BCS violating antitrust laws?

     I recently stumbled upon an article pertaining to my senior exit project that was written last week. I thought it would be helpful to read up on the most recent actions of Congress on the matter. In this article, the author informs us that Bill Hancock, the executive director of the BCS, has received a letter of questions regarding the BCS from Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah and Senator Max Baucus of Montana. The main question in this letter regards how the BCS determines “which conferences get automatic bowl bids”. This question is raised because of teams that have gone undefeated during the season but are not chosen to play in the national championship game.

     Senator Hatch also requested that the Department of Justice investigates to see if the BCS violates any antitrust laws. Despite Hancock claiming that Congress should let the BCS lay in the hands of the NCAA and the rest of college football, Hatch claims that the millions of dollars at play in this industry deserve the attention and involvement of the federal government. Senator Hatch claims that it is violating antitrust laws because it  ”has been designed to limit the number of teams from non-privileged conferences that will play in BCS games,” as he said in a letter to President Obama last October. The Sherman Antitrust Act states that a ”contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce,” is illegal. In the case of college football, the case would not be one of a “restraint of trade or commerce” but of the restraint of  the amount of non-BCS conference teams invited to BCS bowl games. Could this be the approach Hatch and his supporters need to overthrow the BCS from their long disputed rule over college football? Or is this just another desperate attempt to implement a playoff system in college football that will not amount to anything?

Sources: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/football/ncaa/03/10/bcs-congress.ap/index.html

                  http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/2009-10-21-obama-bcs_N.htm

Before there was BCS

 

     This week I will be discussing the history of the post-season in college football before the implementation of the BCS (thanks to the helpful suggestion from Mr. Coffee). The post-season crowning a national champion in college football before the Bowl Championship Series was not radically different from what it is now. In fact, if anything, it was worse. The BCS, at least, attempts to create an accepted system involving ranking the top teams. At the end of the season, the two highest ranked teams play for the title. Prior to the BCS, there was no game considered a “national championship”. After all of the bowl games were played, coaches and sports writers voted in polls to determine who they believed was the national champion. These polls included the AP Poll and the USA Today Poll. This turned to be ugly because with no definitive champion, several teams could claim that they were the national champions.

     The teams named national champions during these years were often called “Mythical National Champions”. While there are many disputes and controversies still today over the national champion, there is at least a game to decide the winner. To the people complaining of the post-season situation in college football now, just look back at how much worse the crowning of a national champion has been in the past. While many point out the upsides of a playoff system in college football, the BCS is not the worst post-season system that could exist.

Source: http://savagetruth.blogharbor.com/blog/_archives/2009/1/8/4050491.html

One of the main reasons Congress is making such a fuss over the BCS is because it deems a National Champion without any sort of playoff. A question that arises is why would Congress bar the BCS from naming a National Championship when other types of inaccurate title claims still reside in sports. For instance, in Major League Baseball, the championship is called the World Series, when all of the teams in MLB are from the United States (with the exception of the Toronto Blue Jays).

The point was also made that the issue is not purely an issue of sports. College football brings in several hundred million dollars annually. Doug Bandow states in his article that Congress is allowed the unique ability to force members of the BCS administration to actually answer questions asked by Congress. The BCS is usually “unresponsive” to public questions and scrutiny, so if the constituents of an official can strongly voice their beliefs, the official would be able to make progress in the matter when the constituents by themselves could not.  In doing this Congress is trying to hold “out-of-line” institutions “to account”. However, does doing this mean Congress is “out-of-line” as well by forcing an end to a system that has not been especially harmful to anyone, but is just a system that some do not agree with? I don’t mean to play devil’s advocate here, as I can fully understand why so many wish away the BCS, but I can also understand those who question the reason Congress is getting involved.

Source: http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11057

How a Playoff System Could Work

Possible eight team playoff bracket

The idea of a 64 team playoff in college football seemed ridiculous. I don’t believe that if a playoff system was presented to be implemented, that it would be a bracket this large. In another article, the idea of an 8 team playoff is presented. It quickly addresses the issue of the season interfering with student athletes’ grades. The article proposes the idea of a three week playoff system that takes place after first semester exams to ensure that students grades’ do not need to suffer because of an elongated football season. The teams that are bowl eligible but are not chosen as one of the 8 to play in the playoffs would still be able to play in other bowl games without its importance being devalued. There would be virtually no difference between this 8 team playoff and the current 5 BCS bowl games to these teams. What it would do is remove any doubt that the winner of a championship game is the true national champion. However, this system would create a lot of renewed interested in college football. It would also produce national exposure for teams that are currently not given as much national recognition as large schools like Alabama, Texas, Florida, and USC. This exposure would help them build their programs and bring a greater balance between college football teams.

