[personal] Re: [Husker] BCS - Am I alone?

[Smith, William]

I'm not sure it's true (that in the NFL excitement for the regular season wanes because of the focus on the playoffs).  How would we even know?

I know I'm not the only person on the list to live in an NFL town.  Baltimore right now is ga-ga over the Ravens (actually it always is, just more so when the Ravens are winning).  We will make the playoffs but we don't know when and the town is set to party when we do.  Once that happens people will still be ga-ga over whether the Ravens can secure home-field advantage or a first round bye or also see records broken.   

The Ravens are one of a couple of teams to win the SuperBowl as a wildcard (00/01).  (The Raiders in 81 are another).  That was an interesting year because in the first half of that season the Ravens set an NFL record for most consecutive quarters without an offensive touchdown.  But they switched QBs, refocused and then started winning.

Were they be best team that season, or the just best when the season ended?  What's the difference?  And some point a champion has to be selected.  All things considered teams that finish a season strong have an advantage over teams that don't.  There is nothing unjust about that. 

Two points currently bantered about that don't impress me:

	1.  Blackledge's contention that "a playoff system would be bad for the bowls".  (I remember Bear Bryant saying the same thing).  So what?  It is axiomatic that money drives this system, but this sort of explicit acknowledgement puts the cart before the horse.  Primie facie discounting possible solutions because "they might hurt the bowls" prevents us of looking at a full range of potential improvements.   

	2.  "Michigan lost ground by not playing a game."  So what?  There is no compelling reason why a team ranked at position X in week Y is guaranteed that position in subsequent weeks.  For most of the season the polls' primary service is to provide bragging rights.  However the second to the last poll is the most important one as far as assessing each team's relative worthiness to play for a quality bowl.  Florida is the champion of what is arguably the nation's most competitive conference.  I definitely want to see how well they match up against OSU, not a replay of Nov. 18.  (BTW, I thought the OSU-Michigan game was the most amazing game of the year.  Those may well be the two best teams this year.  But that game was enough.  Imagine if in 1971 NU and OU had to play again in the OB?)

Bill Smith
Towson, MD 




On Tue, 5 Dec 2006, Mike Nolan wrote:

>> Darn right it does.  Stub your toe once and you're out.  Maybe.
>> Depends on the season.  That's what makes it exciting.  The entire
>> season.  Every weekend, every game.
>
> Yeah, I'm really looking forward to the game that matches the only two
> unbeaten teams, Ohio State and Boise State.
>
> Everybody else stubbed their toe at least once.
>
> BTW, for an entertaining take on this, see ESPN.com:
>
> http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=2687443

That is interesting, but I think it overlooks the fact that the 
excitment of the NFL playoffs comes somewhat at the expense of 
regular season game excitement.

-- 
Theodore (Ted) Heise     <theo at heise.nu>     Bloomington, IN, USA

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