Weekly Affirmation from CFN.com
Zemek's Weekly Affirmation
By
Matt Zemek
CollegeFootballNews.com
Posted Nov 20, 2006
It's Thanksgiving week, which means it's time to be angry as hell about the state of college football. I'm thankful for my family, my pastor, and a lot of other wondeful people in my life, but I'm properly outraged by the condition of this sport and the mess that's exposing the BCS for the big, fat turkey it has always been since its inception in 1998.
By Matthew Zemek
There are two basic conversations to be had this week, as an all-too-familiar BCS disaster ruins our sit-down meal of the big bird and all the trimmings. One conversation is about legal correctness, otherwise known as the letter of the law, and the other conversation concerns justice, or the spirit of the law.
Without trying to hide it or deny it, I'll come right out and tell you that I'm a huge believer in the spirit of the law. There are many occasions throughout human history in which a technically or legally correct interpretation of the law has preserved, protected or otherwise sustained injustice in a given locality or society. Bad laws are made by governments, and in some cases, they're such egregious affonts to human dignity that they must be resisted even before a court of law can overturn them. It seems pretty useless, if not outright wrong, to uphold the worth of technical legality if the given law does not promote justice.
This is where the firestorm involving Michigan and USC comes into play.
It's not a simple decision by any means: Wolverines or Trojans against Ohio State if USC wins out? What is simple, however, is that the dysfunctional nature of the BCS puts all college football fans... in Gainesville, Fayetteville, South Bend, and Morgantown, in addition to Ann Arbor and Los Angeles... in a no-win position. You either have to support the letter of the law or the spirit of the law; if you get legality, you don't get justice, and even if you get justice, you know that a hopelessly broken system didn't work the way it was supposed to, which actually winds up eroding your sense of justice in the first place.
I've been writing this column since 2001, and the above paragraph is pretty much the same thing I wrote in 2003, during the Oklahoma-LSU-USC catfight which marred that particular season. The simple fact of the 2003 season is that it luckily and briefly preserved tradition (with respect to the Rose Bowl, a centerpiece of college football history), but created controversy and the split title the BCS was supposed to prevent. The BCS, in 2003, delivered justice without legality. It delivered the right result, but a result that tore apart the sport by pitting USC and LSU fans against each other in what amounted to a constitutional crisis pitting the system and its computers against open-minded human beings represented by the Associated Press poll. By not working the way it was supposed to as a matter of mechanics, the BCS--by preserving a classic Rose Bowl between USC and Michigan instead of breaking it up--actually worked in a larger sense in 2003. Tradition and a spiritually satisfying split title--at least for one season--endured at the expense of controversy and an emotionally unsatisfying split title. LSU fans felt cheated because the law did in fact stand on their side; USC fans felt vindicated because justice--and a piece of the national pie--resided on their side. The whole country, though, felt deprived because LSU and USC never got to play on the field. Except for those rare seasons when two and only two unbeaten teams reach the title game, college football doesn't get a marriage of both legality and justice. It almost always has to settle for just half of the equation, which means that half the country leaves a college football season filing divorce papers.
In many ways, we have the same situation this year, with a few unique twists.
The argument in favor of legality, and a technical interpretation of law as it exists on the BCS books, sides with Michigan. The good people at the Michigan Law School would tell you that the BCS is mechanically designed to pit the two best teams in America against each other, and after this past weekend, it seems pretty clear that Ohio State and Michigan are the two best teams in the United States. If the BCS works the way it is mechanically designed to operate, Ohio State and Michigan will have a rematch on January 8 in Glendale. The law is a maize and blue entity in 2006, because the BCS's computer-weighted formula is designed to override the whims, extremes and other erratic, emotionally-influenced components of human judgment. Whereas polls might be inclined to drop Michigan after losing a game (think back to the Notre Dame-Florida State situation in 1993), the BCS--which probably would have kept Notre Dame No. 1 thirteen years ago--is meant to keep a team like Michigan toward the top of the standings.
