Words can not describe how completely off-base the new BCS Presidential Oversight Committee chairman is. University of Nebraska chancellor Harvey Perlman recently discussed the BCS system in an interview, and his answers were flat out mind-boggling.

Here are some of his more outlandish quotes from the interview, and of course my thoughts on them:

"What I think most people don’t understand is that the alternative to the current system is not a playoff. The alternative to the BCS is going back to our traditional relationship with our bowl partners."

This might be the most infuriating thing that I have ever heard. The alternative is to go back to an even WORSE system? Seriously? Why isn't a playoff system an alternative? Oh yeah... because the powers-that-be don't give a damn about what the fans want, and are only interested in the bottom line.

"A playoff would seriously diminish the regular season, as it has in college basketball.  I don’t think it’s good for college football, I don’t think it’s good for student-athletes and I don’t think it’s good for fans."

But aren't playoff berths BASED on the regular season? And the only reason it has diminished the regular season in college basketball is because 1) they have 64 teams, and 2) they emphasized the last 12 games more than the rest of the season. Since they're fixing that, even NCAA basketball will be improved. There's no logical way to say it's bad for student-athletes. They travel 7-8 times a year anyway, what's another weekend or two? With an 8-team playoff (theoretically speaking, of course), the maximum amount of additional games would be two. Two extra games... that's it.

"This isn’t basketball. This isn’t March Madness. Football’s a different game, different environment. We have different traditions. It’s hard to see why a playoff is a good idea."

Football's a different game? Then why, with more regular season games and less teams, does the playoff system work perfectly well in the NFL? Is that not football? And let's not even get started on the traditions. Traditions are fine, but when they are based on a completely broken system, what's the point? Also, why not incorporate the "traditions" with the playoff system? That's what they tried to do with the BCS.

"It would diminish the bowl structure and it would reduce the number of opportunities for student-athletes to play in the postseason and that’s not a good thing."

How? You could keep all of the other bowl games... just use some of them for playoff games. There would be no reason to scrap the rest of the bowl games. They don't matter now, since the winner of more than half of the bowl games don't even end up being ranked anyway. So why get rid of them? Keep them... they're still playing for the same thing they were playing for before... a nice payday and some pride.

Based on chairman Perlman's comments, I can only assume that the BCS brass has been cryogenically frozen for the past few years, or is just blatantly ignoring the fans of their sport. Honestly, I don't even mind the BCS. In the end, it's not nearly as bad as people make it sound. But I think we can all agree that a playoff would be much better. Too bad it will never happen, until the dinosaurs are removed from these positions. Enjoy the BCS... it's the best we'll see for a long time.


Talking BCS With New Committee Chief [State Paper] via [The Sporting Blog]