If the last couple years of college football have taught me anything, it's that the BCS is not the most annoying thing about college football.
It still sucks, and anyone who advocates the BCS over a playoff system is either a money-grubbing university president or a complete moron.
But as much as it pains me to say this, the true reason why college football is so frustrating sometimes comes down to media bias. I hate to use the words "media" and "bias" in the same sentence because the phrase is so overused and exaggerated, usually as a cop out.
But when it comes to college football, there is no doubting its prevalence.
Need proof?
Exhibit A: The Big Ten Conference.
Exhibit B: Notre Dame.
No one and nothing in sports is more overrated than Notre Dame, and Big-10 football is not too far behind. It took some embarrassing losses for the general public to realize just how little substance there was to the hype these two entities have been awarded the last several years.
Notre Dame has a proven track record of not living up to its bill, evidenced by nine-straight losses in bowl games for the Fighting Irish.
But it's not like the crappiness of the Big Ten that has surfaced before our eyes this season has come completely out of nowhere, either.
Don't get me wrong, the Big Ten has always been a quality conference in the main scheme of things.
But to mention the Big Ten in the same breath as the Southeastern Conference or even the Pac-10, these days, is just a joke.
How many times did we hear on ESPN last season about how the great Big Ten was the elite conference in college football because of how great Ohio State and Michigan were?
I always knew Michigan was overrated and played through a fairly easy schedule, but I have to admit that even I was buying into the Buckeye hype a bit.
UF and USC proved who the real power conference teams were when they blasted Ohio State and Michigan respectively in BCS games.
So where does media bias come in?
Lots of ways.
Television ratings are one of the biggest reasons.
ESPN sure has a lot of incentive to hype up games being broadcast on its network, doesn't it?
Chris Fowler, host of ESPN's "College GameDay," said publicly last year that the network passed on filming from the sites of certain SEC games for that very reason. CBS has first dibs on SEC games.
If sportswriters and broadcasters pound a team down the public's throat enough, people are going to have a favorable opinion of that team. It's just common sense.
There is also tons of regional bias, something I could very well be accused of for writing this column.
But I have two things on my side to support my opinion that the SEC blows the Big Ten out of the water.
The first is recent performance. The SEC is a perennial leader in non-conference record.
The second is recruiting.
The SEC has ranked No. 1 among all conferences in recruiting every year dating back to 2002, according to Scout.com.
The Big Ten has ranked sixth, fifth, fourth, fourth, fifth and six, respectively.
While there is a certain amount of bias in the subjective world of recruiting as well, the numbers don't lie.
Recruiting is where football teams get their talent, and the Big-Ten should be viewed as more comparable to the Big East than the SEC.
