It’s radical. It’s outlandish. It’s a crazier idea than hiring Mike Leach to baby-sit your children. But that’s precisely why you’ll want to hear my solution to alleviate the problems that we face as college football fans living on the West Coast.
In earlier columns this week, the bowl system as it currently is was lauded. The performance of the Pac-10, our home conference, was bemoaned. My solution complements each of those issues fantastically.
Let’s start by examining the critical predicaments. Pac-10 football is historically overlooked by the pundits at ESPN and the Southeastern Conference and Big Ten Conference elitists. While the oversight is usually without merit, the Pac-10 recently failed to justify its status as a top conference in the bowl season. Arizona in the Holiday Bowl? C’mon now.
We’re also tired of the Western Athletic and Mountain West conferences whining about not being automatically included in the Bowl Championship Series jackpot. It’s true that these conferences boast quality teams, but they also get to play the likes of UC Davis of San Diego State. C’mon now.
Here comes the antidote, a solution drawn from our futbol-playing comrades from across the Atlantic. At the end of each college football season, drop the bottom three teams from the Pac-10, and replace them with the top finisher from the WAC, the top finisher from the MWC, and the next best team from either one of those conferences. The BCS system remains as is, with the Pac-10 receiving one of the automatic bids.
The Pac-10 teams that are dropped are reassigned to either the WAC or the MWC based on location. Obviously, whichever lesser conference loses two teams receives two Pac-10 schools.
The plan rewards consistency and staying power. Teams that have flash-in-the-pan, once-in-a-generation seasons will fluctuate between conferences and continually remain on the fringe of the Pac-10. Schools that incessantly boast top-tier teams (think Boise State, TCU, Utah, etc.) can solidify themselves in the Pac-10. The Washington States and Arizona States of the world are demoted and outsourced.
Lou Holtz, the coach who led six different college programs to a bowl game and remains one of the icons of the sport, once said. “Motivation is simple. You eliminate those who are not motivated.”
Dr. Lou had it right. The dregs that can’t compete should not be allowed to drag down the cream of the crop.
Imagine the fracas that would ensue as recruiting heated up to Death Valley temperatures. Competition is at a premium, as teams fight to hold on to the shot at BCS glory. The bias against the Pac-10 drops faster than the Cincinnati Bengals.
Oregon, USC, Boise State, TCU, Utah, et al in the same conference? The SEC will need to find plenty more Michael Ohers to match that.
The solution, like “the invisible hand” and supply-side economics and all other brilliant theories before it, is not without its minor issues. Schools like Washington State will complain about not benefitting financially from playing in a conference with USC, but the Cougars should concern themselves with other issues … like finding a quarterback that has experience beyond intramurals.
Additional travel will only impact the Pac-10, who will benefit the most from this system and thus offset those minor issues of extending their potential reach as far as Texas. Teams in the Pac-10 can easily be divided into convenient WAC and Mountain West “zones,” so that if they face demotion they will fall into the more location-friendly of the two conferences: generally the WAC for the northern teams and the MWC for the southern teams.
The result of all this will vault the Pac-10 to superior status. No antitrust lawsuits, no Trojan dynasties, no East Coast bias. God bless capitalism.
If you think Ayn Rand should write a novel about his proposed system, e-mail Eshoff at reshoff@media.ucla.edu