A Texas congressman the Associated Press described as “one of the most powerful advocates of a college football playoff system,” offered his view that the Big 12’s “brush with death might eventually help doom the BCS.”

I’ll run the AP passages verbatim, in part because I wouldn’t want anything that the Hon. Joe Barton said misunderstood or taken out of context:

“It’s not going to happen right away,” said Texas Rep. Joe Barton. “But the promise of renewed television riches that persuaded the Big 12’s major football members to reject overtures from the Pac-10 has shone the spotlight on the huge financial jackpot awaiting a playoff.
“The reason the Big 12 stayed together is the commissioner was able to put together a deal that enabled Texas and Texas A&M to go from about $8 million-$12 million a year to around $20 million a year” apiece, the Republican said. “I don’t really have a dog in the hunt as to how the conferences ought to be aligned. But I do think this moves us toward a playoff because we now know where the money is.”

He could have added – though it may have sounded a bit unseemly – that his vast and onerous responsibilities as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives may not permit him adequate time to devote his attention to truly significant stuff like the arrangements for a college football playoff system.

Of course, there is that pesky oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that seems to be much in the news, and Rep. Barton offered up his street cred as a sage observer of that environmental disaster by apologizing to BP, which naturally makes him someone I want to listen closely to as he describes how we should deal with the thorny BCS Playoff question.

The Associated Press took note of same by pointing out that Barton has introduced a bill that would make it illegal to market something as a national football championship unless every eligible team was given a fair opportunity to win it.

One can presume that in the absence of such vital legislation – it’s not like our federal legislators have any other pressing problems in need of their attention – Barton could be counted upon to issue an apology to the duly maligned university that might be unfairly left out of the collegial postseason antics.

Hey, this apology thing just might catch on. Maybe we can muster up something for Bernie Madoff, the gang at Wall Street or even Milli Vanilli. We have been awful tough on all of them, what with revoking – in order – his freedom, their illusory status as contributing members of society and their Grammy.

I’ll leave the apology to Madoff to Sandy Koufax, but first thing tomorrow, I’m going to apologize to my neighbor, who ran over my cat last week.

I owe him that much at least.

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