a playoff system, it would kill the golden goose for the major conferences as teams would abandon them to enter smaller conferences to increase their odds of making the playoffs, also the major conferences might easily find that their revenues would take a huge beating if the pot has to be shared equally with what we now consider smaller Div 1 schools.
Again, there is a lot more to why the major conferences don't want a real playoff system, it would very likely open a can of worms that would destroy college football as we know it today and create an even playing field for the rest of the Div 1 conferences.
Everybody who thinks for a moment that a playoff system would be wonderful is kidding themselves, it cannot come about without a major impact on how college football is set up today. The major conferences have the golden goose under their wing and they aren't about to see it all come down around them, by allowing a playoff system over which they would lose control of their position of eminence.