And in other shocking news Charlie Weis is overweight

Thank God you are sitting down… Ok, if you're reading this on a mobile device while walking you better find a place to sit down because this will be a shocker, one that will rock the very core of your beliefs. The BCS presidents have…. have…. REJECTED the Mountain West Conference's playoff plan.

The MWC proposed an eight-team playoff system that would allow greater access to the national championship game to teams outside the six most powerful leagues. The BCS presidential oversight committee rejected the concept during a teleconference on Wednesday.

Outgoing committee chairman David Frohnmayer had this to say:

"In the last six years, I've read pundits, heard the pronouncements of broadcasters and collected several cubic feet of e-mail printouts from advocates of an NFL-style playoff system. Even those that go beyond sound bite certitude share two intertwined and fatal deficiencies: They disrespect our academic calendars and they utterly lack a business plan."

Listen jackoff, no one and I mean no one gives a flying rat's ass about a business plan. We just don't care, that's not even a discussion in the circles of football fandom. That's your job to figure out the business end of it. I don't sit around a bar with my friends on a college football Saturday and discuss college football as a business. I don't sit there and say "Hey Brad, I think College Football's business model would serve the system better if we applied some Six Sigma concepts to it." No, instead we sit around and dream about how great it would be if college football wasn't the ONLY SPORT IN THE WORLD whose champion is not determined on the field.

As for the 'academic calendar' bullshit, please, please give me your schedule. Give me two weeks between Thanksgiving and the middle of January and I'll give you an 8 team playoff.

Week 1: 8 teams become 4
Week 2: 4 teams become 2
Championship game is played the same time it always is.

You're telling me your academic schedule can't handle that?! You're telling me you even care about academics in football? I seriously doubt it.

It's funny, these guys are so transparent that it borders on the ridiculous anymore. Every time they open their mouths it just gets more and more perverse. They should just release a statement that says "We have rejected <insert angry team left out of championship game here>'s plan for a playoff because it would deprive us of mounds of cash." At least then they could go home at night without feeling dirty.

MWC commissioner wants you to believe the Yeti exist

Or he might as well because you'll have about as much chance of seeing one as you would an eight team playoff in college football. MWC commissioner Craig Thompson proposed a playoff to the other BCS commissioners in a meeting Tuesday.

Thompson's fellow BCS commissioners listened Tuesday morning to his proposal for an eight-team playoff and other changes to the current system. They agreed to take the proposal back to their respective memberships for their spring meetings. They will reconvene in June in Colorado Springs.

The MWC's proposal not only would create a playoff, it would scrap the use of polls and computers in the BCS rating in favor of a committee that would select and seed 10 teams. The bottom two would play in a "BCS bowl" and the others would play for the national championship. The proposal also wants to recalibrate the revenue sharing.

The other commissioners agreeing to "discuss" the playoff is largely ceremonial in that they will take it back to their respective conferences, laugh about it, and roll around in their heaping piles of money they get from the current BCS system. Having said that, I have to admit Thompson did the right thing, instead of trying to change the system a little bit (see: Plus-One format) he proposes broad radical change including throwing out the God-awful BCS rating system and polls for a 12 person selection committee. If you are going to fight the system, nudging it isn't the way to make change you have to hit it with a sledge hammer. Hopefully this radical idea will at least get BCS commissioners thinking. Before you argue with me about the selection committee idea bringing up Penn State's snub by the NCAA basketball selection committee (don't go there) I'm not saying it's the right idea but it at least is something. Anything. But like I said, you'll probably have a better chance of seeing this guy:

Just Because Tis The Season

Penn State is hosting George Mason in the NIT tonight, Happy St. Patrick's Day. Time to get my Irish on. Most have spent the last 2 days bitching why the Nittany Lions aren't in the NCAA Tournament. Granted, Mike Slive gave the most bullshit argument for Arizona's inclusion, possibly the finest work of a talking asshole since Ace Ventura, see Kevin's fine work over at BSD for actual stats and stuff for those that don't really follow the nuances of college basketball and need an explanation as the why. Regardless, from this point on, I'm putting an end to the whining about the schedule. I know, it wasn't great, but it's not what kept the team out of the Tournament. Stop crying the schedule is too weak! The schedule is too weak? The fucking schedule is too weak? You're weak! The season ended up hinging on 2 games and the team didn't come through, that's it, plain and simple. The season slipped away losing to Rhode Island, thus missing an opportunity to play Villanova, and closing out the regular season losing to Iowa. Penn State plays 'Nova instead of Towson, there's your strength of schedule out the window or conversely beats Iowa, locks up number 2 seed in the Big Ten and punches their ticket. Unfortunately, they've been inconsistently great and that's been the problem (that and free throw shooting). Celebrate the year and the team and stop crying.

P.S. ESPN can take ESPNU and shove it up their ass, no one gets your shitty offspring network. Put the worthless play-in game on it. Sláinte!

