It Could Be Worse - MLS could use the BCS "system"

by Sounder At Heart on Dec 6, 2009 6:28 PM PST in Major League Soccer Comment 21 comments

For all the grief that people, including myself, give Major League Soccer; it could be much worse. At least in MLS the team's that perform the best in the regular season qualify for a tournament. In fact even though MLS is between the 15-25th best league in the world, if an MLS team goes undefeated they move on to the regional Championship (CONCACAF Champions League). If they win that they go to the Club World Cup (in Dubai this year).

See, MLS is part of a global organization, and for all its faults at the end of a campaign someone is declared the best in the world. They prove it on the field of play. Whether it be a team from Peru, or Japan, all that they have to do is win their league, and then win their region and then win the CWC.

So MLS fans, it could be much worse. We could follow a sport like college football, where teams in small leagues never get the opportunity to prove they are the best. Instead the BCS takes teams like Boise State and Texas Christian and stuffs them in a tiny box where no matter how they do in a given year they will never be champions. College Football needs a change, and now.

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Amen: playoffs now

It is an embarrassment.

It is the silliest thing in sport. And the saddest for deserving teams and their supporters who are robbed of a fair shot.

Plus, it reeks of the kind of favoritism and injustice American’s generally despise.

by zeagle on Dec 6, 2009 10:03 PM PST via mobile reply actions 0 recs

To be filed under Never Gonna Happen, but ...

College football is the perfect scenario in American sports for promotion and relegation. Sort the hundreds of teams into various leagues and have two sets of playoffs at the end of the year in each league, one for going up or the championship and the other for who’s going down. Meaning that good quality programs can rise to challenge for the national championship.

But as I said, never gonna happen.

by CarlosT on Dec 6, 2009 10:37 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

logic somehow doesn't apply to major US universities?

The reason you “need” a playoff is if you can’t have a balanced schedule, and there may be a considerable disparity in schedules and quality of opponents between teams. Anyone who follows college football even casually knows that, given the 120+ teams in NCAA division 1-A (aka “bowl subdivision”) there is an enormous gulf in quality from the top teams and conferences down to the bottom teams and conferences.

Compare that to MLS, which has the most “balanced” of schedules. Next year, there will be 16 teams, and every team will play every other team twice over the course of 30 games (also making many of us wonder what possible purpose the Western and Eastern conferences serve!!) No other professional sports league in North America can boast this level of schedule balance, as Baseball, Hockey, and Basketball have all succumbed to divisional alignments which only serve to obfuscate who the best teams are during the season, and lengthy playoffs that seem to render the lengthy regular season moot (given the logistics of the NFL, divisions are necessary for scheduling purposes, and they have seemingly struck the appropriate balance between length of season, and number of teams and length of playoffs).

And yet, the league that LEAST needs a playoff, the MLS, invites fully half its teams into the post-season tournament, and the sport that MOST needs it, major-college football, seems anachronistically attached to determining its “champions” through a bureaucratic process that smacks of smoke-filled, back-room dealings!

Someone explain the logic of all this too me!

by malcontentjake on Dec 6, 2009 11:22 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

It's a little worse than that actually.

College teams set their own schedules, and many of the top 25 teams deliberately fill their schedule with home games and games against easy teams. Take Florida for example: out of 12 games, they faced only 4 opponents who had a real shot at beating them. Only 2 teams who were even in the top 25. And one of those two they were forced to play (Alabama) because they are in the same conference. They also only had 4 away games, and they had 8 home games.

Why do they do all this? Because the BCS picks largely based off your final record (unless you are from a minor conference). So why take any chances? Give yourself 8-10 easy games a year, and if you can pull out the other two you just guaranteed yourself a BCS national title birth. One division has been keeping away from this habit, the Pac-10, and they crushed everyone in the bowl games last year. So yea, college football desperately needs some type of playoff system to keep teams from padding their schedules quiet so badly. Let the good teams sort themselves out in the playoffs, rather than arbitrarily guess who’s the best based off who beat down the bad teams the most.

by Fear on Dec 6, 2009 11:42 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

yep

couldn’t have said it better myself!

by malcontentjake on Dec 6, 2009 11:52 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Not sure about that

Yeah, the BCS can be improved, but a playoff system wouldn’t help much. How do you decide who makes the playoffs? In fact, it would probably generate more controversy because now you have more teams that have an argument to be “in.”

