That's why they don't play the game!

49ers are going to the Superbowl

As I am celebrating the San Francisco 49ers beating the Atlanta Falcons and reaching the Superbowl, I got to thinking. What if the BCS system of choosing the best team in football were used in the NFL, or even in other sports?

If the BCS system were imposed on the NFL, the Superbowl would be a lot different. Essentially, it would be the top seed in each conference. This year, it would probably have been the Atlanta Falcons against the Denver Broncos. Last year, there would not have been the Cinderella New York Giants emerging from the bottom of the Wild Card to win the Superbowl. The match up would have been the New England Patriots versus the Green Bay Packers. In fact, the Packers might have been voted the number one team in America by the UPI if voting was done the way it was done by the UPI up until the early '70's. The Alabama Crimson Tide has that dubious distinction of having been voted National Champions and then losing it's bowl game. (Roll Tide!) We could go back a lot further in time, but I think you get my point.

Now what would happen if the BCS system were imposed on NCAA basketball? It's technically the same organization, so why not? It would be easy to see that the makeup of the championships would be completely different. There is only one time that I can remember where all 4 of the top seeds actually made it to the Final Four. If the championship was voted on and then decided by the HAL-9000, it would be a completely different beast. Lots of meaningless bowl games would be played and out would pop a national champion.

How about we also impose the BCS on soccer. I think it would be great!! The U.S. would win the World Cup every time it came up since there are simply more sports writers and coaches in the U.S. and would therefore vote the U.S. to the World Champions. Just think! The L.A. Galaxy would be voted the world champs as well. Soccer would probably catch on a lot more here. I can't wait to see the arguments about which 0-0 game with a shootout win deserves a higher vote due to more shootout goals being scored. Or even Manchester United being considered better because of a 3-1 over Newcastle than FC Barcelona who only beat Real Madrid 1-0. It would drive the Europeans crazy, so I definitely think we should try it!

Just think how the BCS would improve all kinds of sports like Archery, curling, hockey, baseball and Nascar.

OK, now that we've gone on our happy little trip to Bizzaro World, let's come back to reality. We all know that the BCS, the Bowl Championship Series, the method to rank Division 1A football teams is a sham.It's a system where lots of sports writers and coaches vote for or rank teams they think are the best, throw that information into a computer and out pops the top teams in the country.

The Bison are the NCAA Div 1-AA Champions

I realize that every other team sport in the world implements some kind of playoff system, to include Division 1-AA and 2 football. (All hail the Bison of North Dakota State) Division 1A football is different. Unlike any other sport, it matters which division you are in. It matters how good people think you are in the preseason. Scheduling powder puff teams in lower divisions matter because then a team can win enough games to qualify for the Mediocrity Bowl. It is also not possible to have a playoff system. There are only 44 days from when the season ends until the championship game is played. We can't do a playoff system because there are a bunch of mediocre bowls being played with 6-6 teams that only those teams alma mater watch.

Yes, I know Major League Baseball takes less time to run their playoffs, but they have 5-7 game series to run through, so obviously, NCAA Football can't do it.

I know that every team sport all the way down to Little League Baseball have some kind of playoff system, so there are various ways to do it. Here is one of about a thousand ways to do it. There are currently 11 conferences in Div. 1A football plus the independents  We could do something crazy like take conference champions and some wild cards and create a 16 team bracket, much like NCAA basketball's Sweet 16. A champion could be crowned in 4 weeks or 28 days and only 16 teams would be effected. The other teams that did not make the playoffs could go on and continue to play in the mediocrity bowls. I also believe that a ton of money would be made with this or any kind of playoff system.

There is something that Chris Berman always says when comparing teams on paper and reporting how they actually did. "That's why they play the game!. In Division 1-A football, the game is never played.

GO NINERS!!

We Can Remember It for You Wholesale

I just watched the latest movie of Total Recall. This is a remake of one my favorite movies from the early '90s and one of my favorite stories from Phillip K. Dick, "We Can Remember it for you Wholesale".

This movie stars Colin Farell as Doug Quaid/Hauser, which was done by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the original movie. Kate Beckinsale plays Quaid's wife which was originally played by Sharon Stone. Jessica Biel plays Quaid's girlfriend Melina, which was originally played by Rachel Ticitin.

Obviously, no one can replace Arnold in this classic Arnold role. However, in this retelling of the story, Collin Farrell does a great job playing the character of Doug Quaid. He is very likable and brings a certain intensity to the role.


This movie had nothing to do with Mars, which was the main point of the original movie and story. Instead, this movie takes place on an earth where most of it is uninhabitable due to chemical warfare. The only habitable places left are the U.K. and Australia. There is an elevator that goes through the center of the Earth so that people may commute between the two locations. The movie mostly follows the original movie and gives some nods to the original. Both movies are fairly different from the original story but follow the same theme of the guy who goes to Recall or Rekall to have memories implanted, only to find that there are already memories implanted and that the procedure blows the memory cap in place, releasing all kinds of mayhem.

I kind of expected that the end of the new movie, Quaid would find a way to remove the chemical contamination that was inflicting most of the Earth due to the fact that Cohaagan, the Earth's dictator, had a secret way to repair it but was keeping it hidden so he could control the people.



This movie is really good. It follows the Blues Brothers formula of wreckage and mayhem. Many modern police cars are destroyed along with many RoboCops. The story still remains smart and intense. I very much enjoyed it and give it 5 stars out of 5.