Debate Part II- Fairness

Today, I thought about writing about the World Cup…but I don’t have the energy. Then I thought I’d write about baseball…and decided that would put me to sleep. So, I’m going to do a Des Moines Sports Freaks first (I think).

Yesterday, Blake wrote about a great topic…what championship event is the best? He listed out seven events:  College World Series, NBA Finals, March Madness, the Bowl Series, the Superbowl, the Stanley Cup, and the World Series. There are so many factors about this to consider that you could write every day for two weeks about it and still not be halfway done. So, welcome to round II, Earp-style.

The route I’m going to take is fairness in getting to the playoffs. Not just by how teams are picked, chosen, or seeded, but also how teams are judged, coached, ref’d, and ump’d. Once again, I don’t claim to be impartial, but i’ll try my best (part of that impartialness is me discluding the College World Series…we might have Brock write a guest spot on that one, but to be completely fair and honest, I know nothing about it, and won’t pretend to).

6.  NCAA Bowl Championship Series- This one should be obvious. When you don’t have a playoff and are completely seeded by a popularity vote, you cannot really call this fair. There are many factors that go into how these teams are picked, and none of them are by record. Coaches, writers, and computers, as Blake said…but also the what conference the school is in, the tradition of the school, and how the fans travel hold a large part in the invitation process. A bowl could be chosing between a school with a 7-4 record and a school with a 8-3 record. Common sense says take the school with the better record. But lets say the 7-5 team is the Iowa Hawkeyes, and the 9-3 team is Troy. What team do you think is going to get picked? Definitely not Troy. I’m not saying I don’t disagree…but this is about fairness (just ask Boise State and TCU).

5. March Madness- One college system is followed by another. The seeding of the then 65 team tournament attempts to go by rank and record, but even then, the smaller schools seem to get the shaft. Case and point? The University of Northern Iowa. Now granted, they ended up doing alright for themselves by beating Kansas in the second round to reach the Sweet Sixteen…but their road should have been easier. I know strength of schedule has to come into it as well, but come on, how does a team go 27-4 and get a 9-seed? Does that honestly make sense? Does that honestly sound fair?

4. NBA Playoffs- Now we get into the professional side of things. I think the seeding here works just fine. Why is that? Because it goes by record. Cut and dry. No voting. No favoritism. No jacked up strength of schedule. Just which team has a better record than another. But, the refereeing in the NBA Finals is never good, and is the worst officiating in any professional sport. There is a foul on EVERY PLAY (guaranteed), but if you called everything, the game would never be over. I get that. But that leaves too much room to decide which fouls you want to call, and which fouls you should leave alone. That is too much power for three people to have. I’m not saying it is always abused, but trust me, the fans at home know. If you have a twitter account and were following Celtics and Lakers fans, each one was more pissed than the other at the calls/lack of calls their team was getting. Because there are fouls on every play, NBA referees have the ability to affect the outcome of the game almost more than any other sport.

3. Superbowl/NFL playoffs- Let it be known, football is my favorite sport to watch and follow. Whether it is college or pro, it is the new America’s pasttime. That being said, just like the NBA playoffs, the referees hold the key to the game because there is a penalty on just about every play. I like the wildcard, it somewhat makes sense, but the two divisions are so off kilter that a 10-6 team in the NFC, who easily gets in, may not even make the playoffs in the AFC. That is pretty rediculous, but you can’t really change that. It is mainly the refereeing (sidebar- I do not like the idea of a cold weather superbowl; that would make this even more unfair in my opinion, because the elements would play too much of a factor; I know open the comments back to my thrashing…)

2. World Series- Each series is a ‘best of’ series, which is about as fair as you can get. There is a simple wild card process to determine…well, the wild card…for each league. There is always going to be arguements with balls and strikes, and there will always be some atypical events that occur (see Galarraga and Joyce, 2 June 2010), but overall, the system makes sense. Each team in the playoffs is seeded according to their record, and has to get to the World Series in the same way as the next. It makes sense to me. But, with the judgement calls of the umps, and the fact their isn’t instant replay for all instances (and there shouldn’t be either) makes this a close second to the ‘fairest’ system of them all…

1. Stanley Cup- Seeded by record? Check. Instant replay? Check. Penalties called more often than any other sport? Check. Seemingly impartial referees? Check. Most deserving teams? Check. Best playoff format 2-2-1-1-1? Check. This has it all. The only thing it doesn’t have at this time is my full attention. After this past year’s Stanley Cup Finals though, I fully intend on paying more attention to hockey. It is the most exciting sport to watch, with the most non-stop action.

(last thought- Go USA! Kick the crap out of Algeria! Overcome your seven-time game 3 jinx!)