Money Still Driving Football Playoff Debate

In the past week, two well-known people inside the college football world called for the same thing many of the sport's fans have been craving from the outside for decades: a playoff.

With their comments, Florida State president T.K. Wetherell and Penn State coach Joe Paterno both went against the grain in their professions. University presidents and chancellors long have been the most significant obstacle to a playoff system. The majority of coaches also favor the current bowl system, under which more than 30 staffs can put smiley faces on their seasons each year with a bowl victory.

"It's not a question of if there is going to be a playoff, it's going to be a question of when," said Wetherell, a former FSU football player. "It's going to be driven by money. ... You talk to ABC and ESPN, you're talking something in the neighborhood of the Final Four-type thing. That's a huge amount of money. We'll run out of money, then we'll figure out a way to do it. The fight won't be over whether to do it or not. The fight will be over the take, the split."

"To be frank with you, I don't know what the reasons are not to have a playoff," Paterno said. "You can talk about missing class and all that kind of stuff, (yet) you see basketball go on forever. You have a lot of bogus excuses, but obviously the majority of people who have the say don't want it. ... I've always been for a playoff."

Georgia president Michael Adams had gone a step further than either Wetherell or Paterno in January, proposing a detailed playoff system for Division I-A football in conjunction with a reduction of regular-season games from 12 to 11.

Adams' proposal went nowhere. The comments by Wetherell and Paterno are likely to fall on deaf ears, too.

Why? Because of the same topic Wetherell made the foundation of his argument in favor of a playoff: money.

The Bowl Championship Series (BCS), remember, is not run by the NCAA but by the six major conferences and Notre Dame. The NCAA coordinates the playoffs in every other major sport, including men's basketball, and NCAA Tournament revenue provides the organization with almost all of its annual operating budget.

The BCS system for football keeps all of the control — and the overwhelming majority of the money — in the BCS schools' hands. Even if a playoff system would generate more cash, as Wetherell and many others insist, the BCS schools wouldn't be assured of a financial windfall unless they were certain of how that extra cash would be distributed. And that's no sure thing.

Maryland athletic director Debbie Yow said she hasn't seen a proposal for a full-scale playoff that would be a good fit logistically for all of the involved parties (cities, hotels, bowls, television, teams, fans). But she said that other familiar topic — money — could create an even bigger obstacle.

"If we went to a playoff, you'd see everyone — everyone in Division II, Division III, Division I-AA — come out of the woodwork,"  Yow said. "They will want their share of the money. I actually believe that's what would happen. And if it did, I don't know that what would be left (financially) would be worth the effort."

Yow said she is an advocate for the "plus-one" model (one additional game, between the top two teams, after the completion of the BCS bowls) in the college football postseason, as long as there is no change in the current revenue-sharing formula and the number of regular-season games remains at 12. ACC and SEC officials recently pushed for further discussion of the plus-one system, but none of the other BCS participants (Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10, Notre Dame) jumped on board.

Many will continue to voice their opinions about the BCS and college football's postseason, but any major changes appear to be at least several years away. The relevant television contracts are in place through the 2013 season, although discussions on the next generation of TV deals likely will begin a year or two earlier.