College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

I think WMU's getting 3/4 of a million to take a bus ride down to South Bend this year. They got less from Michigan State because that's part of a 3 for 1 deal that MSU is running with all three Michigan MAC schools over the next decade, assuming the 9 game BT schedule in 2014-15 doesn't play hob with it.

Assuming that's roughly the going rate, then UW kept an extra $450,000 or so to schedule Austin Peay (who, in case this matters, have two winning seasons since 02) in lieu of a MAC or C-USA school that you could at least take a little bit seriously.

If it's an issue of an extra 1/2 million, then I can see it. But, truthfully, I'd actually a little surprised that we're not able to bully down some mid-majors to almost that level.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Assuming that's roughly the going rate, then UW kept an extra $450,000 or so to schedule Austin Peay (who, in case this matters, have two winning seasons since 02) in lieu of a MAC or C-USA school that you could at least take a little bit seriously.

If it's an issue of an extra 1/2 million, then I can see it. But, truthfully, I'd actually a little surprised that we're not able to bully down some mid-majors to almost that level.

They did play SJSU To me the bigger issue is just how horrible Austin Peay is...and the fact that Wisconsin chose to schedule a team that had no business being on the same field.

 

[blockski]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Assuming that's roughly the going rate, then UW kept an extra $450,000 or so to schedule Austin Peay (who, in case this matters, have two winning seasons since 02) in lieu of a MAC or C-USA school that you could at least take a little bit seriously.

If it's an issue of an extra 1/2 million, then I can see it. But, truthfully, I'd actually a little surprised that we're not able to bully down some mid-majors to almost that level.

One, this game was scheduled fairly recently to fill an open date. You cannot assume that there are MAC or C-USA teams with that date also open. You can open it up for them, but that's going to cost you - and why bother with that when you can just get AP for a lower price?

Yes, AP was bad. But they're bad because they suck, not because they're from FCS.

 

[Craig P.]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

I think WMU's getting 3/4 of a million to take a bus ride down to South Bend this year.

We might be paying more because it was a last-minute bail-us-out deal after Swarbrick discovered that a game that he thought was set actually wasn't.

(And no offense to WMU, but I'm a lot happier playing them than TCU with the team we have this year. If we were chasing a championship, I'd want TCU in that spot, but we're not.)

 

[blockski]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

We might be paying more because it was a last-minute bail-us-out deal after Swarbrick discovered that a game that he thought was set actually wasn't.

And that's the choice - UW set up the game with Austin Peay less than a year from the start of the 2010 season. Trying to fill open dates that late in the process leaves you with two options - a bad FCS team or paying out the arse for a mediocre MAC team -assuming you can even get the schedules to line up.

Given the options, I don't blame Barry for making the choice at all. If we had Notre Dame's cash, maybe a MAC buy game makes more sense, but we don't.

 

[WeWantMore]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Right, that's fine for Austin Peay. But UW has played 1AA schools 5 years in a row now, with South Dakota scheduled for next year.

Was every single one of those a last second commitment?

 

[bronconick]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

We might be paying more because it was a last-minute bail-us-out deal after Swarbrick discovered that a game that he thought was set actually wasn't.

(And no offense to WMU, but I'm a lot happier playing them than TCU with the team we have this year. If we were chasing a championship, I'd want TCU in that spot, but we're not.)

Sounds about right. I *think* usually it's 4-500k for games at Nebraska, at Missouri, Michigan, etc.

 

[blockski]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Right, that's fine for Austin Peay. But UW has played 1AA schools 5 years in a row now, with South Dakota scheduled for next year.

Was every single one of those a last second commitment?

No.

What do you want UW to do? Wisconsin isn't the only school doing this. There are eighty three such games this season.

They happen because the NCAA encourages them to happen. Quite literally everybody is doing it, and they're doing it for a reason. If you don't like it, that's fine - I don't particularly care for it either - but don't pretend like this is some shady behavior on UW's part. The NCAA changed the rule to allow this, UW and everyone else is taking advantage of it for a free payday.

Remember what things were like before the rule change - with the addition of the 12th game, all sorts of teams wanted that extra home game for more revenue generation. However, since you could only count FCS schools once in four years for bowl eligibility, FBS/FCS games were rare. Similarly, there were relatively few MAC and WAC schools with open dates willing to get slaughtered by a team that really wanted a 7th home game - hence, the price of those home games went up. Way up. The cost of a 'buy' game was obscene.

The rule changed because teams need those home games, and those home games pay the bills for a lot of other programs.

 

[WeWantMore]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Woah, when did I say this was shady behavior on UW's part?

You're quite right in saying that there are 83 such games, but that means there are 38 schools not playing FCS schools this year. I think UW should be one of those schools.

 

[blockski]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Woah, when did I say this was shady behavior on UW's part?

You're quite right in saying that there are 83 such games, but that means there are 38 schools not playing FCS schools this year. I think UW should be one of those schools.

For what reason?

You'd like UW to be one of those schools, even if it puts them at a financial disadvantage? You'd like them to be one of those schools, even if it means giving up a home game?

The NCAA is practically encouraging these games.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Woah, when did I say this was shady behavior on UW's part?

You're quite right in saying that there are 83 such games, but that means there are 38 schools not playing FCS schools this year. I think UW should be one of those schools.

I have a hard time seeing that happen with 10 of the 11 big ten schools are doing it.

 

[WeWantMore]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

For what reason?

You'd like UW to be one of those schools, even if it puts them at a financial disadvantage? You'd like them to be one of those schools, even if it means giving up a home game?

