NCAAF Betting – Bowl Season

The annual college football betting season is here, the chance for the best teams in the country to match up in games that many of us love to watch and wager on, a series that has come under so much scrutiny and criticism lately, that the only reason it has is because it is trendy. The fact is that the college bowl games are one of the most highly anticipated playoffs in online sports betting, and that any notion to get rid of it or replace it with another system is ridiculous.

Take a look at the four major North American sports and the playoff systems that they use. Betting on NFL seems to have gotten it right with the four division winners and two wild card spots, but the fact remains that a team like the New Orleans Saints could fall just shy of a division title, and have to settle for a wild card spot while a team like the Seattle Seahawks could clinch their division with a sub-.500 record and get a home game in the first round. While that system is clearly flawed, you don’t hear as many critics calling for a major facelift in that system.

Consider Major League Baseball and the NHL scores, both leagues where numbers were down in regards to viewers in last year’s respective postseasons, yet there is no real talk about changing their systems. The first round of the NBA playoffs is a virtual walk through for the top seeds, with fewer upsets than ever before as the top-four teams usually get through without much adversity. There isn’t a single playoff format in professional sports that isn’t flawed in one way or another, and this is why the college football bowl system works and should remain in place.

Unlike in the other sports where teams can coast for a couple of games, or in the case of the NBA some teams can coast all season, the regular season in college football means everything. Every time a team takes to the field, they are putting their chances at a championship trophy on the line. How else do you inspire players to go out there and put it all on the line every game? Just ask teams like Boise State and Michigan State how easy it is to get up for every game, where it doesn’t only matter that you win, but how badly you blow the other team away as well. One loss can be the difference in making or breaking a season, and when it is all said and done there is no time wasted with the team’s that showed the most perseverance and accomplished the most during the regular season being rewarded in the national title game. The best of the rest still get their bowl games with intriguing matchups that feature endless storylines. The BCS bowl season is the most exciting playoffs in sports, there is no reason to change the format.