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Jason McGovern makes a great point in this article over at Bleacher Report.

One of the lame arguments against an FBS playoff is that it would detract from the excitement surrounding the regular season. You see, under the current system every single game is important!! If you lose one game your title shot is SHOT!!

So tune in fans! Watch your team! Support your team! Spend money on your team, spend money on our sponsors! Every game counts! If your team loses, that’s it for them, no more chance at the championship! So you better not miss it!

Until your team suffers a loss.

Not that out of the ordinary, I know. Most teams suffer at least one loss. But now your team is eliminated just because of that one loss.

Suddenly the “excitement surrounding the regular season” doesn’t have quite the hold on you that it did while your team was unblemished.

Don’t mess with such an exciting regular season? Every game counts? THIS DOESN’T APPLY ANYMORE. MY TEAM IS FINISHED. THEY HAVE NO CHANCE. Why is the FBS regular season so magical still? IT ISN’T. MY TEAM IS OUT.

In a season that is followed by a playoff, my team would still have a chance. I would still be excited to follow them and hope they’ll make it! The regular season would still mean something. Yah they lost, but hey, they can still make it to the playoffs! Once they’re in, they have a shot at the title!

Now I’m tuned in. And so are millions of other fans, guaranteed.

And while we’re on the topic of that stupid mantra “every game counts,” here is another great reminder of it’s unfairness. Tom Donelson of BASN reminds us in this article that the statement is only true if you’re in one of the “power” conferences.

Otherwise, in terms of being eligible to compete for a national championship, NONE of your games matter! Not a single one of them! If you care about competing to be the best in your sport, you might as well not field a team. Nothing you do on the field matters! None of your games count!

How do you like them apples, you weak meaningless football teams? Yah, I’m talking to over half of the 120 teams in the FBS. You’re worthless and your games don’t matter.

In case anyone forgot why we emphatically distrust the human polls that make up such a significant portion of the BCS formula, Gene Frenette reminds us in this article.

Let’s start using the new moniker “Herd Polls” instead of Human Polls. Fits, doesn’t it?

Also, Dan Wetzel at Yahoo! Sports took a recent look at the polls and gave us a reminder of why the BCS system is so flawed.

“Don’t be shocked by the controversy, the foolishness or the corruption. That isn’t a flaw in the system. It is the system.”

Edward Carifio, in this great article from the Yuma Sun, predicts that we’ll have our beloved playoff “by the end of the next decade.”

I too would love to believe that the dream could possibly come true that soon (actually it really SUCKS that we may have to wait that long).

He argues that enough teams (and there seem to be more each year) from the “lesser” conferences have been doing such a great job of putting a beat-down on the mighty BCS teams of late, that eventually parity will dictate that another method of choosing a champion is necessary.

Utah beating Alabama, Boise State beating Oklahoma, BYU beating Oklahoma (last week), Houston beating Oklahoma State (last week) come immediately to mind, but the list could go on and on.

In my opinion, increasing parity between the BCS’s and the Non’s may eventually bring about a different system, but I see that as being a very long-term effect.

Again, the only thing (in the near future) that will bring about a change in the BCS method of choosing a champion will be more and more years of controversy at the top of the heap at the end of the season. We want multiple BCS teams claiming they have a right to play for the title, year in and year out. This will scream the loudest and will effect the most immediate change. The good old boys always take care of themselves first and if enough of THEIR OWN are crying, they will listen.

I love this rant by Allen Wedge.

And I agree with him 100%. Sportswriters and coaches (but especially the coaches) are going to cast their votes with at least some element of bias. Why in the world is the Coaches Poll part of the BCS rankings formula anyway? Hello? How does that not present a conflict of interest? Hello? Are there any intelligent people out there?

Only one thing can bring about the playoff system that D-1 FBS fans everywhere hope for.

One thing only.

Ready? Here it is:

Multiple teams ending the season with realistic claims to be able to play in the National Championship Game. Period. Exclamation point!

Set everything else aside. BCS busting by non-BCS programs is good, we want that. Cheering for your own team is good, everybody wants their team to do well.

But if you want a playoff in college football, you root for ONE THING ONLY each year, and that is to have a bunch of undefeated BCS teams (or if there aren’t any undefeated teams, then a bunch of one-loss teams) at the top of the polls at the end of the season. Only two teams get into the title game and the rest cry foul. The more BCS coaches that we have at the end of the season whining to their school presidents and conference commissioners that they didn’t get their shot, the better.

