So, basically over half of the division one schools, if not more, are out of the running before the season even starts, because their schedule is viewed as not tough enough, because they're not part of a top 5 conference? Seems a somewhat loaded system.
Yes, it is. Teams from the lesser conferences survive because they get paid huge sums of money to travel to better teams' home fields to give the major conference teams a break from their conference schedule. They then use that money to fund their entire athletic departments. The argument is that if a minor conference team wants a shot at a national title, they should move to a major conference or at least play upper tier major conference teams in all of their out of conference games. The problem is that both of those things are harder to do than they sound. Boise State is the best example, because they play good football but wouldn't bring any revenue to a major conference, so they can't join one. And since they play good football, premier major conference schools don't want to schedule them out of conference. But passing over a quality major conference team to let Boise in one of only two or four spots in a national playoff isn't really a good solution either. Thus the push towards a smaller top division.
And I imagine that if one of the 5 conferences is having a crap year in general, the team that wins the conference is unlikely to get marked down for not having enough hard games.
That's actually not true. Nominally, there are six power conferences, but the Big East is so bad year in and year out that they aren't really considered when it comes time to pick championship game participants. The other power conferences would also need to be really down before the ACC could get its champion in the title game. The Big Ten's poor performance in past title games has -- fairly or unfairly -- devalued their champion a bit. With only two spots available and months to debate, every angle is covered.
You can only beat the teams put in front of you
But teams pick their conferences and make their own out of conference schedules, so they decide which teams are put in front of them. They can't necessarily dictate their conference affiliation, but especially in the current climate if they're truly dedicated to moving up the spots are available. Out of conference schedules are also limited to teams with common unfilled off dates, but it's not hard to tell the teams that are trying to schedule up in their out of conference slate as opposed to those who aren't.
If undefeated small conference school played undefeated, #1 ranked, big conference school in the last week of the regular season, and won, which one would be more likely to get an invite to the championship game?
The smaller school, though neither would be very likely. For the major conference school, that kind of loss that late in the season would be a season killer. For the minor conference school, it would jump it to the top of the also-rans -- provided they were undefeated -- so if there weren't two other legitimate contenders, it would probably get a shot. There would usually be two other legitimate contenders though.
And also to make lots of money. With the system you've got, with so many teams participating, and only 10 or 11 games/season, I don't see much point trying to determine an overall winner. Beat your rivals, win your conference, those are actually meaningful goals, making/winning the championship game, having the #1 ranking seems very contrived, very subjective, mostly just a cash-grab. But that's just me.
No, it's not just you. The money is the primary motivator. But as I've tried to explain, the current, money-driven system is still much better than what we had before. You're also correct in observing that most fans care most about winning the games that are determined only on the field. For me, for example, as an Alabama fan I consider any year when we win our division -- the SEC West -- to be a successful year. When we do that, we get to play the SEC East champion for the SEC title, but the SEC East champion isn't always necessarily the SEC East team that's playing the best ball at the end of the year, or the SEC East team that matches up best against us, so that can be unsatisfying. When we win the SEC title game we're pretty much guaranteed a spot in the national title game, but our opponent there faces the same problems as the SEC East representative in the SEC title game, only more so. But still, it's better than not playing it at all.
You left out soccer, btw. Every team plays every other team twice, and whoever has the most points gets the championship, no post-season required. The exceptions are the US & Aussie leagues, because we expect a postseason/finals from soccer since all our major sports have one.
True, but with the number of games in a college football season requiring a home-and-home for every set of opponents would result in very very small conferences. And that same argument about every other sport's postseason has crept into college football as well. College football is hands down the best sport in the land, but its fans look at the other sports and say "See? Look how they've devalued their regular seasons. We should get in on that." It makes me sad.
I actually find the whole college sports thing very weird, particularly for the big market stuff. You have a bunch of elite, essentially professional athletes working their butts off, helping make a heap of money for the teams/schools they play for. While not being paid a cent themselves, and actually being prohibited from making money from any source from their efforts. There's no other league that size where the players get anything close to 0% of revenue.
It's the elephant in the room, especially as the schools and conferences have abandoned any pretense of integrity as they scramble around for the best media deals in the current climate of realignment. Just this week the Big Ten proclaimed they'd rather abandon the sport than share any of their revenue with the people who labor to produce it. It's an obvious bluff, but it illustrates how reluctant the owners are to share their profits. Paying the players would kill the sport as we know it so I'd hate to see it, but morally there's no way to justify the current system.
I am still very much prop sized, my knees object to jogging. Walking is fine, sprinting is fine, I'll happily pedal for fitness, but jogging 5km is not happening. Hockey works well.
I just run on a treadmill. It has a lot more give than the ground so it doesn't bother my joints much. It is nice when I get to go out and run on the ground like a kid, but it's not something I'd do regularly. Pedaling has never worked for me. It's nice if I want to read a book, but it doesn't seem to help me maintain a weight . . .