With respect to college football's postseason--as is also the case with the lack of a force-out rule on legal possession of a pass thrown to the sideline--there are those in America who, in football and other matters, value a given procedure for only one reason: they distrust human judgment. Removing human judgment from any kind of procedure, in college football or other human affairs, is the paramount principle--perhaps the only one--for many people in this country when they choose to support a particular rule, law, or course of action. The pro-computer faction of America's college football fans largely fits this category, which is generally associated with the argument in favor of legality. A clean procedure with numerical forumlas is believed to have the airtight structure needed to ward off evils such as media bias and human error, which do run rampant during every college football season (more on media bias later in this column). All misguided poll votes from seasons past gave rise to this basic line of thought, and the BCS is its latest, fullest manifestation.
In opposition to the legality argument lies the pro-justice element of the college football world. This community intellectually understands the pro-legality position and its pro-BCS, pro-computer, anti-human judgment leanings. (Surely, the pro-legality folks also understand the pro-justice arguments as well, even though disagreement persists.) However, the pro-justice segment of the population has the view that doing the right thing is more centrally important than doing the thing that's procedurally consistent or legally correct. In college football, there are two basic ways in which a pro-justice view is applied: in the defense of tradition, and in the promotion of purity in the crowning of a national champion.
To go back to 2003 for a moment, that season--while empty and unfulfilling from a legal/procedural standpoint--did not satisfy both pro-justice planks. The 2003 season did uphold tradition by preserving a Big Ten-Pac-10 Rose Bowl, but it did not promote purity in the sport because it didn't address the unresolved post-bowl controversy involving USC and LSU. If the process promoted purity, the Trojans and Tigers would have played a "plus-one" game after the Sugar Bowl for the undisputed title. Therein lies the most realistic solution for college football, a solution the power brokers in the sport should deliver to everyone who invests anything in this great game.
While Michigan and Ohio State were duking it out on Saturday before ABC cameras, Keith Jackson--a former employee of the network--was interviewed on NBC by former colleague Jim Lampley. In the interview, Mister College Football--while assailing the BCS as the result of a "money grab"--made the simple suggestion that a Final Four should be held after bowl games in which the old conference tie-ins are renewed and sustained. "Leave the Rose Bowl alone," Jackson said. "Leave the Sugar Bowl alone." Then have the playoff. That's what Keith Jackson wants, and if KJ wants something, chances are it's good for the sport he covered with distinction for so many years. One can debate whether there should be a plus-one or a Final Four, but one way or another, the emergent solution to college football's problems lies not in a classic playoff or some similarly "bracketed" hoops-style tournament with seeds and multiple playoff rounds. No, the solution lies in returning the bowls to their old pre-BCS format, and then having either a plus-one or a Final Four, which is not a tournament so much as a final championship stage of the long season. After the bowls, enough teams will be weeded out of the equation to ensure that no more than four teams will be viable national title contenders. At the end of the day, a football equivalent of the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee (the only connection with hoops that college football truly needs) should determine whether a plus-one or a Final Four is needed. With old bowl tie-ins restored but a champion equitably (and indisputably) arrived at, justice can be served in America, with old traditions upheld and procedural purity intact.
This brings us back to the current debate between Michigan and USC.
While the pro-legality argument favors the Wolverines, the pro-justice argument sides with the Trojans. From a coldly analytical standpoint that is consistent with legal mechanics, Michigan is better than USC at this point in time. Michigan's one loss (Ohio State) has much more value than the Trojans' one defeat (Oregon State). Ohio State is the clear No. 1 team in the country, and Michigan fought the Buckeyes tooth and nail in Columbus. It is indeed hard to imagine another team playing the Buckeyes as close as the Wolverines did in the Horseshoe. Ergo, the pro-legality folks would say that Michigan deserves to be No. 2. It's the best contention based on the available evidence presented before the court.
Justice, however, deals in the not-so-specific practice of "drawing straight with crooked lines," and in making sense of the evidence not seen, the data not available, the non-story story, the deafening silence of a situation. The things you don't see with respect to this Michigan-USC situation are, in many ways, the defining points of the argument for the pro-justice crowd and its USC adherents.
Where's the big Michigan non-conference schedule outside of Notre Dame? Can't see it.
