Menu
What's new
By:
Filters
AllBuffs | Unofficial fan site for the University of Colorado at Boulder Athletics programs

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

  • Prime Time. Prime Time. Its a new era for Colorado football. Consider signing up for a club membership! For $20/year, you can get access to all the special features at Allbuffs, including club member only forums, dark mode, avatars and best of all no ads ! But seriously, please sign up so that we can pay the bills. No one earns money here, and we can use your $20 to keep this hellhole running. You can sign up for a club membership by navigating to your account in the upper right and clicking on "Account Upgrades". Make it happen!

Was college sports better before realignment?

Buffnik

Buffnik

Real name isn't Nik
Club Member
Junta Member
Let's go back to 1989, the year before Penn State joined the Big Ten to expand that conference to 11.

ACC - 8 teams
Big 8 - 8 teams
Big 10 - 10 teams
Pac-10 - 10 teams
SEC - 10 teams
SWC - 9 teams
Independent - 25 teams

(Eastern independents of BC, Cuse, PSU, Pitt, WVU, Rutgers, VA Tech and Miami were sort of like a conference.)

I actually believe the best number is 9. That gives you a tight regional group for 8 fan-friendly games.

Anyway, I think we went the wrong way.

If I could wave a magic wand, I'd love to go back to that.

Imagine if we had one media deal and set of rules for everyone.

Then you'd have your 1989 style regional groupings (northeast, mid-Atlantic, southeast, Great Lakes, midwest plains, southwest, Rocky Mountain & Pacific coast).

Give me those 8 divisions with 9 teams each. I'd even take a playoff instead of bowls (8 champs plus 4 highest ranked).

How much better would that be?

Sigh.
 
Last edited:
Buffnik said:
Let's go back to 1989, the year before Penn State joined the Big Ten to expand that conference to 11.

ACC - 8 teams
Big 8 - 8 teams
Big 10 - 10 teams
Pac-10 - 10 teams
SEC - 10 teams
SWC - 9 teams
Independent - 25 teams

(Eastern independents of BC, Cuse, PSU, Pitt, WVU, Rutgers, VA Tech and Miami were sort of like a conference.)

I actually believe the best number is 9. That gives you a tight regional group for 8 fan-friendly games.

Anyway, I think we went the wrong way.

If I could wave a magic wand, I'd love to go back to that.

Imagine if we had one media deal and set of rules for everyone.

Then you had your 1989 style regional groupings (northeast, mid-Atlantic, southeast, Great Lakes, midwest plains, southwest, Rocky Mountain & Pacific coast).

Give me those 8 divisions with 9 teams each. I'd even take a playoff instead of bowls (8 champs plus 4 highest ranked).

How much better would that be?

Sigh.
Click to expand...
A lot of college football fans around the country thought it would be AWESOME if there was a playoff so there'd be a real Natty.
A lot of college football fans around the country thought that NIL sounded cool cuz...uh...something er a um....cough...something....
These were largely the younger naive fans with the inability to understand the concept of Unintended Consequences.
So here we are. At the circus.
As long as there's Wyoming football, DU hockey, and Gonzaga basketball, the world is right by me. Let the rest B U R N......
 
Yes, it was better. Greed, homogenizing and corporate hacks reduce everything to the least common denominator. Any variety, quirkiness and tradition that makes any product unique gets flushed down some accountant's crapper.
 
Buffnik said:
Let's go back to 1989, the year before Penn State joined the Big Ten to expand that conference to 11.

ACC - 8 teams
Big 8 - 8 teams
Big 10 - 10 teams
Pac-10 - 10 teams
SEC - 10 teams
SWC - 9 teams
Independent - 25 teams

(Eastern independents of BC, Cuse, PSU, Pitt, WVU, Rutgers, VA Tech and Miami were sort of like a conference.)

I actually believe the best number is 9. That gives you a tight regional group for 8 fan-friendly games.

Anyway, I think we went the wrong way.

If I could wave a magic wand, I'd love to go back to that.

Imagine if we had one media deal and set of rules for everyone.

Then you'd have your 1989 style regional groupings (northeast, mid-Atlantic, southeast, Great Lakes, midwest plains, southwest, Rocky Mountain & Pacific coast).

Give me those 8 divisions with 9 teams each. I'd even take a playoff instead of bowls (8 champs plus 4 highest ranked).

How much better would that be?

Sigh.
Click to expand...
Good times. FSU was an independent too. FSU Miami was always Columbus day weekend and it was often epic.

