Playing favorites

I haven't followed college football very closely for a few years, but since joining friends to see the Oregon/Stanford game a few weeks back, I have been paying more attention. On Friday night I watched the Boise State Broncos bring the hammer down on Fresno State, 51 - 0.  The all-orange uniforms and blue turf might be a little intimidating to a visiting opponent, but from what I've heard, Fresno State is a decent team.  In addition to some great stories, like that of Boise State, I have unfortunately found that the reason I stopped caring about college football a while back still persists: no playoffs.

College football is in a different situation than, say, Major League Baseball.  MLB has a 162-game season before the playoffs, so you have a pretty good idea of the quality of each team.  In college football, you have the opposite: 160+ schools and only an 11 or 12 game season to sort out relative quality before the bowl games begin.  To address this, college football ranks its teams by polling coaches, media members and through a computer formula.  This is understandable, as they need some way to differentiate teams.  However, college football also decided that this hierarchy should be biased in favor of certain teams- those from the largest schools with the largest media markets.  And we accept it. Would fans tolerate an NFL game where the referees would only call penalties on the visiting team?  What about a MLB game where one team used aluminum bats and the other wood?  (Yes, we have the DH rule, but that's for another rant)  We've all heard sportscasters say "that's why they play the game"- the idea that, at the start of the game, each team has an equal chance of winning.  You don't know what's going to happen on the field.  How can fans place any credibility in a sport that slants the rules against certain teams? 

A playoff system would not completely solve college football's credibility problem.  With so many teams, you would still need a ranking system to figure out which teams participate in the playoff games, and there would always be an argument about who gets in and who's left out.   But whether you have a four or eight team playoff, the best clubs in the country would match up on the field, not in a formula- and I think that's all we need. A coach should be able to stand in front of his team at the beginning of the season and tell them "Win all your games and you'll have the chance to play for the title."  Chris Petersen, the coach of the Boise State Broncos, can't do that.  Until he can, I don't know how I could bring myself to care about college football again*.

* I might make an exception if the Huskies someday field a great team again.

Looking out the window

As you may or may not know, I live in an entirely urban environment.  From my condo's living room, I can see a fairly good-sized swath of the area just north of Seattle's downtown core.  Tonight, the only traffic on those streets consists of Metro buses and a street sweeper.  One solitary, deliberate street sweeper.

I haven't worked very many different jobs in my life, so my experience is limited, but it sure seems like operating a street sweeper would be one of the most frustrating jobs you could land.  Every night, you get to drive around mostly empty city streets at speeds only slightly faster than your average Segway.  These streets are filled with traffic during the day, but at night, no one's around to impede your progress.  Yet there you are, moving at 10 mph, restrained by nothing but your sense of duty.

Maybe you could listen to music the whole time, or recorded books?  Oops- probably not. Earplugs are the order of the day with all the brushes and vacuums operating around you.  I think I would go nuts. 

I would have to overcompensate for all of this exaggerated octegenarian driving during my free time, and that would probably lead to a pile of speeding tickets.  Not such a pleasant outcome.  And just to twist the knife a little more, my street sweeper salary probably wouldn't cover a car truly worthy of heaps of speeding tickets.

So, I suppose I should be more appreciative of the job I have :)

Election 2010

Watching the national election results roll in on Tuesday night, two things became apparent to me.

1) Republican and Tea Party gains in this election are a result of voter frustration with national politicians, not frustration with Democrats in particular.  Republicans are correct that voters indicated a desire for change in Washington DC, but are misguided in claiming that voters think the Republican party, as a group, is the right choice.  Americans voted against Democrats, not for Republicans.  Tea Party victories are evidence of this.

2) If the Republicans want to regain control of the executive and legislative branches in 2012, perhaps their best strategy is to just use delay tactics for two years and let 2012 hinge on economic developments- in short, to do nothing.  Results of the 2012 elections will depend heavily on what happens to America's economic situation over the next two years.  If the economy recovers, Republicans can point to their election in 2010 as the catalyst for this improvement, even if they didn't successfully pass any significant legislation.  If the economy does not recover, Republicans can blame it on Democratic policies established in Obama's first two years.  Either way, the Republican party would look good compared to Democrats in 2012.

Combining these two ideas, the real winners of the 2010 election are the Tea Party candidates.  They were elected due to voter frustration with the current set of available politicians.  I expect those politicians will continue to spend their time placing party priorities above public good and above their own principles.  This should be particularly easy with the House and Senate controlled by different parties.  If the elected Tea Party members and potential future candidates continue to vocally place principle above party, and refuse to align with Republicans in some areas, voters will notice, and we'll see the Tea Party representation grow going forward.