Chase Never a Flawed System

Other Sports Tweaking, Controversy in BCS

Huntersville, N.C. (December 1, 2008) – This Friday night NASCAR will crown Jimmie Johnson its champion of the 2008 Sprint Cup season in New York City. Johnson will be presented his third consecutive trophy and nobody will second guess the system of how Johnson won the championship.

Johnson accumulated enough points in the first 26 races the past three seasons to qualify into the “Chase for the Sprint Cup”. Johnson and his team then either had more bonus points earned or continued to score more points than the rest of the competitors in the ‘chase’ to be crowned champion. The team won based on their performances on the track.

Last week, the PGA, which had already adopted a similar playoff system to the ‘chase’, announced they will be making adjustments to their playoff system after 2008 FedEx Cup winner Vijay Singh didn’t even have to complete the last tournament to be crowned champion.

Sunday, the latest Bowl Championship Series (BCS) rankings were announced, a system that uses computers and humans to determine who will play for the college football national championship. There are currently four teams with undefeated records and six teams with only one loss. Three of the six one-loss teams are not only in the same conference but the same division- which only one school will be allowed to play for the conference championship this weekend.

2000 NASCAR Sprint Cup champion Bobby Labonte comments about the current system in NASCAR.

Bobby Labonte, 2000 Sprint Cup Champion:

“It’s simple. If you score the most points in the first 26 races you are going to be included in the ‘chase’. A computer can’t vote you out, a human can’t vote you out and you can’t argue against performance and points earned on the track. We all know the rules when we begin the season in Daytona and know them when it ends in Homestead.

“The champion is then crowned over the final 10 races. What makes the ‘chase’ great is that there is still the level of excitement. It’s really, really hard to make it a complete runaway over the final 10 races. This year Johnson did his best to make it a blowout, but you still had to tune in at Homestead to make sure Carl (Edwards) didn’t catch him. Racing is so unpredictable that you just never know what’s going to happen. It was still a possibility that something could have gone wrong for Johnson, unlikely, but you had to watch it.

“It’s fun to debate different ways to do the ‘chase’ and you can even say it should have never been changed, but I think it’s working. There is excitement and it’s fair to the competitors.

“I know this too. I’m a Texas Longhorn fan and I’m scratching my head this morning wondering what happened. After looking at that system, I think the ‘chase’ works out pretty well.”