That is the only thing that will bring change. BCS teams unhappy with the unfairness of the BCS system.

Kevin O’Malley, in this New York Times article describes the current situation that college football is in, and lists the reasons why we’ll never (or at least not any time soon) see a playoff.

The main reason is that a majority of the FATSOS in charge of administering college football (school presidents, conference commissioners, some coaches, etc.) just plain old don’t want one.

Among their reasons, according to O’Malley:
1. A playoff would devalue and diminish the excitement that now surrounds the regular season.
2. A postseason tournament would not dispel all controversy.
3. A December playoff would conflict with final exams.
4. A January playoff would compete with the NFL and NCAA Basketball.
5. Messing with the current bowl system would threaten the considerable resources that the bowl games provide to the schools and communities that support them.

Well, boo freaking hoo.

My responses:
1. No it wouldn’t. We go with what I consider the most logical 16-team playoff plan, that is, the winner of each of the 11 conferences gets an automatic bid, then use the BCS formula to determine the 5 at-large spots. If that were the case teams would be be certain to schedule tough non-conference games, giving themselves the best chance of getting in if they don’t win their conference. Every game, in-conference or out, would be very meaningful and exciting. Only 16 teams out of 120 will get in to the playoffs by virtue of their regular season play. How could the regular season be more exciting than that?

2. Who cares? Yes there’s gonna be controversy, but I guarantee there will be less of it with a playoff system. The best team didn’t win the playoffs? So what. There isn’t a single sport out there where an end-of-playoff coronation leaves absolutely zero doubt whatsoever as to which team was the best team. It doesn’t matter. Playoffs are fun for that very reason. Give 16 teams a chance to win it all, not just 2.

3. So shorten the season by a game or two, start a week earlier, do what it takes.

4. As long as the Super Bowl and the FBS Title Game weren’t on the same day, it shouldn’t matter. So some advertising efforts have to be re-looked at. Big deal. The tradeoff would be worth it because the additional revenue to be generated by an FBS Playoff would dispel all financial frustrations.

5. TV contracts, advertising dollars, fan revenue, filthy lucre. The bowl system is meaningless aside from the money. Win six regular season games and you get to go to a bowl game? Please. We could do away with over half of them, and everyone knows it. As for the money generated by the BCS bowl games and the handful of other meaningful bowls, the playoff games are your new “bowl” games. You divide the TV rights to the playoff games according to how they’re owned now, as best you can. And then you get on with your lives, you quit crying, and you enjoy the new revenue structure.

Excuses, that’s all they are.

As radio host Bill Simonson put it, “If every coach came out and said they wanted a playoff, they could make it happen.”

I believe that. It’s just a matter of wanting a playoff. Until the School Presidents and Conference Commissioners want one, we’ll never see it. The only thing that will make them want one? Their teams having legitimate claims to play in the championship game, but being left out. That situation, in spades, is what we must hope for every year.

All I’m saying is that every football team in NCAA D-1 FBS should have a chance to play for the national title. Under the current system, there are ONLY 10 or so teams at the start of each year that realistically have a chance to get to that title game. For everyone else, there is NO chance. How is that fair?

Yes, the BCS has come a long way toward allowing teams from non-BCS leagues an easier route to one of the BCS bowl games. And that’s great, that’s a step in the right direction.

But regarding the national championship game, we all know that unless you’re from one of the 6 BCS conferences AND you start the season somewhere near the top 10, it is a mathematical IMPOSSIBILITY to get into that game.

Before the FBS season even begins, over one hundred of its teams are already eliminated from national championship considerations. Period.

How is that fair? How is this even allowed?

Who will be this year’s BCS Buster? Will it come from the Mountain West Conference again (BYU, TCU, and Utah are the candidates) or will Boise State prevail?

This article over at Fox Sports takes a good look at the MWC for 2009 and points out that Boise State could be the conference’s biggest hurdle.

This article by Jonathan Hull also takes a look at this year’s potential BCS Busters. Hull even hypothesizes that if BYU can win their opener against Oklahoma then go undefeated for the season, this could be the year that a non-BCS team plays in the National Championship game. The stars would have to align perfectly with other teams getting losses, but the unthinkable could actually be possible.