Plus-One Game Coming In 2011? Don't Bet On It

The New York Post says a playoff is "coming" to college football -- scare quotes because college football already has a playoff even if it is a two-team one that happens to be the world's stupidest -- around about when the current BCS contract expires:

Sources in several conference offices, athletic directors and television networks told The Post that support is steadily growing for a "Plus-1," format in which there will be a national championship game following the playing of two "semifinal games."

Now, the Post makes this sound all very official, tabbing it exclusive and leading with this...

The question has changed from, "Will There Ever Be a College Football National Championship Game?" to "How Soon Will It Happen?"

...which is weird because, um, we just had a national championship thing (calling it a "game" may not be accurate since "game" implies, like, competitiveness) in January and have been having them for like ten years. It is also way premature, because, like:

"There haven't been any official discussions among conference commissioners, but the overwhelming sense is that that's where we're headed," one conference source said. "There's simply too much money at stake and there's been too much debate with the current system."

(Emphasis mine.) Ah. I see. I have a hunch the Big Ten and Pac-10 might not traipse along happily with this, and not just because of the Rose Bowl. Bowls, as currently constructed, are already slanted in favor of teams in the south and California. I went to the Rose Bowl for the first time this year and Michigan fans comprised about a quarter of the crowd. That's a good showing.
Adding another layer of bowls to the BCS puzzle and forcing Big Ten fans to choose between a first-round game in Arizona and a potential MNC game in Florida will only further unbalance the playing field. The Big Twelve should also be upset about this since the Cotton Bowl has missed out on the BCS gravy train, giving them no plausible way to play at "home" during this playoff. Both conferences should hold out for first-round home games instead of acquiesce to the increasingly worthless tradition of the bowls represented by the BCS. The Rose means something. A game named after tortilla chips does not.

And this plus one game is a (shock!) money grab that only incidentally provides something the fan might be interested in. The Post plan entails the addition of a sixth BCS bowl, which should complete the system's devolution from a tight eight team field of elites or near-elites to a twelve-team monstrosity that throws out games like Pittsburgh-Utah on a regular basis and lets any Notre Dame team that manages a winning record in. This is transparent bullcrap right hyeah:


As if they couldn't find another bowl to fill the hole. There are bowls in CANADA now. Anyone with a 6-6 record gets to fly to lovely Boise, Idaho. No, the BCS won't adopt another bowl because they want to continue expanding their tentacles until they control yet more of your bowl-viewing options. The beast must be stopped.