I advocated for a playoff. Bad idea. The bowls were a lot of fun. Every game mattered. One loss in the wrong place and you were out.

unfortunately, you can never go back
 
PAHIBuff said:
A lot of college football fans around the country thought it would be AWESOME if there was a playoff so there'd be a real Natty.
A lot of college football fans around the country thought that NIL sounded cool cuz...uh...something er a um....cough...something....
These were largely the younger naive fans with the inability to understand the concept of Unintended Consequences.
So here we are. At the circus.
As long as there's Wyoming football, DU hockey, and Gonzaga basketball, the world is right by me. Let the rest B U R N......
Click to expand...
One of the things I loved about college football was no true national champion. The speculation made it fun, and it made the bowl games more meaningful. I was vocal in my disinterest in both the BCS and playoffs.
 
MiamiBuffs said:
Good times. FSU was an independent too. FSU Miami was always Columbus day weekend and it was often epic.

I advocated for a playoff. Bad idea. The bowls were a lot of fun. Every game mattered. One loss in the wrong place and you were out.

unfortunately, you can never go back
Click to expand...
Bowl game over-expansion also hurt. It took the specialness out of it so ESPN could fill programming slots with 6-6 teams playing in empty stadiums.
 
At what point does realignment shift from expansion to replacement?

ESPN: "Clemson would be much more valuable than South Carolina. We'd pay an extra $45M - $3M per team - to y'all."

SEC's 15 other members: "Sign us up."

ESPN: "Now let's talk about Vanderbilt and Mississippi State."
 
The most hilarious part of this thread is fans castigating themselves for wanting a playoff, as if what fans wanted mattered. Television networks ruined CFB, and they would have done the same no matter what the fans thought. This isn't socialist Europe we're talking about, right @Jens1893 ?
 
Buffnik said:
I wanted a playoff. I was wrong.
Click to expand...
Maybe, I don't think you were.

IMO - The way the playoffs were constructed was entirely wrong. The whole concept of "best 4 teams" allowed ESPN to influence the rankings and push the committee to add additional SEC teams to the playoffs.

Had the playoffs taken the "best 4 teams from 4 different conferences (or independents)" I'm guessing we never see conference grow to more than 10 teams.
 
Let the B1G SEC have their playoffs and we can go back to what worked for everyone else.

The uniqueness of the bowl system was what made college football special. Ditto for college basketball.
 
I also maintain that the real problem isn't realignment, but the playoff. The playoff has heavily contributed to some teams having a largely unprecedented dominance.
 
Jens1893 said:
I also maintain that the real problem isn't realignment, but the playoff. The playoff has heavily contributed to some teams having a largely unprecedented dominance.
Click to expand...

People should have seen this coming if they took the time to study the FCS even during the pre-BCS years. It’s evident in D2, D3, and even high school football.

The left behinds have a choice: re-instate the bowl system before the BCS, accept G5-like status, or keep fighting.
 
Jens1893 said:
Without a doubt, but I think the playoff has contributed more.
Click to expand...

Lack of auto-bids for the playoffs definitely was a factor. Auto-bids would have still led to the same teams making the playoffs but the conferences would have been more likely to be stable.
 
I don’t think a playoff is necessarily a bad thing. The NCAA hoops tournament is a fabulous success and one of the best things every year. The problem isn’t the playoff. It’s how the playoff has been done. A lot of mistakes have been made in this regard. Incorporate the bowls and bowl tie ins to the playoff and you have something special. They never did that. Instead, you have Nebraska and Miami playing in the Rose Bowl for the national championship. Stupid. Blaming this on capitalism is, well, weird. Equating capitalism to greed proves you understand neither. But this isn’t the place for that particular discussion.

as to the OP, yes. It was way better.
 
Buffnik said:
Bowl game over-expansion also hurt. It took the specialness out of it so ESPN could fill programming slots with 6-6 teams playing in empty stadiums.
Click to expand...
How dare you diss the tradition and pageantry of the Beef O'Brady's Bowl, the Bahamas Bowl and the San Diego Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl.
 
Yes
BuffsNYC said:
The most hilarious part of this thread is fans castigating themselves for wanting a playoff, as if what fans wanted mattered. Television networks ruined CFB, and they would have done the same no matter what the fans thought. This isn't socialist Europe we're talking about, right @Jens1893 ?
Click to expand...
This. I don't care if the better teams receive a little extra or if everyone gets the same but the entire sec getting double what everyone else gets, excluding the big 10, is a joke. It's no wonder why we have to let go of entire recruiting departments.

Another realignment wouldn't make the situation any worse than it already is. I don't care about playoff expansion either way but it's going to get real stupid if we find ourselves with 4 conferences and 8 playoff spots...can't wait for the big 10 and sec conference championship loser to make the playoff every year!
 
