I love college football.  I hate the current BCS system for determining a champion.  I had to do something about it.

This website presents a simple but remarkably effective playoff plan (the “Laddie Plan”) that should appease all parties involved (the NCAA, the bowls, the BCS and especially, the fans).  This website also provides a thoughtful, in-depth analysis about problems with the current system why implementing the Laddie Plan is so crucial to college football. 

In addition to presenting the Laddie Plan, this site also:

1. 1.Spells out in detail all the major arguments against the BCS - (What is Wrong with the BCS)
   

2. 2.Reminds everyone of the BCS snubs since its inception - (BCS Injustices)
   

3. 3.Provides a weekly update to current and pending BCS problems (Tuesday Morning Blog)
   

4. Provides playoff brackets from 2002-2007 showing what might have been if the Laddie Plan had been implemented - (College Football Tournament Invitations (2002 - 2007))

The Laddie Plan

This plan is so simple and so easy to implement, how can it not have been done already?

Summary:

1. -Sixteen team playoff
   

2. -First and second rounds of the playoff take place on the first and second weekends in December
   

3. -All bowl games remain in place with the first bowl game scheduled no earlier than the third weekend in December
   

4. -Of the sixteen teams that were invited to the tournament, 12 will have dropped out during the first two rounds - those 12 teams will accept bowl invitations.
   

5. -The semi-finals are played on January 1st in two of the BCS bowls (it would rotate each year so each of the 4 BCS bowls would get to host a semi-final every other year)
   

6. -Championship game is played January 8th.
   

A bit more detail:

The sixteen teams would consist of 11 automatic bids to each conference champion and 5 at large bids picked by a selection committee.  By guarantying every conference champion a spot, the Mid-Major Problem (What is Wrong with the BCS) is eliminated and the mere fact that a tournament exists eliminates the Poll problem. (What is Wrong with the BCS)

The sixteen teams would be broken into four regions and seeded by the selection committee.  The first and second round games could be played at neutral sites, or the higher seeded team could host (I’m indifferent on how this would play out)

The bowl games would still have their agreements in place with each conference and would have their pick of the top teams available from their conferences unless those teams made it to the semi-finals.  This is great news for the bowls, especially the Rose Bowl as it would host a semi-final one year and be guaranteed its beloved PAC-10 vs Big 10 match-up in the other years (no more worrying about another BCS bowl grabbing the team they want).  Most playoff proposals I’ve seen involve eliminating or substantially reducing the bowl games, but I don’t think anyone wants that.  I love watching bowl games over the holidays and love the fact that under the Laddie Plan I can have a playoff and still have the bowl games!

Every team that was invited to the tournament would get a payment based on when they lost (i.e the 8 teams that lose in the first round would each get paid X, the 4 teams that lose in the second round would get a higher amount and losers in the semi finals would get a higher amount with the two teams in the championship getting the highest amount).  In determining these pay days the tournament organizers would need to consider that teams losing in the early rounds would get a pay day for being in the tournament PLUS they would get a pay day from whatever bowl they were attending.

The lone hurdle to implementing the Laddie Plan is the fact that all of the conference championship games (and the last week of Pac 10 conference games) are currently scheduled for the first weekend of December so a one week calendar adjustment would need to be made so that the conference championship games (and final Pac 10 conference games) were played on the last Saturday of November.  I know this is a legitimate challenge, which I discuss in more detail below when I discuss possible counter-arguments to the Laddie Plan, but when compared to other playoff plans (such as eliminating all bowl games altogether and replacing it with a playoff OR starting the playoff on the first weekend in January after the bowl games with the championship game not being played until February) a simple one-week shift of the regular season is actually a very simple request, and would not be that difficult to implement.

TOP TEN REASONS why the LADDIE PLAN is the best plan out there:

1.  Everyone knows that the 1st few days of the NCAA college basketball tournament are the most exciting.  The first part of December has always been a bit of a “dead time” as far as sports go.   Can you imagine how much fun it would be to watch all of the conference championship games over the Thanksgiving holiday and then follow it up with back to back quadruple headers on the first weekend in December!!!   

2.  The Laddie Plan is the perfect playoff system AND it saves the Bowl System. One of the biggest fears out there is that a playoff would mean the Bowl System would be diminished or eliminated.  Not true under the Laddie Plan.  Good teams that don’t qualify for the tournament can still have a post-season game.  There will still be college football over the holiday season.  By allowing teams that lose during the playoffs to still play in bowl games, the Laddie Plan guarantees that the bowl games will get a marquee team from the conference of their choice.  The Rose Bowl could ALWAYS have its preferred Pac 10 - Big 10 match-up (they would get the best team from those conferences that is not still in the tournament). 