Where's the depth of the Big Ten, which formed the backbone of the Wolverines' schedule? Michigan's only big-time win in Big Ten play came against Wisconsin. Iowa, once thought of as an elite team, ended at 6-6, with a 2-6 Big Ten record.
USC played non-traditional opponents in some of its biggest games: Arkansas and Nebraska. These games weren't rivalry games filled with emotions; hence, they were tougher for USC in that the Trojans lacked the built-in motivation Michigan had against Ohio State... and that was before the death of Bo Schembechler, less than 29 hours before the OSU game. Where were Michigan's meaningful games without the benefit of rivalry-fed motivation? If Michigan's close game against Ohio State should make UM the No. 2 team in America--and I think it should--one should also realize that Michigan, despite playing the No. 1 team in America on the road, had a built-in advantage of motivation.
And here's the biggest argument of all along these lines: where's Michigan's conference championship, which should be a prerequisite for a national title contender other than unaffiliated Notre Dame? How can you allow Michigan to do what the ACC, SEC, Big East, and Big XII champions will not have the chance to do... and possibly USC as well?
Beyond these arguments, however, the pro-justice crowd has its trump cards, which were referred to earlier in the discussion of the 2003 season: tradition and purity.
The longstanding virtue of college football and its assorted traditions is found in the simple reality that the regular season means more than the regular season of any other sport. In fact, the notion of "preserving the sanctity of the regular season" was the very rationale for the creation of the BCS in the first place. Plainly put, then, college football tradition will be eroded (maybe slaughtered) if Michigan and Ohio State have a rematch on January 8. If the Wolverines and Buckeyes have a sequel, no one can ever again say that the regular season really matters in this sport. The outwardly-stated reason for the BCS' whole existence will be fully, frontally, forcefully, finally and fatefully assaulted, and no BCS proponent could ever again say that the regular season IS a playoff in itself. Period. Tradition will take a huge hit if Michigan plays Ohio State in roughly seven weeks.
In addition to tradition, there's also the question of purity. Since Michigan is the No. 2 team in America--or at least, it is very hard to disagree with such a contention (though one wishes there was more available evidence; sadly, there isn't)--one would like to find a way to enable Michigan to play Ohio State. But you see, pro-justice people in college football only want Michigan and Ohio State to play under the right circumstances... circumstances that would uphold tradition and promote purity. Such a circumstance cannot be achieved under the current legal mechanics of the BCS system; it could only be produced by a Keith Jackson-supported Final Four or a plus-one, as decided on by a Selection Committee.
If the purity of the process is to be upheld--and if Michigan is to play Ohio State under a "pure" system--there are two ways in which this dream scenario could come about.
In scenario number one, you take the current system, have USC play Ohio State in Glendale, and put Michigan against the SEC champion (assuming it has one loss) in the Sugar Bowl. If Notre Dame were to beat USC on Saturday and the SEC champion winds up with two losses, have Notre Dame play the Buckeyes and put Michigan against the Big East champion (who will almost certainly have just one loss at the end of the season) in the Orange Bowl. Then do a plus-one.
In scenario number two, one would have to envision a future reality after the current television contract expires. This reality--if attained--would make college football an ideal world for the first time in a long time, maybe ever: going back to the old bowl tie-ins, everything in the above scenario would exist except for the fact that USC and Ohio State would play in Pasadena, not Glendale; purity supplemented by tradition would be the new recipe for college football. (It's a distant dream at this point, but it's also the best plan available if only power brokers are willing to talk about a new deal for this sport.) If Michigan and Ohio State won their bowl games, they could meet again, and no one would have a single problem. Why? Because there would be a game (maybe two if in a Final Four setup) in between their first meeting and their sequel.
If Michigan and Ohio State are to play for the national title--and pro-justice people want to see it happen (but only in the right way at the right time)--let's have them win one game (followed by a plus-one) or two games (a bowl game and a Final Four semifinal) before having a rematch in the title game. The question pro-legality folks are asking right now is, "Should there be a rematch?" The question that SHOULD be asked at this time--and which pro-justice people are voicing right now--is this: "Under what circumstances should there be a rematch?" Breaking down the BCS mess in these terms enables one to have a clearer, broader and ultimately fairer view of the whole process.
