Start with shame. Add travesty. And crime.
You're just beginning to zero in on college football's Bowl Championship Series. The BCS.
Drop the C and that says it all.
Oklahoma-USC in the Orange Bowl for the national championship?
While half the folks in Alabama may question the wisdom of Oklahoma over Auburn, the rest of the nation is content with the Sooners playing the Trojans because it's been USC-Oklahoma-Auburn in that order for weeks.
The problem involves Cal tumbling out of the BCS and Rose Bowl.
Cal is a very good football team. Good enough to give the Trojans their toughest test this season. Good enough to belong in the Rose Bowl against Michigan.
Good enough did not turn out to be enough. Michigan will play Texas in the Rose Bowl.
"What happened?" asked Bill Cooper, the pained former Cal player and assistant coach.
What happened borders on fraud.
It was bad enough a year ago when the BCS fumbled USC out of the championship game because the formula was flawed.
As Big Ten champ, Michigan automatically qualifies for the Rose Bowl. Having finished second to USC in the Pac-10 Conference, Cal does not get a free pass.
This technicality wouldn't have mattered if Cal had finished ahead of Texas in the BCS poll.
The Bears are ahead of the Longhorns on the sportswriters-sportscasters poll and coaches poll. They were .0129 behind in the BCS poll.
The BCS people did not do all the work that was necessary on their poll. But there's more to it than fixing the formula.
Cal would be in the Rose Bowl, where it belongs had Big 12 coaches not had a revelation about Cal and Texas. It was the week Cal crushed Stanford. Texas had a bye and closed the gap on the coaches poll.
This was a result of Big 12 coaches figuring out how it was to the benefit of the conference for Texas to play in a BCS bowl game. The greater benefit would be additional dollars for the budgets of each Big 12 school.
This calls into question the integrity of the coaches. The starting point for this mess is the greed of the traditional football powers.
What they have is a classic old boys' club to which they want to limit membership. This is why they developed the BCS apart from the NCAA structure.
Money is the bottom line here. The traditional football powers have it funneled into their budgets. They want as little as possible diverted to the non-traditional powers.
If a school like 10-1 Cal gets a raw deal, they'll move on without regret because they see retaining their control and money as the higher priorities.
Please do not be naive and suggest this will push them closer to a national championship football playoff system. They're locked in with their TV deals in the near future and already negotiating down the line. The suggestion here is not that Texas at 10-1 isn't a good team.
Beyond the polls are the facts that Texas lost to Oklahoma, 12-0, and Cal only lost by six to USC and with a break might have won.
Cooper was a member of the 1958 Cal team that played in the 1959 Rose Bowl and is frustrated Cal won't return to the Rose Bowl for the first time since '60.
"We were planning a reunion," Cooper said.
This is a close group. Ten of them are going to New York for the induction of Joe Kapp, their quarterback, into the College Hall of Fame.
The team met in Berkeley this year for the Cal-USC game. Wasn't the game in the Coliseum?
"We refuse to give USC the money," Cooper joked.
He's not kidding around about his Rose Bowl frustration.
"The longer you've been deprived of something the more you want it," he said.
How sweet and correct it would have been for Cal to return to Pasadena.
dailybreeze.com
You're just beginning to zero in on college football's Bowl Championship Series. The BCS.
Drop the C and that says it all.
Oklahoma-USC in the Orange Bowl for the national championship?
While half the folks in Alabama may question the wisdom of Oklahoma over Auburn, the rest of the nation is content with the Sooners playing the Trojans because it's been USC-Oklahoma-Auburn in that order for weeks.
The problem involves Cal tumbling out of the BCS and Rose Bowl.
Cal is a very good football team. Good enough to give the Trojans their toughest test this season. Good enough to belong in the Rose Bowl against Michigan.
Good enough did not turn out to be enough. Michigan will play Texas in the Rose Bowl.
"What happened?" asked Bill Cooper, the pained former Cal player and assistant coach.
What happened borders on fraud.
It was bad enough a year ago when the BCS fumbled USC out of the championship game because the formula was flawed.
As Big Ten champ, Michigan automatically qualifies for the Rose Bowl. Having finished second to USC in the Pac-10 Conference, Cal does not get a free pass.
