The Jets in the AFC Championship: A Strike Against Playoffs in College Football

The New York Jets defeated the San Diego Chargers on Sunday to advance to the AFC Championship game against the Indianapolis Colts next week. The most interesting part of the Jets run in the playoffs has been that it almost did not happen. Following a week 15 loss to the Falcons, the Jets were on the outside looking in. With games left against an undefeated Colts team and a division leading Bengals, the playoff chances for the Jets looked grim. In college football, two tough games left on the schedule would almost certainly mean losses for the Jets. But this is the NFL, and unlike college football, playoffs allow teams to rest players when their playoff seats are already decided.

Over the next two weeks, the Jets took advantage of both the Colts and Bengals taking it easy in preparation for the playoffs. They won both games and made the playoffs as the final team in. On Wild Card weekend, they had a rematch against the Bengals who had taken it easy on them the week before. The Jets won easily and after beating San Diego, will now get another shot at the Colts next week. Wouldn't it be funny if the team that the Colts and Bengals went easy on (allowing them to make the playoffs) ultimately knock both of them off?

Now the question ultimately arises, if there were playoffs in college football, would teams rest players late in the season much like the Colts and Saints did this year? If a team knew that they had a playoff game the next week, would they be willing to lose a season finale (most likely against a rival) to rest players?

I know the immediate reaction is to say no. Of course Georgia would not rest players against Georgia Tech. But take a minute and think about basketball. Georgia plays Georgia Tech every year and ultimately the game means very little to the season as whole. If Georgia had already clinched a spot in the SEC Championship and knew they would have a playoff game the week after, would they risk losing the Tech game to give their players a chance to get healthy before two games that really meant something?

I am personally torn on this subject. I would love to see a playoff but I also think it would take away from the regular season.

Leave your thoughts in the comments.

*Thanks go out to Evan and Earl for stirring up this conversation over email today.

What would Lewis think about moving the Georgia-Florida game?

I was wondering what Lewis Grizzard might have thought about the current controversy surrounding the location of the Georgia-Florida game when I came across the article below, written in November of 1992. I'm not sure he would have the same opinion today, seeing as the game did go to a home and home during the late 90's and Florida proceeding to hang 50+ on us in Athens.

Dogs vs. Gators - Fear replaces fun

Jacksonville - The universities of Georgia and Florida, both fine schools, need to make an immediate decision to move their annual football game out of this city's Gator Bowl before somebody gets killed. Jacksonville can't handle this thing anymore. No city could. Putting an equal number of Florida and Georgia fans, who absolutely hate each other, together in an 82,000-seat stadium just invites disaster. This isn't the World's Largest Cocktail Party anymore. It's the World's Largest Crazy House. There are about 40,000 Georgia fans and a like number of Florida fans in the Gator Bowl on a Halloween Saturday night, and rival fans often sit near each other. The taunting never stops. Some of it is fun, but most of it is not. This rivalry has become so intense, it's primed for a riot. There already have been brawls. I remember a year when Florida students stormed the field after the game and tried to destroy it. A Georgia student rushed onto the field and tackled a couple of shirtless guys carrying away part of a goal post. Five or six Florida students then beat the kid from Georgia to a pulp. It was just as ugly and just as mean here Saturday night. Maybe worse.

I went to Georgia and I'm biased, but I witnessed behavior Saturday night in the Gator Bowl I'd never seen at a college football game before. When it was over, and Florida had won 26-24, a few of the Florida players strutted arrogantly in front of thousands of Georgia fans, and made obscene gestures. One Gator grabbed his crotch in front of the Georgians. Another gave a pelvic thrust and shouted an obscenity. The players left, but then returned to rub it in further. A man who I presume was a Florida coach finally had the decency to shove the players away. Leaving the stadium, Florida fans barked directly into the faces of Georgia fans. Georgia fans retaliated with explicit instructions on what the Gator fans could do with their victory. And to think people used to wear coats and ties to college football games, and shook hands at game's end. I stood in front of my car with a group 0 fellow Georgia fans for an hour after the game. We were insulted by passing motorists or Gators strolling by about every two minutes. A drunken teenage girl told us to eat something humans don't eat.

It's out of control. And it's no longer fun. Orlando wants the game, but Georgia doesn't want to play the Gators any deeper in Florida. The best idea is to make the series a home-and-home arrangement. That way the visiting team would get only a few tickets and there wouldn't be this 40,000 versus 40,000 situation, and more control could be administered. "I'll never come back here," a Georgia friend told me Sunday morning. "I'd like to get Florida between the hedges in Athens every other year, and when the game's in Gainesville I'll just watch it on TV. In other countries, soccer fans riot and kill one another. Georgia-Florida in the Gator Bowl isn't that yet, but go home-and-home before one Halloween night it becomes a nightmare.

- This article appeared in the AJC in November of 1992. Please check out more of Grizzard's work at http://www.lewisgrizzard.com/.