A new "National Champion"

"Settle it on the field."

"That's why they play the game."

Can I think of any more cliches to mock the BCS system?

Monday night was a perfect example of why a playoff format in D-1 football is needed.

I despise the BCS system, so I couldn't be more thrilled with Alabama's victory total domination over LSU in ESPN's hyperbolic "Game of the Century" (gimme a break!).

Even though both teams prepared for this game for 40+ days, LSU looked like they didn't even belong in the "national championship" game. 

Forty days?  Say, you could squeeze a lot of playoff football into 40 days... but somehow a playoff system would make the season too long for the student athlete - that's NCAA's official position.  Even though the FCS finds a way to make it work just fine and to great effect.

But I digress.

Doesn't it make you wonder how fantastic D-1 college football could be using a playoff format?  Wouldn't it have been fun to see Boise State and Oklahoma State and Stanford and Oregon and Arkansas all in the mix?  Who knows what would've happened!

I've heard it argued that a playoff system would render the regular season meaningless.  And I've still yet to understand why.

I've heard it argued that a playoff system would interfere with the conference championship games.

Why is a conference championship even necessary?

Shouldn't the regular season be used to determine a conference champion?  (and suddenly, the regular season is no longer useless!).  Why must there be an extra game played to determine a conference champion after an entire regular season has been played?

And if a conference is truly that big, it needs to be downsized.

Long story short, BCS football needs to be entirely revamped.  Teams are leaving and joining conferences left and right attempting to jockey for position in a major BCS game.  A sweeping facelift is needed for the sport.

I'm not saying eliminate the bowl season.  You can still have your crappy teams with losing records play in the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowls and Famous Idaho Potato Bowls and New Era Pinstripe Bowls. 

But if you want to crown a legitimate, deserving "national champion," let it be settled on the field in a national playoff format.  Not by a computer deciding who should play who for all the marbles.

Football doesn't - and shouldn't - work that way.