Who here is tired of college football hypocrisy? Players can't receive gifts during the regular season, but they can receive up to a $500 gift for bowl games? We talk about protecting their "study time", but we have the title game on January 7th?

Now we hear that the President of the University of Georgia is pushing for an 8-team playoff format? Even if his system is adopted and the bowls serve as a 1st-round game, we're talking about prolonging the season further.

With all the bowl money out there, schools that are not in the top 8 or 10 annually will not agree to something like an 8-game playoff.

Here are the current problems:

1)  time - the post-season is already too long.

2)  fairness - too much controversy if there is no clear #1 and #2 from the regular season

Solution: "bowl + 1" format for the top 4 teams. However, the semifinal bowl games should be played around December 18th (before the start of the bowl season), and the national championship will keep its current time (around January 7th). The top BCS bowls can rotate to host the semifinal and final games.

This solution achieves a lot of objectives:

1) time - the post-season will not be extended beyond the current system

2) exclusivity - the semi-final round will have exclusivity (and fantastic ratings) because it will be played at a time when no other bowls are scheduled to play.

3) convenience - the other bowls do not have to alter their schedules

4) fairness - we improve the chances that the real #1 team in the country gets to play for the national title

5) incentive - the system provides incentives for teams to play hard until the very end of the season.

6) compromise - assuming that there is no increase in the number of bowls next year, this system would mean that only 2 fewer teams than this past season will get to play in a bowl game.

7) better competition - the current long layoff between the end of the regular season and the national championship has to make players rusty. Ideally, with this system, I would suggest playing the national championship game on January 4, 2009 (a Sunday) for maximum exposure, less time off, and it saves the athletes a few days.

Why the 8-team playoff will meet resistance:

1)  time - even if the bowl games were used for the first round, it would still extend the season another week, and not only is that unfair to the athletes, but it also is a bit hypocritical to talk about the importance of protecting their study time while further decreasing it.

2)   let's imagine that we monkeyed around with the current bowl system and we used 4 bowls to play the quarterfinal round around December 25, 2008 (a Thursday), then another 2 bowls to host the semifinal round around January 1, 2008 (a Thursday), and then the naitonal championship was held around January 7, there would be problems:

a)      Mid-level schools lose out - it would mean that 4 teams in the nation who under the current system would be playing a bowl game will not do so (because the semifinal bowl games will get the winners of the quarterfinal bowl games)

b)      Devaluation of non-playoff bowl games - the non-playoff bowls would scream bloody murder, because having playoff games competing directly with their own bowl games would devalue them.

c)      Deprivation of money to 4 universities - College presidents who look forward to collecting bowl money would not be in favor of a system that each year would deprive 4 colleges of much-needed bowl appearance money.

d)      Decreased Incentive - The last problem is one that we see in the current NFL playoff system: teams that have clinched are more likely to rest their starters at the end of the season. With the current systems, every team has to play hard throughout the last game of the season, because no one can be sure how the ranking system will place them in the end. But with 8 teams making it to the playoffs, the top 2 or 3 teams have more incentive to rest their players for the final game of the season, because as long as they place in the top 8, they will still have a chance to chase the national title.

 This solution is a win-win for everyone.