(06-05-2020 12:12 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  What is with "Pods" .... they don't work, and you can't find an AD or coach who likes them, or fans who understand them. It's a solution in search of a problem.

There has been one instance of pods in 1-A/FBS history, so you're argument isn't very strong. I can easily say 16-team conferences don't work either—see Big East and WAC—but that doesn't stop everyone from trying to cobble together four 16-team conferences.

Pods didn't work for the WAC because there was no good way to split the teams up. They would absolutely help the ACC get closer to maximizing their schedule and allow teams to see each other more often. It seems they're the next best thing to getting rid of divisions, which don't work well for maximizing the ACC's schedule.

(06-05-2020 12:12 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  What is with "Pods" .... they don't work, and you can't find an AD or coach who likes them, or fans who understand them. It's a solution in search of a problem.

The advantage of pods is if the NCAA/P5s still requires divisional round robin play conferences can rotate pods/quads in the case of 16 team conferences so teams can play each other once in a while.

An example would be SEC+Oklahoma+Texas

Pod A: Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Florida
Pod B: LSU, Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma
Pod C: Kentucky, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, South Carolina
Pod D: Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi, Mississippi State

Two seasons one division is Pods A/D and the other is B/C, the next two they are A/C and B/D, the next two are A/B and C/D (although that's going to be really lopsided).

If you wanted to balance the pods,

Alabama: Alabama, Auburn, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
Georgia: Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, South Carolina
LSU: LSU, Texas A&M, Mississippi, Mississippi State
Oklahoma: Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri

The problem here is Texas-Texas A&M and Georgia-Auburn don't play every year (although Alabama-Tennessee and Georgia-South Carolina would).

The alternate is permanent East/West divisions (Pods A and C would be East and B and D would be West) where Alabama and LSU (among others) are in opposite divisions and if you keep an 8 game schedule you can't have permanent rivals and you would play teams in the opposite divisions an average of once every 8 years.

Once again, a reason to dump the "division" rule.

(06-05-2020 01:21 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(06-05-2020 12:12 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  What is with "Pods" .... they don't work, and you can't find an AD or coach who likes them, or fans who understand them. It's a solution in search of a problem.

There has been one instance of pods in 1-A/FBS history, so you're argument isn't very strong. I can easily say 16-team conferences don't work either—see Big East and WAC—but that doesn't stop everyone from trying to cobble together four 16-team conferences.

Pods didn't work for the WAC because there was no good way to split the teams up. They would absolutely help the ACC get closer to maximizing their schedule and allow teams to see each other more often. It seems they're the next best thing to getting rid of divisions, which don't work well for maximizing the ACC's schedule.

Your argument is like "real socialism hasn't been tried."

The concept of "shadow" divisions, which is what you are proposing for ACC scheduling, and which actually is in effect in SEC Basketball, is not the same as pods. Similar concepts such as the daisy chain (used by the Big Sky), plus designated rivals are used for scheduling. But these too are not pods.

The problem with pods is that they often have schools "at the boundaries" who find the schools in the next pod over more a rival than some of those in their pod.

Sure for UNC the pod is obvious, Duke, NC State and Wake. But is Clemson really more a rival with Miami and Florida State than with the North Carolina schools? Is Virginia more a rival with Louisville than the North Carolina schools? Is BC a rival with anyone other than maybe Notre Dame? No matter how you break it up, there will be unhappy people.

This happens with Divisions. In the SEC Auburn is not happy being in the West as they feel schools like Georgia, Florida, South Carolina and Tennessee are more rivals than the likes of Texas A&M, Arkansas and LSU. The Pac-12 wound up making big concessions to the 4 California schools, so that they always play each other, making 2 guaranteed crossover games, plus the Notre Dame schedule exception for Stanford and USC. The other 8 schools literally get 1/3rd less access to California held games. In effect this is a "shadow pod." And quite frankly that California "shadow pod" is what you and UNC want.

Fans need something simple and straight forward, which is why every conference, except the ACC has gone to geographic Divisions. The B1G tried something like the ACC and it failed. The WAC tried pods and that simply broke up rivalries. Nobody wanted to switch the lineups. Rotation was fatal to the conference. The examples are not many, but the results are clear, they don't work.

Stick to a shadow pod like the P12 California for the NC schools, and leave it at that.

If it happens, I think they will definately cherry pick the G5. I agree many of the AAC teams will get an invite, I am not sure all teams get the invite. Same for the MWC. I do think Army, Navy and Air Force will be in the allotment. Also, BYU, ND and here is a surprise, Liberty may have more of a shot than people realize. They actually have more money than some P5 schools. It would be fun to watch all this unfold.

(06-05-2020 01:21 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(06-05-2020 12:12 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  What is with "Pods" .... they don't work, and you can't find an AD or coach who likes them, or fans who understand them. It's a solution in search of a problem.

