Quote:
Originally Posted by Adder
Let me try again. Right now, the bowls get to pick the matchups according to which teams will make them most money (ticket sales and tv viewers). They get to do that almost without regarding to which teams are better than others.
You are comparing that to the NFL, where the matchups are selected only by performance. And arguing that the NFL system doesn't lose money because it can't pick matchups for their profitability.
I'm saying you can't say that, because we don't know what the NFL would get if it got to pick matchups to maximize profits.
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But you're describing a system that hasn't existed for years, if ever. In the 1980s, most of the bowls matched the best team in a conference against either the best team in another conference, the best team not in a conference with a bowl team, or the best available "independent" team (of which there were many more). And they all stumbled all over each other fighting for those few good teams before the season was over. So teams would have bowls lined up before playing their last two or three games.
Then the Bowl Alliance came along in the 1990s, where you still had conference tie ins, but a more orderly selection process. the order was the bowl with the highest rated team tied to it got to pick first among the at large teams, and so forth. If 1 and 2 were both tied in, then #2 could play #1.
Then the BCS.
So at no time in the last 30 years have the bowls been able to pick matchups based on the most fan interest or tv. Instead, they've been able to pick matchup with significant constraints, and only then maximizing the attractiveness of the matchup. So if you want me to take the comparison further, that's fine, but what it will involve is the champion of the NFC East automatically playing the champion of the AFC west, unless the champion of the AFC east is #1 and the champion of the NFC east is #2, in which case, NFCE plays AFCE.
If you really believe the old system was more profitable than the new system, then why have they kept changing the criteria to allow more freedom for matchups and fewer bowl tie ins? Perhaps because that's more profitable? If so, then saying the old system was better has no legs to stand on. A playoff is just one (or two) steps further--get the best matchups except in a playoff.
