One Win Away: The Perfect Compromise between Tournament and BCS

Should we BCS or should we Tournament? That is the question.

Beyond the Senator, the Presidents of universities and one large country, the billionaire NBA owner, the anti-trust lawsuit, the books and articles, what we really have are two competing logics. The debate is heated precisely because both sides are (mostly) right.

The BCS Supporters are Right
Tournaments, especially large tournaments, make the regular season less important. Look at it this way: when the selection show ends, the typical team in college basketball's NCAA tournament has a 1.6% chance of winning a national championship; the best team has a 20-25% chance. This means that, over the course of the tournament, the best team (if it wins) improves its chances from 25% to 100% over six games, an average of 15% per game. That best team entered the season with a 15% chance of winning the national championship based on talent alone. Over the course of a 30 game regular season it improves its chances by 10%, or about .33% per game. (With a tournament invite almost guaranteed, its chances improve as it earns a better seed). A typical team improves its chances from, say, .1% to 1.6% over 30 games, or .05% per game. I don’t think many coaches are going to motivate their guys by emphasizing that today they can win 1/300th, or 1/2000th, of a national championship. And the fans don’t get that excited about it either. They wait until March, when the games are 45 times (for the best team) or several thousand times (for a typical team) more important.*

And college basketball is not the worst case of meaningless regular season games. The best pro baseball teams have a 35% chance of taking home a World Series ring when the playoffs start and a 10% chance at the beginning of the season. That means each game, even for the best team, is worth about 1/663rd of a World Series title – and the most important thing they do in each regular season game is avoid season-ending injury. NBA regular season games are worth 1/280th of a world championship for the best team, and the best NFL team looks to earn 1/92nd of a Super Bowl in each regular season game.

In college football, the best team can earn 2.5% or 1/40th of a national championship per regular season game on average. Even if other leagues only played 12 regular season games, college football would still have the most important games. Literally, every game counts.

93-81 does not a champion make

Unimportant regular season games are a problem for a couple reasons. First, fans and players don’t care as much. Second, and more pertinent to this discussion, the championship poorly reflects a team's performance over the course of the season. That, to me, is a serious problem. The '87 Twins were actually outscored in their run to an 85-77 regular season record. They would have finished 5th in the AL East, but they won their pennant and the World Series. The definition of a champion is subjective, but if you are happy putting a ring on the '87 Twins because they won 8 of 12 games after being significantly outplayed by several teams over a 162 game season, you're crazy. I support Cinderellas, but a real Cinderella goes to work from day one, not moments before midnight.

Tournament Supporters are Right
With a 64, or 65, or 68 team tournament, everyone has a shot at winning the national championship. That regular season game may only be worth 1/2000th of a national championship, but for Auburn and Utah in 2004, Boise State in 2006 and 2009, and TCU this year, every regular season game was worthless. I would rather crown the '87 Twins than completely dismiss half of a league from consideration.

This is not a touchdown

I was there when Kellen Moore led Boise State for a last minute score and win against Virginia Tech. Boise fans felt like they were a step closer to a national championship. I was not there when Brotzman missed a couple of field goals against Nevada, but I’m sure Boise fans felt like their national title hopes took a huge step back. In reality, the two games had the same effect on Boise State’s claim on a national championship: no effect whatsoever. As far as the race for the national championship is concerned, it never happened. An undefeated Boise team would have been passed over for a spot in the title game just the same as a two loss Boise team.

So, the solution is not as simple as a single national championship game or a tournament. You can leave out the ’04 Auburns and '08 Utahs, or you can crown the ’87 Twins, ’09 Fresno States, '85 Villanovas and ’95 Rockets.Good news? I have found a way to screen out the '87 Twins while letting in the '04 Auburns.


The One Win Away Approach 
Tournament logic asserts that because team A beat team B in a tournament game, team A is a more deserving champion. But that logic ignores a season of previous results. Georgetown beat Villanova twice during the season. A few days before the NCAA tournament, Georgetown won the Big East tournament and Villanova was eliminated in the semi-finals. Villanova (25-10), Georgetown (35-3); Georgetown won 2 of 3 head-to-head matchups. Villanova wasn't the better team and it didn't have the better season, but Villanova was two points better than Georgetown for 48 minutes (.042 points/minute), so they are your national champs.

In the One Win Away approach, Villanova isn't invited to dance. An invitation is offered, instead, only to those teams that are One Win Away. One Win Away generally means that if team B beat team A, we would then say that team B had the better season. Using the One Win Away Approach, we start by inviting the #1 team in the country. We then invite only those teams that, if they were to beat the #1 team, could then claim to have had a stronger season then the team they just beat**. In a typical college football season, you would have between 3 and 6 teams that meet that criterion. We would also invite any undefeated teams. The invitees would then be organized in an 8 team tournament. If there are fewer than 8 teams with invitations, the top seeds get byes.

