Death to a Playoff: Chapters 2 and 3

Chapter 2 provides a brief account of the creation of the BCS, in part through the eyes of legendary Vince Dooley. While most fans know that the Bowl Alliance was created and eventually transformed into the BCS, many are probably unaware of Dooley’s presentation to Roy Kramer, SEC Commissioner at the time, and his subsequent rejection of said presentation. The authors don’t go into detail about Dooley’s plan and how it would work, only that it involves 4 teams selected after January 1^st bowl games. While this chapter provides little in the way of factually discrediting the BCS/non-playoff idea, it is a nice history lesson.

Chapter 3 has a lot more meat to it, and should be required knowledge for all college football fans. It doesn’t necessarily argue against the BCS, but does a very nice job of exposing how the money flows in bowl games. A good job is done in exploring Derrick Fox’s (Alamo Bowl CEO) congressional testimony about bowl economics and financial activities. The investigation and explanation of his testimony, especially the great detail given about the Sugar Bowl’s finances, should infuriate those involved. Fox comes off as a manipulative slimeball who chooses words and phrases that may technically be correct according to their dictionary definition, but are intentionally misleading. The authors do a great job of investigating those bowls with available records to show that they are not giving as much to charities as they claim, a fact that should not go unnoticed by the public. I am no tax or economics specialist, but I can’t understand how the bowls would qualify for not-for-profit status. It seems like that practice is simply a loophole that is being exploited by those who run the bowls, and a loophole that needs to be closed.

These 2 chapters don’t really make the case for their playoff proposal by themselves but do add great history and information. The authors include bowl games in their plan, so they are certainly not using this chapter to declare that we need to eliminate the bowls. What the chapter does well is apprise the readers of things the bowls are doing wrong. Hopefully this will create a real investigation and some action by the local communities involved in each bowl game.