Last edited:
Not Sure said:
I don’t think a playoff is necessarily a bad thing. The NCAA hoops tournament is a fabulous success and one of the best things every year. The problem isn’t the playoff. It’s how the playoff has been done. A lot of mistakes have been made in this regard. Incorporate the bowls and bowl tie ins to the playoff and you have something special. They never did that. Instead, you have Nebraska and Miami playing in the Rose Bowl for the national championship. Stupid. Blaming this on capitalism is, well, weird. Equating capitalism to greed proves you understand neither. But this isn’t the place for that particular discussion.

as to the OP, yes. It was way better.
Click to expand...

I like how you just can't state that you disagree but instead essentially call me too dumb to understand what capitalism is.
 
Yes, college athletics has been ruined by greed. I've said for a long time that cable TV ruined America. Politically, culturally, societally, and in sports too. ESPN particularly has ruined sports.

Personally, as time has gone by and college football especially has gone from a money making sport to a bazillion dollar making sport, I have switched from a "well, they're getting a free education" view of college athletes to a "adults are making tens of millions off this sport, kids need a piece of that pie" view, knowing full well that this will further accelerate the demolition of the sport.

Cable/streaming contracts are ruining the college sports. NIL will further ruin them. The transfer portal will further ruin them. But all of that derives from the greed that cable TV kick started.
 
Alfred91 said:
Yes, college athletics has been ruined by greed. I've said for a long time that cable TV ruined America. Politically, culturally, societally, and in sports too. ESPN particularly has ruined sports.

Personally, as time has gone by and college football especially has gone from a money making sport to a bazillion dollar making sport, I have switched from a "well, they're getting a free education" view of college athletes to a "adults are making tens of millions off this sport, kids need a piece of that pie" view, knowing full well that this will further accelerate the demolition of the sport.

Cable/streaming contracts are ruining the college sports. NIL will further ruin them. The transfer portal will further ruin them. But all of that derives from the greed that cable TV kick started.
Click to expand...

I think cable TV might have started the process but it won't live long enough to finish the job. Newer technologies such as social media are the key threat right now, linear television in general has passed its peak and only figures to lose importance as the generational change rumbles on.
 
Jens1893 said:
I like how you just can't state that you disagree but instead essentially call me too dumb to understand what capitalism is.
Click to expand...
"Nothing but a few private or corporate bank accounts have ever profited from capitalism and the endless greed that comes with it."

You have access to luxuries that would make 19th century kings jealous. Heating and air conditioning, electricity, food refrigeration, computing devices... Ever flown to a cu away game? Took a couple hours I'd bet? Yeah, that used to take days. For Christ's sake dude, my grandma had to **** in an outhouse as a kid.

You want to talk about private banking or central banking sure but the investment firms that control espn and fox are controlled by the federal reserve, which is a private central bank. Capitalism didn't invent greed and exploitation, they existed well before and will continue to exist forever. The problems arise when there's no parity. Monopolies and duopolies will kill the average person, or in this case the average cfb team, no matter what the economic system is. Additionally, the pareto distribution destroys any notion that inequalities exist due to capitalism.

I'm not even pro capitalist when it comes to sports, I'm pro parity. If the NCAA had one ****ing job it was making sure the average team got their fair share. What good is paying 2 conferences twice the remaining three? Might as well make one conference of blue bloods and have them play a round robin to determine a champion.

Greed killed cfb- yes. Private banking and capitalism?... Lol, nah
 
Buffnik said:
Let's go back to 1989, the year before Penn State joined the Big Ten to expand that conference to 11.

ACC - 8 teams
Big 8 - 8 teams
Big 10 - 10 teams
Pac-10 - 10 teams
SEC - 10 teams
SWC - 9 teams
Independent - 25 teams

(Eastern independents of BC, Cuse, PSU, Pitt, WVU, Rutgers, VA Tech and Miami were sort of like a conference.)

I actually believe the best number is 9. That gives you a tight regional group for 8 fan-friendly games.

Anyway, I think we went the wrong way.

If I could wave a magic wand, I'd love to go back to that.

Imagine if we had one media deal and set of rules for everyone.

Then you'd have your 1989 style regional groupings (northeast, mid-Atlantic, southeast, Great Lakes, midwest plains, southwest, Rocky Mountain & Pacific coast).

Give me those 8 divisions with 9 teams each. I'd even take a playoff instead of bowls (8 champs plus 4 highest ranked).

How much better would that be?

Sigh.
Click to expand...
Yes to all. And specified bowl games based on conference.
 
Uncle Ken said:
One of the things I loved about college football was no true national champion. The speculation made it fun, and it made the bowl games more meaningful. I was vocal in my disinterest in both the BCS and playoffs.
Click to expand...
This has been my stance since since they introduced the Bowl Alliance.
It’s become so sterile now - playoffs happen, no one actually knows which bowls those were, NCG is played, team wins, their champions. Back in the day, arguing all off season about who should actually be ranked where was so much more fun and kept passion for the sport throughout the offseason.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top