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Home > Mark Bradley > Archives > 2008 > November > 19
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
President-elect, UGA president agree on playoff
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A president raised the idea, and now the President-elect of these United States has endorsed it — an eight-team playoff to determine the champion of college football. Barack Obama said Sunday on “60 Minutes” he’d work to implement one, and Michael Adams said hooray.
“I was watching the interview,” Adams said Wednesday. “What he said was identical to what I said last January.”
The University of Georgia president outlined his proposal in the AJC 10 1/2 months ago. Adams was hoping to use his influence to spark debate within the NCAA. Later that month his fellow presidents evinced little support, and the grand plan fizzled. But the American presidency, as has been noted, makes a bully pulpit.
“I’ve been right on some things and wrong on some things,” Adams said, “but I do think I’m right on this one. The closer you get to the current system, the more flawed it appears. And I’m not one to try to predict the future, but I think it’s unrealistic to expect a number of one- or even two-loss teams to fit into the plus-one model.”
Plus-one — a championship game tacked on after the bowls — is seen by many as the corrective to the current BCS mechanism. Plus-one was put forward for discussion by Mike Slive, the SEC commissioner, at the BCS meetings in the spring. “It was rejected,” Slive said Tuesday. “And that made it clear that, over the next four-year cycle, the format wouldn’t change.”
Two days after Obama made his televised declaration, the BCS announced a new television agreement for that four-year cycle (2011-14) with ESPN. Speaking on a teleconference, ACC commissioner John Swofford — who succeeded Slive as BCS coordinator — said: “After lengthy debate, it became evident there was not enough support to change the current format.”
Will Obama’s imprimatur alter the dynamics? Said Slive: “My sense is that it may increase dialogue, but the eight-team playoffs has been vetted so thoroughly [by college presidents and conferences] that I don’t think it will [have much effect].”
Adams claimed to have seen encouraging internal signs for his (and now Obama’s) eight-team plan. “There’s been a lot of behind-the-scenes talk [among presidents],” he said. “I don’t think there’s been as much movement in the Big Ten as the Pac-10. It will be interesting to see if there are several one-loss teams this season and USC is one of them.”
Does Adams believe the BCS is swimming against public opinion? “I don’t know if I’d characterize it like that, but a majority of people do seem to want some kind of playoff. The presidents are key in this … And there are so many new presidents that I would not just assume that because it was one way a couple of years ago it will be that way always. Presidents do have to pay some attention to public opinion.”
And presidents have to listen when the President-elect speaks. Said Slive: “[His] interest in postseason football reflects the national interest; it’s not just a regional game anymore … If he and I had an opportunity to talk, I would try to talk him out of an eight-team playoff — plus-one would allow us not to have the regular season curtailed.”
On it goes, this debate among learned folks over what’s best for what is, at bottom, a billion-dollar game played by students. The belief here is that big-time college football will never have a true playoff because the bowls pay too much and the six BCS leagues will never willingly cede a scintilla of power, but with the president-elect revealed as an interested party, who knows?
And who knew Michael Adams, pilloried in this space and others for his handling of Vince Dooley, would stand revealed as a visionary? Speaking of the President-elect, Adams said: “I think he’ll do everything I suggest — don’t you?” Then he laughed.
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