The NCAA is practically encouraging these games.

Financial disadvantage? If it really is only ~$400,000 for a MAC school compared to ~$300,000 for an FCS school, is that really something to sweat over?

And in no way would it mean giving up a home game. Ohio State played 4 FBS schools in non-conference this year, and all at home. And before you say that they can afford to do that, Vanderbilt played 4 FBS schools this year, while playing 3 of them at home, so it's not like it's impossible.

 

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Financial disadvantage? If it really is only ~$400,000 for a MAC school compared to ~$300,000 for an FCS school, is that really something to sweat over?

And in no way would it mean giving up a home game. Ohio State played 4 FBS schools in non-conference this year, and all at home. And before you say that they can afford to do that, Vanderbilt played 4 FBS schools this year, while playing 3 of them at home, so it's not like it's impossible.

The real question might be what the BCS implications are.

UW is a school that wants to pretend that it has a BCS-level football program. The profit margin of making the BCS vs. not making it is definately larger than the $100-300,000 difference in your opponent choice for one home game.

How does scheduling a cupcake FCS team impact BCS standings vs. scheduling a mediocre FBS team? Admittedly, I don't know the BCS numbers game as well as I know the PWR. I would've thought that strength of schedule might have an impact, but I suppose its possible that point differential is a larger contributor.

 

[blockski]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Financial disadvantage? If it really is only ~$400,000 for a MAC school compared to ~$300,000 for an FCS school, is that really something to sweat over?

And in no way would it mean giving up a home game. Ohio State played 4 FBS schools in non-conference this year, and all at home. And before you say that they can afford to do that, Vanderbilt played 4 FBS schools this year, while playing 3 of them at home, so it's not like it's impossible.

You can't compare the prices from one team to another directly. It's also not just a function of price, it's also one of availability and several other factors.

Can we play 4 FBS teams? Sure, it can be done. Can we do it and get the required home games? Yes, but it's a lot harder to do so if you categorically rule out FCS teams.

The real question might be what the BCS implications are.

UW is a school that wants to pretend that it has a BCS-level football program. The profit margin of making the BCS vs. not making it is definately larger than the $100-300,000 difference in your opponent choice for one home game.

How does scheduling a cupcake FCS team impact BCS standings vs. scheduling a mediocre FBS team? Admittedly, I don't know the BCS numbers game as well as I know the PWR. I would've thought that strength of schedule might have an impact, but I suppose its possible that point differential is a larger contributor.

Florida's played at least one FCS school for several years in a row and has a nice run of national championship game appearances going.

 

[bronconick]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

These games are a win-win for everyone except the fans and perhaps any players who get injured in a meaningless game for both sides.

The bigger schools get an extra home game that nets them 2.5 to 5 million, depending on stadium size and ticket prices, and no longer get punished for playing 1-AA schools. 1-AA schools get 10% of that gate, which is more than what they probably make at their 5 home games and are able to fund their Olympic sports for another year, and if other schools in their conference don't have the same games scheduled, get a possible recruiting edge. You don't think UMass tried selling "We're playing in front of 100,000 people in two years at Michigan. Rhode Island or whoever isn't."


Strength of schedule was basically ripped out of the BCS after the 2001 Orange Bowl, where Florida State lost to Miami midseason, but Miami's win over 1-AA McNeese State kept them behind FSU, though ahead of 1-loss Washington, who beat Miami.

 

[bigmrg74]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

Here's the thing - you make the mistake of judging a team's quality based on their division.

Everybody gave Michigan a lot of **** for losing to Appalachian State. But that ASU team was really good - they won 3 FCS titles in a row. Cal Poly was a pretty good FCS team as well. I'd argue that a lot of those FCS teams are much better than the bottom of FBS.

The other part of the equation is that scheduling is hard. You have to make sure the dates work not just now but well into the future. You want to ensure that you have the right time for rest - UW has refused certain games before because they wanted a bye week in the season, and given the Big Ten's scheduling details, UW didn't get one in conference that year... Plus, you've got other agendas you might want to advance (why UW semi-regularly plays @Hawaii and @UNLV, for example).

True that. As much grief Michigan took for that loss, Appy State has been a very solid D1-AA program in a pretty tough league, who most of its members could easily beat up in most of the lower D1-A programs within the MAC and Sunbelt. Michigan had been one of the few programs to have not schedule a D1-AA team until then, but they forgot the cardinal rule about scheduling a money game, you gotta schedule lousy teams for those games.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

You guys are forgetting that BCS money gets divided amongst the big ten schools. So that payday is somewhat dampened.

$18M for a BCS bowl vs. say $4.25M for the Capital One bowl

 

[Craig P.]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

But the $18 MM is a constant; the Integer gets that every year because they're guaranteed to get their champion in a BCS bowl.

The incremental increase in payout that the conference can get is the $4.5 MM for putting a second team in a BCS bowl.

 

[bronconick]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

But the $18 MM is a constant; the Integer gets that every year because they're guaranteed to get their champion in a BCS bowl.

The incremental increase in payout that the conference can get is the $4.5 MM for putting a second team in a BCS bowl.

What does the BCS do with the other 13 million in years where the Big Ten, SEC, etc. get a 2nd team in instead of the MWC and WAC both sneaking in like last year?

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: College Football II: The BCS hits the Fan

What does the BCS do with the other 13 million in years where the Big Ten, SEC, etc. get a 2nd team in instead of the MWC and WAC both sneaking in like last year?

Graft. Seriously.