This technicality wouldn't have mattered if Cal had finished ahead of Texas in the BCS poll.
The Bears are ahead of the Longhorns on the sportswriters-sportscasters poll and coaches poll. They were .0129 behind in the BCS poll.
The BCS people did not do all the work that was necessary on their poll. But there's more to it than fixing the formula.
Cal would be in the Rose Bowl, where it belongs had Big 12 coaches not had a revelation about Cal and Texas. It was the week Cal crushed Stanford. Texas had a bye and closed the gap on the coaches poll.
This was a result of Big 12 coaches figuring out how it was to the benefit of the conference for Texas to play in a BCS bowl game. The greater benefit would be additional dollars for the budgets of each Big 12 school.
This calls into question the integrity of the coaches. The starting point for this mess is the greed of the traditional football powers.
What they have is a classic old boys' club to which they want to limit membership. This is why they developed the BCS apart from the NCAA structure.
Money is the bottom line here. The traditional football powers have it funneled into their budgets. They want as little as possible diverted to the non-traditional powers.
If a school like 10-1 Cal gets a raw deal, they'll move on without regret because they see retaining their control and money as the higher priorities.
Please do not be naive and suggest this will push them closer to a national championship football playoff system. They're locked in with their TV deals in the near future and already negotiating down the line. The suggestion here is not that Texas at 10-1 isn't a good team.
Beyond the polls are the facts that Texas lost to Oklahoma, 12-0, and Cal only lost by six to USC and with a break might have won.
Cooper was a member of the 1958 Cal team that played in the 1959 Rose Bowl and is frustrated Cal won't return to the Rose Bowl for the first time since '60.
"We were planning a reunion," Cooper said.
This is a close group. Ten of them are going to New York for the induction of Joe Kapp, their quarterback, into the College Hall of Fame.
The team met in Berkeley this year for the Cal-USC game. Wasn't the game in the Coliseum?
"We refuse to give USC the money," Cooper joked.
He's not kidding around about his Rose Bowl frustration.
"The longer you've been deprived of something the more you want it," he said.
How sweet and correct it would have been for Cal to return to Pasadena.
dailybreeze.com
In the good ol' days Cal would'nt be going to the Rose Bowl anyway, USC would. Cal got screwed, but the problem is these 2 and 3 loss teams like Michigan, Pittsburgh and Va. Tech (and their guaranteed bids). Texas should be playing Cal in the Rose Bowl. How about Va. tech vs. Mich? (neither of these 2 deserve the matchup they got) Utah should be playing Auburn. this stuff about Cal missing their first Rose Bowl since 1959 does not wash, they were not Pac 10 champs, but they do deserve to play somebody really good on new years day.
Godspeed ,Thepig.
Godspeed ,Thepig.
Cal would have had as much or more demand than UT for this game, I guarantee it. When they play the annual game in LA versus UCLA or USC the So Cal based Cal alumni put at least 15,000 in the seats. For the first Rose Bowl in 45 years they would have had huge demand. UT travels well, but this argument doesn't work when it comes to the Rose Bowl, Bear fans would have been dying to go to the game and bought every ticket available and then some.
Fishhead:
No kidding ...
them Hawk fans are as loyal as any in the country .. the way Texas fans act toward Brown, Simms, etc they dont deserve this
I hope Michigan spanks Texas like Iowa did when they beat em 55-17 at that Bowl game in Anaheim in the mid 80's ...
Brown does not get that lucky call in Lawrence and he is most likely out of a job as Texas fans have this built image that they think this is the top football school in the country .. hell, they are 2nd best in the THEIR DIVISION in the Big 12
No kidding ...
them Hawk fans are as loyal as any in the country .. the way Texas fans act toward Brown, Simms, etc they dont deserve this
I hope Michigan spanks Texas like Iowa did when they beat em 55-17 at that Bowl game in Anaheim in the mid 80's ...
Brown does not get that lucky call in Lawrence and he is most likely out of a job as Texas fans have this built image that they think this is the top football school in the country .. hell, they are 2nd best in the THEIR DIVISION in the Big 12