There is a simple solution to your argument about scheduling… just give SOS more weight and record less weight.

There is ALWAYS going to be controversy in college football. There was before the BCS, there is now, and if the BCS is done away with, there will still be some left. I’m just tired of this whole, “A Playoff system would solve everything” stuff.

by zeeehjee on Dec 7, 2009 2:14 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

still doesn't follow logic!

A playoff isn’t a panacea, it is just a considerably better alternative. BCS supporters/playoff deniers love to use the “there will still be controversy and snubbed teams” argument to try to support a logically inferior system in the BCS. It’s an insipid argument, the the type that would be thrown out in any intelligent debate. What’s so damming about all this is that MAJOR RESEARCH UNIVERSITIES are involved in this system, voluntarily subscribing to a system propped by lowest-common-denominator thinking!

by malcontentjake on Dec 7, 2009 10:56 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I guess you're right.

(But sheesh, man… could you make me feel any worse for posting?)

Again (see post below) I think it is worth a try, but I don’t expect it to solve all the problems people want it to and I think there is a lot more to think through than simply “Lets have a playoff.” If one is established there would be a lot of debate in terms of how teams are selected, what would happen to the other bowls (and $$$ associated with them) etc. No, that is not an argument against having a playoff system, but just some thought on how far we really are from such a system (especially the $$$ part).

by zeeehjee on Dec 7, 2009 1:02 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Honestly

it’s only the top 4-6 teams that have any real shot at winning the championship each year anyway. So if you take like the top 8 rated teams on the current ranking system (maybe increasing weighting towards strength of schedule as malcontentjake said) and just let them play in a playoff against each other, you can be pretty sure you’re getting the top team. Especially now that mid major teams are actually getting ranked in the top 10 if play really well.

by Fear on Dec 7, 2009 2:44 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

But MLS will be unbalanced again

As they stick to 32 or less games, avoid FIFA dates and only have a March to October regular season with 20 or more teams. So the Playoffs will be necessary in MLS except for next year only.

Recall, Garber wants 20 teams within his tenure (only #20 is undecided).

Find a “balanced” schedule with 20 teams in only 34 weeks that accounts for US OC, CCL, SL and the international dates.

I am not a Supporter
I am not a Fan
I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart

by Sounder At Heart on Dec 7, 2009 8:41 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

...and you have no idea how much that knowledge irritates me!

Its one of the reasons I wonder if the MLS should just stop at 16 teams, and start working on building viable 2nd- and 3rd divisions of professional soccer in USA/Canada, with the eye toward “evolving” towards relegation/promotion.

Let’s face facts, the “balanced schedule, no playoffs, relegation/promotion” system seems SHOCKING to North American sorts fans, but is a proven system worldwide with a long history of success. It is how the sport evolved globally, and if we truly want to be a part of the “global game” here, it’s time to start considering these things, instead of the “americanized” version. (to put up my own counter-argument, I have been heard to say over the course of this season to many fellow supporters that "it is perfectly acceptable for a distinct American system to evolve, that too is part of the fabric of the game, so i guess you ust have to take everything I say with a grain of salt!)

I’m a big fan of balanced schedules, mainly because of my exposure to the idea as a soccer fan. I would blow up the divisions in the NHL, NBA, and MLB — which as I said before serve no other real purpose than to obfuscate — although I would keep the conferences/AL-NL alignment (due to the size, both geographically and in numbers teams). I would just have everyone within the conference/league play everyone else within that conference/league the same number of times, with a handful of inter-conference/inter-league games thrown in. But I digress and ramble!

by malcontentjake on Dec 7, 2009 11:08 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Its already been said...

