RE: What if...
Let’s not fall into the trap of assessing this question only within the confines of the current college football landscape, as the BCS conference presidents, and their allies within ESPN and the other major media would prefer. We are ALL Division 1 football conferences. The MAC plays division 1 opponents, the same as the BCS schools do. We are, and should be “eligible” to compete for the championship; the same as we do in basketball (the most widely regarded tournament of all, based primarily upon it INCLUSIVE nature, which allows for Cinderella stories from Mid-major conferences, which can take advantage by winning a few games, even if not winning the championship, catapulting the program into the national eye, which helps that program with recruiting, alumni support and funding, etc.). Unless all conferences are equally treated in the process, with there being an automatic qualifier from each conference, the non-bcs schools might as well be considered division 2.
Major; all I can say is that I think you are wrong, and far too accepting of the “establishment”, which is exactly what the BCS presidents count on. A four-team, 8-team, or anything less than an all-inclusive format is nothing more than a playoff designed with the specific intent to keep the Mid-majors down in steerage. I love all of you Stampede members for your strong interest in WMU, but any of you who believe that WMU, the MAC, or other non-bcs schools are not worthy of being seated at the same table as the BCS schools better stop complaining about WMU students skipping bronco games to watch UM or MCU play on TV, or proudly wearing their wolverine or Spartan attire. You yourselves believe we are not good enough to eat at the same table as those schools (which are in the same friggin division of intercollegiate sports as we are in). I also ask this question: what, if anything, do we need to do for you to consider our school and our conference to be worthy the same status in football that we have enjoyed in basketball and other sports?
TCU and Boise have been crapped on for years because of this “establishment” brainwashing of the public. Now TCU moved to one of the BCS conferences, after being told that they weren’t worthy football teams because they didn’t play in one of the power conferences, like Indiana, Vanderbilt and Kansas play in. Not surprisingly, after TCU moved to a BCS conference, and beat the crap out of those Big 12 teams, they are still getting the screw job in this grossly political, media controlled, establishment. Who thinks that if Florida or Michigan played the exact same teams this year that TCU did, and beat them by the exact scores, with the exact season results, that Florida or Michigan wouldn’t have been in the playoff? And please don’t tell me that the Big Ten is a better football conference than the Mountain West.
This “playoff” is an absolute joke, and to think otherwise requires ignoring facts, logic, common sense and principles of fairness and equity.
Is parity in sports a good thing? Do we want conferences to be able to have competitive games against each other, and relative competitiveness throughout D-1 athletics? If so, let’s treat the conferences equally, and share the money equally, and allow all schools to compete equally for the same recruits. Different schools will have different levels of commitments, and will make wiser choices, so all will not be equal in the end, but let’s not have two sets of rules; one for the privileged, and one for the also-rans. And before we battle for fairness in the process, let’s work on changing the disposition of those among us who accept our lives in steerage.
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What if...