There has been one instance of pods in 1-A/FBS history, so you're argument isn't very strong. I can easily say 16-team conferences don't work either—see Big East and WAC—but that doesn't stop everyone from trying to cobble together four 16-team conferences.

But "everyone" trying to cobble together four 16-team conferences is not an argument that 16-team conferences are workable, it's an argument that the kind of people that like organizing nice, neat, symmetric systems willingly ignore the fact that every expansion of a two division conference past twelve is at a cost which the expansion must first match with new net benefit before there's actually a net gain to the whole process.

Also "pods" covers two different type of "cyclical divisions" ... the four pod / three cycle where you work through every combination, and the four group / two cycle where you have two anchor groups and two middle groups that swap between the anchor groups. In those ones, the "out of division" games are always anchor/anchor and middle/middle, because otherwise they never play each other.

Quote: Pods didn't work for the WAC because there was no good way to split the teams up.

There generally won't be with three way rotation pods, because everything has to be symmetric in service to the rotation.

But still, the better solution is to have three divisions, smaller, so more cross-division games, and a semi-final / final CCG series with division champions and one wild card.

It's not perfect, of course ... because there's always a cost in conference cohesion and depth of conference brand identification when a conference expands past twelve ... and with three cross-division games, up to one half of any given division can have one locked games located in one of the other two divisions.

But suppose four more schools to the ACC. I guess this is a kind of "Big Ten and SEC gut the Big East" kind of scenario, where the later expiration of the media rights lockdown actually works to save the ACC from being gutted, so the P5 breakaway which is supposed to be triggered by COVID-19 in the OP is actually triggered by the gutting of the Big12.

And now the breakaway says "semifinal/final CCG series? no problem", and 3x6 divisions are on. Let's give the ACC their fondest wish and the breakaway forces schools into a conference to participate in the new CFP, and ND opts for the Eastern Exposure:

So South: Miami, FSU, Georgia Tech, Clemson, North Carolina, Duke; Central: North Carolina State, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, Virginia, Louisville, [?UC]
North: BC, Syracuse, Pitt, [ND], [?UConn], [Navy-FB-only/charged to ND]

Nah, one look at that, and the Carolina Quad says, "hey, since UC and Louisville are out there on an island anyway ..."

South: Miami, FSU, Georgia Tech, Clemson, Louisville, UC;
Central: North Carolina, Duke, North Carolina State, Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, Virginia;
North: ND, BC, Syracuse, Pitt, UConn, Navy

(06-05-2020 12:12 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  What is with "Pods" .... they don't work, and you can't find an AD or coach who likes them, or fans who understand them. It's a solution in search of a problem.

The problems are playing all your rivals and seeing everyone in the conference more than 2 times a century.

I agree that KISS is best and pods are the anti-thesis of KISS.

I'm just demonstrating that you can do something complicated like pods or do what many of these posters are suggesting that makes pods look simple.

And eliminating divisions entirely means people in back rooms smoking cigars break the many ties that will happen instead of it being decided on the field.

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  The concept of "shadow" divisions, which is what you are proposing for ACC scheduling, and which actually is in effect in SEC Basketball, is not the same as pods. Similar concepts such as the daisy chain (used by the Big Sky), plus designated rivals are used for scheduling. But these too are not pods.

In what regard? The subgroups/pods or the division-less alignment?

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Sure for UNC the pod is obvious, Duke, NC State and Wake. But is Clemson really more a rival with Miami and Florida State than with the North Carolina schools? Is Virginia more a rival with Louisville than the North Carolina schools? Is BC a rival with anyone other than maybe Notre Dame? No matter how you break it up, there will be unhappy people.

They are broken up geographically, and the teams can cycle through the conference much quicker than divisions. So Louisville will see opponents much more often than now. Clemson would see the all NC schools much more often than now. This is a plus. Miami-Clemson is a better TV game than NC State-Clemson because Miami is one of the best brands in college football and Clemson is one of the hottest programs.

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Fans need something simple and straight forward, which is why every conference, except the ACC has gone to geographic Divisions. The B1G tried something like the ACC and it failed. The WAC tried pods and that simply broke up rivalries. Nobody wanted to switch the lineups. Rotation was fatal to the conference. The examples are not many, but the results are clear, they don't work.

Stick to a shadow pod like the P12 California for the NC schools, and leave it at that.

Fans need to be told what is going on, hence the easy to remember pod/quad/whatever you want to call them names. I think you underestimate people.

The Big Ten failed because they can easily have geographical divisions, and for some reason they wanted to confuse the hell out of everyone. The ACC doesn't work that way, for a number of reasons we've tirelessly pointed out..

There is no NCAA legislation allowing semi-final games. There will not be such legislation ever from the NCAA.
In this environment regarding player compensation, a breakaway P5 would still not do it.