Source: http://fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2009/122009/12102009/513499/index_html

Downsides of a Playoff System

Finally was able to dig up an article displaying a few of the downsides of a potential playoff system in Div. I college football. You can read this article here. Representative Joe Barton‘s beliefs for what should be done involving a playoff system may cause some to believe that the issue is best left in the hands of the BCS. After stating that the BCS should remove the “S” from its name and name itself the “BS” because it does not crown the real champion, he responded to what should be done by saying: “Well, you could have a playoff system of 64 teams and use every bowl that’s currently in there.” “We’d still be playing,” Derrick Fox, executive director of the Alamo Bowl, responded. If this format of a playoff system was used, there would be six more games to the season for the two teams that make it to the championship game, elongating the season until approximately the Super Bowl. One of the main worries about this is that it pushes the season deeper into the second semester, which would not help players’ grades.

The other downside to a playoff system discussed in this article is the fact that the tradition and importance of bowl games that have been around for as long as a century, would be diminished. It would also be difficult for them to bring in revenue. “Sponsorships and TV revenue that now go to bowl games would instead be spent on a playoff, meaning it would be difficult for any bowl, including the current BCS bowls, to survive,” stated John Swofford, the ACC commissioner and BCS coordinator.

Source: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/college/2009/05/02/2009-05-02_its_a_load_of_bcs_as_congress_makes_push_for_college_football_playoff.html

Government Interaction in College Sports

I recently discovered an article that, while may be a little one-sided, reveals the opinion of someone who is blaming the BCS for forcing Congress to intervene while also giving a historical reference to our government involving itself in college sports. This article by Will Holt is linked here. The BCS executive director, Bill Hancock, says in an interview that “With everything going on in the country, I can’t believe that Congress is wasting time and spending taxpayers’ money on football,” and ”We feel strongly that managing of college sports is best left to the people in higher education.” If Bill Hancock had brushed up on his history, he might have known that our government has quite a role in college

Theodore Roosevelt

sports. As a matter of fact, our government created the largest association of college sports that resides in America. During the early 1900s, the harmful flying wedge formation used in college football cause several deaths and many injuries. As many Americans began to call for universities to end football programs due to these deaths, Theodore Roosevelt realized the importance of college football to the nation, and in an attempt to save it, called forth representatives from several colleges and formed the NCAA. Roosevelt was able to accomplish this feat while also “trust busting” big business and planning the development of the Panama Canal. So, even though it may not be the duty of our national government to step into the world of college sports, it is clearly evident that our government will step in if necessary for the safety or advancement of college sports.

Sources: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/305532-bcs-challenged-by-congress

                  http://www.nps.gov/history/logcabin/html/tr3.html

                  http://www.ncaa.org/wps/portal/ncaahome?WCM_GLOBAL_CONTEXT=/ncaa/ncaa/about+the+ncaa/overview/history.html

Background of the BCS

The BCS Coaches' Trophy, awarded to the winner of the BCS National Championship

I thought that I should begin the research for my senior exit project on the feud between Congress and the BCS not by delving deeply into the politics of this issue (although this research will come later), but by examining the history of the BCS system and how it works.

NCAA Division IA football is the sole sport at the collegiate level that does not use a playoff system to determine its champion. The BCS was created in 1998 to ensure that the number one and number two team in the country would play against each other in a bowl game, with the winner being the national champion. It does this while still maintaining the validity of other bowl games. It was created by Roy Kramer, one time commissioner of the Southeastern Conference, as well as the Southeastern Conference (or SEC), Big 12 Conference, Pac-10 Conference, Big 10 Conference, Big East Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference (or ACC), and independent Notre Dame.

BCS rankings are decided by three components to its selection process, the USA Today Coaches’ Poll, the Harris Interactive College Football Poll, and computer rankings. Each of these polls makes up 1/3 of the BCS ranking of a school. These rankings decide which two teams appear at the BCS National Championship.  The champions of the six BCS conferences (with the exclusion of Notre Dame) automatically receive a BCS bowl game berth. These bowl games are well advertised, and have much more “hype” around them than the other 29 bowl games that occur, simply because the BCS is able to allow the 5 BCS bowl games (Rose Bowl, Allstate Sugar Bowl, FedEx Orange Bowl, Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, and the BCS National Championship) the “cream of the crop” in terms of the skill level of the teams in BCS bowls.

With this background of the BCS system, hopefully I, as well as my readers, can be more informed about what the BCS is, and form our own opinions on what should be its future, or if Congress should be spending its time on determining its future.

Sources: http://www.bcsfootball.org/news/story?id=4819597

http://www.footballfoundation.org/bcs.php

http://www.collegefootballpoll.com/bcs_explained.html

And so it begins…

This blog will be used for the purpose of my senior exit project. My exit project will pertain to the current challenging of the Bowl Championship Series (or BCS) by Congress. In this project I will consider if Congress should be concerned with the BCS at the present, wasting time and money that could be spent on something more important to the well-being of the country. I will also consider if part of the blame rests with the leaders of the BCS and their refusal to implement the playoff system to college football, causing Congress to feel like they must step in.

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