Conference Championship games problematic

by Suckatsports

I'm so glad Fox now has the college football bowls, because they're perfectly equipped with knowledge and background to host and analyze this. As the Philadelphia Eagles game is playing out, Darryl Johnston starts talking about the issues of the BCS and they flip up a quick graphic. In his expert college football opinion, it is wrong that Ohio State, USC, and WVU don't have to play a conference championship game, while LSU, Oklahoma and Virginia Tech do.

First of all, it's the conference championship games that have caused a problem in the last couple of years. It's not that it's wrong that half the conference don't have it, it's dumb that the other half do. We can complain about the BCS being greedy until we're blue in the face, but what of the SEC, ACC, and Big 12 instituting a championship game for their conferences being a greedy move? These games have absolutely nothing to do with football, with competition, or any other factor that the regular season is around. They are there purely for money.

How do I know this? How about the fact that championship games go only so far back as 1992, SEC being the first to create it. Big 12 and ACC followed in 1996 and 2005 respectively. In fact, the ACC stole teams for a different conference just because they wanted a 12 team collection to be able to create a conference championship game.

So, don't tell me it's wrong that half the conferences don't play a championship game and create some heroic aura around the conferences that do. If there's no SEC championship game last year and this year, there's no question Florida doesn't get in, and LSU doesn't get this ridiculous jump in the rankings. If there's no Big 12 championship game, Nebraska never gets an undeserving berth in the championship game in 2001. How about we take a look at the 13 superfluous game that conferences added because of their own greedy tendencies before we blast the Big 10, Pac-10, and Big East for not having one.

Photo: Wikipedia

This post is cross-published from We Suck at Sports.

ThecrookedcapAll-Star

730 days ago

Score 1

In 2001, Nebraska didn't play in the Big 12 Championship game. The team that beat them in the game prior, Colorado, did.

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SuckatsportsVarsity

730 days ago

Score 0

Exactly. One of the biggest problems with that year, was that "Nebraska didn't win their conference" argument. If there were no Conference Championship games, that wouldn't have been nailed into the ground with Colorado.

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RawbeezeitzMajor Leaguer

730 days ago

Score 0

Just because they are made to make money doesn't mean that conference championship games are bad, or that they mess up the BCS.

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Bobbyjim45Draft Pick

729 days ago

Score 0

I don't really have a problem with conference championship games, but you need to either have every conference playing one, or none of them playing one. That would be like the AFC deciding to have the playoffs, and the NFC deciding to just send the team with the best record. Everyone needs to be looking at the same general path to get to a BCS bowl.

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Taytay 24All-American

729 days ago

Score 1

I agree with what others are saying here. It is true that conference championship games make money, but their primary purpose is to decide on the field who the best team is. You can do that with smaller conferences during the regular season, but with a twelve team conference, you don't play everyone. The Conference championship game is needed to determine the champ. If they aren't going to do a playoff, the BCS at least needs to guarantee that non-conference winners can't participate in the National Championship ('01 Nebraska), and non-conference championship game participants can't leapfrog the champ game loser ('07 Kansas) for any BCS games.

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RawbeezeitzMajor Leaguer

729 days ago

Score 2

I think the rule should be that a team that fails to win their division should not jump over a team that wins that same division. This would mean Kansas and Georgia out, and Missouri and Tennessee in. Although, I for one would much rather see UGA in there as opposed to Tennessee.

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Taytay 24All-American

729 days ago

Score 0

Thanks for the translation--that is a much more succinct way of putting my second paragraph.

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Yourboy87Soccer Kid

729 days ago

Score 1

If a conference championship is needed to determine a conference champion, why don't we have a playoff system to determine a National Champion? If we can't vote for the SEC Champ, how can we vote for the National Champ.

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