Killing time with ESPN

Since college football is all about debate with polls, rankings and such and not in any way shape or form decided decisively on the field (like EVERY OTHER SPORT KNOWN TO MAN), the discussion rages into the offseason long after the last whistle blows. In the case of ESPN, if the debate wanes why not just create your own debate, after all that's what TWWL is all about these days. Enter the Prestige Rankings: ESPN's attempt to rank the prestige of all FBS teams throughout the history of football (ah, to ESPN history starts in 1936 - whatever). The system was devised by Chris Fallica, Nick Loucks and Harold Shelton, the fine men of the "ESPN research" team. Not sure this qualifies as research but, ok, I'll play along. First let's look at what "Prestige" is:
pres·tige
Pronunciation: \pre-stēzh, -stēj\
Function: noun
Usage: often attributive
1: standing or estimation in the eyes of people: weight or credit in general opinion
2: commanding position in people's minds

So from the start this is an exercise in futility because you and I will have a completely different idea of what makes a prestigious team then say someone on the "ESPN research" team but, then again, that's what college football is all about: debate. So let's look at what weighs heavy in the minds of The World Wide Leader.

• National title: 25 points
• Berth in one of the major bowls: 10

Major bowls were defined as every Rose, Orange and Sugar Bowl since '36; every Cotton Bowl from 1940-94 (when it started taking the SWC champ until it was booted from the Bowl Alliance); and every Fiesta Bowl since the '86 season when the historic No. 1 Miami-vs.-No. 2 Penn State game changed the landscape of college football.

• Major bowl win: 10
• Best win/loss record in conference regular season: 10

These points were awarded to every team that had at least a share of the best overall record in a major football conference, regardless of divisional alignment. Independent schools were awarded the bonus if they were ranked ahead of at least three of the big six conference champions in a final regular-season poll that season.

• Final AP top-5 finish: 10
• Heisman winner: 8
• Final AP top 6-10 finish: 6
• Conference title championship-game bonus: 5
• Final AP top 11-25 finish: 4
• Bowl appearance: 3
• Bowl win: 3
• 10-win season: 2
• Week as AP No. 1: 2
• Win over AP No. 1: 1
• Each consensus All-American: 1
• First-round NFL draft pick (since '70): 1
• Losing season: minus-2
  
• Each year of television ban: minus-1
• Each year of postseason ban: minus-2
• Each year of overall probation: minus-1
• Each year of financial-aid penalty: minus-1
• Each year of recruiting penalties: minus-1
• Each penalty of "show cause action:" minus-2

Side note: I was completely shocked to read that someone working for ESPN would write that a game played by Penn State "changed the landscape of college football" – I'm sure their pink slips are already printed.

So in the minds of ESPN the most important thing in college football is winning a MNC. Ok, I can except that for some that's all that matters *cough SEC* but for some of us getting banned by the NCAA is a little more of a negative than what ESPN thinks. A postseason ban only draws a negative 2?!?! WTF?? Getting banned from postseason play is a tad more important than that! I would most definitely rank that a minus 8 or at least a 5, you've done something pretty bad if you can't even participate in the postseason. In fact they rank that as egregious as getting a "show cause action" which is more of a self-discipline issue and not a total ban. A school that hires a coach or an AD that is tagged with the "show cause" on their record can still participate as long as the coach or AD in question keeps his nose clean.

I believe All-Americans and 1^st-round NFL picks are weighted too low and Heisman winners are weighted to high. Getting a Heisman is almost as important as major bowl win or a conference championship? I don't think so, how many Heisman's have been complete busts in bowl games and in the NFL? Independents get screwed in this system because they have to finish with a better record than three of the big six conference champions to get the 10-point bonus and they don't even get a shot at the 5-point bonus for making it to a Conference title championship-game, they aren't in a conference.

All in all though, I would think with the Paterno era Penn State is going to finish pretty high in these rankings, and in fact they've already listed Nos. 21-119 here and Nos. 16-20 here and no PSU yet. Nos. 11-15 are due out today with the top ten coming out Thursday and Friday. Stay tuned.

The BCS Championship game: still irrelevant after all these years

So it comes down to Florida and Oklahoma for the BCS Championship game tonight at 8:00 PM. Supposedly this is "the" national championship game but, once again, there will be much debate over who the real champ is. Very strong arguments can be made for Utah, USC, and the winner of tonight's game. Texas has no argument in my mind; they needed a last second touchdown to sneak by an Ohio State team that didn't even make the Rose Bowl.

USC pounded the #6 team (yes I refuse to write it) 38-24 and will end the season with only one loss, the same number as the winner of the Championship game. Then there's Utah. In my mind the game tonight means absolutely nothing because Utah should be the national champ. Utah crushed a powerful Alabama team 31-17 and the score is deceiving, the game wasn't even that close. Not only did Utah beat the #4 team in the nation but it was one of them teams with that "SEC speed." Teams from the Mountain West don't beat them there southern teams with all their speed. That's bullshit bubby, what's goin' on?

Think about this for one moment: if the SEC didn't have a championship game Alabama, not Florida, would be playing in the Championship game. Alabama was undefeated and held the top position in the BCS poll for five weeks before losing to Florida in the SEC championship game. Had there been no SEC championship Utah would have got the chance to crush Florida. I'm not saying Utah would beat any team on any given day but on that day, in the Sugar Bowl, Utah would have beat anybody, they were near perfect. Had there been a playoff they probably wouldn't have won, but that's not an argument we don't have a playoff. Utah is the only undefeated team left and they beat an all-powerful SEC team that was previously ranked #1 and currently #4; in my book they are the champs. So sit back tonight with your favorite adult beverage and take in a great matchup between two very good teams, but keep in mind that this decides nothing. The debate will rage on long after the confetti is swept off the field and the BCS trophy is safely locked away in the winner's trophy case. I for one would like to thank Utah for busting up the BCS party, they may just be the impetus that starts college football down the path towards deciding the championship on the field.