Preview 2008 -
Experts Roundtable
Part Eleven - How Much Do You Care
About the Non-BCSers?
CFN is honored to once again get the thoughts and opinions on some of the hot
topics from some of the most talented, influential insiders in the
college football media, while getting to know a little bit more about
them.
Along with
Pete
Fiutak
and
Richard Cirminiello
from CFN in the
discussion are ...
- Charles Davis, NFL Network/FOX Sports
- Dennis Dodd, CBSSports.com
- College Football Columnist
- Bruce Feldman,
ESPN.com -
College Football Columnist
- Steve Greenberg, The
Sporting News -
College Football Columnist
- Teddy "Mr. Media" Greenstein, Chicago Tribune - College
Football Columnist, Media Columnist
- Stewart Mandel, SI.com -
College Football Columnist
THE TOPICS
- Part
1 What aspect of
college football should you care about, but really don't?
- Part 2 Should a
two loss LSU team really have won the national title?
- Part 3 How should
college football be more like the NFL?
- Part 4
Your college football
guilty pleasure
- Part 5 How/why did you get into covering college football?
- Part 6 How/why is the BCS better than a playoff?
- Part 7 I'm not buying into ...
- Part 8
Just how bad is the Big Ten?
- Part 9 Do you have any problems with Tim Tebow winning two
Heismans?
- Part 10 Give the 2010 Rankings for: Florida State, Miami,
Michigan, Nebraska & Notre Dame
- Part 11
How much do you care about non-BCS teams?
- Part 12 When
Should Players Be Eligible for the Draft?
- Part 13 The Next Really Big Superpower Will Be ...
- Part 14 The Best & Worst Interviews
You've Ever Done
- Part 15 Quick Hitters, Part 1: Greatest Players & Greatest Games
- Part 16 Quick Hitters, Part 2: The National Champion & Heisman
Winner
11. What percentage of your
mental energy do you use on the non-BCS leagues compared to the BCS
conferences?
Fiu: It
depends on the weekend. Since I handle most of the MAC and Sun Belt
stuff, I’ll care about a really big MAC battle over a non-descript Pac
10 or ACC game, but it had better be a monster MAC game. Overall I’d say
I focus on the non-BCSers about 25% of the time, which, judging by the
numbers, is about 24% more than most of the CFN readers.
Teddy
Greenstein:
Is
this a trick question because Notre Dame is 90 miles outside Chicago?
I'd say I'm about 98 percent BCS, unless Garrett Wolfe has a faster,
younger brother who shows up on the Northern Illinois sidelines.
Bruce Feldman: Probably 20%. I watch whatever games I can on TV
and because I have some contacts at non-BCS conference schools, I feel
like I stay pretty plugged in to a bunch of them, but to say I write
more than 20 percent about them would be a big stretch.
Charles Davis: Probably 30% on non-BCS conferences
Steve Greenberg:
5%
Dennis Dodd: Probably 25 percent which, I think, is high when
compared to my peers. The structure of the beat and the game itself
forces you to concentrate on the Big Six conferences. There are always
good stories elsewhere but when it comes down to profiling that big
TCU-BYU game, there are about five or 10 of those in BCS conferences
that mean more.
I always have a soft
spot, though, for the non-BCS teams. They are so far behind in terms of
budget, recruiting and exposure that anything they can do is remarkable.
I remember seeing Karl Benson in the press box seconds after Boise State
beat Oklahoma. I just happened to be wearing a WAC hat because it was
raining that day when I left the house for my flight. He practically
hugged me. He knew that I knew what he and the conference had been
through: The conference almost folding when the Mountain West was
formed.
Richard Cirminiello: Probably about 10-15%. Anything more is
career suicide. That said, I do have a healthy respect and appreciation
for the Conference USAs and Mountain Wests of the world, especially when
they harbor a couple of kids with NFL potential. Unless it’s the Sun
Belt, you can find some very entertaining and wide-open football, even
if the SEC or Big 12 isn’t involved.
Stewart Mandel: Not very much. My obligation is to my readers,
and they are overwhelmingly more interested in the BCS conferences, as
evidenced by both my inbox and by the lack of page views on those
occasions I do write about a non-BCS team. This is not to say I ignore
the elite teams like BYU, Boise State, etc. I would not be keeping
people properly informed if I did. But I can't honestly say I follow the
three through nine teams in the Mountain West the way I might the SEC or
Big Ten.
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