Today the Senate antitrust subcommittee will hold hearings on perhaps the only American institution less popular than Congress itself: the Bowl Championship Series (BCS). Like an earlier hearing in the House, this one will ask whether the system by which college football chooses its national champion is "fair."Shamefully, this congressional overreach is being led by two Republicans - Rep. Joe Barton of TX and Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. Yeesh! Don't these guys get it? Conservatives are supposed to be about lessening the reach of the federal government into every sphere of our lives, not increasing it. I know, I know. That's a practice that is "more honored in the breach than the observance," but therein lies one of the problems with the Republican Party. College football championships, at least, should be an area where most fans can honestly say that they have not been yearning for congressional hearings and governmental mandates.
....In terms of popularity, it's a contest more evenly matched than any Rose Bowl. In one corner there's Congress with its 18% approval rating, according to the latest Rasmussen poll. In the other sits the BCS, whose system makes tons of money from television for its members but is preferred by just 15% of fans, according to a 2007 Gallup poll. No real winner here.
I'm probably one of the few people in the country who is an agnostic on the whole debate concerning the BCS. But I know that passions on this are deeper than they are on any of the issues that I do get riled up about. Let the passions play out in the living rooms of sports fans and on sports radio. Keep Congress out of it. And here's a suggestion:
College football would be better off if those who run the BCS could recognize that the calls for playoffs are being fed by the precision their system implicitly promises but can never deliver. And Americans would be better off if Republican legislators devoted their energies to reforming our antiquated antitrust laws instead of looking for silly new ways to apply them.
3 comments:
Hands off football until they've fixed the whole designated hitter issue in MLB. After that I want the pitcher's mound to be a mound again and the strike zone to be actually bigger than a baseball. When they get done fixing baseball I want them to come cut my lawn so that I can have time to watch a game.
FREAKING TERM LIMITS ALREADY!!!
There are some reasonable criticisms to be made of the BCS system. One almost never hears them. If there was a list of all-time stupid sports commentary, columns written about the BCS would easily take up more than half the slots.
Here's a novel idea, why doesn't Congress actually do what it's supposed to -- effectively run the country -- and stay the heck out of organized sports entirely? If we really want to change something about the BCS and big-time college football, let's all just turn off the TV on Saturday afternoons every fall until a play-off system is installed. The weather's pretty nice throughout most of the country that time of year. Let's go play golf!
Greg @ American Civil War Essays & Research
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