3. The Laddie Plan actually enhances the Bowl System.  Imagine if a small conference champion pulls a stunning upset in the first round, then loses in the second round.  This team would still go to its conference’s regular bowl game as its conference champion.  That bowl game would have a marketing bonanza - “come see team X, that knocked off the big favorite team Y in the first round!”  Teams that didn’t make it to the tournament that are matched up in a bowl game against a team that did make it to the tournament will come into the bowl games with a chip on their shoulder - trying to prove that they are better than a “tournament team” or that they should have been invited as an at large team.

4.  Everyone would have a fair chance (including the Mid Majors) to play for the national title.  The NCAA would be providing a fair and equitable system to determine the champion.

5.  It eliminates the role of the arbitrary polls (with their built in biases) in picking a national champion.  Many teams over the years have had reasons to complain about being ranked #3 or #4 in the BCS instead of #1 or #2.  Unless and until it is settled on the field, we really don’t know for sure if the national champion really was the best team in college football.  With the 16 team playoff, team #17 and #18 could complain about being snubbed, but lets be realistic - if you select the top 2 teams there’s a chance you miss the best team, but if you select the top 16 teams you’re not going to miss the best team.  The 16 team playoff eliminates the SNUB. 

6.  The teams playing in the national championship game will both be on at least a 3 game winning streak, and will be playing their best football of the season.

7.  The biggest layoff a team would face between games would be a two and one-half week break between the 2nd Saturday in December and New Years Day (the perfect amount of time).  This is the optimal amount of time  between the second round and the semi finals.  It gives the student athletes on the semi-final bound teams real time to complete class work and take exams and it gives the teams enough time to heal the bumps and bruises from the playoffs without getting rusty (the current BCS nonsense sometimes has teams waiting 5 or 6 weeks between their last game and the title game - which is obviously way too much time and arguably is why Ohio State has looked so out-of-sync in losing in the title game in recent years)

8. Non conference games would be meaningful again.  The Laddie Plan will help eliminate the “big” schools scheduling cream-puff opponents for their pre-conference schedules.  Some teams are notorious for this - they schedule the 4 weakest nonconference teams they can find so that they are practically guaranteed of 4 free victories to move them up in the rankings, then all they need to do is go .500 in conference play and they finish 8-4, go to a bowl game, coach doesn’t get fired, etc.   In fact, many mid-majors are starting to realize to even get into a BCS game they need to go undefeated so it is in their best interest to schedule four Division IAA opponents before conference play to increase their chances of an undefeated season.  The beauty of the Laddie Plan is that you could lose every game of your non-conference schedule and still get into the tournament by winning your conference.  This would encourage teams to schedule real non-conference games against real opponents to help get themselves ready for conference play.

9.  Everyone would earn more$$$.  Think of how much money could be made with a tournament AND the bowl season still in place?  I believe BCS was able to pay out about $10 million to each team in a BCS bowl ($20 million per bowl * 5 BCS bowls = $100 million paid to participating schools).  I have no idea how BCS accounting works, but I’m guessing if they  can afford to pay $100 million that means the BCS gets at least $150 million in revenue for these 5 bowl games.  Now think of how much money could be raised with 15 playoff games instead of 5 bowl games.  With triple the # of games, you would think that revenue would AT LEAST triple to the $450 millon range?  In 1999 CBS paid $6 BILLION for the TV rights to the NCAA mens basketball tournament for 11 years (average of $545 MILLION per year).  And this would just be the TV rights!!!  There would be many additional sources of revenue as well.  The TV networks and radio stations would be lining up to cover the tournament and would probably end up in bidding wars.  The TV ratings for a tournament would be off the charts.  The championship game might even start to approach SuperBowl status as far as the buildup goes. 

10.  The Laddie Plan is better than the “Plus One” system.  Under the so-called “Plus One” system, the current BCS plan would be expanded to pick 4 teams and play national semi-finals before the title game.  This is an improvement over the current state of things BUT it only very slightly increases the margin of error for the Poll Problems and does NOTHING to address the Mid Major Problem.  Faulty pre-season rankings, poll biases and disregard for the mid-majors would still impact who is the national champion - as opposed to the Laddie Plan in which the national champion is decided on the field.  Nothing short of a guaranteed spot for a mid major conference champion in the tournament (or creation of a new Mid Major division) can solve the Mid Major Problem.

