The Interocitor

BCS is bunk

It seems that each year, the human polls say one thing, and BCS says another. We've managed to go from a system where the 2 top teams never play for the national title because they're playing in different bowls, to a new improved system where the two top teams never play for the national title because some checklist formula picks the wrong teams.

Hopefully, this year is the end of the BCS, at least in its current form.

The whole idea of evaluating teams (or movies or sex partners) by a checklist formula is utter nonsense. Further, combining a bunch of different nonsense does not turn it into sense. The critical subjective factors rarely get much weight. This is the kind of thing process-oriented people devise, mainly as a blame-avoidance device. However, considering that BCS comes out of an academic committee, it doesn't surprise me that they do it this way.

This is like rating movies by strength of cast and their previous roles, box office take, budget and running time, and only as an afterthought considering input from the critics and movie-goers. I don't care how you weigh the numeric factors, the result is still likely wrong. You will note Oscar doesn't do it this way.

Put another way, it's like computer dating without pictures.

AP and the Coaches' Poll have had the thing right all along. The betting seems to be they'll have it right again (USC-LSU-OK), and USC will get a BCS 3rd. The problem was never the polls anyway, but the Bowl invite system. Reform the BCS by getting rid of all the computer folderol, and use three polls of knowlegable human beings to select the bowl berths. Failing that, junk the whole thing.

UPDATE: Calpundit agrees