Congressman plans hearings on BCS in effort to force playoff

[SunDodger]

I don't see how they could "force" a playoff, but it would be interesting to hear the BS coming from BCS officials on the reasons why a playoff is not needed.


Congressman plans hearings on BCS in effort to force playoff

USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — The incoming chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said Wednesday that he will hold hearings and possibly subpoena NCAA officials, college presidents, players, coaches and athletics directors in effort to force a playoff in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

"I think you really do not get a true No. 1 out of (the Bowl Championship Series)," Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., told USA TODAY. "Nobody questions the Super Bowl. The team that wins is the best team that year. I think we can do the same thing at the college level where once it's over there is no questions about who is No. 1 and who is No. 2."

Towns made his intentions known a week after the college football season ended with Florida as consensus national champion, but not without some controversy, a common occurrence since the BCS began in 1998. Florida beat Oklahoma to win the title, but Southern California and Utah received first-place votes in the Associated Press news media poll. Utah coach Kyle Whittingham broke ranks in the USA TODAY Coaches' Poll and voted his unbeaten Utes No. 1.

"I really feel that you can't leave it as is," Towns said. "Right now, if you ask what the No. 1 team is, a lot of people would say USC. Others would say Texas and if you ask anybody in the state of Utah, they would say their team was the best. I want to get a system that has credibility."

Towns said there's no timetable set, and no letters to appear have been sent out. He's hoping to get cooperation from those involved in the Football Bowl Subdivision but would use subpoena authority if needed.

"The presidents, bowl administrators, commissioners and others who are involved with postseason college football are pleased to work with Congress, as they have on several occasions in the past, and welcome any questions or ideas for improving the system," Dr. David Frohnmayer, University of Oregon president and chair of the BCS' Presidential Oversight Committee, said in a statement.

Towns joins a chorus of elected officials that have called for a playoff in recent weeks, including:

• President-elect Barack Obama. Before the election, he told CBS' 60 Minutes, "I'm going to throw my weight around a little bit" to get a playoff in place.

• Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas. The ranking Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee said "the BCS method of determining who is No. 1 consistently misfires." He introduced legislation last week to force the sport to adopt a playoff.

• Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawaii. He and other House members have asked the Justice Department to investigate the BCS and possible antitrust violations.

• Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff. He recently launched an investigation into whether the BCS violates federal antitrust laws.

This wouldn't be the first time college football officials would appear before a congressional committee to talk about the BCS. The Committee on Energy and Commerce held a hearing in January 2006, but that didn't change the format.

The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is the same body that called Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Roger Clemens to testify in recent years about the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. Major League Baseball implemented much tighter testing procedures and Clemens is facing a federal investigation into whether he perjured himself as a result.

Towns said he wouldn't be against calling more hearings into the use of the use drugs in sports, but he's more worried about whether younger athletes are using the banned substances. Towns said it may not be popular to tackle these issues, especially during the current financial downturn, but he added "anytime there's something that needs to be reviewed, you do it."

"I tend to think there's so much else going on, like the economy, that will demand their attention, so they won't have time for this," said former House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt, who attended a forum where Towns spoke at earlier in the day. "I think this is something that colleges will have to figure out together. I'm not sure this is what the public wants Congress to be spending their time on."

Contributing: Steve Wieberg
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/2009-01-14-bcs-hearings_N.htm?csp=34

 

[Conan]

The laws that apply fall under anti-trust legislation.

It's when a governing body fails to be inclusive by providing equal access to markets that smaller or "other" companies (in this case schools) have a right to, thereby forcing them out and unfairly eliminating competition. Basically it's about giving everyone a fair chance at the profits and whatever else is worth the taking.

I think the BCS is dead meat.

 

[MackDonald]

That's just what we need, politicians getting involved with intercollegiate athletics. Half of those nerds don't even know the shape of the ball that is being used in the event they are alledgedly watching.

 

[GoForIt]

Forget the economy, the jobs, the war, and all that important stuff. Let's fix the BCS. After all, we were elected to solve steroid problems in baseball and force playoffs in college football.

 

[SunDodger]

The laws that apply fall under anti-trust legislation.

It's when a governing body fails to be inclusive by providing equal access to markets that smaller or "other" companies (in this case schools) have a right to, thereby forcing them out and unfairly eliminating competition. Basically it's about giving everyone a fair chance at the profits and whatever else is worth the taking.

I think the BCS is dead meat.

You may be right, Conan.

The BCS thought that when they added the title game a few years back and created a few more at-large slots that it would be enough to shut the non-BCS conferences up. But, when you have teams like Utah and Boise St. going undefeated and basically having zero shot at making the title game, it doesn't help the BCS.

