In 2020, the CFP selection committee got on the wrong side of national pundits, divided the country
The pandemic robbed lives, livelihoods and turned college sports upside down in 2020. All we needed from college football was a release, a reprieve, a uniting escape for fans that would elevate the country.
What we got was chairman Gary Barta and the College Football Playoff selection committee dividing a nation with its protect-the-Death-Star-at-all-cost rankings.
In other words, we saw the Grinch. He came out of his cave and made excuses on ESPN.
The way the CFP committee treated undefeated Cincinnati, Coastal Carolina and even BYU proved the system needs another overhaul, be it an expanded playoff or scratch and do-over.
Athlon Sports columnist Bryan Fischer explained on 1280 The Zone this week the CFP committee had a chance to unite a country Sunday, but just split it in half. Fischer published a comprehensive list of postponed, canceled and opted out games at Athlonsports.com.
Tim Brando of Fox Sports said there is a lot left unsaid in the 2020 football season and he blames what he calls a “corrupt” CFP system. Brando, like many national voices, is disgusted with the current system.
After watching BYU destroy Central Florida in the Boca Raton Bowl, he tweeted out: “Anyone care to discuss how good @CoastalFootball D must have been to hold down @BYUfootball the way they did earlier this season? There’s so VERY MUCH left unanswered this unique covid-season we endured. Only 1 exception. A CORRUPT Committee representing the same cartel cashing in!”
Anyone care to discuss how good @CoastalFootball D must have been to hold down @BYUfootball the way they did earlier this season?There’s so VERY MUCH left unanswered this unique covid-season we endured. Only 1 exception.A CORRUPT Committee representing the same cartel cashing in!
— Tim Brando (@TimBrando) December 23, 2020
Stewart Mandel, editor in chief at The Athletic, patiently watched the Barta and the CFP committee roll out head-scratching rankings week after week. He joined an army of college experts marveling at the juxtapositioning to place Power Five royalty in strategic places to protect bowls and money payouts, shutting the door on teams that have achieved in a very strange year.
Mandel tweeted out his theme of a piece, “College football is the only sport with a postseason that rewards logo patches above merit and actively alienates its fans.
“Do. Something. Now.”
College football is the only sport with a postseason that rewards logo patches above merit and actively alienates its fans.
— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) December 21, 2020
Do. Something. Now.https://t.co/xwid1A5Y2F
Mandel had had enough. He joined the train gaining speed downhill that the current system is broken and unfair.
In an open letter column to the college football self-appointed gods, he wrote: “I’m writing to tell you I’m now embarrassed by the same postseason I long embraced. You’ve got a real problem on your hands, folks, and you need to address it. Quickly. Don’t form a task force to review meeting notes of a committee assigned to review the postseason structure. Here’s the evaluation: BROKEN!”
Coastal Carolina President Michael T. Benson also blasted the CFP committee in a letter to chairman Barta, the AD at Iowa, and during an interview with Yahoo Sports. Benson called the snub of Group of Five programs a lack of fairness and absence of character.
“I can’t help but think what might have been this season had all FBS programs been given the same equality of opportunity,” Benson wrote “Just think about that: Football is the only sport where the deck is stacked insurmountably against those who have the inevitable classification of “Group of Five” before toe hits the leather each fall.”
College football fans in America deserve more. They deserve to see competitive games in the Final Four, as designed, but then you get Alabama favored by 19 over Notre Dame in the semifinals, while Texas A&M and undefeated Cincinnati are blackballed.
Cincinnati may or may not be a great team, but nobody will ever know because the Bearcats are part of the unwashed. Back in the late ’80s, the Bowl Coalition, then BCS and now the CFP decided that never, never ever again would an outsider like BYU in 1984 be in the mix for a national championship.
So far, that edict behind closed doors, has worked perfectly. Just a dozen football programs deemed royalty are given all the chances, and keep most the money.
If BYU hadn't scheduled that game against Coastal Carolina at the last second, is the 11-0 team in the PlayStation Fiesta Bowl vs. Oregon making a whole lot more money? It would've been an interesting CFP committee debate.
— Pete Fiutak (@PeteFiutak) December 23, 2020
Writes Mandel, “The problem as I see it is that you’ve inadvertently created a highly exclusionary event that with each passing year alienates another segment of the population. Which is not ideal when someone (ESPN) is paying you $7.3 BILLION dollars to air said event.”
Accurately so, Mandel points out “large segments of the viewing public — the entire West Coast, all the Big Ten fan bases outside of Ohio State, all of the Big 12 fan bases outside of Oklahoma, and every fan of a Group of Five team — has increasingly little reason to be invested in the season-long Playoff race.”
What we need from a college football’s quest for a national championship is a little transparency and fairness.
Here's what a 16-team CFP would look like this season.
— FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) December 21, 2020
Which matchup would be the most fun to watch? pic.twitter.com/XiEInczhw0
What we need is a public admission from the CFP folks that this is biased and unfair.
Secondly, we need the gift, a present in 2021 and beyond, of a new design.
Expand the playoffs to include other football teams who might be deserving of the chance. Call out the bowl folks who have selfishly protected their turf. Tell the TV folks where you want to play and when and if there is a bowl sponsorship involved like the Sugar, Fiesta, Orange and Rose bowls, tell them to get on board. Don’t let them dictate. Make them conform with the times that are demanding a more woke and honest system.
Talk about hypocrisy.
Sadly, the NCAA, comprised of university presidents as board members, have been quiet and absent as leaders of our national collegiate football championship. They simply turned it all over to the BCS and then the CFP.
This year, those folks were exposed.
They could use the truth vaccine for Christmas.
from Deseret News https://ift.tt/3rt155q
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario