I was planning to get around to this eventually, but this post on this article by David Moulton forced my hand to get these ideas set down now.

Is the NCAA inviting the FBS to leave?

The FBS constantly pushes the NCAA's core principle of amateurism. The past two NCAA presidents have been former University Presidents and have been actively pursuing making college sports a better example of amateurism.

Perhaps they have come to the conclusion that FBS football is too big of a fight, and it may be better if they just went their own way.

University presidents may be aloof, but they are not stupid. They know that actions produce reactions and can come to a fair idea of what those reactions will be, given a choice of actions.

Action 1: The USC sanctions

These sanctions are a bit heavy handed, as have been many recent NCAA sanctions. Each year one can almost expect some number of games to be erased from the record books of years past by the NCAA. Loss of scholarships and postseason opportunities punish current students with no proof of wrongdoing while the guilty are often making millions in the NFL.

These punishments are escalating and are not sustainable.

Action 2: Micromanagement running Amuk

The NCAA has gone on a scholarship killing spree with rules regulating things as minor as text messages, twitter use and Facebook contact that fail to recognize the realities of modern social networking.

Is a simulated stadium entrance really that big of a deal?

These are examples that come to mind quickly. I am sure coaches could name many more limitations of practically trivial issues that make little practical sense to regulate.

Action 3: The agent investigation scourge

Before teams could continue on and hope that nothing in their ranks would draw attention. Self reporting and self imposed sanctions appeared to be a way to avoid the NCAA hammer. Help the NCAA watch your ranks and you would have leniency when something did turn up.

Now it appears that webs interconnecting institutions are being pursued, and that all schools could be at risk for the actions of individual players instigated by people with no ties to the institutions whatsoever. North Carolina, South Carolina and Florida. No one is safe.

Reaction

With the NCAA increasing its enforcement of increasingly micromanaged rules with heavier hands each time around, what is the natural reaction?

Is the NCAA inviting the FBS to leave?

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This past spring the BCS unveiled the details of the criteria used to determine future automatic qualifications and the process by which these numbers would be used to determine which, if any, additional conferences would earn an autmoatic qualification for 2012 and 2013.

If the current system is used for the next cycle, these criteria would be used to determine which conferences would have automatic qualifications in the next contract cycle.

The process states that teams will count for the conference they are members of as of BCS Selection Sunday in 2011. Any conference changes next summer would be for the 2012 season, so all moves for 2011 are set.

The changes in membership are the Boise St. Broncos from the WAC to the MWC, the Nebraska Cornhuskers from the Big 12 to the Big 10 and the Utah Utes from the MWC to the PAC 10. The Colorado Buffaloes have announced a move from the Big 12 to the PAC 10 in 2012 that may be moved up to 2011.

So now we will look at the three criteria.

Average Rank of Highest Ranked Team

The MWC has moved into the thick of the race here due to the recent conference changes. The WAC has been significantly weakened here, and the ACC moves up to a critical seventh spot needed for future exemption consideration.

A Colorado move would make no difference to this table.

Average Conference Ranking

These numbers are largely stable. The Big 10 moved up a bit with the addition of Nebraska, but the real mover was the plummet taken by the WAC. This makes the MWC a clear #7 in this category and shows a clear distinction between the top six and the bottom four, with the MWC closer to the top six.

If Colorado moves in 2011 the Big 12 would be at 45.53 and the PAC 10 at 48.06, effectively swapping these two conferences. [Annual swings as high as 10 points are possible, meaning anything within three points is practically a tie.]

This wold allow the MWC to be eligible for an exemption to be considered for an automatic qualification in 2012 and 2013.

Adjusted Top 25 Performance Ranking

The MWC takes the lead in this category despite the loss of Utah. The SEC has the highest raw score, but the MWC has a higher multiplier due to its smaller membership.

The PAC 10 would fall to 9.5 points for 84.44% of the top league with the addition of Colorado, as their multipllier would be reduced upon reaching 12 teams.

Who would be selected now?

If the process were run now, based only on, 2008 and 2009 the following would happen.

The SEC, Big East, Big 12, PAC 10 and Big 10 would qualify for an automatic qualification.

