This is rich. The NCAA is headed towards changing the rule on football scheduling to allow 12 games instead of 11.
Sounds great, right? I mean that’s more football for fans and more money for the schools!
But wait a second. I thought that a playoff would be Very Bad because the extra games would be too much of an academic burden on the players?
Think about that. If there were an eight-team playoff, a size most agree would be reasonable, half of those teams would play just one game (they’d lose in the first round). Those four teams would play the same number of games they otherwise would have, because the playoff would replace their bowl game. Two teams would play one extra game and two more would play two extra games.
And that’s bad.
But having all 117 D1 schools play an extra game is OK?
So maybe it’s not really an academic issue.
Hmmm, this isn’t about money is it? It couldn’t be that the bowls are bribing the universities to maintain their system, could it? No, no, that can’t be it. Can it?