Policy Analysis

Prof Pitney yesterday asked for more substantive policy analysis, so here goes...
President Obama recently opined on an issue dear to the hearts of the male half of America, with broad bipartisan support: reforming the BCS football championship system. Obama wants to scrap the current system and promises to "throw his weight around." I'm wondering how he plans to accomplish this - send in the National Guard? Mark thought he'd issue an executive order.

The BCS currently amalgamates the opinions of coaches, sports writers, and computers to form a super-ranking. The top two teams in the BCS contest the national championship each year. However no one is happy with this system. Some people want a playoff system - the most commonly proposed playoff format, and the one Obama supports, is for the top 8 teams to battle for the championship over three weeks. Supposedly this is a "fair" system where we can crown a national champion and call that team the best team.

When we analyze this issue through the lens of our discussions over the course of a semester, there is only one conclusion: have Congress legislate the national championship teams. This may give an advantage to teams in states with large populations, like USC, Texas, Cal, and Texas Tech, but this proportional advantage in the House is balanced by even numbers in the Senate. Of course, the University of Illinois may be thrown into the BCS equation to sweeten the deal and avoid an Obama veto.

Opponents of the playoff system claim that this would make the season too long and too tiring for the players. This argument is flawed, because in an 8-team playoff only 2 teams would play 2 additional games and 2 teams would play one additional game. Furthermore, many players from the best teams go straight to the NFL, which has a 16 game season.

I would instead argue that when more teams contest the national championship, it becomes less likely that the best team will win. Most people believe that the national champion is the best team because they won the most games at the end of the season. Luck plays a huge role in sports, and the best teams often don't have the best records (The best indicator of strength is margin of victory, not won-loss record). In leagues where every team can play every other team, I think the winner should be the team with the best record at the end of the regular season, like in English soccer (England have a separate knockout competition called the FA Cup, where everyone from semipro teams to Manchester United play in the same bracket. Imagine if the Yankees played at CMS in the first round. The FA Cup is less prestigious than the league championship).

However, in college football this system is impossible because teams can only play 12 games per season, so some sort of ranking system becomes necessary. Coaches and sportswriters tend to value teams that got lucky (i.e. those with 0 or 1 losses) ahead of better teams that played tough schedules and had some bad luck. I favor a playoff system because the coaches and sportswriters will consistently vote the lucky, not good, teams into the championship game. A playoff gives those unlucky good teams a chance to show everyone how strong they are.