The ACC and MWC would qualify to petition for an exemption. The ACC has a tie-in with the Orange Bowl that would be honored. The MWC's case would be decided by the BCS presidential oversight committee.

Looking at the numbers above, public opinion nationally and the politics involved, I don't see how the MWC could be denied an automatic qualification when the final accounting is done. If they can maintain these numbers.

A couple weeks back the Big 12 athletic directors crashed the PAC 10 annual meeting. Apparently some form of partnership was discussed, mostly focused on leveraging their combined TV footprint. Behind closed doors, however, the effects of the impending conference realignment was likely a top conversation peice.

John Berkowitz from UW Dawg Pound has recently posted on the idea of a partnership involving a meeting of conference champions the first Saturday in December.

The basic premise is that the Big 12 less the Nebraska Cornhuskers and Missouri Tigers is still a solid conference and a knee jerk expansion might lower revenue by adding teams that don't draw in more revenue than their share. The Big 12 and PAC 10 would each play a full round robin and the champions would meet while 12 team conferences are having their conference championship games.

A Texas Longhorns vs. USC Trojans championship game would be the Miami Hurricane - Florida St. Seminole holy grail of a champions game, though we see how well that worked out for the ACC.

The PAC 10 would lose a direct path to the Rose Bowl, which would be returning to its roots as the East-West Tournament Game.

All in all, this is an idea that I think warrants more flushing out.

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The BCS's propaganda wing launched a site titled Playoff Problem back in December. The front page lists several questions that are stated as impossible to answer. I will be examining each question and elaborating on the strengths and weaknesses of each option.

And post a poll to measure where the consensus is.

Playoff Problem is a defense against bracket style playoffs and assumes this format. Before looking at the remaining questions I thought it would be useful to examine this assumption.

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[Editor's note: This is part of a series examining the real world constraints on any proposed postseason design. For the previous entries is is best to start at the introduction of the series. This is derived from pages 95 and 96 of my plan to fix the BCS]

The top teams from the top conferences can find sponsors to promote and sell exhibition games on their own. Any postseason design will need to exceed the revenue these teams and conferences would make on their own or they will not participate.

The Big 10 and PAC 10 have stated that they would rather return to an exclusive deal with the Rose Bowl than participate in an expanded tournament. Without the top teams from the top conferences any tournament would fail to be credible in determining the national championship.

More games generate more revenue and each team you add to a single elimination tournament adds a game. Most tournaments generate enough revenue to exceed the BCS revenue. The question is how the pot gets split.

A look at how several offered designs register after the jump.

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[Editor's note: This is part of a series examining the real world constraints on any proposed postseason design. For the previous entries is is best to start at the introduction of the series. This is derived from pages 94 and 95 of my plan to fix the BCS]

FBS football currently generates less than half the revenue that the NFL makes with four times as many teams. Cooperate sponsors will favor NFL over college football any day. Fans don't want to have to choose between NFL games and college games when they can watch both.

NFL is also played mostly on Sunday and some schools refuse to play on Sunday for religious reasons. I have yet to see a playoff design that failed to accomplish this ideal.

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[Editor's note: This is part of a series examining the real world constraints on any proposed postseason design. For the previous entries is is best to start at the introduction of the series. This is derived from pages 90 and 91 of my plan to fix the BCS]

The controversy surrounding the BCS has become toxic. The two primary sources of controversy relevant to a tournament are the failure to give all teams a chance to earn a national championship and having to choose between arbitrarily close teams at the #2 and #3 spot. Moving this to a lower spot actually decreases the consensus of the selection and increases the number of teams claiming they were deserving of a spot.

The old bowl system avoided this by not even pretending to be interested in determining a true national champion. If more games could claim to be a part of the championship picture the better for them all.

Undefeated teams can be managed by requiring any tournament to select undefeated teams prior to teams with a loss. At least five spots would be needed to cover the past twelve years.

Only using gaps instead of a set cutoff addresses the cutoff consensus issue.

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It is time to look at a side issue to conference realignment with overtones far more significant than teams changing dancing partners on their schedules.

The persistent rumor of super conferences has been around for decades. The idea is that the top conferences might split off and form a new league. The conferences involved in this idea? The same ones operating the BCS. After the jump I will outline how a shift might come about.

The real question is would this be a bad thing?

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