Possible arguments against the Laddie Plan (and why your arguments are wrong):

Doubter Argument #1.  Its asking too much to move the season forward one week or to eliminate the 12th game.

Laddie Plan reply:  Could you at least try to come up with a substantive argument for your first attempt?  Have you ever seen the ratings on pre-season NFL games?  By the time August rolls around Americans are salivating for football like one of Pavlov’s dogs!  The stadiums will be full, even if the first games of the year are on the last Saturday in August (instead of the first Saturday in September), especially since these early games will start to be against real opponents because the tournament will eliminate the incentive to schedule early season cupcake opponents.  On the other hand, you can keep the same start date and just eliminate the 12th game.  There is a pretty broad consensus from what I can tell that the 12th game is just a money-grab and guaranteed victory against a hired cupcake that is doing nothing but hurting the integrity of the game.  No one would miss it.

Doubter Argument #2.  It would be anti-climatic for a team that lost in the first or second round of the tournament to still go to a bowl game.

Laddie Plan reply:  Nonsense.  It would be no different than the current BCS system.  Every year under the BCS system we have de-facto semi final games at the end of November as the #1 and #2 ranked BCS teams play their last regular season game knowing that if they win, they’ll move on to the title game.  An undefeated team that loses its last regular season game or its conference championship game already must feel that it lost in a semi-final game (see Michigan vs Ohio State or USC vs UCLA in 2006) but did that mean Michigan and USC, who missed an opportunity to play for the title in 2006, declined an invitation to the Rose Bowl because they were pouting about their losses? Of course not.  Just because a team knows it isn’t playing for a national title doesn’t mean a bowl game isn’t exciting or that it isn’t an honor to be invited.  Oklahoma and Boise State knew they weren’t playing for the national title in the 2006 Fiesta Bowl but that didn’t stop the game from being one of the best ever played.

Doubter Argument #3.  We need to protect the integrity of the regular season.  OR We already have a playoff in college football, its called the regular season.

Laddie Plan reply:  If I hear one more person spout off this ridiculous argument this I’m going to scream.  50% of the teams in the nation are eliminated from national championship contention on the first Saturday of college football.  How anti-climatic is that?  What a horrible incentive for teams to find the easiest schedule possible.  Imagine a baseball season where you lose your first game are are eliminated from the playoffs.  A loss in your first game of the year, when you are still working out kinks and letting young players have an opportunity to get their first playing time, shouldn’t kill your national title chances.  In any event, even in a 16 team playoff, there is very little room for error if you want to qualify.  The five at large teams under the Laddie Plan will likely only have 1 or at the most 2 losses.   Having a playoff doesn’t diminish the regular season, it enhances it.  It gives teams something to play for.  It gives teams hope to know that one bad game doesn’t ruin their season.  It will make the conference games even more intense.

Doubter Argument #4.  A playoff will hurt academics.

Laddie Plan reply.  The BCS always likes to hide behind academics, but I’ve never seen or heard of any official study done by the BCS to establish the severe damage they allege would occur to academics.  I would love to see a study of how much class time NCAA baseball teams miss for their 50 game regular season followed by the College World Series, or how much class basketball teams miss in the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament with the games played on Thursday (at least college football is only played on Saturday where no classes are missed for the actual games) - my guess is that these teams are out of class far more than the football teams.  Everyone knows that all the other divisions of college football have had playoffs for years and academics have survived just fine.  I have to say that the academics argument seems to be the most shallow of all BCS arguments (not because academics aren’t important, but because there’s simply no reason to believe its true).  The BCS also complains that football should only be a one semester sport (i.e. they don’t want it spilling over into February).  No problem there - the Laddie Plan has that covered.

Doubter Argument #5.  Even if the BCS system isn’t perfect, all of hype it generates is good for the sport.

Laddie Plan reply.  I was astonished one weekend when listening to a coach of a team in a BCS conference say on a call-in show that he was actually a supporter of the BCS because the buzz it creates every year raises the profile of college football and, as he said, gives the sports radio guys something to talk about.  Hey coach, here’s an idea for you - start a restaurant chain, buy up all the other restaurants in town so you have a monopoly, and make sure all your restaurants serve disgusting food, and after people complain about it, keep right on serving disgusting food because the buzz that is generated by your disgusting food will give the Food Network something to talk about.

   

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© 2007 Ladd Johnson