It's Time to: Fire Tom Hansen
| 18
|
by The Beast
Last week, Pac Ten commissioner Tom Hansen became disturbed with reports that a plus-one playoff model is on the horizon. Hansen, who supports bowl games and opposes a playoff system, told Sporting News that his league will walk away from the BCS if the plus-one playoff model does indeed becomes a reality.
When asked again if he was serious, Hanson barked back saying, "Yes, no question."
What Hansen really wants is a return to the old bowl lineup with the Pac Ten and Big Ten champions playing in the Rose Bowl every single year. If he had his way, the BCS would be done with all together.
This has to be the final straw for Hansen. So far, he has been a disaster as conference commissioner and his latest remarks are a testament to his incompetence as head of the conference. Throughout his tenure, he has been extremely conservative and has failed to adapt to the modern era of college athletics; him being the single most reason why the Pac Ten fails to garner respect nationwide.
First off, Hansen has put together an extremely week bowl lineup. While all the other BCS conferences have at least two teams playing on January 1st, the Pac Ten never has more than one. While conferences such as the Big Ten send their second and third place teams to New Year's Day bowl games like the Capital One Bowl and Outback Bowl, the Pac Ten's second and third place teams play in second-tier bowl games a week earlier. Cal, who was the conference's second place in 2006, was forced to play in the Holiday Bowl on December 27th against Texas A&M, the Big 12's fourth place team. Why is the Pac Ten's second place team playing another conference's fourth place team at 10 P.M. EST. One of their top teams can't even be featured in prime-time versus a top twenty opponent.
The conference's inferior bowl lineup doesn't stop there. Oregon State, a ten win team, played in the Sun Bowl against the Missouri Tigers who were the fifth place team from the Big Twelve. Their bowl lineup is rounded up with the Hawaii Bowl (versus the WAC champion), the Emerald Bowl (versus the 7th place ACC team), and the Las Vegas Bowl (versus a team Mountain West Conference). The time slots for these bowl games are usually 10 P.M. EST.
If Hansen wants people to respect the level of play in the Pac Ten, then the bowl lineup must improve. College football fans want to see Arizona State and Oregon play teams from the ACC or the SEC. They don't care about watching them play a team from the WAC or the Mountain West Conference just before midnight.
Hansen has also organized the worst television contract in the history of college sports. Currently the majority of the Pac Ten's football and basketball games appear on Fox Sports Net. During an interview with ESPN Radio's Colin Cowheard, Hansen said that placing the games on FSN was no problem because it was a national network. National network? Fox Sports Net rationalizes all of its telecasts. The sixty-six year old retiree in Bacon Raton, Florida, gets Florida based teams on FSN. Each state or region has their own version of Fox Sports Net, FSN West, FSN Arizona, FSN Northwest, FSN Ohio, FSN Midwest, etc. So when California plays host to Washington State on Fox Sports Net, only the people living on the West Coast can view the game. Hansen was under the impression that anyone could see the game because it was a national network. Shouldn't the conference commissioner know how his teams' games are being aired on television.
If Hansen wants more people to see the conference's teams, than do what all of the other conferences do; allow ESPN to televise their games. Isn't that obvious. The kid in upper Manhattan watches the same game on ESPN that I do. So if the Pac Ten played games on ESPN at 3 P.M. EST, than the entire country would be able to view the telecast.
Because of his unwillingness to market the Pac Ten, conference teams have suffered. In 2000, Washington emerged victorious over the same Miami (Fl.) team that defeated Florida State. The Seminoles were the ones who got placed in the BCS title game. Maybe the Huskies would have beaten Oklahoma, and a National Championship trophy would reside in Seattle and not Norman, Oklahoma. The conference got shafted once again in 2001, as Oregon was denied a trip to the BCS title game. Nebraska, who failed to appear in it Conference title game, much less win the conference title, got the national title bid. In 2003, USC got denied a trip to face Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl despite being ranked number in both the AP and coaches poll. In 2004, California's only loss was by six points on the road to the future national champions. A six point loss was pretty good, considering the fact that the second place Oklahoma Sooners lost by thirty-six points to USC. Instead of playing in the Rose Bowl against the Big Ten Champions Cal played in the Holiday Bowl against a fourth place Big Twelve team. In 2005, Oregon had only one loss at the hands of the number one ranked team, but like many other Pac Ten teams they were also denied a trip to a BCS party.
The list of Pac Ten teams getting shut out of the BCS is no coincidence. Hansen has failed to adjust to the new era of college football, where teams play on national television, appear in magazines, grace the cover of video game, etc. His inability to market the conference nationwide is the single most reason why the majority of college football fans don't know much of anything about the players, coaches, and teams of the Pac Ten. His latest remarks regarding a plus-one system show how conservative the commissioner is. I
love the traditional Rose Bowl, but how can you deny teams like USC and Cal the opportunity to play for the national championship. If the Pac Ten truly wishes to become known nationwide as the self-dubbed "conference of champions" than it must be ready to fire Tom Hansen.