(06-05-2020 04:36 PM)BruceMcF Wrote:  But "everyone" trying to cobble together four 16-team conferences is not an argument that 16-team conferences are workable, it's an argument that the kind of people that like organizing nice, neat, symmetric systems willingly ignore the fact that every expansion of a two division conference past twelve is at a cost which the expansion must first match with new net benefit before there's actually a net gain to the whole process.

I never said it was. It's been a complete failure because for the exact reasons you mentioned.

(06-05-2020 05:10 PM)esayem Wrote:  

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  The concept of "shadow" divisions, which is what you are proposing for ACC scheduling, and which actually is in effect in SEC Basketball, is not the same as pods. Similar concepts such as the daisy chain (used by the Big Sky), plus designated rivals are used for scheduling. But these too are not pods.

In what regard? The subgroups/pods or the division-less alignment?

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Sure for UNC the pod is obvious, Duke, NC State and Wake. But is Clemson really more a rival with Miami and Florida State than with the North Carolina schools? Is Virginia more a rival with Louisville than the North Carolina schools? Is BC a rival with anyone other than maybe Notre Dame? No matter how you break it up, there will be unhappy people.

They are broken up geographically, and the teams can cycle through the conference much quicker than divisions. So Louisville will see opponents much more often than now. Clemson would see the all NC schools much more often than now. This is a plus. Miami-Clemson is a better TV game than NC State-Clemson because Miami is one of the best brands in college football and Clemson is one of the hottest programs.

(06-05-2020 03:27 PM)Stugray2 Wrote:  Fans need something simple and straight forward, which is why every conference, except the ACC has gone to geographic Divisions. The B1G tried something like the ACC and it failed. The WAC tried pods and that simply broke up rivalries. Nobody wanted to switch the lineups. Rotation was fatal to the conference. The examples are not many, but the results are clear, they don't work.

Stick to a shadow pod like the P12 California for the NC schools, and leave it at that.

Fans need to be told what is going on, hence the easy to remember pod/quad/whatever you want to call them names. I think you underestimate people.

The Big Ten failed because they can easily have geographical divisions, and for some reason they wanted to confuse the hell out of everyone. The ACC doesn't work that way, for a number of reasons we've tirelessly pointed out..

I think the ACC has shown they want to confuse the hell out of everyone. Why are North Carolina and Florida split, but Virginia and the fartherest north schools not? Their divisions are pretty clearly a failure. They should look at doing something somewhat more geographic.

(06-05-2020 05:16 PM)bullet Wrote:  I think the ACC has shown they want to confuse the hell out of everyone. Why are North Carolina and Florida split, but Virginia and the fartherest north schools not? Their divisions are pretty clearly a failure. They should look at doing something somewhat more geographic.

Exactly why I started the thread "Switching up the ACC's Divisions": https://csnbbs.com/thread-896753.html.

There's another thread in the ACC board as well.

(06-05-2020 05:16 PM)bullet Wrote:  I think the ACC has shown they want to confuse the hell out of everyone. Why are North Carolina and Florida split, but Virginia and the fartherest north schools not? Their divisions are pretty clearly a failure. They should look at doing something somewhat more geographic.

The trouble is that's going to invariably send Cavman north.

ACC North: BC, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Louisville, Virginia, Virginia Tech, NC State
ACC South: Miami, FSU, GT, Clemson, Wake Forest, Duke, UNC

Without looking at a map I think that's a correct N/S alignment, but it probably makes more sense to swap the Hokies and UNC. Duke football can be the sacrificial triangle lamb to the win column of the southern division. They don't really try anyway.

(06-05-2020 12:11 PM)bullet Wrote:  ACC doesn't split as nicely as the SEC where the opposite divisions are in the middle:
South: FSU, Miami, Georgia Tech, Clemson
North Carolina: UNC, NCSU, Wake Forest, Duke
East: Pitt, BC, Syracuse
Central: UVA, VT, Louisville

IMO, just make South+East and NC+Central the two football divisions and be done with it.

...or just do what commands the most TV and guarantees my boys in the CCG:

BC
Syracuse
Pitt
UVA
UNC
Duke
Wake

Louisville
VaTech
NC State
Clemson
GaTech
FSU
Miami

(06-05-2020 05:46 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(06-05-2020 12:11 PM)bullet Wrote:  ACC doesn't split as nicely as the SEC where the opposite divisions are in the middle:
South: FSU, Miami, Georgia Tech, Clemson
North Carolina: UNC, NCSU, Wake Forest, Duke
East: Pitt, BC, Syracuse
Central: UVA, VT, Louisville

IMO, just make South+East and NC+Central the two football divisions and be done with it.

This should’ve been done from the get-go. UVA/VT/WF/DU/UNC/NCST should’ve been one division. CU/GT/FSU/Miami should’ve been the other, with BC/SU pulled in by default (history with Miami). From there, let Pitt pick between the VA/NC division or the one with SU/BC/Miami, and Louisville gets the leftover.