 

[Conan]

At the end of the day, congress is as inefficient as any bunch of guys trying to accomplish something as anything that's ever seen the light of day in this world.

But, the BCS is so biased and unfair with whatever system they've managed to concoct, they make congress look good. I would love to see a playoff system that would allow schools like Boise St. and Utah get a fair shot. First thing that needs to go are the polls where all this bias originates. Polls should not be used to determine a NC. That's leaving it in the hands of writers and coaches who don't know much more than what they want to know. They are biased and follow each other like a heard of lemmings all running off a cliff. Then add to that the public perception that the polls make sense and now there's no place for a team that's been misjudged to go.

If justice is to be blind, then the polls and the BCS needs to go. Only a team's accomplishments like winning its conference or placing an honorable second should matter. PERIOD! Then let them tear each other up and it's the last man standing that wins. How simple is that and who could argue with it? Who could complain that they didn't have a fair shot? NOBODY that's who, and at the end of the day, a real champion is crowned and nobody can complain.

Is that asking for too much?

 

[artiesliver]

Glad to see they are using our tax dollars in a meaningful way...

 

[MackDonald]

Yes, that is asking way too much.

At the end of the day, congress is as inefficient as any bunch of guys trying to accomplish something as anything that's ever seen the light of day in this world.

But, the BCS is so biased and unfair with whatever system they've managed to concoct, they make congress look good. I would love to see a playoff system that would allow schools like Boise St. and Utah get a fair shot. First thing that needs to go are the polls where all this bias originates. Polls should not be used to determine a NC. That's leaving it in the hands of writers and coaches who don't know much more than what they want to know. They are biased and follow each other like a heard of lemmings all running off a cliff. Then add to that the public perception that the polls make sense and now there's no place for a team that's been misjudged to go.



If justice is to be blind, then the polls and the BCS needs to go. Only a team's accomplishments like winning its conference or placing an honorable second should matter. PERIOD! Then let them tear each other up and it's the last man standing that wins. How simple is that and who could argue with it? Who could complain that they didn't have a fair shot? NOBODY that's who, and at the end of the day, a real champion is crowned and nobody can complain.

Is that asking for too much?

How could an association (NCAA) insert a system (method) so logical as the scenerio you describe (one example) to determine a "national champion" be considered? Such nonsense.

College football is part of our "way of life" (our culture) in America; it is important. It would be appropriate to at least sit down and consider various ways to detrmine a true "national champion" (once a year) on a chalked playing field, with a few unbiased officials and a score board.

Yes, that would be asking way too much from the "powers" that sit on a throne (probably well padded and elevated). Heaven forbid.

 

[SunDodger]

I've always felt that if TV ratings dropped enough the networks putting up the money might be able to force a playoff. Reading this article gave me a little hope.



Ratings are proof the addition of fifth BCS game officially a failure

Stewart Mandel -- Monday January 5, 2009 8:54AM

Whenever BCS officials defend their oft-criticized postseason system, they like to point to the "overall health of college football," as measured by increased attendance and TV ratings. They're talking, however, about the regular season.

In terms of the BCS itself, preliminary Nielsen ratings for the first three BCS bowls played this week show that viewer interest has never been lower.

The Cincinnati-Virginia Tech Orange Bowl played on New Year's night drew a paltry 6.1 overnight rating for FOX, shattering the previous low of 6.98 set by the 2007 Wake Forest-Louisville Orange Bowl. By point of comparison, the Dec. 27 Florida State-Wisconsin Champs Sports Bowl drew nearly the same-sized audience.

Meanwhile, the Utah-Alabama Sugar Bowl on Jan. 2 garnered a 7.8 rating, an 11 percent increase from last year's Georgia-Hawaii game. Even so, the game ranked seventh-lowest among the 45 BCS games played to date.

Only the USC-Penn State Rose Bowl on ABC garnered its typically high rating of 12.6, up from 12.0 for last year's USC-Illinois game. But even that number marked the third-lowest of the 11 Rose Bowls played during the BCS era.

Presumably, Monday night's Texas-Ohio State Fiesta Bowl, what with its primetime slot and the presence of two marquee programs, will draw a significantly larger rating for FOX than its first two broadcasts, while Thursday's Florida-Oklahoma BCS Championship Game is expected to draw the sport's largest audience since the 2006 USC-Texas Rose Bowl.

Even so, BCS officials can't be pleased with these early returns. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the addition of a fifth BCS bowl can officially be declared an abject failure.

