Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Utah is to Dewey as BYU is to Truman
Apologies for the lack of posting, if anyone's still reading. Leave it to college football to pull me out of hiding. Even if it is Wednesday, and these comments would have been more timely on Sunday or Monday.
BYU-Utah
More evidence that the national sports scene literally doesn't pay attention to the Mountain West Conference. BYU and Utah played one of their most memorable games ever on Saturday (which I didn't get to see, thanks to the MWC's heinous TV deal; thanks to KSL.com for at least streaming the audio), wherein Utah scored with less than 2 minutes left to take the lead, and BYU scored with no time left to win it. After the game ended, I turned on ESPN to see if they would break through the other games to show a highlight of such heart-pounding Top 25 excitement. All I got was the score ticker across the bottom of the screen: "BYU 27, Utah 31. FINAL."
What? I had left my computer quickly to see the TV, and suddenly thought that maybe there had been a penalty calling off BYU's final touchdown. But we checked the Internet again, and sure enough, BYU had won, 33-31. Whatever doofus at ESPN was in charge of watching that game, however, apparently turned it off after Utah scored. I mean it's one thing not to show the highlight of the winning touchdown (which, of course, they didn't do), but it's another altogether to report false information because you couldn't be bothered to keep watching till the game ended. I should write a letter.
The BCS
As is well-chronicled, I hate the BCS. As the regular season winds to a close, therefore, I'm trying to decide what will be the scenario that will hurt the BCS the most. I suppose I should root for the following: UCLA beats USC, knocking USC out of the national championship picture. Florida absolutely destroys Arkansas in the SEC Championship Game. And Michigan ends up as the BCS #2 to play once again the last team they played, as if we don't know which team is better. The SEC (whose commissioner is head of the BCS) would be screaming, and all the arguments about how a playoff would make the regular season meaningless would go out the window (after all, the BCS is making the regular season meaningless, too--Michigan lost to Ohio State, yet we'll just pretend that game never happened and give them another chance). And of course, once again we'll have a team competing for the national championship that failed to win its conference.
If I had my druthers, I'd solve all the Who-Gets-To-Play-Ohio-State controversy with the one obvious solution no one has mentioned: send Boise State. My high school calculus teacher once defended himself when we complained about how hard his tests were by saying, "If someone gets 100% on a test, I haven't measured everything they know." True, some teams have had harder tests than BSU, but we don't know how good BSU is because they've scored 100% all season long. If they beat Oklahoma or Nebraska in the Fiesta Bowl, we still won't know how good they are. The solution to the "soft strength of schedule" argument is to put Ohio State on Boise State's schedule. Then we'll be certain who the best team in college football is.
BYU-Utah
More evidence that the national sports scene literally doesn't pay attention to the Mountain West Conference. BYU and Utah played one of their most memorable games ever on Saturday (which I didn't get to see, thanks to the MWC's heinous TV deal; thanks to KSL.com for at least streaming the audio), wherein Utah scored with less than 2 minutes left to take the lead, and BYU scored with no time left to win it. After the game ended, I turned on ESPN to see if they would break through the other games to show a highlight of such heart-pounding Top 25 excitement. All I got was the score ticker across the bottom of the screen: "BYU 27, Utah 31. FINAL."
What? I had left my computer quickly to see the TV, and suddenly thought that maybe there had been a penalty calling off BYU's final touchdown. But we checked the Internet again, and sure enough, BYU had won, 33-31. Whatever doofus at ESPN was in charge of watching that game, however, apparently turned it off after Utah scored. I mean it's one thing not to show the highlight of the winning touchdown (which, of course, they didn't do), but it's another altogether to report false information because you couldn't be bothered to keep watching till the game ended. I should write a letter.
The BCS
As is well-chronicled, I hate the BCS. As the regular season winds to a close, therefore, I'm trying to decide what will be the scenario that will hurt the BCS the most. I suppose I should root for the following: UCLA beats USC, knocking USC out of the national championship picture. Florida absolutely destroys Arkansas in the SEC Championship Game. And Michigan ends up as the BCS #2 to play once again the last team they played, as if we don't know which team is better. The SEC (whose commissioner is head of the BCS) would be screaming, and all the arguments about how a playoff would make the regular season meaningless would go out the window (after all, the BCS is making the regular season meaningless, too--Michigan lost to Ohio State, yet we'll just pretend that game never happened and give them another chance). And of course, once again we'll have a team competing for the national championship that failed to win its conference.
If I had my druthers, I'd solve all the Who-Gets-To-Play-Ohio-State controversy with the one obvious solution no one has mentioned: send Boise State. My high school calculus teacher once defended himself when we complained about how hard his tests were by saying, "If someone gets 100% on a test, I haven't measured everything they know." True, some teams have had harder tests than BSU, but we don't know how good BSU is because they've scored 100% all season long. If they beat Oklahoma or Nebraska in the Fiesta Bowl, we still won't know how good they are. The solution to the "soft strength of schedule" argument is to put Ohio State on Boise State's schedule. Then we'll be certain who the best team in college football is.
Comments:
Take every conference winner, and put them in a seeded tournament. Follow the lead of Div. II-A football.
Also, interested in your thoughts on The WalMart Effect.
Also, interested in your thoughts on The WalMart Effect.
I was wondering if I had subconsciously misread that final score alert on ESPN. Totally bummed by the outcome, but glad to learn I am not delusional.
"The Wal-Mart Effect" was an interesting, biased discussion of how Wal-Mart is affecting all aspects of everyday life. I thought some of the anecdotes were enlightening, and I feel like I know more about Wal-Mart, but the author had an anti-Wal-Mart agenda and so I don't put much stock in what he has to say.
I too would form a 16-team playoff with 11 conference champions and 5 at-large teams. Talk about making the regular season important--when Middle Tennessee State has as much chance of getting into the playoffs as Wisconsin, the importance of winning your conference becomes crucial.
And yeah, I saw the final pass of the BYU-Utah game on ESPN's plays of the day, many hours later, once someone called to say hey, worldwide leader in sports, you got the final score wrong. Still no excuse for the ticker mistake.
I too would form a 16-team playoff with 11 conference champions and 5 at-large teams. Talk about making the regular season important--when Middle Tennessee State has as much chance of getting into the playoffs as Wisconsin, the importance of winning your conference becomes crucial.
And yeah, I saw the final pass of the BYU-Utah game on ESPN's plays of the day, many hours later, once someone called to say hey, worldwide leader in sports, you got the final score wrong. Still no excuse for the ticker mistake.
You're a big time lawyer now Matt... if a poor law student like me can splurge 14.95 bucks to watch the game live online (cstv.com), you have no excuse ;) (That 14.95 would have gotten you all of BYU's November games by the way).
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