Gordon Gee Is An Idiot And A Traitor

Is anyone shocked that the president of Ohio State University doesn’t really want to change the current BCS bowl system in college football? That’s the same system that got his university into the national title game in 2007 and made like $10 million for the Big Ten because it got Illinois into the Rose Bowl. He’d have to be a complete idiot to rag that system.

Expecting E. Gordon Gee to say the BCS should try to give the little guys a shot is like expecting President Obama and Sarah Palin to say, “You know, we really need a viable third party in this country.”

And yet, of course, that’s the point. Those in power are not going to cede it easily or quietly.

E. Gordon Gee, Obama, and Palin could give two shits if they’re directly responsible for the ills plaguing this country. They have positions of status and power (university president, actual president, reality star/village idiot), and all of us would say and do exactly what they’re doing to keep it, were we in their position.

And we’d do it even if what we were saying didn’t make sense, which Gee’s arguments do not.

Gee criticized TCU and Boise State for playing the “little sisters of the poor” every week. He forgot Ohio State plays them every year too. To wit: Ohio State has played Marshall, Ohio, Eastern Michigan, Purdue, Indiana, and Minnesota in 2010. Quality teams, all, I’m sure.

Ohio State has also availed themselves of playoffs in virtually every other sport for which they have a varsity team. It was, after all, the same Ohio State University in the basketball title game a few months before the football title game loss to LSU.

This isn’t about Boise State or TCU and their schedules at all. It’s about the money, stupid.

Wouldn’t it be nice if our politicians just admitted they were whores for money and that they didn’t give a crap who knew it or where it came from? It’s the profit motive in its purest form. Adam Smith, baby.

The difference between politicians and E. Gordon Gee, however, is that politicians need us to like them. We can all tell politicians are just playing out the kabuki theater of running for office. We know what they’re going to say before it’s said, and we already know whether we agree or not. They just want your donations, thank you. And when they get to Washington or the state capitol or whatever, they’ll be open for business again.

The BCS, and all the university presidents and athletic directors that come with it, are different. They could care less about being popular with anyone because they don’t have to be to get their hands on a shit-ton of money.

So, in a way, Gee’s admission that he prefers the current system because it got his university into the title game in 2007 is rather refreshing.

But not really. We get the red herring argument first about Boise State’s schedule. The “sisters of the poor” and all that. It’s not even worth disproving, really, because we all know it’s the football version of the same things politicians are saying to us.

“It’s the schedule” is the new “It’s the high taxes,” “It’s the immigrants,” “It’s the deficit,” It’s the Republicans,” or “It’s Bill Clinton.” Arguing about scheduling weaknesses is like differentiating between Democrats and Republicans. It’s there to distract you from the actual systematic problems. A playoff in college football makes everyone’s schedule stronger because they have to prove it on the field.

Same thing with the BCS, only since it involves money, it’s going to take a little revolucion from everyone who isn’t a power-holder in the BCS sweepstakes.

Hopefully, E. Gordon Gee’s comments are the “let them eat cake” of college football. It’s time for a playoff in college football because the old system is elitist and exclusionary. And since the country, for some reason, doesn’t feel like fixing that system in Washington D.C., we might as well do it somewhere we actually care about like college football.

Everyone, even Auburn and Oregon fans, should root their asses off for Alabama and Arizona. And maybe that’s asking a little too much, but everyone who isn’t a direct fan of those two schools definitely has a rooting interest in those games now.

Let’s be clear. The BCS and the major universities do not care at all about equality, sharing the money, the players or the fans. We, the fans, care more about college football than anyone, and yet we’re all wondering what it is we can actually DO to make it better.

And not to end this on a melancholy note, but I have no idea either. An Ohio State fan revolt against E. Gordon Gee might be a good start. What a dick.

Oh, and Gee did his undergrad work at, wait for it, UTAH. So he’s a traitor and a dick.