Dear TCU,
Ye valiant BCS challengers, once again on the brink of a possible appearance in the National Championship game. You have achieved heights in the last few years that few, if any, college programs have over the same time period. Your achievements are in the company of Alabama, Boise State, and possibly no others. Even Florida and Texas have faltered this season, while you have gone undefeated . . . again.
But news has broken this morning that you are moving to a conference that has worse football teams, horrible travel arrangements, basketball squads with whom you can't compete, and baseball squads who can't compete against you. Yet, they have one thing that you do not enjoy: an automatic BCS bid. One that will likely go to Connecticut this season, who is 7-4 and unranked.
How could you?
How could you put that kind of travel strain on your student athletes over a bid that you already get? It is 869 miles to the nearest school in your conference: Louisville. How do you expect your athletes whose intelligence is not subsidized by the school to deal with that kind of travel while attempting to keep up with their studies? The answer is clear: you don't.
How could you possibly think that playing a worse schedule will enhance your championship game chances? Only one team in their conference is ranked (West Virginia - 23rd), while two teams in yours are ahead of them. Do you really think that the experts are going to say, "Well, they beat Rutgers on the road this season . . ." Do you know who beat Rutgers on the road this season? Tulane.
How could you deny your fans the chance to develop natural rivalries, and to travel to road games? No, Mountain West rivals aren't exactly next door, but the Big East plays a brutal 18 game schedule in basketball, meaning two fewer chances to schedule neighbors like SMU, Texas, etc. And conference championships? In the 2010-2011 academic year, the Big East will hold two conference championships south of the Mason-Dixon line: baseball and golf. Do you think that a bunch of Texans are really gearing up to visit places like Jamesville, NY and Storrs, CT when it's cold outside?
But most of all, how could you sell out your image as the BCS-busting squad that people love to complain about, but secretly support? The team that BCS schools love to claim isn't good enough, but hate to play? The team that embraces the American ideal that if you work hard enough, eventually you will bust through that glass ceiling, because anything is possible in America? The underdog.
If this morning's report is true, then it is with a heavy heart that I request the next stop on the TCU bus. I must get off.
Go Ducks,
Barry
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