By inviting only One Win Away teams to our tournament, it logically follows that the team that wins the tournament is also the team that has had the strongest overall season. It is, therefore, the perfect compromise.

What would a One Win Away tournament look like? In 2004, USC, Oklahoma and Auburn would be the top 3 seeds. California, Utah and Texas would also get an invite. Louisville would probably be left to watch from the comfort of their own homes, already having 1 loss and a significantly weaker schedule than the top teams. USC and Oklahoma would get byes, Auburn would play Texas and California would play Utah. The winners would get Oklahoma and USC, respectively, in the semi-finals.

Why it works: Every team in the country has a shot. We get a tournament, and the winner of the tournament will also be the team that has had the most complete season-when team A beats team B, that really does mean it is the more deserving champion. This would make the regular season slightly less important for those two teams that control their own destiny, but it would be infinitely more important for everyone else - overall, regular season college football games would be more, not less, influential in awarding the national championship.

Why it might not work: We need some way of finding the “One Win Away” teams. This is relatively easy to find using the BPR, but rankings are, inherently, somewhat subjective – especially rankings that must account for hypothetical wins. Also, the “One Win Away” approach requires a flexible postseason which makes planning and marketing much more difficult. A lot of rich and powerful people are deeply invested financially, emotionally, and intellectual in the existing system.

The "One Win Away" approach is, at least logically, the perfect compromise between a single national championship game and a tournament. Unfortunately, I have never known the sports world to be motivated by logic.

* These are, admittedly, back of the envelope calculations, but the logic is sound and the estimates lean towards the conservative.
** This does not mean they would, themselves, become the #1 team in the country, but they would, at least, be One Win Away from the new #1.

Quick Note: Week 4 Results

1) The BYU Defense-BYU has not allowed a point in two complete games now. The last points against the Cougars were score by Jake Locker and, notably, not Washington's kicker. Inexperience and lack of depth on defense were supposed to be BYU's achille's heel when the season kicked off, but the Y has pitched shoutouts even when they've thrown out the scout team in big blowouts. They aren't Auburn or anything, but as Wyoming's Devin Moore put it, "They were a little faster than I though they were."

2) Auburn/LSU-I don't care what SEC backers say, beating Mississippi State 3-2 is not a good thing, and Auburn finally got a small taste of comeuppance. This was a tight game between two very evenly matched teams that was essential decided by two injuries. The first injury was that inflicted by LSU's Andrew Hatch. QB Jarrett Lee's performance in the first half had been so bad that he was not going to see the field again--until Hatch was knocked unconscious. Then, all of a sudden, Jarrett Lee was back in the spotlight and he couldn't screw up if he tried. Auburn also suffered some breakdowns in the secondary and, for the first time in the game, LSU was able to make them pay.

The second big injury was suffered by Auburn's RB Brad Lester. Ben Tate was going to get most of the carries anyway, but the change of pace between the two was beginning to give LSU some headaches. And as time was running down, Lester could have been used out of the backfield to add a little unpredictability to an otherwise painfully predictable offense.

3) South Florida-the Bulls need to drop a few spots. Beating Kansas was a nice, but needing a big comeback at home-against a team that looks more like a 20-30 type team instead of the top 10 team of last year-does not merit a sub-teen ranking. And now that they have struggled against both UCF and FIU, they are getting no love from me. But, of course, since they play in the Big East, which might not be as good as the MWC from top to bottom this season, they'll probably finish the season with two losses and a trip to a BCS bowl.

4) One fifth of the top 25 is currently held by the MWC and the WAC. These five teams have gone a combined 17-1 over a schedule that has included Oregon, Washington, UCLA, Rutgers, Michigan and Wisconsin, not to mention in-conference foes (and teams that went bowling a year ago) in New Mexico and Air Force. The MWC teams will beat each other up a little, and TCU has a tough task ahead in going to Oklahoma, but if one the three survives the ringer, Boise State or Fresno State wins and Tulsa continues its winning ways, we could be on path to a major BCS logjam.

Quick Note: The Brewing BCS Crisis

What do East Carolina, BYU, Utah and Fresno State all have in common? They might all be better than the automatic BCS invitees from the ACC and Big East. This could be a very big problem.