Seven of the nine lowest-rated games of the BCS era have now taken place over the past three seasons. That coincides with the beginning of the current cycle in which the BCS added a fifth game and turned the national championship game into a stand-alone event.

By removing the top two teams from the existing BCS bowls (Rose, Fiesta, Sugar and Orange), the remaining lineup gets unavoidably watered-down. And with the "double hosting" model -- in which the city hosting the title game gets last choice of teams for its regular bowl -- it almost assures there of being at least one dud matchup. This year, that was the Orange Bowl, which was contractually obligated to take ACC champ Virginia Tech (which came in 9-4 and ranked just 21st in the AP poll), while the other bowls all passed on Big East champ Cincinnati (ranked 12th).

It's not like the BCS commissioners didn't see this coming. After all, it wasn't their idea to go to a five-bowl system in the first place.

The BCS' current model was formed out of a "compromise" brokered by a panel of university presidents in response to pressure from the non-BCS conferences for increased access to the big games. Only one such team, 2004 Utah, qualified under the old parameters during the BCS' first eight years of existence.

The arrangement has worked out magnificently so far for the previously disenfranchised parties, with one of their teams qualifying for a BCS bowl in each of the first three years (Boise State in 2006, Hawaii in '07 and Utah in '08) and the Broncos (against Oklahoma) and Utes (against Alabama) doing wonders for their credibility with historic upsets.

However, the appearances of said teams haven't exactly been good for business. The four BCS games so far to involve non-BCS teams have all been among the nine lowest-rated BCS games of the 45 played to date. The others have all involved an ACC and/or Big East team.

Obviously, the one certain way to increase interest in such games would be the inception of a playoff. Far more fans would be inclined to tune into Alabama-Utah were it to hold greater implications than which team goes home Sugar Bowl champion.

As officials across the sport have made abundantly clear, however, a playoff is not on the horizon, and in fact ESPN recently outbid FOX for the right to air the same five games for the 2010-13 seasons. It will be interesting to see how ESPN uses its significant promotional power if it intends to renew interest in the non-championship games.

For all the complaints about bowl season, the Disney behemoth has done a remarkable job of maintaining, if not increasing viewership for its "Bowl Week" coverage of the second- and third-tier games. At the same time BCS ratings have been sagging, eight of the 10 highest-rated bowl games in ESPN history have taken place just since 2005, including this year's Champs Sports and Alamo (Northwestern-Missouri) bowls.

But there's always going to be a segment of diehard football fans who tune in to those early games. The key to racking up what used to be far larger audiences for the BCS bowls is to draw in more casual fans -- the type for whom New Year's Day football has been a longstanding tradition.

That's another area where the BCS, and bowls in general, have erred. By spreading out the traditional New Year's games farther and farther each year (this year there were more games played on Dec. 31 than Jan. 1), the original appeal of these games has become irrelevant. The Washington Post's Michael Wilbon, who is 50, wrote this week that for the first time in his life, he did not feel compelled to watch football on New Year's Day.

"The Orange Bowl, the only game played in prime time on New Year's Day, featured two teams not ranked in the top 10," he said. "The Rose Bowl, as we all suspected going in, was a total non-contest."

My guess is ESPN will reverse the trend, at least somewhat, by using one of its most ubiquitous weapons: hype. Alabama-Utah, on the surface, might not sound appealing -- until Rece Davis, Mark May and Co. beat it into your head that is with never-ending breakdowns leading up to the game.

But there's only so much the networks can do to sell what is essentially a broken product. This is a BCS problem, not a TV problem, and if the BCS honchos don't want to stray from their current format, the least they can do is make some tweaks to improve it.

As I've written before, it's time for the BCS to think about revising its selection process in order to create more compelling matchups. Between the various conference partnerships, automatic berths and selection order, there's almost no flexibility when it comes to which teams the bowls can select.

If USC wants to leave Pasadena for a change -- in the case of this season, maybe for the chance to play No. 3 Texas in the Fiesta Bowl -- it should have that right. Similarly, there are a whole bunch of rabid, SEC fan bases chomping at the bit for access to the Rose Bowl. I know the folks in Pasadena are wed to their Big Ten-Pac-10 tradition, but how many more USC-Big Ten blowouts can they expect us to stomach?

As it is, there are presently no indications that the next BCS cycle will be any different than the current one. Which means the national-championship game figures to become bigger and bigger, while the other four bowls fade further into oblivion.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/stewart_mandel/01/04/bcs.ratings/index.html

 

[SunDodger]

But, after reading this, I get the feeling we will be stuck with this bullshit BCS system forever.



