Wal$h $treet: Bad news for college football fans

(WWLP) - Terrible news this week for College Football fans hoping for a playoff system anytime soon. ESPN and the Bowl Championship Series announced a deal that will keep the BCS alive through at least 2014. ESPN will pay $125 million a year to broadcast the BCS games, according to the Associated Press.

The BCS is an upgrade from the previous bowl system, where the nation's top two teams may not have met. Every year there seems to be controversy around which teams will play in the national title game, but just about every year, it somehow works itself out.

This season there will be something as close to a playoff as we can expect from college football. Alabama and Florida will likely play in the SEC title game for a spot in the national title game, while Saturday's Oklahoma, Texas Tech game is basically an elimination game.

The problem herein lies in the system itself. FBS (Division I-A) college football is the only NCAA sponsored sport that does not allow the national champion to be determined by a tournament.

The argument against a playoff system seems to change every year. First, it was that a playoff would keep these kids out of class too much. This is inaccurate, since teams playing in Bowl games practice just as much as they would if they had a playoff. Also, many of these playoff games would take place during a school's winter break. Also, the NCAA allows FCS (Division I-AA), Division II and Division III teams to play a tournament, so I guess their school-work doesn't matter.

The next argument that came out was that a playoff system would ruin the tradition of the bowl games. To me, bowl games are already tainted, many have half-filled stadiums with teams playing that barely have winning records. Plus, with a playoff system, you could still keep all the Bowl games. The teams that do not make the tournament could still play in a bowl game, just like the NIT for college basketball. The teams that do make the tournament could then play in the Sugar Bowl National Semifinals or the Fiesta Bowl national quarterfinals. I guarentee it would add a little luster to these dying bowl games.

The latest argument against having a playoff system is that "College Football has the best regular season of any sport" and it would lessen the importance of every game. Wrong! Once again. If their was an 8 or 16 team field, it would not water down the regular season like college basketball does, by inviting 65 teams.

Every game would be as meaningful as it is now. Truthfully, once a college football team loses 2 games, their season is rendered meaningless. So this, much like the wild card in major league baseball, would keep more teams' playoff dreams alive longer into the season. Ask Pete Carroll at USC, who loses one game and is out of the national title picture, even though the Trojans are arugably the 1st or 2nd best team in the nation.

In an 8-team field, you'd have 6 representatives from the power conferences (Pac-10, SEC, Big Ten, Big East, ACC and Big 12). Then 2 at-large teams from anywhere in the nation. So in this format, this weekend's Oklahoma, Texas Tech game would mean just about the same as it does this season.

If their was a 16-team field, there would then be 10 at-large bids, which would be more fair to the non-power conferences and escapes the controversy of situations like Oregon State winning the PAC-10 and USC on the bubble to make an 8-team field.

The truth of the matter is that their are too many bowl games and to me, only the National championship matters, except when Ohio State is involved. You cannot tell me that a Boston College team gets up to play in the Chick-Fil-A Bowl. Or USC would be pumped up to play in the Capital One Bowl.

With the economy falling on hard times, some of these bowl sponsors are likely to bail on their bowl games after their contracts expire, which leads me to my last point.

Everything revolves around money, College Presidents are greedy for money, not the integrity of the bowls. CBS pays around $545 million dollars a year to broadcast the NCAA basketball tournament. ESPN is paying around $125 to broadcast the BCS games. You can't tell me that a network wouldn't jump at the chance to be the exclusive rights holder of the NCAA college football tournament. They wouldn't pay upwards of $500 million to get these games? So maybe if some of these bowl sponsors can't ante up, then maybe the NCAA will look for another source of big money. A tournament solves that problem.

The biggest problem now is that it can't happen until at least 2015. Thanks ESPN, you have been so wonderful for college football, except now you're just keeping it in the ice age for another 4 years.