[NU Sports] B(C)S ratings and attendance ...

Thu Jan 12 08:13:47 CST 2012

While I'm sure you can find plenty of other things to blame liberals for, this particular situation was the result of the beloved hidden hand of the free market.

The "standards" for bowl qualification haven't changed significantly since the Bush II administration.  That's when, as a result of the expansion to a 12 game season (2006), a winning bowl-qualifying record for an FBS school became 6-6 as long as no more than one of those wins came against an FCS team and all FBS teams with better records already had bowl bids.  Six bowls have been added since that rule change including the BCS championship bowl.  That's roughly one a year.  That is the same rate that bowl games have been added to the schedule since 1997, so the data would suggest that the rule change was not the primary driver in adding new bowl games.  The more likely candidate was the increase in TV and sponsorship revenue available to bowl committees.

The last part of the rule requiring bowls to take all teams with better records before they can take a 6-6 team was eliminated last year after pressure from bowl committees who preferred 6-6 teams from higher profile conferences to 7-5 (or better) teams from lesser conferences.  Certainly doesn't appear to be any sentimentality in that change either.

This year we saw UCLA get granted a waiver to play in a bowl game with a 6-7 record because their seventh loss came in their conference championship game against Oregon.  Again this strikes me as a decision motivated by money and UCLA's profile.

The NCAA turned down two bids for new bowl games in 2010 because the current schedule (35) consumes almost all of the qualified teams (when you include the inevitable handful of postseason suspensions).  Those new bowls would have supported the past rate of expansion of one new bowl every year.  So it appears that perceived demand for bowl games continues to expand.  If the NCAA were motivated as you suggest, they would have added these bowls.  As it is, they appear to be holding the line at 6-6.  

Here's a decade by decade analysis if you'd like to draw any other conclusions.

1901 - Rose Bowl
1930's - Orange, Sugar, Sun, Cotton
1940's - Gator, Capital One
1950's - Liberty
1960's - Chick-fil-A
1970's - Independence, Holiday
1980's - Outback, Insight
1990's - Champs Sports, Maaco, Alamo, Little Ceasars, Famous Idaho Potato, Music City, GoDaddy
2000's - Meineke Car Care, New Orleans, Kraft, Hawaii, Belk, Armed Forces, Poinsetta, BBVA, New Mexico, Military, Beef, BCS
2010's - Pinstripe, TicketCity

Finally, just another comment on all of the fine dialog going on about the current system.

All of the other BCS stuff aside, I think that this was a very enjoyable football post season.  NU and UM were the only games where I had a dog in the hunt, but many of other games were just good football - more so than in recent memory.  The BCS game was a dud, but it usually is.  If we can use the quality of play on the field as any gauge of how the system is working, IMHO the system worked well this year.

Jeff

-----Original Message-----
From: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com [mailto:nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com] On Behalf Of hakirsch at aol.com
Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2012 1:29 AM
To: SjT (Stephen J. Truog); Michael Vance; nwu-sports at tssi.com
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] B(C)S ratings and attendance ...

To me the big negative is too many bowl games. When there were about 5-6 total  bowl games on NYE and New Years day, they were exciting and tradition reigned and I could recite the story for each game. There was The Cotton with Lindsey Nelson announcing and Texas playing someone. There was the Sugar either on NYE or NYD with Alabama playing someone.  There was the Rose with BT/Pac 8 and beautiful Pasadena. The evening finished up with the Orange and a  team from Florida playing Kansas , Nebraska,or maybe PSU.  ND was somewhere wherever needed to fill a spot.  The Gator Bowl was thrown in there opposite one of the others on NYD and that was about it

  But then the liberals ruined it . They have called for dumbing  down the standards so that 70 teams now play.  It's like giving every kid who participates a medal rather than only the ones that do well.  And you thought it was the money and overpaid bowl committees 

Harry 
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From: "SjT \(Stephen J. Truog\)" <sjtruog at yahoo.com>
Sender: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com
Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2012 21:42:57 
To: Michael Vance<michael.vance at att.net>; nwu-sports at tssi.com<nwu-sports at tssi.com>
Reply-To: "SjT \(Stephen J. Truog\)" <sjtruog at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] B(C)S ratings and attendance ...

Explanation? The B(C)S sucks so much that it destroys all it touches -- even the Rose Bowl. Sure, it's not gone altogether - but it's a shell of its former self.

Look guys, I'm not romanticizing or waxing nostalgic of the good old days -- all I'm saying is that what's happening now sucks. Really sucks. Go forward to a playoff. Go backwards to traditional bowls. Cancel the bowl season altogether and end with the regular season. I don't care what path we take - let's just get the heck out of this B(C)S rut/hellhole we're in now. It's awful. Attendance is down. Ratings are down. Even the Cartel leaders see that this system is a disaster and are scrambling to find some fix that will allow them to keep their stubborn pride and not admit that they created the worst system possible.

I know y'all ask why I rail against the B(C)S so much every year and take such delight it its (too slow, but eventual) demise ... but I'm just amazed so many of you are satisfied with the status quo and make every excuse possible to try and defend it. You're B(C)S enablers! :) You keep making up new excuses why this or that wouldn't work ... or you chant the ESPN line about how the system worked this year ... or repeat fears on how dangerous something else would be ... but you never actually look at what's in front of you. Be honest and look at how many college bowl games you watched in the last decade. Mine has declined significantly. I'll always love college football, but the end of every season just plain sucks now. I dunno. Maybe I'm missing the joy of half empty Orange Bowls, watching the "U" take the field in Pasadena, watching a 6-6 CUSA team against a 6-6 MAC team or having a team declared the "champion" when they couldn't even win their own
 conference.

Or maybe you all just have a higher pain tolerance than me ...

But like I said, I'm loving all the cracks that are showing in the system - I don't necessarily care what happens next, just that this system ends as soon as possible.

GO CATS!!!
-SjT

PS - Not understanding all the NFL hate either ... especially with the round of games coming up this weekend (well, aside from that Houston/Baltimore game) -- now that Bowl Day has been destroyed by the B(C)S, the divisional weekend in the NFL playoffs usually is the best pigskin event on the calendar -- four thrilling games leading to Championship Sunday. Can't wait!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
STEPHEN J. TRUOG
sjtruog at yahoo.com
GO CATS!!! GEAUX SAINTS!!!
Super Bowl XLIV Champions!
________________________________

________________________________
 From: Michael Vance <michael.vance at att.net>
To: nwu-sports at tssi.com 
Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2012 10:23 PM
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] B(C)S ratings and attendance ...

So what's the explanation for the ratings decline for the Rose Bowl and how does that bolster your case for a return to the "good old days?" You had the true champs from the Big Ten and Pac-12. It was a compelling speed vs. power matchup. Their rankings were comparable. How does that fit in to the SJT view of how things oughtta be?

On 1/10/2012 3:00 PM, SjT (Stephen J. Truog) wrote:
> > From the LA Times ...
> Rose Bowl (Oregon over Wisconsin 45-38): 11.8 rating.
> In 2011, the Rose Bowl between TCU and Wisconsin drew an 13.1 rating. The 2010 Rose Bowl between Ohio State and Oregon drew a 13.8.

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