BCS TV Ratings Up: Attendance Down

January 12th, 2009 by srr50


The five BCS Bowls averaged about a ratings point higher than 2008, despite the fact the the Orange Bowl turned in the lowest TV ratings in BCS history. The other four BCS bowl games all saw increases, with the Texas win over Ohio State making the biggest jump with a 35% increase.

Meanwhile game attendance was down in 3 of the 5 BCS contests. Here is a breakdown of the BCS Championship Series. A quick note: the ratings number relects the percentage of the total number of TV households in the U.S. that are tuned into the game. The share number reflects the percentage of TV households that are actually in use that are tuned into the game.



Florida’s win over OU drew 3.7 million more viewers than LSU’s demolition of Ohio State in 2008.

The BCS Championship Game: (Florida 24 - OU 14)
Household Rating/Share # of Viewers
15.8/25 26.7 million
*This game is the 5th most viewed championship contest since the inception of the BCS in 1998. Aside from the overall numbers, the advertisers are really after the coveted 18-49 age group, and this game pulled a 9.5 rating/25 share, which was about 15% higher than the year before.

Attendance
78,468 were in Miami for the game, which was a little over 1,000 fewer than last year’s contest in New Orleans.



Despite the annual USC blowout over a Big 10 opponent/victim, the Rose Bowl continues to draw the best numbers of any bowl outside the championship game.

The Rose Bowl: (USC 38 Penn State 24)
Household Rating/Share # of Viewers
11.7/21 20.6 million
*In the important 18-49 category, the Rose Bowl drew solid numbers with a 6.5 rating/20 share, which was up slightly from the 2007 USC blowout over Illinois. The overall number of 20.6 million viewers was up almost 2 million from the 2008 game.

Attendance
The Rose Bowl pulls in just over 93,000 fans each and every year.


Texas dramatic last-second win over Ohio State helped the Fiesta Bowl secure the largest jump in TV ratings among the BCS Bowls.

The Fiesta Bowl: (Texas 24 - Ohio State 21)
Household Rating/Share # of Viewers
10.4/17 17.1 million
*The clash between the two traditional powers was a terrific boost for the Fiesta Bowl which saw a dramatic 35% increase over last year’s ratings for the West Virginia defeat of Oklahoma. The contest pulled a 6 rating/16 share in the 18-49 age demo. In terms of total viewers, the 17.1 million was almost five million more than tuned in to the 2008 Fiesta Bowl.
Attendance
There were grumblings that Ohio State had a much more difficult time getting rid of their share of the Fiesta Bowl tickets, but overall attendance was 72,047, almost exactly 2,000 higher than the 2008 game between West Virginia and OU.


Utah’s win over ‘Bama was a mixed blessing for Fox in terms of TV Ratings

The Sugar Bowl: (Utah 31 - Alabama 17)
Household Rating/Share # of Viewers
7.8/13 13.4 million
* In terms of sheer numbers, this game outdrew the Georgia-Hawaii contest of 2008 by over 1.5 million viewers. However, the 18-49 age demo was actually down slightly from that game — with a 4.3 rating/12 share.
Attendance
This year’s Sugar Bowl had 71,872 fans in attendance, which was down 2,500 from the year before.


This year’s Orange Bowl was a disaster from both an attendance and TV ratings standpoint.

The Orange Bowl: (Virginia Tech 20 - Cincinnati 7)
Household Rating/Share # of Viewers
5.4/9 9.3 million
* This is the bottom of the BCS barrel. It is the lowest-rated BCS Bowl game ever. It’s 18-49 demo number was a 3.0 rating/8 share. And those numbers are almost a third lower than the 2008 game between Virginia Tech and Kansas pulled. Total households was also down over 2.6 million viewers.
Attendance
This game drew only 57,851 fans, which was 22% lower than last year’s attendance of 74,111.

Some Perspective on These Numbers
*In case you are still wondering why the Rose Bowl carries so much clout, remember this: The Rose Bowl is consistently the highest-rated bowl game outside the championship contest, even though it is the only BCS game that is not played in prime time.

* The overall BCS numbers were up this year, but that means it is the second-lowest rated total for BCS games since the inception.

* 2006 set the bar for the individual ratings on the championship game, and overall. The 2006 Rose Bowl is the gold standard for the BCS. The Texas win over USC pulled a 21.7 rating and over 35.6 million viewers. The four BCS games that year pulled an average rating of just over 14. That means that the BCS ratings are down 27% from their peak that year.

* For the advertisers, it is still a very good buy. As bad as the Orange Bowl numbers were, it still finished in the top 20 for the week and in the Top 10 in the target age demo of 18-49.

http://www.barkingcarnival.com/srr50/bcs-tv-ratings-up-attendance-down