But enough of the solutions and suggestions. Let's deal with what's going to happen: reality is going to leave everyone unsatisfied... as is the case in every year that lacks the one golden "USC-Texas" scenario: two and only two unbeaten teams at the end of the season. Remember, college football is an ungodly mess, and the BCS is cause for plentiful amounts of outrage.
Getting past all the hopeful planning and wishful scenario-building, reality tells us that one of two things will happen: either Michigan will play Ohio State, or USC will. While everyone (pro-legality and pro-justice) will disagree about the team that should face Ohio State on January 8, everyone can agree that the result will be a very imperfect one... just like 2003. And as in every other instance when the BCS has not gotten its USC-Texas magic bullet, the fundamental conflict--the one that has always made the BCS a travesty from the very beginning of its (now) nine years of existence--will remain: if the system works, tradition or purity--sometimes both--get killed; if the system doesn't work--which will upset the fans of the unfortunate team--justice prevails, but at a cost.
In 2006, there won't be any purity regardless of Ohio State's ultimate opponent in Glendale. Tradition will be upheld if USC is the Buckeyes' opponent, but the two best teams in America won't be playing. Hence, the system won't work, delivering justice without legality. And if Michigan gets the rematch on January 8, enabling the two best teams in the country to compete, the tradition of college football will be dealt a death blow. Hence, the system will work and deliver legality, but without authentic justice. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the basic conflict that will always emerge whenever the BCS doesn't get the single magic scenario that saves it from itself. The BCS creates premature, forced and false choices between merit and tradition, legality and justice. One direction defeats the other, and ultimately leaves half the country--if not more--unsatisfied.
Just answer this question, or at least give it a try: in the six years when the BCS did not get its one dream scenario, was there ever a sense that, yeah, you know, the system actually worked and resolved lingering questions... just like Roy Kramer and the other BCS creators said it would? Tell Ohio State fans in 1998, Miami fans in 2000, Oregon fans in 2001, USC and LSU fans in 2003, Auburn fans in 2004, and one fan base this year (Michigan or USC) that the system worked. Undisputed national title? The BCS delivers one only when the one dream scenario arrives and takes all the guesswork out of the equation. Therefore, it's clear that this "system" can't produce systemic cleanliness or real justice whenever there's any doubt or uncertainty surrounding the larger process. That, in short, isn't much of a system. The only thing the BCS ever was--and ever will be--good for is that if there's a USC-Texas scenario, USC winds up playing Texas for the national title, whereas in past years, that never could have happened. But without its only magic bullet, the BCS is rendered impotent, and becomes utterly incapable of doing anything positive for the college football community... both its pro-legality and pro-justice factions. That's cause for anger in these days before Thanksgiving.
While the BCS is, frankly, enough for a full column, there's just too much controversy in college football for it to remain unnoticed or unmentioned at this high-drama point in the national title chase.
A few brief words have to be said on the matter of media bias, another anger-producing entity which is never far away from BCS controversies and the rankings behind them.
It's no secret that ABC/ESPN devoted a rather lavish and extensive amount of coverage to this game, more than ever before for a game of equivalent (if not greater) stature. This simple but powerful fact is important for one reason and one reason only: if anyone ever thought that USC was a permanent media darling because of the L.A. market, you can't think so anymore. This time, media hype has cut against the Trojans, and not in their favor. With the flashy skill-position stars last season, USC wasn't just a media market magnet; the Trojans had style points and sex appeal. This year, Michigan--especially after beating media-friendly Notre Dame and entering a cherished American sporting event (the Ohio State game, a sociocultural centerpiece in this country) undefeated and ranked second--is the sexier story. Bo Schembechler's death has only added to the Michigan aura, giving the Wolverines the kind of momentum and mythology that are unbeatable in terms of ratings points, newspaper sales, and other relevant elements of the synergistic "media-industrial complex" in college football. This is why Michigan-Ohio State is being called a classic, despite a number of mistakes that almost equaled (not quite, but close) the miscues made in the West Virginia-Louisville game on Nov. 2.
