College football fans only have to wait one more year for the playoff they have screamed for to arrive. This will be the final year of the much-maligned Bowl Championship Series.
The college football season has always been like the favorite friend or family member. You know what I'm talking about: always the life of the party, captivating and able to provide endless entertainment.
On the other hand, the BCS has been that friend or family member you dread showing up at a party, wedding or important event—the friend or family member that you know is going to do something embarrassing or stupid, end up in the ER, or say something offensive.
As great as the college football regular season normally is for providing great memories or exciting games, the BCS has given us several big-game letdowns. Last year's title game, match-up mishaps West Virginia dropping 70 points on Clemson and teams getting left out of the BCS (like Auburn getting snubbed in 2004) all come to mind.
But the hated BCS system won't be around long enough to reach voting age.
A four-team playoff that fans and sports writers have begged for over the last few years will replace the BCS. Of course, we'll all love the playoff system until the fifth team in the nation—with a similar or same record as the fourth-place team—gets snubbed.
The love will be gone when a one-loss team jumps an undefeated team to reach the playoff. Then, the demand will come for more teams to be added to the playoff format.
That is how the NCAA Basketball Tournament expanded over the years.
It is easy to beat up on the BCS, but it has done some very good things for college football.
Boise State burst on to the national scene in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl. The team, which plays on the so-called "Smurf Turf," got the chance to play and beat one of college football's most storied teams, Oklahoma.
The Broncos busting the BCS led to TCU making a breakthrough that culminated with a win over Wisconsin in the 2011 Rose Bowl. The Horned Frogs were the first team from a non-automatic-qualifying conference (SEC, Big Ten, Big East, ACC, Big-12 and Pac-12) to ever play in the Rose Bowl.
TCU went on to be the eighth undefeated team in the BCS era not to win a national title.
The BCS's lasting legacy might be the SEC's dominance of the system's final years. In this final year of the BCS, the SEC will look to win its eighth-straight national championship.
A playoff might make it easier for some other conference to knock off the SEC, but it could also make it easier for the SEC to pull off the 2011-12 title game over and over again. How mad would the rest of the country get if they had to watch variations of LSU versus Alabama repeatedly?
Watch for the 2013 JFP College Football Issue next week.
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