But I have no sympathy for BSU whatsoever. They scheduled precisely one good team the entire year and they managed to nip Oregon at the start of the season at home. They then go one to play a creampuff schedule and get millions in dollars for making a BCS bowl game?

Its a racket… not a tragedy.

by brokejumper on Dec 7, 2009 8:53 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

Nice Point

Its true… BSU and other small conference schools have the advantage in that they don’t have a tough league to get through. If BSU wants to take it to the next level they might have to consider the Notre Dame model and go as an independent.

I’m not sure what the drawbacks to this model are, but it would free them up to take on some better schools in the future.

by zeeehjee on Dec 7, 2009 9:00 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Boise State is literally begging to play other schools

Not even asking for a home game, and still the big 6 conferences are saying No

I am not a Supporter
I am not a Fan
I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart

by Sounder At Heart on Dec 7, 2009 9:08 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Sort of a monopoly

The big conferences have a lot of power when it comes to who gets the big games, no question.

I’d love to see Boise get some big time games. I love what they’ve done over there. But we have the same conundrum… do we favor record or strength of schedule? How can we make this as fair as possible? If you institute a playoff system, how do you determine who gets in? And how many teams get it? 8? There are a TON of teams that can make a case for being in the top 8 in the country. Instead of’ 3 or 4 teams arguing that they should be in the Championship, you’ll have 8-10 teams left out that might have a case.

Don’t get me wrong… I want to see the two best teams playing for the championship. And (to go against a lot of what I said) an 8 team playoff would probably make that more likely because it would guarantee that the 3or 4 teams that are a cut above the rest would make it in, and they would control their own destiny rather than a computer.

I guess its worth a try… I’d support a one year trial at least just to see what happens. I’m definitely curious how it would work, but still doubtful that this is the solution to all the problems.

by zeeehjee on Dec 7, 2009 10:13 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

That's just the thing

Whoever runs the BCS won’t even give the playoff a chance because it could simply work out perfectly. If this happens, and it should, they lose money. and lots of it. That’s what it always comes down to. The $$$. People can complain and argue all they want, but sadly the system will not change, at least for a while.

by deepsouthsoccer on Dec 7, 2009 11:07 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Boise State/ Gonzaga

Boise State is to football as Gonzaga is to basketball, and the Huskies cancelled the cross-state series against Gonzaga, because they were tired of getting beat by a team from a small conference!!!

by malcontentjake on Dec 7, 2009 11:11 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

except Gonzaga has March Madness to play in. They have a chance every year to play for the national title. BSU doesn’t. No matter how well they do in the regular season they have 0 shot at the title. This and the cupcake schedules the powerhouse schools put together is why i will not watch college football.

by DarthGreedo on Dec 7, 2009 11:27 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Apples and Oranges

Agreed. The BSU/Gonzaga comparison doesn’t work for many reasons. First of all the amount of games. The BSU conference schedule takes up 7/10 of BSU’s season, whereas GU’s non-conference schedule takes up only 1/2 giving them the opportunity to schedule better non-conference opponents.

Don’t get me started on the talk to expand the NCAA basketball field. Do they want to make the regular season completely meaningless?

by zeeehjee on Dec 7, 2009 12:58 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

and it also doesn't work because...

… teams will play Gonzaga (well, other than the Huskies) because they know there is a playoff in basketball, and teams are REWARDED by the Selection committee for playing tougher schedules (SHOCKING, I know, someone call the football coaches!)

regardless, the comparison was only meant to draw a parallel for the small conference similarity the two have… everyone know major-college basketball is far better run than football (and I say that as someone who IS not a basketball fan!)

...that's MISTER Keller to you!!!

by malcontentjake on Dec 7, 2009 1:48 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Amen and then some

You’re so correct that we beat up MLS for its playoff structure … til we hold it up next to one like the college football farce. What a chicken-s—t thing to do, pairing up two of the “outsiders” (TCU and Boise State) so they won’t embarrass one of the establishment teams.

by Steve Davis on Dec 8, 2009 2:55 PM PST reply actions 1 recs