BCS Playoffs Deserve More Than a Final Four

It's sounding more and more like the prayers of many a college football fan are about to be answered.

In the midst of all the NFL draft hoopla, it was reported by ESPN (and others) that college football's 11 FBS commissioners and other head honchos emerged from meetings in Florida on Thursday with "two to seven" playoff proposals to take back to their universities for discussion.

Each of the playoff proposals involve a four-team playoff system, meaning college football could very soon move away from the No. 1 vs. No. 2 BCS championship system that everyone hates.

And there was much rejoicing...

Well, kinda. Even if the powers that be in college football do determine to move forward with a four-team playoff, nothing would go into effect until 2014. That means college football fans are in for at least two more years of No. 1 vs. No. 2, which of course would be two more years of heated arguments and general mockery of the BCS.

Also, those at the meetings chose to eliminate proposals for an eight or 16-team playoff system, which is a real bummer.

The BCS' explanation for eliminating eight or 16-team proposals is an even bigger bummer:

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"Having carefully reviewed calendars and schedules, we believe that either an eight-team or a 16-team playoff would diminish the regular season and harm the bowls. College football's regular season is too important to diminish and we do not believe it's in the best interest of student-athletes, fans, or alumni to harm the regular season."

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Okay, let's be honest here. First off, roughly 90 percent of the bowls can be done away with. Sure, there's tradition to take into account, but a lot of the bowls are irrelevant now, and they stand to become even more irrelevant once the BCS adopts a playoff system. Nobody should care about disrupting the wretched thing known as "bowl season."

Second, is the regular season really that important?

I'm not delusional enough to say "No" here, but there's definitely a way to shorten the regular season without angering anyone. All college football would have to do is eliminate games like Alabama vs. North Texas, USC vs. Tulsa and LSU vs. Saint Mary's School for the Blind. Games like those are complete jokes that prove nothing. They can be axed to make room for a longer playoff system.

The regular season doesn't need to be 12 games. If it were to be 11 games, made up of a couple non-conference games and each team's conference schedule, an eight or 16-team playoff would be possible.

If that's what it takes, so be it. Frankly, the powers that be in college football should be doing everything in their power to make the playoffs bigger. A final four is definitely a start, but it's not good enough.

In other words, the ante needs to be upped as much as it can be upped. What's in place right now isn't good enough, and a final four wouldn't be good enough.

The biggest problem with the BCS is that it's all about No. 1 and No. 2. After that, the rest of the Top 25 really doesn't matter. Worse, these rankings are generated primarily by human voters who can't possibly know how good every team really is.

But since it all boils down to No. 1 vs. No. 2, it really doesn't matter what the rest of the Top 25 looks like. The voters can worry about getting the top two teams right, and then they have every excuse to wing it with the other 23 teams in the Top 25.

I doubt the rankings will ever be done away with completely, but a playoff system with eight or 16 teams would make the rankings drastically more important than they are today.

Having a shot at a championship now means moving up to No. 1 or No. 2. Imagine how intense things would be if teams knew that merely cracking the top 16 or the top eight would mean a shot at a championship. Teams at the lower end of the rankings would have lots of incentive to move up the rankings, which is something that cannot be said now.

It's exactly this intensity that college football needs to have as the season is winding down. College football is plenty fun now, but not nearly as much fun as it should be. The regular season always comes to an anticlimactic end, and then begins the useless bowl season.

Screw bowl season. What college football needs is a proper postseason.