Would I rate the Michigan-Ohio State game a classic? Yes, but grudgingly, and not for the football itself. This game is a classic because it was produced under emotionally wrenching circumstances in a tremendously hyped game. Had there not been the over-the-top hype, and had Bo Schembechler not died to make this game a seminal moment in American sports history, the pure football merits of the game would not have elevated this game to the level of a classic. But when you take all the elements of this game and put them together, yes, the game manages to make the cut as a classic. Michigan's level of fight and grit, plus the Heisman-sealing performance of Troy Smith, provided enough historic elements needed to give this game elite status in the history of college football. Without those details, however, this game would not have passed the "classic" test.
Bo Schembechler and Woody Hayes would have understood that contemporary football doesn't allow for the three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust mentality that prevailed during The Ten-Year War. The two now-deceased legends wouldn't have personally engaged in a "fast-break game all the way," as Jim Tressel put it, but if they had, they still would have insisted on the fundamentals they--and presumably, all Big Ten fans of defense, blocking, tackling, and sound kicking--viewed to be central to winning football. So, Big Ten fans (and also SEC fans, who view football in a similar way; by the way, that was a nice SEC/Big Ten-style game between Cal and USC... guess they can play defense in the Pac-10...), did you like the missed tackles, the bad pass interference penalties, the silly personal fouls, the two botched snaps that enabled Michigan to stay in the game, the two huge overthrows by Chad Henne, and the other turnovers that plagued this game? And if this game was such a classic on the football merits--as opposed to all the off-field stuff--why was OSU never in real or immediate danger of losing? Where was the riveting, nailbiting finish? When Michigan used its final timeout at the 2:55 mark, it became apparent that the Wolverines would have to recover the onside kick if they wanted to have a chance. That's a pretty anticlimactic way to end a big game. Yes, the game went back and forth, as some commentators observed, but it went back and forth between a one-score OSU lead and a two-score OSU lead. Had the "back-and-forth" involved constant lead changes, THAT would have made this game a lot more special on its own merits.
Yes, this game was a classic, but more so for the emotions, the spectacle, the hype, and the ghost of a just-deceased Bo Schembechler. The game itself was somewhat better than the West Virginia-Louisville game, but not by much. The 2006 Rose Bowl towers over both games as a pure football showcase. Don't let the excess of television and Internet coverage lead you to a different conclusion.
This media section promised to be brief, so we'll conclude very neatly and quickly. We'll wrap up this week's column with a suggestion that I hope the folks at ESPN will take very, very, VERY seriously heading into 2007.
Since the Worldwide Leader has such reach, visibility and scope in the college football broadcasting world... especially now that its production values and employees are attached to both ABC and GamePlan telecasts, which comprise most of a 13-hour Saturday of football (15 if you include College Gameday)... it would be a godsend if ESPN could have a half-hour show each week in which media hype could be blunted, even silenced, by straightforward analysis away from the frenzied crowds of a live on-site Gameday audience. Complaints about media bias would die down substantially if Gameday aired from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Eastern time, followed by a 30-minute taped show (before the football games at Noon) in which the truly wonderful, accomplished and distinguished trio--Fowler, Corso, Herbstreit--sat in a video room and broke down film of top teams, followed by very specific, itemized explanations of why one team is better than another. If such a show could air each week during the college football season, and if such a process could take place throughout the ranks of college football analysts, we'd have a lot less hype and a lot more substance as we try to arrive at a legitimate national champion. After all, we're saddled with the BCS for a few more years, and unless the sport's influence peddlers institute a Final Four or plus-one, we'll have to make the best of a very bad situation. ESPN can either do the same old stuff, or create new shows in which its superior broadcast journalists--both Chris Fowler and Kirk Herbstreit certainly qualify in this regard--can give very detailed explanations for their positions, which will eliminate much, if not all, of the suspicion and media manipulation that are sadly superabundant in the college football world.
We have the dysfunctional BCS. Why not have the media--its decision makers, not its accomplished journalists on the ground--become part of the solution, and not the problem?