After Clemson, Virginia Tech, Rutgers and Pitt were dismantled last weekend and West Virginia was manhandled on Saturday, new ACC and Big East frontrunners Wake and USF needed a long last second field goal and overtime,respectively, to stay unbeaten. If West Virginia is down and Pitt, Virginia Tech, Miami and Florida St are trying to rebuild, these two conferences are mediocre at best.

This kind of thing has happened before. Pitt was no match for Utah in their 2005 BCS showdown and Boise St proved it belonged at the party by beating Big 12 champ OU.

But this year we could have the four non-BCS standouts finish with one loss between them while the ACC and Big East send 3 or 4 loss champs. Things could get even more complicated if Notre Dame is good again and Ohio State plays in another national championship game. All of a sudden, you've got to tell Utah or Fresno State that they got to take their undefeated record and top 12 ranking to the Crap Bowl in early November-or lock out Florida, Georgia, LSU, Auburn, Missouri, OU, etc. from a BCS bowl because they couldn't win the Big 12 or SEC-whose divisions are more talented this year than the Big East and ACC combined.

This talk might be a little premature-BYU still gets UCLA, Wisconsin is awaiting Fresno St, and East Carolina has road games against Virginia, UCF and Southern Miss. Wake and USF are still undefeated despite the scares. But you got to believe that the non-BCS conferences will be producing at least two solid representatives, and the Bowl Championship Series picture will get very crowded.

Good Sign/Bad Sign

Now its time for a little Good Sign/Bad Sign. Every week I will pick out one team from each BCS conference and one non-BCS team and discuss the good signs and bad signs from their last performance.

Texas (Texas 52, Florida Atlantic 10)

The Good-The Longhorns won big against a non-BCS conference opponent, something they struggled to do last year. They are finally starting to utilize some of that athletic ability that so often goes to waste under Mack Brown.

The Bad-Texas wins in blowout fashion, but still Colt McCoy, the Vince Young antithesis, leads the team in rushing. This reflects poorly on the UT running backs, but it also has to make you worry about McCoy’s durability.

Last year Texas finished 109^th in the nation in pass defense and this season they have added two freshman in the secondary. Florida Atlantic’s Rusty Smith threw for more yards in the first half (226) than McCoy in the game (222). It makes you wonder what a Graham Harrel, Sam Bradford, Zac Robinson or Chase Daniel could do against this secondary.

Auburn (Auburn 34, UL-Monroe 0)

The Good-The Tigers ran for more than 300 yards and kept another opponent off the scoreboard. That’s always good. And Auburn’s Robert Dunn returned a punt back for a touchdown, displaying un-Auburn like-offensive pizzazz.

The Bad-Auburn scored only two offensive touchdowns and threw for 85 yards in a new, wide-open spread offense. Tony Franklin, Auburn’s new offensive coordinator summarized the performance, “We stink.” Auburn will need a passing game to beat LSU.

West Virginia (West Virginia 48, Villanova 21)

The Good-WVU can throw the ball. Pat White was 25/33 for 208 yards, 5 TDs and only one pick.

The Bad-399-354. Either West Virginia’s defense is no good or . . . ? Getting outgained by Villanova makes the team look a little vulnerable against a South Florida offense that could have scored 50 points on Saturday on one leg.

Clemson (Alabama 34, Clemson 10)

The Good-Virginia Tech 22, East Carolina 27; you play in the ACC, not the SEC.

The Bad-Rushing Yards: 0. If the offensive line is really that bad, Clemson might not be good enough to win a conference championship in the Sun Belt.

USC (USC 52, Virginia 7)

The Good-Did you see Mark Sanchez’s bomb to Ronald Johnson? That kid might be something special. You always have to be happy with a 52-7 win against a team that was a serious contender in a BCS conference just 9 months ago.

The Bad-The knee dislocated in a non-contact drill. I broke a foot in a non-contact drill 9 years ago and it’s still a problem. Durability could be an issue for Mark Sanchez. And, by the way, Joe McKnight is no Reggie Bush.

Illinois (Missouri 52, Illinois 42)

The Good-Juice Williams: 26/42, 451 yards, 5 TDs. The Fighting Illini outscored Missouri 21-7 over the last 17 minutes of the game.

The Bad-Missouri’s offense slashed through the Illini defense like chopped liver; that’s two games in a row in which the defense has been thoroughly abused by a first class offense.

Fresno State (Fresno State 24, Rutgers 7)

The Good-They traveled across the country and beat a solid BCS team in Rutgers. Sophomore Ryan Mathews ran for 163 and 3 touchdowns on 26 carries. Those are very good numbers

The Bad-Bulldog QB Tom Brandstater was 11 of 24 throwing the ball. That’s not a very good number.